Looks like I’m in charge right now.
He padded over to inspect the supplies their enemies had left—nuts, dried fruit and protein bars. The only fresh food was wrapped in foil and had been placed in the fire to roast, now despoiled with spattered blood. Raff pawed the packs, telling her with his eyes to gather up anything useful. She caught on swiftly and loaded up on food and first aid items, then he limped out of the clearing, back toward the cabin.
Oddly, she didn’t question their direction. This wasn’t the way to Daruvar, though maybe she didn’t realize. She just followed, carrying everything he couldn’t. It was getting harder to breathe, which meant the bullet inside him was doing bad things to his innards. Thalia probably wouldn’t like it when he shifted and asked her to perform surgery.
Just keep moving. We’re almost there.
The blood trail he was dropping was a fucking mess, but the wounds coagulated or froze at some point. It was so fucking cold, colder than it should be. The trees looked dark and strange too, stretching and shrinking around him when he blinked. Guess I’ve lost more blood than I realized. He held on because Thalia was behind him, and he didn’t think she could find shelter on her own. Raff understood too that she wouldn’t leave him to find help. Whether they lived or died out here, they’d do it together.
At last, he broke from the trees and saw the cabin. His three working legs wouldn’t carry him any farther. Raff stumbled and went down as the world dimmed to black.
18.
“Raff!” Thalia shook him, but he was out, a limp wolf sprawled on a patch of ice. Get him inside. That’s my top priority. With effort, she locked down the panic battering at her mind. He’d helped her keep it together long enough for them to reach the cabin. The rest was up to her. She huffed, wrapping both arms around him and towed with all her strength. He was a large wolf, much bigger than nature allowed, and he was impossibly dense with muscle. Thalia fell twice, scrambling in the slush and mud. Her breath came in ragged bursts, and she had to rest before resuming the struggle.
Finally, she got him to the doorway and she cradled him against her chest, fighting helpless tears. The logical thing to do would be to power up her phone and ring for help, but that would ruin their plan to expose the traitor and it might expose Raff to greater risk. There was no guarantee that those who responded would deliver benevolent assistance. Her enemies might strike while she was vulnerable, especially with Raff too weak to fight.
Putting him down gently, she let out a breath and made the decision. For good or ill, she would look after him and stick to the plan. Her mind made up, she opened her phone and took out the battery, as there was a faint chance that her location could be tracked that way. Now she had an unconscious wolf to deal with. As she hauled him into the cabin, they left red streaks on the ice, on the rough wood floor. His black fur made it difficult to tell exactly where the injuries were, and she didn’t have the tools to shave him.
I have to do this. Sorry, Raff.
Deliberately, she pressed down on his injured leg and he roused with a snarl, snapping at her with ferocious teeth. She barely pulled her hand back fast enough to avoid a vicious bite.
“It’s me, Thalia. We’re at the cabin. I need you to shift.” His eyes went fuzzy and vague and she shook him, gentler this time. “Don’t pass out. You’ve done so much, saved me so many times. This is the last thing, Raff. I can handle the rest.”
She hoped. As promises went, she didn’t feel 100% confident, but he didn’t need to know that.
A shudder ran through him and then his body blurred and elongated. It was the strangest thing; even as she looked at him, her mind couldn’t quite process how it happened, like a mental skip. One second he was a wolf, and in the next blink, he was a naked man, lolling in her arms.
Now, now she could see how bad it was. The graze on his shoulder had sealed to a scab and it seemed to be healing well, no signs of infection. Likewise, the bullet had gone straight through his bad leg. It was mostly sealed, just a sluggish trickle of blood from her meddling with it. The wound in his side troubled her because there was no exit hole in his back; that meant the bullet was still inside him. Raff’s body would heal around it, but leaving metal inside couldn’t be good, even with Animari recovery rates.
He clutched her hands with bloody fingers. “You have to take it out.”
It’s like he can read my mind.
Thalia’s first instinct was to argue; she wanted to say, ‘I’m not a surgeon, I’m not even a doctor’, but in fact, there was nobody else. They couldn’t risk exposing his weakness right now. Better to hunker down and let their enemies come out into the open, then once they regained their strength, strike from the shadows and finish this damned game of cat and mouse.
They’ll be surprised who has the fiercest claws.
Squaring her shoulders, she nodded. “I’ll take care of it.”
She found a blanket folded in the rough-built cupboards and spread it on the floor. There was only one bed, one set of linens, and if she ruined them, they wouldn’t have anywhere to sleep once she finished Raff’s treatment. He rolled onto the coverlet, shivering from such minor exertion.
This is not good.
His breathing was labored, and there was a sickly tinge to his normally brown and glowing skin. Don’t think about what could go wrong. Just do what you must.
The pep talk carried her through various preparations, like boiling some water and sterilizing
