Three months later…
“Walking in the woods, going to find the caaaaave,” I sang as I waddled through the bushes and up the mountain. I was so preggo I couldn’t see my feet anymore. My hips and back hurt and I was down to weekly cave searches. It was too exhausting, and I was starting to have contractions on cave hunt day, which I knew it was too early for, so I had to take it easy. Walk slow: one trip up the mountain with my wolf inside of me and hope for the best. I’d become completely numb to the fact that I’d been here six months. I’d tried one more time to find the Paladin lands last month and got lost coming back. It took me five days to find the cabin.
Five days alone in the woods with no shelter and no sure source of running water was terrifying, especially when pregnant, but I’d learned so much in my time here that I was able to find food and water pretty easily. Now I’d resigned myself to the fact that the woods would not let me leave until I had found the cave. So I had two options. Find the cave, or stay here and live out my days in nature forever.
I sighed, trying not to fall into a depressive episode. Last week I’d just lain around the cabin only getting up to hunt or wash, and I recognized symptoms of what was probably depression.
How the hell was I going to raise a baby here, alone, possibly forever? I was a social creature, I needed human interaction and Instagram and people to talk to. The baby would help. I could talk to her, but … Sawyer, my parents … what were they thinking and doing right now? Were Sage and Astra losing their minds? I’d bet Rab was like “I told you she would take forever.”
“ARGH!” I yelled at the mountain as I reached the top and bent to untie my ankle string.
A female moan ripped through the woods and I froze, fingers hovering over the knot on my ankle as goosebumps ran up my arms.
No. No. No.
The day had finally come. I was hallucinating, hearing voices. The noises from the woods were tricking me.
“Hello!” I shouted as I pulled my hunting knife from my thigh holster.
It wasn’t real, probably just a tree moving, not—
A distinct feminine moan, similar to an injured animal, called back to me.
What the hell?
My heart leapt in my throat, and I looked up the mountain path where I was supposed to go, before glancing out into the darkness of the woods where the noise came from.
Was it a trap? Was it a person who needed help? How was that even possible?
You’re not real. It’s not real. I chewed my lip, feeling the nervous breakdown threatening to consume me.
There was another moan that gave way to a whimper and I froze. If someone was out there, I had to know for sure. Diverting from the beaten path that would lead me up the mountain, I went sideways and to the left, slowly. This led away from the cabin, away from the cave, but nearer the direction I thought the Paladin lands were.
Would someone have come looking for me? I didn’t allow myself to hope such a thing, especially since Rab said whoever crossed over into the Dark Woods and was not of alpha bloodline would be cursed. But … maybe it was a fey or a troll or someone else. Anyone else would do. If they were hurt, I could nurse them back to health and then I’d have a friend here. I’d best friend the shit out of a dark fey right now, I was that desperate and lonely.
Spurred on by these exciting thoughts, I slowly trudged through the thick forest bramble, coaxing the twine behind me so that it didn’t get caught on anything and tear. My belly was large, but the baby was sitting pretty high, so I was able to move with ease across the mountainside without too much trouble. One thing being in the Dark Woods had done was get me in shape. You either got in the best shape of your life out here or you died. I didn’t mean that I was skinny, I was strong, with endurance and mental aptitude I just didn’t have before I came here.
“Hello?” I called again, wondering if I was leading myself into a trap. So far for six months I hadn’t seen another soul, but that didn’t mean that people didn’t travel through here. I’d seen bear, deer, fox, rabbit, elk, a whole host of animals, but no people.
“Hephgmn.” Someone tried to speak, but it was muffled, and there was a sick gargling noise to it that made the hair rise on the back of my neck.
The female tone to the voice was the only thing that spurred me forward. It reminded me of Marmal and how she’d saved me from being near death.
What if I could do that for another?
“I’m coming!” I shouted, and ran faster, holding my belly with my right arm to keep it from jostling the baby too much, and gripping the twine with my left. I was running so fast, so focused on the sound of the woman, that I didn’t realize the string was getting shorter until it pulled taut, yanking my ankle out from under me. With a hiss, I threw both hands out and caught my fall as I stumbled onto my knees.
That was close.
I needed to slow down or I could hurt the baby. The twine was pinching my ankle and I knew that if I wanted to go after whoever this voice was, I needed to leave it and venture a bit farther … blind. The thought scared me, but I couldn’t leave a woman out here to die and miss out on my chance at having a companion.
“I’m coming!” I shouted one more time as I untied the twine and ripped a nearby branch off, pinning the twine into the earth like you would stake a tent. The trees might move while I was gone and yank the twine away, so this was the best I could do.
I popped to my feet and got my bearings. “One more sound! Just one more and I’ve got you,” I called out into the woods.
“Mmmmm!” they grunted deeply, and my hands shook as I spied a naked leg peeking out from beneath a tree trunk. Pulling my knife, I stalked slowly toward the leg, wondering where the hell the rest of the person was. Then I realized what I was seeing. The tree had fallen on her, and she was hanging down the hillside, where I couldn’t see the rest of her body obscured by the large trunk.
“I see you!” I cried out, and then looked back over my shoulder to make sure I had a good sense of where I’d left the twine rope tied off. I could see it; I had a good sense of direction. Turning back around, I scrambled the last fifty feet with my heart in my throat.
The one exposed leg was wearing a familiar black Nike tennis shoe … and I really wondered if I’d gone insane and was hallucinating. I didn’t think so, because everything about this encounter was terrifyingly real.
Peering over the top of the log, a sob ripped through my throat.
A shock of red hair splayed out in a fan. It was Sage lying face-down in the dirt, the heavy tree pressed across her entire back, pinning her into the ground. I’d know that red hair anywhere, and I stood there for a moment in complete shock that she’d come looking for me.
“Sage!” I half sobbed. “I’ve got you. I’m getting this off of you,” I screamed as she began to weep, her whole body shaking with sobs. I scrambled backward and looked for a large, sturdy walking staff or branch that I could use as leverage to roll the log off of her. I was over six months preggo and there was no way I was going to try to deadlift that thing and have my baby come early.
I’d made a lot of improvements to the cabin land over the last three months, building a small nursery addition to the main cabin, and I’d done so by using a lever and pully system to move heavy logs.
There! I spotted the perfect fallen tree limb and grabbed it, quickly snapping away useless branches until just the large staff was left. Running back over to Sage, I tried to mentally work out whether I should roll the log down over her head using gravity but risk hurting her brain, or over her legs and risk breaking an ankle…
You could heal a broken ankle in the woods but not a broken brain. Positioning myself at her head, I wedged the staff under the log and she screamed in pain, until I realized I’d stabbed her arm, which was trapped beneath the log as well.
“Shit, I’m sorry.” Moving a few inches over, I tried again and got a good firm grip on the staff. “I’m going to roll it off you … but it might hurt.”
She didn’t say anything, and I took that as a sign that she’d either passed out or consented. One. Two…
“Now!” I shouted, and jumped up into the air, bringing all of my weight down on the staff. The giant log popped free of her back and rolled over her butt, slamming down on the backside of her knees.
A wail of complete misery ripped through the forest and tears rolled down my face. I’d unpinned her arms, but she hadn’t moved them, and I didn’t know if that was because she was scared to or paralyzed.
“One more and that’s it,” I told her. “Hang on.” Wedging the wood under the log again, I leapt into the air and came down with all of my weight. The giant log popped up and then rolled off of her tennis shoes, barely missing her ankles.
She was free.
Panting, I fell to my knees and brushed the red hair off of her face, before bursting into quiet sobs as I barely recognized my bestie.
She had three thin scars running from her eye to her chin, dirt and blood caked her eyebrows, and her once fierce look she always wore was now dull and hopeless.
I took in her dirty, torn clothing, and her handmade suede backpack. She’d been here a while … maybe even months.
I was having a hard time believing this was real. Maybe I was imagining her because I’d been so lonely … but why would I imagine Sage hurt like this?
I wouldn’t.
“You came for me.” I cupped her cheek, getting onto my elbows so that she could see me at her odd angle. Her neck was bent weird and she hadn’t moved and I didn’t know what to do.
Her vacant eyes searched my face, and she chewed on her lip before looking past me at nothing. “Rab was right. I’m cursed. This whole place is cursed.” Then her entire body shuddered and she went limp.
It took me nearly three hours to get Sage back to my cabin. I had to take off my large suede skirt, lay her on it, and then fashion a harness with the twine so that my wolf could drag her like a pack mule. Every time we went over a rocky area, Sage would roll off my skirt, and twice the holes in the suede just ripped and the twine flew out. I had to braid it to make it thicker, and it was digging into my wolf’s shoulders, but she didn’t complain.
Once we’d finally gotten her back, I threw on another skirt, a short one that sat under my giant belly, and lay Sage in front of my cot on the floor. She was too heavy for me or my wolf to lift into my bed, and I wasn’t sure moving her more than we had to was a good idea.
She looked … near death. Her body was covered in scars and bruises, ranging from blue to yellow, and I wondered if her werewolf healing could handle a broken back or internal bleeding or whatever might be going on.
I sat there, chewing off all of my fingernails, wondering just how long she’d been out here looking for me—surely she didn’t come in a week after I left like she joked she would.
She was joking, right?
And what in the hell had she meant by being cursed? I stared at her, wondering what in the hell to do, when my survival mode finally kicked in.
I hadn’t hunted today. I had no refrigerator, and other than some mushrooms, dried dandelions for tea, and a few sweet potatoes, I had nothing to eat. I couldn’t help Sage right now. I wasn’t a doctor and I didn’t have an MRI, but I could hunt so that when she hopefully woke up, there would be a hot meal for the both of us.
Staring at the steady rise and fall of her chest, I decided to just focus on what I could control or I would go insane with worry. Grabbing my spear and net, I set out to the creek behind the cabin to catch some fresh fish.
Okay, Sage was here, near death, but I wasn’t alone anymore. One of those two things was very cool. I needed to focus on the positive.
The baby kicked then, and I reached down and rubbed my belly. “It’s okay. Mama’s got this.”
After about an hour of spear fishing, I’d caught six fish. I normally only caught about two or three before heading back, because I had no need for an excess of fish that would just rot on my wood block kitchen counter, but I was hunting for Sage now too, a thought that brought me untold happiness.
“I’m not alone,” I mumbled to myself, unsure if the gravity of that sentence actually had sunken in yet. “I’m … not alone.” I stopped at the edge of the creek, fish in my net, and broke into sobs.
I’m not alone anymore.
My best friend came into the cursed woods to look for me and nearly died. Did I even deserve that kind of friendship? I wasn’t sure. I had to make sure Sage got through this. I had to take care of her.
I wiped my tears, gathering myself and then headed back to the cabin. The second I neared, I sensed something was wrong. One of my clay pots outside was tipped over, broken, and I could hear weird huffing animal sound. When I rounded the corner, the sight of a giant black bear caused me to stop dead in my tracks.
“Go on!” I shouted. “Get!” I raised my arms to make myself look big.
The bear was peeking inside the open cabin door, right at Sage! I’d seen bears off and on around here, but always from a distance. They never came into my camp and I never kept food overnight. If I did, I tied it up in the trees in a satchel. I knew enough about camping to do that.
What I wouldn’t give for Marmal’s shotgun right now.
“Hey, bear!” I shouted, and reached down to grab a rock, chucking it at his back. My wolf stirred, sensing the impending danger, and in the blink of an eye she was out of my body and had solidified by my side. The bear backed away from the door and turned to face me, his nostrils flaring as he no doubt smelled the fish in the net that I held.
I was not giving up my dinner! Sage needed this meat to get better.
Since I’d gotten here, there had been little use for my magic. Running vampire fast didn’t help when searching for a hidden cave opening, you had to go slow for that, and there were no bullets to stop out here either. So I’d just gotten used to being a regular old werewolf, but now that I was faced with this threat, I felt my magic stirring. The scent of hot wires filled the air.
I set the net containing the fish down on the ground and then stepped closer to the bear.
“Get. Out,” I growled.
My wolf dipped her head low; her lips peeled back to reveal her pointed teeth, then a deep, terrifying growl ripped from the back of her throat. The bear sniffed the air again and immediately jerked backward as if he’d smelled my magic and knew what it meant. Taking one last look inside of the cabin at Sage, he turned and ran away, heading toward the creek to hopefully catch his own damned fish.
I relaxed, my magic fizzling as weakness took hold of me. I couldn’t handle my wolf being outside of my body for too long anymore, and already having her out for so many hours while she dragged Sage here, it was taking its toll.
As if sensing this, she leapt into my chest. I picked up the fish and headed back to the cabin. When I got inside, I was relieved to see Sage’s wolf curled into a ball, her chest rising and falling in rapid pants. That was a good sign. If she was alive enough to shift, that meant she was going to make it.
Right?
She would heal faster in wolf form.
I went about the work of gutting and deboning the fish, tossing cubes of it into my clay cooking pot with wild mushrooms, sliced sweet potatoes, and some wild green onions that had just started to spring up around the creek.
Once the food was boiling on the rack above the fireplace, I set out to make another bedroll. I’d been collecting cotton so that I could try to make a bassinet for the baby, and maybe even a winter sleeping bag of sorts, but all of that would have to wait.
Sage was here.
The very thought had me looking down at her to make sure she was real.
Using a bone needle and twine, I pierced the edges of two large pieces of suede cloth and started to make a sleeping mat. I was sure it was going to be comfortable, but the stitch work needed help. I just didn’t care. I was too tired and too excited and nervous for Sage to be here. Once I had roughly sewn three sides together, I started to shove the cotton inside. I’d already shelled it and picked off the little hard bits that were left over, including the seeds. Then I’d pulled the buds apart, making it fluffier and as big as possible. By the time I stitched the top of the mat, I’d gone through all the cotton I’d harvested for the baby, but I had made a four-inch-thick mat for Sage to sleep on.
I had one deer skin left, and I could probably harvest another before I went into labor. I’d started hunting big game recently, knowing that when baby came I would need things like animal skins to keep her warm in the winter. I took what meat I could and left the rest for other animals nearby.
Shaking off those thoughts, I stepped back inside the hut and lay the mat in front of Sage’s wolf, who was still asleep. The scents of the delicious fish soup had completely saturated the cabin, and I was so starved I wasn’t going to be able to wait for her to wake up.
Pulling the pot off the fire, I set it on the ground and grabbed a clay bowl and matching spoon. I’d tried many times to replicate whoever had made these, but whenever I tried to fire them like you would in a kiln, they cracked. Whatever skill the person who had made these had, I wasn’t going to learn it anytime soon. Pouring myself a large bowl, I scarfed it down while I watched Sage sleep.
“Sage,” I called to her in between slurps.
Her wolf stirred slightly but stayed fast asleep, panting in a heavy rhythm.
“Hungry? Thirsty?” I sucked down the last bit of my soup and then poured a large bowl for her from the clay pot, using the same bowl and spoon. There was only one set, so we were going to have to share from now on.
From now on. I wanted to cry at the fact that I wasn’t alone anymore. The steam from the soup filtered up to the roof of the cabin as I watched Sage’s wolf and prayed she would wake up and be okay.
Running my fingers through my hair to detangle it, I pulled it into a tight braid and then brushed my teeth with some clay powder and ground mint leaves. Sometimes I had silly thoughts like the fact that I could probably sell this homemade toothpaste to the hippies back in Spokane for like nine bucks a small clay pot.
After rubbing my teeth vigorously with the dried abrasive moss brush I’d made, I spit into the sink.
“Holy shit, you’re pregnant!” Sage screeched in a weak and raspy voice, and I jumped backward so quickly I nearly tripped over the bowl of soup I’d put down for her.
I looked down at my best friend, wide-eyed, heart pounding in my chest.
She spoke … that meant. “You’re real?” Tears streamed down my face.
The scars on her cheek were still there, like she’d been attacked by an animal, and so was the bruising, but she was talking and breathing and sitting up … so that was good.
Reaching out, she pulled my suede blanket over her naked body and took in a few deep breaths. “Are you really pregnant? Or am I hallucinating?” she questioned again, her eyes on my belly.
I chewed my bottom lip, nodding as more tears fell, and then I dropped to my knees before her. “From the night Sawyer proposed, I think.”
She burst into crying laughter and reached out to lay a hand on either side of my swollen tummy. As she extended her right arm, she winced and retracted it. With her left, she stroked my stomach, looking at it wide-eyed. “Demi … you’re fucking pregnant.”
Now it was my turn to burst into crying laughter as she pulled me into a hug, cradling her obviously injured arm between us.
“I’m so … glad you’re here,” I said, between sobbing and laughing like a lunatic. “How long have you been here?”
I felt like being social was hard for me right now, like six months without another human conversation had made me a bit crazy and I needed to relearn eye contact and pausing to let others speak and all of those things you would teach a child.
When she pulled back, she looked at my belly and then at the soup. “Is that…?”
She seemed about as socially awkward as I was.
I nodded. “For you.”
She looked skeptical. “I won’t take food from a pregnant lady. Are you sure you’ve had enough?”
A grin pulled at the corners of my lips. “I have, and there’s more.” I pointed to the steaming pot in the corner at the hearth of the fireplace. Without another word, she grabbed the soup bowl and started to chug, only stopping when a chunk of fish or potato made it in her mouth, and even then she only chewed once or twice. She’d lost weight, her hair was caked in dirt and blood, and she smelled like a zoo.
“Sage, how long have you been here in the woods?”
She shook herself, moaning as the last bit of soup went down her throat. “Forever? I lost count. It got too depressing so I stopped.” She looked behind me, to the doorway, as if expecting someone to charge in and attack her.
I frowned. “How long did you wait for me before you came after me?” I’d kept a meticulous daily count. If she told me how many months she’d waited until coming after me…
“A week. Like I said.” She looked at me then with a fierce protectiveness and my whole body froze, my throat tightening with emotion.
“Sage … you’ve been here five months and three weeks. How did you survive?”
She chewed her lip and I could see that I had fared much better than she had. There were so many scars; she was too skinny, too unhinged, paranoid even. Why did she keep looking at the door?
Her bottom lip quivered. “Same as you. Drink from the creeks, hunt small game, forage. Sleep under the trees.”
But that’s not what I had been doing. I’d had a home, letters to read, a shower, a place to go to each night and have a sense of normalcy.
Her eyes flicked to the door once more, and I reached out and grasped her hand, causing her to jump.
“Sage? What did you mean about you being cursed?”
Her gaze flicked from the door to me again and she swallowed hard. “I shouldn’t have come here. It will bring trouble to you. I need to go.” She moved to stand, but I yanked her down with surprising force and she winced as if in pain, causing me to loosen my hold.
“Sorry, but, Sage, I’ve been alone for six months. I’m pregnant and stuck here. You are not leaving me no matter what trouble you may bring, and I’m not leaving you either.”
She pulled her hand from mine then and burst into tears, cupping her face as she rocked back and forth. “It will know I’m here,” she wailed. “You might get hurt.”
My heart broke in that moment for my poor friend who was clearly on the edge of a mental breakdown. I’d been there, so many times I’d been there.
“Just calm down. We will figure this out together. What is it?” I rubbed her back softly as she sobbed.
She pulled her hands from her face, showcasing tearstained cheeks, which had run through the brown dirt and crimson blood, leaving clean tracks on her face.
“The curse, the magic, the woods. It hates me. It’s trying to kill me. Rab was right,” she whispered as if it could hear her.
Maybe she’d eaten some bad mushrooms or something and was hallucinating. “Okay, well, if it comes, we can fight it together.” I smiled, trying to brush the whole thing over.
She shook her head and then pointed to the three lined scars that ran down her cheek. “Last time I did that, this happened.”
Something clicked in my mind, then. “Wait, are you talking about the bear?”
She looked out the door, eyes wide. “The bear, the elk, the mountain lions, the trees. They’re all trying to kill me for coming here. I’m not wanted here,” she told me, and lifted her shirt to reveal a puckered scar.
My mouth popped open in shock as things started to click in my mind.
The moving trees, the bear sniffing inside my cabin … was he specifically hunting Sage? Was Rab right about the curse?
“What’s that from?” I asked, pointing to the scar.
“Elk attack, while I was sleeping.”
Elk attack? Elk didn’t just randomly attack sleeping people. “The tree,” I whispered.
She nodded. “Threw itself at me and knocked me into the ground. I would have died without your help.”
Holy shit. Holy, holy, fucking shit.
Okay … my best friend had been stuck in killer woods for over five months searching for me and now we had no way out. No big deal … I could handle this.
“Okay. Well … I’m an alpha and the woods don’t hurt me and neither do the animals, so you’re safe with me now.”
I hoped saying it would make it true.
She looked at me with pity, like she wanted to believe that, but there was no way she could.
“So if you left a week after I did … is the war?” Please give me good news. I just needed good news about the outside world.
Sage swallowed hard, looking down at my belly again like she maybe didn’t want to tell me something that might upset me.
“Sage. Is Sawyer okay?”
She nodded. “He’s fine, but we lost the war. Everyone, including nearly all of the Paladins, went underground and are safe in hiding as far as I know.”
I sagged in relief. Sucked to learn we’d lost the war, but good to know our people were alive. I could deal with that. “So Sawyer is in the bunker?” That was good. It meant he was with my parents.
Sage chewed her lip.
“Sage!”
She sighed. “Sawyer commanded that Walsh get everyone into the bunker and stay there to look after your parents and his mom. Astra stayed in Paladin Village to beat that stupid drum every hour.”
My throat closed with emotion at that. Sweet Astra. I hoped she was okay.
“And Sawyer?”
Sage frowned. “He and Eugene said they would wait to go into the bunker until you got back.”
My eyes widened. “So he just stayed out in the open in the middle of a war!”
Sage winced. “He hid obviously, but I don’t know how well … he could have been captured.”
Captured! I burst to my feet and started to pace the small room, made even smaller with Sage and her mat on the floor.
“Or not … I don’t really know. Maybe he went into the bunker…”
I stopped my pacing and settled. Yeah, maybe … except I knew Sawyer, and he wasn’t the type to hide and wait to be saved.
Frick.
A long stretch of silence passed between us. I didn’t know what to say, and clearly neither did she.
“Did you make this place?” She looked around at the cabin and I was grateful for the topic change.
I shook my head. “Past alphas did, but I improved on it. It’s got a shower. Want one? I can start boiling the water.” No sense in worrying about Sawyer and my family until I was out and able to do something about it.
Her eyes widened. “YES I want a shower, are you insane? What kind of question is that? Do you have soap?”
I chuckled. “No, but I have an exfoliating clay scrub with lavender.”
She grinned. “That sounds like heaven.”
I boiled the water and then helped her stand. She had a limp on her right side, the leg that had been bent at an odd angle when I’d found her. With a little help, I was able to get her into the shower and fill the clay pot overhead with warm water.
“Ohmygod, this is heaven!” she screamed as I stood outside the small shower hut and peered into the woods with paranoia. Would that bear come back? Would an elk? What she’d said was so weird, I wasn’t sure how to process it.
Were the Dark Woods trying to kill Sage? If so, she might be safer here in the pasture with the cabin. It was free of large trees, and if we could erect some kind of fence, it might deter the animals…
“Are you seriously here?” Sage called through the thatched siding.
I grinned. It was weird how easily we were falling back into our normal banter.
“I know, I can’t believe it,” I told her.
“So, I can start helping you look for the cave now and we can be out of here in a few weeks I’ll bet!” she said excitedly.
Oh. She still had that optimism I’d had three months ago.
“Yeah, maybe,” I said.
Now that Sage was here, I was less interested in searching for the cave and more so in preparing to safely have this baby.
