Wolves and Men

William patted Katherine on the arm after she took a shot from her weapon. She ducked down and looked at him. He pointed back toward the fence. She hesitated, then nodded once and fired another shot at their attackers. Charles watched the whole exchange and he nodded as well. Aceso nodded and crouched ready to move.

Then the gunfire stopped.

They hesitated a moment before they heard a sound that should have been a relief. A lone wolf’s howl rang out against the sudden silence. All four of them looked to Aceso. She listened with a growing unknown expression on her features. The howl was wrong, it was tainted. William had heard wolves in his forest howl for just about every reason imaginable and this howl matched nothing from his memory. It just sounded wrong, somehow. The five of them listened as another howl rang out and it carried the same dirty feel with it.

Then they saw the source of the howl as it rounded the wood and launched itself into the air and attached itself to Charles mid thigh. The Tracker grunted in pain as the wolf held on with some kind of demon’s strength. Charles tried to dislodge the animal from him but he didn’t want to hurt the animal. Just as William was about to help Katherine was jumped by another wolf and William barely side stepped a third as it dove at him.

William had only had to fight two of his pups. But that was out of fear and the fight had quickly ended and they had come to understand the why about who and what they were. This was altogether a different feel. He had never had to fight a wolf like this before, not even the Old Grey.

Even in his forest when he first fought the old Grey after he had changed that first time in his forest. The old Grey had fought ferociously and with a steel will that he had come to expect from Alpha wolves. But this was like fighting a deranged person who didn’t feel pain. William stabbed down into the wolf’s belly just below the chest area. That didn’t even slow this beast down.

It was Nicolas who reached down and grabbed the animal by the neck and held it till its body went limp. Then he tossed it gently on the ground and heaved William to his feet.

The wolf that had attached itself to Charles’ leg was sleeping soundly on the ground next him and soon the wolf attacking Katherine was also asleep. The five didn’t wait for any more surprises. They all ran for the fence. William and Charles took up the rear guard and fired blindly into the construction yard. Before they reached the fence the gunshots from the vampires resumed.

William was the last to hurl himself over the fence and landed with a soft body roll and popped up firing two quick shots behind them. The five raced away from the yard and the sound of gunfire slowly, too slowly for any kind of comfort, receded behind them.

When they reached a safe distance away with relatively good cover, they all took off their gun belts and shifted back to their original forms, except for Aceso.

The belt that had a light weight to William in werewolf form was suddenly heavy and it was a strain just to hold the thing. It must have weighed all together thirty pounds or more. He laid it on the ground and looked around at his pack mates.

“What the fuck was that?” Nicolas demanded. “Did you know about this?” he shot at Aceso.

The Alpha shook her head, “No and I can’t explain it. I don’t think I want to.”

“Well, that’s just great!” Nicolas said sarcastically. “Now they are using our kind to do their dirty work. What’s next? Are we going to meet werewolves that are fighting on their side too?”

William thought back to someone he hadn’t thought of in a long time, not since he had left her little valley, Tasha and her pack. He wondered if the Mountain considered her an enemy or just something to be ignored and forgotten. If it was the former than maybe the Elders did expect her to fight for the vampires.

“Does it matter?” Charles asked calmly. “We got what the Elders wanted. We know what this place is supposed to be, some kind of training facility.”

“No, I don’t think so,” William answered. “If this was a training facility those particular vampires wouldn’t be there. This was a trap. You heard them when we first arrived. Kenneth sent them here on purpose, to catch and kill whichever werewolves decided to show up. And I’ve seen these vampires before.” The group looked at him, even Nicolas, but his eyes were telling him not to say anything.

“Have you seen these vampires before, William?” Aceso asked.

He looked at Nicolas. Nicolas shook his head slowly. He ignored the Scout. “Nicolas and I both saw them. These were the same vampires that were with Kenneth when he captured Ansuya.”

There was silence in the group. No one spoke and the implication of what they had just learned settled around each of them like a death shroud.

“If that’s true, then their methods have gotten more intricate. Either this Judge Cortez is no longer a reliable source for the Mountain, or we have to be very, very careful from now on.” Katherine said quietly.

Aceso nodded, “Yes, but now we have to get back and let our people know what has just happened.”

“No,” William said. “This changes everything. We have to find Ansuya and get her back. I’m going to the Elders as soon as we get back and volunteer to take a strike team out to find her, whatever it takes.”

Aceso looked at him like he was crazy.

“Yeeup,” interrupted Nicolas in a upbeat tone, “Then Derceto will probably jump us at some point with her little pack of greys and demand that we go and find out exactly how the vampires did what we are going to claim that they can do, if she doesn’t accuse us of being traitors and sentence us to death on the spot. Forget about your elder girlfriend then Setford..” Nicolas snorted dismissively with a wave of his hand.

The implication of what Nicolas had said was not lost on the group and Derceto had not taken well to them as a pack either. She still believed that William was a threat to the Mountain and she had done everything she could do, without being directly implicated, to push William and his pack to do something dangerous and stupid. It had taught William that even though the werewolf society as a whole was incredibly inclusive in most things when a wolf set their mind to something, it was near impossible to change it, or persuade them otherwise.

Aceso stood up and shifted back to her wolf form. William took two of the gun belts and Nicolas and Charles took the rest. Slinging them over his shoulders he followed their wolf guide back the way they had come. He wished he had something better to tell George, other than the fact that they just got their asses handed to them.