The Wolf's Bite

I let my feet hit the trail hard as I walked, a sound that reminded me of my running days. The crisp morning air was filling my lungs and I kept my hands shoved into the pockets of my jacket as I walked. With summer nearly upon the Pacific Northwest, I could not expect too many more days like this one. And there was no better way to spend a late spring morning than at the Washington Park Arboretum. The beautiful foliage surrounding me brought me peace and good memories.

I took a deep breath and sighed out slowly. The trees around me rustled, unsettling dew from last night's rain and showering the ground below with rainbow specs of water as sunlight filtered through them. The tried and trusted sneakers on my feet were a comfort. My headphones in my ears drummed a familiar beat to lift me up and push me forward. The only thing more perfect than this would be getting back to my apartment with a hot latte in my hands and a long list of movies to binge on a day I had no plans.

A planned couch potato day was not my usual weekend, but I was tired to the bone. The kind of tired that a draining job and the stress of no money puts on a person. The kind of tired that a nap wasn't going to fix. Tired. Stagnating. The kind of tired that made you ignore the buzzing phone in your pocket as your roommate called you. Again.

I sighed through my nose, debating on letting it go to voicemail. Kat had already called me twice, so something must really be up if she was awake before noon and calling instead of texting. I yanked my phone free of my pocket and answered, taking out one of my earbuds to hear her.

"What's up, Kat?"

"My job blew up!" she squealed, and I had to move the phone a few inches from my face.

"Do you want to try that again without the dramatics?" I asked. "What really happened?"

"No for real, June!" Kat snapped. "You know all those sirens we heard last night? It was some kind of gas leak in the plaza. Apparently several of the buildings are badly damaged from an explosion or something. My work is blown to pieces!"

I stopped walking. "Are you serious?"

An older couple stared as they walked past me, the lady giving me a snooty look for blocking the trail. Not that it wasn't plenty wide for all of us, but I moved aside all the same.

"So serious," Kat groaned. "I'm helping Mrs. Pataki collect some of the surviving stock today, but after that I think I'm out of a job."

"She's not going to relocate or reopen? What about insurance? You can't tell me the deli doesn't have enough insurance to fix the damage."

"I don't know," Kat said. "Even if she does, I won't have any shifts for months until it's fixed. Even if she relocates it will be a while. I don't know what I'm going to do!"

"Stop. First, take a deep breath." I paused, listening to her breathing on the phone. "Good. Now, I don't want you to worry about your share of the rent this month. I have a lot of savings and I've been in a pinch before when I got the help I needed. I know karma when I see it."

"But—"

"Then, we find a new part-time job for you until we know for sure what Mrs. Pataki is doing," I said.

"Juniper," Kat sounded as though she had begun crying. "Girl, I don't know what I would do without you."

I sighed, smiling. "You'll be fine. I'm going to let you go and finish my walk. I'll pick us up some tight month groceries on the way home, okay?"

"Can I get that spicy miso ramen again?" Kat asked, sniffing.

"Sure thing. I'll see you later."

"Okay, bye June-bug."

I hung up and stared blankly at my screen. Another stone of stress dropped into the pit of my stomach. Using my savings would set me back from quitting at the clinic to find something better, but Kat has been there for me, and I'll be there for her.

I ran a hand through my short black hair. The undercut was cute, but it was high maintenance enough that I was close to letting it grow out again. And hell, if Kat really lost her job things were going to be too tight to go to the salon for a while anyway. I pushed it aside and shoved the earbud back in place, changing my playlist to something a little more aggressive and picking up my pace. I was walking fast, but not quite jogging.

Smack. Smack. Smack.

Shoes to pavement, clear my mind. Take a deep breath and think.

With what I had scraped together, I should be able to pull me and Kat along for a couple of months if I needed to. Seattle was a big place, there was always someone somewhere hiring. The work might not be great, but it would be work until we figured out something better. Maybe Mrs. Pataki would just reopen somewhere else. The deli was a popular spot. Surely it was worth her time to keep the business going...

I drummed along, letting my feet take me where they wanted. My head was clouded with money calculations, not really paying attention to where I was going. That is, until the splat of red on the pavement in front of me drew my eyes.

I stopped walking. Someone had lost a good little splash of blood. Recently.

I looked around. There was no one on the path in front of me. No one on either side of me. No one behind me.

And then I looked to my right. There, in the grass was another spot of red.

I frowned and stepped off the path. I headed to a thick patch of trees. Admittedly, there were a lot of those since I was walking in an arboretum, but this one made for a good place to step off the path unseen.

But if someone was injured, I might be able to help. I didn't take those first aid courses for nothing.

I trotted across the grass, the morning dew reaching my ankles as I headed into the trees and heard hushed grumblings. The sounds of struggle made my heart race, and I reached for the pepper spray clipped to the lanyard in my pocket. I shifted my fingers around the keys and my ID badge until I had a firm grasp on the small canister.

"Hello? Is someone in trouble?" I asked loudly. Maybe if this was some kind of danger, other walkers on the path would hear me too.

Rustling ahead confirmed I was hearing more than one thing moving. I squared my shoulders and pushed forward. Hearing the strangest conversation of my life.

"Curse you, warlock, for all eternity!" A woman's angry voice, nearly snarling as she spat out the words.

"Calm down, Amelia," a man with a stern voice said. "We need to secure a safe location before this lunaria's dream wears off."

"What the hell did you do, warlock?" Another male voice hissed.

I heard thrashing after that. Grunts of pain, frustration, and discomfort.

"I…told you," an exasperated man said. His tone was clipped and clearly annoyed. "We have…nine hours…of this!"

Then, growling. But the moment I heard the woman's pained whimpering, I felt my feet move. I was spurred into action, my pepper spray in front of me as I rounded the tree.

"Okay, that's enough!" I screamed. "What are you doing to her?"

My eyes swept over the scene before me. Hunched in the pine needles that littered the ground, were four huge men, all with varying stages of injury visible. On the ground was another man, also in some sort of pain and covered in soot. His once nice button-up shirt was in tatters, and he was clutching his abdomen. The woman on the ground was naked. Like, fully naked, with scratches all over her. Her long black hair was a rat's nest, and her eyes locked onto mine. I shivered. For a moment they looked like something entirely inhuman. Yellow, like an animal.

But there was no time for that now. I stood there before the four sunned men, and one of them visibly growled at me. These people were clearly in need of medical and mental attention, but more importantly this woman and probably the man on the ground needed rescuing.

"Turn back around, human." It was the man with the stern tone I had first heard. "This is not your business."

"The hell it isn't," I snapped, my voice shaking. "What did you do to them? Is this some kind of kidnapping? Abduction?"

The woman at my feet convulsed, arching her back way off the ground as she grunted and whimpered in obvious pain.

I thrust my pepper spray in front of me, aiming for the biggest man. With my free hand, I reached down to try to take a vital off the woman's wrist.

"Don't move or you're getting a face full of pepper spray!" I shouted, still hoping someone on the trail would hear me. "I already called the cops, so you had better behave while I help her!"

I prayed my bluff would work long enough to take a look at the woman on the ground. She could be under the influence of any number of drugs. She could be having a panic attack or a seizure. I just needed a moment to see what I could do for her.

Unfortunately, I didn't get a moment.

What happened next was fast. Too fast. I couldn't see it fast. My hand was near her wrist, going for a pulse when the woman on the ground changed somehow.

"Amelia, don't shift!" someone shouted.

"Alpha!"

"Damnit!"

The woman, Amelia I guess, went from her back to all fours in less than a heartbeat. Her limbs flailed, and she almost seemed to grab her head when it turned to me. In a flash, what was once a human woman had grown a weird, long mouth. Her teeth sharpened. It was like something from the movies. As I tried to yank back my outstretched arm, she lunged and bit it.

I screamed. The pain shot up my forearm and right into my shoulder. An echo of pain in my skull rang hard as I instinctively pulled back my arm. The four men jumped into immediate action. One of them disarmed my pepper spray and flipped me onto my knees, pinning me downward while I screamed and began crying in pain. The other three all jumped onto the woman—the thing—that bit me. And the man on the ground, despite being in some kind of intense pain, spat out a string of curses directed toward a dog of some kind that I hadn't seen.

With my head pressed to the grass and tears stinging my eyes, I witnessed the most bizarre morphing of a human shape I had ever seen. Her face shifted back and forth between human and the odd long-mouthed face that bit me. Hair faded in and out. Bones shifted under her skin, making sickening popping sounds. She convulsed under the three men trying to pin her down, and at the same time in her own way she was holding them back.

I had one solemn moment of clarity when the biggest man's eyes met mine. They held some sympathy. Why I wasn't sure, but I knew that's what it was.

"I'm sorry," he said softly. Then, he pulled back a fist and punched me hard enough to knock me out.

The wolves nodded, then we moved. There weren't many people in the arboretum yet today, and we were able to move with no incident. The rain and the disaster from last night helped. It kept the humans indoors until the scare wore off.

I scanned what I could see through the trees, but I was going to have to get closer if I wanted a clear picture. I could hear motors and cars, but I couldn't see them yet.

"Stay here and watch the human." I set the woman down in the grass and strolled out of the trees like I belonged there. I even smiled and nodded at an unsuspecting couple taking a walk.

Nothing to see here, humans. Don't stray from the path.

Out of the gardens and through any barriers between the paths and the road, I was able to lean casually under a tree. Or I did until I realized it wasn't actually at a busy road.

"A golf course? Are you kidding me?" I muttered.

The cars I heard were motorized carts. Any noise was from chattering humans playing a leisure game on wide grass fields.

I grunted, annoyed. Or at least, I was until I spotted the main building for the golf course in the distance. Buildings meant cars. Cars I could take so we could leave the city.

With no shirt on, I didn't look like one of the golfers. But an easy fix was nearby as I crept up behind an unused cart, stealing the towel and sunglasses off the back of it. The old man in the driver's seat didn't even notice as he watched the others in his group whacking their balls into the distance.

Towel around my neck and sunglasses on, I strolled down the path like I belonged there. Not as any kind of customer, but perhaps a worker. I earned a few frowns as I lowered my head, stepping out of the way of the well-dressed golfers and their carts as they passed. But there weren't many of those, and I made it to the building with ease.

A grin spread across my face as I spotted exactly what I wanted to take: a floral delivery van. The store logo was just one of those cheap magnets on the door. Easily taken off for our trip through Seattle.

I glanced in the driver's side window as I passed. The keys weren't in it, but that would have been too stupid. Even for a human.

"Oops, sorry!"

I looked up to see a young man fumbling at the front entrance of the club.

"It's...fine. Just go to the side service entrance next time. Didn't you see the signs?" A haughty woman was looking down her nose at the poor flower kid with what must have been a forty-pound arrangement in his arms that he was trying to see over.

"N-no, I didn't, ma'am."

"Well, it's over there." She pointed. "Do try to remember that next time."

"I will," he answered.

Poor kid. The easily flustered type. Still, it would work to my advantage as I spotted the keychain in his back pocket, the plastic baseball logo dangling within easy reach.

I watched and followed. The kid did go where he was told, but slowly due to his armload. Easy pickings.

I pulled the sunglasses off and dropped them on the ground.

"Hey, kid. You dropped your sunglasses."

"Oh, I…did I?" He tried to turn around to see me. "I thought I left them in the van. Thanks, man!"

He sort of looked at them from over the flowers.

"Here, I got it," I said. I bent down, picked up the glasses, and put them in his back pocket. The switch was easy to make, and soon enough I had his keys.

"Thanks, man!"

"No problem. Have a nice day."

"You too."

And the kid was gone, around the corner to the service door.

I went straight for the van, took the magnetic logo off, tossing it in the back of the van as I slid into the driver's seat. There were a couple keys on the chain, but one was more obviously a vehicle key, and it started with ease.

I pulled out of the parking lot and sped off. I had to navigate around the golf course before I could figure out how to get back into Washington Park, but once I eventually did it was only a matter of getting the van as close to where I left the wolves in the arboretum as possible.

I rolled down the window, sticking my head out and using a combination of scents and sounds to try to locate them. When I heard Jack's trademark whining when he gets bored, I knew I had them.

I gave four sharp whistles, a signal they all knew well enough by now. Within minutes, Carson came forward with the human woman over one shoulder and half dragging a stumbling and struggling warlock with the other. Jack and Aaron had Amelia, and they all piled in the back.

I barely waited for the door to shut before peeling off the side of the road I had found and turned the van around.

The smashing of glass was distracting. I had a feeling I knew what it was, but I still had to ask.

"What was that?"

"Amelia broke some flowers," Jack answered.

"She broke the jar, dummy," Carson said. "Not the flowers."

"She broke the vase," Aaron growled.

"Are there more?" I asked. I had not really looked back there for other deliveries the kid was making.

"No, that was it," Jack answered.

"Shove the glass aside and keep Amelia from hurting herself. You know how she gets when she's drunk and pissed."

"She's not drunk," Carter said. "But…I guess it's about the same behavior."

I sighed, rubbing the headache at my temple with one hand. "Aaron, any sightings from humans while I was gone?"

“None," he answered. "The girl nearly came to, but we put her back out again."

I swerved a bit, causing an oncoming car to honk at us. "You hit her again?"

"Yeah, well..." He looked nervous when I glared at him in the rearview mirror. "She was waking up."

"She had better turn successfully," I muttered. "Otherwise, we probably gave a human head trauma before she dies a slow and painful death by failed shifting."

"How long 'til we're out of Seattle?" Carson asked.

I grunted. I hated car rides, and this one was shaping up to be a bigger pain in the ass than normal. I did not answer him, I just kept driving.

Out of Seattle, out of the surrounding human cities and towns. We were going east, and it was going to be a long trip.

Amelia thrashed. Jerod groaned. The human stayed unconscious.

And the pit in my stomach told me we were getting close to whatever wave of withdrawal we were going to have from the lunaria's dream.

Great. Another damn problem.