3. Sofia

3

Sofia

S ofia had not been prepared to run this fast and for this long. As she ran through the woods, branches snagged her threadbare shirt, cutting her skin and tangling her hair. She healed quickly, but the cuts still hurt.

She could hear the wolves in the distance. Many of them had shifted and they ran in their animal forms, no doubt to try and catch her scent. She had shifted at first and ran as a bear, but she wasn’t as fast and nimble as the wolves. She couldn’t slip through thickets of trees or hop over rocks.

She had to get out of Siberia.

Once she was on the outskirts of Yekaterinburg, she finally slipped inside a pub. She washed her hands and face, so she didn’t look quite so out of place, although the lack of a coat was a problem because she stood out. She was able to grab a phone that had been left unattended, and she found the nearest airport, called Koltsovo International Airport. Once she was done, she dropped the phone back on the table. She wasn’t a thief, not unless it was absolutely necessary. She would never be like her family.

She hitchhiked her way to the airport, and then slid into the cargo holding area of a plane. She didn’t know any specific spells for not being visible, but something kept her from being detected. The flight was rough, and she had to hold onto the wall for dear life. But hours later, she was still alive, uncaptured, and she was in Moscow. There, she did the same thing, taking shelter in a flight to Tokyo. And from Tokyo, she made it to San Francisco.

The balmy California air was so unlike the biting cold of Siberia. There were people everywhere, crowded on streets and buses and packed into cars. The Bay area had millions of people, all packed together. She’d learned that fact in one of the airport magazines. It had been crumpled, stuck between two suitcases, and she’d read it cover to cover on the way to Tokyo. Krasnoyarsk had a million people, but the places where she’d lived had never felt so alive, not like this. But maybe that’s because she’d almost been killed there.

As she wandered through the various streets, she realized she looked very out of place. She didn’t know how to live in a city. The buildings suddenly felt suffocating, and she started to run. Her eyes landed on the California state flag. There was a brown grizzly bear on the fabric. Relief flooded her body. That was it. She’d shift, and she’d stay that way for as long as she needed. If a bear was on the state flag, then it was safe for her to be a bear, as long as she could get out of the city.

She ducked into a used bookstore and found an atlas that featured a paper map of the United States. She studied every inch of it.

Then she began walking. She walked south as a human, and as soon as she reached the Big Basin Redwood State Park, she shifted into her bear.

She kept moving. Eventually, she ended up in Nevada. There were places that obviously were not a natural habitat for bears. When she came to the desert, and the red rock structures, she slept during the day and ran at night. Not once did she consider shifting back into a human. She wanted to get to Canada. Once she was in the Northwest Territories, then she’d never have to worry about being out of place.

She cut through Utah, and then ended up in Colorado.

But the longer she was in her bear form, the less she thought like a human. She quit looking for maps or road signs. She just let the stars in the night sky guide her.

She wandered through Colorado, which had a significant bear population. Once, in the distance, she heard human voices and felt the pull of a fellow shifter. She ran the other way. She did not want to talk to shifters. They could be aligned with wolves, just like the ones in Siberia.

She thought about staying in Colorado, but everywhere that bears lived, humans did too. They hiked and skied and swam in every inch of the land. There was no place they wouldn’t camp, and no rock they wouldn’t climb. Everywhere she went, they were there, with their gear and their cameras.

In the northern part of Canada, there would be very few humans. And the ones that were there wouldn’t bother her. She left Colorado for some peace and quiet. She just had to get through the fields of the midwest, and she’d be on her way. She’d welcome some colder weather as well. Colorado had plenty of snow in places, but the daytime temperatures were often well above freezing during the day, even on top of the mountains.

She hit a patch of land with no trees to speak of and went back to her plan of only traveling at night.

Then the worst happened. She saw the sign that read ‘Welcome to Texas.’

Texas.

No.

That was the exact opposite direction of Canada. She’d gone the wrong way. Texas had no bear population to speak of. They didn’t have the right kinds of landscapes for her to blend in. How could she have been so stupid?

She couldn’t cry as a bear, but she could lose her mind. She ran and kept going. Eventually she saw a sign that said Cedar Lake. She stumbled onto a ranch. It was the worst possible place to stop. But the exhaustion had overtaken her. The property had a lake with cool water. She drank from the lake and then found a barn.

She ducked behind the barn and fell asleep. When she woke up, a sheep was standing next to her, completely unafraid. The sheep was not a shifter, but a regular animal. But it wasn’t afraid of her at all.

Hi , she thought. You have a white spot on your face that looks like a flower. I think I’ll call you Daisy.

Then Sofia fell asleep once again.