Chapter 19

Chapter Nineteen

A strid stuck her nose in the air and sniffed. She, Bec, and Kalle had been following the odors of unwashed clothing, urine, and wet fur, along with Erec’s distinct scent of cedar and smoke for the last few hours, but they were fading. And quickly, now that another winter storm had begun to whip through the forest. Because the clumps of drifting snow had already blanketed the tracks from Jerrick’s men, the three of them were left to rely solely on their noses to lead them to the pack and Erec. But even smells were getting harder to track with the wind blustering in all directions and the wetness diluting any lingering scent trails.

The cold was relentless. The prickling of it across Astrid’s cheeks, nose, and ears had turned to a sharp burning, and no matter how many layers of wool and fur she had wrapped around her frame, nothing could stop her teeth from chattering. The storm was slowing them down. Every passing second felt too long, knowing Erec was still in danger. Every moment he was with Jerrick and not her, the odds of something terrible happening to him only increased.

It was too painful to think about, and so she didn’t—at least she tried not to, as best as she could, and forced her focus on the trail they were following. They trudged through the drifts in silence for some time, until the bustling wind changed direction again, coming from the south this time. The snow fell harder, blurring the forest in front of them.

Kalle cursed loud enough for Astrid to hear him over the whistling past her ears. At first, she thought it was from the harsh conditions they were fighting against, but when she sniffed the air again, she realized the true reason why. The scents they had been following had vanished, dispersed, completely lost in the storm. They all stopped and looked at each other.

“What do we do now?” Kalle shouted over the roaring storm. “The storm is getting worse, and we’ve lost both trails.”

“We should go back.” Bec hitched up his hood and squinted at Astrid through the snowfall. “It’s too dangerous out here now.”

“We have to find Erec,” Astrid yelled back. She gripped her spear tighter, and the simple action had her frozen knuckles throbbing. Nothing was going to stop her from finding Erec and making sure he was all right. Not the storm or the cold or a lost trail. Nothing. “I’ll go on. You two can go back to camp.”

Kalle shook his head, blond curls swinging in front of his eyes. “No way. Filip will have our hides.”

“And Boden,” Bec added in.

Astrid huffed, her warm breath briefly hovering like a puff of smoke. “Then it looks like you’re coming with me, because I’m not leaving Erec behind.”

“We’re just scouting Jerrick’s camp. We have strict orders not to attempt a rescue,” Bec said sternly, and Astrid scolded herself for the slip. As her father’s good friend for many years, Bec had always been the one to follow orders, and she knew that if she was going to try and get Erec out of Jerrick’s clutches, she was going to have to be sneaky about it. But now that Bec knew her intentions, it was going to be even more difficult to get around him.

She nodded in an attempt to seem accepting. “Right. Well, I’m going to scout then.”

When she turned, a gust of wind blew past her, carrying the sharp smell of blood with it. Erec’s words jumped from her memory about blood clinging to the earth, leaving a more lasting trail, even after rain or snow. Pulse galloping, she glanced over her shoulder to see Bec’s and Kalle’s nostrils flaring, picking up the scent, too.

But whose blood was it? She hadn’t seen any wounds on Erec when Jerrick’s minions had struck him unconscious and carried him away. Maybe the blood was newer. Maybe they had hurt him along the way. Her stomach plummeted, and the more the air rushed past them, the stronger the scent became. It was leading farther south.

Where Jerrick’s camp was.

Astrid was off in the next second, running as fast as the knee-high snow would allow. Without having to utter another word, Kalle and Bec were at her heels. The storm pushed against them, slowing their steps and slapping across any exposed skin, but they clutched their coats tighter at their necks and threw themselves against the wind. They followed the blood trail for another half hour. Until the sharp clatter of metal on metal rang out, causing the three of them to freeze.

Kalle’s large hands grabbed Astrid’s coat, and he tugged her behind a large oak tree with him. Bec squeezed in beside them and wiped his wet face. The trunk was wide enough to stop the wind from smacking into them, so Astrid took the opportunity to gulp in mouthfuls of much needed air.

“Did you see anything?” she gasped between frozen breaths.

Bec nodded and in the lowest whisper said, “We’re close. Too close.”

Meaning they were lucky the storm was raging like it was and the wind was in their favor, otherwise they would have been caught in a heartbeat.

“Did you see Erec?” She couldn’t help the excited little leap of her heart at the thought of him being near. She wanted to peer around the tree and look for herself, but both men had pinned her in between their bulky figures.

“No. It’s hard to see through the snow.” Bec leaned sideways slightly, just enough to peek around the wood. “There are no fires. Only one tent that I can see.”

“Where do they sleep?” Kalle added in. “How do they not freeze to death?”

Even Astrid thought that was extremely strange. In the winter, temperatures dropped to a deadly number. Not many could survive such conditions without ways to get warm, like fires or shelters. Not when in human skin, at least.

But wolves could. Maybe Jerrick’s men stayed in their animal forms most of the time.

“How many are there?” Astrid asked.

“Only two men that I can see. They’re sparring. Practicing,” Bec replied.

That’s where the sounds of metal clanking must have come from. “And wolves?”

He hesitated for a long moment. Then, his gaze whipped back to them, and he gripped his axe even tighter. “They’re in the snow .”

Kalle’s eyebrows shot up. “What?”

Astrid could feel Bec’s panic rising as his eyes locked on a mound of white fluff a few paces away from the tree and them. Her own nerves twitched in response.

He pointed to it with his axe’s handle. “In. The. Snow.” He mouthed the words instead of saying them. “There.”

She stared at it, not knowing what to expect, but then, the snowy knoll in front of them rose slowly and fell. Like it was breathing.

Not good.

Astrid’s gaze swept the whiteness around them, seeing similar piles everywhere. Were the wolves buried underneath the snow for protection from the storm? She didn’t know and didn’t want to be around to find out. Who knew how many of Jerrick’s men were sleeping by their feet at this very moment. Or how many they had passed along the way. The thought had her shivering.

They had been lucky they hadn’t accidently stepped on one coming here, but now, how were they ever going to get away?

“I’m going to shift.” Bec’s voice was nothing more than a rumble. She probably wouldn’t have heard it if she hadn’t been standing so close. He dropped his axe and stripped off his clothing. Without the curse, the change rippled through him faster than it did for Astrid; it took only seconds before a massive gray and tan wolf was in his place. It shook out its fur, pressed its snout into the snow, and then swung its massive head right, a silent command to follow.

Kalle took Bec’s weapon and clothes. Then Kalle and Astrid crept behind the creature as it inched forward. She glanced over her shoulder every couple of steps to ensure they weren’t being pursued and kept her movements slow and calculated, despite the growing sense of urgency.

After walking for some time, Bec stopped and lifted his head, ears pointed straight up. He’d heard something. Astrid’s first thought was that it was one of Jerrick’s men, but when Bec didn’t bare his fangs or run for it, she realized it had to be something else.

Then she heard it. The twittering of a lumibird floating on the wind.

No, not a bird. It couldn’t be. Lumibirds didn’t sing that loud, nor would they be out in this storm.

Hope flared in her chest. It was Erec!

Her legs dashed forward without thought. The wind whooshed past her ears as she ran, but the tweeting song was still there. Faint but still there. She reached out across the pack bond and found his aura. To her surprise, it was emitting explosive rage more than anything else. Dodging any piles of snow, just in case, she sprinted past trees until a shadowy square outline came into view. As she came closer, she could make out metal bars and a hunched figure behind them. It was a cage, very much like the one that had held Henrick, Dana, and the other prisoners. And Erec was inside.

He jerked his head in her direction, and his blue-tinted lips lifted into one of his heart-skipping smirks.

Astrid came to the bars. “Erec,” she gasped, “you’re okay.”

Something troubling hovered in his eyes at her words, but he didn’t speak on it.

“How did you find me?” he whispered, crawling over to her. He reached out for her hand, and she let him take it, desperate to feel his touch again. Her skin felt on fire compared to his.

“I heard your whistling.”

His entire body trembled as another gust of wind whirled by them, but his expression showed no sign of distress. He grinned, dark blue eyes locked on her face, taking her in. “I told you it comes in handy.”

The anger she’d experienced before through the pack tie had softened now to that same pulsing warm glow she had become accustomed to whenever she was with him, maybe even craved. It was strong enough to melt the chill from her bones, even in this arctic storm.

Erec frowned. “Please tell me you didn’t come alone, Astrid.”

“Bec and Kalle are with me,” she replied, tone low. Peering over her shoulder, she spotted their shadows hovering close by but near the coverage of a bush. “I’m going to get you out of here.” Orders be damned, there was no way she was leaving here without him. She couldn’t see any traces of Jerrick’s camp from the cage and the wind was still blowing against them, so their scents couldn’t be caught. It was the opportunity she had been hoping for, and she wasn’t going to just let it go.

“Smashing the lock like last time will be too loud,” Erec said. “Even with the storm, someone will hear it.”

True. And none of them had brought a hammer with them.

She looked at her new spear with the glowing pink stone arrow for a tip and a thought came to her. Just how sharp were Svanna’s rocks?

“Maybe I can cut through the lock or the bars with this?” She showed him the blade, and his eyes widened in surprise.

“Is that…?”

She nodded. “Henrick made it for me.”

“I should have known.” Erec stepped back and whispered, “Try it. But be quick.”

Astrid walked over to the lock holding the cage door closed and pressed the spear’s tip to the metal. She began to saw at the latch. It took some effort to get it started, but after a while, the stone had made a notch in the latch. She smiled at him. It was working.

But the moment Astrid raised the spear again, the wind switched direction, tossing her hair over her shoulders and slamming against her back. She stumbled forward and almost smacked into the cage from the force of it.

Erec gripped the bars to keep himself steady, but there was panic in his eyes. “You have to go,” he blurted out.

Her breaths quickened. “What? Why?”

“The wind.” He glanced behind him, where Jerrick’s camp lay beyond the trees. “They’ll pick up your scent. You have to go.”

“I’m not leaving you.” But as soon as the words left her mouth, the sound of heavy footsteps reached her ears. They were coming from the woods on the other side of the cage, so they couldn’t be Kalle or Bec. And they were headed their way.

Dread seized her.

“Go, Astrid!” he barked. He yanked at the cage’s bars, testing the damaged lock to see if he could break it now. When the door’s hinges groaned but the bolt held strong, the ferocity of his fear slapped against her aura. She couldn’t just leave him here. She was supposed to rescue him. Despite the terror crawling over her skin, her legs fixed her in place.

Erec pressed his face between the bars. “Go!”

Behind her, Kalle was calling her name in a frantic whisper. The footsteps were getting closer.

As much as her heart told her she couldn’t, her sense was telling her she had to go. If Jerrick caught her, too, then all was lost. She ripped herself away from the cage and forced her feet to step backward. Her body was heavy, each movement weighed down by her regret to leave him behind like this.

The farther she got, the more the fear of never seeing him again crashed into her. What if this was the last time they were together? What if he never knew how she felt about him? Pain twisted in her chest.

“I—I—” The shadows moved beyond the cage, locking the words she so desperately wanted to tell him in her throat.

“Jerrick plans to attack the morning after the Blue Moon,” he said, the words jumbled and rushed. “Tell Filip.”

The half smile he gave her was somehow sad. Was he thinking the same thing? Could this really be the end for them both?

When Astrid reached the bush where Kalle and Bec were hiding, she glanced at Erec one last time, taking in as much of him as she could in those seconds. She engraved the image of him into her memory—the stormy color of his eyes, the strong lines of his jaw, and the wheat color of his hair. She wanted to remember every detail just in case…just in case…

Her eyes stung as tears rushed forward. But before she could linger long enough to change her mind, she spun and followed Bec’s wolf farther away from the cage and Jerrick’s camp. With every step, the pack bond between her and Erec stretched thinner, until finally, his sorrow and worry became nothing more than a heaviness she carried in her heart.