7. Ylfa
Brianna leads the waythrough the forest, Theresa and Andrew close at her side, and I just pray to Luna that this wasn’t a mistake.
I am putting my trust in these humans. They pretty much tried to kill us and distract us from our goal of finding Raven, but we eventually learned to work together and cooperate.
Well, I hope so.
They’re taking us to their rendezvous site, but it will be weeks until we get there. Chelsea keeps a sharp eye on Brianna, flipping her blade around in case the human gets any ideas.
We all trek by foot. Once again, we wear clothes like civilized beings in the presence of humans, and by this rate, it could be months until we get there.
We won’t shift in fear of scaring our new friends.
I feel for the humans, having to move around on their weak human legs. They have to travel everywhere by foot now, and considering they only have two feet, that sucks. A car sure would come in handy right about now.
As I fell asleep last night, more memories came to light. It seems Silver had lived when humans still drove cars, several times for that matter. If I saw a car right now, I think I could drive it. It would be muscle memory at the most, though.
But as Silver said, my past lives will guide me.
It’s just a shame that all the cars have gone. Now forests have reclaimed all the roads and highways that the humans frequently used once. We still find the rusted skeletons of a beat-up car here and there in abandoned towns, but most shifters don’t care for anything created by human beings. They balk at anything man-made and prefer to use archaic forms of travel, such as carriages. Since our wolf-drawn carriages are designed for the usage of wolves, we consider them lupine inventions.
Humans used horses. But we wolves have no use for such beasts, any more than we do fuel and cars.
It’s not so bad. We’re big enough to travel by foot since we’re a migratory species. We have four strong legs when we shift, and we’re also capable of creating boats strong enough to withstand any ocean current if we wish to travel to distant lands. Again, since the boats are designed for wolves in mind, we consider them lycan.
We can stay in wolf form for weeks at a time too, living on raw meat and any other wild game we find in the woods.
Humans are far weaker, though their ancestors were found on nearly every continent in the world. They started off in Africa, but humans were everywhere at one point... The only continent they never inhabited was Antarctica, for obvious reasons.
They learned to adapt and live in any climate. There were humans who lived in the high mountains of Tibet, and there were others who lived in the extremes of the Arctic. They could be found in almost any habitat, from deserts, to jungles, to forests, and my heart quakes just thinking about them.
We cannot take these creatures for granted. They may seem weak now, but we must keep our wits about us. If they could populate nearly every part of the world, then they could do it all over again.
So it is in our best interest to build trust with the humans, and we can’t do that when we’re loping around in our wolf forms, panting and growling and looking like monsters.
It will be like the time I worked with the timber wolves during the first round of the games, except I’m working in reverse now. Back then, I stayed in lupine form to appease to the timber wolves, but now I operate in human form to appease the humans.
The rendezvous site is located on the western coast, and we’re miles away inland. It looks like we will be camping under the stars for weeks.
The humans stop, and we pause. Brianna extends one of her knives, and Andrew and Theresa do the same. I listen with my advanced lycan hearing, but I needn’t have bothered. The smells are strong enough.
It looks as if we are creeping into another pack’s territory — a pack we most likely met at the games.
They will have heard about what I did at the fortress. They will know that I let Raven escape, and there’s no telling what they will do once they pick up on my scent.
No shifters are close by at this point, but someone has recently patrolled the area, and I sniff, trying to see if I recognize the scent.
I met many wolves at the Gathering. With such a large concentration of wolves, it can be hard to pick up on individual scents, which is why I come up empty.
I indicate to Patrick and Hunter to if they recognize the scent. They shrug, shaking their heads. It would have been easier if we knew what we were up against. This just means we have to take another route. We can’t risk running into any hostile wolves.
I am determined to see this through. We will make it to the coast, and I will see Raven again.
Brianna strides up to me, and for the first time, I notice the wide berth she keeps from me. There’s a noticeable gap between the humans and the wolves of our party, and I have to put an end to that.
“We need to find another way around. Unless you think you can talk to the wolves in that pack?”
I could try, but if they recognize me, then we’re as good as dead. They will think I have defected over to the humans’ side, and I couldn’t blame them at this point.