Chains

Chapter 16 - On The Road Again

Lucy

We stayed for a week in Evansville, resting and relaxing for the first time in months. Nobody paid too much attention to us, two young women passing through. Some of them may have wondered why we didn't have a car, but nobody said anything about it. There were a couple of minor incidents, nothing that I couldn't handle. A small group of local boys kept trying to talk to Jax, flirting in the most obvious ways, not realizing he was a male. I'm two years younger than Jax, but at 20, I look older than him; probably due to my exercise regimen and life as a scout. I am also taller than many men which can be intimidating. Most of these boys looked to be high school age, which matched Jax's apparent age. I wonder what they would have thought if they knew he was 22, almost 23. That would probably have shocked them as much as finding out that he's a guy. I was able to turn them away with a fierce look or two whenever they became too persistent. Jax was too self conscious to engage in their antics, although I sort of wished he would; it might be good for him. They just thought he was shy.

Jaxon's been more relaxed than I've seen him since we ran away from the pack. He called mom and dad every day and they talked for hours. That really helped him calm down too. He never talked about himself or the time he was kept by alpha Pete, he just wanted to catch up on everything going on with them. Sometimes grandma and grandpa got on the phone too. Grandpa is a real joker, so it was all laughs and grins when they were on the line.

We checked out of the motel early on our last day. Before it started to get light outside. We ate some fruit and hard boiled eggs we bought the night before. We didn't want to have people notice that we were leaving on foot, and we really didn't want anybody knowing the direction we were heading. If nobody sees us leave, nobody can tell anyone who asks which way we went.

Shortly after passing the town's boundaries we turned East again. Our plan was to follow the road because roads are usually considered neutral territory to werewolf packs and it was possible we might be passing through the territories of other packs. We didn't really know as neither of us was familiar with which packs were in this area or how many packs there were. And human maps don't list werewolf territories. If I had thought about it, I'm sure dad would have had that information, but we didn't think about it so we didn't ask. After we left the town we didn't have a cell signal any more. I'd make sure to ask dad when we got to the next town.

There were two more towns between us and our final destination. We decided that a larger town would be a better place to stop because it would be easier to lose ourselves there if anyone came looking for us. It would be too easy to track us down in a small town like Evansville.

The next town was only a day away travelling as wolves. We entered town just before dusk, found a diner and ate, then lodged in another small motel; this town had several to choose from. The following morning we got up early again, but instead of just leaving, we stopped at the diner again and had a delicious breakfast of eggs, bacon, hash browns with a side of pancakes smothered in syrup. After breakfast, we made our way out of town and once again shifted to our wolves and sped off on our journey.

At one point, I was aware of wolves keeping track of us as we passed through their territory. They followed us until we reached what I assume were their borders then they turned back; leaving us alone otherwise. That was our only encounter with another pack so far. I hoped that any other encounters would be as uneventful.

Jaxon

We ran for a few hours after leaving the last town behind us. At one point I caught the scent of other wolves, Lucy caught it too. They didn't bother us though, simply followed us to make sure we weren't going to cause any problems for them. Later we came to a fairly large river and had to shift back into our human forms to cross the bridge. There was a lot of traffic on this road and two wolves crossing the bridge would have caused too much of a stir. After crossing, we made our way back into the trees and shifted back to continue on our way.

I've gotten back a lot of my former stamina during these last several months, and am able to keep up with Lucy without any problems now. I still haven't gotten back to my original weight though, but that will come with time. I've never weighed all that much, but I lost a lot during my captivity.

I guess we must have passed through another pack's territory again after a while because we were followed once more by several wolves. Like before, they just made sure we passed through their territory without causing any problems and let us continue on our way unmolested. The wolves up here were more tolerant than White River pack was; they would have detained any wolf travelling through the territory, even if they were on the roads.

It was late in the afternoon of the fourth day when the road we were following turned sharply to the South, heading off in another direction to the one we were heading. We bid farewell to the road and kept heading East cutting cross country hoping to make our destination within the next couple of days. We are far away from White River territory now, and the further away we get, the safer I feel.

It wasn't long though, before we became aware that we were being followed by another group of wolves. We no longer on neutral territory having left the road behind us an hour or two ago.