Oath of the Hunter

14 - Danger

Rowan

My sleep is a broken one; dreams melting and contorting into one another like a whirlpool of chaos.

I hear a soft knock, voices in the dark — muffled and rushed — and I can't quite work out if I'm dreaming or awake. Clarity is a fog seeping through my fingers.

"...need to get out of here," one voice, vaguely recognisable, murmurs. "That wolf River and Rowan found, it's not the first and it won't be the last."

"Darius asked for my help, Milo," another voice retorts. I know it. Matteo. "I can't leave now. Not with the hunters—"

"Fuck the hunters. They aren't the problem. I only let you in because I thought he'd have the decency to send you away, or at least tell you the truth, but he hasn't. He wants you to die like the rest of us."

"What truth? Milo?"

Howls — distant and forlorn — break the quiet. I'm falling head-first into a thick, confusing dream of knives and fur and shadows and chaos.

Thundering footsteps, gasping voices. I only manage to catch a few words. Hunters. Woods. Patrol.

I startle to clarity as the door crashes open— abruptly wide-awake — only to find the chaotic dream has manifested itself all around me. Distant howls, footsteps racing further into the house, Matteo's panicked voice in the doorway.

"Ro, wake up! The hunters are here!"

Without waiting for an answer, his silhouette darts out of sight, further down the hall. I hear him barge into Kay's room, then Lachlan's, on a mission to rouse us all. My focus snaps to the other side of the bed and the rising panic within me reaches a crescendo.

Empty. River's gone.

"Fuck," I hiss, a shock of ice jolting down my spine as I stumble out of bed and shrug on a shirt and shoes.

Teo is back in the doorway, wild-eyed and alert. Over his shoulder, Kay and Lachlan are gathered in bleary determination. Their attention fixes on the empty bed and their eyes flicker gold with the echo of their wolves.

"Is River out there already?" Lachlan asks, all of them backing up as I approach with steadfast strides. My wolf stirs in the back on my head, hackles raised. River's gone and hunters are attacking.

Terror seizes my chest, stealing my breath. "I don't know. Come on."

There's no time to think, to do anything but rush outside towards the bedlam. The house and clearing outside are a cacophony of chaos with werewolves either racing into the woods or darting out of them for safety. Darius, Milo and Imogen race alongside us into the dark woods.

Electric fear hisses through my veins. I know River can handle himself, but hearing the distant sounds of a fight echoing through the trees and knowing he could be in the thick of it— it's a special form of torture. A nightmare I can't wake up from.

What if the wolves turn on him? What if the hunters are too strong, or there's too many of them? What if he isn't here at all? What if he's gone to Lakeside already?

Gunshots crack through the woods. Broken howls and snarls light the cool air.

My wolf scratches at his confines, yipping and whining for release. I urge him back and race on, pouring on as much speed as I can muster. Shifting will waste time I do not have.

We dart down shadowed trails, every bush a figure looming in the dark, every groaning branch a wail for help. The sounds of fighting rise into a crescendo and cut off with a fractured scream not too far away. It's over. At last, when my lungs burn and my thoughts are aflame, I breach a clearing and skid to a stop, catching at a trunk to steady myself.