Runaway Rogue

Chapter Four: Caspian's POV

Caspian was running out of gas. Hell, he hadn't started on a full tank, being awake for almost twenty-four hours before the warmth set in. God only knew how long he had been running for now. It felt like forever. It felt like five minutes.

There hadn't been a thought in his head when he first shifted. He hadn't cared about a single damn thing. His wolf led him and he took a backseat, watching the world through eyes that didn't feel like his own. Being in wolf form always felt more primal, the instincts often stronger than the rational, but now he felt entirely feral.

At first, he knew the forests. He knew the land that surrounded his pack better than he knew himself most days. Could it be possible she had always been so close by? Then, his wolf demanded he keep running. The world shifted, the trees changed, he crossed a stream he had never been to before.

He had been certain he had found her, that she was just through some bushes. His fried brain had convinced him that he heard a whimper and the way it struck at his very soul had him convinced it was her. But when he entered the meadow, no one was there. Not a doe, not a bear, not a squirrel and certainly, not a person.

It was then that the human part of him realized that he was in wolf form with his clothes very far away and very much shredded. If this was heat, he was screwed anyway. He was already twenty-eight, there had to be a reason for the delay. The obvious one could be that she was a human, though uncommon, they were not impossible. How was he supposed to show a human that he was not a threat? Randomly appearing naked men could arguably be more frightening than a wolf. And that was only one of the options and all the others had similar or less favorable outcomes.

His wolf did not care about his feeble human protests, especially when something struck his nose. Caspian had been hunting and tracking down rogues for what felt like forever. He was certain that he had labelled every scent under the sun. Human to werewolf, rogue to packmate, animal to human. He had encountered it all. But this was so different that even his wolf stopped short.

Rogue? Maybe. There was something close to that strange, fishy rot that rogues tended to get over time, but Caspian was also close to a river now.

It wasn't human, at least he didn't think it was entirely human. Whatever it was, it was odd, almost unnerving when he sucked in a deep breath, like it was setting off alarm bells. His security system had been tripped, but he wasn't exactly sure why.

It certainly was not the heavenly scents everyone described when they talked about their mate. Lavender, honey, cucumber and mint. Nope, this was something unpleasant.

Well after the sun had risen and illuminated the entire valley, Caspian continued to pace around in wolf form. His nose would catch a scent and he would follow it until he could not. Sometimes it seemed to vanish all together, sometimes it pulled him towards a fast moving stream.

He paced forever. He trotted about with his nose to the ground until all the warmth in his chest, all the drive in his heart was gone. The only thing left was exhaustion. And doubt.

Caspian knew he was done, knew that if there had been some mystery girl out here, she wasn't here now. The scent that he had been tracking was getting weaker and weaker by the second. Every time the wind blew, a little more of it was carried away. If she had crossed over the river somehow, there was almost no chance he would be able to catch on to her smell again.

Throwing one last frustrated howl at the sky, he stopped searching.

He retraced his steps, taking himself back home. With every step, he felt the ache in his back, felt the tenderness in his paws. The tiredness that had been so easily ignored just a few hours ago came ripping back, syphoning every single ounce of his drive out of him. He had no cell phone, no clothes, no one knew where he was. The only way to get back home was to push through.