Lone Wolf (First in Lone Wolf Series)

Chapter Ten

　

Dawn sat bolt upright in the bed and let out a cry of pain. Her body felt as if it had been beaten with a stick. No, not a stick, the entire tree. It felt as if some giant had uprooted the entire tree and then proceeded to beat her with it.

She looked around her surroundings, recognizing Grange’s bedroom from the one other time she had been inside it. She curled her nose. What was that smell? She looked down at herself and saw the sweat, the blood and the embarrassing proof that she had soiled the bed. Her nose began to burn and her eyes began to water.

She had never had a great sense of smell but suddenly every scent was assaulting her. She could even smell the trees and the nearby river. She could smell water? What the hell was going on? How had she gotten here?!

Then she began to hear things. The birds singing, the birds beaks running over their feathers, the squirrels gnawing on nuts and the grass blowing in the breeze.

Grass blowing?!

A fear began clawing at her from inside. She didn’t understand what she was feeling. It was almost as if there was something living inside of her, fighting to get out. Fighting to be free and be in control.

The scents confused her nose, the sounds hurt her ears.

She jumped from the soiled bed and ran to the broken bedroom door. She could smell Grange but he wasn’t here. Wait, why could she smell him? What had happened to her?

She remembered the man, (or whatever he had been), in the woods biting her on the neck. The pain had nearly been unbearable. She had rushed to Granges cabin and she had curled up in Grange’s bed and soon had drifted off into unconsciousness, not able to remember anything else until waking up just a few moments ago.

A fly began buzzing around Dawn’s ear, the sound nearly deafening her, and she swatted at it, before letting out a whine and then covering her mouth quickly with her hands as her eyes widened.

She ran to the corner, pulled her knees into her chest and began rocking back and forth as she wondered what in the hell was wrong with her. Had that creature turned her into something? Where was Grange? Where was the mate! The mate! She needed the mate!

Dawn shook her head to clear the desperate outcry currently filling it. Something was very very wrong.

***

Grange was more asleep than awake as Trig and Nickolai all but carried him through the forest. As they neared the cabin, Trig suddenly jumped away and yipped excitedly.

“Grange! Grange, I smell her! She ain’t dead!” he exclaimed. Then he frowned and his brow creased. “But she does stink to high heaven.”

Grange’s head snapped up, his fatigue momentarily forgotten, as relief and happiness filled his entire being. He could smell her too. She was afraid, and she did indeed stink, but she was very much alive!

He had no idea how she was alive but he wasn’t about to question it. Instead he broke away from Nickolai and Trig and ran into the cabin.

“Dawn!” he called out and he burst into the bedroom to find her sitting in the corner with her hands over her ears.

“Stop yelling!” she exclaimed. “What is wrong with me?” she demanded with tears shining in her eyes. “Everything smells too strong and the noises are hurting my ears!” Grange saw the gold flecks forming in her eyes. That was a trait that not all wolves possessed and he knew she had gotten it from him.

“Dawn, love, do you remember what happened to you?” Grange asked in a whisper so that her ears could adjust to her heightened sense of hearing.