Call Wolf

Chapter One

PilgrimagE

Charles looked out towards the meadow, savoured the vague breeze on his sticky skin. It was noon. The July-sun had just taken its highest place in the sky and made every plant sulk, as well as caused every waterhole hiding within the forest to condensate. Its inhabitants hadn't seen rain for the better part of the month.
The meadow in which Charles' cabin was located within was just as brown and dry as the surrounding treeline, but the man himself looked strikingly alive. His posture was impeccable as he sat perfectly still on the veranda, allowing his eyes to play far past the wooden staircase leading out of the cabin's patio. Each day for two months he'd done the same thing, noted the same thing: electricity sparking in the air.
Incidentally, something else was also craving his attention. A second mind was burrowing into his, not delivering any clear wishes but an abstract weariness Charles had come to recognize - its intentions, as well.
"No," he responded, very calmly, seemingly addressing the meadow itself. "I cannot return, Kripin. Not yet."
This time It was more adamant, wavering Charles' concentration just enough to annoy him.
"Step down. I've told you, something is going to happen and I have to be present for it - I trust the pack is well under your leadership."
A slight disturbance in the nagging presence made Charles sigh, unnoticeably clench a particular muscle in his jaw. Kripin had already taken too much of his time. With a brisk armoring of his thoughts, Charles shut out the other mind invading his and was once again alone. It was important that he remained so. What he was going through was a pilgrimage each alpha had to experience - one last hinderance to then end up alongside the greats in history. A cleansing of the spirit, far away from the support of ones pack.
Each alpha gained something different from it, and each one knew individually when it was time. Some returned after months with a wolf twice as strong as before, some brought luck back upon their packs. Charles had felt the undeniable pull a couple months back and ended up in that particular lonesome cabin, lacking food and water, waiting for something he couldn't identify. But he was nothing if not resilient.
Charles steadied his posture, drew a deep breath, and closed his eyes; another day was before him.

Something made the cabin tremble, the porch's beams rattle. Charles' eyes shot open and his being returned to an attentive state after countless hours of floating into mindlessness. He put his hands to the boards, perked his hearing.
There it was again, this time followed by a wailing moan.
Charles got up, quickly locating the back of the cabin as the source of the ruckus. He allowed his nails to sprout, transform into deadly claws, as he cautiously began rounding the cottage.

He wasn't certain what he had expected to find; perhaps a hostile wolf or a packmember not satisfied with his sudden disappearance. He did know that what he in fact did find wasn't in the realm of what he would consider possible: a human.
She laid against the cottage's spotty paint, colored the exposed wood with her own red leaking from multiple wounds. Her body was close to gone but her mind was still fighting, trying to keep herself from slipping into darkness. Her eyes were plastered to the treeline hundred meters away, alert and terrified.
She finally noticed Charles and, upon realizing she couldn't run away, forced out a pained, "Please... help."
Charles watched her, then the treeline, with narrowed eyes. He slowly neared. "Who did this to you? How did you get here?"
She followed his gaze back to the forest and pressed herself further against the cabin. She was a small thing, even for a human. "You cannot let them find me! Please, you cannot."
Charles was at this point closer to her than he had been to any human prior. Slightly hesitant, he bent down and sniffed her, but the blood was too much for him to be able to detect any other scents.
"Please," she repeated. Her hand flew out, gripped his arm and squeezed with the last of her strength. Her awareness was fighting a losing battle and Charles could tell she would faint within the next moments. Her attention was still not on him. "Do not let them get me... They are not who they claim to be."
Gone.
Charles removed his arm from her limp grasp and stood up. He tried to convince himself to go back up front, to continue his journey before the woman would ruin too much. After all, it wasn't his responsibility to look after every human; they were much too fragile for that to be a possible thing to do.
Humans died, and that was that.
Charles really couldn't justify why he was soon thereafter carrying the pitiful creature indoors, abandoning his stone-solid routine he'd held for the past two months to tend to her wounds.
As he sat by her bedside at the end of the day, watching her chest rise and fall with unsteady hitching and writhing, he attempted to make himself cast her out. Nevertheless, as darkness arrived, she was still sound in his bed, ignorant to the sharp eyes observing her, trying to determine her fate and his part in it.
"You humans get yourself in all kinds of trouble," Charles thought aloud, letting his chin rest on top his fists. "War, heartbreak, petty squabble." The candlelight danced across her face, highlighted the cuts and bruises splattered across her skin. He once again marvelled at her small, very human frame. She could probably be broken with a single, slightly too tight, grip. Perhaps that could come in handy. "But who could you have offended to this degree?"
She didn't respond - obviously.
Charles felt dumb. He stood from his chair, blew out the candles, and closed the door as he left the bedroom. Kripin was still at it trying to peck into his head but Charles kept him out, wondering if it was unwise to not mention the human in his bed to his closest in command.
He came to the realization that it was, but he didn't feel like explaining himself tonight. He'd had far too much encounters than he was supposed to have during the pilgrimage already. So he sat himself back on the porch, drew a deep breath, and tried to numb the racing thoughts of what could be hiding in the woods - what could be chasing a human.

For the first time in two months, the night wasn't calm for Charles.

A/N
Please let me know if you liked the firs chapter :)