Last Fae

Chapter 16 ~ Hike

We drove back to the Wolf Territory in silence. The questions swirled around my mind desperate to be released so they could find their answers but for some reason I couldn't get them passed my lips. I stared out the window into the dense forest, feeling Kellan's gaze on me again and again as we got closer to the house. My fingers scratched at the skin of my wrist when the first cottages appeared. The skin turned an angry red, but I couldn't stop. The slight pain distracting me from the sheer terror of where I was. Of what I had agreed to.

Was it too late to change my mind? I whipped my head around to Kellan ready to beg him to take me back to The Lone Wolf. The cure, I thought to myself. Focus on the cure. If you can get through this, it's yours. You'll never have to feel like this again. I strengthened my resolve and forced my body to calm down. I could do this. And if I could convince him to show me where he was keeping the vial, I might even be able to get out of here without having anything more to do with the Wolf inside me.

The large house loomed into view and my heart pounded. I forced myself to take long deep breaths. I could do this. I could stay here until I got my hands on the cure. I just hoped it wasn't going to be too long. We drove passed the turn into the driveway with the parking spaces and I shifted my gaze from the wolves outside to the one in the car with me.

"Where are we going?" I questioned, not the first question I wanted to ask when he said he'd answer anything but necessary as the village of Wolves disappeared behind us and we continued on a narrow overgrown path. The leaves scraped at the windows like claws and the old truck groaned with the effort of moving up the steep slope before it.

"Well, I know you aren't going to want to stay down there with a pack of Wolves. I can smell how terrified you are of them. So, we are going to head into the forest higher up the mountain. There is a small cabin up here, it's where we take Wolves before their first shift."

"Will anyone else be up there?" He shook his head. At least there was that. Though the idea that he was taking me to the place where Wolves shifted for the first time wasn't the most comforting thought. Was he going to make me shift too?

"What does teaching me about Wolves involve anyway?" The corners of his lips turned up in a grin and I felt a smile tug at mine in response. He turned the truck around a sharp corner and brought us to a stop with a jolt.

"You're about to find out." He pulled his door open and jumped out a spring in his step that wasn't there before. The tiredness seemed to leave his body as he strode around to my side. I pulled my own door open before he had a chance to and stepped out, eyes searching the thick forest around us for any sign of the cabin he'd mentioned.

"It's a bit further yet," He chuckled at what I am sure was a look of pure horror on my face. The idea of hiking through thick forest up a mountain in the middle of the night was not high on the list of things I wanted to do right now. In the morning, after a good nights rest, sure. But not here, not now. I shook my head, but the grin on his face only stretched wider lighting the depths of his tired, grey eyes.

"How much further are we going?"

"Just a couple more kilometres. It shouldn't take long." He turned toward the thick wall of trees. Was he serious? This was ridiculous. We should have waited until morning. He tugged his shirt over his head and I gasped stepping back.