Killing the Wolf

Blood in the ocean - Part 2

When substances around us release microscopic molecules, they stimulate our human odor receptors. Then a message is sent to a human brain to identify the scent. That is how a human sense of smell works. The mechanism is identical with werewolves, except much stronger. Some might argue, that a sense of smell is more important to a werewolf than sight. From a very early age, young werewolves start to learn how to use this sense. In Cage's pack, young wolves - teenagers and young adults, trained vigorously, but Philip Cage had believed that young wolves would learn best when the training was gamified. All Black was one of the ways to grow the next generation of skillful werewolves. All Black was a competition in which the goal was to sharpen and strengthen the werewolf senses. When Fay was a teenager, she had never really appreciated these competitions and games. Like many teenagers, she had not understood the reason behind them. To her, they had been stupid traditions to underpin pack's power structures. But now she was grateful for those lessons.

Seth had sent more adult wolves to protect them, but they were still on their way. Fay needed to make sure they would stay safe before their arrival. And even after that, they might have to face the hostile wolves.

The situation was dire, but there were two things in their favor. One - she knew every inch of these forests - thanks to all the competitions and games she had to part take as a teenager. Two - the awaken protector intuition would warn her of danger when her logical and trained mind couldn't notice something.

This brought her confidence as she assisted the children and seniors out of the bus. Every now and then she looked up to the tree branches to assess the wind direction and speed. So far it was what they needed - from the ocean towards the town.

"How many do you need?" one of the fighters asked her. Fay lifted her eyes to the branches again.

"As many as possible. But start with the ones that could block the direct range," she said.

The man nodded. He motioned a couple of other fighters to follow him.

"Wait!" Fay said and the man turned to look at her. "The road that leads to the Alpha Phillip's old cabin."

"Yes?"

"Make one there too."

The men disappeared into the forest - in three different directions. Fay turned to speak to the seniors.

"You all have to keep an eye on the trees. If the wind changes its directions, we'll block the children's scents as much as possible. Keep them as low on the ground as possible and block the wind with your body. Like this," she said and sat on the ground. She pulled one of the children near her and bent her upper body over the child."

"Ms. Fay, is that enough? Even I, an old wolf, could pick up that child's scent from afar," an older man said. The same worried look was in all of their eyes.

"It's not enough," Fay nodded. "But it doesn't have to be. We don't have to make their scent disappear completely. We'll make it faint and widespread."

The older man smiled. There was pride in his eyes.

"Blood in the ocean," he said.

"Exactly, blood in the ocean."

"We might be old, but I'm sure there are many of us, who are willing and able to help with that," he said. Fay noticed an excitement in his eyes.

"Alright. Pick five among you and the rest will stay with the children.

There are several ways to manipulate scent. Fay knew it had to be done in a subtle way, not to seem too obvious. Had she ordered a fire to be made only near them, Finnigan's wolves would have understood there was something it was covering. Trying to cover.  But now there were several small fires around the forest. The fighters she had sent, had done a fine job at locating perfect spots. The smoke hovered all over the forest. If Finnigan's wolves wanted to check them and what they were allegedly covering, it would take time. And it would expose them. Right now Fay had no idea where they were - or how many there were.

As Fay's skills with manipulating scent had increased over the years, she had learned that it was - most importantly, a mind game.  More blood in the ocean than playing the wind. So instead of the hilltop where the wind could carry the scent towards the ocean, Fay had ordered the drivers to take the busses to a gully. It would take a lot of skill and tactical vision to pick up the scent from there. And Fay was certain they had that skill and vision. That's why the busses were there.  If you were hiding something valuable, you wouldn't put it somewhere where it could easily be taken. No no. You would do you're best to hide it. So yes, when the Finnigan's wolves would find the busses, they would find them empty.

Though it was mostly blood in the ocean, manipulation required slick ways to play the wind. The five seniors and Fay had been staining the forest with their and the children's scents. There were teddy bears, blankets, and even diapers hidden among the moss, hanging on high branches and under rocks. Yes - there were children in the forest. Everywhere in the forest.

Now they'd wait for the back up to arrive. Fay prayed they'd arrive before Finnigan's wolves would run into them.

***********************************************************************************************

Hey!

I had "technical" difficulties with this one. Meaning yesterday I accidentally clicked Save instead of Publish. Today I was feeling a bit down thinking, was the chapter so bad. No votes and no comments. I came to read it myself and noticed me "technical" problem. I'm an idiot!

Anyways! I hope you liked this one :)

I decided to write one more Blood in the ocean chapter, so there'll be part 3. I'm already writing it, so hopefully, it will be ready tomorrow.

If you're wondering what blood in the ocean means - it will be explained in the next part.

I'd love to hear your thoughts!

M