Chapter 75

[ 997 words ]

Rainstorm

75: 75.

Rainstorm Aria

Rain slicks my skin in a spontaneous downpour.

One second, the forest is just damp and heavy with the promise of a storm, the next it’s pouring cold drops that are slicing through the canopy of trees, soaking through my shirt, turning the ground beneath my boots into a slip and slide.

Just our luck.

Beside me, Quin looks just as soaked through, only while I’m giving drowned rat, she looks like the early bird in a wet t-shirt contest.

“I know. The girls get all the attention,” she says with a smirk.

“Shit. I’m no better than a man. Sorry. I didn’t realise I was staring.”

She laughs, and we weave through trees.

“Don’t. This is the most action I’ve had in weeks. Being stuck in the pack has not been good for my libido.”

She wipes the rain from her brow, and I do the same.

Not that it does much, but I’d settle for any amount of visibility under these conditions.

“Stay with me. We’re about to go on a steep decline, but the river is not too far off now. Make sure to plant your feet, it’s going to be slick.” Quin calls over her shoulder, her voice steady despite the way she’s moving faster now, weaving through trees like she was born to this exact stretch of forest.

I fall in behind her, matching her pace, forcing my breathing to stay even.

Every sense is stretched thin, every crack of a branch or shift of wind making my pulse spike beneath the sound of battering rain.

It makes my senses feel less reliable, and me feel vulnerable.

Quin glances back just long enough to check on me, her pale hair plastered to her face from the rain.

“Here we are.”

She stops pointedly in front of a dramatic drop-off.

When she said we would be going downhill, she was kidding.

The ground slid off at a sharp thirty-degree angle.

“The trick is to keep yourself leaning backwards.” Quin’s voice is not as confident as I would like it to be, but I can’t blame her for the unease.

Even without these conditions, this would be a hell of a descent.

“Or we could just scoot on our ass until we’re down,” I suggest.

She snorts.

“Yeah. Or that.”

We angle toward the slope, and the moment my foot hits the edge of the decline, it sinks.

The unstable dirt moves like sludge, sliding and rolling in on itself.

Eww.

This isn’t gonna be pretty.

Quin and I take small steps, sinking onto our asses so we can drag and slide against the side as we creep toward the bottom.

Every shift of our weight is deliberate.

“This is so nasty,” I say.

“Let’s just be glad we haven’t encountered deer shit yet,” she says.

“Oh hell—”

A howl splits the air.

It rips through the forest like a blade, deep and unmistakable.

Not just one.

Two.

My heart speeds in my chest.

“Lools like they found us,” I breathe.

Quin doesn’t deny it.

“Yeah.”

Her pace picks up, and I’m right with her.

The sound of snapping branches becomes louder, closer.

They’re not even trying to stay quiet anymore.

It’s like they’ve decided we’re not worth the extra precaution.

Like they believe we’re easy pickings.

My wolf snarls at that thought, daring the males to test her.

“They’re closing in!” I shout.

“I know!” Quin fires back.

“We have to get up and run.”

“Fuck,” I snap, but I know she’s right.

We’re sitting ducks moving at this pace.

Falling is a risk we have to take if we want to get away from them.

Fear coils tight in my chest, but it’s not just for us.

It’s for them.

My mates and my pack.

Our group is expecting us to be at the meeting point.

They’re out there somewhere, fighting their own battles, trusting us to make it back to them.

We push to our feet.

The snarls are even closer now.

Just a few feet.

My wolf pushes at my skin, and all I can think about is the fire inside me.

The volatile, dangerous thing I barely control, heating my skin until I can no longer feel the cold from the rain.

If I lose it…

If they see…

If any of these wolves get away and report back to the Assembly there is no telling how much danger I could put our already targeted pack in.

We take off on a run.

The wolves howl in malicious delight at the chase.

My gate is uncoordinated.

The earth sinks unevenly beneath my weight, and Quin isn’t doing much better.

My foot slips and I nearly go down, catching myself on a tree just in time.

“Shit.”

“I’ve got you,” Quin snaps, reaching out for my hand and pulling me along.

I make the mistake of looking back to see the moment the wolves come to the edge of the decline.

They start down, only for a moment before jumping into action.

They slid and slid but even as they had to slow and dodge trees there still fast then is in their wolf forms.

Quin suddenly veers sharper down the slope.

“Shift,” she says.

I blink.

“What?”

“Shift and run. You’ll be faster.” I hear the determination in her voice, and something about it unsettles me.

My wolf surges at the permission, claws scraping against the inside of my skin.

Yes.

But something in Quin’s eyes tells me she doesn’t mean both of us.

I ask the question knowing I won’t like the answer.

“What about you?” I demand.

She doesn’t answer immediately.

Her pause is answer enough.

“Quin.”

She curses under her breath.

“I can’t.”

My chest tightens.

“Why not?”

“I’m submissive,” she snaps, like it should be obvious.

“If I shift during a fight and a dominant gets close enough, he can suppress me. Force my wolf down.”

The words hit like a punch.

There is still so much I have to learn about shifters, about our world

Now I’m starting to see why Kade was worried.

She continues, “Which is exactly why I stay in my human form. I can fight back this way.”

The forest blurs around us as we run, rain stinging my eyes.

“You’ll be faster in your wolf form,” she adds.

“You can make it.”

Make it.

Without her.

The idea is so wrong it makes me stumble again.

My wolf is revolted at the idea of us leaving her to save ourselves.

It offends her to have that type of cowardice placed on her character.

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