When he returned to the rest of the pack, Aceso had William’s ten point buck up on her shoulders and Nicolas was carrying the younger male. Katherine had the doe on her shoulders and as soon as William joined them, they moved out of the copse of trees back the way they had come. The trek back to the wolf den was uneventful. He felt like he should be sore or in some kind of pain from the beating he took from the buck but he felt nothing, only a sleepy kind of exhaustion. He knew that it was from not having eaten properly and the amount of effort it had taken to bring down that buck without killing it.
The rain did not let up through their trip back to the den. If anything, it got worse. William was miserable and the rest of the pack did not look like they were having any fun either. Charles ears drooped. Katherine’s whole body seemed to droop with the weight of the doe on her shoulders. Her tail was hanging low, swishing from leg to leg as she walked.
The sky continued to darken and the world around them took on a surreal shadowy existence. William found it hard to focus his eyes. The rain blurred his vision and the deepening shadows of the forest made him uneasy for some reason. He felt it as a small weight between his shoulder blades. With the cold rain and the long hike back to the den that weight increased to the usual pain that he felt whenever he was tense or nervous about something. He couldn’t identify what it was that was bothering him. It was something that he couldn’t grasp, something that played just outside his conscious understanding. He tried to shrug the old feeling away but it, like the rain, stubbornly remained.
They got back to the corral. Thankfully the two does were still asleep. The rain wasn’t as heavy in the corral, and they placed the three new additions in the enclosed space as well. Katherine had to have Charles help get the doe off her shoulders without dumping her on the ground. Aceso eased the ten-point buck onto the ground, where the male slid down and rested easily on the ground, like a sack of potatoes. When their burden had been set down Charles went to every deer and placed his claw over their nose and mouth. He remained with each deer for a good ten seconds or so before moving on to the next one. William had no idea what was really happening, he was just glad that Charles was here. It made their job a whole lot easier, even if Charles’s abilities did make him wary at times. When Charles was done, he vaulted himself over the enclosed fence and rejoined the group in the frigid downpour.
To be heard over the storm Aceso had to yell. “We won’t find anything tonight in this storm.” William didn’t need to but out of habit he was holding his arms across his chest to conserve body heat. “Let’s get down into the den.”
William practically dove headfirst into the warm den. He found his spot along the earthen wall and waited for the rest of the pack to join him. Aceso was next followed by Nicolas. Now that William was out of the cold rain, he felt his eyes grow very heavy and he felt like he could go to sleep right then. When the rest of the pack had entered the cramped space of the den Aceso spoke to them again. “We had better get some rest. We can hunt in the morning.” Aceso laid down.
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William didn’t need any more of an invitation than that. He laid down in the same position as yesterday. The warmth of the five other werewolves in the enclosed space warmed the place well. This made him even more comfortable, and he was asleep almost instantly.
William had a dreamless but fitful sleep. He felt his body turn over constantly. He was hungry but that was no explanation for the restlessness that he now felt. He opened his eyes more than once only to have a heavy drowsiness overtake him almost immediately. The times where he was consciously awake he didn’t see any of his pack mates having any trouble sleeping at all. The rest of the pack was like the dead with their chests rising evenly and slowly through the night.
It felt like he had just gone back to sleep when a chocked scream rang out into the early, predawn morning. William jerked up at the sound and the rest of the pack stirred. William felt like he had not gotten any sleep at all, and his mind was sluggish to respond.
Nicolas was sitting up next to Aceso. He had a disturbed look on his face. He looked calm but his eyes kept darting all over the den and to the various members of the pack as if his eyes didn’t believe what it was seeing.
Charles, all calm collectedness asked into the dim light. “Nicolas, what it is?”
The Scout sat there a moment. He shook his head from side-to-side. He didn’t want to talk about it whatever it had been.
“It was just a dream Nicolas, go back to sleep.” William said as he let himself slide onto his side and closed his eyes.
Whatever had happened to Nicolas seemed to do the trick for William. He slept like a log after that. He awoke several hours later feeling great. The tension in between his shoulder blades was gone and he felt amazing. He sat up and he could see the sunlight filter down into the den. The rain had stopped, and he inhaled. The musky smell of warm, still damp, werewolf fur was heavy in the den.
William picked his way to the tunnel entrance of the den. For some reason this was a lot easier than it had been the previous morning. He poked his head out and bathed his face in the cold winter sunlight. He inhaled the natural smells of the forest around him. The cedar pines and the redwood trees had a subdued fragrance that was light and clean. There was still heavy rain drops glistening on millions of pine needles but the clouds that remained in the sky this morning were puffy, white, and separating from each other rapidly. It was going to be a beautiful day today. And with any luck they would be able to catch that last male and get back home by nightfall.
William ducked back down into the den ready to start the day. The rest of the pack was also stirring. Aceso sat up and looked at William who took a crouching position by the entrance. Nicolas was rubbing his eyes with the back of his claws. It seemed that he had had a rougher night that William had. The blonde looked around in a childish bleary-eyed uncertainty, as if he didn’t believe where he was or what he was seeing.
This expression was not lost on Katherine. “What’s the matter Nicolas?”
The blonde only shook his head. It was if he couldn’t speak. His wild staring eyes passed over every member of the pack. If Nicolas was trying to tell them something he was being very cryptic about it.