She was lost. Not a bit lost. Not lost in the way where she’d be able to find her way back by following the road. No, she’d managed to get completely, utterly, and hopelessly lost. Charlie looked around at the windswept moor to her front, the forest to her back, and tears pricked at her eyes. Crap. She might die out here. How long did exposure take to kill you, anyway?
She pulled her supposedly waterproof and windproof jacket around her tighter, but the piece of crap didn’t keep the bone-chilling wind out.
If she survived this, she’d be suing her employers—or at least the idiots her company hired to take them on this team-building exercise. Who the hell sent a bunch of insurance underwriters off to team build anyway? Everyone knew they were the quiet ones. The sales teams loved doing shit like this. Not her.
Think. She tried to focus her mind on getting back to the group. They’d been walking up a long footpath together, but when they approached the stile leading to the moors, they had been told to split into teams of four and go on some sort of orienteering hell-hike. She despised the great outdoors, unless you were talking a hot, sunny day at the beach. Oh, how she longed for her home and its stunning views over the Menai Straits. Would she ever get to see it again?
“Oh, stop with the melodrama,” she said aloud. “You need to focus. They can’t be far. You only stopped to look at a squirrel and rest your legs, so they must be near.”
The whole situation sent creepy shivers up and down her spine despite her denial of anything wrong. She’d stopped by a rounded hill, enchanted by the small white flowers blooming in this wintery landscape. Two red squirrels ran down a nearby tree and came to a stop right by her. Her colleagues were a few yards away, but she didn’t want to shout for them and scare the squirrels away, given how rare the red ones were. She’d watched them play for what seemed a moment, but when she glanced back at her colleagues, they’d gone.
Maybe she ought to call out for them. But fear of who else might be in these scary woods, or out there on the moors, stopped her. It seemed highly improbable that a murderer would take the time to hang out on moorland waiting for a victim. They’d be waiting a bloody long time up here.
Still, the way the wind moaned and groaned through the trees and the desolation of the moors spooked her no end. Not even a bird sang now. How the hell had the cutesy Disney scene she’d been part of a moment ago turned so somber?
Voices reached her, carried on the wind, and her heart lifted. They came from behind, from somewhere in the woods. Laughing and chatting, they sounded like her colleagues and provided immense comfort in this suddenly forbidding landscape. Perhaps not the team she’d lost but one of the teams. And really, who cared? She needed to find someone, and any team would do. Caught in the moment between lost and found, despair and joy, she headed toward the sound.
She set off back into the woods and followed the voices as fast as she could. Her limp didn’t slow her down too badly. She’d had it for so long now it had simply become another part of her. She still kept active and went jogging regularly, as well as playing netball with her local girls’ team. Other people noticed it more than she did, and she hated it when they stared or looked down their noses at her because of it. Not that she let them get to her. They were no better than the idiots who looked with distaste at her size, her red hair, or her glasses.
These days, Charlie did whatever the heck she wanted. Yeah, okay, so maybe not everything she wanted. She didn’t date or dance anymore. Those two things were off her list.
Memories of the day her carefully built, though thin and brittle, shell of fake confidence cracked assaulted her. She shook them off. Now really wasn’t the time to get all maudlin. She needed to find her friends.
As she hastened through the woods, she strained to hear any more voices over the crashing of her own feet through the undergrowth, but no more came to her. The wind carried only its own mournful song now and she shivered. Scared, suddenly.
She darted glances to her left and right and behind her too, the feeling of someone at her back too strong to ignore.
“Ooof.” Her momentum came to a sudden halt when she slammed hard into a huge tree. Christ, she might have hurt herself. Pausing to catch her breath and take stock, she looked around.
To the side of the tree ran a long, high fence. She peered closer and saw some sort of door in the wood. Fences meant people, right? A doorway meant people! Maybe a farm or something. She circled around the tree but stumbled over the roots at its base. Her ankle twisted and she cried out as she went down, landing on the forest floor with a muffled thud. Her breath left her body and searing pain shot up her leg. Fuck. She’d gone over on the bad one, too. So much for being careful.
Trying to keep calm, she pushed up on her arms, still struggling to breathe. As she got onto her hands and knees, she lifted her head and her breath stalled again.
In front of her, not more than a few feet away, stood a huge bear. No, no frickin’ way! She must be hallucinating. It had to be from the fall. Maybe she’d banged her head up badly or something.
She shook her head and blinked twice, then looked again. The bear remained, staring at her like something from her nightmares. Its great head moved side to side as it took another step closer, and it grunted as it sniffed the air.
Her heart raced so fast her head spun. With no oxygen and a rapidly accelerating heart rate, faintness stole over her. Desperate and terrified, she managed to finally drag in a lungful of air and it cleared her mind. A bear! What the hell was a bear doing in the woods in Wales? Her heart nearly came out of her ribcage as the thing continued to stare at her.
Oh, crap, she was going to pee her pants. She pictured the headlines: Girl Found Mauled by Bear in Woods. Had Peed Her Pants. The shame. This would be worse than all her past embarrassments put together. And then her colleagues and school friends really would have something to laugh about. They’d probably feature some sort of super unflattering picture too, probably the one of her grinning with spinach in her teeth and frizz in her hair. She’d asked her so-called-friend, Lucy, to take the damn thing down from Facebook, but she hadn’t complied.
The thing grunted again, and she whimpered. She didn’t want to die. Please don’t let it hurt her. Unable to move, she remained locked in the weird stare-fest with the huge beast.
She needed to think and do something to get out of this mess. She’d spent a fair bit of time watching the National Geographic channel and tried to dredge up the facts she’d taken on board during her viewing. The thing looked to be a grizzly. This animal resembled no small brown bear or a black bear. Too big, too rough looking. The grizzly news wasn’t good. Not good at all. They were deadly, or so she’d heard.
The bear still watched her. It didn’t charge her or do much of anything; it simply watched her, doing the odd grunting and scenting the air thing it seemed fond of. What did you do when faced with an angry bear? Did you run? Or did you fight it? Throw rocks, perhaps? She remembered the rock-throwing thing from a trip to Yosemite National Park and tips on how to deal with cougars. But bears weren’t cougars, and what the fuckety-fuck was a bear doing in Wales?
It won’t hurt you. What the hell? The whispery soft voice echoed in her mind clear as day, but when she tried to focus on it, the voice skittered out of reach. It came again, dancing around the edges of her brain. It means you no harm. Then a different voice, darker, yet more powerful, made itself known. It will kill you. It wants you. Wants to take you and hurt you. Come with us instead. We have so many lovely things. Come and visit with us.
There’s no time to go insane, she berated herself. You need to deal with the threat before you have the luxury of losing your mind. Deal with the fucking bear.
Desperate for a weapon of some sort, she scrabbled around on the ground. Fingernails dug into the soft soil, while her eyes never left the animal in front of her, until she hit pay dirt. Her fingers wrapped around something cold and heavy. A quick glance down revealed a large, wet rock. Charlie picked it up, slow and steady, as she pulled herself into a standing position. She didn’t want to hurt this animal, but her life depended on making the thing go away.
“Shoo.” She flapped her arms at it, and she swore the animal understood her. It cocked its head, and a grim approximation of a smile stretched across its huge mouth. Then the thing took one lumbering step forward, and she raised her arm, careful as can be, and threw the rock with all her might and a massive scream of exertion. It glanced off the bear’s head, hitting the side, and the monstrous beast let out a roar.
It moved nearer, fearsome teeth on display in a snarl. If the thing were capable of human emotions, she’d say it looked pissed off.
She stepped backward as it neared and glanced around wildly. Maybe she should climb a tree. With her twisted ankle, no way would running save her hide. The thing got so close its hot breath hit her cheek. Odd sounds came from its throat. Low and soft, a growl, but not aggressive. They almost sounded like soothing sounds. A mother bear hushing her cubs. It leaned right in then and sniffed her.
Oh my God, it’s going to eat me.
Her breath came in staccato huffs and her chest hurt as she gasped repeatedly. When it licked its lips and lowered its head, Charlie lost all hope. A strange, rushing sound echoed in her ears, and sparks danced in front of her eyes as her world faded to black.