SIX
The next morning Sarah and Connor met Patrick outside the lodge and Cecily arrived early on another train, which had been a day behind them. Sarah put a hand on the English girl’s shoulder and relinquished Cora, still bundled tightly in blankets, into her arms.
“I’ll look after her, mum,” she said, “you and the master, though. You be careful, hear? I don’t like this whole affair.”
“Neither do I, Cecily. Let’s hope it’s over soon,” she said.
Patrick had rented a 4x4 Jeep for their meeting and the couple squeezed inside. It was summer, but the morning was particularly chilly; the clouds had started to roil up on the horizon like a stew, bubbling black over the hills.
“Looks like it might rain,” Connor replied grimly.
“Hopefully, this’ll be over before that,” Patrick said, pushing the Jeep into drive and tearing off down the rough dirt road. Each jump seemed to rocket through the vehicle’s outdated springs, and Sarah felt her knees hit against the side of the door. “In any case, this will be a very delicate situation,” the ex-Senator went on, “I hope you two are up for it.”
“You called us, don’t forget,” Sarah chided, and saw Connor smile at her volatile remark.
They drove for almost half an hour, but it was slow going up an old logging road that circuited into the hillsides, and on more than one occasion, they almost got stuck in the ditch or high-centered on giant washouts that had split the road.
Finally, they arrived at a big turnaround surrounded by tall cedars on the uphill side and a vast clear-cut to their right on the downhill. It was maybe two years old, since there was still evidence of tracks and wrecked slash – but for the most part, life was trying to seed itself, and a canopy of ferns and wildflowers had sprung up among sapling trees.
“This is as far as it goes,” Patrick said, stepping out and stretching.
“Nice place for an ambush,” Connor replied.
“They wouldn’t dare.”
“I don’t see anyone,” Sarah said, stepping out. She had on a leather jacket like Connor’s, but black, and she undid the top strap that ran up one side.
Patrick scanned for a moment, his eyes trying to filter through the shapes above and below and finally he made a little gasp and pointed. They both followed his finger to where a large shape was regarding them. It was a Bear, female and grizzled, like someone had been chewing on her collar. One eye was shut tight, but it was impossible to tell whether it was injured or missing altogether.
“I guess this is it,” Connor said, starting to take off his clothes.
Sarah followed suit and soon the two of them were naked on the logging road. Connor reached out and touched her hand, and she nodded. Patrick backed up and watched as the two of them transformed. It had become a fluid process for both of them, as easily as one might put on or take off a pair of shoes. Connor’s form was a gaunt but muscular brown shape, with long legs and a wide torso, and he let out a little growl and sniffed fondly at the black bear beside him. In contrast, Sarah had always been a bit smaller, and like her hair in human form, every part of her fur was a sultry black. Almost like it was re-imagining what ‘black’ was – light didn’t even seem to reflect off of it, and save for her eyes and when she opened her mouth, it was like staring into a shadow.
They both approached slowly, loping toward the shape on the hill. As they neared, the other Bear suddenly grunted and turned, as if to lead them further back into the woods. Sarah perked her ears, trying to sense if there were others around, and almost lost her nerve – but beside her striding casually and with his muzzle set, Connor seemed to say without words that there was nothing to fear.
A few minutes later, they reached a clearing and the other Bear turned and quickly turned into her human form. She was a young woman, but there was a grit and toughness to her. Her slender body was a deeper tan than Sarah or Connor, who changed into human form as well.
Sarah noticed that the woman’s left eye was healed over, where she’d obviously lost it in a fight of some sort. She could make out scar tissue warped around the socket. Her hair was also long, but knotted into firm dreadlocks that bunched at the top of her head, and fell almost to her buttocks.
“I’m Connor, this is my mate Sarah.”
The woman didn’t seem to register anything, but glared at them.
“You are part of the Bloodweres, are you not?” Sarah asked, taking a step forward. The woman recoiled a bit, and her small breasts hung on either side of her body. Unlike Sarah’s, which were already large and full before she’d started nursing Cora, the woman’s seemed to sag uncomfortably.
“Damon was right. You actually came,” the woman suddenly smiled, and Sarah decided she didn’t like the look of it, “amazing. Such arrogance.”
“We seek peace with the Bloodweres,” Connor interrupted, “we know that it was you who burned the chalet. We hold no grudges about that – it was our belief that you wanted to become a part of the tribe again. There is no schism anymore. Clawgrove and Greyback are as one. We welcome the Bloodweres as well.”
The woman laughed. “Welcome us? Do you not know who we are? We are Blood. We live here, free of restraint. Free from the pompous decadence of your so-called tribe. Damon was right about you… you are not only arrogant, you’re stupid as well.”
Sarah felt a knot grow in her stomach. Things were not going according to plan, and she could sense Connor planting his feet as well, bearing down should the situation turn ugly.
“Then why did you burn the chalet?”
The woman turned and glared again at Sarah, her teeth flashing. She was filthy, Sarah realized – it wasn’t so much a tan as layers of accumulated dirt and grime. She’d probably been living as a Bear for months, if not longer. Even now, she seemed a bit unsteady on two legs.
“To bring you here. Damon knew. He always knows. He knew you’d come.”
“Connor,” Sarah whispered over her shoulder.
He sensed her fright and narrowed his eyes. “I want to meet Damon.”
“That’s an honor that may come to you one day, Clawgrove whelp,” she bit off the words, “but it will be your final hour. Mark it. By now, his plan has already been put into action. You’re too late.”
Panic gripped Sarah and she thought about Cora – an image of the small girl twisted in her gut and she let out a little whimper as Connor approached and steadied her, and then marched firmly up to the woman. The woman was much smaller in comparison and her eyes grew large as he grabbed her by the shoulders and thrust her hard against the trunk of a cedar.
“What plan?!”
The woman didn’t say anything, but cautiously her eyes fell back on Sarah, and it was obvious what the Bloodwere’s mysterious plan had been. Cora.
“Oh god, Connor,” she said.
Connor growled and looked back at the woman who glowered at him with an evil grin. He swiped at her with an open hand and the crack of his slap echoed through the woods. The woman was hurled like wet laundry into a bed of moss by the power of his strike, and lay there, unconscious.
Sarah took off at a run, her bare feet slipping on twigs and could feel the skin tear and rip as she ran with Connor close behind, calling her name.
It had been a trap. At the landing, the Jeep was sabotaged – most of the engine had been ripped out by what looked like claws, and bent over in human form on his back Patrick laid against the side of the tire. He had several vertiginous grooves in his belly and chest, and was breathing hard as they landed on their knees and tried to prop him up.
“Bastards!” Connor shouted.
“I… I think I was wrong, Connor,” he said, “Please forgive me. I only wanted… only wanted peace. That’s all I’ve ever wanted. For the good of the tribe.”
“I know,” his son said, bending down.
“Don’t speak, you’re hurt badly,” Sarah said, pulling back his open vest to get a look at the wounds. He had already bled profusely, and she knew that the wounds were fatal. Connor also must have known, but he didn’t let it show on his face.
“They came all at once, before I could change,” he wheezed, his breath becoming a labored gasp, “I tried to fight them off, but there were too many. You have to… have to go. It was all a trap, a way to lure us away… they’re after the child.”
Sarah grabbed their clothes from the back of the Jeep and pushed them against Patrick’s wounds, forcing him to gasp in pain, and she started to cry as she worked to tend to him. Big hot tears plummeted over her cheeks as she tried to restrain her sobs.
“There is only this,” Patrick said, reaching up with a palsied hand and touching her cheek, “don’t cry, my daughter. Go… now… save them.”
Patrick Clawgrove died with a smile on his lips and a slow exhalation that tapered off and then he was still. Connor merely stared at his father, his eyes clouded over, and a grim resolve settled behind them like sediment in a river. Sarah saw his fist tighten into a ball, turning white and shaking, and several drops of blood oozed from between his fingers.
Gently he touched his father’s forehead and kissed him and stood up. Sarah wept again, her sobs choking in her throat. Connor reached out and grabbed her hand, and suddenly took off at a sprint. She followed behind, letting him drag her for several meters down the road.
He turned back once, and she steeled herself and increased her pace so that both of them were running side-by-side. Then, almost as if on cue, both fell to all fours, and without breaking pace became Bears again. Their black and brown shapes sped downhill, their claws tearing into the earth with fresh resolve – all Sarah could think about was Cora.
Heaven help them if they’ve touched her, she thought to herself, until it became a mantra in her head, synced to the beat of her heart and the movement of her paws. Heaven help them all.
*
By time they reached the edge of town, Sarah knew something was wrong – there was a lot of shouting, and smoke had started to cinder up into the air like a black drill. The smell clogged her senses, and she sped up, racing ahead of Connor. From the top of the hill through the trees, she could make out men and women running to and fro, and it looked like an antiquated fire engine had been called out of retirement to help put out the blaze that was racing through a number of buildings.
Including the lodge, Sarah realized,with a pang of fear and panic that swept through her. She lunged down the hill and would have barrowed right into town if a huge paw hadn’t reached out and pulled her back into the shadows of the trees.
She turned viciously, growling at Connor. He simply regarded her with his usual calm and stoic expression, and she realized he’d pulled her back because she was still a Bear. It would only deepen issues if she appeared in town as a raging furred creature. Although it will still be odd, a naked couple running into town, she thought.
They changed back and Connor grabbed her hand, pulling her out of the woods and down a back alley. As luck would have it no one saw them, and they would have been too busy dealing with the fire to really care. They ran again, skirting a street, and headed toward the hill where the lodge was. Even from here they could see it had all but burned to the ground. There was smoking wreckage and a number of figures gathered – they all looked to belong to either the Greyback envoy or Patrick’s.
When Sarah and Connor arrived, breathing hard and panting, it was a relief to see that no one from the town had made it up yet. The lodge was just one of many buildings on fire, and she supposed the lodge didn’t take precedence.
“What the hell happened?” Connor bellowed.
One of the envoys, Sarah’s trainer from the past, Marcus, approached holding his side, and held out a simple black uniform. Connor took it with a growl and pulled it on, and held out the other to Sarah who absently tried to cover her form.
“You’re hurt,” Sarah said.
“It was an ambush, m’lady,” he growled, and she could see blood coming out between his fingers, “it was the Bloodweres, alright. Right after you left, they hit us in full force.”
“Where’s Cora?”
He flinched at the question, and Connor let out another growl. “We… we don’t know. We think they took her.”
Connor’s hands pulled at his lapel, and he grunted. Sarah tried to keep her composure and touched Connor’s hand. “No,” she said, “it’s not his fault.”
“It is, m’lady,” Marcus insisted, “I was tasked with the protection of the family. I failed in that. Do as you will, my liege. Otherwise, I shall do it myself.”
Connor’s giant hands slowly relaxed. “No, I’m sorry, Marcus.”
“Where did they take my baby?” Sarah pleaded.
“We don’t know. But we think this,” he waved at the whole village below in smoke and fire, “was just a ploy. We think they were after Cora all along.”
“Why??”
Connor reached out and held Sarah who was on the verge of hysterics, and she shook, her eyes wide and flummoxed, and suddenly afraid.
“We don’t know,” Marcus said.
Sarah rushed forward to where a group was bent over another figure. As they cleared, she saw it was Cecily – poor innocent Cecily, who was not a Bear herself, but who had served the Greybacks her whole life. Sarah felt another shock of rage quiver into her fingertips as she knelt over her beloved friend and touched her face.
“Cecily,” she cried, “my poor Cecily.”
The maid had been hit in the abdomen, much like Patrick. There was too much blood, and Sarah felt another sting – she had already seen death today, the idea of seeing it again, in the face of someone she loved beyond words, was too much. She sobbed, her shoulders quaking.
“S’okay, m’lady‘tis a scratch,” Cecily said bravely, and her face changed. “The baby. They took the baby. I’m so so sorry. I tried to stop them, I did. But they were too strong, Bears, all of them.”
She wouldn’t have stood a chance, Sarah realized.
“You were so brave, my love,” Sarah said, stroking the young girl’s forehead, “the bravest girl I know.”
“That’s kind of you to say, mum,” she said, “but I don’t feel brave. I’m scared.”
Sarah knelt down with a sincere smile, and the maid closed her eyes. It took Sarah several minutes to stand back up, and when she did, everyone around her took a step back, as if at any moment she might explode. She was like a tempest, a swirling wrath of fury bubbling in the ether. They had never seen Sarah truly angry – but as she turned and marched back toward Connor she was not the same woman. Something had changed in her, something had snapped.
No, rather something had wrung itself in her, tight and bundled like a rope that would support the vengeance of both parents. She stood in front of Connor, who stared straight ahead, his own visage one of contempt and revenge. The charred remains of the lodge smoldered and Marcus followed his gaze. He was looking out the way he’d come, into the dark depths of the Canadian wilderness where his father had died. Where the Bloodweres had started something they could not undo.
Sarah put her head straight against his collarbone and closed her eyes – his hand came up and touched the back of her head and they stood there motionless.
“What are your orders, my liege?” Marcus asked.
“You, sit down and have someone take a look at that,” Connor said flatly, “we still need you. And I’m not losing any more of my kin today.”
Sarah looked up at him. “What about Cora?”
“The Bloodweres want a war with the Clawgroves and the Greybacks,” he replied in the same monotone voice, but there was something portentous in his throat now, something sharp that promised to cut through the cords of the world. “They’ve got one.”
***
The rest of the day was spent dealing with the arson. Eventually the fire engine from below came up, but by then the Greyback entourage had retreated back down to the village. There was nothing left of the lodge, anyhow. Now it hung above the village like a smoldering reminder of what they’d lost. It was also a beacon, a way of bolstering their hatred and anger into something productive.
There were relatively few casualties, but each time Connor saw another sheet draped over a body, his face only strained harder. They haven’t just attacked us, they’ve brought this outside the realm of Bears, and into humans, Sarah realized. If there was one thing worse than killing another Bear, it was killing a human. There could be no turning back.
In one of the old warehouses that housed some machinery, the entourage mingled with survivors from the fire, and Connor tried to mediate his own resources. Some of his guards, including Marcus would keep an eye out for any other Bloodweres, while some of the maids and other envoys would assist with finding food and blankets, and tending to the wounded.
A few triage tents were arranged, but resources were limited. Marcus made sure that all the most heavily injured were taken by the few transport vehicles in town to a bigger city. In the meantime, everyone else would be on their own. If the Bloodweres came back, they’d have even fewer people and vehicles with which to retaliate. Connor, as well as Sarah, suspected that that wasn’t the case.
For Sarah, time passed as slowly as ever – and yet, before she knew it, the sun was in the west again. She knew that she was in shock, and this was what shock felt like. A kind of muted hopelessness, like there was nothing she could do. She could only wait, try to be useful. The whole time, her mind was filled with death and Cora. It wasn’t just Cecily and Patrick, although their faces were frozen in her heart – it was Caroline, too.
But Cora, every time she thought about her baby, something shifted in her stomach and she felt like throwing up. She valued the sensation of being in shock because she knew that when it wore off, she would be even more of a mess. She didn’t want to feel; it was better to feel empty, hollow, like this. Now, as she went outside and sat down on the curb of the street, and looked up she knew that it was coming back.
She cried into her hands, weeping until there were no tears. Connor finally found her and wrapped his arm around her.
“It’s going to be okay,” he promised, “we’ll find her. I promise. I swear to you.”
“Why did they take her??” she half sobbed again, “she’s just a child!”
“They must have a reason… and that means they don’t want to hurt her. She’s okay, I promise you. And we will get her back.”
“It’s all my fault, Connor.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m the one who said that I should accompany you. I’m the one that brought Cora along. It was all a trap, meant for her. And I led Cora into it and tripped the trap shut.”
He made a shushing sound and brought her head closer to his, hugging her more tightly as a fresh stream of tears erupted out of her eyes and her face contorted. “That’s not true. None of this is your fault. You love Cora, as I love you. You would never do anything to hurt her, I know that. What happened, was the Bloodweres.”
“I brought her here,” she insisted.
“You came with me to protect me,” he said, “because you knew that the hope of peace was worth it. You, me, Cora, we’re a family. We’re always together.”
“Oh, Connor, I’m so scared, what if they hurt her?”
He shushed again, and rocked her gently back and forth on the curb. “Not going to happen,” he said, “I made a promise to you once that I would always protect you, no matter what; that I would never leave you. I made that promise to Cora, too. I’m not in the habit of breaking my promises.”
He leaned over her and kissed her and she kissed him back, touching his bristled face.
“I’m ugly right now, don’t kiss me.”
“You’re the most beautiful woman in the world,” he said, “and you’re my wife.”
“They have a day head-start on us. You don’t think they’re coming back?”
“You heard Cecily… I think they meant to take Cora. In which case, they probably want us to follow them.”
“We should have left immediately.”
“And leave everyone here… to die, or worse? You couldn’t do that. Neither could I. That’s what makes us good and decent people. You can try to pretend that you’re not, but I know that you are.”
“What are we doing to do?”
He looked up at the stars and pointed. “You see that? Big dipper. You know the Latin name for that constellation?”
“Ursa major,” she replied.
“That’s right. The large Bear in the heavens. Sailors and explorers would often use the stars to steer their way. They could look up, no matter where they were, and the stars were always there… like a fixed point. A landmark one could use to find their way home.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The Bloodweres are clumsy. They’ve been Bears for so long they’ve forgotten what it means to be in balance with their human side. That will be their downfall. I intend to find them using their weakness.”
“What weakness is that?”
He grinned. “They stink,” he said, and then elaborated, “you smelled that girl earlier right? The one without an eye? What did she smell like?”
“Like… like this place. Like smoke. Like burning.”
“That’s right. It’s a crude way of stirring up trouble, but effective, I’ll grant them that. But that girl hadn’t bathed in weeks. She reeked, and the reek of smoke had stuck to her skin. I would venture a guess that she was among the group that set the chalet on fire.”
“So, you think the Bears who set the village on fire probably smell like smoke, too?”
“If they’re as ragged and filthy as that girl, I sure do. We’ll set out at first light, follow them by Bear-sign. We won’t stop until we find Cora and bring her back to us. I won’t stop until you’re both safe with me.”
She leaned into his arm and gulped. She felt a bit better talking to him, even if she knew that he was trying to give her hope, where perhaps there wasn’t any. It was still a comfort. She took in a deep breath and wiped at her cheeks and eyes.
“Then we run, my love.”