Marked in Flesh Read online

  “Should I put in some cans of soup?” Shelley asked.

  “Nothing we need to cook or heat in order to eat,” Jesse snapped in reply. She set her full crates by the door, then went into the back room and returned with a daypack, her rifle, and two boxes of ammunition.

  Shelley’s eyes widened. “Jesse?”

  “You got that crate filled? Then go grab your purse and be back here in five minutes. I mean it, Shelley. Five minutes. Then we head out.”

  “Head out where?”

  “Clock’s ticking.” Hide the puppies. Hide the children. The words were a whip that wouldn’t relent until she obeyed.

  The alarm bell stopped ringing. Jesse walked to the middle of the street and looked at the people who were waiting for an explanation. “We have to evacuate. A cassandra sangue called me to give warning.” And I don’t know what it cost Meg Corbyn to give that warning.

  “What’s the warning, Jesse?” Phil Mailer asked.

  “Death. Traps. Fire. It’s coming for us.” Maybe already found some of us.

  Couldn’t think about that.

  Billy Rider had taken a wagon and team of horses from the livery stable and drove up to the general store. “Tried to get hold of Tobias,” he told Jesse. “Tom Garcia said some kind of miniature twister tore up a bit of fence and spooked the horses, so the men are out rounding them up. I told him about the alarm. He said he’s staying at the ranch, but he’ll be on the lookout for trouble and will ring the bell there if he sees anything. Ellen Garcia is driving in to meet up with you. She’ll bring her kids and any terra indigene youngsters she spots on the way.”

  Wasn’t likely that Ellen would find many terra indigene youngsters that far from their settlement without any adults nearby, but every warning was better than none.

  Prairie Gold’s small bus and the minivan that served as a taxi pulled up.

  “Stop dawdling and get on the damn bus,” Jesse snapped at Shelley and Abigail Burch. “We have got to move.” She pointed at the taxi. “Swing around that end of town and pick up whoever you can. The bus will head toward the hills and pick up the folks at that end.”

  Phil Mailer stepped in front of her. “Who else can I contact? I’ll send out messages until the wires go down. You’ve had the most experience with the terra indigene, so you need to go. But some of us are going to stay. This is our town, our home. These buildings are packed to the rafters with supplies that we need to see us through the next year. I’m not letting some yahoos burn us out.”

  Murmurs of agreement from other men.

  “Go on now, Jesse. Go and do what you can for all of us.”

  Nothing to say to that, so she climbed onto the wagon seat beside Billy Rider and led the women and children into the hills—and wondered if there would be anything left when they returned.

  • • •

  Joe howled, then waited for a response. He howled again.

  He heard the Song of Battle and ran in that direction.

 

  Joe slowed to a trot.

 

  His ribs tightened and he struggled to breathe.

 

 

  Having made his choice, Joe ran hard and fast to find the pack before the humans sprang the trap.

  CHAPTER 33

  Firesday, Juin 22

  Vlad rushed into the sorting room, then stopped when he caught the stink of vomit that almost overwhelmed the scent of Meg’s blood.

  “What . . . ?” Simon stopped beside him. “Nathan heard a phone ringing just after he stopped the Robert from running into the street. Jake heard it too.”

  Vlad stared at the razor on the table. “Go after Meg. I’ll try to find out who called.”

  “She didn’t speak.” Simon wrinkled his nose and took a step away from the vomit. “She saw the visions.”

  “She’s scared sick. You have to find her before she gets hurt.”

  Simon pulled off his clothes and tossed them aside. Then he shifted to Wolf and ran out of the Liaison’s Office.

  Vlad pulled a section of newspaper out of the recycling crate and dropped it over the vomit. He would clean up the mess later. Right now, they needed answers.

  As he reached for the telephone, Pete Denby stormed into the room.

  “Gods above and below! I know they were playing where they weren’t supposed to, but they’re just kids, and I was coming down to deal with it. Did Nathan have to throw Robert to the ground like that? The kids are terrified.”

  “The next time we won’t stop your pup from running into the street,” Vlad snapped. “Don’t leave your young by themselves until they’ve learned to avoid the things that will kill them.”

  Pete drew in a breath, then made a face. In that moment, Vlad saw the man replace the father.

  “What happened?”

  “Don’t know yet, but Meg is running scared. Is there a way to find out who called her, or is that something only the police can do?”

  “There’s a way unless she placed a call afterward. Then you would need the police to get records from the telephone company.” Pete joined Vlad at the counter and pointed to a small button beneath the others on the phone. “I would try ‘redial’ first and see what you get.”

  He pushed the button and listened to the phone ring and ring and ring.

  “Walker’s General Store.”

  A beat of silence before Vlad said, “Tolya?”

  “Did Meg Corbyn say anything else?”

  A chill went through Vlad. “She’s not saying anything at the moment.”

  “The Wolves are running into a trap. Joe Wolfgard is trying to stop them. The town is preparing for attack. Jesse Walker is taking all the youngsters to a hiding place in the Elder Hills.”

  “Who is with you?”

  “The men in the town. Vlad, are the humans going after all the Wolves? Or are they after all of us?”

  “I don’t know. Do what you can, Tolya, and I’ll do the same.” He hung up.

  “Bad?” Pete asked.

  “Very.” He opened Meg’s address book, found the number for Sweetwater, and dialed.

  “What?” A male voice, already stirred up and angry.

  “This is Vlad Sanguinati at the Lakeside Courtyard. Can you get a message to Jackson Wolfgard? It’s urgent.”

  “Lakeside? Has your prophet pup gone crazy too? Jackson’s pup ran in here all pee-stinky, called someone, and then ran away yelling that they had to hide. Some of the Ravengard are following her to make sure she gets back to the Wolfgard den.”

  “Tell Jackson that the terra indigene and the Intuits are in danger. The other kind of humans have turned on us.”

  “I— I’ll tell him.”

  Vlad hung up and looked at Pete, who was sickly pale. “Where are your offspring?”

  “Lorne from the Three Ps came out to help. He took them to the medical office.”

  “The Lizzy too?”

  Pete nodded.

  “Keep them there until I say otherwise.”

  Vlad left the Liaison’s Office, turned to smoke, and raced off in the direction of the Wolfgard Complex.

  • • •

  Skidding to a stop in front of the Wolfgard Complex, Meg flung herself out of the BOW and screamed, “Sam! Sam!”

  He ran to greet her, followed by the other puppies and Skippy.

  Meg opened the back of the BOW. “Get inside, Sam. Get inside. We have to run. We have to hide.”

  He jumped into the BOW and immediately went to the passenger seat. The other pups hesitated, sensing something wrong in
her behavior.

  “Skippy. Come on,” Meg panted. As soon as he jumped in the back, she grabbed a pup and tossed her into the BOW. Then another and another and the last one.

  “Meg?” Jane, the Wolfgard bodywalker, hurried toward her in human form while the pack’s nanny rushed toward her, snarling. “Meg, what are you doing?”

  “We have to run!” Meg screamed. She closed the BOW’s back door.

  “You’re bleeding.”

  “We have to hide.” She fell into the driver’s seat, started the BOW, and shot away from the Wolfgard Complex. Sam whined and Skippy arrooed, which started the rest of the pups howling.

  “Quiet! We have to be quiet!” Where to go? Where could they hide from an enemy who could do . . .

  Meg swallowed hard and drove blindly and recklessly along the dirt trails that were barely wide enough for even a vehicle as small as the BOW. She glanced in the side mirror once and saw Wolves chasing the BOW. But not the Wolf she needed to see.

  “Simon,” she whispered.

  Then the trail ended at a dip in the land. She drove the BOW into the dip, bouncing on the way down. Flinging the driver’s side door open, she tumbled out of the BOW and ran to the back to open that door. As the rest of the pups and Skippy leaped out of the back, she grabbed Sam, who was more than a double armful now, and staggered a few steps away from the BOW.

  Shaking, she sank to the ground and held on to him. Had to hide because she’d seen . . .

  Her stomach rose, and she threw up over both of them.

  • • •

  Simon sniffed around the Wolfgard Complex. Where was Meg? Where were the other Wolves?

  Nathan said.

 

 

 

  Simon lifted his muzzle, intending to howl. If the other Wolves had followed Meg, their reply would help him pinpoint where she was in the Courtyard. But he stopped before the sound rose. Why were the other Wolves silent? Why wasn’t Sam howling?

  He and Nathan followed the road, running toward the Hawkgard part of the Courtyard. They had to find Meg. There weren’t that many roads in the Courtyard that could accommodate a vehicle, even one as small as a BOW.

  Jenni Crowgard flew toward him.

  Nathan said.

  Jenni flew over their heads, back the way she’d come.

  When he reached the spot, he raced down the incline. How had Meg gotten the BOW down there? And how were they going to get it out?

  He slowed down to avoid stepping on the pups who were sufficiently scared now that they wouldn’t move far enough away from Meg to receive protection from Jane or the nanny. The rest of the adult Wolves remained on the incline in a protective circle, with Blair and Nathan at the top keeping watch.

  Sam gave him a pathetic look.

 

  The cut along her jaw was starting to clot, but her neck was streaked with blood and her shirt reeked of vomit, erasing the usual lure of her blood’s scent.

  Pretty sure that she was too sick to be confused about him being naked, Simon shifted to human and crouched beside her. “Meg? What did you see?”

  “We have to hide. Have to hide from . . .” She retched. Sam whined. The other pups backed away, finally seeking protection from the adult Wolves.

  “Who has to hide?” Simon asked.

  “We do. The Wolves.” She focused on him. Her eyes looked weird—too big, too black instead of gray. “Joe’s face looks like that.”

  Like what? Simon wondered. Before he could ask Vlad was beside him, reaching past him to wrap a hand around Meg’s arm.

  Vlad said. Then to Meg, “Did you see anything about the rest of us? Meg? Do the rest of us need to hide or just the Wolves?”

  She stared at Vlad with eyes so blank Simon wondered if something had broken inside her brain.

  “Just . . . Wolves,” she finally said. “And people living in little wood houses.” A pause. “Cabins. Fire. Burning.”

  “Okay.” Vlad gave her arm a gentle squeeze before releasing it. “The Wolves will hide with you until it’s safe. The rest of us will send the warning to as many packs as we can.”

  Simon looked at Vlad.

  Vlad replied grimly.

  Joe’s face looks like that.

  Vlad rose, his legs already shifted to smoke.

  Everything he and the rest of the terra indigene in Lakeside had tried to do by working with humans was breaking apart. How far was it going to break?

  He shifted back to Wolf form, instinctively understanding that it would calm Meg.

  Vlad said.

 

  The Sanguinati shifted all the way to smoke and raced over the ground.

  Blair reported.

  Jenni said as she, Starr, and Jake perched in the nearby trees.

  Sam whimpered.

  He didn’t want to lick the pup either. And they would need to wash any of the other pups who were splattered with puke. For now, there was nothing any of the Wolves could do.

  Resisting the temptation to lick her neck clean of dried blood and ignoring the bad scent of vomit, Simon rested his head on Meg’s shoulder, offering silent comfort—and trying not to think too much about what was happening to the Wolfgard in other parts of Thaisia.

  CHAPTER 34

  Firesday, Juin 22

  Jackson trotted back to the Wolfgard cabin. While troubling, the meeting with the Panthergard had gone well. Only one of the Cats now living in the Sweetwater area had gone through the first level of a human-centric education—enough to read, write, and do sums, as well as speak with humans and make a purchase at a trading post.

  Enough education to distinguish between normal human activity like farming and tending animals and activity that felt . . . wrong.

  Nothing suspicious around Sweetwater’s Intuit village, but that wasn’t true about Endurance, the closest human village. Something wasn’t right there. Something had changed. But it was like trying to hook your claws into air, hoping to catch hold of the problem and deal with it.

  one of the Ravens called.

  He ran toward the cabin, momentarily relieved when he spotted Grace. Then Hope burst into view looking as terrified as a fawn being run down by a Grizzly.

  “We have to hide!” Hope screamed. She ran past Grace, grabbing at the pups who had run to greet her. “We have to hide!”

  “Hope?” Grace said, her white hair gleaming in the sun.

  Jolting to a stop, Hope looked at Grace. “Fire. Death. We have to hide!” She ran toward the creek and the pups ran after her.

  Jackson told Grace.

  Grace pulled off her clothes, shifted to Wolf, and ran after the girl with the pack’s nanny and the juvenile Wolves following.

  Jackson rushed into Hope’s room in the Wolfgard cabin. Where had the girl been? She wasn’t supposed to go out of sight of the cabin without telling an adult Wolf.

  He stopped at the smell. Wasn’t Hope a little old to be piddling on the floor?

  Spotting the sc
atter of pencils and crayons, he moved cautiously around the bed—and smelled a hint of blood that was almost overwhelmed by the scent of urine.

  He came farther into the room, moving his feet with care to avoid stepping on Hope’s drawing supplies. When he lowered his head to sniff the floor for the blood smell, he spotted the drawings under her bed. He pulled out the intact drawing and then the pieces—and snarled.

  All the pups and juvenile Wolves in the Sweetwater pack. Dead. Mutilated. No wonder Hope wanted them to hide!

  Then he looked at the intact drawing. Meg Corbyn’s face in one corner. A hilltop view of the Intuit village at Sweetwater, all the buildings on fire. And filling the center of the paper . . .

  He wasn’t sure what he was seeing. It was like the drawing she did of the mound of bison except . . .

  Joe.

  Jackson tore out of the cabin and ran as if everything in his world depended on his speed . . . because, at that moment, it did.

  he called.

  Replies from the Ravengard, Hawkgard, Eaglegard.

 

  That was Grace.

 

 

  Who? How many?

  Reaching the communications cabin, he flung himself inside, shifting to human as he walked to the table that held the telephone and the computer.

  “Jackson?” The Hawk minding the cabin stared at him.

  Jackson stared back, then picked up the phone and called the number he had for Prairie Gold. Getting a busy signal, he hung up and called Howling Good Reads. No answer.

  As he stood there, he smelled Hope and urine.

  “The Hope pup was here?”

  The Hawk nodded. “She used the telephone. She said ‘Meg, run, hide, death,’ and then she ran away.”

  Jackson wrote a phone number on the pad of paper next to the phone. “Call this number. Keep trying until someone answers. Tell whoever answers, even if it’s a human, that the Wolves have to hide. They have to hide or they’re going to die.”