Blood-Stained Moon

Hide

A glisten in the distance, a body of water peeking through the treeline. A chance, a hope that watery sludge would mask our scent. I push forward with the last of my energy, my muscles fighting back in fatigue. One last push, nearly there.

The water opens up into a glimmering lake with several sprouting streams, a perfect place to confuse my trackers. With one last leap I throw myself in, hoping the water is deep enough without the time to check. With a struggle I wriggle against the mud to get deeper, my fur helping soak the water to weigh me down. I grasp onto any solid object I can, as I claw us forward through the lake bottom, pushing the mud into our undercoating.

It's not enough, not enough

Desperation bubbles through me, replacing the little oxygen in my lungs. Muffled shouting comes from above, distant splashes follow. I have to get deeper, make myself less visible. But I know that if I shift back my chances of survival lessen.

I'm sorry Wolfy

I have no choice, I shift back, my lungs burning as I run through what little I have left. I struggled forward still, in darkness, turning to coat my back in the sludge. Jagged rocks catch every part of my body, my fingers claw violently at everything, shredding in the process.

Stop, don't move, they're almost above us

My body convulses for breath, my heartbeat pounds in my ears. I flatten my body as far as I can into the mud and stop. It feels like hours ticking by and barely seconds at the same time. My lungs are screaming for air, fighting to breathe, but if I move they will find me. I don't know what they will do to me if they do. What stories will they tell about me, the lies? Ryan's disgusted face above me, Grace and Leon turning their backs, being left alone... Death, perhaps, is better than being alone. They would mourn for me, I hope.

I cannot hold on much longer, the darkness intensifies, roaring water in my ears. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry... wolfy, help me...

My stomach churns and throws its contents out, my heavy lungs pump the water out. I'm so confused, it takes seconds to remember. I was underwater, I was so tired. but why? Every inch of my muscles are on fire, violently cramping against every movement. Another wave takes me and I vomit again all over myself. I hear sounds against the pounding of my head, lights and colours in my eyes, a shape moving against my face. A touch against my skin, heat, I'm so cold. My body acclimates to the air and I shiver uncontrollably. A groan escapes my lips, I feel pain, overwhelming pain, and hurt. A vision of Greene smirking and a knife slashing, I jerk forward in panic. The shape in front of me turns into a face, a disfigured, contorted face. A huge scar running from the corner of their mouth up to the arch of their brow, a large burn mark across the other cheek stopping just below the eye. The skin puckering up at the sides as if it healed badly. The mouth contorted into a permanent lopsided smirk as they breathe heavily. The eyes look strangely familiar, a deep brown, hard inside. Droplets fall from her face, she brushes them away, making her hair fall forward from behind her ear. She leans closer to whisper "Shh, they're still close, stay down and quiet." my frantic gasping slows. The gears are clicking into place in my head, my eyes swivel to take in the scenery, it's dark still but small streams of moonlight flood down through the ceiling. My eyes begin to adjust gradually, the walls are of thick mud and roots, the damp smell of water, mildew and dirt in the air. The ceiling of roots intertwined and twisted together, a few dangling limply, soil scattered across lightly dusting the air, dancing in the tiniest light streams. Soil shakes down as thuds come from above, moving across, my body stiffens in defense and I look to Claire, her gaze also following the movements, her body crouched in defense. I avert my eyes and blush, her pale body streaked with water and mud unclothed. The pain radiating my body begins to settle into confined areas, my middle being the most concentrated. Once the sounds cease, Claire begins to move slowly from the corner of my eye, still crouched. Her body loosens "They're gone" she whispers lightly.

I let out a deep breath, ouch, and prop myself onto my elbows unsteadily. I blink repeatedly to process. I grimace when I come to the realisation that I am also completely naked. My legs and body are smothered in a mix of soil, mud and blood. My torso more so with blood. Teeth marks cover one side of my torso, curiosity makes me lightly trace the wound, I wince. " Uh, sorry about that Remy, I had to drag you by my teeth.". Claire looks directly at me and then to the wall to avert my nudity. I take a chance to explode "What the f*ck is going on Claire, why were you following me? Your face, that not fresh, when did that happen? Who? Why did you save me, where the hell are we and what-" She cuts me off with her hand. " You tell me Remilda. Do you think I'm as stupid as your friends are? I've been watching you since we got here." She pauses to sigh and touch her scar. " Same thing happened to me. I like to be alone, this-" She traces her hand along her gruesome scar "I like to be alone, nobody knows about this. Pretending to be shy all the time ugh. You think I like to wear my hair across my face? This is just what we get for being who we are, for being lowly." She spat. "I found this place by accident on the first day, snuck out for a run to find somewhere alone, got chased by patrol and fell through the ground. Don't know how long this has been here, it needed some work on it. Patched the hole I fell through, would have done more, but they've had eyes all over me- no thanks to you. Hardly anyone comes this far out at least, rounds once a night. It's kind of peaceful." She shrugs and throws something at me. "Here, it's not much, but it will cover you at least." I unfold a baggy jumper and pull it over my head with difficulty. I croaked out a thank you in return. Wolfy shifts around uneasily inside, making her distrust obvious.

"So... what now? What's going to happen if we go back? Can we go back? Do we become rogues? How would we even get off the territory without being killed? I didn't ask for any of this. " I suppressed a sob and stared intently at a long piece of root to distract myself from my inner turmoil. My head is spinning with possibilities, none of them ending well. "Well, there's not much they can do Remy. Technically, you've done nothing wrong. If they out you, then they're admitting to an attempt to scar you with silver. Heh, and a bond with the Alpha. They're not stupid enough to do that. Let's sleep a bit and sneak back in the morning for the breakfast shift. There's a half hour gap in security, nice little loophole to shift change." Claire grins contorting her scar into a grimace. " You're going to stay quiet about this, aren't you Remy? This is my little hideout, and my little plan. If you open your big mouth it'll ruin everything.", "Ruin what?" I ask puzzled. "Exactly". She holds a finger up to her mouth and gestures above. Paw thuds hit the overhead softly before fading from one end to the next. She walks to the other end quietly and grabs a lamp from next to a pile of rags and walks over to a broken table propped against roots. A striking sound comes next and the barely lit room fills with candlelight. My eyes adjust and I look around. The pile of rags consists of blankets and an old pillow. There's a rickety old wooden chair next to the broken table and some broken pieces of wood stacked against them. Claire grabs some clothes from the chair and hops into a hoodie and jeans. She pulls a watch from her hoodie pocket and fiddles around. "That was the midnight patrol, we have 4 hours before the morning patrol." She stops to suck her teeth and stares me up and down. "You better run fast and quiet Remy, it'll be close in timing between patrol here and the security gap at the castle. You mess this up for me, and I'll cut you myself, got it?" I nod vehemently.

She's crazy, I don't trust her.

I second that. I wonder who she was bonded to, to make her like this. She did save us though, we have to trust her enough to get through tonight.

My thoughts wander to Nathan and Roan. Our old Alpha or our Beta? Claire throws me a damp blanket to huddle under and sets her pillow and blankets down to make herself a bed. I find a sloped edge of the wall and curl up against it, my muscles are sore and stiff but already healing. I won't sleep easy.