MARKED

FOUR

❰Meliora❱  

As I lay there plotting my defense, I saw a body run towards me with great speed. I had to really squint my eyes to see what it was and before I could figure out, it had already jumped over me and was now standing between the man and me.

In a whisk, I turned around and gasped at the sight. My heart beats got faster and chaotic and my body heated up in response to the terror I felt building inside of me. It was the same wolf that had attacked me two days ago.

It stood tall with its hair bristled, its back facing me. This was definitely not a regular wolf, it was much bigger. He would be almost my size if I stood up. Its tail pointed straight out and ears pointed sideways as it snarled at the man, bearing its teeth. It was angry, you could tell. 

The man only flinched whereas I had already started counting the ways I'd die and which body part would be ripped off of me first. How could someone look so unfazed by the beast that stood in front of us? When the man didn't move, the wolf snarled again. This time, it bent it's front legs as if ready to pounce. A look of fear crossed the man's face as the reality of the situation set in. Then, he just backed away till he was far enough and quickly disappeared. 

Oh my God! What had just happened? Had the wolf already claimed me as its kill? I had read online that wolves usually protected their kill from other animals. Is that what the wolf was doing? If so, I was surely going to die tonight.

The wolf turned around with its canines still showing; it sent chills down my spine. Please, dear God. Don't let me die tonight. I prayed and backed away, my grip on the flashlight tightening as the animal took a step towards me. The flashlight could've helped me against the man, but against a giant wolf, I had no chance.

I weighed my options. I couldn't run, it would chase me down. I couldn't fight it, I lacked the instruments and the skills. I could play dead but it was too late. My only option seemed to be surrendering. 

The wolf shook its head vigorously as if to shake something off. Now when it looked at me, its teeth were hidden and its ears pointed to the front. It looked calm, almost pacific. Its eyes shined a bright golden against the dim light of my flashlight.

The wolf looked me in the eye, a paralyzing gaze, and I found my nerves instantly calming. Those eyes were so captivating. Of all the episodes on Nat-Geo, I had never seen a wolf like this ever!

Now that I felt calm, I took notice of its fur; it was a unique blend of colors.

The face was framed by a darker shade of brown around its forehead that formed a giant T that extended till the bridge of the nose. A bright shade of copper helped in graduating the darker brown to the ivory around its jaw. Its golden eyes were defined by a dark line around them and then blended into light washes of brown. It almost gave out a highlighted effect. Even though ivory dominated its chest, it still had hints of darker and lighter browns on it. It looked magnificent.

The wolf lightly chuffed and started walking in another direction, leaving me furrowing my eyebrows. Its lack of interest confused me as much as it intrigued me. If it wasn't planning on killing me, why had it attack me two nights ago and why had it driven the man away tonight? It just didn't make sense.

I found myself drawn to the wolf so I followed it at a distance, curious to know and learn more about it. After all, this was my first wolf encounter and as a future animal behaviorist, I had to know why it behaved in a contradicting way.

Every time its paws hit the ground, they made a thumping sound loud enough to wake the birds up. I noticed that its paws were almost twice the size of my palms. How did a giant wolf like this stay hidden from us for so long? I surely would've known if we had found a wolf like this in our town. Perhaps it had migrated, or worse lost its way.

The wolf looked in my direction and let out a woof. It sounded like a warning or the sound of annoyance, I couldn't really tell.

If it was a warning, I wasn't terrified anymore. I should've been, but for some reason all my nerves were calm. Somehow, I knew although it had attacked me two nights ago, it wasn't going to hurt me. Also, the wolf didn't really do anything even after I kept following so I just assumed it was okay.

"You seem to be alone. Where's your pack?" I asked, mostly to myself. It was well known that wolves traveled in packs. Maybe this one was a lone wolf. Would explain the impulses. 

The wolf kept walking with its tail downward, informing me that it was at peace. So, I kept following it at a safe distance; I wasn't going to push my luck so far.

"I wonder if you're a male or a female. I'm guessing a she-wolf," I said. I didn't want to look between its legs, that was a gross violation of its privacy. The wolf turned to look at me and growled as if it was offended.

"What? You should be happy I didn't...wait! Did you just respond to me?" My eyes widened as I realized it had. He chuffed again. Oh my God! I spoke to a wolf and it responded! Was that even possible? I knew that they could understand our gestures, but language? This had to be a topic of further research.

"Do you understand everything we say?" I asked him. I figured if he growled at the mention of a she-wolf, I must've hurt his ego. Men! I rolled my eyes. He internally rumbled and I took it as a confirmation. Wow! Could wolves understand our language? Why had no one ever discovered this yet? That got me thinking, did every wolf understand?

"Do all the wolves understand our language?" I asked him. He made a noise that sounded more of a grumble than anything. What did it mean? Yes or no? What was I supposed to decipher from a grumble? I rolled my eyes. What had my life come to? I was talking to a wolf in the middle of the night.

My eyes widened. s**t! I was supposed to find my necklace. I looked around. I didn't even know where I was at this moment; I had blindly followed the wolf. I turned around and hoped we only came straight from where I met him. Great! Now I was lost.

The wolf suddenly stopped in his tracks, his tail pointing straight out. His ears had pulled to the sides as he smelled something in the air. Had he found something? Perhaps another prey? He suddenly turned towards me with hooded eyes.

You need to leave. They're coming.

I could hear a heavy voice say, but there was no one around except the wolf. My eyes widened as realization hit me. The wolf had spoken to me! He had spoken to me not through his mouth but through his mind. What the actual f**k? Was I going crazy? I definitely was. This had to be a hallucination. There was no way a wolf could telepathically talk to me and understand everything I said. When I registered that in my head, I immediately freaked out thinking to myself that none of this was real.

Run!

He snarled, sending a current of electricity tingling through my body. I could feel the adrenaline pumping through my veins as I kicked my feet in motion and ran as fast as I could.

Turn left.

I heard his voice in my head and momentarily lost my balance. I may have scratched my knee against the roots of a tree but I didn't have time to sit and cry out about it. I had heard the sounds and the ruffling. There was definitely something else in these woods and it was not alone. I looked back and saw the wolf behind me.

I took the left as he had asked me to and ran as quick as I could until I saw the road. Heaving a sigh of relief, I rushed towards it. The wolf howled and after a few minutes, I heard a series of howls. So he wasn't a lone wolf after all.

A giant figure thumped right in front of me and took me by surprise. Unable to control my feet, I stumbled and twisted my ankle in the process. I yelped out in pain as I fell. With the amount of pain throbbing through my feet, there was a possibility of a cracked or broken leg. 

I looked at the figure and let my fear engulf me. This was not a bear or any other giant animal I had known, this was a monster. It was six, maybe seven feet tall with a giant human-like figure with two legs and what seemed like two hands, except it was a lot hairier. The face though, the face was that of an animal.

Oh my God! This was a werewolf! No, no. This is just a hallucination, this is not real, werewolves do not exist. I kept telling myself as I crawled backward to keep as much distance as I possibly could. Looking at its face didn't convince me at all that this was not real because the werewolf was just beats away from ripping my head off.

Think Meliora! Think. I told myself. What the hell was I supposed to think? I was a person of science, I used to ridicule Ethan's every attempt to convince me to even watch one of those wolfy movies. I didn't know how to fight a werewolf! Until tonight, I didn't even know wolves could understand human language and talk to us in telepathy.

I somehow managed to get myself on my feet. I didn't understand my own plan here because there was no way I could look bigger than a werewolf if that even intimidated them at all. I got my answer seconds later when it threw me with one hand motion.

The werewolf had only taken a step towards me when it was tackled from the side by the wolf I had spoken to. Both of them hit the ground with a thud, the wolf over the werewolf. Soon, they erupted into a full-fledged fight and each threw the other a claw. They had drifted away so I limped behind them even it wasn't a safe or sane decision.

By now, each of them had scored mild scratches on each other's body. The wolf took a leap and landed a massive scratch on the werewolves arms. I could see the blood oozing from it. When he went for another one, the werewolf used its other arm and sent him flying.

Before I could even limp myself out, the wolf came flying in my direction and sent me knocking to the ground. The extreme force caused me to hit my head hard, again.

This time though, the pain was everywhere. I felt like I had easily broken a rib or two. The wolf whimpered as if in pain himself but stood up immediately. He looked at me with wide curious eyes and I wouldn't be able to tell it was a concerned look if it wasn't for the whining.

I nodded my head lightly to tell him I was okay when in reality, I wasn't. I had to really fight to keep my eyes open, stay conscious. Maybe he sensed that too but he went back to fight the beast. I tried to focus on the brown furred animal that had saved my life twice tonight but I found myself drifting until everything went black again.