Fever

In those seconds it took for the wolves to peel open the roof, there was so much commotion that I couldn’t distinguish my pulse from the falling debris. I felt Emily’s hand on mine, I felt the floor shake as it broke beneath their giant paws, but I couldn’t feel my own heart. Through the doorway, it felt like a separate world falling apart just outside of my grasp. It felt like all I had to do was shut the door and it was over. But it had spotted me, spotted all of us, and its piercing eyes would not leave me.

Of all the fear I had felt in the past few months, this would have been the moment where it should have reached its climax. But I felt nothing but Emily’s hand – soft, warm, and stiff with shock, or maybe it was fear that had her paralysed. I had felt so much, been afraid and happy and nervous and guilty, but in those blue eyes I felt nothing as I knelt there at Sam’s bedside. Maybe I had reached the climax where all my fear had run out. Maybe this was what everyone felt before they died – not afraid, but absolutely nothing.

I met that stare, the one that was meant to chill me to the bone. I wasn’t going to die with my eyes closed, lips trembling in fear. I was going to go the way Jacob would want me to. The vicious sounds that fell from its gnashing mouth shook the doorframe and with a grunt and a swipe, the wall splintered and was knocked aside as if it were nothing. Pieces of drywall and wood bombarded the three of us, causing me to fall back against Emily. It advanced with its hot breath hitting us, sticking to my skin. As it opened its mouth, I swore I heard it laugh. I caught my breath in my chest, holding onto it, as it was probably my last. In that moment everything grew still, just as I imagined it would, I started to tremble.

But the tremors shot up my arm that connected with Emily’s, with Sam. He was shaking all over as if he were convulsing, but his eyes were wide open with determination and despite the pain that shot across his face, he kept his jaw set. His skin started to split in places across his body, giant tufts of fur spilling out instead of blood. Emily knocked me over and dragged me as far away from Sam as possible, her grip tight around my shoulders. He continued to change, painfully contorting as he shifted.

The approaching wolf hunched into a pounce position, growling low as Sam started to grow in size. The bed collapsed beneath his weight, Sam writhing and crying as he shifted into a giant grey wolf with a black mask. But unlike the other wolf, Sam’s posture was wrong. His shoulder was higher, held at an awkward angle. His limbs quivered beneath his weight and I could see him supporting his weight with only three paws. Despite being able to transform, he couldn’t do anything else. He was still broken.

The two wolves stared each other down as if calculating their next move. I was afraid that the other wolf would strike and Sam would crumple. Emily had stopped shaking, but her gaze was locked on Sam as if it were the only thing holding him up.

With a loud snarl, the other wolf lifted his lips and began growling, the vibrations shooting through the floorboards. Sam’s replied with just as much ferocity, trying to mask his pain with that of anger. The growl’s were matched well for only a moment before a third joined and the blue-eyed wolf looked over just in time to be tackled through the wall by a brindle wolf that snapped viciously at any inch of flesh it could get to. They disappeared from view, but I could hear them attacking one another.

Sam waited only a moment longer before collapsing on the broken bed, the fur retracting back into his skin in reverse motion. He lay there motionless, the only sound of his consciousness being his small grunts of pain. Simultaneously Emily and I stirred and we hurried over to his side. We rolled him over onto his back, carefully of his bruised body.

“Are you stupid?” Emily asked quietly, checking over his body. “You could have gotten yourself killed.”

“I had to do something,” he said through his clenched teeth.

“You didn’t have to shift,” she said, continuing to check him over.

“You asked me for my help, didn’t you?”

She didn’t have a response for him and started wrapping a sheet around his naked body, acting as a temporary bandage. The side of the house shook as the two wolves continued to fight, the ground trembling slightly when they landed on one another.

“We can’t stay here,” Emily muttered, “we have to get him out of here.”

“And go where?” I asked, trying my best not to sound panicked.

“Anywhere but here, if we stay we’re going to get crushed by Quil and that wolf.”

I hesitated, but the next tremor seemed to alert me of the immediacy of our situation, “Okay, I’ll take the left side.”

Together we struggled with Sam and lifted him to his feet, but he could barely hold up his own weight. He hung off of the two of us, trying his best to stand on his own, but we were his only support. I clenched his hand tightly that was wrapped around my neck, willing for my body to be strong, to not give out. We started forward awkwardly, stumbling forward as we headed out the wreck that used to be our safe house. I couldn’t see my mother anywhere, nor any of the other girls. Maybe Billy had them moved to another place, but I knew that no one was safe.

“Keep going straight, we’ll head for that red house.”

I grunted in reply, unable to waste any energy on speaking. I was breathing loudly as I struggled to hold him up but he was just so heavy. I could see Emily struggling just as I was. I could see it in his face that we were causing him more pain by holding him the way we were. He was clenching his jaw so hard that I could feel the muscles in his body contract tightly.

“I don’t think I can make it,” I grunted out, my legs starting to burn.

“Just keep going. We can’t stay here.”

She was right, of course. If I collapsed here we were just sitting ducks. I was trying to be strong and support him, but I wasn’t strong enough. I wanted to push myself, I wanted to, but I could feel him slipping out of my grasp.

“Kayla!”

“I’m sorry, I-I can’t,” I was starting to sink to the ground with his added weight.

“Okay, quick, over here,” Emily indicated with the tilt of her head towards a shed.

We barely made it to the shadow of the small building, but Sam slid to the ground as if gravity were putting extra weight on him. The two of us followed, collapsing at his side with heavy breaths. Emily pulled the sheet tighter around him, making sure that he was at least lying in a comfortable position.

“I’m sorry,” I said quietly.

“We’ve got to get the car over here,” she muttered, looking around. “We have to get him out of here.”

She had a look in her eyes that was desperate and I realized that was how I must have looked so many times before. The vehicles were nowhere in sight. They must have gotten knocked away in the attack. I couldn’t see any other cars within reach around us. The only thing I could see really was Quil and the other wolf. I tried not to look at them in the distance, but there were so many cries of wild anuish that I couldn’t ignore it.

On the edge of the tree line, another pair of wolves appeared with saliva trailing behind them as they ran. I recognized Jacob among the pair immediately, his russet coat standing out. But just as soon as they arrived, more wolves started to pour out and I could tell that things weren’t going well. Quil screamed so loud that I knew he was losing. I couldn’t see the damage, but the larger wolf left without Quil in pursuit. I tried not to think about what had happened.

Jacob didn’t see the blue-eyed wolf slink away behind a few of the houses. With its nose in the air, it was trying to pinpoint the rest of the mates. I didn’t have to see its eyes flicker towards our location to know it had found us. Emily saw it took, the slow advance as it tried to hide its presence and approach stealthily. She rose to her feet quickly, looking around wildly. I sat there and watched her as she disappeared around the corner of the building and return with a shovel in her hands. She wasn’t going to last against that thing.

“Emily, come on, let’s try to move him. I think I can do it,” I said quickly, looking at the distance between the wolf and us.

She didn’t reply but stood protectively before Sam and I, holding the shovel out like a weapon. She was ready to meet it head on just to save us a little more time. I wanted to cry out, to call for Jacob or Seth or anyone to come help us, but in that moment I think the only name that I could grasp onto was my mothers.

“Mom…” fell from my lips, but it was only audible to Sam and I as we waited for the wolf to take us out, one by one.

I grasped Sam’s hand, holding onto it tightly because it was all I had left in me to do. I watched just as numbly as before with my lungs tight and painful, holding onto the air in my lungs as the wolf closed in. She held the shovel up, ready to take a swipe at it. But she must have known that she didn’t stand a chance. It seemed like she were a fly and as she pulled back the shovel to swing it, the wolf just knocked her aside. Her body hit the side of the nearest house, her body cracking against the wood painfully. She didn’t stir from the ground. I could feel Sam clenching his muscles once more, trying with all his might not to shift. His hand was shaking from clenching my hand so hard.

The shoved sat at our feet but I didn’t even reach out to it. I was just going to be swat away the exact same way that Emily was. But my eyes darted to it and back to the wolf and that courage I had suffered from was starting to well up again. I lifted my hand from my lap and looked back from the shovel to the wolf that was watching me carefully, its lips curled up. It was daring me to grab the shovel.

I let out the breath that was lodged in my chest and leaned forward to grab the handle, but just as I did so the wolf pounced. As the wolf was in the air, a gunshot rang out from so close that my ears started to ring from the blast. The wolf was caught around the jaw and it fell to the side, scrambling to get out of range of the gun. Around the corner my mother came running, her face pale and her limbs trembling. She grabbed onto me so tightly that I thought she was never going to let go.

“I-I thought-“ she was breathing so erratic, I couldn’t make out the rest of her words.

“Stay here with him,” I muttered, prying myself from her hold. “Watch Sam.”

She looked down at him, almost as if noticing him for the first time. I pushed her towards him and took of running towards where Emily was lying. My legs felt so numb like they were detached from my body altogether. I hardly felt the burn of my muscles as I pushed myself across towards her. I just kept going.

She was lying face down in the grass when I approached and I immediately fell to her side and pushed her over gently. She was surrounded by broken glass from the window on the house. A few shards were embedded in the side of her face, but it was nothing compared to the blood that was streaming from the split in the side of her skull. Her hair was covered in it and it was starting to stain the ground. I ripped off the sweater I was wearing and held it to her head. My hands had started to shake and I tried my best to find her pulse but I couldn’t tell if it was my hand that was causing the vibrations.

“Emily?” I whispered, trying to shake her.

She didn’t stir, so I shook her harder. I brought my hands, now stained with blood, to her face, slapping the cold skin of her cheeks. I slapped her hard. Her eyelids were droopy, but they lifted only slightly. It was enough to let me know she wasn’t dead. I looked back over to my mother who was hunched over Sam, looking down at him worriedly. I could see Billy sitting behind the shed with his gun at the ready.

One of the nearby houses exploded with the weight of the two wolves that fell through it. It was a mess of brown and grey, tossing and wrestling, gnashing and slashing. The blue-eyed wolf was lying beneath Jacob who threw his whole weight onto him, fighting with such vigour. I could see blood matting in its coat where Billy shot it. They both screamed and growled, their sounds echoing throughout the reserve.

“Can you hear me?” I looked down at Emily.

“Yeah,” her voice was weak and she looked disoriented.

“Can you move?”

She lifted her arms, but her actions were so weak, I knew she couldn’t hold herself up. “Here, can you hold this to your head?”

I helped direct her hand to her head and pushed her hand tightly against the sweater. She was just as big as Sam was and I knew I couldn’t carry her myself. I hooked my arms under her shoulders and dug my heels into the dirt, trying to drag her away. But she was so heavy; I couldn’t move her. I pulled harder, using my weight to pull against her but my feet slid out from under me, kicking all the dirt. It was useless.

I tried to lift her again, trying not to panic, but this time my body gave way when I heard such a horrible cry that my heart stopped beating. The wolves were no longer fighting; instead there were only two men, one hunched over the other. I stared without breathing at the man, feeling my eyes welling only slightly at the possibility that it was Jacob on the ground. I couldn’t tell who it was, not even as he stood up and turned towards us.

I gripped Emily tightly as he started to approach quickly, reaching for a broken piece of glass to defend us if needed. But he ran past Sam and my mother without paying them any notice that I knew that it was over. It was really over. I dropped the piece of glass, wiping off the little blood that I had drawn and let out a loud sob. It was over.

When Jacob reached me he enveloped me in an embrace that I wished would never end. I could feel the stickiness of blood and sweat on my arms and my face as he held me. I could feel his heart racing, his ragged breathing. I wanted to cry or laugh or something, but I felt all my muscles relax in his hold, I didn’t have any energy left for anything else.

“It’s over,” he said quietly in my ear.