Wolf: A Military P.A.C. Novel (27 page)

Chapter 56 PAC

PAC found his way to the valley that held Michael’s cabin and White Bear’s home. As a wolf, he could sense things about his world that had never occurred to him. Not that he didn’t have the same abilities: the sharpness of smell, the acuity of vision, the precision of hearing. But it was all different than it had ever been. The tactile touch that felt the beat of the world beneath his feet was new. That came from Faelon herself. From her flesh and the otherness that was part of her.

He raised his nose into the air, questing into the wind that riffled his fur, giving him power, but also telling him
—everything.

White Bear, Faelon, the black wolf. All of them were near.

Faelon was alive. Could that mean . . . ? He hadn’t seen Michael’s body.

PAC moved to narrow the scent field into something he could follow, searching the ground, his mouth open
to let his senses gather more information. When he found the black wolf’s trail, he picked up his pace and ran. Now there were two wolves leading him. One he had never smelled before. The trail led to a mountain cave hidden in the ridge of the valley wall, hung in shadows and the boughs of snow-laden evergreens. When he entered, he saw that there was room enough for a platoon to camp. In the air was the sharp odour of sulfur mingled with the sweetness of water. 

He didn’t need his nose anymore to tell him what was there. He could see White Bear, kneeling on the ground, one hand supporting him, the other hand clenched into a fist, a fine trickle of sand falling from it, like an hourglass. In reality, it was a paintbrush forming the patterns of a ritual as old as the Navajo people.

Faelon, alive, was off to his right. Caught in a sand painting with the black border closed, a bed of white under her body. Oddly, she mirrored White Bear’s form, though she rested on her hips, her legs under her for more support. Her forearm was buried in the sand up to the wrist, her other hand drawing sand into fine lines. Symbols he couldn’t see from here. Patterns that were hidden in the white on white of the sand she was drawing upon.

The black wolf was pacing, from Faelon to the shaman, stopping at
the line of black sand between each of them. His whine pierced the wind and echoed in the cave. As if he didn’t know why he was there.

Near the
two wolves was another—ginger in colour—as if blood had leaked onto a grey background and darkened as it dried. This wolf was large. Almost as big as Faelon and the black wolf. PAC could smell them, the lineage of the three clear to his new senses. Each had a separate aroma, a base layer that filled the glands in his nose and mouth. But under that, was another fainter pheromone signature. From Faelon to the black wolf, and from him to the ginger wolf.

And PAC understood.

The otherness that was part of Faelon and now himself, from the limb he had assimilated. The thing he couldn’t recreate until he had more information about it—from Faelon and her medical scans and then her flesh—enough to incorporate it into his awareness. PAC remembered the research from
Shaman’s Curse
, how the Navajo legends told of the Skinwalker and the ways to make that a reality. And though this was different, he could see the puzzle pieces slip into place as he thought about it.

So much that he didn’t feel a hand curl into the thick rough of his mane and turn into a fist
, pulling him off the ground.

Chapter 57 Michael

The dry hills of Saudi twisted under the feet of the recon team as they moved to the crest of the dune. The fox had come back into view, briefly, as they crouched low on the hill, and then it had disappeared behind the scrub on another hill of sand. Its pads silent as it moved. Ahmed poked his head up, scouting, then brought it down. “Sammy, give me an overhead. Go thermal with echo and R.F. Indiscriminate. Mirror on the other units.”

“Affirmative. Projecting.” A small holo blossomed into place, the radiation overlays and the ping information showing what the P.A.C.s had surmised earlier. Small bits of heat showed animals
: lizards and mice. A larger signature that was the fox they had seen earlier. No humans. Not near anyway, with the next village a klick over the hill.

“
There’s a cistern here, sir. Like we thought. It’s huge though. Years of supply.”

“Roger,” Captain Scott said. “Ping it to Mother Bear.”

“A human has appeared,” said PAC.

The holo
-image confirmed it. But a moment ago the only image that had been there was a fox.

Ahmed stuck his head up. A shot pierced the air. Captain Michael Scott felt something hot and sticky-slick against his face, smelled the burnt cordite that
came with the knowledge of what kind of gun had just fired. He stared at Ahmed’s face, the grey matter behind his head covering the sand in splatters for three and a half metres past his body. His legs twitched.

Michael felt his hand take the gun from his holster, he brought it up to his face and stood up. He fired at the body in front of him, as the interminable heat of the desert sucked the moisture from it. Blue eyes stare
d at him, stark, wide. Surprised. The bullet entered through one eye and out the back of the skull. Then Michael stood over the body, his clip empty, and the click of the trigger echoing in the still air, again and again.

There
was nothing left of the eyes that had stared at him, or the face below them. Fifteen rounds had slammed the head into the soft sand, emptying it of any matter. Then a scream ripped through the air and Captain Scott had his hands full. There was a cracking sound and a thump, as if a ball had been thrown through the air to hit the ridge of a sand dune.

The boy's head roll
ed down the dune, a trickle of blood soaking into the sand in heavy droplets.

Two men stare
d at the crumpled form of their commander. They understood it, or they would have if it had happened to them.

That need to fall apart.

If they had just realized they had killed a twelve year old boy wearing nothing but the shoulder straps of dual holsters. But they were in shock and didn’t feel anything. Not until long after Michael Scott got up and disappeared into the desert.

By then the war was over.

Michael pulled the scruff of fur, his fist holding the skin and pulling the animal towards him. *Michael.* The voice slammed into his mind, hard enough to make him wince, the emotion in it so strong.

*PAC?*

*I’m glad you’re not dead.* Inside the cave, PAC watched a wolf being drawn into a sand painting. He knew the art, the craft. He’d done the research for Michael, but he’d never seen it used this way.

*How are you doing this?*

*I needed source material to fix your hand.*

*My hand
. . . your communication cells?*

*Yes.*

The black wolf howled, the pain filling the cave with sound and agony, enough to make the fur on PAC’s new body shiver and ripple.

*How does this
. . . *

*
. . . work? Faelon needs us, Michael.* And PAC shifted. One moment he was a wolf, the next he became a man as fast as Faelon had ever changed. This man was dark, two metres tall and one hundred and twenty-five kilos in weight. Anyone looking would have called him Michael Scott. But PAC wasn't Michael, though he had an intimate knowledge of him and all the piezo-electric power stored he would need to change energy to mass.

*I will distract the shaman,* P
AC said.

And Michael watched himself walk into the cave. White Bear looked up.

Faelon cried out.

The real Michael rushed into the cave and the black wolf leapt at his throat.

Chapter 58 Faelon

Sand ha
d shape. The granules formed up, the power between each grain building on each other as they dropped from Faelon’s hand to create a pattern on the ‘iikááh. A place to talk to the gods. She didn’t want anything for herself. Her desire was for other things—for her cubs to survive. She could wish for Michael’s return, too. She did, in her heart, in the granules of sand and flesh and Yeii that made up her body. But her mind told her that he couldn’t have survived the fall from the cliff. The height as high as if he had fallen from the place where the sun sat. The rocks and debris following him, almost the way it had with her sire.

So she shaped the sand for other reasons. Made the contours form the way she had been taught by her
sire. She could feel the power gather around her, mingling with White Bear’s. Flowing like sand trapped in water. Two elements conjoined. Swirling.

The five cubs in her belly squirmed, forcing her to breathe, to ease back from her position for a moment, then she went back to her task, drawing the sand that would save her and her cubs, and
that would let her talk to the First Woman.

Across from her, White Bear’s chanting flowed with the power and need to open a Way. He drew the
coloured sand along his own patterns, trying to undo something, to heal his body and mind perhaps. So why did he need the wolf that was her enemy? And who was the pack-mate he had brought with him? The one that watched her with eyes that said he knew her and voiced the small barks that confirmed it. Faelon didn’t know him though. So, who was the red wolf that he thought he knew her?

Then the black wolf yowled, a high
-pitched thing that told Faelon that he was being hurt against his will. She watched him being dragged towards White Bear’s ‘iikááh, the black sand border parting for the wolf. And even though he struggled it made no difference as he was dragged inexorably into the painting White Bear had created. Under his paw, the shaman’s drawing spread out, matching the wolf’s shape, so that when the wolf touched the patterned sand he began to grow into it, to become the words that would speak to the gods.

He howled, the sound echoing through the cave. The grin on White Bear’s face was hollow, the cheeks pulled back to
o far, his eyes glazed in trance, and behind them, pain. But the wolf settled and something changed in his demeanour as he became the drawing under White Bear’s hands. The sand rippling as the power flowed.

Michael walked into the cave, his clothes gone, the look on his face serene in all the chaos that filled the cave, all the power that beat at the walls. Then she smelled him
,—or rather, he had no smell. Not-cub?

Then the real Michael burst in, right behind not-cub, his scent heavy with the musk and smoke that let her recognize her mate. Her heart beat again, as if she hadn’t realized it had stopped when he went over the cliff. Her eyes drank him in. The clothes he wore, the knife in his hand. The fierce determination on his face.

She shouted his name and he turned to look at her, his face breaking into a smile.

White Bear rubbed his hand over the black border of his sand
painting. The black wolf leapt off the sand and lunged for Michael’s throat.

Michael
fell, but as he did his arm went up and the wolf’s teeth clamped down, hard. She saw him grit his teeth and bring his fist up, the one holding his knife, and drive it into the wolf’s ribs.

A yelp pierced the air, muffled as the wind of the wolf’s lungs wuffed out around Michael’s arm. They rolled, wrestling over the ground and carrying themselves back into the cave. The red wolf growled
, but leapt from their path. She heard another yowl from her enemy, and Michael growled, as if he were a wolf. The power of her mate coming forth. The alpha of her life.

How could she have doubted his ability to
survive? Never again. He was her mate. She would never doubt him again.

Then she heard not-cub speak.

“Skinwalker.” The sound reverberated, swelled, pushed at the power flowing around like a palpable being.

White Bear looked at the Michael that was PAC, the trance breaking now that the wolf had left the sacred place. His eyes stared with recognition and fear, dropping to Michael
’s hand, looking for . . . a weapon. What?

“No. That’s not possible.”

Not-cub stepped forward, into the power that swirled around White Bear and eddied in the cave, drawn to Faelon's own drawing.

Faelon let the last few grains of white sand fall from her hand, her painting complete.

First Woman spoke to her, and Faelon’s head dropped as the trance took her, the words of the Blessing Way flowing over her tongue. Like water over a bed of rocks.

Chapter 59 Michael

Michael slammed his elbow into the wolf’s jaw, trying to dislodge his arm from the tight grip of teeth that refused to let go. His knife was still between its ribs; the wound would seal up around it. But the blade—that would grind away inside every time the animal moved, weakening him. Maybe giving Michael an edge. The fear in the wolf’s eyes that was there, that was normal. Michael had seen that before. What he’d never seen was the confusion that sat at the back of the amber eyes. As if the being inside the wolf had no idea of where he was, or who he was. But that didn’t change the pressure of the bite on his arm, nor the savage fury that all that fear was giving his opponent. He drove his fist into the wolf’s skull and heard a grunt of pain escape its lungs. That didn’t stop it from grinding its teeth into Michael’s arm, sawing through his flesh with each small movement. If he didn’t get his arm loose soon it’d be at his bone. Then a quick snap and his arm would be gone. Then he wouldn’t be able to help Faelon. That made his choice for him. He pulled.

A
scream ripped from his throat, but he didn’t let the pain stop him. He drove his other fist into the hilt of the knife forcing the beast to grunt once more. His arm slipped free, he rolled over and punched the knife hilt again. He got to his feet simultaneously punching the wolf’s ribs, hearing them crack as the force of his punches broke them, and then hearing them pop as the wolf’s healing abilities took over.

Then the wolf flipped over and ran, leapt to a free space in the cave and the shimmer of a change came over him. A small boy stood there. The hue of his skin the same as White Bear’s, the strong features of the Navajo race looking
back at Michael. He pulled the knife from his ribs, a plaintive whine on his lips, in his eyes.

“
No.” Captain Scott dropped to his knees. “Not a child.” Tears leaked from his eyes, his face contorted in pain. “I won’t do this again. No.”

The boy walked towards him, held out his hand. Looked back at White Bear.

“Your enemies are mine, Grandfather.”

He leapt, changing as he did, the black wolf coming back, fury in his eyes,
and teeth glistening with saliva as he ripped Michael’s throat out and left him on the floor of the cave. Blood pooling. His life spreading over the cave floor.

Faelon didn’t see it to react
—couldn’t, in the trance state she was in.

And PAC was busy with White Bear, as seven hundred kilos of grizzly bear tore into him.