To Catch a Wolf (43 page)

clean. It stank of a previous tenant's stale sweat and cigar smoke, fouling each breath

she took.

Athena swallowed her distaste and set her small pack on the uneven floor. The sheets

on the bed, while much mended, appeared reasonably tidy. Not that she expected to

get much sleep.

She pulled the single, rickety wooden chair up to the window and watched the snow

cover the street, the cheaply constructed buildings and the handful of wagons tied up in

front of the general store. The few pedestrians moved hastily, anonymous figures with

lowered heads and white-caked boots. Denver, and the comforts of home, seemed a

million miles away.

Going back was another possibility she did not consider. The tightness in her stomach

told her that her instincts were correct. She must get to the ranch. The two men she

loved most in the world were in horrible danger.

In spite of her conviction that sleep was out of the question, her chin began to nod on

her chest. She tried to eat a little of the bread Monsieur Savard had packed for the

journey, but it was as dry and tasteless as sand. The small room felt like a cage—the

kind of cage Morgan had described when he had spoken of her life—and the

unthinkable idea she had rejected began to seem inviting. Only that final, lingering fear

held her back.

She dozed fitfully in the chair. Out of the maelstrom of her imagination, a picture formed

in stark black and white. At first all she could see was snow: snow on the ground,

among the trees, in the sky, painting everything one sullen, lifeless hue.

Then she saw the black shape, lying in the snow—black fur, black tail, black muzzle.

The eyes were open, but they did not see. The body lay perfectly still. No breath plumed

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from the open jaws. But there was one other color present in this ashen world

one

vivid shade that wept in the snow beside the great wolf's head.

Scarlet. The color of fresh, bright blood.

Athena sat up in the chair, choking on a scream.

Only a dream, she told herself. But that was a lie. She had "dreamed" of running with

Morgan as a wolf, sharing what he felt as he ran alone. Part of it had been real. What if

this apparition, too, were real

or soon to be?

All her choices were gone. Morgan needed her, now, and there was but one way she

could face the storm and make it through alive.

Shaking with reaction, she kicked her bag under the bed and pulled a wad of banknotes

from her pocket, leaving them where they would be found by the innkeeper. The sun

had gone down; few if any people would be on the street to see her leave or try to stop

her.

She crept down the stairs, willing the other guests to remain in their rooms. The smell of

greasy cooking hung in her nostrils, but the innkeeper was busy elsewhere, and she

passed through the lobby unseen.

The snow continued to fall as heavily as before. Athena ran to the stable and made sure

that Dandy had his blanket and oats. She had only one more favor to ask of him.

Hiding behind his sturdy bulk, she quickly stripped out of her clothing. First came the

coat, and then the two layers of shirts, and then the cinched trousers. Icy wind whistled

through chinks in the stable walls, curling around her bare flesh. But the cold was

unimportant, as easily shrugged off as the shirts and trousers and boots.

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She stood naked at Dandy's head, stroking his muzzle as much to comfort herself as

him. He could rest at his ease, his care assured by the generous payment she'd left in

her room. But she had a long way to go.

And that journey must begin with an act of courage she was not sure she possessed.

Nor could she take that first step among the horses. Making a quick search of the

stable, she discovered a small loft where she concealed her bundled clothing—no need

to give the poor innkeeper more concern than he would already face when he found her

gone.

Straw crackled under her bare feet as she crept to the stable door. She had no need to

worry for the sake of modesty, or of being dragged away to an asylum for the insane.

The street was empty of man or beast. Even the most recent wagon tracks had been

erased. Yankee Gulch was dark save for one or two lights shining in windows, but her

wolfish night vision made it seem almost as bright as day.

Wading through the snow, she circled the stable to the alley beside it. It was as good a

place as any to attempt the impossible.

Not impossible. You did it once, easily. When you were hardly more than a girl, you

couldn't imagine a life without it. Or a life without the use of your legs.

Now you have your legs again. Claim the rest of yourself, Athena. For Morgan's sake.

She closed her eyes and willed.

Nothing happened. She stood on two weak legs, her loosened hair lashing about her

face. It would be so easy to give up and admit defeat.

I cannot. It has been too long. My body does not know how.

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She sat down in the alley, burying her face in her hands. Better to just lie here and let

the snow cover her up. How could she help Morgan—she, who had lived a soft and

easy life, believed herself so important, and yet had no real courage to face a true

challenge when it came?

Who was she, to think she had the power to save him?

She flung her head up and stared at the falling snow. That same snow fell on him now,

in a place where he might lie dying and alone.

She clenched her fists and pushed to her feet. She remembered what it had been like

when Changing required no more than a thought. She remembered racing through the

forest up at the ranch, borne to ecstasy on a hundred smells and sounds even her

superior human senses could not detect.

Above all, she remembered running beside Morgan, wolf with wolf, utterly free.

A peculiar frisson swept through her body. It was as if every muscle, every bone, every

nerve twisted inside out, yet there was no pain. A mist rose about her like a silken veil,

untroubled by the wind.

She threw up her arms and gave herself to the Change. Life flowed and shifted. Her

sight altered, taking in the world from a vantage much closer to earth. Scents and

sounds burst in upon her senses like a tidal wave.

For a moment all she could do was breathe, struggling to manage the overwhelming

assault. Gradually what seemed so alien became familiar, as natural as walking had

been before the accident. She took a step on four wide paws. Her hind legs trembled,

the lingering remnant of her lameness, but they carried her out of the alley, first at a

walk and then a trot and a gallop.

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She ran down the deserted street and to the shacks at the outskirts of town, past the

mine and the tailings and waste of man's grubbing in the earth. The forest called to her,

and the mountains, with songs only one of her blood could hear.

Instinct pointed the way to Long Park when no trail remained for a human being to

follow. Instinct, and a very human emotion called love.

Athena howled defiance into the blizzard and ran as she had never run before.

Niall had come this way. Morgan sniffed at the ground, detecting the odors buried under

a layer of newfallen snow. Any tracks Munroe had made were long gone; if he were not

dead already, no human born could find him.

But a werewolf could. And Morgan planned to do so, setting aside his hatred of the man

he hunted. For Athena's sake.

He almost felt Athena beside him, bounding over frozen creeks and through thickets of

serviceberry shrubs. But she was in Denver now, safe and warm where she ought to be.

He sat on his haunches and chocked on a howl. The last words he had spoken to her

had been filled with cruelty and bitterness. That was her final memory of him—angry,

hating, blaming her for being what she was instead of what he wished her to be.

She had not made the same mistake. She had understood that he wouldn't go with her.

Perhaps that was why she had asked.

Damn you, Athena Munroe. I will find your precious brother. And then you must let me

go. Let me go, do you hear?

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His growls flew away in the wind. Tensing his muscles, he leaped up and over a

snowbank and followed the trail of scent. No other animals were foolish enough to be

abroad; the forest and park looked as they must have done before the first intruding

human had walked in these mountains. Peaceful. Still as death, or forgetfulness. A

sweet offer of ending he could not accept.

A few hours before dawn, he found his quarry. Niall crouched in the partial shelter of a

fallen tree, his coat drawn up over his head. There was no sign of his mount. Morgan

smelled the ash where he had tried to start a fire, but no flame could survive this gale.

Morgan stalked closer, ears flat to his head. He heard the ragged sound of Niall's

breathing, felt the warmth of body heat—alive, then. He shook off savage regret and

drew closer.

Niall's head jerked up. His brows were frosted with rime, his skin nearly blue. He tried to

move, feeling in his pocket.

Morgan dashed in and seized Niall's wrist between his teeth, tasting leather and

sheepskin. Munroe's smell was rank with fear and exhaustion. He met Morgan's gaze,

and the last spark of fight went out of him.

He had one more shock to face. Morgan released him and backed way, shaking the foul

scents from his coat. It was almost a relief to Change and find his senses dulled, as

they always were in human shape.

Munroe exhaled a great cloud of steam and tried to sit up. "You," he said hoarsely.

"Yes." Morgan crouched on his heels. "I've come to take you back to the ranch.”

Munroe laughed. "You have come to

save me?”

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"I would just as soon let you die here. But there are two who care for you, and it is for

their sakes that I came tonight.”

"Two?" He shivered and tried to adjust his collar with frozen fingers.

"Your sister, and Caitlin.”

"Caitlin." He shifted again and fell back. "Is she all right?”

"She and the others are safe.”

Niall closed his eyes. "You found them?”

"Yes. Your men said that you went out to look for them after the storm began. That

earns you the right to live.”

"The right to live," he echoed. "And what gives you the right to judge me, Holt? You,

who murdered your own father?”

Morgan felt no surprise. He'd lived too long among men to keep such secrets

indefinitely, and no one had better motive to uncover those secrets than Niall Munroe.

But Munroe's accusation did not touch him. It was as if

Athena's brother spoke of another man, summoned memories of another life.

"You do not deny it," Munroe said. He sat up, emboldened by Morgan's silence. "Not

that it would do you any good. I blame myself for not having discovered it long ago. The

only thing I don't understand is why you were not hanged.”

"Then there is something about me you don't know.”

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"That you claim justification for patricide?" He laughed again, teeth chattering. "A man

capable of that could do anything. But you are not a man, are you? You're a beast that

thinks nothing of killing.”

"A beast like your sister.”

"No!" Munroe scrambled to his feet and leaned on the fallen tree. "My sister cannot help

what she is. I will not let her give in to the monstrous heritage her mother imposed upon

her." His eyes glazed. "I knew she was evil the first time I saw her in my father's bed.”

Morgan became aware of his body again. "She?”

"Gwenyth Desbois. The bitch who seduced my father and stole his love for my mother."

Munroe's teeth flashed white in the rigid oval of his face. "I saw her Change long before

Athena learned how to twist her body into an animal's. And my father knew. He knew

what she was, and wanted her anyway. He forced my mother to raise Athena as her

own—”

"And you hate Athena for that. You've hated her since she was born.”

"Shut up! You know nothing about it, what it was like to know what she was. I would

have kept it from her, let her live an ordinary life. But our father told her everything when

he thought she was old enough to understand. He ruined her." He slammed his fist