Page 25 of Caligo

“Adrian? Is that you?” I could pick out Jasper’s wolf no problem, but differentiating the other wolves in the dark took more practice than I had.

He tipped his snout down in acknowledgement and trotted behind the deep brush. Adrian emerged in his human body a moment later and rushed over to me. “Ava, thank God. I heard Jasper calling out for you and I thought the worst.”

“We were worried about you! We heard your howl and thought you must have gotten into trouble with the other wolf,” I told him, relief flooding my veins. Thank God I wouldn’t have to explain to Jasper another one of his friends was in the hospital. Or worse. “I don’t want to make things awkward, but you didn’t happen to bring any clothes with you, did you?”

Adrian stood in the blowing snow naked as the day he was born, and didn’t seem to be a bit concerned about it. I tried to keep my eyes above the waist level. He rolled his eyes. “It’s nothing you haven’t seen before. And wolves run hot, so I’m fine. I wasn’t exactly expecting to shift back in the woods.”

“Okay.” I just had to ignore the nudity. No big deal. “Did you find the other wolf?”

Adrian settled his lips into a tight line. “Oh, I found him, all right. He led me on a wild goose chase for quite a way before I lost him.” He looked around. “Where’s Jasp? Is he still shifted? I lost track of him awhile back.”

I felt my extremities grow numb, and it wasn’t from the cold. “I was hoping you would have crossed paths with him. We got separated around here. I’ve been trying to track him down but I guess I followed your prints instead.”

Adrian narrowed his eyes. “Okay. Don’t panic. Jasper can take care of himself. Why don’t you head back before this storm gets any worse and I’ll track him down?”

I shook my head. “No. I’m not running. I’m going to help you find Jasper and take this asshole down.”

His face was pure annoyance. “Jasp is gonna have my head for this, taking his mate out in a bloody snowstorm,” he muttered to himself. “All right, let’s go. I’ll stay like this for now, but I’ll shift if we run into trouble. Try to not get hurt.”

“I think you’ll find I’m quite capable,” I told him, irritated. I gripped my blades tighter and shoved past him into the brush. Sometimes I felt like Adrian was the little brother I never had. Or wanted. I huffed and headed deeper into the forest.

“Ava! I’m sorry!” Adrian jogged after me, apologizing. “I didn’t mean it that way. Jasper is going to be pissed at me if something happens to you. So please stay safe.”

“I won’t let anything happen. Relax. Now let’s focus. We have to find Jasper.” I imagined the worst. Jasper’s broken body lying on the ground. Jasper’s bright red blood pooling against the new white snow. Jasper’s throat, slit.

The snow was thick, and time was a vague concept. We trekked through the forest for what felt like hours, but what was probably nowhere close to that amount of time. We were silent except for me occasionally checking to make sure Adrian didn’t have hypothermia (he didn’t) or him occasionally pausing because he thought he heard something (a squirrel). The storm continued to pick up in intensity, making it difficult to see in some areas.

We paused for a break under a dense cover of evergreens, waiting for the snow to let up. “Can you smell him?” I asked anxiously. I spun my blades around in my hands in a lazy form of the trick Jasper had taught me, trying not to seem anxious.

He sniffed the air. “No, nothing.”

I groaned. This felt like a futile mission, us tracking Jasper who was tracking the other wolf who was tracking us. I hoped we’d all make it to see the morning. But I wasn’t about to give up. Not now.

“What if you shifted? Do you think you could smell a bit more then?” There had to be something I was missing, something to help us out.

Adrian tilted his head from side to side, weighing the options. “Possibly. But with the snow coming like it is, it’s a toss-up and I’d rather not shift unless I have to. If something happens to you, it’s easier for me to help if I have thumbs.”

He spoke like he was more concerned I was going to trip and break my ankle than us coming in contact with the other wolf, which scared me. What if we couldn’t find either of them?

I pushed the topic, hoping I was wrong. “Adrian, you’d be more help to me against this other wolf if you were in wolf form, too.”

He stared at me for a moment. “I don’t think we’re going to find the other wolf.”

“But the other wolf has Jasper, and we have to find Jasper,” I protested. Adrian was confirming my worst fears. I was well prepared for a fight, but that meant nothing if we couldn’t find the enemy.

Adrian winced and shook his head. “I don’t know what happened to Jasper. He could’ve run into the other wolf, or it could also be something else. But the odds of us finding the other guy this late at night aren’t great -- we’ve had a hard-enough time with weeks of planning.”

“No. You’re wrong,” I stubbornly disagreed. The only option here was he was wrong.

“Look, the snow is getting worse. We need to have faith Jasper can take care of himself. If he was smart, he probably found some cave to hole up in for the night and can’t hear us calling. Let me shift, and I’ll take you home on my back. We can start fresh first thing tomorrow.”

“No.” I was angry, and the look on Adrian’s face said he knew it. “I’m not leaving without him. You can go home if you need, but I’m staying out here as long as it takes to find him.”

“As long as it takes to find who?” A woman spoke from behind me, and I whirled around to see her hand brushing aside the tree giving us cover. Two familiar figures stood amongst the trees. I couldn’t let myself give in to the shock, couldn’t let myself think too much on what her presence meant. Why they were in this forest, on Christmas Eve, in the snow. I had a job to do, and my focus had to be on my job. Otherwise all of Jasper’s training was for nothing. I held my blades out in front of me expertly, protectively dropping in front of Adrian.

“Stay back,” I warned. They had no idea what I was prepared to do -- for Adrian, for the pack. For Jasper.

“Ava, do you know these people?” Adrian snarled, looking impressively menacing for someone who wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing in a massive snowstorm. He edged closer, and I knew he was ready to shift at the first given moment. One of them was going to end up hurt if this went any further, and I didn’t know which one I was more afraid of being in danger. I held one blade gently against his arm to stop him.

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