Kane Holtwood's Arc

Chapter 1 of 2

Kane crouched at the edge of the treeline and counted the tracks in the mud. Four sets. All wolf. None of them his. He had left Eden's cottage an hour ago and already the sky was going gray. Every minute here was a minute she stood alone behind a moss line and a locked door. He needed a pack at his back before something worse than him came sniffing around her yard. He did not have a pack. He had a list of names whispered by drunks and a forest full of wolves who had forgotten their own faces. He followed the freshest track north until the trees opened onto a stone hollow. His own cottage sat inside it, low and quiet, the door marked with a paw print he had carved himself. He did not go in. He waited. Theo came down the slope from the other side, blue hair damp, jacket half-zipped, boots quiet on the rock. "You're late," Kane said. "I'm here." Kane held out a folded scrap of paper. Six names on it. Wolves he had scented at the edges of Everwood over the last month. "Tell me which ones are still people." Theo read the list. His mouth tightened at the third name and again at the fifth. He handed it back. "Two," Theo said. "The rest are gone." "You're sure." "I watched them. You told me to watch them." Kane looked at the paper. Four names to cross out. Four days he would have wasted. Four nights Eden would have been alone for nothing. He folded the paper smaller. "Which two?" Theo pointed. "Her. Him. Her den is past the crystal pool. His is closer. Start with him." "Why him first." "He still flinches when you say his name. He remembers being spoken to." Kane nodded once. He did not thank him. Theo did not wait for it. A laugh cracked from the rocks above them. Raze sat on a boulder with his boots swinging, ram horns catching the last light. Kane had not heard him arrive. That itself was a message. "Two wolves," Raze said. His tongue flicked. "That's a sad little pack, Holtwood. You sure the girl's worth thinning your options for?" Kane did not look up. "Get off my rock." "I'm just saying. You go recruiting, something walks up to that cottage while you're gone. Something already has her scent." He grinned. "Just neighborly concern." Kane's eyes flashed yellow. Raze raised his hands and slid off the boulder, still smiling, and was gone between the trees. Kane stood. The list in his hand was shorter now, and heavier. He knew who to find and in what order. He also knew he had been watched deciding it, and that whatever hunted Eden already knew he had left her side. "Go back to her yard," he told Theo. "Stay in the trees. Don't be seen." Theo was already moving.