Page 12 of Entering a New World

A couple of moments later everything went back to normal—howling wind, pounding rain, roaring ocean, but I didn’t dare to move even an inch.

I was so going to die here. I wasn’t going to starve. I wasn’t going to die of thirst. I wasn’t going to be mauled by a wild animal. I was going to die tonight, taken out by the storm.

Another round of lightning hit, painting a scary web of light in the night sky.

I was going to get crushed or hit by lightning. I was so dying to…

A warm tongue licked my icy cold hand, eliciting a scream from my already sore throat. I’d done a lot of screaming in the last couple of hours. However, the licking didn’t stop; my whole hand was getting coated in saliva, hot breath fanning over it, hitting my face through the cracks between my fingers.

I was ninety-nine percent sure I knew who was licking me—there weren’t that many big, wild animals that’d do such a thing in the middle of a raging storm, but I still didn’t dare lower my hands. What if it wasn’t Wolfie? What if it was a different wolf?

My heartbeat was deafening, my whole body trembling as I shook my head in disbelief.

A huge, wet— yet warm—head shoved between my forearms, nudging my chest until I finally dropped my arms. It was hard to see in the darkness of the storm, but I could make out the huge wolf in front of me.

“Wolfie?”

The wolf in question whined and started licking the tears off my face.

“You came back!” And now I was crying again, wrapping my arms around the animal, clinging to it. I’d never let go of him. Sobbing, I hid my face against the fur of his neck, inhaling the scent of wet dog that’d usually gross me out but was like the most heaven-like scent I’d ever smelled right in this moment.

Wolfie had come back.

A laugh broke free, a maniac cackling that turned into a sob. “Please don’t leave me,” I begged. “Please don’t leave me. I don’t want to die alone. Please don’t let me die here all alone.”

The wolf snarled. The noise sounded angry, but I didn’t even flinch. I was pretty sure he wasn’t angry at me. After a moment, he took a step back, trying to get out of my death grip.

“No!” I shouted, moving forward to keep him in my arms, but the only thing I managed was face-planting to the wet floor.

Wolfie whined, his nose nudging my neck, urging me to move. It took a while, but I managed to get on my feet, and shivered as the rain whipping through the window hit me square in the face, drenching my already wet hair.

Looking for my animalistic friend, I turned around to find him standing in the doorway to the cabin.

“Wolfie?” I asked, voice strained.

The wolf nodded outside, looked back at me, whined, and nodded outside again.

“You want me to go out there?” My voice was high-pitched, filled with panic. My heart hammered against my chest, and I started shaking my head, taking a step back out of reflex. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

I could practically see it in front of my inner eye. Me, stumbling almost blindly through the thick forest, my foot getting caught on a root. Breaking my leg, lying on the ground, unable to keep walking.

Me and Wolfie hiking through the storm, a huge branch snapping, burying us beneath it, a smaller branch impaling me, making me bleed out right on the forest floor.

Us walking through the raging storm, the sky lighting up, a lightning bolt hitting a tree in front of us, starting a fire.

A lightning bolt hitting a tree right in front of us, the wet forest floor transmitting the electricity, frying our brains, making our hearts beat erratically before stopping them entirely.

Suddenly, Wolfie was by my side, whining pitifully, pressing his head against my chest. My hands found their way into his fur, grabbing it and holding on for dear life.

“I can’t go out there,” I whispered, my voice so quiet and broken I could barely hear the words I’d said myself. “I’ll die. It’s probably safer to stay here.”

Wolfie shook his huge head against my chest.

Another bout of lightning illuminated the sky. The roaring thunder was followed by a different noise; it almost sounded like an aching, someone sighing heavily as if they were carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders.

“What the…” I started, but didn’t have time to finish. A scream ripped from my throat as I looked through the window and saw a huge, dark something coming right at us.

A tree, my mind helpfully supplied.

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