Page 59 of Scarred Resolve

“Aside from the house fire, which they absolutely would have taken their time making sure that no one could link to someone else. They’ll stage it to look like we caused it or the fighting,” Niko said with an agitated grumble. He was clearly holding back the topic he had avoided earlier even though he was pissed by it.

“Just ask, Niko,” I said with a sigh, knowing I was part of his frustration. We had none of our gear. We were caught off guard. This was a disaster, and part of it was my fault. I knew he wanted to talk about it.

“What the fuck happened? Why didn’t you raise the alarm? I got up for something else and found you about to get killed!” he ended with a frustrated yell.

“I think it was magic,” I admitted softly. “I tried. Once I got past the initial shock, I opened my mouth, and… nothing would come out. I don’t know what happened, but it felt so wrong. In fact, there was a part of my watch that felt… unfocused. I couldn’t…” I lowered my head. “I know it sounds… like I’m trying to cover for myself, but I swear if I was distracted, I would admit it. I…” Guilt ate at me even though I was certain that I hadn’t gotten that distracted without some external influence.

“Why did you get up?” Davor asked casually, the most collected of the three of us.

“I wanted to talk to Jacky about something, and it felt right to wake up early because I can handle that better than her and it would have given us privacy to discuss it,” he answered without any hesitation. “Not that we need to keep secrets from you, but it felt right to speak to her alone.”

“Of course. I don’t think you have any secrets I would need to know anymore. What was it?” Davor’s curiosity felt out of left field, but I made no effort to get us back on topic. I wanted to know what Niko was thinking when he got up, and it took the spotlight off my failing.

“How she snapped at me at the BSA,” Niko muttered. “Feels childish to think about now.”

“It feels childish, but I understand. I’ll explain.” I turned on the log to be able to look at him. “I was thinking about how those humans were dead. There was that werecat out here that was going to need to die, and it was all such a tragedy. It felt disrespectful to the dead, wasting time to mess with the BSA,” I answered, sighing. “It’s not because I wanted to protect the feelings of the BSA agents we were dealing with.”

“Ah.” Niko nodded. “I try not to think of these things in that light.”

“I couldn’t help it.”

“It’s fine,” Niko bumped my shoulder with his. “Really. We all deal with it. I said Itrynot to think of these things in that light. I’m not always successful. This is…” Niko trailed off, but Davor quickly picked up.

“Our worst nightmare,” he said in a whisper. “The Last Change is our worst nightmare.”

“It’s better for me not to ever dwell on that, so I try not to. I try to detach. Getting caught up in the feelings can be a distraction.” Niko didn’t look at me, still staring in the direction we had come from. “I don’t want to die… but you were right to say something to me. I hadn’t realized I was crossing the line of disrespect. The dead deserve that, at the very least. They lost everything else. The least I can do is be respectful and handle things quickly and efficiently.”

“Thanks,” I said, bumping his shoulder with mine. He bumped back, then stood.

“We can’t stay here for very long. We need to double back and try to get the jump on them next time. They couldn’t have been using that cabin as a base, but I bet they’re close to it.”

“I agree, but we don’t know their numbers,” Davor pointed out.

“And we don’t have any of our things,” I added. “We have a dart gun and your silver claws, and that’s pretty much it, right?”

“Yeah, and I don’t have much ammunition on me,” Davor said with a huff. “I got a tracker into the werecat, but no computer…”

“Well, we’ll get back to the cabin and see if we can scrounge anything,” Niko said, shrugging. “We’ll go in with stealth to maybe kill whoever is lingering by it, maybe get a jump on any traps they might have set…” Niko looked at Davor. “You know lots about traps, brother.”

“I do,” Davor confirmed with a humorless chuckle. “They’ll have one set for us. Without a doubt. If they aren’t willing tochase us, but they have our gear, they’ll expect us to go back. If some of them did leave, we’ll be able to find that trail and follow them. We’re clearly investigating more than we previously considered, and now we have no way to contact anyone else.”

“Which means this is on us,” I said, nodding. “I can Change, but someone will need to keep my clothes with them.”

“I’ll carry them and stash them before we pick any fights, so they aren’t destroyed,” Niko said, stepping away a little further.

“Thanks.” I stepped away, putting my back to them. Quickly, I looked over my shoulder to see they also turned their backs to me. It was just to be polite, and while it was unnecessary, I was grateful. I got through it quickly, seeing Niko folding my clothing by the time I was on four paws and finished with my Change.

“How do you feel?” Davor asked me, coming closer.

I flexed my claws into the earth, stretching as I knew I would be moving and fighting like this.

“Good,”I answered simply, knowing they would both hear it. My telepathy was really simple and easy to use. Neither seemed disturbed nor thrown off by it, prepared for my mental intrusion in their heads. I knew it could bother other moon cursed. A werecat wasn’t supposed to be able to do it.

“We’ll have to track back near our initial trail here,” Niko started explaining. “That means we can potentially run into issues with those who attacked us. We need to be prepared for anything, but if we see a small group or just the werecat, we need to take advantage of it and take them out. The werecat as well. I understand you both really believe in the theory that it’s under the control of the witches, but whether we break that control purposely or accidentally, we are still faced with a werecat in the Last Change.”

“Certainly,” Davor agreed, and I nodded my head, not needing to say anything to that.

We started moving as a unit, the energy of our group as changed as my form. We had gotten to this point, running from a fight that had caught us off guard.

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