giant like Chris down. I guess a 30 aught 6 rifle would do it, he thought, trying not to recall the events of the two days past. He still had a nasty cut on his forehead covered with Sarah’s dressing. It would leave a deep and wide scar, even though she’d managed to sew it together.
The images in his mind turned from blood, pain and pressure to that fateful night, when he and Sarah had finally consummated their marriage-to-be and made love. He blushed in spite of himself, recalling the feel of her warm body sliding against his, the feel of her pulse through a breast or a thigh, or her own stunted breathing gasping into his ear. Maybe it was the stress that had driven them to it; maybe it was being trapped on an island. These were his excuses – his rationale – for avoiding the more obvious answer.
She’s fallen in love with me, he dared to think. And what about me? He searched his feelings, and while he could say with certainty that he felt strongly about her, he wasn’t sure what to call it. “Gah,” he moaned out loud, slipping on a stone and splashing up to his ankle in muddy water. He looked down and tried to peel off the grime on his hairy leg with his finger and threw it back in the small stream. And there, just upstream, he saw what he’d been looking for.
The mud forgotten, a smile drew on his broad lips and he pulled back the heavy black sheaf of hair that had started to grow shaggy and slide wave-like over his broad brow. His blue eyes centered on the spiny plant. He took out the knife from his waistband and began to saw at one of the pale stalks. Devil’s Club, an aptly named water-borne plant with fearsome nettles. He swore as his hand slipped and received a stinging reward for his efforts but it could be made into a tea and would help with Chris’ recovery. The dank heavy smell of it was pungent that he had to turn his nose away from it as he gripped a handful of the shoots and, satisfied with his bounty, started back toward the cabin.
His shirt was already wet with sweat, and clung to him uncomfortably, so he peeled it off and stuck it in the waistband of his pants next to the knife. Young full muscles rippled with promise. All the time spent clambering up hillsides, running, and climbing trees had given him a lithe and dexterous frame, no longer the boyish musculature that he had arrived on the island with. Now, there was something mature, something thick and hardened to him, a comfortableness with the flex and ease of tendons and the wiry flesh that concealed them.
He had taken to going barefoot on the island. It felt good to feel the earth under him and it gave him additional grip as well. He felt as if he was truly returning to his roots, so to speak. Bears had no need for hiking boots or sandals and he had begun to take a certain pride in the endurance of his feet; they had hardened, turning into thick callused pads, and he could easily run the rocky root-wracked trails without fear of cutting his feet, which he did now.
Autumn was fast approaching, and he could feel a small snap in the air, like the warning of what was to come. With the passing of the season, new smells began to unearth themselves, lacing the air with their own sweet aromas like calligraphy. He suspected that was why the training took so long. It was the initiation that every male shifter had to undergo and it wasn’t just about learning how to shift or get in touch with the inner bear that resided in his kind. It was a process that was designed to inform the novitiate about the cycle of things, the one restless constant that pervaded all existence – change.
I wonder if that’s what Chris is trying to teach me, he thought, a bit contemptuously. He had nothing but respect for his oldest friend in the world, but he was a bit frustrated with the protocol the elders had enforced. Not the least was the way in which they had had him select his mate: a small booklet with a profile list of different women of ideal mating age, who had been carefully chosen as appropriate candidates. Based on what