to his little late-night wolf powwow, whatever that was about. I thought he had no pack. I’d have to ask him about that. I shook my head and ran my fingers through my hair, trying to undo some of the tangles I’d developed during the night. My stomach gurgled, and I pulled my pack over to get out a power bar for breakfast. I assumed slave traders slept at night like everyone else here and if they were weighed down by a lot of people, we could have a good chance at catching them today.
I stood as quietly as I could, stretching my arms, legs, and back. I still wasn’t sure what to make of Wolf. I didn’t know if I could really trust him or not. He’d apologized and explained, and I wasn’t going to lie to myself—he looked good and smelled good too. But he’d been after Marianne for a reason. For her, whoever she was, and no matter what he promised, that thought lingered in my mind. He growled at some phantom dream image.
I snuck off to go to the bathroom, far out of his potential sight in case he woke up, and then came back, debating. I could leave him here and set out on my own. But he’d tracked me to the giants’ lair, so there was a good chance he’d just be able to find me again without a problem. I figured slavers probably needed a decent road to travel on at some point, but unless I got lucky and bumped into it, I needed Wolf to find them too. And what if I did find them? I had no idea what slave traders were like here, or how I would get Marianne away from them. Whatever the situation, I needed Wolf to survive. He’d seemed serious enough last night with his pledge. All he asked for was a chance. Fine. I’d give him one. Then we’d see how long it would take him to forget. I knelt beside him.
“Time to get up,” I said quietly, touching his arm. I didn’t want to be too rough in case he woke up snapping or something.
He rubbed his face into the leaves and grunted in protest. I frowned. It was still hard to believe he was half wolf, but after dealing with giants and everything else I didn’t have room to doubt him. Asleep he looked like just a man. A handsome one too—and I really wasn’t supposed to be thinking things like that.
“Hey,” I said a little louder this time. “Let’s get going now.”
Wolf snatched my hand and pulled hard. I shouted in surprise as he rolled me over, coming to rest on top of me. His smiling face looked down at me. He took in a deep breath.
“You smell lovely.”
“I need a shower.”
“And spoil all that natural goodness with water?” He pouted.
“Can you get off me please? We need to go look for Marianne. And yes, by the way, I would rather spoil whatever smell I have with water rather than be gross.”
He stood and hauled me to my feet. I was glad he’d had enough sense to sleep apart from me last night, but now I almost wished he hadn’t. The man was downright toasty.
“By the by Caroline, how’s your head?”
I touched the spot where the injury was and discovered that the leaf had fallen off during our brief tussle. A tiny scar was in place of the cut, and my head felt just fine.
“Wow. That stuff really worked.”
“Lavawort and gum leaf—a wolf’s cure-all. Mind you though, you may crave really red meat for a few days.”
I gave him a stiff nod. “Right.”
“Come.” He started through the trees. “Let’s go.”
“Why am I calling you Wolf, anyway?” I asked. “Don’t you have a name?”
We’d walked for most of the morning. My stomach was grumbling even though I’d fed it a candy bar barely an hour ago to add to my early morning breakfast of power bar. For once I was glad I over-packed snacks when I went to wolf-watch. I hadn’t known how long it would take for Isabeau to emerge with the pups or if she would show them to the pack that day, so I’d planned for an entire day’s worth of snacky food. Except now all I had left was a bag of goldfish and one more candy bar. I resolved to give the goldfish to Marianne when we found her.