Part 3
I kicked with legs that could barely feel the command.
The rope held me so tightly that my boots only scraped dirt, but the movement was enough to make the wolf veer wide for half a second. Half a second was all Scout needed. He dropped hard onto all fours and lunged across the front of the tree, his paw cutting through the space where the wolf’s head had been.
The wolf sprang back. Scout’s claws tore bark from a fallen branch instead, sending splinters into the air. Before he could reset, another wolf came from the right, low and quick, aiming not for his throat but his hind leg.
They were not trying to win at once.
They were trying to spend him.
I had watched wolves work elk that way from a ridge half a mile off, back when observation felt clean because I was not part of the meal. They did not rush the strongest point. They asked small questions with their teeth. Can you turn fast enough? Can you guard both flanks? Can you keep doing it after pain makes you stupid?
Scout answered with violence and restraint in equal measure. He charged only far enough to drive them back, then returned to the tree. He would not let them pull him away. Twice, one wolf feinted left while another circled right, and twice he shifted his weight before either could commit, as if he knew the pattern from a language older than fear.
The third time, the lead wolf changed the question.
He was a large gray male with one torn ear and a pale muzzle, older than the others and calmer. While the younger wolves kept Scout’s eyes busy, the old one moved through a patch of brush so quietly I saw only the bending grass. I tried to shout. What came out was a strangled sound that vanished under Scout’s roar.
The old wolf hit him from behind.
Scout twisted, but not fast enough. The wolf’s teeth caught the thick muscle above his right hind leg and held. Scout’s whole body jerked. His roar shook through the tree into my spine, not only rage now but pain, sudden and bright. The other wolves surged in at once, emboldened by the break in his rhythm.
“No!” I yelled.
My free hand found the loose strand at my chest and pulled with everything I had. It did nothing. I pulled again, scraping my knuckles raw against bark, trying to force slack into a knot that Wade had tied with cruel patience. My left wrist was still pinned. My ribs screamed each time I breathed.
Scout threw himself sideways.
The old wolf lost his grip and tumbled away, landing hard but scrambling up. Blood marked Scout’s leg now, dark against the fur. He favored it for one step, then another. The pack saw it. I saw them see it.
The younger wolf on the left came in too boldly.
Scout met him with a swing so fast it barely looked like an animal moving. It looked like weather. The blow caught the wolf along the shoulder and sent him rolling into a thicket of serviceberry. The sound he made afterward was thin and frightened, and it changed the clearing.
Not ended. Changed.
The pack pulled back several yards. Their bodies stayed low, but their confidence had cracked. The injured wolf limped away from the center of the fight, and the old male did not stop him. He stood with his head lowered, eyes fixed on Scout, calculating the cost of one tied man and one wounded bear.
Scout rose again.
He could not put full weight on his right hind leg, but he still lifted himself high enough that his shadow climbed the pine behind me. His mouth opened. His teeth shone wet in the dimness. The sound that came from him rolled across the clearing and into the trees, so deep it seemed to come from the ground instead of his chest.
The wolves listened.
For several long seconds, nothing moved except Scout’s breath. Then the old male gave a short, sharp sound. One wolf backed up. Another turned sideways, reluctant but obedient. The injured one was already gone into the brush.
They withdrew the same way they had arrived, without drama. A gray body became a shadow. A shadow became a gap between two trunks. The last thing I saw was the old male’s pale muzzle, held low as he watched Scout over his shoulder before the trees took him too.
I did not relax.
Neither did Scout.
He stood in front of me until the forest had settled into a different kind of quiet. His ears moved constantly, catching what I could not. Somewhere far off, a branch cracked under the weight of something leaving. A minute passed. Maybe two. Time had stopped being useful.
Only when he was satisfied did Scout turn back to me.
The look he gave me was almost irritating in its focus, as if my unfinished rope were an insult he had no intention of accepting. He limped closer, lowering his head. Blood fell from his leg in slow, dark drops, one after another, disappearing into the needles at his feet.
“Scout,” I said. My voice broke on the name. “You’re hurt.”
He ignored the obvious and took the rope in his teeth.
This time, I helped with more than panic. I forced my right hand to work, pinching the frayed section across my ribs and pulling it outward while he bit down. The rope tightened so hard I thought one of my ribs might give, but then the fibers began to part. Not all at once. One strand. Then another. Then a sudden tearing release that let air flood into my chest.
I coughed until my eyes watered.
Scout flinched at the sound, then pressed his nose briefly against my shoulder before moving lower.
The rope at my hips was thicker, doubled around the tree. He could not get a clean bite without scraping me. For several minutes, he worked at it with a care that felt impossible to witness. He used the tips of his claws to lift the rope away from my jacket, then hooked his teeth into the gap he created. Once, a claw touched my shirt and sliced the fabric open without breaking skin.
I held still until my muscles shook.
“Easy,” I whispered, though I no longer knew which one of us I meant.
The knot slipped.
My left arm came loose so suddenly I nearly struck him in the face. He pulled back, snorted, then bent to the last loop around my thighs. My hands, half-numb and clumsy, clawed at the rope from above while he worried it from below. The fibers were wet with dew and blood, but they had been damaged enough. They began to give.
The final strand snapped with a sound like a branch breaking under snow.
I fell forward because there was nothing left to hold me up.
The ground hit my knees, then my shoulder. I lay in the cold needles with my face against the earth, breathing in dirt, sap, and the bitter smell of torn rope. My legs were not legs yet, only heavy things attached to me by pain. I tried to push myself up and failed.
Scout stood over me, panting.
His breath came fast. Too fast. Blood tracked down his hind leg and gathered at the dark fur above his paw. The fight was over. The ropes were broken. I was free.
And the bear who had saved me was bleeding into the dirt.