After Glow

Chapter 3

Lyle worked his way slowly through the underbrush, moving as quietly as he could. He was almost undetectable. Lyle remembered when his father had taken him out hunting as a boy and taught him how to track, and how to be stealthy when in the woods. His father told him “if the animal hears you coming, you’re going hungry because that animal will tell all the rest.” Dad was right. If you scare your prey, and they run, they scare everything else in the area also. It was important for Lyle to be successful now. He wasn’t able to just walk into a restaurant and order food anymore. The supplies were thin as they were, and they needed to last. How long they needed to last, no one knew. Lyle had no idea how much longer they would be on the run. Who knows when he will have a chance to replenish the supplies?

The deer were just ahead drinking at the stream. They had not heard him, and he was down wind, so they wouldn’t smell him. Hawk, Lyle’s wolf, came to the surface. Lyle could feel him pushing for control. 'Easy. We don't want to spook them. We need to eat.' Lyle said to Hawk in his head. Werewolves had always had someone to talk to, because each human part was born with a wolf that awoke from its dormancy when they reached maturity. Well, almost all werewolves. There was one exception that Lyle could think of. His mate. She was also the Oracle, and the rightful Queen, although she did not want either of those titles. Right now, the only title that she was worried about was that of Mom. Lyle's mate was pregnant with his child, but they had been on the run for months now. Lyle sighed inwardly and refocused on the deer at Hawk's urging. 'You're going to let the meat get away.' Hawk complained at Lyle's lack of focus. Lyle quickly moved around the bush and within striking distance of the deer. Leaping out from his cover, while he transformed into his wolf, Lyle and Hawk took down two of the deer, who were standing next to each other, neatly. Hawk lost no time and ripped into the largest of the two deer. 'No Hawk!' Lyle screamed in his head. Hawk had been getting stronger and stronger, and it was all Lyle could do to keep control sometimes. At other moments, like now, if Lyle gave Hawk any control, Hawk was reluctant to give it up. Lyle fought for dominance, but Hawk continued to feast unbothered. Lyle felt trapped and worried. If he did not get Hawk under control, he was going to get locked in the back of Hawk's mind forever. Hawk was usually rational, but he was also very impulsive and sometimes aggressive. Hawk was also very protective over his mate, especially now that she was carrying their pup.

He fed on the deer until he was full. Once he was through, Hawk relinquished control and shrank back into his human form. Lyle breathed a sigh of relief. At least it was just to eat, and he only ate one deer and not both. 'You worry too much. I left some for our mate.' Hawk said and then settled back into the back of Lyle's mind. It did not reassure Lyle that Hawk ate first and the leftovers were for Amaris. "Our mate has plenty, and we need food to be a good protector." Hawk said with one last comment before he was completely gone. Lyle went back to get his backpack, and got out his hunting knife so that he could clean and skin the deer that was left. He would cut it up to bring back to Amaris at their temporary camp.

They had not heard from anyone else in weeks. Not since the panicked mind link from Anna saying that both of the other groups had been attacked and those who were left had gone underground. Amaris has been devastated since. She lost Gran in the attack. The woman who raised her as her own and the one person who Amaris was sure had the answers to the questions that had plagued her since all this started. Amaris never got the chance to ask them. Now she would never see her again.

As if losing Gran was hard enough, Amaris was suffering from immense guilt over the many other people who have lost their lives since The King, and his daughter Sveta had started hunting her months ago. The King had wanted Amaris to mate with him so that he could exploit her powers. He had captured her and would have succeeded if it were not for his flare for the dramatic. He had to create a spectacle. The King had partnered with the vampires and Adam, Lyle's younger brother. Half brother more precisely. Adam had been Sveta's mate, but he did not mark and mate her because he had other plans. Adam wanted Amaris' power too. He was also jealous, because he somehow had found out that she was Lyle's mate. Lyle had given over leadership of the pack to him while he stayed down in Amaris' village to protect her. Adam, in the end, had betrayed everyone that loved him in pursuit of power.

While the King was dead now, and his daughter held Amaris responsible for both her father's and Adam's deaths. Sveta wanted revenge, and she had taken her father's throne and was now using her power as Queen of the werewolves to hunt down Amaris and anyone who has ever had any contact with her. Many people have paid with their lives. That guilt weighs heavily on Amaris. While Amaris asked for none of this and up until just before her seventeenth birthday, she had no idea that she was even a werewolf nevermind a goddess.

Lyle finished cutting up the venison and packed it all away wrapped neatly in his pack. It was not as much as he would have liked, but it should last them for the week. Werewolves, unlike humans needed more protein and ate a mostly protein diet. A pregnant werewolf needed almost twice as much protein. She was growing a pup at a much faster rate than a human baby. Werewolf pregnancies only last six months. Amaris was now about three and a half months. Lyle was worried they would not be free of the huge shadow hanging over them before the pup was born.