“All right, let’s take a break,” I said, looking around. I wanted to see the lay of the land, and see if there were any potential sites of civilization closer than just hoping and staying on the same side of the lake we started on. Also, I wanted to find some food. “Ten minutes?”
Robin nodded and slung her bag off, much lighter than it had been when we left the plane a week earlier. She plopped down on the ground, her head nodding between her knees, and I watched her for a minute, concerned that it was time to take a day off to go hunting and trapping. I didn’t want to make Robin eat grubs and bugs, but if we had to, I’d do it. Hell, I have done it. After a moment, though, she looked up at me, and her eyes were clear, if tired. “Ten minute break, then we keep going,” she said, her voice determined. “But you so owe me a weekend in a five-star hotel after this.”
“Deal,” I said encouragingly. “Nothing but spa treatments, pampering, and room service.” At the mention of room service, my stomach grumbled, loud enough for both of us to hear. Robin giggled and patted her own stomach. “I think we might take the next hour to scout out some foraging as well,” I said. “There’s gotta be some sort of nut trees around here.”
Walking away, I kept my eyes open, looking for any signs of man or food. The lake was like milky glass, a shiny, slate gray that did not lift the spirits at all. I kept scanning and hoped for the best. Robin needed it.
Robin
While Wes was down by the lake, trying to see something that could help us, I let my body relax but kept my senses open. The incident with the snake had taught me a very important lesson, and I kept my walking stick near me, my ears open, and my eyes unfocused, trying to detect any movement I could.
I heard a sound off to the left, turning my head on a swivel. The wolf was big, a male who had obviously been outcast from his pack, at least from the scars on his side. He moved in, and in an instant I was rolling to my right, my stick in my hand.
I had been pretty good with the staff during my days in martial arts, although I’d never had to use anything I had learned outside of the classes. Wes was out of sight, maybe a hundred yards away through the trees, and I focused on the wolf instead of calling for him. There was no way he could get to me in time, and I knew I couldn’t waste any of my focus on anything but the wolf.
The staff, so similar but still so different from what I had used in martial arts, had become an extension of my arm over the past few days. Thicker near the top and tapering toward the end, I brought it up in my hands in about a one-third, two-thirds split, giving me reach but still balancing the weight. I didn’t have time for any other adjustments as the wolf charged, a growling cry tearing from its throat. My eyes felt almost supernaturally focused, and an intense sense of calm that I had only barely felt the wisps of before dropped over me. When the wolf’s rear legs tensed for the final leap, I started my thrust, jabbing the tapered bottom of my walking stick where I somehow knew the wolf was going to be.
Days of usage and dragging over the forest terrain had turned the tip into a rounded point, maybe not spear sharp, but good enough to do the job. It caught the wolf square in the throat, slipping just below his bottom jaw to scrape along the fur before landing solidly in the larynx, catching and twisting the wolf to the ground. I was still knocked back, the wolf’s sixty-five pounds of flying body mass driving the staff out of my hands and driving me to a knee, even though it never touched me. Recovering quickly, I sprung toward the wounded wolf, driving the sharp splinters into the wolf’s lungs. It coughed in agony, unable to stand or even howl with a crushed windpipe.
The whole fight lasted four seconds at most. I could see Wes running toward me out of the corner of my eye as I calmly retrieved my stick, which I could see was cracked in half, the narrow end hanging on by a thin strip of twisted pine wood that I yanked off. I was left with about a two-foot-long stake of wood with a murderously sharp end, which I looked at before I looked at the wolf. I could see the agony in the dark brown eyes, and I knew what I had to do. Before it could suffer any longer, I drove the sharp end of the stick into the wolf’s side, piercing through the lungs and I had hoped the heart or something that would kill it quickly. I must have hit something, because there was a short gush of blood which coated my hands, and the wolf sagged to the forest floor, dead.