Goldilocks Read online

  You’re always treating me like a child! Jake let the thought trail off, knowing that he would never win this battle.

  His father was upset that he hadn’t been there during the attack, but Jake knew if he had been there, he would have been pushed back and not allowed to fight anyway. He didn’t see how it made a difference. The wolf had been caught, and would be dealt with.

  You gonna be home in time for dinner? Jake nodded to the North, much higher than the clearing they were standing in.

  Gotta go back to the mine Rone responded, dropping his shoulders so that the wolf’s head lolled forward and finally dragged its body down to the ground with its weight.

  A small one compared to last time Jake nodded, turning the body over so that the gaping wound in its side was visible. Nearly ripped this one to shreds…

  Not that it would do any good Rone cut him off, slamming his right paw down on the wolf’s heaving chest. You think you can get him back before he starts to heal? Don’t waste any time! This wasn’t an easy…

  I got it dad Jake shook his head, clamping the wolf’s neck tightly in his teeth, just below the jowls.

  Warm blood squirted into his mouth, dripping from the sides and back down onto the ground as he maneuvered the massive body underneath his. He could feel the animal’s pulse, its plea low and agonizing, pushing through his thoughts, but he ignored it, just like his father had taught him. Jake resented the approving nod his father gave him before turning and heading back the way he’d come, towards the mine.

  Rone had taken a chance on leaving today, his person probably reported as missing since the tunnel they’d been working in collapsed over an hour ago. He’d seen to it that as many men as he could reach made it free of the falling debris, before charging off after the escaped wolf. Calling Jake from patrol hadn’t been necessary, but when the thing had attacked him from behind, Rone had let his fear show for just a moment, his worry for his family translated as anger when he realized that he had no idea of Jake’s whereabouts. He’d only seen one wolf escape through the gap in the rocks, but the collapse had happened so fast, he wasn’t sure. With no leader, the miners had taken it upon themselves to follow old man Jacobs plan and continue drilling deeper. The town had suffered during the two years the mine had been closed, and everyone was anxious to start providing for their families again. They wouldn’t listen to him, and so he worked with them, while at the same time working against them, collapsing the tunnels when necessary, and praying for forgiveness when his fellow man was injured in the process. If only they knew…

  Jake heard the tail end of his father’s thought and immediately felt guiltier for not being there during the attack. To Jake and his mother, his father wasn’t head of the council, keeper of the woods; he was just Rone, loving, caring father and husband. Jake knew that, and he knew his father’s anger was for his own protection, but when did he get his chance to grow up? Even though he had a few more months before his eighteenth year, Jake had already chosen the shifter life. He’d never taint the waning council blood with one of ‘them’. He didn’t need the humans, and his fight was with Creed and his pack, not his own family. I do know…

  Jake willed the thought through with a heavy sigh, dropping the still panting wolf at his feet, so that the blood running from its neck dripped over the rim of the cursed abyss. His breath held as he repeated the ancient spell.

  Bound, not broken, spirit born, cursed in life, death and beyond the living grave in which you shall live throughout all eternity. Council given, council taken, unto this world you are no more…

  Jake didn’t look as he shoved the body over the edge just as a last ditch yelp echoed free towards the quickly darkening sky. He’d looked plenty of times before, and knew that his ears saw far better than his eyes ever would into the thick inky blackness below. The sound of the wolf’s bones snapping and breaking, crunching with every thud against the sharp jagged rocks that made up the cyclone shaped vortex he stood over, clenched his spine and tensed his body as he forced the thing’s fading thoughts from his head. Even still it would live, and heal slowly, but painfully, until it had fully regenerated enough to be sent out to search for an escape again. Forged by nature, and cursed by the council upon Creed’s betrayal, there was no way out, except through the deep dark tunnels the miners were creating on a daily basis.

  The man had called the girl ‘Hannah’. Jake breathed the name past his human lips, shivering against the shift that left his bare skin chilled without the covering of his fur. The mouth of the abyss was situated on the highest peak, furthest from the base of the nearest mountain to his home. From there he could see all of the lights that made up Lake City, the few twinkling dots that made Hinsdale an official town, and then off in the distance, just below the pass, in his forest, a lone glow of yellow, so dim that he had to strain to know that it was really there. He couldn’t hide it from his father forever. By morning the whole town would know about the girl and man living in old man Jacobs’ cabin. A few more weeks, struggling on their own, the miners would have given up like that had so many times before, oblivious to the danger that they were in. But if there really was a new inspector, it could only mean one thing. The mine wouldn’t be closing any time soon, and that wasn’t good.

  Chapter 3:

  Hannah opened yet another suitcase, trying to figure out where she’d put her toothbrush. Routine had been the key to her sanity back in D.C., but her first full day in her new home, and she couldn’t even start her morning off right. A call from the moving company, early that morning, had alerted them that the trucks had been delayed by a day maybe more, which meant that the sleeping bag she’d crawled into late last night would probably be her bed for another night or two. She was trying, but her dad hadn’t mentioned the lack of stable electricity out here, or simple conveniences such as Wi-Fi and air conditioning.

  Upon moving all their bags from ‘Big Red’ to the cabin, she’d immediately discovered that none of the light switches worked. It had taken another hour to find the utility shed in the back yard that housed not only an antique furnace, but a generator that looked like it was one of the first ever built. Her dad had assured her that she wouldn’t even notice the change in the source of their power, but once he’d finally gotten it up and running, Hannah had readily noticed the differences, and so had he.

  Where their apartment had recessed lighting that allowed them to set it anywhere between dim and super bright, the cabin’s four rooms boasted one light fixture each, the bulbs in them weak and flickering ever so often. The kitchen served as the living room and dining room, the tiny refrigerator churning out an irritating noise every time the generator started a new power cycle. The toilet in the bathroom came with special instructions and so did the nozzle hanging from the ceiling that was meant to be a shower head.

  Her father had apologized too many times to count over an awkward dinner of canned soup and leftover sandwiches from their ride, insisting that she at least take the room at the front of the cabin that had one of the three windows in the entire place. The space probably wasn’t big enough to even hold her queen sized bed they were having shipped from D.C., but Hannah had refrained from complaining, situating her sleeping bag in the middle of the hard wood floor with her suitcases stacked around her.

  It was a huge mess now, most of her neatly packed clothing and shoes now scattered about the floor, along with a few books and items she couldn’t bear to leave in the hands of the movers. It had been her intention to get everything put away today, but even if she’d had the box of hangers she needed, there was only one closet in the whole place, and it was in her father’s room, in the back of the cabin. Sharing was not an option, and he’d promised her he’d figure something out in the morning, but looking around now, Hannah doubted there was anything to figure out.

  Morning had brought sunshine streaming in through the tiny window of her room, allowing her a good look at what was to be her space, but unlike her carefully decorated bedroom in their apartment
, there wasn’t much of a vision when Hannah looked at the square shaped stack of logs surrounding her. The modern paintings, that had once been her mother’s, would just look out of place tacked up on these walls, as well the string of Christmas lights she’d planned to drape around the ceiling as she had her old bedroom. There were no plugs, not even one to plug in the Swarovski pink crystal lamp Aunt Maggie had given her last Christmas. She’d always felt it to be a little too girly for her taste, but because of the giver, she’d cherished it, and kept it on her nightstand right beside her bed.

  Hannah sighed in frustration, blowing her bangs off her already sticky forehead; one more thing that needed to be addressed while there was still daylight hours. While the cabin stood in a cocoon of giant trees, it still held in the summer’s heat like a furnace. With no air conditioning to speak of, they’d only managed to get one of the two windows in the living room open last night, the breeze stopping just before it made it around the corner towards Hannah’s bedroom. Her own window lacked a screen and had been nailed shut, but after the sweltering night she’d had last night, she was determined to at least get a crack in it today so that she could sleep without sweating.

  “Okay shoes…” Hannah muttered to herself, grabbing her two favorite pair of cross country trainers from out of the pile on the floor.

  She’d almost decided on a wall to line them up against, when a light knock sounded on her door causing her to jump.

  “Didn’t mean to scare you,” her father held up one hand in defense, the other extended to her balancing a plate piled high with a fresh salad.

  “Where did you….?” Hannah’s words trailed off as she dropped the shoes and grabbed for the plate.

  “There’s a pretty nice sized garden out back actually,” Paul shrugged. “A little overgrown, but I found potatoes, radishes, cucumbers, a few tomatoes, lettuce and carrots,” he smiled as she stabbed the stack of vegetables with the plastic fork he’d laid on top, watching as she shoved the whole wad in her mouth.

  “No dressing, but this is delicious!” Hannah moaned, her mouth watering as her teeth crunched down on crisp cucumber and juicy tomato. “

  Aunt Maggie had turned her on to a mostly vegetarian lifestyle when she’d started running cross country back in middle school, and Hannah had stuck with it, only allowing fish, milk and eggs into her diet on the occasional basis. After two days of tofu sandwiches, hummus chips, and a few bites of tuna, the salad was a feast in and of itself, instantly lifting the low spirits she’d woken up in this morning.

  “Figured you were hungry,” Paul said as Hannah barely gulped down what was in her mouth before taking another bite.

  “Starved!” Hannah corrected around a mouth full of greens, laughing at herself when a few bits flew free.

  “I’m not going to take it, I promise!” Paul joked, pretending to swipe food from his shirt and pants. “I’m actually going to head into town and see if I can find me a steak or something…”

  “Yuk!” Hannah pretended to gag, shaking her head for him to stop.

  She didn’t mind that her father ate meat, just not in front of her. The thought of it made her stomach flip flop, and the smell literally made her gag at times. She didn’t need details of what he would most definitely be enjoying for breakfast.

  “And then over to the mine,” Paul continued, pausing when Hannah’s eyebrows pinched together with worry.

  “Already?” she mumbled, looking around at her ransacked suitcases she had yet to organize.

  “It won’t be like before sweetie. I thought I should probably get over there and introduce myself. Meet with whomevers been in charge up until now and see where I need to get started. A few hours at the most, and I’ll be back to help you get this place into shape. I know it’s not our apartment back home, but…”

  “Don’t apologize anymore dad,” Hannah stopped him short, swallowing the slice of tomato she’d been chewing so that she could talk more clearly. “It’s gonna take me a while to get used to all this, but I think I kind of like it,” she fibbed just a little, nodding her head towards the window. “When we got in yesterday, I thought I saw a trail leading up into the woods. It’d be perfect for cross country training; school starts in a couple weeks and I haven’t trained all summer.”

  “I don’t know if the woods are such a good idea,” Paul shook his head, noting immediate defiance in his daughter’s features.

  “Oh come on dad, the parks of D.C. are probably less safe than these woods. You let me run there for hours at a time with no complaints.”

  “Yeah, but with your cell phone, and a can of mace!” Paul interrupted her, shaking his head as she slipped her phone out of her back pocket and held it up for him to see. “That won’t help out here, no service remember? And I have to take the satellite phone with me to get in touch with Mike.”

  “Ok so I’ll just leave a trail of breadcrumbs,” Hannah joked, tossing the phone onto a pile of shirts at her feet. “And I’m not sure where the mace is, but what’s the worst I could run into out here?”

  “You’d be surprised,” Paul shook his head at his daughter’s fearlessness, wishing he’d had more time to prepare them both for the sudden move from the city.

  “What? Like lions, and tigers and bears! Oh my!” Hannah laughed, pretending to shiver all over with fear.

  “Yeah maybe,” Paul answered seriously, his lips pulling into a grim line. “Well…not lions and tigers, but maybe bears and fox, and…”

  “Well if I run into a bear I’ll just lay down and play dead,” Hannah shrugged, trying to wipe the smile from her face for her father’s sake. “And if I see a fox, well…I’ll just outrun him,” She punched her dad lightly on the shoulder before taking another bite of her salad to hide the smirk she couldn’t get rid of.

  “I don’t think the whole playing dead thing is true,” Paul’s brows creased, his thoughts wandering back to what little he remembered from boy scouts when he was younger. “But I’m sure you could outrun a fox with those long legs,” he finally sighed, knowing that he wasn’t going to win this battle.

  She was just like her mother, strong willed and determined to have her way if she could. He didn’t want to start an argument with them just making up yesterday, so he pulled out the map, he’d intended to use, from his back pocket- circling the location Sam had highlighted the day before.

  “This is the trail I think,” Paul pointed to a light blue line running straight back from their property heading north, up the mountain. “Now I don’t want you to go too far. That ‘trail’ use to be an old mining road I think. From the yard it seems pretty clear, but if you see anything…anything at all…”

  “Don’t worry,” Hannah took the map and let it fall on top of her phone. “I’ll take it with me, and the phone,” she added with a smile. “And if I see anything, I promise I’ll come straight back to the cabin and wait for you to get here.”

  “Promise?” Paul lifted her chin so that she looked at him directly, her green eyes widening innocently as she nodded slowly.

  “Promise.”

  **********

  Hannah had changed three times before finally deciding on the black leggings, thin long sleeved powder blue V neck and her pink cross trainers she wore now. Her first trip out of the house had only been for five minutes, and she hadn’t even started her stretches before her bare legs and arms were burning with mosquito bites. After applying a slathering of alcohol to her skin, she’d pulled on a light fleece jacket and sweats to cover her body, but had almost fainted immediately, upon stepping outside, from the ninety degree midday heat. The leggings and long sleeved shirt proved thin enough to keep her cool, but thick enough to keep the bugs from being attracted to her skin while she ran.

  Once again outside, Hannah made a mental note to check the clothing she’d brought with her for more leggings and long sleeved shirts. Her winter clothes were somewhere in a box on the moving truck, and washing clothes at this point was a mystery since the cabin had neither a washer
nor dryer she could use.

  “Welcome to the great outdoors,” she muttered as she strapped her ankle pedometer on, fixing it tight enough so that it wouldn’t jostle about too much.

  Her long blond hair was next, the tresses already flat from the humidity in the air. Despite most of her previous teammates’ preferences for shorter hair during the cross country season, Hannah didn’t mind the weight of her ponytail on her back. Her mother’s hair had been the same golden color, stick straight, and impossible to curl, just like hers. When Hannah looked in the mirror she saw a little of her in herself, and feared that chopping it all off would erase that tiny piece of her she held on to so dearly. It only took a couple minutes to stretch a headband down around her neck and then push it back up so that her bangs caught with the rest of her hair, instantly cooling her face and neck when she pulled the hair tie from her wrist and secured her ponytail tightly at the back of her head.

  She started her stretches slowly, turning in an arching circle with each twist until she was facing the section of woods behind the house where she’d spotted the trail. In broad daylight it was easier to see, a partially imbedded boulder seemingly marking the spot where it started. It had been a few months since she’d run at all, much less to time herself, but her body still remembered what to do, the muscles in her calves tightening into the easy jog she set for herself across the yard, and up towards the path.

  Today’s goal was to get a feel for the lay of the land, find the tricky spots, and make a mental note of where not to step. Too often she’d seen other cross country runners ruin their chances of a season by miss-stepping off a path right into a sink hole or a ditch. Running on this terrain would be much different than running through the parks in downtown D.C., and her twelve minute flat 5K didn’t stand a chance at try outs in two weeks if she wasn’t ready.

  Hannah counted her breaths as she climbed the first slope with ease, her shoulders and arms relaxing into the natural gate her feet had fallen into. A quick look behind her, and she could still see the cabin through the trees, the brightness of the tiny clearing a stark contrast to the shrouded cover the forest surrounding her provided. She’d never thought it possible to have so many dips and hills in one small area, but after a second steeper slope, Hannah found that her breaths were coming faster already, the short span of flat terrain between the last rise and the next, not quite enough to even out her pace.