Authors: Christopher Golden
“Who will you take first?” Jack asked, retying his boot-laces. He and Reese could never keep eye contact for long, never let the guards know there was a conversation going on.
“Nearest one. Get his guns, then move on.”
“You ever shot a man?” Jack asked, and he could already see the answer in the big man's eyes. For a moment, he actually looked scared.
“Not yet,” Reese said.
Jack was aware of the rest of the men listening. He glanced around to make sure none of the slavers could hear, and they seemed safe for now.
“You need to go for the strongest first,” Jack said. “Not the loudest, or the cruelest, but the one who'll coolly shoot a man in the back in cold blood. We already know one of them, but there'll be more. We have to spend time marking them.”
“You're just a damn kid!” Reese said.
“And you're just a bear with no bite.”
“No one talks to me like that!”
“I just did,” Jack said. And he realized then what he had to do. He'd known for a while, he supposedâmost of that dayâbut here and now, he saw the way this would play out. Most of the men were behind Reese, because the lure of freedom was greater than the wisdom of caution. So he had to prove to the men who was wisest, and who
was strongest. He had to show them who could really lead them to freedom, and in the wild, that wasn't done by talking politics.
Reese was already keen to fight.
Jack took a deep breath, glanced around at the othersâexpectant faces, sad eyes, some of them already beaten menâand then his gaze settled on Merritt.
His friend's eyes went wide as he saw what Jack was about to do. “Jack, don'tâ”
Jack pushed himself forward, swinging a heavy right at Reese's head. With the thunk of fist against skull, and the excited shouting of men, the fight of his life began.
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Reese had not been prepared for it. Though he acted the hard man, he was exactly what Jack had suspected: a coward enjoying the scent of leadership. Jack's flailing fists drove him over sideways, and both of them fell dangerously close to the fire.
Voices rose around them, and a cheer as Reese recovered and launched a heavy fist into Jack's shoulder. Then he bucked and threw Jack off, grabbing a burning stick from the fire and swinging it high over his head.
Jack rolled away and felt the stick strike the ground close to his feet. Sparks hit the bare skin above his wet socks. The heat was almost welcome. He gained his feet
and turned, ready to hold back an attack. But Reese was just standing there, swinging the still-smoking stick left and right like a giant pendulum.
The whole camp had gathered to watch. The slaves had stood and pulled back into a tight circle, affecting the air of people avoiding violence rather than urging it on. Jack saw Merritt there, the only one who seemed to despair over what he saw.
He
is
still my friend
, Jack thought. And in the midst of a fight that was partly about saving Merritt's life, that idea pleased him immensely.
Beyond the slaves, William's men were also watching. Jack saw five or six of them gathered within the circle of tents, William and Archie included. The others must have still been on guard duty beyond, not lured in by the sudden violence, and already Jack was learning how organized they were.
Don't you see?
he wanted to shout at Reese.
But Reese was coming at him then, blackened branch swinging wide again.
Jack ducked and punched Reese in the stomach. His hand sank into flab, and the big man
whoof
ed and staggered to the side, winded. Jack went after him and struck him across the head, but Reese surprised him by swatting him aside. Jack stumbled and hit the ground hard.
He heard the slavers betting on who would win the
fight. His fall must have changed the odds.
Standing, Jack braced himself for another attack. But Reese hung back. A trickle of blood ran down from somewhere under his wild head of hair, drawing across his cheek and entering his equally unkempt beard. He looked like a forest wild man of legend, but his eyes spoke of an altogether gentler upbringing. For an instant Jack wondered where Reese came from and who waited for him back home. Then the big man came for him againâperhaps finally realizing what was at stake hereâand Jack stepped sideways.
The fight became more consistent, and more brutal. Reese had seen the look in some of the other men's eyes, and he knew that he had to win this fight to maintain his position at the top of the pecking order. And Jack caught sight of Merritt's lost, longing expression, and knew he had to save his friend. The first bullet would be his, yes, but the thought of Merritt dying because Jack could not protect himâ¦that was unbearable.
The men were growing wild, now, like a pack of dogsâor wolvesâwaiting to see which fighter would dominate, and which would offer up his throat. His fellow oppressed men, and the oppressors, all cheered and jeered. But beyond that was something else. A great awareness, a paused beat in the timelessness of the mountains and
rivers, as if just for the length of this fight, time had halted, held its breath, and Jack was suddenly
more
than a speck in the wilderness. He was the mountains themselves, the deep rivers holding their glittering golden secrets for those brave enough to search, and that watcher from the mountains gave him strength, and it was a strength that came from fear.
Because the thing that watched was no wolf.
Reese had strength, but Jack had youth and speed, and a brutal instinct that the other man lackedâhe had hurt men before, beaten them into bloody submission in dock fights and back-alley brawls. He took no pride in that history; it had merely been his way to survive the life he had led up to this day, and it would get him through this night.
The wild in him. The wolf. They came to the surface like never before, and he thought of the pack, surrounding them, howling, and he knew there was only one way this fight could end. He beat Reese, and when the big man fell, Jack beat him some more. Defeated, Reese raised his hands in supplication. Still Jack fell upon him, nuzzling down beneath the stinking beard and clasping the man's throat between his teeth. He growled.
“Yes,” Reese panted.
Jack growled again, and he heard the sudden silence that had fallen over the slavers' camp.
“Yes,” Reese said, whispering this time. “I submit. I submit.”
Jack released him, tasting the sweat and blood of victory on his tongue. He stood slowly. And before Archie and three other men came at him with their fists and clubs, he felt the cowed, respectful eyes of the other slaves upon him.
J
ACK COULD NOT SLEEP
. The beating they'd given him had been bad enough, and he was thankful that no bones appeared to be broken. Weak as he already was, thinner than he'd ever been, suffering again from the beginnings of scurvy and feeling how loose his teeth had become, the energy he'd expended that day should have slipped him into the deepest sleep. After panning for twelve hours with little food, then fighting Reese and taking the beating from Archie and the other thugsâ¦
He could not recall ever being so exhausted, and yet sleep eluded him. He lay on his back and stared up at the stars. The night sky drew heat from the ground, and from Jack, and however many skins he draped over himselfâand some of the men had thrown their own across to himâhe could not stay warm. He wondered at the number of
stars up there, and thought about how many other hopeful people were lying like this across the Yukon Territory, staring into the dark and dreaming of the golden days yet to come. Even though Jack's situation was far differentâthe bruises, his ankles tied to a stake in the groundâhe still felt free. There was more to trapping a man's soul than tying his legs and beating him into submission.
Jack blinked, his eyes heavy and sore with tiredness. He heard snoring from the other men around him and hoped that Merritt was sleeping well.
Saved your life today
, he thought, and he was sure that Merritt understood. He hoped they
all
did, even Reese. He'd not meant the big man any lasting harm.
He tried casting his mind out beyond the camp, leaving the captors and captives behind, exploring the darkness to seek out whatever had been watching the fight. Even while Archie had beaten him with fists and a wooden club, Jack had felt observed by something far away, that terrible thing that held him in such curious regard. And, knocked almost into unconsciousness, he had felt like the observer. He'd felt a distance to his pain, as if he was both suffering it here and viewing it from afar.
Within him was a raving hunger the likes of which he had never experienced before. This was not only a hunger for foodâgood meat, which he'd not had since hunting
from the cabin; fruits and vegetables, which they'd had little of in Dawsonâbut for something more spiritual. Something deeper.
Listening desperately for the familiar howl of wolves and, when he could not hear them, feeling lonelier than he ever had in his life before, Jack drifted off to sleep at last.
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In his dream, something touched his face. It was cool and wet, and Jack raised a hand to brush it away. Something else brushed against his exposed foot, and a shape worked its way closer to him beneath the skins piled across his body. He felt both trapped and assaulted, and he started to panic as he felt the thing coming closer. He could feel the strange heat of it, and yet when it touched his stomach, it, too, was cold, and wet.
He opened his eyes. Shadows stood all around him, barely visible in the light of the weakened campfire, utterly silent. He gasped and sat up, and when the pain of his beating bit in, he realized that this was no dream.
Ten trail dogs stood around him, staring. They'd been nudging him with their noses, and now that he was awake, they simply watched. These animals were slaves to William and Archie and the rest, just as Jack and Merritt and the other men were. They'd stolen the dogs, just as they'd been trying to steal Hal's mangy mutt when Jack
and Merritt had first encountered them.
He looked from one to the next, and each of the dogs reflected moonlight in its dark, wet eyes. None of them made any noise. None of them glanced away, not once, even when he brought his arms from beneath the skins and folded them across his chest.
It's so damn cold
, he thought, and he glanced at the fire. It had been allowed to burn down, and around it he could make out the shapes of his fellow slaves sleeping. Surrounding them, visible as pale blurs in the starlight, were the slavers' tents. Beyond the tents somewhere, he knew, there were at least three slavers still on guard.
Or there should have been.
“They'd have come to see what was happening by now,” he whispered, and one of the dogs edged closer.
Jack pulled back. He knew how vicious trail dogs could be. But then he exhaled, sensing no threat here. They were around him but not
surrounding
him. He reached out a tentative hand, and a dog rolled its head against his open palm.
“Hey, boy,” Jack whispered. “What's on your mind?”
The dog whined, low and quiet, and Jack felt its voice rumbling against his palm. The others edged closer. One of them sniffed him, another snapped at the offending dog.
What
is
this?
The moon emerged from behind scattered cloud cover.
It was half full, and its silvery sheen fell across the landscape like a dusting of snow. The tents grew lighter, the shadows beyond less dense. Jack looked around, trying to make out the moving shapes of William's guards, but he could not spot them. Maybe they were sitting somewhere, watching the silent camp and confident that, motionless, they'd spy any movement the instant it happened.
The dogs turned away. Jack felt a momentary pang of regret at their departure, and he almost called them back. But whatever part they were playing this night was over, and he was keen to see what was to come.
Something's happening
, he thought. He assured himself again that he was not asleep; the vibrancy of his senses convinced him of that. His skull hurt, and his neck, and his limbs and ribs from where the slavers had beaten him. But the pain seemed fresh and vital, as startling as the burn of returning sensation after almost freezing to death.
He looked beyond the camp, because he knew that whatever happened next would come from there. And then he saw the wolf.
It stood below a line of trees a hundred feet from the camp, up a steep slope that led out of the creek and to the hillsides higher up. It stood in just the right place for the newly revealed moon to touch it, and its mottled gray pelt seemed to shine.
“There you are,” Jack whispered, and at the sound of his voice the wolf began to walk. It was making for the camp.
No!
he thought.
No, they'll see you, they'll
shoot
you!
He looked frantically for the trail dogs, but they had already melted away into the camp, returning to their hidden places like shadows beneath the sun.
Jack could see only the wolf's head and the tip of its tail for a while as it came closer, its step confident, no hesitation at all in its approach.
“They'll
see
you,” he whispered, glancing around desperately for the sentries. But they were still absent. Nothing stirred among the tents; nothing moved around the fire.
The wolf disappeared behind one of the tents and then emerged close to the closed flap. It sniffed at the tent, then started across toward Jack. It was beautiful. As the creature moved gracefully, its fur caught the moonlight in rolling lines, shadows dancing across its coat like breaths of smoke. Its eyes were alight, brighter than the meager campfire, and they never moved from Jack's face.
“You're here,” Jack said as the wolf stopped ten paces from him. He sniffed, and he could smell the animal scents; he closed his eyes, and he could hear the wolf breathing.
It came closer and pressed its muzzle against Jack's throat.
He snapped his eyes open, and he was staring into the
wolf's face. It opened its jaws, slowly, and closed them on the collar of Jack's coat. Then it pulled.
It wants me to leave
, he thought. “But⦔
The wolf growled, so softly, and then it darted to Jack's feet. In seconds it had bitten through the ropes binding his legs together, and in another few heartbeats it had gnawed the rope staking him to the ground. It turned its head and looked past Jack, back at the forest from which it had emerged. It growled again, slightly louder.
“Merritt,” Jack whispered. “If I go and he stays behind, they'll kill him.”
The wolf grabbed his hand in its jaws, a lightning-fast movement. He felt its wet tongue, the heat of its insides, and the incredibly hot points where its teeth pressed into his skin.
It's going to drag me!
he thought, panicked, and there was no way he'd be able to fight such an action. But it bit once, then let go and walked a few steps back the way it had come.
Jack crouched, wincing as circulation returned to his legs. He should have been seen by now, and so should the wolf, but he was being offered an opportunity here, the chance to get away and seek help. Hal had said that the mounted police patrolled these vast northern areas, and if he could get away and find them, bring them back, then maybeâ¦
The wolf's hackles rose as it looked back and forth
between Jack and the forest. It trotted back toward the tentsâ¦then gripped the flap of one in its teeth and pulled.
“No!” Jack said, louder than he'd intended. Nobody stirred, and the wolf let go of the flap and stared back at him.
I can go
, he thought.
I can follow it out of the camp as easily as I watched it walk in, and once I'm away, I can do my best for these men. I can fetch help
. Right then, weighing the chance of that against the possibility of ever overcoming William's menâhowever much he knew about them, however good his knowledgeâthere was no real alternative.
Besides, this was not the first time the wolf had saved his life.
I'll leave the camp and it will be gone
, he thought.
Vanished back to wherever it comes from
. He went, moving quickly but carefully, and as he passed between two tents, he could hear men snoring inside. The wolf stood before him, resplendent in its coat of starlight. He followed, and as he crossed the grasses and entered into the forest, he expected the crack of a rifle at any moment, and the impact of a bullet between his shoulder blades. But none came.
The wolf did not pause. It led him up the slope, heading out of the creek bed and toward whatever wilderness lay beyond, but Jack's flush of freedom did not last for long.
Minutes after entering the forest, he sensed that he was being followed.
And moments after that, he knew that whatever stalked the darkness was nowhere near human.
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He could smell it: rotten meat, rank flesh, insides turned out. It pursued him, and he turned around to see its face. But however quickly he turned, the thing was always behind him. It made no noise, but it was always there. Jack ran. The wolf led the way, and whenever he feared it would leave him behind, it slowed down, giving him time to catch up. Not for a moment did he believe the thing following him was one of William's men. If he had believed that, he would have turned to fight. This thing kept its face hidden from him, buzzing around him like his own echo. And Jack ran.
The slope was steep, but he dug his hands and feet into the soft ground and pulled himself up. The wolf was close in front of him, so close that he could smell it again, and when he glanced back and saw fleeting movement from the corner of his eye, the wolf loosed a low, mournful howl as if Jack were already dead.
Low down in the creek behind him he saw the glow of the firelight.
The slope leveled a little, and Jack was able to move faster. If the wolf had not been with him, he believed he would have screamed, so close was his pursuer. He could smell the stench of it, almost feel it reaching for him with
each tree he passed and each shadow that merged with his own. He glanced back again, and once more the thing coming after him flitted from his line of sight. He paused for a moment and turned left and right, looking up through the branches at the stars and down at the mud between his feet. Still his pursuer eluded his view.
I was safe back there!
he thought.
People around me and the fire, and I was safe!
This thing, whatever it might be, was playing with him. It could have closed in on him at any moment, and if it had meant to kill him, it could have done just that.
Jack shouted. His voice, a wordless scream of rage and frustration and fear, echoed across the creek.
What nightmares will I seed in those sleeping men's heads?
he thought, and then his own nightmare appeared before him.
At first, he knew that he must be asleep and dreaming. This was the most realistic dream ever, but he would wake up aching from the beating and shivering in fright from his nightmare, and then he would go back to the creek and start panning for gold again. The idea held a sort of comfort for him, because at least then the danger was something he was used to and could face: the brutality of man. Here, standing before him in these dark woods and staring back with eyes that he recognized all too well, the danger was far from known.
He stared at himself. Haggard, emaciated, weak, his skin so thin it was almost translucent, teeth missing from bloody gums, hair fallen out in clumps from a loosened scalp, neck and jowls hanging low and empty, and Jack London's eyesâfor his they wereâwere older, and darker than he had ever believed possible. This was the face of a man who had seen the pit of hell and returned with its madness imprinted upon him.
Wendigo
, Jack thought, amazed and terrified, and the wolf bit into his ankle. He screamed and fell, and when he looked up again, the thing had gone. He caught sight of a shadow some distance away, and as it moved downhill toward the camp, it grew, expanding into the physical and finding its true, huge, monstrous form. Undergrowth rustled at its passing. Tree trunks cracked.
And Jack knew what it would do. Everyone in the camp, includingâ
“No,” he said. “Merritt,
no
!”
Jack ran, and this time he went downhill. He had no inkling of what he could do when he reached the camp again, and there was no real logic to his actions, but he could not leave Merritt there alone. Not with thisâ¦not withâ¦