Keva moved with speed on her snow shoes. “The blonde’s right, we have to go now!”

  The two wolves looked over their shoulder and began moving around the group of humans in a screening maneuver, moving in a wide circle looking and sniffed outward into the woods looking for any danger.

  Javier was a little more used to the snow shoes than the two women, he moved ahead of them but was still no match for Yrsa. The woman moved farther and farther away from them. Yrsa glanced back and seeing that she was far ahead of the group, she slowed down and rested against a tree, laying down her load of the unconscious man.

  She walked back towards the group and stood still. She listened to the woods around her. They would never outrun the hunting party that was following them. The sound of the arrow burying itself in the tree was all she had needed to hear to know that they may die today.

  The hunting parties of the Northman were always a threat. She had been warned since she was little to never go this far north. After all her time as an adult, she had never heard or seen any proof of these wild men who lived like animals, until today. They had trespassed too deep into their territory and now she was going to die because of these monsters.

  No, that wasn’t right. Javier had shown himself to be respectful and almost kind in a lot of cases. He brought her here to protect his friends. These beasts who looked like men were the monsters. They were her kinsmen, almost. Well, if they wanted a fight, she would bring more than a few down before she was taken.

  Javier and the two smaller women came up and turned around. The two wolves were out in front growling softly, the hairs along the back of their spine was standing straight up. Keva knelt down and unbuckled her snow shoes from her feet. She would need to be able to move quickly and the snow shoes would only get broken, or slow her down. Javier and Michelle did the same thing. Javier threw his pack over towards a tree. They turned back to the north and waited.

  The snow softly fell and the dark of the forest was not lessoned by the time of day. They stood, listening to the soft growls of the two wolves and to each other’s breathing.

  Then, all at once upon the drifts of snow they saw, two, no three heads rise over the snow drifts then a fourth and three more, and an eighth. Javier clenched his fists. There were as many as twenty men that came into view from over the snow. Javier blinked and looked closer. They weren’t all men, some of them were women.

  They were wearing thick layers of animal skins like the blonde man that Keva had brought with them. They were all broad shouldered. They had armed themselves with axes, various polearm weapons and a few rifles, mostly bolt action but there may have been a semi-automatic or two in their as well.

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  Yrsa stared wide eyed at what she was looking at. These people were not supposed to exist, they were simple ghost stories to keep her near home, so she wouldn’t get lost in the woods. This was impossible, impossible! They couldn’t be here!

  Without a word or signal, the twenty people let out a huge yell into the woods. The terrible war cry, or whatever it was, echoed and reverberated off the trees, shaking some snow loose from the branches overhead.

  Michelle looked at the people who had guns. There was no way she could get to them on foot, especially in snow shoes and without them she’d just get stuck in the snow. She gently snapped her fingers. The two wolves whipped their heads back to look at the Sage. Michelle quickly closed one eyelid over her blue eye and gave a half smile and the barest fraction of movement from her fingers.

  She watched the attacking party and the first male raised his rifle. Michelle having already found the membrane between this reality and that of the Whyte Plain, pushed.

  Yrsa gasped audibly and looked around like a scared animal, seeing the misty silent darkness of the Whyte Plain for the first time. Michelle looking at the scared, broad-shouldered woman and thought, Yeah, that was my reaction the first time too, sis. I’ll give you the tour later.

  “Hysminai, Soter, let’s do this,” Michelle said playfully as she moved a few rapid steps forward toward where the guy had first lifted up his rifle. The two wolves shifted into their werewolf form and Michelle winked again, pushing against the membrane between the two realities.

  The two wolves found themselves right in front of two men who held rifles. The men’s eye grew wide as saucers as two six and half feet tall werewolves suddenly loomed in front of them. Not even the Northman’s impressive human height could match that of the werewolves. They soon found their rifles ripped out of their hands and broken in half.

  Michelle didn’t waste any time but shifted immediately and ripped the rifle out of the hands of the guy who was in front of her. The startled jerk of the weapon caused the gun to fire and Michelle felt the bullet tear into her forearm. In a fit of rage, she ripped the weapon out of the guy’s hands, taking a finger with it, and her claws raked across his face and neck. The guy was so shocked, she wondered if he actually felt the slash or just the rapid blood loss from the wound. She broke the weapon in her hands as well before turning around, just in time to see a woman raise a semi-automatic rifle and pointed it at Hysminai.

  She pushed into the Whyte Plain and ran the two steps she needed to close the distance between her and her target. She jumped and pressed back into the real world. The jump carried her through the air and she tackled the harsh looking woman to the ground. Her claws ripped the woman’s arm out of her socket and the weapon came with it. Michelle beat the woman’s face with the butt of the weapon once cleanly knocking her out.

  Javier came crashing out of the Whyte Plain shifting mid punch as he closed with one of the men wielding an axe. His claw caught the man’s arm mid swing, breaking his wrists and forearm. The second punch pushed the man’s face in and he fell backwards in an unconscious heap.

  He turned just in time to push aside a swipe from a pole arm. The weapon was heavy and very durable. Javier could think that this was used to kill bears. Well, he wasn’t a bear and his claws came with apposable thumbs.