Chapter 10

“Chloe… Chloe…” a soft male voice was trying to coax her from her dreams and Chloe wanted nothing to do with the voice. Pulling the thin cover over her shoulder Chloe curled up tighter into a ball.

     “Chloe… I know you need to rest but we really must leave now. Please Chloe, wake up”

     “Chloe!”

     The voice was intruding within her skull and the familiarity of Phillips voice in her head startled Chloe awake. She shot up from her make shift pillow to find herself inches from Phillips face. Phillip placed a delicate hand over Chloe’s mouth before she could let out a yelp.

     “Chloe, we must leave before anyone wakes up. Please hurry.” with Chloe’s nod of agreement Phillip released her mouth from under his hand and walked away into the darkness. Even though she couldn’t see him she could hear him rustling around close by.

     Seeing as she only had one bag and had not changed out of her clothes early in the night she was ready long before Phillip had returned for her. The camp was sleeping and a faint cough, here and there, could be heard.

     Phillip walked passed Chloe gently taking her hand as he did. The stiffness of his posture alarmed Chloe and she thought it best to stay quiet until they left the boundary of the camp. Back into the chaos of the forest Chloe was once again assaulted by the overgrown branches and sank back behind Phillip’s frame.

     She wasn’t sure what time of the night it was when she had first been woken up but she could see from the tree line to the right the first shades of the morning sky. The blackness was seeping away allowing the sky to fade from a darker blue to a lighter one and hints of orange began to appear.

     There was a strange stillness in the air and Chloe realized that she didn’t hear any animals. It was as if they were still sleeping and oblivious to the rising sun. This seemed incredibly strange to Chloe.

     “Um, Phillip, the animals… Um why are the animals still asleep? I mean why aren’t they up yet?”

     “There are no animals in this forest except for the ones belonging to the camp we just left.” Phillips tone was icy and unnerving and it made Chloe stop in her tracks.

     Seemingly annoyed Phillip stopped in his tracks and not looking back. “Chloe, I understand some things are confusing and you need answers but I can’t give those to you right now. I promise everything will be explained soon. Let’s just keep going and get to Nikolai’s as soon as possible.”

     Annoyed by the circumstances that they were put in Chloe stomped her way past Phillip and kept walking down the worn down path ahead of her.

What was he thinking? Chloe thought. Does he really think he can keep leaving things like this? Someone else is going to explain everything to me? I don’t think so.

Chloe whirled around ready to give Phillip a piece of her mind.  “Phillip if you think…”

Phillip wasn’t there.

Standing there in shock at not finding Phillip an overwhelming sense of fear began to creep its way into the seams of her mind. Chloe slowly began to step back down the path that she had just walked.

     “Phillip?” He voice was hushed and she knew he couldn’t hear her if he was a few steps away. She knew he wasn’t there.

Panic and terror overwhelmed her. She took off running back down the path and began to scream for him.

“Phillip! Phillip where are you? Phillip!”

Now shrieking his name she wiped back the tears that were now streaming down her cheeks. She began to run faster franticly searching for Phillip. This was different than when she was running from that thing in the alley way. A deep embedded fear was growing from within her. Phillip would not leave her willingly.

Remembering that he had spoken to her in her head she stopped running and began screaming for him in her mind.

“Phillip! Please tell me where you are Phillip! I am scared… Phillip?”

     Chloe stood there weeping and waiting for a reply. Where was her Phillip and why had he abandoned her here in these woods? Had she finally pushed him so far that he decided that she was not worth the time anymore?

     “C-C-Chloe! Please run….” His voice was so distant and so weak. This terrified Chloe and she ran back down the path away from where she had left Phillip.

     Concentrating on the path in front of her she ran fast. She ignored the sharp stings from the low branches as they whipped at her face. She knew that she was running for her life and for some reason Phillip would not be coming to her rescue this time. The path winded to the left and the trees began to thin slightly.

That’s when she heard them. The many ruffled sounds of feet in the morning shadows of the forest. The crunch of the leaves on the forest floor was so scattered it sounded like the unseen things were surrounding her.

Picking up her speed Chloe ran faster and was hoping to find the edge of the forest so she could be out in the open to face her unseen predators. A low lying branch caught Chloe on the right shoulder and she tumbled to the ground with a thud. The wind escaped from her lungs and left her gasping for air and then everything went quiet.

There was no more crunching of footsteps in the forest. There was no more sense that she was being followed. Chloe looked up and let out a terrifying screech as she found herself looking up into the piercing blue eyes of the red haired man that she had first seen back at the camp. His face held a look of immense joy and excitement and it sent a chill instantly down Chloe’s spine.

She sat there in confusion as she realized he was half naked with nothing but a pair of shorts hugging his thighs. His massive chest was bare but for a rather large patch of short curly red hairs. Muscles twitched and shuttered all over his body and she could see he was covered in sweat.

 He arched his head back exposing his massive throat and let out a deep crackling sound that sounded almost inhuman. Chloe realized he was laughing at her. Pulling herself up instantly Chloe reached back and gathering all her weight to her right side she pulled all her strength back around and let her closed right fist contact rather satisfyingly on the man’s left cheek with a loud crunch. To her surprise he barely even registered what she had done. In fact she didn’t even know why she had done it.

“What the hell is wrong with you sir? How day you scare me!” With her hands planted angrily at her hips Chloe stared into the man’s eyes with an icy glare. He had a smug look on his face that made Chloe even angrier and the way he looked at her with such amusement made her so irritated.

“What? What is so amusing? Is there a reason you are standing here before me other than to make me annoyed?” Chloe was surprised at the venom she heard in her own voice.

     He just stood there with that smug look on his face and staring down at her. Their eyes locked in a stare down. Chloe didn’t even know this man’s name but she knew she didn’t like anything about him. She was startled out of the stare down when she heard a sound behind her and she was relieved when she found Phillip trudging down the path towards her.

     He raised his head from looking down the path and as he realized the pair standing in front of him his body grew tense and his face grew hard in anger. His brow furrowed and his lip curled up into a snarl as he was getting ready to pounce onto the red haired man.

 “Phillip!” the panic in Chloe’s voice stopped Phillip in his tracks as he remembered she was there and he was instantly at her side. His hands gently placed on her wrists as he looked over searching for any signs of harm.

“I am ok Phillip. This man just showed up out of nowhere but nothing happened…” Her voice trailed off as Phillips eyes locked onto the top of her right hand. She was staring down at bloody knuckles unsure of when she injured herself. The blood was slowly traveling down the under part of her arm and she winced when he moved the fingers of her hand. She realized then that her hand was broken.

Looking at the red haired man Chloe gasped in confusion. She had hit him and mistakenly taken the crunch as a sign that she had harmed the man in some way. She couldn’t fathom how she had broken her hand on his face.

Before she could even take a breath she found herself staring at a wild Phillip tackling the man. He pounced so hard on the man that they both fell to the ground with a loud thud. The man didn’t even try to fend for himself as Phillip began to punch the man with both hands.

Phillip began to make growling noise and Chloe realized that he must have changed into the his wild self. Now scared for the man’s safety Chloe ran over to the two men pulling at Phillip’s shirt begging him to stop.

Phillip turned around pale face and large fully dilated pupils stared back at her. His face was crunched up into a wild snarl as he growled back at her confirming that he had changed.

“You protect him? He hurt you!” Snapped the wild Phillip. His voice tore into Chloe with the thick animal like tone and deep anger that came with every word.

“No, I don’t protect him. I beg you. I don’t want to see anyone hurt at my expense. I hit him and did this to myself. He, um, found me here running from something and I am sure that if he didn’t show up I would have been eaten by some wild animals.”

The wild Phillip stared back at her with disbelief clearly struggling to make sense of her words. He turned back to the red haired man, not sure if he was willing to give up the punishment he was giving.

Clearly seeing when he gave into Chloe’s plea the wild Phillip growled one last time.

“Shaithis, you leave now and I better not see you around her again. If I do not even she can stop me from what I really want to do.” Warned the wild Phillip and Chloe was startled by the mere fact that he was talking coherent words.

The smug look on Shaithis’ face told Chloe that the red haired man did not seem the least bit intimidated by Phillip. What was even more shocking to her was that he didn’t even seemed fazed by the change in Phillip. This confirmed that everyone in the camp must know about the wild side.

Chloe stood by Phillip’s side as they watched Shaithis stroll back down the path towards the direction of the camp.