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61

"Who's still in there!?" someone shouted. Bethany did not know who. "For the love of the Cora, who's still in there!?"

Voices. That's all they were.

"Thoka, you and Ivio keep to the south side! Don't let those freaks get through! Denko, you stay here and protect the women!"

"How in the blue blazes am I supposed to -"

"Just do it!"

Disembodied voices, like ghosts. Maybe she was already dead, and this was hell. Maybe she died inside that tent. Maybe she and the twins and Taberah and everyone else was just dead.

"We can't stay here, Sai!"

"Seffer! Go help Yanek! Vekka, snap out of it!"

"We're gonna get overrun at this rate! We have to move!"

Bethany kept seeing him tilting back in his favourite chair by the kitchen table, puffing away on his pipe and staring up at the ceiling without a care in the world. Never in all their years together had she ever seen him tip over, even though she always expected it to happen at any time, even though she always had an 'I told you so!' ready and waiting on the tip of her tongue... she never saw him fall.

And now she never would.

"Salem!?" Bethany screamed, raking her claws across her face. "Salem!!"

"Mother!" Layla grabbed her hands, but there was no power in her grip at all. She could barely hold on. "Mother..." With the last bit of strength she had left, the girl embraced her, folding her arms around her body and winding her slender fingers through the tattered folds of her dress. Bethany could feel the blazing warmth of her tears against her shoulder and the shuddering impact of every muffled sob.

Bethany looked into her daughter's eyes, but it was the all-consuming flames that stared back from within their reflective depths, as if devouring her from the inside out.

"Mo... ther..." The poor girl could take no more. She had surpassed her own limits again and again during the course of this hellish night, and this was as far as she could go. Her knees buckled.

"Layla!" Bethany grabbed hold and they both sank down to the ground, desperately clinging to each other within the unforgiving glow of the fire, weeping for the lives lost, the families broken, all the blood spilled and all the blood yet to be spilled.

They wept...

It was in this moment, when hope had never seemed so far away, that she saw something moving within the flaming wreckage of the tent; a broken support post rising off the ground and pulling a sheet of burning canvas up along with it - a curtain of fire.

It was flung aside in a stream of embers, revealing a figure clad from head to toe in shifting layers of smoke, a shape blurred and distorted by the rising heat.

A figure with an unconscious vixen draped over his shoulders and a broken pipe bit protruding from his mouth.

"SALEM!!" Bethany screamed his name in joy and relief. She screamed his name in horror and misery. It was a call of thanks as well as a cry for help. She screamed his name because she was still capable of screaming and he was still alive to hear it.

Salem struggled across the uneven terrain, his teeth bared. The vixen's head lolled to and fro as he crunched his way over random piles of burning junk, her limp arms occasionally banging against his chest.

Several Wolves hurried to the edge of the burning detritus just as Salem coughed and spluttered his way over the last few obstacles, nearly tripping and falling.

"Salem! Oh gods, Salem!" Bethany reached for him, even though he was still so far away, desperate to touch him, desperate to make sure he was okay, desperate to feel the comfort of his embrace in turn, but she couldn't get up. Layla was bleeding so badly and oh, how she needed him! Now more than ever!

One of the Wolves grabbed him, holding him steady while another pulled the unconscious vixen (she was almost unrecognisable with all that soot and ash covering her face, but once Bethany noticed how badly the neckline of her dress was stretched out, she realised with a start that it was Sarah) off his back. They hobbled away from the intense heat as quickly as they could, but Salem had used up all the energy he had left. He fell down in stages, first down to one knee, then two, then all fours, never taking his eyes off Bethany. He reached up with a shaking hand, took the cracked and broken bit from his mouth, and vomited a stream of dark brown sludge to the ground while his helper Wolf patted him on the back. Salem tried to say something, but then his shoulders heaved and he vomited yet again. This time the stream had dark grey (almost black) streaks in it, and when he raised his head to look at Bethany, his eyes were the most bloodshot shade of red she had ever seen.

"Beth...?" he croaked, one lonely string of vomit hanging from his bottom lip. He looked down, and the moment he laid eyes on the bloody horror his youngest daughter had become, it was as if his entire being just shattered. "Oh gods, Beth!"

"Salem!"

His helper tried to get him back on his feet, but soon realised Salem simply wasn't capable of standing anymore. They closed the last few strides of distance in a crippled shamble, with Salem's useless legs dragging furrows in the snow.

The moment he was close enough, Bethany threw an arm around him and kissed him, loving him more than she had ever loved him in the past. "Salem! Oh gods, I tried to find you! I tried, but..."

"No, shh, shh," He hugged her tightly with those strong, yet surprisingly gentle blacksmith's arms, slowly rocking her back and forth. "No need to think about that. No need at all."

"Salem..."

"But Layla, is she...?" He couldn't bring himself to finish the question.

"She's alive," Bethany said, wiping at her streaming eyes, "but she's not doing very well. I don't have my medical bag or - or anything!"

"Is there nothing you can do? Nothing at all?"

"Salem... I'm afraid to even move her."

Salem bit down on his bottom lip, clearly struggling, and gently ran his calloused hands through Layla's bloody hair, tears shining in the depths of his bloodshot eyes.

The girl's fingers suddenly curled into a fist, weakly gripping the cuff of Salem's sleeve. "Fa..."

"Layla!"

They both bent down closer, but she was so exhausted she simply couldn't open her eyes. All she could manage were the barest of whispers, riding the outward bound currents of every shallow breath. "They saved me... everyone..."

"Who saved you?" Salem delicately pulled an errant lock of hair from her face, revealing, to everyone's surprise, a gentle smile, as if she were having a pleasant dream.

"Little Tio..." she said. "And Dan... And Dorin and his friends..." With every name, her smile grew just a tiny bit bigger. "They all worked so hard... to help me... to save me... So I can't die yet... If I did... I'd never be able to thank them..."

"By the gods, girl..."

"I love you, Fa... Ma..."

Bethany and Salem both took their daughter's hand in theirs, holding it between them - father, mother, and daughter - and for a moment it was just the three of them, together, their clothes in tatters, their fur all scorched and blackened.

For that single moment, they did not fear for their lives. For that single moment, they were happy just being together. They were happy just being a family.

But even a single moment of happiness could not be tolerated on this terrible night, because a moment was all it took for Salem to ask a question Bethany simply could not answer.

"Beth... what of Kiana? Where is she?"

Bethany began to shake. She couldn't help it.

"Beth?"

She buried her face against his shoulder and tried to gather enough courage to tell him what he needed to know, but every breath got stuck in her throat.

"Beth? What's wrong? What happened?"

An ominous silence descended over their little family, minus one. Bethany raised her head and, already knowing what she would see, looked into Salem's face.

He had gone cold, like stone. His arms were still hugging them close, but all the warmth had faded from his eyes.

He slowly raised his head and began to look around, seeing everything, but unable to take it in. It was a feeling she was intimately familiar with. The sense of impossibility unfolding all around you, of everything you had ever known and loved crumbling to pieces before your very eyes.

He looked out over the remains of the basecamp - so many Wolves grappling with each other. Half of them consumed by bloodlust and a thirst for vengeance, the other half desperately trying to protect what little there was left to protect. Bethany followed his gaze and saw Wolves staggering around with patches of flayed skin hanging off their bodies in bloody, dripping tatters. Broken bones sticking out of crooked limbs. She saw Wolves incapable of standing, crawling along the ground and trying to bite at the legs of their enemies. The sounds they made. The screams, the growls, the howls of pain. Curses in strange tongues.

Salem cast his gaze over the small group of survivors who had gathered here, in this hurtful, throbbing light, and Bethany knew immediately what he was doing. It was the same thing she had been doing for the past few minutes, over and over, praying to get a different result each time, but always coming up with the same answer.

He was taking attendance.

The twins were off to one side, frantically trying to get Sarah to regain consciousness, alternately slapping her on the cheek and looking out for danger. The Wolf named 'Denko' was doing the same with Taberah, desperately shaking her by the shoulder. Danado was in even worse shape than Layla, shivering in the crimson snow. A small Wolven boy stood watch over him, wringing his hands and looking from face to face, silently pleading for help. Small groups of Foxes, huddled together in fear, were trying to protect and comfort each other as best they could. Aisa was still hugging Renna to her chest, refusing to lay her down even though the girl must be getting monstrously heavy by this point. Another Wolf (the same one Nilia had carried in on her back, Bethany realised), had a hand on her shoulder and was trying to tell her something. Bethany couldn't make out what it was, but when he was done, Aisa rested her head against his shoulder and wept. Eric, William, and Jonah were here, too, staring out across the battlefield, feeling small, feeling useless. This was something so much bigger than any of them, bigger than all of them. But there was something far more terrifying to this tableau. Something quiet. Something subtle.

The ones who were missing.

"Kiana..." Bethany whispered, gripping the folds of Salem's shirt.

He hugged her back, but it was an automatic process, without any warmth or awareness. She could practically see him coming to the same conclusion. She could see him tallying up the numbers and finding them wanting.

"No..." he whispered. "No, it can't..."

Bethany touched his face. They were both so badly burned, but these wounds only went skin deep, and could never compare to the pain raging through their hearts.

"Beth..." He lightly touched his forehead to hers, and began to cry. She tried to comfort him, but could only produce tears of her own.

And so they cried. They cried in each other's arms. They cried for their daughter, lost to the night, her fate still unknown.

Sarah suddenly stirred against the twins' constant prodding, slowly writhing and moaning, and Bethany's heart sank even further.

No, don't wake her, you fools! she wanted to scream, but couldn't find her voice. Don't let her see!

Her eyes fluttered open and her arms immediately shot up to her face as if to ward off a blow. She looked from face to face, trembling like a leaf, her eyes wide and staring. The twins tried to calm her down, but it was no use. She sat up, shoving them out of the way, and began to call: "Mat, where are you!? Maaaat!"

And now Taberah was beginning to stir as well. She rolled onto her side and began to cough thick ropes of greyish phlegm into the snow. Her shoulders heaved with every convulsion, and Denko, completely at a loss, simply patted her on the back until they began to subside.

"Mat!" Sarah clambered to her feet, fell down, and immediately got back up again, whipping her head from side to side in the hopeless search for her son. "Maaaat!"

Once again, the twins tried to calm her down, but she ripped free of their placating hands and began to totter towards the blazing remnants of the tent, still calling his name.

All it took was one look into those wide, demented eyes for Bethany to know that she had gone completely over the edge. The friendly, tea-totalling, occasional dirty joke-telling vixen was gone. This creature stumbling across a field of ash and snow was the same vixen that had scaled a mountain with a bleeding womb and a crying infant on her back. This was the same vixen that would scratch and claw her way through any torture to save her children, and that's how Bethany knew...

This was a vixen about to get herself killed.

"Sarah, no!" Bethany turned to Salem. "Take care of Layla! Try not to move her!"

"Beth, wait! Where are you -"

Bethany slipped free of Salem's weak grasp and stumbled after her, calling her name. "Sarah! Don't!"

"Mat! I'm coming!" She had almost reached the edge of the fire. "Just hold on!"

"Sarah, no!" Bethany finally caught up and grabbed her around the middle, locking her fingers tight.

"Let me go!" she screamed, thrashing and flailing. "Let me go, you bitch! Mat is still in there!"

"It's too late, Sarah!" Bethany screamed back, amazed that a vixen as scrawny as this could have so much raw strength.

"Let me go!"

"There's nowhere to go, don't you understand that!?" The thing burning before them wasn't even recognisable as a tent anymore. It was just a blazing trough of flames. A bonfire stretching on for two dozen strides in both directions. Some of the supports were still holding their shape, but the skin was rapidly burning away, leaving them to look more like a hollow, decaying ribcage. Nothing could be left alive in there.

"Maaaat!" Sarah reached for the flames, and that was where the last of her energy finally gave out. All the strength simply ran out of her legs and she dropped down to her knees, with Bethany still holding on, and screamed to the sky.

Just as Sarah's shriek gradually turned into a sob, so too did Bethany's restraint gradually turn into an embrace.

Sarah cried for the son lost to the flames, and Bethany cried for her missing daughter and the little Wolven boy she had come to love as one of her own.

Mateo. Kiana. Hezzi.

They were kids. Just kids...

And they were gone.