Chapter 18
Tuesday breathed in the scents of the forest, relieved to be free of the helmet. Chilly air, a distant creek, dead leaves breaking down into soil, the specific green-dark smell of hemlock — and underneath all of it, the mountain itself. Old and venerable.
Her wolf rose in her psyche and justbreathed. This wasn’t woods near the city. This was forest. Far from civilization.
There were only two cars in the lot besides Knife’s bike. A Monday in late winter, whichmeant they’d have the trail largely to themselves, and Tuesday exhaled.
Knife was already shouldering his pack, and she noted he’d opened the bike compartment with hers inside.
She put it on, fastened the front strap, and smiled at him. “Thanks for thinking of this. I love the feel of this place already.”
“This is my favorite trail,” he told her. “But I won’t spoil it for you. Want you to experience it as we go.”
They hiked a good ways before she could hear the water she’d scented in the distance from the parking lot, and Tuesday let herself fall into the rhythm of boots on dirt with morning light coming through the canopy in long, cold slants.
She heard him breathing behind her, steady and unhurried, and felt her own breathing match it without deciding to. She blamed the submissive part of her brain for it, and told herself it had nothing to do with him specifically.
Her inner wolf, however, smirked at her and settled deeper into the pace, following his lead.
The trail started easy, meandering through a cathedral of hemlock and hardwood until they came around a bend, and she stopped.
The huge hemlock stood at the edge of a rock shelter, its trunk wider than her arm span. Wider than both their arm spans combined. The bark was deeply furrowed and dark with moisture, the roots gripping the rock and dirt with the strength of a being who’d been here for centuries and would likely be here for many more. The rock shelter curved behind, moss covering all the nooks and crannies.
She stepped close and looked up. Put her hand on it to say a quiet hello, and to justfeelit.
“Do you know how old it is?” she asked.
“Around five hundred years, according to the experts.”
“Yeah, itfeelsthat old, doesn’t it?”
“It does. I mean, it was two hundred years old when the Cherokee were still living in this gorge,” Knife said, from just behind her shoulder.
“It’s seen both people and animals use the shelter for centuries,” she noted. “It feels sentient. Not quite entlike, but… an ent without legs and feet.”
“I love that you think so, too. Also, that you shared that with me. Thank you.”
She turned to face him, and then stepped back because the moment was suddenly too serious. Unsure of how to handle it, she shrugged and said, “We’re both wolves. We pick up on stuff I don’t think most humans can sense. Not something I’d share with a human.”
“Do you often hike with humans?” he asked.
“No. Other pack members, sometimes. That’s pretty much it.”
She looked back to the tree for a long moment. Her wolf was looking at it too — something young and feral acknowledging something older and different, a silent sentry full of wisdom Tuesday couldn’t begin to fathom.
And she tried not to notice the wedge she’d put between her and Knife by reminding him she’s part of the pack.
They moved on, and Blue Hole Falls stopped her next — the waterfall dropping nine feet into a pool so clear she could see every stone on the bottom, the water a deep, improbable green.
“That color is… it looks like an oversaturated photo,” she said.
“It does,” he agreed.
The water sounds grew louder until the trail took a left turn near the confluence of two creeks, joining together to make a larger one.
“Big Fiery Gizzard Creek and Little Fiery Gizzard Creek,” he told her.
“What is it called once they join?”
