The Wolf Road Read Online Free Page B

wet, stuck-down hair off my face, but the rain just started falling heavier. Ground was turning quick to mud ’neath my boots. Trapper got me them boots early that spring, said they came off a barrow, some boy in Dalston died that winter. When I asked ’bout the blood on ’em he said the boy had a sickness a’ the lungs what made him cough red. I washed them boots in the river till my hands was numb and raw. Trapper said the boy got too cold and the devil got in him ’tween the shivering.
    “No,” I said, ’less I end up like that boy, “I don’t want to freeze up.”
    He screwed the scope back on the rifle. “We all got our jobs, Elka. Even this rifle got a job.”

    Always liked that gun, I did, she was black and sleek and the barrel was longer’n my arm. I could just ’bout hold it right, but Trapper never let me fire it. Said the kickback would knock my whole shoulder out a’ joint.
    He put the rifle bolt back in the stock and tested it a few times. That bolt slid back and forth smooth as butter over a hot plate.
    “Where’d you get that gun?” I said. I winced soon as them words left me. Don’t ask no questions was one a’ our rules.
    But Trapper didn’t growl at me like he normal did. ’Stead he set down the rifle and started loading up one a’ the magazines with bullets. Homemade bullets a’ course.
    “Took it off some Ruski fella in the Second Conflict,” he said, looking at the gun not me. “I gave him my rotten M16 as payment. Gun what I just shot him with. This here is a Dragunov. Got to take the best a’ what’s in front a’ you, girl.”
    I picked up the ax, still stuck in that log, and tried to pull it free. It was the best ax we had and it was better’n splitting logs with a knife and hammer.
    “You was in that fight?” I said. “My nana said my granddaddy was too.”
    “Everyone was in that fight,” he said, “only, not all of us was wearing uniforms.”
    He watched me struggle with that log but didn’t make no moves to help. He put the last bullet in the magazine and loaded the rifle. Then he picked up his hat and wax jacket from inside the hut.
    “I’ll be back tomorrow,” he said, slinging that rain gear on and striding out into the mud. He’d been gone all last night and it weren’t all that much past noon. It weren’t normal for him to be gone so frequent and so early, but I figured he must a’ had his reasons and I’d already pushed my luck with the questioning.
    He stopped at the edge a’ the trees.

    “Hold the ax at the end a’ the handle, not the head,” he said, “and put your foot on the log.”
    I did, and the ax popped out easy.
    “Keep the fire lit, Elka girl,” he said, and stalked off into the trees.
    I always kept the fire lit and he knew it, but he said it every time he left no matter what. Figured maybe it was his way a’ saying a kindness without having to. ’Stead a’ I love you, you keep the fire lit.
    Not sure why I thought a’ them “I love you” words then, I don’t remember no one ever telling me that. Trapper never did, that’s for damn sure, and I couldn’t even imagine them sneaking out ’tween my nana’s gnarly lips. But them words was stuck up in my head.
    Tell my little girl, I love you.
    Momma’s letter. The paper they was on was lost or rotted or stolen by the thunderhead, but them words was still there. Quick realized I hadn’t thought a’ them the whole winter past, since the middle a’ the year afore.
    Suddenly had me a longing to see Trapper. Didn’t want no girly cuddle off him or nothing soppy like that, but I wanted him close, not gone all night on a hunt. Never felt as safe in this world as when he was ’round.
    I set my head firm and figured he couldn’t a’ got far. It weren’t often I went ’gainst Trapper’s words but some deep-down feelings got the better a’ me and I was decided afore my senses got a say in it. I set down the ax on the porch and went inside for my coat and hat as well as a