The Claiming by Cooper

Chapter 77 Mason Mason

When I wake, I'm shocked to see I'm back in my human form. Not only that, but Jara's scent is all over me. Having her close has pushed the haze away.

The fact that she's worried enough about me to still be here speaks volumes about her feelings for me. I know she wants out of this claiming without a mark on her neck. She wants to be the one who gets to choose. But I've already cho- sen, and she's agreed to be mine. Now, it's just a competition between the two of us.

Well, us and the last remaining wolves in the territory.

I'm tempted to follow her into the trees, but I know that me crashing through the branches will draw attention to me and therefore her. She's been hiding in the trees for days and only a few of us know that. I want to keep it that way. I won't risk losing her to something foolish like making her slip and fall into someone else's unsuspecting arms or falling myself and making me incapable of catching her.

So, after laying down a challenge which I know she won't be able to resist, I begin racing down the cliff face. After two days in the haze, I feel fantastic. It's like she's given me the freedom that the haze took away. Now, to claim her before it sets in again.

As I get to the bottom of the cliff, I can see her dancing through the trees in front of me. I'm about to take off, when something makes me stop. I stand, turning around, wonder- ing what it is that feels off, feels not quite right.

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I sniff the air, looking for danger, then look around again. And that's when it hits me. Where's Typhon's body? He should be dead, lying broken on the rocky forest floor.

I lift my nose in the air again begin searching for his scent. I find the spot where he landed, and it's covered in blood. How did he survive this fall? I look up and realize he must have fallen at least eight stories and with the injuries he sustained before his fall, he shouldn't be alive. But where is he?

I reach down, touching the blood. It's mostly dry. I follow the trail for a bit, seeing that he was headed to the stream. I want to follow Jara, but I need to know that Typhon is dead. If he isn't, Jara will want to know.

When I get to the stream, there are no bodies. There is blood and I can see where he pulled himself into the stream, but he's gone. The water here is too shallow for him to have floated away. I begin tracking him, searching for his exit point from the water. He's washed off the blood and his scent, so tracking him will be harder. Normally, I'd shift to my wolf, but I'm afraid the haze will take me if I do, so I stay in humar form.

It's several hours before I finally find his exit point. I follow it as far as I can, but then his trail becomes crossed with too many other scents. When I finally give up trying to find him, it's mid-afternoon.

I've had to intimidate and fight several wolves today. More and more are becoming haze-crazed, especially the omegas. Most of them have been in the haze for several days and now they can't feel the Alpha command or sense that I am an Alpha and no match for them. I have tried to keep from killing them when I can. Even if they attack, I'll try to injure them and not kill them, but some are too far gone. They can't stop fighting me and I end up having to kill them.

I head back to the cliff where I was with Jara this morning. I lift my nose in the air and begin to follow her scent. It takes me the rest of the afternoon and into the evening before I find her. I knew she'd move close to the claiming entrance.

At 8am tomorrow morning, she can run out of the territo- ry and claim herself as an independent woman. I won't let her of course, but I know she'll try. And the excitement of the chase has me unable to sleep, which is good because I haven't found her tree yet.

I'm guessing she went up high again. I start back at the last tree where I found her scent and I begin again. This re- minds me of when I was in the haze, searching for her in the trees, but then it was all instinct Hunt, catch, claim.

Now, it's more than that. Now I want my mate, but as a man, not just as a wolf.

When I'm pretty sure I've found her tree, I leap up, and be- gin to pull myself into the tree. The limb can't hold my weight and it breaks crashing to the ground, taking me with it.

I look up, narrowing my eyes at this tree. I realize that un- like the others that she's been in, this one has smaller limbs. She must not be planning to sleep tonight because none of them seem large enough for her to lay on. But that also means, none of them are strong enough to support my weight.

I try again, just to be sure and the same things happens. I'm pulling myself up when the limb gives way and I fall back to the ground.

Growling in frustration, I move to one of the trees next to this one. I leap up, noting that her scent just got stronger. She's here, I can smell her.

I climb up as far as I dare before finding a limb that will take me to the tree that I now know she's hiding in. I walk as far out as possible before judging the distance. I leap, crash- ing into the tree. I wrap my arms around the trunk and place my feet on the branch closest to me.

As soon as I put my weight on it, it gives way. Before I can fall to the ground, I wrap my arms around the trunk again, holding myself in place. I look up, and I see her eyes sparkling down at me. She doesn't say anything, but she's watching to see if I climb up to her.

I look down and around me for another limb to stand on. I find the closest one and put one foot on it. When it holds, I put another foot on it, before slowly letting go of the tree trunk. I've just about decided that this one will hold my weight when it gives. I begin tumbling to the ground, my arms wind- milling around until I h*ok my arm on another limb, farther down.

I've barely caught my breath when this limb breaks off too and I fall crashing to the ground. I snarl, getting up, howling my frustration at the sky and at Jara.

I have a moment to realize that I'm now in wolf form and that the haze is taking me again, before my brain switches off and instinct kicks in.