One of them turned and took a few hesitant steps on its newly shaped legs. It grasped the horns of a bison with its new hands and, with all the strength of its true form, gave a savage twist and tore off the bison’s head. Dropping the head, it raked its claws over the belly and watched the entrails slide out.

<This is what it means to be human,> it said. <This is what humans do.>

<This is what humans do,> the rest agreed.

Those who had taken this necessary but unwelcome shape shifted back to their true form.

Then they all headed for the human town called Bennett, and their footsteps filled the land with a terrible silence.

CHAPTER 36

CHAPTER 36

Firesday, Juin 22

Jackson in Wolf form and five Intuits on horseback watched the pickup trucks burn. They had stopped—or exploded—yards away from the simple barricade that the terra indigene and Intuits had set up across the road that led to the Sweetwater settlement and village.

The fire sweeping over the land had begun at the two pickups, which must have carried many containers of gasoline as well as the men who had intended to burn down the Intuit village. Now it rushed toward Endurance, the human-controlled town in the distance.

“Gods above and below,” one man said quietly. “If the wind turns again...”

The fire should have raged toward Sweetwater. Instead it had turned with a deliberation that couldn’t be explained as anything but conscious choice and headed for the few human ranches that had been established on the land around Endurance, setting the pastures ablaze before turning toward the houses and stores.

“Supply trucks will charge more if they have to come all the way to Sweetwater,” another man said.

“Assuming there’s still a right-of-way and any trucks can reach us,” the third man said.

Jackson noticed how careful they all were not to look at him as they spoke.

They were right. Supply trucks didn’t want to waste the gasoline to drive to Sweetwater when they could leave most merchandise at a rented storage area in the human town. They were also correct that the right-of-way through the wild country would no longer exist, and there was no certainty that anything would be able to reach them, whether the town burned or not.

Trading post, Jackson thought as his eyes followed the dirt road that ribboned through the burning land. We could build a trading post near the place where our road connects to the paved road that leads to the human town. There is already a gas station and little store at that spot. Even a depot where things could be dropped off for the Intuits and Others would be enough. Earth native trucks would still be allowed to use the roads, even if the Elders completely turned against humans. We could still bring in what we need—if those things still exist.