He held her while she buried her face against him and shook, grabbing his shirt so hard that she ripped the shoulder. He rocked her gently. Had they not been in the middle of this place that he distrusted, he would have sung to her.

Gradually she relaxed against him, her body shuddering now and then, like a child who had cried too hard to stop all at once.

“Anna?”

She pressed her head more tightly against him, but she didn’t say anything.

He jerked his head up as a scent came to his attention, this one more real than the one he’d started to identify with their unknown enemy. This one he smelled, but it was the same scent. When he took in a deep breath, he could not smell it again. But he knew he hadn’t imagined it.

Deciding that he wanted to get Anna out of Wild Sign, he stood up, holding her tightly to him, and headed back up the trail.

Tag was waiting for them at the sign at the top of the trail. He had shifted to wolf, which Charles appreciated. Tag’s wolf could be counted on—not to be less ferocious or less crazy, but the wolf obeyed orders. Sometimes Tag had trouble with that when he walked on two feet. Charles could deal with Tag, but he’d rather not have to while he was trying to protect Anna. He didn’t want to kill Tag by accident.

“I don’t know,” he told Tag, who was staring at Anna. “I think she’s okay now. She’ll tell us what happened when she’s ready.”

He hoped he was right.

He set her down briefly to secure the pack on Tag’s back. As soon as his hands were off her, she began the change to wolf.

Charles waited. When he sensed that she was absorbed in her transformation, he gestured for Tag to watch Anna. While she completed the change, Charles ran back to the amphitheater and found the recorder. It looked ordinary enough and it felt inert in his hands. He took it anyway. He was back before Anna was aware he’d been gone.

It was a good sign that Anna had decided to change to her wolf, he told himself as she rose, somewhat unsteadily, to her feet. Anna’s wolf was how Anna had survived the hell of the Chicago pack in the first place.

But he didn’t like the way her ears were lowered submissively—his Anna didn’t have a submissive bone in her whole body. The defensive hunch of her body threatened his control of Brother Wolf. Tag wasn’t in a much better state. Anna wasn’t his mate—but Omega wolves were to be cherished.

He put the recorder in Tag’s pack. Then Charles went down on one knee beside Anna.

“Are you okay to travel?” he asked.