The Pain Of Their Presence - Sequel to Sound of Their Presence

Chapter Forty Six: Forgive and Forget, Or Not

Shane's POV

    I have this terrible feeling I can't quite shake from the pit of my stomach. I feel that leaving Cheyenne with Lysander and Naomi was a bad idea. But Naomi explained to me why she was determined to help Cheyenne out. The guilt of shooting her, or so she claims.

    I continue running back towards were the wolves were fighting. But this peculiar forest, in the center of a swamp. Why? Why? 

    When I finally reach the battle ground, all I hear is the sound of my own pants. My own thumping heart beat. I see only dust rising through the mixed flora and fauna, surrounding the carcases of fallen werewolves. Some lie in their animal form, others lie as crumpled heaps of humans. They bleed from both vital wounds, and just scratches. And the hunters? The hunters who I once would have called comrades?

   I, even after all that has happened, feel a pang of pity for the hundreds of human bodies, fully clothed that lie scattered about. Weapons fallen on the ground beside nearly all of them. Some of the older men bear long scratches along the sides of their faces and throats. Others, like women in their early twenties, have snapped necks. Some of the younger boys, from as young as eleven years old, bear a bullet in the head or chest, in addition to the claw and fang marks on their faces or around a missing limb. These boys were probably shot by their parents or elders, given the mercy of a bullet instead of being forced to face tragedies of the battle field and missing limbs, parlysis, or whatever else may have plagued the boys if they lived.

    I spin in circles, clawing at my eyes with my dirt caked fingernails. These sights, these terrible, God awful images I can never get out of my head. I have been scarred, truly. I can never get the screams and shouts out of my head. I can never get the image of Cheyenne, probably dead out of my head. I will never be able to forgive these hunters or werewolves, alike, for the pain they caused each other. I can never forgive myself, for leaving. For not doing more. For not stopping this altogether, before it started. I could have done something! I was a hunter once, and a shifter now. Someone must have been able to understand!

    Now I can never forget.

    But i have to pull myself out of this downward spiral! Pull it together, Shane. Pull it together! 

    There are not enough werewolve bodies to have been completely wiped out, as in genocide. And as for hunters- I have no idea. But hunters are nearly impossible to beat back. They don't give up. They fight until the last . . . .