The trees felt wrong. Celeste knew it the moment her group stepped past the third mile sign.
The trees were too quiet. No birds sang. No insects buzzed.
Even the wind had stopped blowing.
"Maybe we should go back," whispered Janet, one of the younger dogs who had followed her. "Never," Celeste snapped.
"We're better off without that omega pretending to be Luna." But deep down, fear crawled up her spine like ice water.
Twenty wolves had seemed like a good amount when they left.
Now, surrounded by silent trees and strange shadows, they felt tiny. A branch cracked behind them.
Everyone spun around, but nothing was there. Just more empty forest. "Keep moving," Celeste directed, though her voice shook slightly.
That's when the howl came. It wasn't like any wolf sound she'd ever heard. It was older.
Hungrier. It made her bones quiver and her wolf whimper deep inside her mind. "What was that?" asked Harold's son, Marcus Junior.
