Chapter 1The Hunt Begins

The forest swallowed him whole.

Rissa stood at the edge of the tree line, her hands still slick with blood that wasn't hers. Dorian's blood. The human she'd just let live. The alpha's howl ripped through the night, a sound she'd heard a hundred times during pack rituals. But this time it meant her.

*Run.*

Her boots hit the forest floor before her mind caught up. Branches clawed at her arms, her face, as she plunged into the dark. She knew these woods. Every game trail, every deadfall, every stream that ran silver under the moon. She'd patrolled them for three months as a cleaner, erasing evidence of the pack's existence. But tonight she was the evidence.

Another howl answered from the east. Then another from the west.

They were boxing her in.

She veered north, toward the ridge where the trees grew thin and the ground turned to rock. Harder to track, harder to scent. The Moonstone's glow pulsed through the canopy, casting sickly green light on the bark. The trees looked wrong tonight—gray needles, peeling bark like sunburned skin. She'd noticed it weeks ago but never asked. No one asked questions about the land.

*Keep moving.*

Her lungs burned. She wasn't fast enough, wasn't strong enough. Turned wolves never were. The full moon gave her speed, but the pack had been born to this. They had decades of muscle memory she couldn't match.

A shape blurred through the trees to her left. Then another to her right.

They were herding her.

She changed course, dropping into a dry creek bed. The stones shifted under her feet, sending a sharp pain up her ankle. She bit down on the scream. Silence was survival. She pressed her back against the bank and listened.

Footsteps. Close.

Two of them. No, three. Their breathing was controlled, predatory. They weren't running anymore. They were stalking.

*Think.*

She couldn't outrun them. She couldn't fight them. The only thing she had was three months of watching, learning, memorizing the cracks in the pack's armor. The territory had gaps—places the patrols skipped because the terrain was too steep, too unstable, too easy to break an ankle.

The ravine.

It was a mile east, a sheer drop into a river that ran fast and cold. If she made it, the water would mask her scent. If she fell wrong, the rocks would break her bones.

Better than what Vance would do.

She pushed off the bank and ran.

---

He was still there.

Rissa almost stumbled when she saw him—Dorian, slumped against a fallen log, one hand pressed to his ribs. His face was pale, his jacket dark with blood. He'd made it maybe three hundred yards from the compound before collapsing.

She should have kept running.

He looked up, and she saw the fear in his eyes. The same fear she'd seen when she'd first found him in the clearing, camera in hand, recording the pack's ritual. He'd expected to die then. He probably expected it now.

"You're still bleeding," she said, her voice flat.

"I noticed."

The words came out sharp, defensive. She didn't blame him. She'd been the one holding the knife. She'd been the one ordered to cut his throat.

"The pack is hunting us. Both of us." She crouched, keeping her distance. "If you stay here, you die."

"And if I go with you?"

"I die too."

He stared at her, and she saw the calculation in his face. The journalist's mind, cataloging every detail, deciding if she was a threat or a chance. His hand tightened over his ribs, and fresh blood seeped between his fingers.

"Why did you let me go?" he asked.

The question she'd been asking herself for the last fifteen minutes. "I don't know."

"Liar."

The word hit harder than it should have. "Fine. Because I didn't want to become what they are." She stood, looking toward the ravine. "Is that what you wanted to hear?"

"No," he said, and there was something raw in his voice. "I wanted to know if you meant it."

A howl cut through the silence. Closer now.

"Move or die," she said. "Your choice."

He pulled himself up, wincing, and she saw the effort it took. The wound was bad, maybe worse than she'd thought. He wouldn't make it to the ravine on his own.

She grabbed his arm and pulled him forward.

---

They moved through the dark like wounded animals, dragging each other over roots and rocks. The howls grew louder, then faded, then grew again. The pack was playing with them, tightening the noose.

Dorian's breathing turned ragged. His weight grew heavier against her shoulder.

"There's a cave," he said, barely a whisper. "North of here. Near the old logging road."

"How do you know about it?"

"I've been watching this pack for six months. I know more than you think."

She wanted to argue, but the words died in her throat. The ground sloped upward, and she saw the shape of the ridge ahead, the mouth of a dark crevice hidden behind a curtain of moss.

They stumbled inside just as the first howl echoed from the ridge above.

The cave was small, damp, and cold. Water dripped from the ceiling, forming a shallow pool in the center. She pulled Dorian into the deepest shadow and pressed her hand over his mouth.

Silence.

Footsteps passed above them. Stones crunched under heavy paws. A low growl, followed by the snap of a branch.

Then silence.

She waited, counting her heartbeats. Thirty. Sixty. A hundred.

When she finally pulled her hand away, Dorian's eyes were closed, his face gray with pain. She tore a strip from her shirt and pressed it against his wound. He flinched, but didn't scream.

"They'll circle back," she said. "We have maybe an hour before they search this area."

He opened his eyes. "Then I need to show you something."

He reached into his jacket, his movements slow and careful. His hand emerged with a folded piece of paper, yellowed and cracked at the edges. He unfolded it, and she saw a map—hand-drawn, detailed, marked with symbols she didn't recognize.

"What is this?"

"The logging company's property lines," he said. "And the location of the Moonstone."

She felt the air leave her lungs. "You know about the Moonstone?"

"I know it's not what they say it is." He met her eyes, and she saw the weight of something he'd been carrying alone for too long. "I know it's killing the land. I know it's killing them." He paused. "And I know it's the reason my brother is dead."

The words hung in the damp air, heavy and final.

"So tell me, Rissa." His voice was quiet, but it cut through the dark like a blade. "Are you ready to destroy it?"