The echoes of Elara's gunshot had barely died when the forest erupted.
Howls surged from every direction, rolling through the trees like a storm front. Low growls followed, closer, overlapping, until the patrol couldn't tell if it was one pack or twenty. Eyes blinked to life between the trunks—yellow, unblinking, circling.
"Formation!" the captain barked. His rifle swept left, then right, but his voice cracked under the strain. "Hold!"
The words felt thin against the sound coming for them.
The first ferals broke cover in a blur of motion. Two of them lunged low, fast as shadows. One slammed into the line and bowled a guard straight into the dirt. Another hit the captain's shoulder, claws tearing into the worn fabric of his coat.
Gunfire split the night. A shotgun boomed, deafening in the close air. A bolt from Caleb's crossbow hissed past Elara's cheek and buried itself in a chest, sending one creature stumbling. Corin's knife flashed silver as she intercepted another, moving faster than Elara thought possible, her strike so precise it looked practiced.
Torvee dove from the canopy, raven wings snapping in the moonlight before she hit the ground in human form, driving her shoulder into a feral's side.
For a heartbeat, the line held.
Then the woods poured open.
More shapes surged forward—six, eight, ten, slipping between trunks, jaws gaping. They weren't clumsy. They weren't beasts. They moved like hunters who already knew the taste of victory.
One of the guards screamed as a feral clamped its teeth on his arm. He swung his rifle with his free hand, but the bite had already gone deep. The captain's face blanched.
"Leave him!" he roared. "He's gone!"
The words cut through Elara like a knife. The bitten man's eyes went wide, terror swallowing them whole. He tried to plead, but his voice was drowned by the pack. The feral jerked him down into the undergrowth, and he vanished beneath the shadows.
Another guard went down under a blur of claws. This one didn't rise again.
"Back to the truck!" the captain bellowed, firing in bursts. His magazine clicked empty too soon. "Fall back! Move!"
They stumbled through the leaves, boots pounding, shadows breaking apart and reforming around them. Caleb shoved Elara ahead of him, his crossbow snapping another bolt loose as he grabbed his knife with the other hand.
The overturned supply truck loomed through the trees, its metal skin scarred with claw marks, cargo scattered across the cracked asphalt. Relief surged—cover, maybe a way out.
"Inside! Get inside!" someone shouted.
They piled against the vehicle, the captain and a guard yanking the driver's door open. The man inside shoved a trembling hand at the ignition, twisted the key. The engine coughed. Once. Twice.
It didn't catch.
"Again!" the captain barked.
Another twist. Another cough. A choking rattle. Nothing.
"It's done!" the driver gasped. "Fuel line's shot—look!" He jabbed at the black smear pooling beneath the truck. Diesel dripped steadily from the torn belly.
A howl rose right behind them.
"Out! Scatter!"
The order was desperate. No one argued.
Caleb grabbed Elara's wrist and yanked her into the trees. Corin darted past, knife flashing in her hand. Torvee swooped low as a raven and slammed into Elara's shoulder, shoving her out of the way just as another feral crashed into the side of the truck.
The captain turned back, rifle swinging in arcs, firing controlled bursts to buy them seconds. He was still shouting when three shapes hit him at once and pulled him into the shadows.
Elara stumbled, nearly fell, Caleb's grip the only thing dragging her upright. Her lungs burned, every breath a rasp, branches clawing her arms as they ran.
Behind them, the screams rose, sharp and terrible. They weren't cries for help. They were endings.
Elara couldn't look back. She forced her legs to move, dodging roots and fallen branches as the world narrowed to the circle of light the moon allowed them.
"Left!" Torvee's voice cut from above, sharp and commanding.
They veered, pushing through a thicket. The trees swallowed them, the undergrowth tugging at their boots. Ferals snapped through the brush behind them, voices guttural, animal.
One of the remaining guards staggered beside Elara, blood soaking through his sleeve. His breath hitched. She saw the bite—ragged, angry, already spreading veins of black under the skin.
"No," she whispered. "Not again—"
The man's eyes met hers. Wide, wet, terrified.
Then he screamed, not in pain but in something deeper—his body jerking, teeth bared. His pupils narrowed to pinpricks of yellow.
Caleb shoved Elara aside and fired point-blank. The man fell backward into the brush, silent in an instant.
Elara's stomach lurched. The world tilted, and she could barely choke air into her lungs. Bites mean death. Always.
She wanted to scream but the howls stole the sound from her throat.
"Run!" Caleb snapped, dragging her forward again.
They broke into a hollow where the ground dipped around an old streambed. The pack circled, voices bouncing across the trees. Corin's blade was slick in her hand, her face pale but steady. Torvee dropped down beside them, feathers still caught in her hair, her chest heaving.
"We can't stop," Torvee said. "Not here."
"Then where?" Elara gasped. Her arms trembled, the revolver heavy in her hand.
"Home," Caleb said. His voice was iron, though his jaw was tight. "We make it home or we don't make it at all."
The words weren't meant to comfort. They were a sentence.
They ran again, breaking through the trees, each step a desperate gamble. Shadows followed, breaking branches, hurling themselves just out of reach. Caleb fired his last bolt. Corin's knife tore through another throat. Torvee struck from above, wings cutting the night.
Elara tripped, caught herself, and raised her revolver at a shape rushing from the side. She fired. The blast rang in her ears. The feral collapsed mid-stride. She staggered but kept running.
Time dissolved into heartbeats. Into breath. Into motion that never ended.
At last, the trees thinned. The cliffs rose, jagged against the pale sky. Lights flickered in the distance—floodlights strung along Ravenholt's walls, faint but real.
The four of them stumbled into the open, lungs searing, legs shaking. Behind them, the howls carried on, closer than they had any right to be.
They didn't stop until the gates groaned open and they fell into the courtyard, bent double, every breath a fight.
The guards slammed the gates shut again, the bar thundering into place. The sounds of the forest pressed against the wood and stone, howls and shrieks echoing. Then slowly, gradually, they faded.
Only silence remained.
Elara dropped the revolver from her hand. It clattered against the stone, the sound small compared to the storm in her chest. Her hands shook so badly she pressed them to her knees just to stop them from flailing.
Around them, people gathered. Questions were asked, names shouted, but the answers were in their faces. Of the patrol that had left, only four had come back whole.
The captain was gone. The guards were gone.
Bites had taken the rest.
Elara's eyes blurred. She pressed her fist against her mouth to keep the sound inside.
Caleb slumped against the wall, crossbow empty, his hands covered in blood that wasn't his. Corin leaned on her knife, her shoulders shaking though her smile was gone. Torvee stood with feathers tangled in her hair, her gaze fixed on the treeline as if the forest itself had carved its way into her.
Elara didn't know if the trembling in her chest was fear or fury. Maybe both. All she knew was that the pack had shown them the truth: no one was safe. Not out there. Not even here.
The memory of the bitten guard's eyes wouldn't leave her. The moment he changed. The moment Caleb pulled the trigger.
A bite was death.
She knew it. She believed it.
And in the days to come, when the same fate reached her, it would make the truth of what happened next all the more impossible.