I'm heading away again this week and unfortunately ... no wifi :( So I'm giving you a double chapter now and the promise that I'll continue as normal the Monday after next.

This chapter is dedicated to llanii_23 for reading the entire story in a day and voting on every single chapter <3

The winter holiday wasn't over yet. In fact, if I had my way, it was only just beginning. As Last Haven basically ran itself (especially when Ollie did all the work for me), I had found another free afternoon to chill.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Leo asked me cautiously.

It had been a whole day since our snowball fight/snow-animal building contest, and we had come up with a new and even better idea. The previous afternoon had been spent digging through the equipment stores in the cellars so that we could participate in dangerous outdoor sports. Today's activity was skiing down a woody slope to the west of camp.

"It'll be fine," I replied, brushing off his concern.

"Famous last words," he muttered but helped me fix the skis onto my shoes.

"Nah. You pessimist."

He bridled indignantly. "I'm the most optimistic person I've ever met."

"And you've met yourself, have you?" I scoffed. "Look, let's test it out."

I picked out a water bottle from my rucksack and showed it to him to ask the age-old question, "Half empty or half full?"

"Half full," he said immediately.

"Buzz buzz. Wrong." I emptied the bottle over his head. "Completely empty."

Leo spat out a mouthful of water and moved soaked hair out of his eyes. He was astonishingly chill about the whole thing. "Okay, so we've proved I'm an optimist. And you're clearly a sadist."

I accepted that title with a grin. "What about Fion?"

We turned to her, only to see my open rucksack spilling its contents on the ground and my sister sat in the middle, munching on a fallen chocolate bar.

"Opportunist," Leo decided mildly. It was accurate.

As it was my chocolate she was devouring, I wasn't nearly so calm. It took a full ten minutes to rescue the food, by which time the water on Leo's scalp had frozen into icy powder. Before he died of hypothermia, I hurriedly picked up the two branches which would serve as my ski poles.

"Okay, let's get this over with."

Fion caught hold of my jacket, in case I started slipping off before I was ready. It was harder to balance than I had imagined. "Whenever you're ready."

Below was a view of the land between Snowdonia and the Silverstones. Two huge mountain ranges which split the land. And in between? Somewhere in the mess of forest and rivers was Lle o Dristwch, although I couldn't actually see it. Beyond the horizons was pack land, but everything in front of me was rogue country. There was acres of it.

We were on a big hill or a small mountain. Whichever you prefer. And the slope below me was littered with trees, both standing and fallen. I would have to dodge all of them on the way down. As I had never skied before in my life, it was going to be a very steep learning curve (pun intended).

I took a deep breath, ready to push myself off, when Fion gave me a not-so-helping hand. She shoved me down the slope, and all I could do was struggle to stay on my feet. And even worse, by the time I realised what had happened, I was too far away to push her back.

The first tree was approaching fast, and all thoughts of revenge vanished in favour of steering. I leant left, nearly overbalancing in the process, and narrowly avoided face-planting the trunk. The branches whipped at my face, so I crouched down.

I was so busy looking up that I didn't notice the holly bush until I was tangled up in it.

My mate and my sister, the supportive darlings that they were, found that very funny. Laughter rang out from above as I dragged myself free of the bush. My arms and face were covered with shallow, bloody scratches. Most of them were already starting to heal over. I spat out a twig which had somehow found its way into my mouth and clambered back to my feet.

I traversed the rest of the hill slower, but even then, I fell over twice more and tripped on a pile of dead wood disguised by snow. Once the ground seemed level and I could safely stop, I kicked off my skis (one of which had snapped already). With the bushes obscuring the view of the others, I picked out a tree with branches all the way down the trunk.

The lowest was within my reach, so I wrapped my arms around it and used what I like to call the 'koala' technique to pull myself up. I scurried up the branches until they were thin enough to creak under my weight. Sometimes being small had its advantages. With practised ease, I swung to the side so I'd be able to pull myself to the top side of the branch, then clambered up through more branches until I had a good view of the slope.

The others were a lot more graceful (Rhodric had taken everyone skiing last winter when I had been in bed with the flu). Leo obviously hadn't been here, but somehow he still managed to stay upright the whole way down. So it was just me then.

"We finally found something you're not good at," Fion teased as she skidded to a halt in a spray of snow.

My only reply was to shake a branch. A shower of snow filled her hood and whitened her hair. But in doing so, I managed to unbalance myself. Rather than fall out of the tree, I grabbed the trunk and half slid, half fell to the ground, ending up in a heap at Fion's feet.

"Very graceful," she snorted. I showed her my middle finger and picked myself up slowly.

Leo plodded over, using his skis as snowshoes. His eyes were wide as he looked at me, and when I glanced down, I realised why. The scratches from the holly had bled a disproportionate amount. My clothes were dyed red as the smeared blood blended with melted snow. It looked like there was an awful lot more blood than there really was.

"It's okay, I'm healing already," I reassured him. There would be no fixing the damage though, not without a carton of washing powder and an afternoon at the stream — the only way to wash clothes at camp.

"We'd better get back, you know. Ollie's nagging me through the mind-link," Fion told me. My second-in-command had stayed behind to hold the fort in my absence. And while I had no doubt he could do an excellent job in my absence, his abilities tended more towards carrying out orders than giving them. So Ollie clearly wanted me back, which was flattering, but inconvenient.

I looked wistfully at the hill behind me. Just a few weeks ago I would have felt bound by pride to ski over and over again until I mastered it. Now it hardly seemed to matter. Last Haven was more important.

By unspoken consent, we split off to shift. I found a hawthorn to shelter me while I pulled off my clothes and stuffed them into the rucksack. Standing naked in the snow was freezing and weird, but my wolf didn't hesitate to kick off the shift. I grew fur before I lost any toes to frostbite.

I would've usually carried my clothes in my jaws, but shoes were more difficult and the whole process wasn't particularly hygienic, so hence the rucksack. That was a lot easier to scoop up and run with. Duffel bags worked well, too, especially for heavier objects.

Leo and Fion appeared from their respective bushes, shifted and excitable. We had a tussle to burn off energy before beginning the brisk run home. It was miles and miles back to camp and I wanted to get there before dark. This particular part of the forest held legends of a monster roaming the woods at night. Bullshit of course, but I wasn't in a hurry to be proved wrong.

But we hadn't got even a quarter of the way when I caught an unusual scent. Humans. Out in the middle of nowhere, with no roads within walking distance. I skidded to a halt and snuffed around for a trail. What if someone was in trouble?

As it turned out, they found us instead. There wasn't enough time to hide before two human children, heavily bundled in winter coats, came running down the path. The taller girl stopped and stared at us warily, but the little one started squealing with delight.

"Puppies!" she shouted happily. My wolf was offended by that term, but I told her to shut her muzzle. Hopefully, they would think we were just oversized huskies.

I dropped my rucksack discretely behind a bush, because that looked a tiny bit suspicious. They had already seen us — the damage was done — so I didn't see any reason not to stick around for a bit. Playing with a wild 'puppy' could make any kid's day in my experience.

"Ellie, you stay away. They might be dangerous," the older girl commanded. She couldn't have been more than eight years old and not very sure of herself. Her sister — the resemblance was unmistakable — ignored her.

"Puppies aren't dangerous, silly," Ellie assured her. She edged forwards to rub Fion's nose, who backed away uncertainly. Ellie approached me next. "Good doggie. Stay."

I wagged my tail and licked her hand, acting the goofy, slobbery dog. If that wouldn't put her off, I didn't know what would. But Ellie was loving it. She scratched my ears in just the right place and won me over enough to lie down at her feet.

After setting such a beautiful example, I stared at Fion pointedly. Growling would only terrify them, and perhaps prompt shouting for nearby parents. She rolled her eyes in response.

Ellie crouched down contentedly beside me and messed with the fur around my scruff. The older girl looked less certain as she held out a hand to Leo. A sniff and a stroke later, the two of them were well acquainted.

"Ellie," someone hissed. "What the hell are you doing?"

The new arrival was a boy in his early teens. His light hair was the same shade as our admirers', so I safely assumed this was a big brother. He was gaping at us from the path, and alarmingly, holding a rifle.

Fion and Leo both did the smart thing and scattered to the shelter of the trees. But me? Being stubbornly stupid, I remained exactly where I was, with the logic that you didn't alert someone to your presence if you were going to shoot them. Besides, he looked more worried than angry.

"We found puppies, Carter. Can I keep one?" Ellie asked pleadingly. The teenager blinked at her in surprise. "Please."

"No, you can't damn well keep one. They're wolves, Ellie. Don't you remember what they did to our parents?" Carter demanded. He pulled Kathy behind him and took the safety off his gun.

Oh. I understood then. This wasn't a coincidence. There weren't any wild wolves in Britain, so it was safe to assume that he knew werewolves existed. The path they were walking on was the same as the one we had taken to get to the hill in the first place, and it was littered with oversized canine footprints. This boy had been deliberately tracking us.

"Don't you remember what our parents were trying to do to them?" Kathy countered quietly. Oh, I liked that kid. She had her wits about her.

The boy didn't seem to understand her defiance. He spluttered, "They're monsters! Look at her!"

"Monsters don't play with children," Kathy insisted, but her brother didn't even hear her. He was looking straight at me.

The rifle rose to chest height, and I found myself staring down the barrel. "You have five seconds to get away from my sister or I'll shoot."

I started debating if I was stubborn enough to stay where I was. Five seconds later, I still hadn't reached a decision, and he still hadn't shot. Maybe the sucker was counting with 'elephant' seconds. Fortunately for me, Ellie solved the problem by putting herself in front of me, straight in the bullet's path. She folded her arms and stared her brother down angrily.

"You aren't killing my puppy," she insisted. I grinned smugly and wagged my tail at her.

"That's not a puppy," Carter snapped. "When we get home, I'll buy you a real puppy."

Ha. Liar. No one just hands out puppies. No one is really that nice.

"But I want this puppy," Ellie whined. The other girl smothered a laugh with her hand.

I noticed a flash of motion in the woods behind Carter, and I knew one of my packmates had him covered. He had forgotten all about the other two 'puppies'. With Ellie still shielding me, I rose to my haunches and flicked my tail. Leo recognised the signal and pounced. The force of the jump knocked Carter flat on his face.

Leo placed his jaws on the scruff of the boy's coat but didn't kill him, which I was grateful for. I was curious — why was he tracking us? An interrogation would be useful to solve that mystery, and those worked best when the target was breathing.

As the boy had been lucky enough not to fire the gun at himself as he fell, I ripped it out of his grip and threw it out of reach. Safely disarmed, Leo nudged him back to his feet and watched his every move. Fion bounded towards us far too late to be of any use and ran excited circles around everyone.

After growling her to a standstill, I opened my mind and reached out. There were the bright, distinct consciousnesses which belonged to Fion and Leo, and three duller, closed-off human minds. It was Carter's I reached for. Mind-linking with humans was possible, but it could only go one way and it was strictly forbidden to keep our species a secret. With a boy who already knew about us, I didn't see the harm.

"Who are you? Think and I'll hear you."

Hunter. The word echoed eerily around his mind, full of pride and hatred. I hunt your kind.

He was the first hunter we ever found, but certainly not the last. With all the conflict amongst our species, it was inevitable that it would occasionally spill out into the human world. A single victim, killed in suspicious circumstances, might have half a dozen relatives looking for answers. Ignorance bled into hatred to convince them we were soulless monsters. Those relatives could then stumble onto the right person, who could recruit them to exterminate all of us.

That person was usually a man named Malcolm, the spider in the centre of a web of hunters in our country. It was his idea to create the ferals — to use our own kind against us. Destroy a wolf's humanity, drive him crazy, and set him against his friends. It was ingenious and deadly at the same time.

But I knew very little of that at the time, and all I could think of was a probing curiosity. It would have been far safer to kill Carter on the spot, if I had had the stomach for it. But I couldn't do that in front of his sisters, not when I knew exactly how I would feel if someone hurt Rhys or Fion.

"If you come quietly and behave yourself, we'll let you live," I decided. This he didn't reply so coherently, but I could feel the general flicker of assent. There was a wide mixture of anger, confusion and fear, all wrapped up in his newly forming escape plans. As he would never outrun us even if he did manage to get away, I wasn't that worried.

Leo lowered his front legs to allow little Ellie to clamber on. She got the idea very quickly and stretched out, grabbing handfuls of fur to hold herself in place. It didn't look very comfortable, but at least we would be able to move at a decent pace. Kathy was too big to ride on a wolf's back and too small to walk fast enough, so Carter gave her a piggyback.

I retrieved my rucksack and the rifle. With my jaws full, Fion took up sentry position at the back to watch Carter carefully. He may have been just a pup, but he was a dangerous one. We began the trek in a ragged line, and I led, of course.

We were limited to a human's walk, much to my frustration. Travelling the long miles back to camp was delayed several times. First, Ellie began to cry because she was so cold. We had to stop so that Carter could insulate her with our spare clothes.

The second time, dark clouds obscured the sunlight and I knew a storm was coming. There was a heavy feeling to the air which precedes thunder and lightning. After my last experience outdoors in a storm, I wasn't in a hurry to repeat it. Which meant we needed shelter fast.

"There's a shepherd's hut on the slope over there," I suggested to the others through the mind-link. "It's not much, but it's close."

"Not a good idea, Skye. Forget the humans — just let them go. We could still make it back to camp," Fion argued.

I stopped to shake my head at her. "If we left them, they'd freeze out here. It's Jeff or the storm."

"Jeff?" That was Leo.

There was one tiny thing I had failed to mention about the shepherd's hut, which Fion already knew. It was inhabited by a crazy werewolf named Jeff. At least, I assumed he was a werewolf. I had never seen him shift, but he was bad enough in his human form.

We had endured several run-ins over the years, mostly dares which ended in Rhodric getting angrier than I had ever seen him. The last time it had happened, we had been told in no uncertain times how stupid we'd been, which was incredibly out of character.

And for good reason. Crazy werewolves are dangerous in an unpredictable way. Their wolves tended to push them towards violence, much like ferals, actually. Old Jeff had been known to kill people who pestered him.

"He's the local nutcase," was all the explanation I offered. "And it's worth the risk."

If we were outside when the storm hit, we could end up dead. If we went to see Jeff, we could end up dead. It was an impossible choice to make. But I didn't hesitate at all. You see, I liked Jeff.