Rhys stalked into the courtyard on the hunt for my mate. I followed frantically, trying to keep up with his longer stride. That was the problem with being a midget — short legs. All thoughts of cleaning up were forgotten in the rush to prevent murder on my doorstep.

People made way for us grudgingly, most of them offering a murmured greeting to Rhys, who was annoyingly well-liked around camp. I heard one old-timer remark that things hadn't felt the same without a Llewellyn at the castle. I certainly agreed.

He found Leo outside our sleeping alcove. My mate was bedraggled and half-asleep where he stood, probably looking forward to an early night. No such luck.

Rhys, who was never one for beating around the bush, grabbed Leo's collar before he could blink. I winced at a dull thud — the sound of his head slamming into a pillar. Dazed and confused, my mate noted my presence then frowned at Rhys in a hurt sort of way.

"As much as I like you, Rhys, I like breathing a little more. So if you wouldn't mind...?" he wheezed.

My brother, rather reluctantly, loosened his grip. Aside from that, he continued to glare at Leo and ignore my mental pleading. Waiting for a confession or explanation, I guessed.

"Er ... thanks. Just out of curiosity, have I done something to deserve this?" Leo asked amiably.

Rhys raised an eyebrow. "You tell me what you've done, and I'll decide."

He must have had a death wish, because he put on a lopsided smile and tried, "How about you tell me what you think I did? It would be kinda awkward if I confessed to the wrong thing, wouldn't it?"

"So you've definitely done something dodgy," Rhys reasoned.

"Well, no. I wouldn't say that. Just that you might consider it dodgy, when in fact, it isn't. An easy mistake to make — not your fault, of course."

Rhys had tired of the word games by then. "Okay. How about this for dodgy? You sunk your teeth into my sister's neck."

Leo, being incredibly sly, played dumb. "You think I killed Fion? What the hell, man?"

Rhys reasserted the pressure on his captive's throat. "Nice try, but I'm talking about the mark on Skye's neck."

His glance flickered to me and back. I could feel the nervous energy oozing through the link, because he was utterly cornered. "Oh ... yeah. That I did do. We're mates though, so it's fine."

"Fine?" Rhys asked incredulously. "It's anything but fine. You think you can date my little sister?"

The whole thing seemed to be going sideways, and I knew it was time to step in. But all my interruption happened to be was a cough and a correction: "Big sister, actually. I'm three months older than you."

"You're a midget," he scoffed, "so it doesn't count. Now I'd shut up if I were you — I can see his mark, too, and you're next."

I sealed my lips and retreated a few steps. Best to just give him space to let off steam and then sneak off with Leo later. What Rhys didn't know couldn't hurt him.

"Was I supposed to get your permission? Is that the problem?" Leo tried, clueless about how futile it was.

"No, that's not the damn problem."

I had expected to get an earful, but this? It was getting strange enough to draw a line. I had never dated before, but I had tried flirting. Rhys had never cared much about that, so I had to wonder what had changed. I strongly suspected it had something to do with Fion and Brandon's twisted relationship.

"Rhys," I whined, in one last attempt to save Leo. Looking thoroughly downtrodden and miserable, I blinked to fill my eyes with water for extra effect. "I like him. Are you going to keep me away from someone who makes me happy?"

"Freaking perfect," he growled.

"And I like Skye — a hell of a lot," Leo piped up immediately.

I thought we had the advantage until Rhys scowled and asked, "Enough to die for her?"

He didn't miss a beat. "Yes."

"Lovely. Meet me in the courtyard at dawn."

"Rhys!" I scolded. "Be serious."

"I was being—" He caught the glare I gave him. "Never mind."

Someone slung an arm over my shoulder, and I didn't need to turn to know it was Fion. She didn't look the least bit surprised to see Rhys, which was suspicious in itself. And she sounded incredibly smug when she told Leo, "I warned you he'd beat you up."

"Yes, you did," Leo agreed mildly.

"Did he find out that you two were sleeping together?"

"What?" My brother turned to me too slowly, his eyes dangerously narrowed. I knew the next step in this mood, and it was usually punching. Shit.

"Thanks a bunch, Fion. I'd nearly calmed him down," I muttered. We were attracting attention, so I pulled aside the curtain to the alcove and half shoved, half dragged Rhys inside. Leo, free at last and rubbing his throat, followed. Fion leant against the frame and smirked at me while I stammered excuses. "We were just sharing a bed. I swear to the Moon Goddess — nothing happened."

"You don't believe in the Moon Goddess," she reminded me. "Something about female superiority..."

"Not helping," I hissed. Rhys didn't seem to be buying it, so changing the subject was probably my best bet. "Have you two already talked? When did that happen? I thought you were on firewood duty today."

"Uh, yeah ... I..." Fion suddenly blushed deep red and avoided my gaze. "I caught his scent earlier."

"Hmm, sure you did." I was being sarcastic, but neither of them noticed or cared.

She backed away from the alcove. "I'd better get back to the ... um, firewood."

We watched as she disappeared into the crowd, then Rhys finally gave up. He sat down heavily on his bed and frowned at the unfamiliar bedding. "Has someone been sleeping here?"

Leo made a half-arsed effort to disguise his pile of belongings with a blanket. I had no doubt that Fion would snitch about him sleeping here, but there was no hurry for that fact to surface. Especially when we were finally acting like civilised human beings.

"Oh, yeah. That was me," I admitted.

He shrugged. "It's cool then. Look, the guys at camp are expecting me, but don't think this means you're off the hook. If I find out that Leo's even touched you, there'll be hell to pay."

Rhys grabbed a jacket and slung it over his shoulder, made the 'I'm watching you' gesture at my mate, then vanished around the corner. Finally, Leo and I were alone. And in the same room as a bed. What luck, and such a pity I couldn't take advantage of that rare solitude.

"I'd better get back to the dining hall," I sighed. Our punishment seemed to have slipped Rhys's mind in the hurry to see his friends, which left the whole job to me. "If it's not spotless soon, I'll end up in tomorrow's casserole."

Leo slipped his hand into mine the instant my brother was out of sight and offered, "Okay, I'll help. No point ruining a perfectly good casserole with your scrawny bones. And I'm not in any rush to turn cannibal."

"Are you sure? It'll just be picking up mushy food," I pointed out doubtfully. There was no point making my mate share the torturous chore.

"True, but it's worth it to spend time with you."

I shoved his chest and smiled grudgingly. "Of course it is. I'm amazing."

***

I made the leap cautiously, my foot finding a grip on the slippery stone before I trusted it with my weight. The river ran high and fast around me, fed by snowmelt and winter storms. Making the crossing in these conditions wasn't clever, but what was the worst that could happen? Fall in, swim to shore and have to change my soaking clothes — that wouldn't be so bad. The benefits were worth that risk.

After spending three hours mopping up food in the canteen, I had noticed something in the sky. It gave me a good excuse to delay my bedtime and be alone with Leo. Because the sky was clear tonight, and shooting stars were lighting up the night.

The last stepping stone tilted as I stepped onto it, then my feet found the safety of the stony bank. I was on an island, except instead of being in the ocean, it was in a river. Maybe ten by twenty feet, the tiny stretch of land was covered by bushes and wild grass. It was the perfect hideaway for a couple who wanted privacy — so perfect for Leo and me.

I had even filched alcohol and crisps from the kitchen, which Leo had volunteered to ferry across. He crossed as I watched from the bank, and began struggling on the wet stones. But the food arrived safely once I lent a hand.

We lay down in a patch of snowdrops — which happened to be my favourite flower — and used a coat to keep the snow off. There was a perfect view of the sky, with no city lights to obscure it. Lle o Dristwch was in the middle of nowhere, and that suited me perfectly.

The shooting stars came every few seconds, tiny flashes of light which looked very much like aeroplanes to the untrained eye. They certainly weren't obvious, but there was something magical about it.

Leo wove his fingers through mine again. I pointed with my other hand at a formation close the horizon. "That's the big dipper, and if you follow the tail, you can see the North Star. That bright, whitish one."

"I see it," he said quietly, although he was staring at me, not the sky.

I tried not to fidget under his attention and carried on my tour of the stars. "Up there is Orion's belt — the three in a row. And just beside it is my star sign, Sagittarius. When's your birthday?"

"Twentieth of August," Leo sighed.

"That means you're Leo." I started giggling uncontrollably, which might have had more to do with the alcohol than my amusement. "Leo's a Leo."

Leo confiscated my drink at that point. The vodka bottle wasn't even a quarter empty, so I shouldn't even be tipsy, I realised. Maybe this was a new kind of drunk — on excitement and other feelings. Being marked had woken a part of me which I hadn't even known existed.

"I don't think my parents realised when they named me," he admitted.

"Really? I'd like to meet your parents," I decided, finally managing to swallow my laughter.

Leo squeezed my hand a bit. "I'd like you to meet them too, but I don't think they'd like to meet you. They inherited the old prejudice."

"Against rogues?" I guessed. "I'm sure it can't be that bad."

"Oh, it is. And they're really ordinary, so I don't think you'd like them either."

I half smiled. "I've never met an ordinary person in my life. Who knows? It might be a nice change."

The shooting stars were getting scarcer, and clouds were obscuring the view. In true British fashion, the weather took a U-turn from clear and cool to muggy and cloudy. Soon I could only see the streaking lights in the patch of sky where the moon resided. And with an inaudible groan, I realised the moon was full. So we didn't have long left.

I rolled over to face Leo and found that he had done the same. So obviously, we kissed. And kissed some more. Then made out. There wasn't really any rush — just a desire to make the most of the time we had.

Until I heard screaming.

The sounds were far away. Far enough to be mistaken for children playing unless you listened carefully. Human ears alone wouldn't have noticed it — my wolf was the one who pricked up her ears. And what she heard was a piercing scream which split the silence like a knife. Then more screams, and a chorus of howls and yips. They didn't come from the direction of the castle, or even the camp, but the opposite way altogether.

We would have been interrupted anyway. It was the full moon tonight, and I had felt my wolf nagging me to shift long before we left the castle. On that one night every month, every werewolf transformed involuntarily for the hours following midnight. Most of the camp would have shifted already, just to save themselves the trouble of resisting it. So it wasn't really a surprise to me that our fun had to stop abruptly. But it was still annoying.

I jerked backwards and crouched on the stony bank. On the other side of the island, Leo stood listening, a tall shadow in the moonlight. For a while, we were the only ones to notice, but then the camp flickered into life. Lights blazed into existence and frantic shouting told me that they were planning to respond.

And if backup was on its way, I saw no harm in investigating personally. I pulled off layers of clothing to keep the shift from damaging them, then let my wolf submit to the moon's thrall. Paws touched the stones instead of feet, and a heartbeat later they broke into a run. I swam the river, a loud splash from behind telling me that Leo had followed me into the torrent.

The two of us raced through the dark woodland, away from camp. It wasn't hard to find my way  — there was a distinct stench of wolves to track. For once, the wind was on my side, and it told me that there were hundreds of wolves moving around. Not so strange, for a full moon, but the screams told another story.

We had travelled several miles when I noticed the smell of blood. Well, stench was a better word for it. That dreaded metallic scent radiated from a clearing like a beacon. We hadn't even been following that smell for a minute before we skidded into the ruin of a campsite.

The snow was more red than white there. And mutilated corpses were strewn around, left as carelessly as garbage. There were men, women, and to my disgust, even children. All killed without humanity or mercy.

Ferals.

Leo made a choking sound as he took in the carnage. I didn't blame him. Most people would have vomited. Unfortunately, scenes like these were getting far too common.

I tried to forget my anger. Ferals couldn't exactly help what they were. At least, I didn't think so... No, some external factor must be responsible for stripping them of their humanity. A disease, or an inherited gene, or poison. So it was no use being mad at them. I just had to stop them.

The tracks on the ground told a clear story. Hundreds of paws had torn up the ground, overlapping and smudging prints, but the general direction ran south-west to north-east. That told me everything I needed to know. The main feral force had left Ember Pack and was headed straight for Shadowless.

So while I was on a roll, that meant the ferals who had passed so close to our camp had been a scouting party for this larger army. They had taken Wimpy to lead the way and set a scent trail for their friends. It would end rather abruptly where we had killed the scouts, but from there it wasn't difficult to find Shadowless. They would be there in a few hours.

I needed to warn Zach, was my first thought.

But why? Even a month ago, I would have happily left a pack to be slaughtered. They wouldn't do any different for us. But maybe, after meeting Alphas face-to-face, I was entangled with their fates. Maybe I would need the packs if I wanted Last Haven to survive the year. And maybe, just maybe, I had grown up a bit.

There were plenty of innocents in Shadowless, innocents who had never spilt rogue blood. Did they deserve to die? Not really. Not even to mention that every one of them would be 'recruited' by the ferals. So it was really in my interests to choose the packs over the ferals, however much I resented it.

Zach was too far away to mind-link, but he had given me his phone number. I touched the mind-link reluctantly. "Ollie? I need a favour."

"Just name it," he offered without hesitation.

A mental sigh. "Find my phone, could you? You already know the password. Just look for Alpha Zach's number and call him — tell him there's a feral army marching on his pack."

"I'm on it." Ollie's confusion was obvious, but I knew he would do it anyway. Unlike myself, he was the obedient, unquestioning type.

Then I returned to surveying the mess. At a quick count, it looked like there were thirty dead. Mostly women and children, who were no doubt considered unworthy to be turned feral. Tents had been shredded as badly as the bodies, and the smouldering remains of a campfire obscured the forest with smoke.

"Who were these people?" Leo asked through the link.

"Flockies," I guessed after checking their scents. "Not sure which pack, though. And Goddess only knows why they were camped so close to us."

He looked dubiously around the clearing. "I agree — it's weird."

But even stranger was a child-sized footprint in the snow. The victims had obviously been in their human forms, but that one in particular attracted my attention because the footprint was bloodied and didn't lead to any corpse. So maybe there had been a survivor.

I attracted Leo's attention with a flick of my tail, and the two of us began the tedious job of tracking the child. Once away from the torn-up ground of the clearing, it was easy enough to identify nearly a dozen sets of children's prints, all leading away from the slaughter. The trail led to the entrance of a tiny cave.

Not even the full moon cast enough light to illuminate the inside, so I padded in blind and careless. If there were ferals in there, all the better. I would have almost welcomed an ambush, just for the opportunity to teach those bastards a lesson about butchering pups.

A torch flicked on, the light stinging my sensitive eyes. The backglow revealed a tight-knit group of children huddled in a far corner. Some of them were bloodied, but none looked dangerously hurt. It was almost too good to be true that so many had managed to hide, and I immediately assumed the ferals had some agenda for these survivors.

"Please don't eat us," the oldest one whimpered.

I let my tail wag in long sweeps to reassure them. But it was Leo, the child-friendly werewolf, who used the mind-link to say, "It's okay. We're here to help. Can someone be really brave and tell me what happened?"

A girl whose age I put at six or younger spoke up with shaky confidence. Odd, how the youngest of the pups was most fearless. "I was sleeping when the bad wolves came. Mummy said to hide, and I did, but the bad wolves hurt her. And then Daddy, and then my brother."

"How'd you survive?" I asked, probably too bluntly.

She sniffled. "There was a monster. He had a weird eye, and I thought he was a bad guy too. But he chased everyone away. His friend brought us here and told us to stay until it was safe."

I looked to the other children, expecting them to contradict her. But they just nodded shyly, and one of them whispered 'monster' in agreement. Was that just the trauma talking, or was there some truth to it? I wasn't sure I wanted to know. Especially if said monster could chase away several hundred ferals.

"Do you remember anything else?"

"One talked in my head, and it was a boy's voice," she said thoughtfully. "That was the big grey wolf. He was nice. The monster had a weird eye, I think— I don't really know, he was far away."

 "That's good, really good. What's your name?" Leo asked her gently.

"Um. Ceinwen."

"Okay, Ceinwen. We're going to get all of you somewhere safe now, so just sit tight."

My mate was better with kids than I was, which was unfair, because I had been raised by Rhodric and I really should have learnt a thing or two. As he seemed to have the situation under control, I was free to leave and track down the 'monster'. Anyone who fought ferals was okay with me.

I didn't need to share that decision with Leo. The mind-link did that for me. So I turned tail and left the cave without another word. The snow outside was relatively undisturbed, and it didn't take long to find a likely set of footprints.

Last Haven wolves were finally putting in an appearance, with Rhys at the forefront of a pack of his rogue buddies. They looked raring for a fight, having just come for the clearing. And the smell of alcohol clung to them. Go figure. My brother's chosen homecoming activities were throwing food at people and getting hammered with the guys. Why was I not surprised?

Well, it didn't really matter anyway. Drunk or not, he was still the best fighter I had while Rhodric was away. Better than me, and I wasn't ashamed to admit it. The perfect companion for a stroll in the deep, dark woods.

"You up for a chase?" I asked Rhys. "There's a pair of unidentified males lurking around somewhere."

His long tail swished back and forth. "Just point me in the right direction."

"Are you sure? I mean, the run here might've worn you out..." The teasing wasn't necessary, but it had been so long since we had run together, and my wolf wanted a bit of competition. She knew one sure way to get that, and it was winding him up.

"Of course not. It was barely two miles," he scoffed.

"I don't know," I said sceptically. "I think you might have been panting when you arrived."

"I wasn't!" He was offended now, and it showed. Ears up, tail raised. He was challenging me without intending to.

"If you're tired, I could go with Leo instead..." That proved to be the final straw.

"Bullshit! I'm not tired, Skye! I'll chase them on my own if you're going to baby me, and do it twice as fast as you."

That would do it.

"Alright, alright. You can come. Just play nice when I beat you," I warned him.

His derisive snort told me exactly what he thought of that possibility. But petty squabble aside, I lowered my nose to the ground to cast for unfamiliar scents, or even familiar ones... There weren't any that stood out, but I did find two sets of footprints running east.

"I'm going on a monster hunt with Rhys," I updated Leo through the link. "Don't wait up."

"Whatever you say," he replied, which of course meant he would stay awake all night waiting for my return. "Just be careful."

I put on my most reckless wolfy grin even though he couldn't see it. "And when am I not careful?"

"Always." Leo withdrew from my mind with a mental sigh.

And then we were free to go. Rhys's buddies had the area locked down, even if they weren't walking in straight lines, and Leo was looking after the pups, who were beginning to shift, by the yips from the cave. The damned full moon.

There was something wrong with the trail we were following. The footprints didn't hold a scent, not even a whiff. So it was lucky we had the prints themselves to prove we weren't tracking ghosts. And even those were strange — one set was abnormally rounded, with fewer claw prints. They didn't even look canine, but I didn't know what else they could be. Monsters don't exist.

Rhys and I broke into a sprint to cover the distance when we realised the tracks were spaced out, suggesting the same gait. I wanted to catch them before more snow fell and hid the prints. We built up speed slowly at first, keeping together even through a tangle of brambles and thorns. But when I pushed myself to the limit, Rhys ended up a few paces behind.

He had longer legs, yet I had better stamina. My brother could beat me in a fight, and Fion could bulldoze her way into my mind, but neither of them could run faster, and I was proud of that. In fact, my wolf was so busy enjoying herself that she failed to stop when the tracks did and almost ran headfirst into a stone wall.

I skidded in the snow and stared at the wall. It was familiar, because I had been here only days before. In front of me was the rundown shepherd's hut which belonged to old Jeff, our local nutcase.

A monster. A monster, with a 'weird eye.'

No. There was no way. No way at all. Because Jeff was a crazy old man, who was hardly able to leave his house, let alone fight off hundreds of ferals.

Right...?

The alarmed look my brother threw suggested he was considering the same possibility. Then he padded to a window to look inside.

"Jeff's fast asleep in bed," he said through the link, then paused for a heartbeat. "But there's another mattress on the floor with blankets and nobody in it."

That was when we should have realised. On any other night, having not witnessed bloody carnage, we might have stopped to consider the significance of that. But any other night wouldn't have been a full moon. Every werewolf in range was shifted in that moment, yet old Jeff was sleeping in his bed, entirely human. And entirely not.

"It couldn't have been him?" It was more a statement than a question, because the idea of Jeff being a hero was just inconceivable.

Rhys shook his head. "I don't think so."

We turned and melted back into the forest, leaving Jeff to his dreams. But if we had stayed even a second longer, one of us might have noticed a dark figure watching us from the shadows. A dark figure who also wasn't shifted, despite the pale disk in the sky. And if we'd stayed another minute, we might have seen them smile sadly at the place we had been and heard them whisper:

"I'm sorry."