Chapter1

I was the sole anomaly in the Blackwood pack.

My siblings could shift. I couldn’t.

When they took their wolf forms, they were majestic. When I shifted, I looked just like a Husky.

On the day of the Trials, the pack elder demanded it publicly: "Alpha! Kill her, before she disgraces our bloodline."

My father didn't agree immediately. I saw his hands clench so tight his knuckles turned bone-white beneath his robes.

My mother threw herself at his feet, sobbing, begging him to spare my life.

Father remained silent for a long, agonizing moment before finally speaking. "Exile her."

The elder opened his mouth to argue, but my father cut him off. "My word is final."

He didn't look at me when he turned away. But I remembered the flash of raw heartache in his eyes just a split second before.

He ordered my brother to dump me at the edge of our territory. "Let her fend for herself," he declared. But right after those harsh words, my father secretly ordered him through the pack mind-link to take the long way around and settle me in the safest, most sheltered corner of the woods.

My mother secretly built me a little wooden shelter. She left food and sneaked out to visit me every few days.

“When you're older, maybe the shift will finally complete itself,” she would whisper.

I waited a long time. I never changed. If anything, I grew up to look even more like an oversized Husky.

That was my life. Until the day humans trespassed into my territory.

I was lounging beside my wooden shelter, absentmindedly practicing digging in the dirt, when the sharp, acrid stench of gasoline and burnt rubber tearing through the snow hit my nostrils. I froze. Dropping my belly to the ground, I slunk into the dense underbrush.

A vehicle door slammed. Heavy boots crunched against the snow, followed immediately by the suffocatingly sweet scent of cheap perfume riding the wind.

“Hey guys, look what I just found.”

A heavily made-up woman marched into view, thrusting a smartphone mounted on a gimbal ahead of her. The camera lens pointed directly at the half-dug hole I had just abandoned.

“The black market rumors were right. There really is a rare, mutated wild canine in this restricted zone. Just look at these tracks—the proportions are exquisite.”

From her ongoing narration, I gathered her name was Madison, a viral shock-vlogger and urban explorer with a million followers.

Cowering behind the broad leaves, I clung to my brother's strict warning: Never let the outside world—let alone humans—discover traces of the wolf pack. I was just a "dog." If I stayed hidden, she would eventually get bored and leave.

But she didn't.

Spotting a patch of fur I hadn't concealed well enough, Madison pulled a chunk of raw beef from her pocket. She crouched down, her voice dripping with fake sweetness. "Here, doggy... Come on out, sweetie, I've got a treat for you. Don't be scared, I'll take you to a nice new home."

She tossed the meat less than three feet from where I lay.

I was a wolf. Even if I looked like a domestic pet, my sense of smell was sharper than any warrior in the Blackwood camp. The second the beef hit the snow, I caught the bitter, chemical taint laced deep inside the muscle fibers.

I didn't flinch. Instead, I pressed myself deeper into the shadows.

One minute passed. Then five. Then ten.

The saintly "animal rescue" facade Madison wore for her camera rapidly crumbled. Pushing a button, she killed the livestream feed with an irritable huff.

"Damn it. Stubborn little freak isn't taking the bait."

She stood up and waved impatiently toward the parked SUV. "David, forget it! Grab the net and the stun pole. We're catching it."

A hulking brute stepped out of the vehicle, dragging a heavy wire net lined with vicious outward-facing barbs.

Every hair on my spine stood on end. These weren't urban explorers. They were professional poachers.

"Make it quick," Madison ordered, her eyes gleaming with undisguised greed. "The underground buyers will pay a fortune for an anomaly like this. Just don't ruin the pelt."

She snapped on a high-lumen tactical flashlight, sweeping the blinding white beam recklessly through the bushes.

The harsh light caught my eyes, triggering a defensive, guttural snarl from my throat before I could stop myself.

“Right there!” David roared, lunging into the brush.

I bolted. Using my deceptively small stature to my advantage, I darted under the heavy steel net right as it slammed into the snow behind my tail, scrambling frantically into an abandoned burrow dug beneath a massive tree root.

David cursed loudly.

Only one thought echoed in my frantic mind: Get back to the pack lands! Even if the border patrols caught me, even if the elder demanded my blood, I had to run away. I had to reach my father and my brother.

“It’s heading out the other side! Move!”

Madison’s heavy boots stomped violently across the dead branches directly above my head.

The moment I popped my head out of the far side of the burrow, a sleek metallic barrel was shoved right into my face.

David flashed a cruel, crooked grin.

A quiet pop cracked the air, and a tranquilizer dart buried itself deep into the muscle of my hind leg.

I collapsed into the icy snow, my vision instantly blurring at the edges as the heavy sedative surged through my veins.

If I wanted to, I could have howled right then.

But I couldn't.

The camera lens hovered just inches away. If I truly wanted to keep my family alive, I had to protect the pack’s secret. If a video of a shifting wolf hit the internet, the entire Blackwood pack would face an immediate, catastrophic siege by human hunters.

My father had put his position as Alpha on the line just to keep me breathing. I wasn't going to be the one to destroy his pack.

Gritting my teeth until they ached, I forced the instinctual howl back down my throat.

“Gotcha, you little goldmine.”

Madison’s boots crunched to a halt right in front of my nose. Annoyed by my fading struggles, she snatched the stun pole from David and thrust it directly into my soft underbelly.

A blinding surge of electricity tore through my nerves, sending my body into violent convulsions. After that, I couldn't fight anymore.

Just before they hauled me up and shoved me into the cramped rusted iron cage, I gathered every last, trembling ounce of my strength and hooked a claw under the red thread around my neck, snapping it tight.

Clink.

The small silver bell, engraved with the crescent moon crest of the Blackwood pack, rolled silently into the snow beside the splintered remains of my little wooden shelter.

It was the only clue I could leave behind for my father and my brother.