The howl still lingered in Elara's ears when the gates slammed shut behind the returning scout. His face was pale, his breath ragged as he stammered out his report: movement on the supply road. Too fast for strays, too organized for animals. Something was out there.
The courtyard of Ravenholt Castle shifted like a stirred nest. People whispered in anxious clumps, children were ushered back into tents, and guards climbed higher on the walls, rifles clenched tight. The hum of the generators seemed louder in the silence that followed.
Caleb's hand brushed Elara's arm. "They'll send a patrol," he said.
Of course they would. Supplies didn't walk themselves home, and whatever had moved out there couldn't be ignored.
The captain of the watch barked orders. Within minutes, names were being called—men and women with weapons, steady enough hands to aim them. Caleb stepped forward before Elara could even blink.
"I'll go," he said, his voice firm.
Elara's stomach dropped. She already knew what would happen next.
"Elara will come too."
She blinked at him. "What?"
"You're steady with a shot," Caleb said, though his eyes softened. "And I'd rather have you at my back than leave you waiting here."
"I'm not—" she began, but Corin's laugh cut her off.
"Count me in," Corin said, sauntering forward, her knife twirling lazily in her hand. Her golden-brown hair caught the floodlight glow, and her smile was sharp enough to draw blood. "You'll need someone who doesn't waste ammo."
The captain frowned but didn't argue. Desperation made room for volunteers.
A shadow passed overhead. Elara tilted her head just in time to see a raven land on the battlements, feathers shivering as the shape folded in on itself. Torvee stepped into the torchlight, her leathers creaking softly as she straightened.
"I'll fly ahead," she said simply. "You'll want eyes above the road."
That settled it.
Minutes later, the patrol gathered at the gates. Eight in total—five guards in patched armor, Caleb, Corin, and Elara bringing up the rear. Each was armed differently: rifles scavenged from old stations, shotguns, crossbows. One man carried a hunting spear fashioned from rebar.
Caleb slung his crossbow across his back, checked the knife at his belt, then patted the holster at his hip. "Two magazines left," he muttered. "We save the bullets unless we've got no choice."
Elara swallowed hard as a guard pressed a revolver into her hands. The metal was cold and heavy, the cylinder loaded with six dull brass rounds.
"Don't waste them," the woman said flatly. "And don't aim unless you mean it."
Elara nodded, trying not to let her hands shake. She strapped the holster to her belt, the weight unfamiliar but strangely reassuring.
Corin smirked as she slid her knife back into its sheath. "All I need."
Torvee said nothing, but her raven-dark eyes never stopped moving, scanning the treeline even from within the gate.
The massive doors creaked as they opened. The air outside was colder, sharper, carrying the tang of the sea mixed with the damp musk of the forest. The patrol stepped through in silence, boots crunching on gravel. Behind them, the gates groaned shut again with a sound that always felt too final.
Elara glanced back once. Ravenholt loomed against the cliff, floodlights glaring into the night, patched walls bristling with barbed wire and welded cars. For all its scars, it was safety. It was home. And now it was shrinking behind her with every step she took into the wild.
The supply road stretched ahead, cracked and uneven, weeds breaking through the asphalt. Rusting cars lay scattered along the edges, their doors hanging open, windows long since shattered. Branches clawed overhead where the forest pressed close, shadows thick between the trunks.
Caleb took point, crossbow ready, his steps careful but sure. Corin walked beside him, humming under her breath, as though the tension in the air were just a game. Elara stayed close behind, her revolver heavy at her side, eyes darting from shadow to shadow.
A flutter overhead drew her gaze. Torvee swept silently through the branches in raven form, her wings brushing the leaves without a sound. She circled ahead, vanishing into the dark before swooping back again, ever watchful.
Every creak of a branch, every snap of a twig set Elara's nerves on edge. She gripped the revolver tighter, her mind flashing back to screams, to banging doors, to the sound of silence that followed.
"Easy," Caleb murmured without looking back. "Steady hands."
"I'm steady," she lied.
They walked for nearly an hour, following the road as it curved deeper into the forest. The night pressed close, broken only by the sweep of the moon and the occasional crackle of static from a guard's battered radio.
Then Torvee dropped down from the branches ahead, feathers rippling back into skin as she landed lightly on her feet.
"There," she said, pointing down the road.
The patrol followed her gesture. Elara's breath caught.
An overturned truck lay on its side across the cracked asphalt, its cargo spilled in a dark smear. Supplies—food tins, water canisters, bundles of cloth—were scattered like bones. And there was blood. Fresh. Too much of it.
The patrol tightened formation, weapons raised.
"Stay close," Caleb murmured to Elara, his crossbow coming up.
They approached slowly, boots crunching over broken glass. The smell hit first—copper and rot, cloying in the back of her throat. Elara swallowed against it, fighting the bile that rose.
The driver's door hung open. Deep claw marks scored the metal.
"Ferals," one of the guards whispered.
Elara's grip tightened on her revolver. Her skin prickled with the certainty that they weren't alone.
And then the forest broke into motion.
Two shapes exploded from the shadows—low, fast, too fast to be human. Yellow eyes blazed in the dark.
"Contact!" Caleb shouted.
Crossbows twanged. A rifle cracked. Elara froze, her heart hammering against her ribs as one of the ferals lunged straight for her. Its teeth bared, its face twisted beyond recognition, human once but no longer.
"Shoot!" Caleb's voice cut through the chaos.
Her hand shook. The revolver felt impossibly heavy. The memory of the bunker crashed into her—blood on the tiles, the woman's trembling voice, the horror that followed.
The feral was almost on her when Caleb shoved her aside, slashing with his knife. Elara stumbled, breath ragged, vision blurring.
Corin darted past, moving faster than she should have, her knife flashing as she drove it into the creature's side. Torvee swooped down in raven form, wings battering the second feral, claws raking its face before she shifted back mid-strike, landing with inhuman grace.
"Now, Elara!" Caleb's voice was desperate.
She raised the revolver with trembling hands, the feral's eyes locking on her. For a heartbeat, the world narrowed to that yellow gaze.
Her finger squeezed the trigger.
The gunshot cracked through the night like thunder. The feral jerked back, its chest blooming red, before it collapsed in a twitching heap.
Silence followed—brief, terrible.
Then, far in the distance, another howl answered.
And another.
And another.
The forest shivered with sound, a chorus of hunger rising in the dark.
Caleb's face paled. "We've stirred the pack."
Elara's revolver trembled in her hand. Her first shot had saved them, but the echo of it carried through the night like a beacon.
And the wild was answering.