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1. The Thing in the Trees
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2025-07-31 14:14:58The forest always felt louder before a full moon. Like it was holding its breath.
Kaela stood barefoot in the dirt, the frost nipping at her toes like a warning she was ignoring. Her hoodie was too thin for this time of year, but she didn’t care. She pulled the hood low over her hair and breathed in deep. Cold air burned her lungs.
The moon wasn’t even full yet — still two nights off — but already something inside her was pulling, scratching. It had been building for weeks. That... thing inside her. Her wolf.
She closed her eyes.
Her pulse throbbed in her ears. Her skin felt too tight. Muscles twitching. Like she was standing too close to a storm about to break open.
“Soon,” a voice whispered from somewhere deep in her chest. Not hers, not fully. Not yet.
She opened her eyes fast. Movement? No — nothing. Just wind through the trees and the soft crackle of ward lines humming at the edge of Frostclaw territory. Still, she couldn’t shake it.
She wasn’t alone.
Hadn’t felt alone in a while, actually.
Kaela blew out a breath and turned, heading back toward the village. Leaves crunched underfoot, and the wind carried the usual smells — pine, snow, woodsmoke. But something else too. Smoke and... ash? Weird.
Her dreams had been getting worse. Or weirder. Harder to ignore. Every night: fire in the sky, wolves snarling beneath a blood moon, and always those same eyes.
Gold. Watching. Like they knew her.
But they were never hers.
She crossed into the compound just as someone yelled about the food stores again. Everything was chaos with the summit coming. Tents going up, Gamma patrols doubling, warriors in and out of the border lines. And with the Shadowfangs invited? Everyone was on edge.
The compound looked the same — rough wood cabins in a half-moon, pale banners flapping in the wind. Silver fang on pale blue. Kaela barely noticed anymore.
Her mom was waiting at the cabin steps, arms folded, jaw set. Not great.
“You were in the woods again,” she said. Not a question.
Kaela shrugged. “Just needed air.”
“Near the border? Kaela, what if one of them picked up your scent?”
Kaela pulled off her hood and walked past her. “No one did.”
Her dad was there too, leaning against the inside wall like always, quiet but watching. “You’ve been... off lately.”
“I’m shifting soon,” Kaela snapped, tugging off her boots. “Isn’t that supposed to make people moody?”
“That’s not what we mean,” her mom said, softer now.
Kaela didn’t answer. She lit a candle and sat on the edge of her bed, arms wrapped around her knees. Her fingers still buzzed from the woods. She could still feel it — like eyes pressing against her spine.
Watching.
In the mirror across from her bed, her skin looked too pale. Her eyes flickered — silver for just a second when the flame caught them right. Her parents blamed stress or hormones or whatever. But Kaela knew better.
“You’ve kept it hidden for nineteen years,” her mom said from the doorway. “But the first shift… it’ll rip through you whether you’re ready or not.”
Kaela didn’t say anything. There was nothing left to say.
She was a white wolf. One in a thousand. A legend, apparently.
Her dad had explained it once: “To some, you're sacred. To others, you're a threat.”
So they’d hidden her. Trained her. Smothered her instincts with discipline and structure and fear. Even the Alpha didn’t know.
Not yet.
“The summit is dangerous,” her mom added quietly. “If you shift during it, if someone senses what you are...”
“I won’t.”
“You might not get a say.”
That night, Kaela didn’t sleep.
She lay tangled in blankets, skin damp with sweat even though the fire was out. Her head was full of fire again. The dream came back.
Flames all around her. Her hands covered in blood. A forest burning, howls echoing, and in the smoke — those same damn eyes.
Gold. Glowing. Staring right through her.
She stepped toward them in the dream, heart thudding. Her wolf surged up inside her, hot and wild. The word came from nowhere, searing her brain like lightning:
Mate.
She reached toward the eyes — and woke up gasping.
It was still dark. Barely past dawn. But she couldn’t stay still.
Next thing she knew, she was walking. No jacket. No boots. Just drawn toward something she couldn’t explain. Her feet moved like they had a mind of their own.
The trees thinned as she reached the edge of Frostclaw land, right near the invisible line where the wards ended and enemy territory began.
She knew she should turn back. She didn’t.
The wind shifted. Pine. Smoke. Ash. Something... unfamiliar.
Then she saw it.
Not a face. Just a figure. Barely there. Hidden among the trees, just beyond the wardline.
Watching her.
She froze. Her heart stuttered. The air felt heavy — thick with something ancient. The bond tugged inside her like a rope pulled tight.
Him.
She didn’t move. Neither did he.
Her wolf shoved forward, desperate and shaking.
Mate.
And then, in a blink, he was gone.
Kaela stood there like a ghost. Her breath white in the air. Her hands curled into fists.
Back in the compound, she didn’t speak. Not to her parents. Not to anyone.
But when night fell again, she sat in the dark and whispered the word under her breath like a secret:
“Mate.”
And her wolf howled back from somewhere deep inside her.
Latest chapter
Claimed by the Enemy Alpha 67. The First Crack
Morning in the White didn’t happen the way it did anywhere else.It didn’t break. It leaked.Thin strips of weak light bled through the skeletal trees, painting everything in washed-out gray. The frost clung stubbornly to the ground, whispering under Kaela’s boots as she sat up in the cold.She’d slept—sort of—but every time she’d drifted off, the whisper had been there. That same curl of almost-words brushing her ear. She couldn’t remember them when she opened her eyes, but she remembered the feeling they left—like something cold had crawled under her skin and stayed there.The camp was quiet except for Dax, crouched over the embers of a dying fire, coaxing it back to life with slow, careful movements. Steam rose from his mouth in little bursts.“He’s out there,” he said without looking at her.She rubbed her face. “You mean Ronan.”“Who else?” Dax smirked faintly. “Eastern edge. He’s been there a while.”Of course he had.Kaela pulled on her boots and followed the trail—big, deliber
Claimed by the Enemy Alpha 66. Night Watch
The White never really slept.It just shifted—breathing in long, cold exhales, rustling in places where there was no wind, creaking like the bones of something ancient.Kaela sat by the half-burned fire, chin tucked into her scarf, eyes locked on the tree line. Her wolf was restless. Her turn on watch. She should have been alone, but Ronan was out there too, pacing the shadows like a caged predator.“You can sit, you know,” she called out quietly.“I’m not tired.” His voice came from somewhere to her right—rougher, lower, like the night made it heavier.“You’re always not tired.”He didn’t answer, didn’t even pause. Just kept moving. His boots crunched over frostbitten ground, slow deliberate circles skirting the outer edge of the firelight. It was the kind of movement that made you feel watched even when you were the one watching.Kaela’s teeth caught on her lip. She told herself she was listening for threats, but her focus kept drifting to him instead—the way he moved with that cont
Claimed by the Enemy Alpha 65. One Blanket
The fire was low, more embers than flame, exactly how Ronan kept it. The kind of fire that gave just enough heat to stop their fingers from going numb, but not enough to light them up like a beacon in the White.The air beyond that soft glow felt alive in the wrong way. Heavy. Watching. Kaela’s instincts kept brushing the edges of something—too faint to catch, too patient to reveal itself. The cold seemed sharper because of it, like the air itself wanted them brittle.She was on the far side of the fire, legs tucked under herself, dagger across her lap. She’d been telling herself she’d make it through the night awake, that she’d watch him do those constant perimeter sweeps and keep her own eyes open, that the cold wouldn’t matter. But the White had its own rules, and right now, her body was losing to them.“You’re shivering,” Ronan’s voice cut across the crackle of the wood.She looked up. “I’m fine.”His head tilted slightly. “That wasn’t a question.”Kaela smirked, but it was short-
Claimed by the Enemy Alpha 64. Between Teeth and Silence
The White swallowed sound whole.Not like the forests Kaela knew, where the wind could scream through the branches or the snow could crunch underfoot loud enough to give you away for miles. Here, the silence was heavier. Thick. It clung to her ears until even her own breathing sounded like an intrusion.She hated this place.Not just for the cold — though the cold here wasn’t a thing that bit and then went away. It was a slow invasion, a thing that crept into her blood and made her wonder if her heart was still beating at the right speed. But worse than that was how the White erased the world. No color. No smell. No movement unless you made it yourself. The White didn’t just hide things. It made you question if they’d ever been real.A lone figure cut through that emptiness ahead of her — Ronan, a shadow against the pale world. His shoulders rolled with each step in that steady, predatory rhythm he had, even when they weren’t tracking prey. He didn’t look back. Didn’t need to. She kne
Claimed by the Enemy Alpha 63. The Trail Left for You
Kaela woke with the kind of unease that didn’t belong to dreams.It wasn’t the cold that roused her—though the cold was a living thing here, biting and needling until your skin felt too tight—it was the quiet.Too quiet.Camp was never silent. Even in the dead of night, there was always something: the soft crunch of patrol boots, Lira’s low pacing hum, Ronan’s steady breath moving past her tent. This morning, though… nothing.When she pushed herself upright, the world outside looked wrong. The snow should’ve been broken and messy from movement—patrol shifts, restless wolves—but it was smooth. Unbroken. Glittering under the thin throat of dawn like it hadn’t been touched since it fell.Except for one thing.A single, perfect mark slicing across the whiteness. Narrow. Unwavering.It started just inside the ward line.Ended at Ronan’s boots.Her stomach dropped.“Ronan—”“I see it.” His voice was low, gravel dragged over stone. Either he hadn’t slept, or the night had taken more from him
Claimed by the Enemy Alpha 62. The Breath Behind You
Kaela didn’t sleep.Not because she wanted to be heroic about it—her body begged for rest, muscles throbbing from the day’s march—but every time her eyes slipped shut, the fire’s glow dimmed just enough for the dark to lean in.And in the dark… she could hear it.That sound from earlier—low, slow, deliberate. A breath so long it felt wrong. Not like lungs filling because they had to. Like it was done on purpose. For her.Lira was half-dozing near the fire, bow balanced in her lap, head tilting forward only to jerk back up. Her lips moved now and then—those old-words again—but she never said them loud enough for Kaela to catch.Ronan hadn’t sat down once. He was still a dark shape at the edge of camp, standing with his back to them, staring into the tree line like he could force the shadows to give up their secrets.The snow glowed faintly under the half-moon. It made the shapes between the drifts look like they were moving—just at the corner of her vision—never when she looked straigh
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