Into the Wild

A weak morning light penetrated the gnarled trees in the forest and cast long shadows on the ground. It was cool air but with every breath Serena took, it lay on her chest like lead. And it had been much more tense in the days since the bloody battle with the renegade werewolf. It had been a formidable beast, and yet Serena had been more formidable. The rage of the midnight wolf had driven her, howled through her, given her the power to bring down the beast, but that same rage left her trembling, sick, like a storm brewed inside her body.

“They moved quickly, didn’t have time to linger.” The second the rogue werewolf’s body had grown still, Lucian had made that clear. The word had spread by now — the Onyx wolf was alive. They were being hunted.

“We have to go,” Lucian said and his voice was strong, although fear played painted on his features. His eyes turned into a horrible mixture of care when he faced Serena. “It’s not safe here.”

Serena held her silence, feeling the force of his words hit home. The Onyx wolf writhed inside her, a restless beast that needed something, and she fought to step not into her old skin but into this new one. But for now, she might still rein it in. Barely.

Lucian strode ahead, stopping now and then to observe the flora around him with eyes keener than any wolf’s, and Elias trailed after them, feet stumbling, as if afraid to step too hard. She didn’t need to read the note to know that Elias had grown distant since the fight. It was weighty, weightier than prior, and it rattled her. She couldn’t disregard her sense that something was unusual about him, that he was withholding something.

The trail through the trees seemed an extra barrier between Serena and Lucian. Lucian had always taken care of her, always ready to give his help, but the longer they trekked, the more her walking was stifled by his fear. It was not that she didn’t love him—she did, more than she could ever admit—but that with him her existence was a captive beast, a livesome creature deadlocked between human guilt and the feral dominance of the Onyx wolf in her soul. She would not be played anymore, not any longer.

“This can’t keep going on,” Serena said, to herself, a whisper. But the words were something she fought for, terrified to say aloud.

Lucian turned toward the sound, brows knitting. “What did you say?”

“I said I’m fine,” she retorted, her tone sharp. It was a lie. She wasn’t fine, not at all. But less than anything else did she want either his pity or his help.

sigh, the silence stretching, amassing unsaid sentences. He tried to connect, to calm her, but she rebuffed him like a wall of ice. A difference in her, the way the Onyx wolf had started to devour her from within—and it frightened him. She was disappearing from him, from the person that she had been.

Elias walked a few steps ahead, searching for the trail. He was generally uptight in the outside world, but today felt like it belonged on another planet. Serena had seen the difference in him, how he always crossed his arms now, how he looked as though he were defending something.

“You’re not saying anything,” Serena said after a pause, breaking the silence. She caught Elias’s gaze. “What’s going on with you?”

Elias did not answer at first, but after a beat, he halted in his tracks and glanced back over his shoulder toward her. His dark hair hid his face and his eyes were inscrutable. There was something about the look that made Serena’s stomach clench.

“Listen, I need to tell you something,” Elias said softly, so low it made Serena move closer, as if the words were precious. “I haven’t said everything.”

Serena shuddered, goosebumps rippling along the back of her neck. “What do you mean?”

Elias inhaled, each of those words heavy on their tongue, unvoiced terrors still hanging on. “I’m not just any werewolf. I was a filthy blood line like no other, a reaper that comes with fear My mother’s people are tied with the ferals, their power runs deeper than depth you’ve known.” A sort of power that you can’t really control.”

Serena could feel her heart racing and her pulse pounding. She’d always known Elias was up to something, but this? It was more than she had ever dreamed of happening.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she said, the words coming out of her mouth before she could stop them. Her mind raced. How would he have kept this from her? She had thought they trusted one another.

“I didn’t want you to know,” Elias said softly, his eyes heavy with regret. “I didn’t want to be a dead weight. But now … now I’m not sure if what’s happening to you will happen to me as well.” The wolf I carry squirm, scratch my skin. It’s not as powerful as the Onyx wolf’s wielder, but it’s not to say it isn’t there. And, Serena, if you and I collaborate … I fear the consequences.” Dangerous ones.”

Serena did not know what to say to them. She could hear what he had said, but it brought no comfort. It only fed the dread that was bubbling up within her.

“You mean that the the Onyx wolf and the bloodline of yours might… mix?” she asked, her voice shaky.

Elias nodded grimly. “It’s a prophecy. Combine the two and they make something neither of us can drive. And if that explodes, it’s going to blow everything up.”

Serena was silent, replaying everything from Elias in her head all over again. The Onyx wolf had always felt like a curse, something she wasn’t sure she was even fit to have, and now Elias was saying what they had between them could be worse? It felt like the world was shrinking around her.

“I wish I could tell you,” Lucian said finally, sounding very irritated. “We need to keep moving. We cannot remain running in the same space for long. The hunters — still out there.”

She shot him a look, and anger surged through her veins anew. He had always come across so confident, so powerful, but Serena was starting to suspect it wasn’t he who needed protecting. It was her. She has to guard against the storm brewing inside of her, and the beast that once roamed her soul and cries to be set free — an Onyx wolf. And Lucian’s relentless efforts to protect her, to save her, only made it worse.

“I’m fine,” she said again, but this time there was a strain in her voice, the lie clearer than ever.

Lucian didn’t answer, and the pain she read in his eyes felt — for Serena — like losing him, as well.

She had to get away. She would have to figure this out for herself.

Yet would not, as the day wore on, the lure of the wilderness. The call of the Onyx wolf was a call she couldn’t ignore, and so she followed it, away from the trail, away from the trees, carving a path through the belly of the wood. That was a deadly tmeptation behind all thr lismns her ects moved riht ticht-lick.

They were losing her, and neither Lucian nor Elias could reel her in. Not that she had wanted them to.

It was wild and unruly, and so was she.

And just beyond, another threat waited in the dark. Serena sensed it before she saw it — a nonhuman presence. A clinical, methodical force, stalking them from the trees. A cadre of hunters — more skilled than any she had ever faced — was hunting them.

And in that moment, she realised the fury of the Onyx wolf just might be the only salvation.

them. But it may also be what dooms them all.