“Yes. What is it?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Something is coming.”
“Were the wards broken?”
“No. I don’t think—it’s like they changed. Somehow.”
“Robert?”
“I don’t know. Ox. I think it’s coming this way.”
“You stay there,” I growled. “With Mark. We’re coming.”
“Be careful.”
I hung up the phone.
“You hear that?” Chris said to Jessie. “Get to the house.”
“Keep her on the phone,” I told Chris. “I don’t want her there before us.” Chris nodded as I stood. “Robbie, Tanner, with me. Rico, go with Chris. You follow behind us. We get to Jessie, she leaves her car there and gets in with you. Understood?”
They nodded, eyes narrowed, teeth bared.
WE REACHED the dirt road without seeing anyone, though the electric feeling intensified the closer we got. I gripped the steering wheel, knuckles turning white. My teeth were clenched and I was angry.
Jessie was already waiting for us and she didn’t hesitate, moving from her vehicle in with Chris and Rico, hair pulled back, staff clutched in her hands. I watched in the rearview mirror until she shut the door, then took off down the road, dust kicking up in plumes behind us.
We passed the old house first. It stood as it always did.
The house at the end of the lane was the same. Elizabeth and Mark were waiting for us on the porch, half-shifted, eyes bright even in the sunlight.
“Anything?” I demanded as I threw open the door to the truck.
“No,” Mark said. “No one has approached the house.”
“They will,” Elizabeth said, looking off into the trees.
I walked backward toward the porch, scanning the tree line. Everything looked the same. The trees swayed, the birds sang. The territory felt like mine, like ours. But there was something else there, sliding along on top of it, not quite fitting, but close. I didn’t know if this was Richard and Robert, trying to trick us. Because even though my skin was crawling, it felt like something I should recognize, but it was making me anxious. Snappish. I wanted to prowl in front of the house, warning any intruders away.
The others gathered behind us on the porch, spread out in the formation we had trained with so many times. They didn’t need to be told. They just knew. The wolves were spread out amongst the humans, claws out and ready. I could feel their strength at my back, all of them, and I hoped whoever was stupid enough to come at us felt it too before we made sure they wouldn’t do it again.
The electricity intensified.
“It’s coming from the north,” Mark muttered. “From the clearing.”
It was also moving.
“What is it?” Rico asked, sounding nervous.
“I don’t know,” Mark said. “It’s almost like—”
The wolves all tensed, hearing something that we couldn’t.
“Four of them,” Robbie growled. “Moving fast.”
“Stand together,” I said. “Whatever it is, we stand together—”
I heard it now. In the forest. The footsteps, the running strides. A flash of color in the thick trees, something red and something orange and it—