Silas Nightwood tracked the beast for three days, and on the fourth the village where he hunted turned on him. He crouched at the tree line before dawn, studying fresh claw marks on a broken fence. A shepherd's dog lay dead nearby. The beast had killed close to homes now, and Silas meant to end it before it reached the woman he loved. But footsteps crunched behind him, many at once, and he rose to find a crowd blocking his way back. They carried lanterns and pitchforks. An old man at the front pointed at Silas's ears, dark and pointed against his hair. "Wolf blood," the man said. "You bring the killings. We've seen no beast but you." Silas raised his empty hands. "I hunt the thing that did this. Look at the tracks. They're twice the size of mine." He knelt and pressed his own hand into the mud beside a print. The paw dwarfed his palm. A few villagers leaned closer, uncertain. The old man spat. "Tricks. Leave, or we burn you out." A younger man swung a torch toward the dry grass at Silas's feet. Flame caught and spread fast toward the fence and the homes beyond. Silas made his choice in a breath. He could argue and let the fire prove them right, or he could save them and lose his hunt here. He tore off his coat and beat the flames down, choking on smoke. He dragged a water trough over and dumped it across the grass. When the last ember died, the crowd stood silent. He had spared their village while they cursed his name. The old man lowered his pitchfork. "You could have run." "I don't run from what I started," Silas said. "But I can't stay. You've cost me the trail." He turned his back on their lanterns and walked into the trees. Behind him a woman called a thank-you he did not answer. The beast had a full night's lead now, and it was moving in one direction. Toward home. Silas ran. The manor rose at the end of its long, tree-lined drive, pale stone under a graying sky. Every window was dark but one. He crossed the gravel and threw open the door. Luna stood at the top of the stairs in a loose blue gown, her white ears pinned back, her blue eyes wide. His mate. She had heard him coming the way she always did. "You're covered in soot," she said, hurrying down. Then she saw his face and stopped. "What happened?" "The village drove me off. The beast is close." He took her hands. "Closer than I let myself believe. It's hunting this way now." Luna's grip tightened. Outside, past the dark trees, a long howl rose and broke off. Neither of them breathed. The thing Silas had chased for weeks had stopped running. It had come to them.

The howl died and the manor went silent. Silas gripped Luna's hands on the stairs. He knew the beast would come through a door or a window soon. He could fight it. But not while he stood between it and Luna, unsure which way she would run. His mate was unarmed, and fear for her would slow his hands. He needed her safe and hidden before the thing crossed his threshold. "Listen to me," he said. "The cellar has an iron door. You'll go there and bar it." Luna's ears pinned flat. She shook her head. "I won't hide while it tears you apart." "You'll die if you stay," Silas said. He held her face in his soot-stained hands. "I can't fight it and guard you both. If I know you're behind iron, I can let go. Do you understand? I need you safe to have any chance." Glass shattered somewhere in the east wing. Claws scraped stone. Luna flinched at the sound, then looked back at Silas. Her eyes were wet, but her jaw set hard. "You come back to me," she said. It was not a question. It was an order. "I will." She kissed him once, fast, then ran. Silas watched her disappear down the hall toward the cellar stairs. He heard the heavy door groan open. He heard it slam. He heard the iron bar drop into its bracket. Something in his chest loosened. She was safe. Now he could move. Silas turned toward the east wing and let the change take him. His bones stretched. Black fur swept over his skin. Where a man had stood, a great wolf now filled the hall, eyes burning pale, smoke curling off his shoulders like breath in cold air. The beast came around the corner. It was larger than him, its jaws wet, its tracks the same twice-sized prints he'd found by the dead sheep. It had hunted them for weeks. Now it had cornered them in their own home. But it had cornered only him. Silas hit it before it could lunge. They crashed through a table and into the wall. Teeth found his shoulder. He twisted free and drove the beast back down the hall, snapping at its throat. It was stronger, but he was faster, and he fought without one eye on the stairs. Every strike went where he aimed. He no longer had anything to protect but himself. He tore a long wound across the beast's flank. It yelped, broke away, and crashed through the shattered window into the dark. Silas stood in the wrecked hall, bleeding, and let the man rise back through the fur. He crossed to the cellar door and knocked twice. "It's me. It ran." The bar lifted. Luna threw the door open and pulled him inside. He was hurt, and the beast was still alive out there in the trees. But it knew now that his fangs could bite. And it knew the woman was beyond its reach.

By morning the beast's blood trail led east, across the village fields. Silas cleaned his shoulder wound at the manor window and stared at that land. The mob still called him the killer. If they saw him crossing their fields, they would swarm him with pitchforks and rope. He would be cornered while the beast crawled away to heal. He needed to reach the trail before it went cold, and the only path ran straight through people who wanted him dead. Luna came up behind him. She had already made up her mind. "You can't walk it," she said. "They'd have you before you reached the far hedge. But they won't touch me." Silas turned. "You're not walking me through a mob." "I'm not walking you." She pulled a wagon key from her gown. "I'm driving you. My scent doesn't read as wolf to them. I can pass for one of their own. Nobody looks twice at a woman with a cart." He shook his head. "If they search it, they find us both." "Then we don't give them a reason to search." She touched his cheek. "You told me to hide behind iron so you could fight. Now let me hide you so you can hunt. It's the same trust, Silas. It just runs the other way." His own words, turned back on him. He had no answer for that. "Reluctantly," he said, and she almost smiled. They loaded the wagon in the yard. Silas climbed into the bed and lay flat. Luna piled blankets over him, then baskets of bread and dried apples on top, so the load looked like market goods. The weight pressed warm against his ribs. Through a gap he watched her work. Luna folded her white ears down flat against her hair. She pulled a fuzzy white cloak over her shoulders and raised the hood until her face sat in shadow. In the morning light she looked like any farm woman bound for the square. Nothing about her said wolf. "Stay still," she said. "Stay quiet. Whatever they say to me, don't move." The wagon rolled onto the fields. Silas heard voices soon after. Men called out. Boots crossed the dirt toward the cart. His hand curled into a fist under the blankets. "Morning," a man said. "Seen the Nightwood dog? He killed again, they say." "Not out here," Luna answered. Her voice stayed light, bored. "Just bread and a long road." A hand thumped the side of the wagon. An apple rolled off and struck the ground. Silas held his breath. The blanket lay one tug from his face. "Go on, then," the man said. The boots stepped back. The wheels turned again. Field gave way to trees. When the voices faded, Luna pushed the blankets off him. "We're through," she said. Silas sat up in the open woods. The beast's trail cut fresh into the mud ahead, close now. He had crossed the mob's land. Nothing stood between him and the hunt but the trees.