Hope's POV.
Branches whip against my arms and legs, but I barely feel them. My lungs burn. My heart is a drumbeat of fear in my chest. Emory is just behind me, and Morgana leads the way like a woman possessed, tripping over roots, stumbling, gasping — but she doesn’t stop. None of us do.
Not when her voice cracks with fear. Not when dread coils tighter and tighter around my ribs with every step. Because something is wrong. Deeply wrong. And the closer we get, the more I feel it — like a sickness in the air, clinging to the wind, seeping into the ground.
When the trees finally part and the pack house comes into view, I think — No. No, this isn’t real. This can’t be real.
But it is.
Bodies lie scattered across the grass — wolves I know, wolves I love. Velara is slumped against the porch
