Dawn filtered weakly through the trees—a dirty light that seemed to carry the stench of death with it. We walked without speaking, following the trail the gammas had left on the damp earth: deep footprints, dried blood, broken branches leading north.
The forest was no longer a refuge. It felt sick. The air was heavy, and no birds sang.
Ethan walked ahead in silence. His eyes—the Alpha’s eyes, not the man’s—moved with predatory precision, alert to every sound. I followed, my pulse still racing from what had happened a few hours earlier, from the smell of bodies and blood.
“We should stop for a while,” I suggested. “You need to rest.”
“I can’t,” he replied without looking back. “If I do, I’ll see their faces again.”
I knew who he meant: the gammas. The men and beasts we had killed to su
