The mountains breathed around them, exhaling mist into valleys older than human memory. Akira felt each vibration of the living earth through paw pads that had crossed continents, sensed shifts in air pressure that spoke of weather changes days before they arrived. Twelve thousand winters had taught her patience, had taught her to read landscapes as others might read simple words on a page.
The makeshift pack moved through dense forest in near silence, fallen pine needles cushioning their steps. Fifteen days on the Pacific Crest Trail had stripped away all pretense of civilization, leaving only the essential core of what they truly were. Not refugees, not experiments, not victims. Predators. Survivors. Family.
Akira led from the front, her massive white direwolf form cutting through unde
