EMMA
The howls made sense now.
That was the cruelest part of it—not the fear, not even the revelation itself, but the way every strange, unsettling moment rearranged itself in my mind with brutal clarity. Like a puzzle snapping together after you’ve already cut your hands on the loose pieces.
I shut myself into my room and leaned my forehead against the door, breathing hard. The estate felt different now. Not hostile—never that—but aware. As if the walls had always known what I was and were only just now acknowledging that I had caught up.
The howls.
Not dogs. Not wind. Not old pipes or mountain echoes. Wolves. Real ones. Not metaphorical. Not symbolic. Flesh-and-bone creatures bound by blood and hierarchy and instinct. The mournful sound that had curled through my chest night after n
