In the end the snow had not been kind enough to show up when it had made its threat a few days earlier. That was actually a good thing, thought Sofia as she ran alone along the dirt road. No matter how good the cinanthrope was at hiding his steps, if he was still in the vicinity his footprints would be visible on the white blanket. Even an inexperienced person would soon figure out where he moved. As long as the only thing covering the ground was a thin layer of frost, he would have a better chance of going unnoticed.

That night Sofia had not taken Kas with her. Not only was she going to do her usual exercise routines, but she also wanted to look around in the forest, and it could be dangerous for her dog. She had no idea what the rancher had planned, but knowing them it could be anything. Also, many of the townspeople had hunting licenses and few scruples when it came to shooting a dog, and the presence of a cinanthrope could always attract other types of hunters, whether her mother was there or not. Besides, if she wasn't able to find him, her own mother would dispatch him. The only thing that reassured her was that he didn't seem to have made an appearance in the last few days. Many cinanthropes lived as humans for the whole month, going out only on the night when the full moon forced them to change. Sofía didn't think that was the case with this one. He was a born predator, a hunter, surely he was still around but he had had the good sense to hide better.

“This looks like a good place,” Sofia said to herself, stopping by the trees and bushes that lined the path.

The moon was practically a silver thread in the sky, so the forest was totally dark to anyone with human eyes. However, the dim argent light was enough for Sofia's pupils to see her surroundings with absolute clarity. Thin, pale rays penetrated through the branches and reflected off the frost that covered the ground, making it glow like quartz dust. The winter cold had its own aroma, one that softened all the others, masking them behind one reminiscent of glaciers and ice.

That area was close to the place where she saw the cinanthrope trying to hunt down a deer. There was no reason to think that he would still be there, but the forest was huge and it was the best place to start looking. Just as she was about to plunge into the shadows she heard a sound of footsteps approaching. A part of her shuddered with an instinctive fear that was too deep-rooted to just shake off. However, far from the full moon and without feeling that her body was going to change at any moment, her rational part did not find it difficult to put aside those fears. This was no hunter. Hunters were quiet, and they didn't go jogging along a forest trail. While she was ruminating about that, the jogger appeared around a bend in the trail, and at that moment she wanted to kick herself for her bad luck.

“Hey, hi,” Dave stopped when he reached her. “What are you doing here? I thought you weren't working out today. Where's Kas?”

“I didn't bring him, and I didn't really come to exercise. I have something to do,” she said, looking toward the forest.

“Do you want me to give you a hand?” asked the young man, tilting his head slightly to the side.

Sofia bit her lip. Yes, she did want a hand because she really felt very alone with her own problems, but she couldn't involve him in this. To do so would mean telling him things about the world of shadows, things he didn't know and that would destroy his life forever. For a mere human it was better to remain ignorant of the creatures that lurked beyond the veil.

“It's fine if you don't want to, but I've noticed that you've been a little distracted lately. You don't need to tell me anything if you don't feel like it, but if I can help you with anything, don't hesitate to count on me,” he said before she could answer.

“Is it that obvious?” asked Sofia in a whisper.

“We sit next to each other. It's hard not to notice.”

Sofia let out a quiet sigh.

“This is a very rural town, and there are a lot of ranchers and a lot of hunters. A dog has killed a lamb and wounded a deer. Some boys in class were commenting that there are already plans to kill him. It's his natural behavior but the father of one of the boys, the farmer who lost the lamb, is not going to risk him attacking again.”

“And you want to find him and help him,” the young man commented.

Sofia showed a small smile as she looked back at her friend.

“You'll think I'm a fool for coming out here at night to look for a dog,” she said, blushing a little.

“Not at all. I think that makes you a good person. What will you do if you find him?”

“I don't know. I've only seen him a couple of times, he seems very elusive, and that's a good thing. I'd like to try to keep him away from the ranchers and hunters, but I don't know how I'm going to do that,” confessed Sofia, who naturally couldn't reveal that the dog had human intelligence and that her plan was to try to talk to him.

“If you want me to help you, I will, but if he's as elusive as you say he is, he may not let himself be seen easily,” Dave commented after running his tongue over his lips.

“I know that, but I want to see if these people have set traps or something. The kid in class said his father was preparing a little surprise for him, and that could be anything.”

“Then let's go take a look,” said Dave, taking her hand and giving it a gentle squeeze.

That small gesture not only made Sofia smile, but also brought a pleasant warmth to her belly. It was a simple, brief caress, but the touch of his skin against her own hand made her feel less alone. The worst thing was that she felt the armor she had built around herself cracking more and more each day, and little by little, drop by drop, a certain happiness was returning to her life. With it also came some of that normality she had longed for, even if what they were doing that night had little that was normal.

Together they entered the forest. The pale frost-covered grass crunched under their feet. They walked for at least an hour during which time they found multiple boot prints, but no sign that the cinanthrope was still around. Being in full shedding, if he had stayed on the spot she would have seen some tuft of white undercoat, but she saw nothing.

“They're so sure nature belongs to them that they leave their tracks everywhere,” Dave spat, his voice low and deep, not hiding the obvious irritation he felt.

“You don’t like hunting?”

“I accept hunting for food, but this trophy hunting...” he bent down and picked up a discarded shell casing that was on the ground. “This just litters the wilderness and adds nothing. Wanting to kill a... an animal just because it bothers you, because it made the mistake of touching what it wasn't supposed to touch, is despicable,” he concluded, turning his head sharply and clenching his jaw tightly, as if trying to restrain himself from saying anything else.

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The breeze that blew at that moment carried an unpleasant odor that made them both wrinkle their noses. It was a rather noticeable stench, one they both recognized immediately as that of carrion. After exchanging a brief glance they walked in the direction from which the odor came, focusing on making as little noise as possible with each step. Sofia had learned something from her mother, but she was surprised to see her friend molding himself to the ground, almost unconsciously searching for those patches of earth that would make the least noise when stepped on. Biting her lip she stole a discreet sidelong glance at him. Again it seemed to her that a fleeting greenish glow reflected in his pupils as the moon fell upon them.

They struggled to find the source of the stench as it was quite well hidden, tucked away in an area of dense undergrowth. It was a lamb resting right at the foot of a holly tree, but not just any lamb. It had a powerful bite in its neck, the wound that had caused its death, and it was in such an advanced state of decomposition that it stank horribly, even with that icy cold that dulled the odors.

“What do they think, that the... the dog is going to come back and claim the lamb as if he thinks it belongs to him?” Dave spat, kneeling down in front of the body and reaching out to it.

“Don't touch it!” Sofia exclaimed, dropping to her knees beside him and quickly pulling his hand away.

Dave hadn't seen it, but Sofia had, not only because her eyes gave her a certain advantage that allowed her to see a slight metallic glint, but also because she knew that kind of trap. The ranchers acted like that when they got angry with the wild fauna. With great care Sofia disabled the mechanism that activated the wire snare that was placed between the holly’s branches, at the perfect height for a scavenger to stick its head in and strangle itself. She then unraveled the wire and, after rolling it into a ball, put it in her pocket to throw it in the trash as soon as she got back home.

“A snare!” gasped Dave, paling visibly.

“It's a cruel trap, but it's not the cruelest thing I've seen them do. It wouldn't have done much to you, not like a foothold trap, but it's not the most pleasant thing to have a snare around your wrist either.”

A little embarrassed at his carelessness Dave looked away. Sofia checked the surrounding area for more traps but found nothing else. That was to be expected. A normal dog would easily fall into a snare. A cinanthrope would think much harder, especially since the meat they consumed was fresh. No cinanthropes fed on rotting carrion, their stomachs couldn't handle it and they could get sick just like humans. That's why she found the smell so unpleasant, when Kas would have found it most interesting.

Suddenly they both heard the sound of approaching footsteps, and raised their heads at the same time. Slightly confused, they exchanged a glance in which Dave raised an eyebrow, and she bit her lip. However, their doubts had to be put aside when another sound burst into the night, one that froze her blood. The chilling click of a rifle bolt.

With her mouth open in a mute gasp and her heart in her throat, Sofia leapt towards her friend and pushed him hard enough to send him crashing to the ground. Barely a second later they heard the detonation, and the crack of wood being penetrated. Splintered pieces of bark fell on the two teenagers, and Sofia felt a shudder as she realised how close the projectile had hit.

Silence returned to the forest again. Trembling and breathing heavily, the two boys dared to move just enough for their eyes to meet. In their gazes was a silent question, to which they both responded with a nervous nod. Carefully, crouching low, the two peeked out from behind a nearby tree and tried to catch a glimpse of something. Although Sofia was able to see clearly in the dark, they were in a forest, a forest that was full of bushes, trees, rocks and slopes where a hunter could hide. Nothing was in sight, and yet she knew they were being stalked. The hair on the back of her neck bristled and the energy in her chest began to stir uneasily. They had to get out of there.

Again they heard the click of the lock. This time it was Dave who reacted first. Just a second before the detonation, the boy jumped on his friend and pushed her to the ground, where he covered her with his body. The bullet hit just a few metres away from her. Despite her attempts to control herself, she couldn't help but pant, and at that moment she didn't care if the boy noticed because they were in far more serious trouble. There was a hunter out there, one who had set out to kill them, and Sofia didn't understand why. It didn't make any sense, she hadn't changed yet, and the people in her old guild were interested in furs and fangs, not pups that hadn't gone through their first change. None of that made any sense.

Her train of thought was interrupted by the sound of approaching footsteps. Dave, who was still on top of her, covering her with his own body, tensed. That didn't make sense either. Hunters were silent, that's why they were so lethal, because they could stalk even a cinanthrope without being noticed. This guy walked through the woods as if he couldn't see what was in front of him. He squashed grass, tripped over roots and kicked stones that rolled on the ground. Either he was playing with them, or he was an absolute rookie.

A curious vibration in her friend's chest made her look up at him. The boy's muscles were still tense, but the expression on his face had changed. Fear had given way to a frown and tight lips, as if he were fighting a grimace that was threatening to show. Before Sofia could even wonder what was wrong, he jumped away from her and ran. Her blood froze and the hair on the back of her neck bristled when she realised that he wasn't running for his life. He was running in a circle around the hunter, trying to get his attention. He must have succeeded as she heard another shot, but the bullet was lost in the night, far away from her.

“Fuck, Dave!” Sofia let out a growl, and this time she didn't try to hold it back.

She quickly got to her feet and hid behind the tree trunk. Taking advantage of the fact that the hunter seemed to have his attention on his friend, she peeked out and scanned the night forest again. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Dave in the distance, running through trees and bushes that he used to confuse the hunter. For an instant she thought she saw again a fleeting greenish glow right in his path, just a couple of reflections in the night, and again there was the sound of a detonation. The boy dropped to the ground, landing on all fours, before jumping to his feet to continue running.

Sofia bit her lip. Dave was agile and fast, there was no denying that, but the hunter only had to get lucky once. She needed to find him, and fast, so, using stealth to her advantage, she ran towards where the detonation had come from. A second one was heard, allowing her to adjust her trajectory. Then she saw him, and didn't know whether to be relieved or pissed off. It was a guy about her height, but he wasn't wearing typical hunter's attire. In fact, he was wearing jeans, a thick jacket, and a wool cap. In his hands he held a bolt-action rifle, typical of hunters – the wildlife ones, not the supernatural creature ones. Again she growled. It was someone from the village, and he had come to hunt the dog in revenge for the damned lamb.

The growl in her throat went silent when she saw her friend stagger and fall to his knees. Breathing heavily, the boy raised a trembling hand to his chest. It was too dark for a mere human to see anything clearly, but surely the hunter had seen movement around where he had heard the boy fall, for he raised his rifle and took aim. Sofia's blood froze, and the memory of Angel's death hit her full on and left her momentarily breathless. No, she wasn't going to allow it. Not again!

With the energy in her chest flaring and a dull rage burning in her belly, Sofia ran towards the hunter and pulled the rifle upwards to deflect the shot. The roar of the detonation deafened her for a moment, but she was experienced enough that it didn't slow her down. Before the hunter could turn to face her, she pulled his beanie down until it covered his entire face, then thrust her foot between his legs and shoved him to trip him. The boy fell over with a cry that sounded familiar to Sofia, and dropped the rifle. The girl took the opportunity to kick it several meters away, and then ran towards her friend.

“Let's go!”

Dave stood up as best he could, though his legs seemed to be shaking a little, and broke into a run. Together, they crossed the dark forest, leaving the hunter behind, until they reached the dirt road where they should be safer. Once there, they both dropped to the ground and sat there for a long time, panting. Sofia could feel the energy in her chest disturbed, and her muscles trembling with the still present fear. It hadn't been a real hunter, just some asshole who was out hunting a feral dog, but had taken to shooting without seeing clearly what he was aiming at. That didn't change the fact that the hunters in her guild were a very real thing, though, and he might as well have been one.

Next to her, Dave was panting as hard as she was, but he seemed to be trying to control the rhythm of his breathing. She didn't care when she saw his trembling hand resting against his chest, and the pained expression that crossed his face. Nor did she care to hear the restrained moan he held between his lips. Fear turned to rage, and she pounced on him to grab him by the pullover and fix her eyes on his gaze.

“Have you gone mad? How could you do such a thing? He could have killed you!” she shouted, a note of desperation creeping into her voice.

“I... I just wanted to help you...”

“I don't care!” she cried, and tears began to stream down her cheeks. “I don't care...” She buried her face in his pullover.

He let out a long sigh and wrapped his arms around her to hold her close to his chest. In that moment, when she felt his warmth, his smell, when she knew he was still there and that he wasn't hurt, her integrity collapsed and relief washed over her like a flood, feeding her tears. She hated herself for it, because she knew this was going to happen, and now there was no turning back. This boy who smelled like forest had become her friend, and she didn't want to lose him.