We didn't stop until we hit the tree line of the Grey Forest.
The convoy pulled off the logging road into a dense thicket of dead pines. The canopy was thick enough to hide us from drones, but it couldn't hide us from the cold. Or the fear.
"Kill the engines," Caleb ordered over the radio. "Total blackout. No fires. No lights."
The silence that followed was suffocating. Sixty wolves, usually loud and boisterous, moved like ghosts. They set up a perimeter in the dark, their eyes glowing faintly—yellow, amber, and green.
I sat in the back of the SUV, feeding Leo a bottle of formula. He was quiet now, his earlier distress replaced by a heavy, exhausted sleep. Maya was next to me, cleaning her shotgun with a rag. The rhythmic swish-swish of the cloth was the only sound in the car.
