Moonlit Awakening

recommended: compass, first aid kit, emergency blanket, water purification tablets, and enough trail mix to fuel her five-m

aya called, adjusting her pony

ng her forehead. "I still don't understand why you can't

d her watch. "And I've done this trail three times already. Plus,

me when you reach the summit and

ll

made sense to her-clear rules, predictable outcomes, logical explanations for everything. Unlike high

sed occasionally to photograph interesting fungi or identify bird calls, making mental notes for her ecology journal. B

f the valley below. She settled onto a flat boulder, pulled out her water bottle a

quickly: *Be ca

smates judging her for raising her hand too often, no whispers about how she should "

g in the underbrush behind her, to

rying to keep her voice

rew closer. She stood, instinct

ely. There was something unsettlingly deliberate in the way it stalked toward her, i

ig, make noise, back away slowly. "HEY!"

large for either-cocked its head,

details with unnatural clarity: the creature's silver-tipped fur catching the sunlight, the surpri

ed, thrashing wildly, her hand finding a rock. She swung with all her s

r skin. Maya scrambled backward, clutching her torn shoul

cool air. Then, impossibly, it nodded-a deliberate, human gesture-befo

fumbled for her phone with blood-slick fingers,

t's your

Trail... animal attack

coming. Can you descr

e seen? "A wolf, I think. B

o make the edges of her vision darken alarmingly. The last thing she remembered was being lifted onto a stretcher, the concerned

-

tissue damage, considering," the docto

l, stretched uncomfortably over muscles that ached with unfamiliar tension. The fluorescent lights see

e asked, wincing at how

d. "Animal attacks can lead to unusual infections. But if all your l

blankets and her father alternating between awkward silence and promi

s more than that-her entire body hummed with a strange, restless energy. The moo

ional blood work. But nothing showed up in her tests, and by afternoon, she was back in her own bedroom

her mother said, setting a glass of water on Ma

ehind in her advanced placement classes made

says there haven't been wolves in this region

nd-" She stopped, remembering the disturbingly human intelligenc

d like a tide. She woke gasping, her sheets soaked with sweat, her heart hammering against her

ate for water. When she caught her re

-the exact color of the cre

s. Pain ripped through her body as bones shifted and reformed. Maya collapsed to th

is isn't scientifically p

e way her teeth were lengthening, sharpening. Maya crawled back to her bedroom, desperate to

oice came through the door: "M

but all that came out

he doorkn

other wave of transformation. Before she could process what was happening, Maya had l

managed to gasp out, her voice dist

"If you'r

. Sorry I

herself as the transformation continued. Her consciousness flickered like a badly tuned t

completed its impossible metamorphosis. Where sixteen-year-old Maya Bennett had stoo

nto the wooden bedpost, driven by instincts she couldn't understand or control. Only the lingering huma

ked and shivering on her destroyed bedroom floor, human again but forever changed. Her scientific mind raced t

ajamas and the ruined state of he

vidence, stuffing torn fabric into the bottom of her trash can and reposition

the house. Through her now-enhanced hearing, Maya caught the murmur of unfamiliar voices speaking to

ling up her spine. Someh

strained: "Maya? There are some people here who need to

living room across from two strangers: a severe-looking woman with silver-streaked hair pull

, and this is Mr. Everett Wolfe. We represent Moonlit Academy." She extended a hand, the

ontrol your wolf before y