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It felt like we'd been waiting a very long time. And yes, I understood, in theory, that it would take time for Mam to make her plans with the raiders, but didn't she understand how difficult it was to just sit here? And worse, to convince Hayden to continue sitting here when the man who'd killed his father was in his home and so very, very close to his mother too?

I'd walked around to the ward just for something to do. Ellis had crept down there at some point, and he was sat in the ancient armchair, watching over our sister as she lay slumped against the pillows, her blonde hair plastered to her forehead with sweat. I was told that she'd had a seizure with no clear trigger this morning. And she'd woken up again mostly fine but so exhausted that she could barely sit up.

"Thought you were only having absences since you started this new shit," I mumbled as I perched on the bed beside her and put an arm around her. She leant her head against my shoulder. I couldn't get over how guilty I felt for being away so much. Not that there was anything I could do to help her even when I was here.

Eira shook her head wearily. "I wasn't even having absences. It was working. And usually, if they work, the tremors and the other neuro problems get worse instead, but with the Pregabalin, it didn't."

"What do you mean didn't?" I asked sharply. "Are you off it now? How come?"

"Lost the drugs when we moved camp. They're prescription-only ... and not easy to get hold of," she mumbled.

Excitement bubbled up inside me. Because here I could actually be useful. "I can get some for you! You met Seth when he came to the camp, right? He's an actual doctor. Like, with qualifications and everything. He can write you a prescription."

"That would be pretty cool, if he could. Because then we wouldn't even have to pay for them," Eira said, smiling properly for the first time.

Our little brother was on his feet and hunting for snacks on the counter. He must have been growing, because I had scarcely seen him without food in his hands these last few months. But he still found the time to pause and frown at me. "Well, we might, actually. Is Silver Lake registered as a private practice?"

I wrinkled up my nose. "I've got no bloody idea, El. But it doesn't matter much. Liam and I will cover the cost. I have a piece of plastic now that contains infinite money. I think. Honestly, I still don't really understand it."

"It's called a credit card, and no, it does not contain infinite money," Ellis informed me. He opened his mouth to add some more snideness, but I was spared when his snack-obtaining efforts became too clumsy, and he knocked a tray of medical equipment onto the floor.

I sniggered. Eira, tired as she was, managed to produce a jeering sound that had him glaring at both of us. He puffed out his cheeks as he surveyed the mess that he'd made. A glass beaker had shattered, and there was blood splattered everywhere from a half-used transfusion bag.

I was expecting panic from him, but he just shrugged and then trudged back towards his chair. He sat down again, curling his legs under him.

"Ain't you gonna clean that up?" I demanded.

He didn't even look at me. Just opened his book in his lap and smiled down at it, like there was some private joke that I didn't get. It made me edgy. Ellis was always so quick to fix his mistakes. There wasn't much rogue in him, I didn't think. He hated being told off.

But I didn't get a chance to push the matter. Because a few seconds later, the ward door opened. And Aunt Fion came in, doubtless to check on Eira. She eyed the mess and then turned to look at us all with a frown on her lips. One reading, one bed-bound, and one unoccupied dumbass who had been much, much too slow to understand.

"Eva, come and clean this up, please," she said shortly.

I crossed one leg over the other and shook my head. "It was Ellis."

My aunt crooked an eyebrow. She wasn't pissed off, because she was never pissed off, but that didn't mean she couldn't be firm when she wanted to be. She'd raised Nia, after all. "Very funny, Eva. Clean it up."

Oh, Goddess. Oh no. This had never been a problem before.

"No, it really was Ellis," I spluttered, horrified.

"It was," Eira added. I gave her shoulder a squeeze to say thank you. The two of them had ganged up on me so much when they were younger that this was a pleasant surprise.

Aunty Fion regarded me with narrowed eyes. She could have checked my mind. A single touch would have shown her the truth of the matter, and it wasn't like I had my walls up. Not at home. Not with my family. But she didn't like to intrude on us like that.

"Stop taunting your brother," she told us. "Clean it up, or you'll be chopping wood until your arms fall off."

Well, shit. That was no empty threat. I growled deep in my chest, but I did push myself off the bed and trudge over to begin the long, tedious process of picking up the glass shards. I made sure to glare at Ellis every few seconds, not that he cared. He had his head buried in his book and the tiniest of smirks on his lips.

I couldn't get over the unfairness of it all. The joke had always seemed funny to me, but we'd accidentally made him invincible, and now it seemed like all that power was going to his head. Maybe he was a proper rogue, after all.

Once the glass was gone, I started on the blood. The more I scrubbed, the more I seemed to spread it into the tiles. I shouldn't have bothered. Although I didn't know it, there would be a lot more blood on that nice, clean floor before the day was over.

By the time I'd finished scrubbing, Eira's examination had finished, and Aunty Fion was already halfway out the door.

"You seem better than you did," she told Eira as she was leaving. "No concussion, even though you did take a nasty fall. I'll get Cass to stop by in a few minutes. She's got to come and look at Rhodri anyway."

I looked up sharply. "What's wrong with Rhodri?"

"What isn't wrong with Rhodri?" my aunt sighed. She saw the way my jaw was set and relented with a gentle elaboration. "He has scar tissue everywhere and a dozen minor infections and nerve pain, so he's getting a lot of check-ups. Don't worry about it."

"How am I supposed to not worry about it?" I demanded. But she was already out of the door and didn't hear me. The very second she was gone, I threw down my cloth and climbed onto my feet, stalking towards Ellis until barely a foot of space separated us.

I saw his throat bob, and ever-so-slowly, he looked up from his book to meet my eyes. Only to drop his gaze again just as quickly. His wolf was a lot softer than mine.

"You're an evil little bastard," I murmured. "And I'm going to kill you when I have ten minutes to spare."

His eyes were very wide. I reached towards him, and he twisted in the chair in his efforts to avoid me. But all I did was snatch his packet of crisps for myself before heading outside.

It was a pleasant surprise to see Liam out there. A fluttery feeling kindled in my stomach. His hood was up against the rain, so he was looking even more like a young delinquent than usual. It went without saying that I was into that. There wasn't a rogue on earth who wasn't.

"You looking for me?" I asked him.

He came towards me, leaning against a tree trunk. The rain dripped steadily from his coat. "For Rhodri. I dunno where he disappeared off to. But you'll do, I guess."

"I'll do? That's flattering."

A smile flitted across his lips. "If you want flattery, Eva, just say so."

I laughed. Stepped a fraction closer. Glanced around in all directions. We were blissfully alone, and that was such a rare thing at Haven. I looked up at him through my lashes, watching and waiting.

He leant down. I tilted my head back. Our lips were barely an inch apart when Liam rested a gentle hand on my chest, stopping me in my tracks. His breath was warm against my cheek.

"You said not at camp," he murmured.

"Yeah, I did."

"You said it very sternly."

"Yeah."

A raised eyebrow. Another gentle question. "So what's this all about?"

"Changed my mind," I said simply. "And there's no one here to see us."

It was the stress. It was always alcohol or being tired or stress that got my inhibitions down and made me do the stupidest things. We would still be strictly 'friends' if it wasn't for the damned stress. It had a way of making me forget all the reasons not to do something.

I wondered if Liam knew all that. He certainly didn't seem to mind. He tended to take what I offered, no questions asked. But he'd stopped me just now, and it made me worry that he was beginning to guess at just how conflicted I was about him and what we'd been doing these last few weeks.

But he took his hand away from my chest. And he tipped his head down to join our lips, and for a moment we could both just ... forget. Because all I could think about was that slow, lazy kiss and his hands on my hips and the gentle pressure of his body against mine.

Liam turned us around ever so slightly. My back hit the tree trunk, and his lips were now a fraction more demanding than they had been. One of my hands snuck to the nape of his neck to draw him closer still. His fingers had found the sensitive skin at the base of my throat. One was maddeningly close to my mark.

We were getting well-practised at escalating from a kiss, after all these weeks. Liam was more sure of himself, and I was less afraid of spooking him. We didn't have time to do anything much today, given that we were trying to start a war. And we certainly didn't have anywhere to do it. But that didn't mean we couldn't enjoy a few minutes of mindless fun.

"What the hell are you doing?" a voice demanded behind me.

I knew it was Rhodri without even looking. And so I didn't bother to. But Liam's head turned sharply, his eyes wide and startled. Hell, we were both startled. I knew that much. I'd kinda forgotten that we were in such an open place.

Rhodri's hair was soaked from the rain. He was only wearing a t-shirt, and the scars from Silver Lake stood out starkly against his skin. It was hard not to stare at them sometimes. They might have drowned out a quieter person, but Rhodri wore them carelessly. Hannah was a pace behind him, her hands in her pockets and her eyebrows raised.

"Oh, Goddess," I sighed quietly. I was only now beginning to remember why I'd decided that there could be no kissing in camp.

"How about you put your hands where we can all see them?" Rhodri snapped. "And get away from her while you're at it."

Those words were directed at Liam, and he very much knew it. His hand had strayed beneath my shirt a few minutes previously. He snatched it back now and took a wary step away from me. If I didn't know better, I would have said his cheeks were a bit flushed. He looked from me to Rhodri and back again. I sighed at myself and straightened my t-shirt and ran a hand through my hair to tame it.

"I can't unsee that, you guys," Rhodri spluttered, rubbing at his eyes as if he could scratch the image out of them. "So cheers, I guess. Goddess above. How long have you been ... doing ... that?"

The look on my face told him everything he needed to know. Yes, it had been a while. But I was also trying to stifle my amusement at seeing him so flustered. He'd seen me doing a lot worse over the years. The fact that it was Liam seemed to make it ... different.

"It's, um ... it's not ... what you think," Liam said, one hand coming up to rub the back of his neck ruefully.

Rhodri stared at him. "It's exactly what I think."

We were attracting an audience. Bryn was the first one to come creeping around the corner, drawn by the raised voices, and the rest of the family wasn't far behind him. Up to and including the little children. Great. I cast a slightly sheepish look at Liam, because I'd been the one to initiate this, and now the worst had happened.

"What's all the racket?" Nia asked.

Rhodri nodded towards us vigorously. "Turns out they've been making out with each other this whole time."

"Oh. Yeah."

"Oh yeah?" Rhodri demanded. "You knew about this?"

Nia just made a face and shrugged at him. Already, she was starting to look away, losing interest, but the rest of them were only just getting started. I could see a lot of wide eyes and shit-eating grins on the faces gathered before me.

Jess was bouncing up and down on the spot. "Are Liam and Eva mates?"

Oh dear. A sore subject. I rubbed at my jaw and tried not to look at Liam and hoped someone else would answer that for us. I spent most of my day trying not to think about it.

"They don't know yet," Rhodri told her. Although the way he eyed me in the wake of those words made it very clear that he had not forgotten what Joel had told him. "Which is why what they're doing is so stupid."

"Hey," I said, the word without force.

"I think this counts, right?" Bryn said, hopping in place as he tried to get warm despite being in a t-shirt and shorts and generally looking like he'd just rolled out of bed. "For the bet? Can we finally call it? I've got a few quid to collect from Eira."

"Yeah, it counts," Sam said. He was in the process of hoisting little Jess up into his arms to keep her out of trouble. "Have you two got anything to say for yourselves?"

He was usually so mature. So above it all. He'd had to grow up fast, and then he'd taken care of the rest of us, so it was easy to forget he was an honorary big brother as well as our babysitter. He'd been the first kid our parents adopted - back in the days when Lle o Dristwch had been their home, not Haven.

I glowered at him now. "Yeah, actually. You're a bunch of nosy pricks. Go bother someone else. Like ... hey! These two, actually. Because what were they doing out here? Alone in the woods?"

I had never seen two people jump onto the defensive so quickly. Rhodri and Hannah looked at each other and then looked at the rest of us. Their eyes were a bit too wide.

"Arguing," Rhodri said, much too quickly.

"Peeing," Hannah said.

They'd spoken at the exact same time, which would have been damning enough even if they hadn't turned to each other with poorly concealed annoyance right afterwards.

"Peeing?" Rhodri asked incredulously. I tried not to snigger now that the attention has so easily turned away from me and Liam. But I did take advantage of the distraction to sneak over to Liam's side and put my lips on the underside of his jaw. Once that was done, I settled beside him, my head resting on his shoulder.

"Yeah, that's a bit weird, that is," Nia muttered, wrinkling up her nose. "Together?"

"No," Hannah said indignantly. "Peeing apart. In separate locations. And we just happened to come across each other."

"Well, they're full of it," Bryn said dryly. "But who cares, really? They're mates. We all know how this is going to end. Just a matter of when."

Rhodri scowled at him. "Yeah? Screw you."

Bryn sounded very sure about it, but I wasn't. Hannah was an ally now, not a hostage, but it hadn't removed the huge, unyielding barrier that was their living situation. Hannah didn't want to leave her pack, and Rhodri couldn't join it. I believed that maybe they'd been talking, but neither of them looked even remotely tousled, so I doubted it had been any more than that. The arguing ... now that I could believe. I'd never seen two people who were capable of getting on each other's nerves so fast.

"You cool now?" I asked Rhodri wearily. "Over it?"

He sighed at me, rubbing at his jaw until the scowl eased. "Yeah, whatever. Just don't do anything in our tent. Or near our tent. Especially when I'm asleep in it. But also not ever."

"Wasn't planning on it. But sure."

"I wouldn't believe them, if I was you," Nia said dryly. "They ain't got nowhere else to do it. I'll bet they're rolling around the second you leave."

Rhodri shuddered, glancing over at Liam and me as if trying to determine the truth of that. It didn't take him very long to mutter, "Yeah, I'm moving out."

I shook my head at him in disappointment. But yeah, he could go and stay with Bryn if it made him feel better. Right now, we were at Haven anyway, and it wouldn't matter. I'd crash with the boys, like usual, and Rhodri could sleep between me and Liam if he really wanted. We'd survive.

Meanwhile, Rhodri's attention had moved onto the boy I was cuddling up to. "Don't look so bloody skittish. I'm not mad at you or nothing. I mean ... shit. Can't think of many guys I'd rather she was sleeping with. Just takes some adjusting to - alright?"

"Alright," Liam said quietly.

"And as for you..." Rhodri murmured in a heavy undertone, his eyes on me now, "if you hurt him, I'll actually kill you. Hope you know that."

I was a little taken aback, to say the least. Not because I'd expected him to direct that comment at Liam instead - who was incapable of doing emotional harm to anyone. But more ... because he felt like it needed to be said. As if I was just messing around with Liam. I was sure all of that was probably written all over my face, because Rhodri's expression softened a fraction, and he gave me a look that was almost apologetic.

Any thought of replying was lost when I realised that Nia had gone still at some point during the exchange. It was rare that she actually needed to concentrate on a mind-link, and I found myself frowning as we all fell into silence, waiting to hear what was so important. But when she did finally snap out of it, it was me she looked at, and it was me who got slapped on the back.

"We're wanted elsewhere, kiddo," she said. "Upper field. And step on it. Sounds like they're waiting for us."

Ah. The fun was at an end. And so was the waiting. I didn't know whether to be relieved or panicked. Liam would be coming with us, obviously, and Hannah was sent off to fetch Hayden from wherever he was sat, trying and failing to process what had happened to him that day. We'd need him too, of course.

Rhodri glanced in the direction of the field and heaved a long sigh. It was a mile and a half over rough terrain, so it would take him a very, very long time on his crutches. But I didn't doubt that he would have liked to be included.

"I'll just wait here," he said eventually. "Easier that way. We'll talk after, yeah?"

"Yeah," I said. And I would keep the link open so he could listen if he wanted. Nia and her mother were starting to teach him how to use his mind properly, and this would be good practice for him.

We were turning to go when little Poppy grabbed at Nia's leg. She was usually so giggly and overexcited that I was surprised to see that she was biting her lip.

"No," Poppy said firmly. "No. You stay."

I felt a pang in my chest. She hardly ever got to see Nia anymore. It was all part of growing up, of course, but it was hard not to miss the days when we'd all been together.

Nia crouched down to mess up her hair and pull her into a quick hug. "I'm sorry, sweetie. I can't right now. We'll play together later, yeah? Go inside with Sam. It's time for your dinner anyway."

"No," Poppy said again. Sam huffed against Jess's weight as he bent down to take the little girl's hand. Her parents were probably at the field with Mam by now. Sometimes, I reckoned we took Sam for granted. He had always been so willing to take care of the little ones - never a complaint or raised voice.

"Go on," he told Nia. "I've got her. She'll calm down when you're out of sight."

"Cheers, Sammy," she said. There was another lingering, regretful look at her little sister, but then Hayden came around the side of the house, looking for all the world like an emotional wreck, and we were out of time.

When we started walking away, Poppy burst into tears behind us. I could feel Nia wincing beside me. But she did keep going, not daring to glance backwards. I did, though. Rhodri was leaning on his crutches as he watched us go, a slight frown on his lips. He looked uneasy, but I wasn't sure why.

"It might be wise to angle north a little," Nia was saying. "We've got old Jeff set up with a tent down near the stream, and I don't want to get within a mile of him if we can help it. He gets all antsy when he can smell wolves."

We all adjusted our course obediently. Well, all of us except Hayden, who was still walking with the fairies. Hannah leaned over to catch his arm and pull him with us before he could collide with a patch of brambles. I looked at him and sighed.

"I'm sure your mam is fine, flockie," I told him. "She seemed tough to me, and Jaden's got no reason to hurt her."

"He's got no reason not to," Hayden shot back. It was hard to argue with that. But I had managed to shake him out of his apathy, at least. He kept his head up for the next minutes as he wrestled with his frustration, and that meant he was actually looking where he was going.

A spindly yew tree loomed ahead before long. Hayden knew what yew trees looked like by now, so he gave it a wide berth, eyeing the rest of us with an extreme amount of caution. But even he could tell that there was something different about this tree. The bark was patterned, and the rest of us touched our hands briefly to our hearts as we passed it.

"What is that?" he asked.

Oh? A question? Unprompted and unrelated to his immediate survival? Were we making progress? I gave him a wary smile. "It's Rhodri's tree. You're supposed to salute it, but whatever. It's not like you're friends with him."

All of a sudden, I could sense Hannah's eyes on me. She was taking an interest - and all it had taken was for me to say his name. Maybe there was hope for them after all. Hayden, on the other hand, was frowning. He kept turning back to look at the tree as he walked, and I had to smack him before he tripped over his own feet in his carelessness.

"What do you mean, it's his tree?" he demanded.

I blinked at him. "It's ... his tree."

It took me a moment to process that Hayden wouldn't know. Because why would he? The flockies knew that the trees were important to us - it was obvious from the way we took care of them. And so they would burn them down if they had the time and inclination. They were aware that it would upset us, but that was all.

"Um. Well," I said. "When someone's pregnant, they're supposed to collect seeds. And then, when the baby is born, the mammy and daddy take it out into the woods and plant a handful of those seeds. They fight it out, and whichever sapling wins is your tree. The type is meant to predict what you'll be like when you're grown and shit, but it's probably just dumb luck."

Although a yew tree was pretty accurate for Rhodri, I had to admit. Before he'd got injured, he'd rarely gone a day without getting into a fight.

Hayden scratched the back of his head. He didn't look interested, but he didn't look bored either. "Oh. Why, though?"

"Dunno. Why not? Not all rogues do it, mind. But the ones that do ... we use the trees for pyres after a person dies. It's your family's job to go and cut it down. Some people use the stump for ... like ... a gravestone, I guess?"

I didn't mention how painful it was to be cutting down a sapling for one of those pyres. Or how people would donate a branch from their own trees so it would burn those little bodies properly. Or how we would spend days bringing down a tree that had grown for eighty years or more on the rare occasion that a rogue did succumb to old age rather than flockie teeth.

We were in a hurry, yeah, but I didn't see the harm in an extra thirty seconds, so I adjusted our course ever-so-slightly as we walked onwards. It wasn't long before we arrived under the branches of a pretty alder. And Nia and Liam were touching their hands to their hearts once again. I beamed at it instead. It had been a while since I'd seen it.

"This one's mine," I said. Unlike Rhodri, I had planted climbers at the base, including an ivy plant that had been subsequently executed so I could carve my patterns into those stems and not the bark itself. It was much kinder to the tree ... if not to the ivy.

"Oh, cool," Hayden said. He reached out to press his fingers against the bark, but he didn't get within a foot of the thing before I slapped his hand away. Nia dragged him backwards by his shirt just for good measure.

"Whoa," Nia said. "No. Don't do that."

Hayden blinked at us both.

I rubbed at my neck and scowled at him, trying not to be too resentful, given that he didn't know any better. "You're not allowed to touch. Geez. It's ... very rude. Bordering on a punching offence. Hell, you shouldn't even go under the canopy unless you're invited."

"Sorry?" he tried. I acknowledged that with a little shrug, and then we kept walking on.

Of course, no one had planted a tree for Liam, but he'd picked a blackthorn after he'd been with us for a few months. It was about the right age, and perhaps more importantly, it was only a few paces from my tree. Now that they were grown, their leaves tangled together every time the wind blew. I found it weirdly comforting.

"Wouldn't it be better if you left the trees standing after someone dies?" Hayden asked. "That way, you have something to remember them by."

I wrinkled up my nose, glancing back at the alder. "I guess? And some people do that, probably, but then ... what do you build the pyre from? Just any random wood? No. Don't like that."

We kept on like that - Hayden asking quiet, almost shy questions - and the rest of us taking it in turns to answer him. It was better than him walking around in some kind of vacant trance, at any rate. And Hannah seemed content to follow and listen and brood.

We passed two different camps before we arrived at the meadow. It was the height of summer, and the wildflowers were out in force. Of course, that meant Hayden was sneezing and rubbing at his eyes before long. The tree pollen had gone, and now it was the flowers' and grasses' turn to irritate him.

Mam had come all the way out here because it was closer to the raiders' camps. They didn't like to be too close together, or there would be arguments, but there seemed to be three scattered around the edges of the field. And all the most important people from those camps were gathered around my mother in the centre. I recognised Emmett and the Morris girls and Ian straight off the bat.

We went to join them. They all looked up at us in a wary, disinterested sort of way. Eyes lingered on Hayden and Hannah more than anyone else. Nia won herself a few grudging smiles. I thought it was unfair that she could get the other raiding leaders to like her, given that they usually bickered so enthusiastically and barely spoke to each other, but clearly there were some perks to being Rhodric Llewellyn's granddaughter.

Although I was still having trouble believing that. Don't get me wrong, it made sense in every single way, and it explained a lot, but it had forced me to adjust my entire grip on reality.

"Here's what we're going to do," Mam said. She was kneeling on the grass next to a patch of exposed earth. Someone had etched a series of shaky lines into it, and even at a glance, I recognised the positioning of the northern packs. Riverside was central and oversized, with the river and pack house marked clearly. "It starts at the south-east border. Furthest from New Dawn."

I put my hands in my pockets and stared down at the map. She was pointing at the corner of Riverside Pack. The one that wasn't actually very far from Haven. We had a good angle to attack it. Maybe that had been her reason for coming here.

"We'll start by sending a few rogues over at a time," she was saying. "Enough to get Jaden to leave New Dawn. Not enough that he'll decide to bring any New Dawn fighters with him as back-up. Then we'll have Hayden mind-link his mother to see if it's safe for him to go back. Jaden may leave a few men behind. If he does, it won't matter much, because by the time they alert their boss to what's happening, it'll be too late for him to come running back."

Hayden's expression was dark. And from the moment Mam had mentioned his uncle, I had been able to feel his wolf pacing. He interrupted her now with, "I get to kill him. My uncle, I mean. So whatever the plan is, make sure it ends with me ripping his throat out."

Some of the raiding leaders looked mildly impressed. Mam let her eyebrows creep upwards. I didn't think she'd been expecting so much violence from him. He was so gentle by nature, but I was just now remembering that he'd scared me a little when I'd first met him.

"Quiet, pup," she said eventually. "I'm getting to that bit. But no, I'd rather you didn't fight him one-on-one. We can't afford to lose you. And neither can your pack. But if you ask very nicely, I might leave him hamstrung for you to finish off."

Hayden shook his head slowly. "No. Not good enough."

Mam sighed at him. She exchanged a wary glance with my dad, who looked equally worried. "I get it, kiddo. You're pissed off. But you didn't magically become a mature adult just because your dad died. As far as I'm concerned, you're our responsibility now, and letting you fight an Alpha on a reckless impulse would not make me feel like I was taking care of you."

I let my eyebrows wander upwards and tried to swallow down a laugh. Because yeah, we wouldn't want anyone to kill an Alpha on a reckless impulse, would we? Mam didn't know about me, in fairness, but she sure as hell knew that Liam had killed Micah, and I didn't remember any protests then. I wasn't sure if we should take it as a compliment or not - that Hayden was the only one being babied.

"I don't need to be taken care of," he snapped. "I have to do this."

"Okay," she said, somewhat less patiently than before. "I'm going to finish explaining the plan. And then you and Zach Lloyd can fight over who gets to do the honours, because I'm sure he'll be wanting a crack at your uncle, too. Is that cool?"

Hayden just stared at her. No sign of agreement, but no protests either. And Mam didn't need any more prompting to return to the dirt map.

"Hayden will need time to bring his fighters to heel and explain the situation," she said. "So we'll give it to him. Rogues will lure Jaden's men further and further from his territory, if they can. We'll keep the flockies out of the fight until New Dawn are ready to move. And then I want them securing Riverside's pack house while Shadowless, Ember and Silver Lake move to surround Jaden's fighters. We want them surrendering, not slaughtered, so I'll have my rogues pull back at that point. They're only going to roll over if they're faced with flockies."

I thought that all sounded pretty reasonable. It was four packs against one. We had the element of surprise, too. It would be easy enough. And I doubted we'd get many casualties to the Silver Lake fighters if Riverside did really surrender at the sight of so many packs arrayed against them.

"Why can't we be the ones to take the pack house?" Ian asked. He was an old man. Too old to be leading a raiding team, many people said, but he just let the younger rogues do the running while he used his decades of experience to make sure they didn't get themselves killed. "It'd be rich pickings."

"Because we'd bloody terrify them, wouldn't we?" Mam laughed. "And just think how hard the Riverside men would fight to get back there if they knew there were rogues attacking their families. So ... no. Hayden will do it, under the guise of protecting them, and that is not up for debate."

Ian shrugged, which was pretty close to assent in my books.

"You want me and Eva with the flockies, I'm guessing?" Liam asked.

"Yes. Is that alright?"

He didn't get a chance to answer. A faint rumbling distracted us all from the map. Across the grass, Liam's phone was vibrating on top of his coat. He turned to frown at it at the same time that I did. Before he could go over and answer it, he paused. Because Mam's phone was going off, too. The hairs on the back of my neck were suddenly standing up on end.

"Ignore that for now," she said. "I want you clear on the positions and timings before you go back to Silver Lake. You'll be coming from the north-east, obviously, so take care that your flanks touch Ember's. We don't want to leave them any room to slip away."

Liam's phone was still going off. There was a slight pause, then it went right back to ringing again, and that was enough to get me walking towards it, whatever Mam had said.

I didn't get that far.

In the distance, I heard a strange, distorted howl. It was faint - barely at the threshold of my hearing. And it was cut short after only a second or two.

That would have been enough to get the warning bells ringing. But it was followed up by a mind-link slamming into me. And if the frowns and glazed looks around the circle were any indication, it had been extended to everyone in range.

It came with a feeling of pure, unfettered panic. Quickly followed up by a flash of hot white pain before the link faded away again, as quickly as it had arrived. I didn't know who it had been, but to me, it seemed very clear that someone was trying to warn us. Of what, though?

Mam stood up slowly. It wasn't often I saw so much worry on her face. She shifted her weight from foot to foot and dug her knife out of her pocket.

"Get your raiders over here," she told Nia. "Now. We might need them."

Uncle Rhys kicked dirt over the map until it was indistinguishable. Mam had her eyes closed as she tried to get in touch with anyone who might be able to tell her what was happening. I was sure we had people out there somewhere. Hunting or foraging or even going for a roll in the leaves. There were always outliers. The trick was finding them.

Nia's raiders arrived in twos and threes. It seemed that one of the closer camps belonged to them. A trickle of men and women were coming from the other camps, too, as they came to see what was going on. I reckoned it was safe to say that everyone had got the mind-link.

Before long, we had about twenty of them gathered behind us. I paid them little attention. Like many of the others, I was absently picking at zips and shedding extra layers of clothing. A few seconds could make all the difference when you needed to shift in a hurry.

All the while, my gaze was fixed firmly on the trees at the bottom edge of the field. Because that was the direction the howl and the mind-link had come from. It was eerily quiet down there. Even the leaves seemed to have gone still.

It all happened so quickly, in the end. One minute, the forest was empty, and the next, there was a sea of wolves charging for us. They came in one long line, stretching as far as the eye could see. And behind that line, there were plenty more. And moving so quickly, too. One blink, and they'd closed half the distance.

I didn't have time to be afraid.

Everyone else was shifting, but my mother remained where she was, ignoring the approaching wolves in favour of giving a few snapped orders while she still could. One of them was meant for me. "Eva, go now. Get to the kids. The rest of you, hold your bloody ground. We run when I say so. Not before."

I was so numb, so deep into shock, that it took me a moment to remember how to trigger the shift. It took me another moment to calm myself down enough to dig that deep and find the place in my mind that was more wolf than human. I felt the ripple of change go through me - a shuddering, tingling feeling of muscles knitting themselves together and tendons splitting.

Then my front paws landed heavily on the grass. And not a moment too soon. The flockies were on us. There were bodies colliding with bone-breaking force all around me as they ran full tilt into us. Some of the rogues were still caught in the shift and died on the spot. The others engaged the enemy with vicious relish.

I lurched to my right and set out across the field. Towards Haven, which felt so very distant. It had been the last safe place. We were at home here, and so we let our guards down. And now we were caught two miles from the kids. I could run that far in two minutes. Maybe one and a half. But it was going to be the longest ninety seconds of my entire life. Because the flockies wouldn't need that long to kill everyone at the cabin.

I went from a standstill to a sprint in less than three seconds, and I was still picking up speed. Every muscle in my body seared in pain, protesting at the sheer amount of force I was demanding from them.

I didn't look around to see if I was being pursued. There was no point. I'd lose them soon enough anyway. The meadows melded into trees. The snarls behind faded to nothing. But it wasn't long before I could see flickers of motion in the corner of my eye.

The flockies were closing on the camp in one long line, and I was running across it. They were sporadic and patchy as the miles went on, but ... there seemed to be no end of them. I wasn't going to be fast enough. They had probably reached the cabin just seconds after they'd reached the field.

The trees around me seemed to blur. I was heedless of the brambles ripping at my legs and the sting of the wind against my eyes. It was all I could do to weave in and out of the saplings. I ignored the wolves closing on my flanks. I ignored the hunting howls and yips that sounded as soon as they spotted me.

I was painfully aware that I was running past dozens of kids with every knot of tents that I passed. But at least they stood a chance. They had their parents nearby. Only the cabin was completely unguarded.

I could have sworn I had never run so fast in my life. I hadn't thought any of my family had followed me from the meadow - although admittedly, there were very few of them who could have kept up. And the attack had been so sudden. But just at the point when the flockies were getting dangerously close to me and I was beginning to have to angle away from them, much to my frustration, I heard a pitiful whimper behind me.

I risked the barest of glances over my shoulder and saw a tangle of pelts and snapping teeth. I couldn't tell who it was. But they were now caught alone, away from the others, and I didn't much fancy their chances. It didn't matter, really, who had followed me. Because I couldn't stop to help them.

The wave of flockies was pushing me further and further off course. If I kept turning the way I was, I was going to end up running away from them, not heading for the cabin, and that was not an option.

A frontrunner lunged for me. His teeth closed around fur, not skin, ripping a chunk free from my hindquarters. I got a strong whiff of Riverside scent, and then I was gone, leaving him far, far behind, whether he had turned to give chase or not. My heart felt like it was going at a hundred miles an hour. This wasn't going to work.

I didn't stop to think about the wisdom of what I was doing. I watched for a gap in the flockies, and then I turned sharply towards them, weaving my way in and out of snapping teeth and startled eyes. They were five ranks deep, but only the last of the flockies had enough time to react to my change in direction.

He barrelled into me. The force of the collision knocked the wind out of me, and it sent both of us tumbling head over heels. I yelped as his jaws closed around my ear. He didn't get the chance to do anything else before we flipped over again. He was knocked loose, and I was up again in the blink of an eye, scrambling to get my feet under myself.

And then I was back to running and more than a little surprised that I'd survived. There was blood sheeting down into my left eye, which didn't help much, but all I could do was shake myself and keep going. I was now behind the flockie lines, and there was no one left to slow me down.

My lungs were burning by then, but I was nearly at the cabin. So close that I could see it. And I could also see wolves milling around it.

I was the quickest runner in this entire camp. No one could have covered that ground faster. I'd pushed myself to the point of collapse.

And I was still too late.