No one is coming tonight.
No, it’ll just be a chance for me to be alone for a little while and try to come up with a way to find Ellie.
I circle around the tower slowly: sniffing, examining. No one has been here since the last full moon. Even then, that was only me. Still, it’s nice to know the space is undisturbed. Although wolves are the ones with the strongest ability to scent, dragons aren’t bad at it. We aren’t bad at anything.
Except, apparently, finding lost sisters.
I shake my head and circle the space two more times before I find a tree to settle into. I climb up, lean back against the trunk, and observe the stone tower.
It’s a mythical thing, really. The stone towers were built by the dragons who first inhabited these forests. We wanted mountains and secrets and places we could be alone, and we got it. Westbridge Forest, as the locals call it, is over 15,000 square miles of woods that backs up to an incredible mountain range. There are little towns and homes and cabins sprinkled here and there, but for the most part, the forest belongs to the shifters, and that’s the way we like it.
There are wolf clans nestled in different areas of the forest, along with groups of bears and tigers and, of course, the dragons. We aren’t even the only dragon clan in the forest, but Fablestone is, in my opinion, the most wonderful. It’s not just because I grew up in the clan.
It might be because I grew up in the clan.
Still, what matters now is making it through tonight and then figuring out where to look for my sister. If only she could send us a message. If only I had anything to go off of, but right now, I have nothing. I don’t even have her fucking scent right now.
I hope Wilson comes up with a fucking plan because if I have to wait much longer to start the hunt, I’m going to go crazy. I’ve waited because I respect him and his judgment. I know he wants to do more recon before he starts some sort of interspecies war, but at some point, enough is enough.
As the moon rises, I find myself starting to relax. I should be more on edge than ever, but there’s something so calming about being alone in nature and just staring at the beautiful night sky.
Is Ellie out there looking up at the same sky?
Is she thinking of me?
Of us?
Of her clan?
Does she know that we’re here, wishing for her?
I hate not knowing where she is.
I hate not knowing if she’s in trouble.
I hate not knowing she’s lost and afraid.
And then I hear a twig snap, and I stop feeling sorry and instantly go on alert.
Someone’s come to the stone tower, and it can’t be anything good.
Chapter Five
Peggy
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
We make it to the fourth stone tower just before midnight, but there’s a problem. I hike the baby carrier up on my chest and shush the kittens, who are going crazy in my backpack. Yeah, I know it’s not really cool to carry my kittens in a backpack, but it’s not like I was going to leave them behind and I couldn’t go hiking through the woods with a cat carrier.
We’re definitely at the tower, but there’s nobody here.
No one.