Page 139 of Wolf Dad Energy

That's what I wanted. It exposes itself. Its shape stretches farther than before. Thinner.

More solid. Maintaining a physical form is costing it.

"Carys!" I shout again.

"The freezer!"

She understands immediately. The old cellar door. Beneath the pantry. Stone walls. No windows. One entrance. She yanks open the hidden door.

"Sayer!"

He disappears below. She follows. Slamming the heavy wooden hatch behind her. The entity lunges. Too late. It crashes into the cellar door with enough force to splinter the frame. It doesn't break through.

Not immediately.

It is frustrated. I see it. Feel it. It wanted Sayer. Not simply to kill him. To claim him. To erase him. To finish whatever began 15 years ago.

The realization hardens something inside me. We're done waiting. Done hiding. Done hoping this thing will make a mistake.

It pounds against the cellar entrance again. The entire house shudders. I step between it and the door. My wolf bares every tooth.

The entity slowly turns to face me. The air between us vibrates. No fear. No hesitation.

Just certainty. One of us isn't leaving this fight.

It drifts backward toward the broken front wall. Not retreating. Inviting. Drawing me after it. Into the woods. Toward wherever it truly lives.

I don't follow. Not tonight. Not blindly. Instead, I memorize the direction. The angle. The path.

Because now I know. It has a destination. A source. A place it returns when it isn't hunting.

The entity dissolves into the darkness beyond the tree line. Silence crashes over the property. The alarms finally stop screaming. The cameras reboot one by one. Emergency lights flicker weakly inside the battered cottage.

Carys climbs back out of the cellar with Sayer close behind her. Both are shaken. Neither is hurt.

She looks around at the shattered walls. The destroyed windows. The ruined sensors.

Then at me.