It was a clear, dry autumn in Artemisia, Washington, which was unusual. The weather was perfect for taking pictures of a meteor shower, though. Ainsel Madan loved the stars and she had high hopes that her best friend Zo? would be able to get some really spectacular photos with her new camera. There were, however, unexpected problems.

  “How could you fall asleep again?” Ainsel demanded. She and Zo? sat in the cafeteria at Silver Pine High School. Zo? was a round-faced sixteen year old with dark brown hair and murky hazel eyes, currently downcast. She was also Ainsel’s best friend.

  “I don’t know,” Zo? mumbled. “I was getting my stuff together and I just passed out.”

  “Again?” Ainsel shook her head. “Well, that settles it. I’m definitely coming over tonight to help you out. Tonight is supposed to be the peak.” She opened up her packed lunch and inspected the contents. Zo? always bought her lunch but one of Ainsel’s foster mothers insisted on making Ainsel a handmade lunch every day.

  “I guess you might as well.” Zo? clattered her silverware.

  Ainsel glanced up again. Zoe didn’t usually like distractions when she was taking her photos. Ainsel had expected her to argue. This was worse than she thought.

  Without thinking about it, Ainsel touched her friend’s hand. Sometimes, when she touched somebody who was hurt, a sort of pleasant spark zapped from her to them, and they would feel better. She’d always been able to do it, ever since she could remember. Although, since her memories only went back a few years, to the day she was found barely conscious naked by a roadside, that wasn’t saying very much.

  But there was no pleasant zap today, just her best friend’s hand, warm and present. “I will,” Ainsel said. “It’ll be fun.”

  “What will?” asked Tyler, leaning his hip on their table end. Tyler was Ainsel’s other friend. Other friend, because in all of Silver Pine, only two other students were willing to be seen talking to her.

  “We’re going to watch the meteor shower together tonight,” Ainsel told him.

  Tyler grinned. He was tall and blond and handsome, and Zo? visibly perked up when he smiled. “Yeah, the Cereids. Pretty cool, huh? The Astronomy club is having a viewing party tonight. You want to come to that?”

  Zo? frowned. “And have everybody ignore Ainsel once again? No thanks.”

  “Hey, I’m in with them, maybe I could work some magic.” Tyler waggled his fingers, still grinning.

  “That’s what you said the last two times we crashed a party with you.”

  “Third time’s the charm?” When Zo? glared at him, his smile faded. “Anyhow, it’s not crashing the party if you’re invited and you’re always invited, Zo?. It’s just…” He glanced at Ainsel.

  “If Ainsel’s not, I’m not,” said Zo? firmly.

  “It’s all right, Zo?,” Ainsel put in. It wasn’t all right, exactly. Every time Ainsel thought of Zo? going to one of those parties with Tyler and without her, she felt a little surge of panic. But it wasn’t right to hold Zo? back just because the whole school hated Ainsel.

  She didn’t even know why. The first year she’d attended Silver Pine she’d been a little bit of a curiosity, but everybody had been nice enough. But somehow, in the last year, people had pulled away until now nobody would even talk to her. But they sure stared all right.

  Ainsel tried not to let it bother her. But she was really grateful that Tyler seemed immune to whatever bothered the other students. It meant Zo? wasn’t quite so cut off. Zo? always had a bridge back.

  “It’s not all right.” Zo? had that stubborn look in her eyes. “I wish I could shake every one of them. Look at Alizabeth over there. She used to eat lunch with us every day this time last year. Then she got a girlfriend and suddenly she’s too busy for us.”

  Ainsel followed Zo?’s gaze. There was Alizabeth and Sam, along with a group of honors students. “They’re cute, though. It’s hard to be mad at a couple that cute.”

  “Well, if you’re not coming to the Astronomy party, where are you going to watch the meteor shower from?” asked Tyler, drawing attention back to himself.

  “There’s a little hill near the forest behind my house,” said Zo?. “I keep trying to set up there.”

  “Oh yeah, I think I know the place. Well, you’ll definitely get a good view there. Have fun!” Tyler tossed them a little salute and moved on, continuing his popular-boy rounds. His next stop was Bradley, a solitary computer nerd. He’d avoided Ainsel even before everybody else did. Sometimes Zo? said Bradley had a crush on Ainsel. But Zo? used to claim everybody had a crush on Ainsel, back when they’d first started avoiding her. That didn’t seem very plausible now.

  After lunch, Ainsel split up with Zo? for their afternoon classes. Ainsel had AP American History and Honors English, which she drifted through just like she did every day. She rarely participated in class discussions—less so now that people hated her—but she did well enough on the reading and the papers that she got good grades anyhow. Not like math and chemistry, where the homework requirement frequently bored her silly. Fortunately, she had those classes with Zo?, who had a knack for making the classes bearable.

  After class, she reminded Zo? that she’d be over later, and went home. The first thing she did was kick off her shoes. She hated wearing shoes. It was one of the first things she remembered from the time right after they’d found her by the roadside. She could barely remember how to speak, but when they tried to put socks and shoes on her, she panicked. Andrea, one of her foster moms, called her a hobbit. It seemed as good an explanation as anything. Ainsel was a bit taller than hobbits were supposed to be, but she was still pretty short.

  Kishar, Ainsel’s other mom, came out of her study. She was a tall, elegant Indian woman with sleek black hair and dark skin.“How was school?”

  “It hasn’t gotten any worse,” Ainsel said brightly. “I’m going over to Zo?’s tonight to help her shoot the meteor shower. You and Andrea can have a nice dinner without me.”

  Kishar gave her a long, steady look. “Do you want a ride over there after you finish your homework?”

  Despite being somewhere in the vicinity of seventeen, Ainsel didn’t have her driver’s license. Andrea had tried to teach her to drive for a week before giving up in despair. Ainsel had been grateful when she’d stopped. Riding in cars was all right but operating them seemed awkward. She’d try again eventually but for now she was all right walking everywhere. She liked walking.

  Besides, Zo? could drive, although she had to borrow her dad’s car when she did. When Ainsel had to get somewhere that was too far to walk, she was set.

  But that wasn’t Zo?’s house. Zo?’s house was barely two miles away, if Ainsel cut across a few fields and a small forest. “Why would I need a ride?”

  Kishar shrugged. “It’d be faster. And Andrea heard there was a pack of stray dogs causing trouble.”

  Ainsel smiled at Kishar. “If any dogs bother me, I’ll climb a tree and call for help. I’ll be fine, Mom.”

  Kishar made a face. “You only call me Mom when I’m stifling you. Fine, fine. Make sure to do your homework and at least eat something before you head out.”

  Ainsel obediently went to her desk, where she drew pictures of flowers all over her notepad for half an hour, then typed up her off the cuff thoughts on Pride and Prejudice in fifteen minutes. They were probably good enough. After blazing carelessly through her math homework, she declared herself done, and went to the kitchen to decorate some cookies.

  She wasn’t particularly fond of school, but she did really enjoy baking. Cupcakes and cookies were her favorite: tasty little platforms for sugar artistry. A few days ago she’d made some shooting star sugar cookies for the start of the meteor shower and now she decorated a dozen of them with designs inspired by the flowers she’d been doodling. Then she left four of them on a plate for Kishar and Andrea, ate the two mistakes, and packed the rest up to take to Zo?’s.

  By then, the sun was setting. It was still brilliantly clear out, which was promising for Zo?’s photos. “I’m heading out, Kishar! Have fun with Andrea!”

  Kishar poked her head out of her study. “Did you do your homework? Eat?”

  Ainsel gave her a dazzling smile. “Of course. I also left cookies on the counter for you two.”

  Kishar sighed. “I expect you back by eleven.”

  Ainsel waved an acknowledgement and escaped. Once out in the fresh air, she breathed a sigh of relief. Kishar had been so focused on the homework she’d forgotten to request Ainsel wear shoes. She had a pair of flip-flops in her backpack, but she didn’t like to wear them unless the terrain was really hostile.

  Walking across the field beside her house, she could feel the dry grass curling underfoot and dig her toes into the sun-warmed soil. She felt a part of the world, in a way she never did while in shoes, no matter how nice the shoes were.

  The fading rays of the sun were crimson and purple across the fields, but the forest she approached was already the deep violet of night. It was dark, she supposed, but she’d always had very good night vision and to her darkness was just shading in a different color scheme: blues and purples and grays and silvers.

  The trail across the field led into the forest, used by both animals and the occasional jogger. She followed it, stepping with easy familiarity over a jutting rock and an old fallen tree that glimmered silver. The shadows under the trees were purple against the deep gray of the standing trees.

  Except under one tree, just ahead of her, where there was… darkness. Ainsel couldn’t make out any details. It was strange enough that Ainsel stopped.

  She hesitated. But if she went home again, what would she say to Kishar? “I was afraid of a shadow.” She was never afraid of shadows, or the dark. She wasn’t going to change that now.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  Squaring her shoulders, she strolled on, keeping an eye on the strange patch of darkness. It was like a patch of emptiness. After she’d passed it, she felt embarrassed. It was probably just a place where the brightening starlight couldn’t reach. Just because it seemed weird—well, Andrea said lots of things looked different in the dark.

  A twig crunched behind her and something scuffed against leaf mulch. The sound sent chills down Ainsel’s spine. It was silly. Of course there were animals out just after twilight. If she stopped to listen, she’d hear dozens of the sounds of an ecosystem waking up.

  But she didn’t stop. She didn’t look over her shoulder either. Instead, Ainsel started walking faster and fished her cellphone out of her bag.

  “Hi, Zo?,” she said when her friend picked up. “I’m on my way over.”

  “That’s good. I’m getting my stuff together, and you can help me cart it out to the hill.”

  “I’ll do that. No problem.”

  “All right. See you when you get here—“

  “No!” said Ainsel said breathlessly. “No, stay on the phone with me?” She hopped over another fallen log and hurried around the bend in the path.

  Zo?’s voice sharpened. “Ainsel, what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. I just… I’m walking through the woods now. I’ll be out soon. Halfway there! And I don’t want to walk alone right now.”

  There was another cracking twig from Ainsel’s left and she caught a glimpse of a moving darkness out of the corner of her eye. She didn’t look.

  It was just shadows. She’d be out of the forest soon and she’d never had any trouble in the fields. And there was a road just beyond the field. She usually took a shortcut, but maybe not tonight.

  “Oh.” Zo? sounded strange. “Is… is something following you?”

  “I’m not looking,” said Ainsel firmly. “Kishar did say something about a pack of dogs, though.”

  A barely audible growl rumbled somewhere behind Ainsel, and she added, “I like dogs!”

  “Really big dogs,” said Zo?. “They’ve followed me, too. I’m coming out to meet you.”

  “No, you don’t—” The darkness was skulking on both sides of the path now, and the growl behind her didn’t stop. The hairs on the back of Ainsel’s neck stood on end, and almost every part of her wanted to break into a run. But one calm part of her mind declared that would be fatal. It was the oldest part of her, the part of her that had led her to the road after she’d woken naked and confused in a different forest three years ago.

  “Ainsel?”

  “Please come,” said Ainsel. “Hurry. I can’t.”

  There was a clatter and a thud from Zo?’s end of the phone. “It’s all right. Just keep talking to me.”

  “I don’t think these are dogs. It’s dark here now. Darker than it’s ever been before.”

  “They’re just dogs. And it’s always dark there at night,” said Zo? patiently. “I’ve had those stupid dogs following me other places, too. All the way up to my house.”

  “You never told me that,” said Ainsel reproachfully.

  “Well. They seem a lot scarier than dogs and who wants to admit to being scared of monsters in the dark? I certainly don’t.”

  The growl got louder and Ainsel raised her voice. “The edge of the forest is just ahead. Yay! Zo?, are these nice dogs why you haven’t photographed the meteor shower?”

  “No. I fell asleep.”

  “Do you feel sleepy at all right now?” Ainsel put her foot down on a jutting root and jumped, squeaking and flailing as her arms as she tried not to fall. The phone went flying from her hand into the underbrush.

  The shadowy creatures on either side lunged toward her and Ainsel could feel hot breath on the back of her legs. She caught her balance but her nerve broke. She ran.

  She was fast. The track team was one of the last groups at school still on speaking terms with her. She was fast and agile, darting like a deer toward a dead tree at the edge of the forest that was only half-fallen. If she could scramble up it—

  One of the shadows yelped behind her and then Zo? yelled, “Close your eyes, Ainsel!”

  Ainsel leapt for one of the dead tree’s branches, closing her eyes just as a brilliant flash seared against her lids. The shadows whined. When Ainsel opened her eyes again, she saw the gray and blue forms under the shadows: bigger than dogs, with shaggy fur and long muzzles, shaking their heads and pawing at their eyes. Just beyond them, shadow swirling around its feet, was something larger, with taloned hands instead of front paws. For a moment Ainsel’s eyes met the monster’s.

  Then Zo? yanked on her foot. “Now we run.” As soon as Ainsel’s feet touched the ground, they dashed out of the edge of the forest. Ainsel expected the monster to be after them immediately, but it wasn’t until the wolves had recovered from the flash that the entire pack moved, howling in unison.

  The night air was already cooling down and the grassy pasture was uneven. Often there were horses in the field, but tonight it was empty, and Ainsel hoped the animals were all right.

  Ainsel’s breath was hot and ragged, but she could hear the wolves behind her, gaining ground. Zo? was gasping beside her. She was no track star in the making and she’d already run from her house. They had to do something or the wolves and their monster would catch them and whatever happened next would probably exceed Ainsel’s ability to fix her friends’ injuries.

  Then Zo? tripped and rolled. She came up right away, holding a tube as long as Ainsel’s backpack. Ainsel hesitated, looking over her shoulder, and Zo? said, “Keep going!”

  “I’m not leaving you!” There were at least four of the shaggy wolves in the pack. She couldn’t see the monster anywhere.

  Zo? shook her head, wrenched the lid off the tube and started throwing tennis balls at the dogs. On her second throw, she hit the wolf in the lead on the muzzle, and one of his companions tripped over his feet trying to track the ball. Then Zo? tossed the rest of the balls at the newly confused wolves and grabbed Ainsel’s hand. “Now let’s keep going!”

  They ran across the field, hopped a pole fence and jogged down the side of the street. “They’re not afraid of the road,” Zo? warned, panting. “But if we cross to the other side, we might get lucky and a truck will run them over.”

  “Zo?!” Ainsel protested.

  “Better them than us!” Zo? pulled Ainsel across the road. “Actually, they haven’t been this aggressive with me. They’ve just followed me around. Like hungry strays, except horrible gray monsters.”

  One of the wolves wiggled through the fence, then paced along it, watching them with yellow eyes. Ainsel watched it curiously. It didn’t look hungry. It didn’t look like it belonged in this world at all. Wolves like that belonged in fairy tales, not walking along blacktop roads.

  “Um.” Zo? stopped and Ainsel dragged her gaze away from the wolf on the other side of the road. Ahead of them, a long, deep shadow stretched from the woods, up the shoulder of the road and halfway across it. “What’s casting that shadow?”

  Ainsel furrowed her brow. “I can’t see into it. We definitely shouldn’t go into it.”

  Zo? pointed her flash at the shadow and triggered it. In the glaring radiance, the shadow evaporated. Something monstrous loomed at the edge of the woods, where the shadow had originated.

  “I did not just see that.” Zo? took a step backward.

  Ainsel squeezed her arm. “No, don’t. Don’t run.”

  Toenails clicked on the blacktop behind them, as one of the wolves darted across. Zo? suggested,“I’m out of tennis balls. Call your mom?”

  “I don’t think they’ll sit and wait for us to be rescued.” Ainsel straightened her shoulders. “We have to go forward. Don’t look into the woods. Just walk. Fast.”

  Zo?’s eyes widened. “Are you kidding?”

  Ainsel shook her head, squeezed Zo?’s hand tightly and started walking briskly. She looked neither to the right or left, but at the intersection ahead, where you turned right to get into Zo?’s neighborhood. Once they made it there, they were surrounded by houses and people. It would be fine.

  Even though she kept her eyes ahead, Ainsel could still feel when they passed the shadow-casting monster. It didn’t growl or shift or even breath, but the chill radiating from the forest was terrifying. The returning warmth as they stepped out of the deep shadow was like the return of summer.

  Step by step they walked down the side of the road. Once a minivan drove past them without noticing wolves or monster, but otherwise the road stayed empty. Once they reached the turn-off for Zo?’s neighborhood, Ainsel’s tension eased and her grip on Zo?’s hand loosened.

  “No, don’t relax yet,” Zo? whispered. “That’s probably what they’re waiting for.”

  Ainsel looked over her shoulder. There was no sign of any of the wolves or their monstrous companion. “I think we’re okay now.”

  “I’ll feel all right when we get back to my house and I’ve called the cops, thank you very much.” Zo? looked around, too. “Can we run again?”

  Ainsel thought about it, and listened to her instincts. “No. Let’s not risk it.”

  “Running helped back in the forest. I’m just saying.”

  Flushing, Ainsel said, “I’d already lost my nerve. You saved my life, Zo?.”

  Zo? looked down. “Yeah. Those stupid dogs.”

  They walked the six residential blocks to Zo?’s house in nervous silence. When they went inside, Zo? called, “I’m home again.” There was no response and she shrugged. “Dad’s playing a video game and Mom’s out at a reception. Come on.”

  She led Ainsel back to her room, which had a sliding glass door that opened to her expansive back yard, which had a tree line instead of a fence along the far edge. She paused, giving a brooding look out at the woods, then pulled her phone out and called 911.

  Ainsel looked out at the back yard while Zo? had an unpromising conversation with the dispatcher. The night sky above the woods was dazzling. A meteor flared, the tail a burn across the sky. The woods themselves were just amorphous gray and purple shapes from here. Nothing moved except the trees swaying in a light breeze, and Ainsel had the dizzying sense that the meteor was a fixed point the rest of the world swung past.

  “Gah!” Zo? put down her phone. “Somebody will call me. They called me back last time I reported the dogs too. And lectured me on jumping at shadows and exaggerating. Said Animal Control couldn’t find any evidence of the dogs, even tracks.” She glared at her phone.

  “I can call too?” Ainsel offered. She opened her backpack and pulled out the cookies she’d decorated earlier.

  “They won’t listen to you either, I bet.” Zo? took a cookie and admired it before biting into it. “And those dogs weren’t nearly as terrifying the other two times I saw them. Just creepy and out of place. And that thing in the shadow! I didn’t even mention that to the dispatcher. He was already muttering about how hysterical I was.” She hesitated. “Did you actually set out to walk to my house with cookies in your basket, only to meet wolves along the way?”

  Ainsel gave her a curious look. “Yes?”

  Zo? shook her head and muttered something about red hoods, then added, “You saw it too, right? The monster?”

  “Eight foot tall wolf standing on two legs? Yeah, I saw it.” Ainsel looked out the window again.

  “It had silver eyes, too. All the normal wolves had yellow eyes. And listen to me saying ‘normal wolves’. There aren’t supposed to be any wolves west of the Cascades!” Zo? finished the cookie and went to her pile of photography gear. “If somebody at one of the viewing parties gets eaten, that dispatcher is going to be sorry he blew me off.”

  Ainsel watched Zo? skeptically. “Are we going back out again?”

  Zo? hesitated. “I guess that would be pretty dumb.” She kicked her desk chair. “All I wanted was some great pictures. Why does this keep happening? Falling asleep the past few nights and now this.”

  Ainsel shook her head slowly. “I still don’t understand how you could fall asleep.”

  “Well, neither do I, but it happened. At least it didn’t happen tonight.” Zo? joined Ainsel at the sliding glass door, looking up at the sky. Her expression changed, becoming wistful.

  Ainsel nudged her. “If we’re not going to take any pictures, let’s go play a video game or something. And I’ll have to borrow your phone eventually to let Kishar know I’m staying over. Mine is out in the forest somewhere, being slobbered on by wolves.”

  Much later that night, Zo? returned to the sliding glass door. Ainsel was already asleep on one side of Zo?’s bed, her long blond hair spread around her head like a halo.

  The meteor shower was still going on, although the peak had passed. Her back yard was barely visible, until she turned off the rest of the lights and let her eyes adjust.

  There were motion-detection flood lights on the house because Zo?’s mother had insisted. And the sensitivity was tuned so low that almost nothing set them off, because Zo?’s dad couldn’t tolerate the way they turned on twenty times a night, because they were pointed at a forest.

  Nothing turned the lights on now, either. Even after her eyes adjusted to the shadows, the edge of the forest was still impossible to see. Was it the weird, cold shadow they’d passed through as they walked past the nightmare monster, or just ordinary darkness?

  Something pale glinted among the trees. At first Zo? thought it was one of the falling stars, it was so bright and ephemeral against the tree shadow. But when the glimmer came again, it stayed: the fragment of an outline of a shape. It was familiar, somehow. She’d stood here before, looking out at something in the forest. But when?

  Then Zo? remembered the moon-bright eyes of the wolf monster. She crouched down, fumbling in her camera bag until she found her little point-and-shoot camera, with the flash that always reset to ‘automatic’. The cops didn’t believe her about the wolves. They told her that proof would help a lot. Pictures would be pretty good proof.

  She turned the camera on and eased open the sliding door. The glimmer in the forest responded, shifting one way, then another. A thrill ran down Zo?’s spine. She’d been terrified when they fled from the wolf pack, but now, all she felt was a nervous excitement. She had a camera. Somehow this time, that would make everything okay.

  Avoiding the floodlight sensors, she trod across the grass. The glimmer in the forest was waiting for her.