The Girl Who Cried Wolf

Chapter 8

I screamed myself awake, regretting it immediately afterwards.

The scream echoed though the forest, making me panic.

I couldn't shake the feeling I was being watched, neither could I shake the sweat off my back, because I'm not wolf enough.

I was cold, the sun had barely risen so the earth had not been warmed by its presence.

Shaking my head at the dream, I made my way down the tree, the backpack slung over my shoulder.

My stomach growled and I knew I had to find food soon.

I walked back towards the waterfall, relieved to see the pond was still a pond and hadn't frozen over or anything. Next to the pond were some apple and orange trees I had passed earlier. Running to them in joy, I picked as many as I could carry before retreating to my tree.

I stood at the edge of the tree, looking up before deciding the better of it. My scent had had all night to cover the tree and I needed to keep moving.

I started heading East, towards East Field Pack's territory. Of course, I didn't plan on trespassing, just simply to find a better tree that was further from my previous one.

Finally, after at least an hour and several swims in the stream, I found a large tree with stretching branches and a few strangely tame squirrels.

Climbing up, I tried to stay away from the squirrel family to give them their own privacy.

Sitting on the tree, I went through a few apples and threw them on the ground, letting the squirrels have them who hopefully ate apples.

One of them came very close to me, staring at me with its beady little eyes.

Then I got that feeling again, that strange feeling I couldn't put my finger on.

It was like a pull towards the animal, it made my head tingle, the same with my whole body.

It stared at me and I stared back for what would have been a good 10 minutes.

The sensation grew and grew until I started shaking and sweating.

Feeling scared, I wanted to run, but the feeling drew me closer to the tiny animal.

"what the heck is this?!" I wanted to scream, but no sound came out.

I wanted to leap from the tree and run away.

I wanted to get away from the unknown feeling that was, to be honest, scaring me.

Then suddenly the feeling exploded and the world seemed to grow around me.

Rays of light shone from every direction as the world grew and grew until it was so large and I was so small.

Even the squirrel before me had grown to my size.

Frightened, I went to climb higher up the tree, but noticed my hands.

They had CLAWS!

I looked behind me.

A TAIL?!

WHAT IS THIS?!

The squirrel looked at me like I was crazy.

"what's wrong with me?!" I screamed at him, but it came out as a chittering noise.

I expected him to say something or explain what was going on, but instead he made a chittering noise and scampered down the tree.

I stared after him, confusion wrapping around my mind.