Majori's POV:
The maid said, her voice small but steady:
"Yes. A shortcut. Lord Vincent said to take this route to avoid being followed."
I immediately looked up.
"A shortcut?"
I glanced out the window. There was only a narrow trail half–buried in snow, flanked by pine forests as dark as ink.
No streetlights.
No guard posts.
No Silverfang pack territory signs.
Nothing belonging to Vincent's secured grounds.
A sharp chill crawled down my spine.
I lowered my hand slowly, my fingertips brushing the door lock.
"Strange," I said, letting the words fall as if casually though my mind tightened like a knot, "Vincent hates shortcuts. He hates abandoned paths like this. He even said… anyone who chooses shortcuts is choosing danger."
She sat still.
No denial.
No confirming words.
Not even a strong breath.
That silence so absolute was far more frightening than any excuse.
I turned to look at her. Under the faint car light, I saw sweat sliding down her temple. Not the sweat of someone who had rushed here.
But of someone who was… waiting for something.
Then...
The car braked sharply.
I was thrown forward, my shoulder slamming into the seat knocking the air out of my lungs.
The engine shut off immediately.
No hum of machinery, no heater.
Only the thick, suffocating quiet of the dark forest and my own breathing.
"We're here."
She spoke without even looking at me.
I looked outside.
Darkness.
No house.
No lights.
No footprints.
No voices.
Only the forest.
And a cold so harsh it squeezed my lungs tight.
"Vincent… is here?" I asked slowly, choosing each word with caution, even though I knew how impossible it sounded. Unless he could turn invisible, there was no way he was here.
He was the Alpha of a major pack, wherever he was, there should be light, soldiers, presence.
Not emptiness like this.
But before I could say anything more, the woman beside me reached out to open the door. A blade of freezing wind sliced across my face.
"Get out. You go first."
"Wait."
My voice was low, but sharp as a knife.
"Show me his signal. A contact badge. The Silverfang pack insignia. Anything."
She paused for half a second.
Just half a second.
But it was enough for my heart to drop straight to the bottom of my stomach.
I continued:
"If my parents were really in critical condition, Vincent would've taken them to a hospital. Why would he sit here waiting for them to die?"
I tilted my head, looking straight into her eyes.
"…If it were Vincent, this place would be flooded with lights and guards."
My words dropped like a hammer.
The girl's eyes shrank like a cornered beast. But she wasn't the one who should be afraid.
I was.
Why did it take me until now to realize something was wrong?
Even if Dane could control the guards near my room, she couldn't control the guards across Vincent's entire mansion.
Dane was just a woman. Respected in the Silverfang Pack, yes, but ultimately a lady of noble treatment, not someone with actual authority to command soldiers or manpower.
Vincent would never let a single weak woman escort me alone.
He would never let me crawl through some filthy hidden passage.
He would never let me leave without guards.
I was stupid. Truly stupid after all the years beside Vincent, after everything I knew about him. I really was a fool.
My words peeled back her layers one by one.
Now, the maid didn't bother acting anymore. She turned her head.
And this time, she smiled.
A slow smile.
Very slow.
As if she had been waiting for me to say exactly those words.
As if she were savoring the moment her prey realized it had stepped straight into a trap.
"Smart…" she whispered.
Her voice no longer trembling, no longer afraid but light, relaxed, chilling to the bone.
I opened my mouth to react, but she was already lunging.
Fast.
Too fast.
A hand clamped onto my shoulder, her nails digging into my skin with a numbing sting.
Before I could breathe, she threw her entire weight forward.
I was hurled out of the car like a sack of goods.
My back slammed onto the hard snow. A burst of pain exploded along my spine. My vision spun.
The car door slammed shut and the engine roared.
Tires churned snow into my face.
"Stop!"
I screamed so hard my throat burned.
"STOP!!!"
The car sped away, its tail lights swallowed by the whirling snow in seconds.
I lay sprawled on the icy ground, shoulder throbbing, lungs burning, heart pounding wildly.
Finally, one truth pierced into my mind, sharp as a needle:
I was deceived.
Someone had tricked me and thrown me here.
Who in the Silverfang pack hated me this much?
But if they hated me, why not kill me?
Why dump me here?
My eyes scanned the surroundings: empty, blurry, nothing but snow.
They didn't spill my blood but leaving me here was enough to make sure I wouldn't survive the night.
A scream tore out of my chest, ripping through the white void in front of me.
"You bastards!!!"
The forest answered with dead silence.
It took me several minutes to force myself upright. Snow clung to my face, my hair stiff from the cold.
No path.
No tire marks.
Nothing but a pitch-black pine forest.
In the distance, insects and predators cried out, a sound that chilled me to the marrow.
I inhaled a lungful of air sharp as knives and muttered to myself:
"If I survive this… I'll find them. They'll have to tell me why. Every reason. Every person behind it."
The wind roared through the pines like an ancient beast howling.
I dragged myself forward through the snow, my head spinning, no longer sure what was cold and what was fear.
Only knowing that if I stopped, I would freeze—becoming a breathing block of ice.
Night was dense.
Every breath dissolved into mist.
I couldn't tell direction anymore; everything looked the same, rows of black trunks standing like hundreds of shadowy figures watching me.
"I think… I've gone the wrong way," I murmured to no one, voice trembling. "Or… maybe I'm just walking in circles."
My stomach growled softly.
Hunger and thirst made me so tired I wanted to sit down.
But if I sat, the snow would swallow me. I knew that well; I'd heard too many stories of people lost in snow close their eyes for a moment, and never wake again.
I kept walking.
One step.
Then another.
Then...
Crack!
My foot caught on a root. My body tilted and I fell forward, face sinking into the snow.
The freezing sting snapped me awake, but pain shot down my back.
I stayed still for a few seconds, thinking: "Maybe I could just stay here…"
Then I slapped myself mentally.
No. I couldn't die like that.
I pushed myself up, ready to continue when a faint light cut through the snow.
A flashlight.
One trembling beam… then two… then three.
A man's voice echoed, low and raspy like rusted metal:
"Hey, drink less, idiot. You're downing that liquor like water."
"You talk too much. It's freezing as hell tonight, drinking keeps me warm."
"Hmph, drink then, but don't puke on my boots again, got it?"
"Shut up. Hey… hey, I think I saw something move."
I held my breath, heart pounding.
Those voices… didn't sound like Silverfang pack guards at all.
The hormones in my body warned me they weren't decent people.
I smelled the filthy, rancid scent of unwashed fur.
My wolf shivered inside me.
"You feel it too, right? They're not good people."
"But what if I'm wrong? What if they're villagers from outside…?"
"Move my ass, it's probably a fox."
"No, bigger. I saw something white."
"Oh then… a snow ghost?"
A raspy laugh echoed.
I dragged myself behind a tree, covering my mouth.
But then a flashlight beam swept across my face.
"Ha! I told you! Someone's there!"
I jolted, stumbling back, and a few desperate cries escaped my lips before I could stop them.
"Please… help me…"
Four figures staggered toward me.
As the lights drew closer, I saw them clearly and in an instant, whatever hope I had evaporated.
They weren't villagers.
And they definitely weren't good people.
Three men and one boy who couldn't have been twenty.
All wearing thick coats stained with mud, faces gray, beards messy. Their eyes were bloodshot and the stench of alcohol was so strong I had to hold my breath.
One of them had a burning cigarette between his lips, the smoke curling around his face like poisonous mist.
"Ahh… look at that," one of them slurred, "a flower in the middle of a snowstorm. God, bless our luck tonight!"