Chapter 5

Dream

Maddy lay awake in her tent, her sleeping bag around her seeming to provide no warmth. Rhydian had his own sleeping bag and was sleeping contentedly, but she just couldn't seem to. Normally, she'd cuddle into him and they'd share, but something about that felt wrong to her. She loved Rhydian to the ends of the earth, but this wasn't really him. This was just a dream she was having while her body repaired itself.

Sighing, she realised she probably wasn't going to get any more sleep, so she got up and quietly pulled her shoes on. She ducked out of the tent flap, trying to enjoy the night air. Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be a breeze. It made a depressing kind of sense. She wasn't outside. Not really. If she had to guess, she was probably in her room. There was no way Rhydian would have just left her lying outside unable to do anything. But if she truly was in her room, would it have killed him to either crack the window or turn up the heat? Just anything to create a through-draft or remote air current... That would probably be the first thing she did when she woke up. The other thing she wanted was an emergency hog roast night if it wasn't a Wednesday when she came to.

Maddy paced, unsure of what to do. It was weird how this hibernation was working. She could hear the frost-covered grass crunching under her feet, but couldn't feel it or the obvious cold that should be there. She knew she should sleep, but she also had a seemingly boundless level of energy. She was tempted to transform and run, but she knew wouldn't do any good. That energy was a sign her body was repairing itself. She needed to conserve it.

"Don't resist it." The voice was barely a whisper, but it was there. Suddenly, Maddy felt the transformation start. She hadn't even called it forward. It wouldn't stop. Her jaw elongated and her bones re-shaped as fur spread across her body. In seconds, a wolf stood where she once did and took off running at breakneck speed. She wasn't in control. It felt just like it did during the blood moon. She could feel the pent up homicidal rage at every little thing that had ever happened to her, be it anger at herself for stupid or embarrassing things she'd done to people at school who always had a go at her size or her clothes or whatever else they could. She genuinely wanted to kill them all and she hated herself for it!

'Is this another test of some kind?' Maddy wondered to herself as she fought to regain control. 'If it is, someone went way too far!' Try as she might, she couldn't take control back. Her wolf kept running, burning energy she knew she needed. It was only after about ten minutes that it stopped and reached a small stream. It dipped its head to drink and Maddy was shocked to see blood red eyes staring at her in the reflective surface of the water. This time, she fought like never before. She thrashed and screamed from inside the prison of her own body, forcing herself to transform back. It felt like she was being ripped apart. Still, she pressed on. Eventually, she collapsed onto the grass and took several shaky breaths. She now felt even more drained than when she'd first entered the dream. This dream that was now more like a nightmare…

"What the hell was that?" Maddy muttered to herself as she splashed some water on her face. It had no effect. Of course it didn't. She stood up feeling frustrated and defeated. "I'm glad that's over. That felt even worse than usual."

"You wound me, young Wolfblood!" The voice resonated in her head so intensely it physically hurt. "I thought we were close!" On impulse, Maddy spun on her heel and froze. A small brown wolf stood there, legs spread out into an aggressive stance. The blood red irises seemed to see right through her.

"You're… This is impossible!" Maddy backed up a few paces and the wolf advanced, determined not to allow her any ground.

"This isn't impossible. This was inevitable."

"How can you do this?" Maddy asked. "You're my wolf! We're one and the same!"

"We were never one and the same!' the wolf corrected her. 'The consciousness of a Wolfblood's wolf exists in just a few strands of DNA. Ever since your first transformation, I've been trapped inside, forced to watch you take all different kinds of abuse day after day! To share a body with such a fangless coward is sickening!"

"I'm not a coward!" Maddy protested. "I threw myself into danger loads of times! I put the secret and my pack at risk to keep my friends safe!"

"How many chances did you have to tell your friends the secret?' The wolf let out a snarl. 'You'd sooner see Shannon committed than put yourself at risk. She only found out in the end because she had to! She found out because you put saving her life above the secret and why did you do that? If Ceri had murdered Tom and Shannon the police would ask questions. It wouldn't just be you anymore. Every Wolfblood would be in the firing line! Yet you didn't think about the safety of the rest of your pack. You should have taken them out covertly the next chance you got and hidden the bodies. No witnesses means it never happened."

"I'd never do that!" Maddy yelled, hot tears springing to her eyes.

"And because you couldn't, she managed to hide a camera in the den! If that wasn't enough, you then forced her to delete everything she'd gathered because you couldn't bare the fact she had dirt on you. You wanted her to suffer for all the problems she'd caused you before she knew. The secret just became a tool for you to hurt her with!"

"Screw you!" Maddy screamed, trying to call her wolf forward. Then she remembered that it was her wolf standing right there in front of her. She was defenceless.

"Tomorrow night, the full moon in this dream will give me the power to take control of your body back in the physical world.' The wolf turned and stormed off, her tail swinging angrily behind her. 'When I do that, the full moon in the real world will allow me to take control permanently."

"You can't do this!" Maddy yelled at the wolf's disappearing figure as she headed into the undergrowth.

'The only way to stop me is to die in the dream.' The wolf paused briefly, tail swinging angrily. 'Do you have the courage to do that?' Without waiting for a response, she took off at a run. Maddy collapsed to her knees and sobbed.

It took her a good two hours to walk back to the camp. By that point, dawn had just broken. Her parents and Rhydian were talking to Mr Wallace, but she couldn't hear what they were saying. She must have lost her enhanced senses as well when she separated from her wolf. Emma glanced up and saw her approaching, taking in the state of her pyjamas.

"Maddy Smith, where the hell did you go? And what happened to you?" Maddy collapsed into her arms, burying her head in her neck.

"I need your help."

"Is this a matter I need to call the police over?" Mr Wallace asked, looking at Maddy with concern as he ran his hands through his beard.

"No!" Maddy protested too quickly. "Look, I just need to talk to my family alone."

"Fair enough, then." Mr Wallace grabbed his cane and turned to leave. Just before he did, he turned back to Daniel. "If you think you do need police, you need only come and find me. I'll let you use the phone in my shack."

"Okay, thank you." Dan nodded before turning back to Maddy. "What happened?"

"My wolf got loose." Maddy said in a rush.

"What?" Rhydian asked dumbly.

"She forced me to transform last night and then tore her way out of me!" Maddy elaborated, trying and failing to keep her voice down. "She's planning to use the full moon tonight to gain control of me!"

"That's impossible!" Rhydian protested. "A split like that just can't happen! If it did and you were split like that, you'd die on the next dark moon. If your wolf goes into the physical world controlling you and you're the one trapped, you'll be dead in two weeks!"

"But she said she needed the full moon in the real world to make the change permanent!" Maddy protested.

"Maddy, the next dark moon is coming before the next full moon." Dan reminded her.

"So she was lying?" Maddy guessed.

"I don't know if anyone's wolf has ever tried this before." Emma muttered. "She might not even know."

"She might just not care." Maddy shrugged. "She hates me."

"Maddy, you have a tendency to think everyone hates you over just one little argument." Rhydian said, only half joking. "Remember Shannon and the disco? That turned out okay, didn't it?"

"So, what the hell are we going to do?" Maddy asked.

"We can't really do anything." Rhydian sighed. "I'll be there for moral support, but this is your dream, remember? We don't hold any power here. We're just a part of it."

"So I'm basically stuck on my own!" Maddy ran her hands through her hair in frustration. "Is this even a part of the dream? If it is, then this is way too much!"

"No, it isn't." Rhydian's tone told her he was completely serious now. "This threat seems very real."

Author's Note: Okay, so it's been a while since the last time I updated this. Sorry for that. I've got a lot of stuff going on right now, but I promise I'm trying to update when I can. I've finished writing it, so it's now just a matter of uploading the chapters. Please feel free to review. Your feedback is one of the things that inspires me to keep writing.