What happened next was a blur.

Laurent's eyes flickered over the forest and shock covered his features as he lowered Bella's arm from his face.

"What is that?"

A large black creature had emerged from the tree line and was slowly stalking towards us, its teeth bared and a low growl emitting from its chest. It was utterly terrifying, and if I wasn't already facing death by a psycho, I would be shitting myself in fear of this new addition.

This must have been what Dad had talked about. It could pass for a bear - to half blind, confused hikers I guess - but it was obviously much larger and resembled a dog.

Holy moly, it was a wolf.

I had never seen a wolf even half this size. It was huge! I wasn't sure what I should be more scared of - the wolf or the murderous man.

As if things couldn't get weirder or scarier, four more wolves fell in line behind the first, though they spread out in a formation as if they were warriors heading into battle. They were all different shades of gray, except for the first black one and the one closest to us - it was a deep russet. Each one had its teeth bared and the numerous growls and snarls bouncing off of the trees were louder than thunder.

Laurent released Bella and took a few steps back as the wolves advanced. He had completely forgotten about us, and while it gave us a chance to run, I knew that the likelihood of us outrunning a wolf was zero to none.

The wolves were nearly to us, so I raised my gun and aimed it at the leader, fully prepared to shoot in self defense if he pounced on Bella or me.

But instead, he leaped forward as Laurent disappeared into the woods faster than humanly possible. The wolves chased after him - all except two.

A dark gray wolf with lighter gray patches and the russet wolf stayed behind. The gray one glanced over at the russet one before setting its eyes on me, and the familiarity of those complete heterochromia eyes almost sent me to the ground.

Only one other living being I knew had a brown and a hazel eye like that. But he was a human. Suddenly, the years of listening to Billy tell the Quileute legends hit me like a ton of bricks.

Taha Aki.

Shapeshifters.

Wolves.

Cold ones.

Laurent's red eyes flashed into my mind and the things he said suddenly made sense.

I opened my mouth to call out for Embry, just to see if my theory was correct - hell, I had nothing to lose since my sanity was already waning after today's encounter - but the russet wolf shook its fur and the movement caught my attention. I was so on edge already, any little movement was bound to catch my eye.

I glanced over at the other creature, which was looking my sister over as if to check her for injuries. It's own brown eyes flickered over to me for a split second, but that was all it took.

The earth suddenly slowed to a stop as its dark eyes met mine, and I felt like I was having an out of body experience. My heart rate slowed down to a near stop and I couldn't remember how to breathe or what my middle name was.

And just as quickly as it happened, his eyes left mine and he darted into the forest after the others. My heart began to beat wildly as an unfamiliar tugging sensation burned in my chest.

The gray wolf was left alone with us, and it whined sadly as it stared at me.

I opened my mouth, barely in control of my mind anymore. I was so dang confused and out of it, I half expected myself to wake up from this dream. That's what it seemed like - a crazy, completely made up dream.

Because vampires and shapeshifting wolves didn't exist in the real world, did they?

Before I could say anything, the gray wolf took off into the woods after his pack.

Bella and I found ourselves alone in the silence of the meadow. What was once a beautiful place was now tainted, and I was sure that I would be having nightmares of this place for a long time. I wanted to smack Bella for even inviting me on this stupid hike.

We both let out the breaths that we had been holding.

"What was that?"

Bella bit her lip and chanced a glance towards the woods where the wolves and Laurent had disappeared. "I'll explain in the car."

-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-

"So I was right."

Bella quirked a brow as she sat up on her bed. After speeding home, we had each taken a shower to rid ourselves of the day at the meadow and then met in Bella's room so she could "explain." She ended up telling me the story of her boyfriend - Edward Cullen. How he was a vampire and he had saved her life from another vampire named James. That was the reason for the scar on her hand and the incident in Phoenix last year, and how she knew Laurent.

It was also the reason why this Victoria woman was after her.

She gave me details about these vampires and their special abilities. Knowing what they were capable of made me that much more afraid of the meadow and Laurent.

"You knew Laurent was a vampire?" she questioned, clearly confused.

I nodded, but moved my hand in a so-so motion from where I sat crisscrossed on the end of her bed, picking at the fuzz on my super fuzzy blue socks. "When the wolves came, I noticed that one of them had multicolored eyes. One brown and one hazel. It struck me as odd and then I remembered that I only knew one person with eyes like that - Embry."

Bella's eyes widened. "Nori, are you saying what I think you're saying?"

I bit my lip and looked at her. "Bella, have you ever been told the Quileute legends?"

"Yeah, Jake told me about them a while back. That's actually…well, it helped me understand what Ed- what the Cullens were." She paused. "But I never thought the wolves existed."

"But it makes total sense. That's why Laurent ran away like he did. And they didn't attack us because we aren't vampires. It would also explain why Embry could have been one of them." It suddenly sank in.

I screamed. "Ohmygod!"

"What?!" Bella screamed back after jumping nearly a foot in the air at my outburst.

I smiled at my sudden revelation, not because I was happy, but because it all just made so much sense and gave Embry a legit reason for abandoning me.

"The cult! Sam Uley, Paul, Jared, Embry. They're the pack! Didn't you say that the Cullens showed up and then Sam started the little clan?"

Bella nodded, a new light of understanding glowing in her eyes.

"That's why they went all wolfy! The Cullens came, which meant vampires around here, and suddenly they disappeared for a few weeks and turned! And plus, there were five wolves out there today." I counted off on my fingers for visualization. "Sam, Embry, Paul, Jared, and…" I stopped.

Bella sucked in a breath, knowing where I was going with this. She immediately began shaking her head violently.

"No, no, no, no, no. That can't be right! He wouldn't - He would tell me if something like that happened. I mean, I'm his best friend! He told me about the Cullens, so he would tell me about this…right?"

I shrugged as Bella's eyes filled with tears.

"W-We have to go to La Push," she whispered.

I thought about it for a second. If telling the guys that we knew their secret meant I could get my friendship back with Embry, then it would totally be worth it. Plus being involved with supernatural creatures just seemed freaking awesome - minus the scary moments when they could kill you, like today.

But on the other hand, they may deny everything and still ignore us. I didn't know if I could handle that. Knowing the truth but being denied because I'm human or not cool enough to be part of the group? I'd rather stay in the dark.

"I have to see Jacob," Bella whispered brokenly, wiping her tears away.

I sighed. "Fine. But can we go tomorrow? I can only take one supernatural occurrence every twenty-four hours."