A blinding flash glowed red through my clenched eyelids. A yelp—followed by a soft hiss. Then deafening quiet. The acrid stink of singed fur burned the inside of my nose. I dared to open my eyes. Hanging in the air was a cloud of ash, a million particles floating like delicate snow to dust the glittering black stone fragments now scattered along the forest floor. The wolf was gone. No. Impossible. The wolf had been right there. I had seen it, I’d smelled it. I looked down at my hands again. They still shone with that same bizarre light, now fainter and fading fast. Understanding crashed into
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