Previously: Echo, the main character, gets tripped by a mysterious force and falls into a bush. she then sees her friend Frost go into the wolf (and possibly magic) infested woods. Worried Frost is going into danger she follows her, and sees Frost meet with a silver wolf with black markings, who Frost addresses as Secret. They go into a cave, but after a while, Echo gets bored and turns to leave, but realizes she's lost. After she gets even more lost and it's night, she gets attacked by a white wolf, who strangely turns around at the last second. She falls asleep because her nerves can't handle the stress. Then Frost finds and saves her; after Frost sees a bruise on Echo's ankle, she leaves. She comes back muttering cryptically. She takes Echo back to where she entered the woods and leaves, assuming Echo can get back herself. Echo lapses in and out of consciousness, and dreamed that Secret bit her arm.

Echo woke up slowly, what a dream! She didn't feel right, almost as if waking up from a drugged sleep. She couldn't feel anything, she couldn't move. Was it a dream? She ached all over and felt exhausted. Slowly, she started smelling. It smelled like wet dogs and blood. Ew. Then she started hearing. "I was going to do it myself. Why did you bite her?" Was that Frost? "Oh really? you saw the mark, right? She has to die." The new voice was authoritative and stern. What mark? Were they going to kill her? "I know. I could have done it myself if you hadn't intervened. Now she knows! Maybe killing her won't even fix it, who knows how it works?" "It already knew. I'm sure it directed her here. I'm sure it marked her because she's friends with you! I told you, don't make friends outside the pack!" "Maybe it chose her because she believes or something!" "Does it matter? Now, I have to kill her before it worsens." "I know. I would have been glad to do it myself, I just didn't think it was right to kill her when she was in that situation." "And that could have made all the difference. Who knows how long she's been marked?" "Exactly. Maybe just yesterday, maybe 2 weeks ago." "And maybe, it's been a month." "Ha. We would know if it had been a month." "We need to kill her before the month line. Which is now." "I know. I was going to do it today." Echo was able to twitch her toe, trying to block out what she was hearing. Frost would have been glad to kill her? "She deserves an explanation first." "No. We don't know how much it knows." "Can't I tell her the basics? It would make her so happy, and she deserves to know know what her mark is." "No. You can tell her the basics, but no explanation." Echo started being able to move, and slowly opened her eyes. She was tied in the middle of a cave, surrounded by wolves and people, and Frost speaking to a middle-aged woman, with hair torn between black and silver. Frost turned to look at her. "She's awake." "I can see that for myself." "You were going to kill me?" Echo pleaded, her voice full of hurt and betrayal. "It's more complicated than that. Echo, magic is real." Echo tried to laugh. "Sure." "I'm part of the pack of wolf walkers. We can switch at will between wolf and human form. The wolf that almost killed you last night was me, I've never smelled you as a wolf before, and wolf vision isn't good. I didn't recognize you until the last second. This is Secret, the alpha. After I had to tell her about you she ordered me to kill you." Ordinarily, Echo would be thrilled, if it was true. But at the moment she was quite literally tied up. "Which i hope you would have done anyway. Unless emotion is clouding you?" "I would have! I was reporting it to you for obvious reasons." "What mark do you keep talking about?" Secret glared at Frost. "I can't tell you." "You can't kill me! We're friends! You'll get put in jail." Secret shook her head. "I will, and nobody can put any of us in jail." Secret suddenly morphed into a wolf, the one Frost was talking to. "Wait, maybe we don't have to kill her yet." Secret glared. "You care too much, need I remind you what could happen next?" "Echo, look at your ankle, when did that mark appear?" Echo stared at Secret, about to pounce. "Echo, your life literally depends on it." "Frost, we can't let her go, she would run away." "I'll make sure she doesn't." "Yes, because marked humans would always trust a pack member. She'll escape." "She can't outrun me, and I've got the best nose in the pack. If she does escape I'll track her, and kill her, no questions asked. immediately!" What was going on? "If she stays with the pack, she can live the rest of the month." "OK." Frost's expression was perfectly neutral. "You can untie her." "Echo, when did you get the mark?" What mark? Echo glanced down at her ankle and saw a little black spot, in the shape of a circle, with a crescent mark inside. In the circle left by the crescent was another crescent, and so on, seemingly infinitely. "What does it mean? I've never seen it before. It's right where I got caught when I tripped yesterday." "Then you have a full month to live. Make it count. You cant go back home and if you leave the cave you have to stay with Frost." Then she certainly wouldn't leave. She didn't want to be anywhere near Frost. She wanted to kill her?! Echo went to the corner and sighed, wishing she wasn't about to die and hadn't just been betrayed by her friend. Frost came over and sat by her. "Go away." "Echo, let me explain?" "I thought you weren't allowed." "I can say some things." "I just don't want to deal with you." Frost turned away, looking down. "Would you just go?" "Fine..." Frost stood up and left, but Secret intercepted her, barely within hearing distance of Echo. "Why did you save her? The longer she has to accept it the harder it will be when the time comes." "Because maybe I can get her to trust me again. If i can we could learn more about it, maybe even destroy it forever." Secret smiled. "Clever. You have my full approval. Do whatever is necessary to gain her trust. But remember, the pack comes first." What? She was being used now too? For something she didn't understand? She had trusted Frost! but she wouldn't let on that she had overheard them, and she would learn what the mark was herself. maybe she could use it somehow.