In the Wolf Forest, Grom, Sonia, and Franek follow strange lights through the trees and into a clearing where something unknown begins to move toward them.
The Wolf Forest never truly slept. Even at night, the trees shifted and sighed, their branches scraping softly against one another while the wind dragged long, crooked shadows across the damp ground. From the edge of the thicket, a lynx stepped into the moonlight, silent as a flicker of smoke. His name was Grom, and nothing about him was more famous than his courage, or his habit of looking too closely at danger.
That evening, he was not alone. Sonia, a squirrel with quick eyes and quicker thoughts, darted ahead and back again through the branches. Behind them padded Franek, a hedgehog who liked safety, preferred warnings, and only followed because the forest had been whispering for days. Strange sounds had drifted from deep among the trunks. Then, just after dusk, lights had begun to pulse above the treetops.
No one in the Wolf Forest could explain them. No one wanted to go near them, either. That only made Grom more determined. So the three friends moved on, stepping over roots and fallen pinecones, pausing whenever the darkness seemed to listen back. Sonia climbed high to scout from the branches, while Franek kept glancing over his shoulder as though the forest itself might decide to follow.
At last they reached a small clearing.
The lights floated there in a trembling cluster, pale and shifting, as if they were breathing. Strange paw prints scored the mud near the center of the clearing, far too large for any creature Grom knew, and the air carried a sharp, unfamiliar scent that made his whiskers twitch.
"What is that?" Sonia whispered from above. "And why does it feel like it's watching us?"
Grom took one step forward. Franek froze behind a stone. Then, with a sudden hiss, the lights vanished.
Silence crashed over the clearing. Every leaf, every shadow, every breath seemed to stop at once. From the dark between the trees, something huge moved toward them, and as it came closer, its feet left a trail of faintly glowing prints in the grass.