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hours. For some reason, that felt very, very important.
     
    She thought sitting down might make her feel better, but when Rylie planted herself on a bench around the fire pit to write in her journal, she found she couldn’t stay seated. She kept shaking her head as she paced around the camp. A distant, persistent buzzing rattled in the back of her skull.
     
    The sun dropped. It was getting dark. The new moon would rise soon, and it would be the darkest night of camp yet.
     
    Her group didn’t go to the mess for dinner. They roasted hot dogs and corn over the fire, and still Rylie paced. She had to move. She had to
go
. The dark trees were calling to her, and the muscles in her legs twitched like she was ready to run.
     
    When they were done eating, the counselor let the girls build the fire higher and higher. The leaping flames licked at the starry sky. Ash drifted through the air and stung Rylie’s eyes.
     
    The heat from her anger had never faded, and now it settled in Rylie’s bones. She thought she might be sick.
     
    “Can I go to bed?” she asked Louise in a hoarse whisper.
     
    Louise looked annoyed until she caught sight of Rylie’s pallor. Her lips drew into a frown. “Yes. Of course.”
     
    Rylie crawled into her cot and pulled the sheets over her body, shivering hard. She writhed in bed, rolling and twisting from side to side, and she struggled to keep lunch in her stomach.
     
    The forest wanted her.
     
    Shoving her window open, Rylie gasped cool air into her lungs. There was only one thing to keep her from dying of this fever, and she knew exactly what it was—running up the mountain and never stopping. She had to do it.
     
    But Rylie couldn’t afford being seen leaving again. She waited as patiently as she could in bed, too hot under the covers but too cold without them. She kept kicking them off and pulling them back on again.
     
    All the other girls came to bed after awhile, but Amber wasn’t with them. She had no sense of time anymore. She stifled her groans on her fist and in her pillow.
     
    Peeking through the cabin door, Louise did a head count, and Rylie made sure she was visible. Her entire body shuddered with her efforts to stay still.
     
    “Good night, ladies,” Louise said with a pointed look in the direction of the loft.
     
    She turned off the lights and shut the door. The girls immediately started talking. Rylie waited, feeling like she was going to crawl out of her skin. Little ants marched up and down her spine.
     
    Eventually, the other girls fell silent. Their breaths grew deep. Everyone was asleep.
     
    Everyone but Rylie.
     
    Pushing the window open the rest of the way, she slithered through the small opening and dropped to the ground outside. She eased around the corner of the cabin, watching for counselors. They chatted outside their own cabin, holding mugs of hot tea and discussing problem campers—more specifically, Rylie and Amber.
     
    “I just don’t know what I’m going to do with her. Amber’s parents are threatening to sue. Rylie’s dad’s lawyer has already sent us a letter.” Louise sighed. “I can reassign them to different cabins, but what good would that do? I think they go out of their way to get into fights.” Rylie was tempted to stay and listen, but her body demanded movement.
     
    She plunged into the forest, letting the fever drive her.
     
    It was so much easier now. She never had to slow down to dodge the trees or leap over rocks. Her instincts guided her deeper and deeper into the wilderness. She could smell other beasts: wolves and bears, deer and groundhogs and squirrels. Rylie could even smell summer rain approaching.
     
    Her lungs heaved with exertion. Her feet ached. Rylie’s ribs ached like something was trying to burst out of her chest. A wolf howled in the distant night.
     
    She collapsed to her knees. The fever had been momentarily cooled by her flight in the forest but returned with a fury, and Rylie tore at her own skin.