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Walker’s sharp little voice demanded inside her mind.
    Rage was unable to bring herself to turn back or to cross the road because it would be too obvious why she had done it. She was so nervous that she thought if the person sneezed, she would probably have a heart attack. The idea made her want to laugh, and all at once the clouds let through more light. Then she did laugh because now she could see that the person was just Logan Ryder.
    “What are you doing here?” she asked, too relieved that it was someone she knew to worry that it was someone who disliked her.
    “Waiting for you,” Logan said.
    Rage’s heart skipped a beat. Logan’s green eyes flared at her like neon lights as he straightened up.
    “Why did you call me last night?” she asked. To her surprise, it was Elle’s voice that came out, light and strong and challenging.
    “Call you?” Logan sounded puzzled enough that Rage wondered if she had dreamed it after all. Then he gave a snarling laugh. “Yeah, I gave you a wake-up call.”
    “I don’t think I’m better than anyone else,” Rage said quietly, hitching her schoolbag onto her shoulder so that she could run if she needed to.
    “You think you’re special because your mum is in hospital. A lot of kids have dead mothers and fathers,” Logan growled.
    “I told you I don’t think I’m special,” Rage said. “But even if I did, why do you care?”
    Confusion passed fleetingly over his face. Then Logan glowered at her. “Tough talk for a little girl out all alone in the night.”
    “It’s not night and I’m not a little girl,” Rage said evenly. She forced herself to start walking toward him again. He stepped into the middle of the path, blocking her way.
    “I have a message for you,” he said in a sinister voice.
    Rage was surprised to hear him use exactly the same words as the firecat in her dream. She gave a startled laugh.
    Anger distorted Logan’s features and he lunged, grabbing the handles of her bag and wrenching it off her shoulder. Rage clung to the bag, and to her belief that this was just a school-ground scuffle.
    “Leave me alone. I don’t want to hear any message from you,” she shouted.
    “So you don’t want to hear about what happened?” Logan jerked the bag lightly and Rage stumbled closer. She let the handles slide down to her fingers so that she could step back, and she glared at him.
    “I don’t want to hear anything you have to say, Logan Ryder, now let go of my bag!”
    “You don’t want to know what happened to Mrs. Marren?” Logan taunted, giving the bag another light tug that unbalanced her and further loosened her grip.
    Rage felt a hot little dart of shock. “Mrs. Marren? What are you talking about?”
    “So you do want the message?”
    Rage’s fear melted into an intense weariness and she stopped struggling. “If you have a message from Mrs. Marren, Logan, then just tell it to me instead of acting like some stupid gangster in a movie.”
    Logan’s expression grew uglier. “You think you can give me orders?” He wrenched the bag out of her hand, unzipped it, and emptied it onto the snow, then threw it down.
    Rage gave a cry of dismay. “You rotten pig,” she yelled. She would have flown at him despite the disparity in their sizes, but suddenly there was a sound that made them both freeze.
    It was a deep, savage growling.
    Rage turned toward the sound. She saw with dreamy horror that three enormous wolves with pale, silver-tipped pelts and flaring green eyes were hurtling across the football oval beyond the park on the other side of the road. All at once she registered that the wolves were running toward them.
    “Oh my God! Run!” she screamed. She grabbed hold of Logan’s parka, breaking his paralyzed stance as she pulled him toward the school gate. She let go then and ran for the bike shed, praying it would be open. She did not have the slightest doubt that if the nightmarish beasts caught them, they would be killed. Logan passed