Argus hesitated. He knew what he wanted, but he’d never been very good with words because he’d never had to be. Noble had always been the spokesman. Now that Argus had to express himself, he was at a loss for words. “I uh, I came here because I…” He paused, feeling his heart begin to pound and his body become hot all over. He knew he’d never be able to make it sound as good as Noble could, so he took a deep breath and just blurted it: “I want to join you and live in the forest, like my father did.”

Phelan’s eyes opened wide and his head jerked back as if Argus had taken a swing at him. He quickly recovered and shook his head. “No. No, no…No, you can’t.”

“What? Why not?”

“No. It’s not a good idea.”

“But I’m big and strong, and I’m a good fighter. If I lived in the wild, I could be alpha male of a pack.”

“Is that why you want to leave your brothers and sister? To be alpha male of a pack—if you find one and if they allow you to join them in the first place?”

It was Argus’s turn to be taken aback. Obviously there were many things he had yet to consider.

“I allowed you to find me,” Phelan continued. “Our kind—those of us who were born and raised in the wild—are excellent at hiding from our enemies…and anyone else we don’t want finding us. You and your brothers have barely come of age, and you’ve already allowed one of your kind to be trapped by a human, and your images to be captured on one of their machines.”

Phelan was referring to Doctor Edward Monk, who’d videotaped the pack changing shape in the forest before he kidnapped Tora in an attempt to take her out of the woods. How Phelan knew about that adventure was curious, but he obviously knew more about them than he’d let on.

Argus didn’t know what to say in the pack’s defence. It was true they’d nearly allowed themselves to be revealed to the rest of the world, but they’d learned from their mistakes. Besides, there were many instances where their kind had been seen by humans. “What about the Sasquatch legends—Bigfoot and all that?”

A smile crossed Phelan’s face. “That was our creation, a way to explain those rare times when one of our kind is careless and is seen by humans. It has worked too. So many sightings, and still no proof.”

That was true enough, but Argus wasn’t about to turn around and head back home with his tail between his legs. “I’m here now, though. And I want to live in the wild. I can learn from you. I can become like you.” He paused. “Please!”