I looked around at everyone's now annoyed faces. I don't see what the big deal though, I liked to make new friends.

"Now, before I organise you into pairs I would like to confirm that the werewolves of this class are not allowed to transform fully into their wolf form, obviously you can use your advanced hearing but NO changing, and witches... don't use your locator spells or it kinda defies the point of this lesson. Okay?" said Mr Kohl.

"Yes sir" we all chimed together.

I looked at Cobalt, who was still on my shoulders and ran my hand over his shiny, lapis scales, its weird I only got him today and I feel as though I would do anything to keep him safe.

"Chase" called Mr Kohl.

I looked away from Cobalt and brought my attention to the teacher.

"You are with Elizabeth" he stated pointing at the girl from earlier.

Her eyes widened at me and she puffed in annoyance, rolling her eyes at her friends who were scowling at me from a distance. I approached her cautiously and held out my hand.

"I'm Chase," I said giving her a warm smile.

"I know who you are" she scoffed looking me up and down ignoring my hand.

I dropped my hand and I could feel my smile drop into a frown. Did I do something to offend her? I looked over to my best friends Aurora, Max, and Orpheus, who had somehow become one of our closest new friends. They still hadn't been paired and gave me a genuine smile when they noticed that I was watching, I smiled back at them lifting my spirits and decided to give Elizabeth a chance.

"Orpheus and Shade"

I watched closely as Shade grinned smugly. Poor Orpheus, I don't know why but Shade seemed to hate him above anyone else.

Orpheus looked and over to Shade and hugged Aurora without dropping his eye contact. I inwardly laughed at his attempt to piss Shade off and watched with amusement as Aurora played along earning a growl to come involuntarily from Shade. Orpheus grinned and used his vamp speed to stand next to him, pretending that nothing happened which only seemed to annoy Shade more.

We waited until everyone was paired and then began the challenge. We were each given ribbons of different colours to tie to a post that was supposedly in the middle of the open glade that we were following the tracks too. We had to tie the ribbon around the post in order of our arrival to see which team was the fastest and which was the slowest.

"You ready?" I asked Elizabeth who was looking at her freshly manicured nails.

"Yeah whatever, you better not lead me through any mud though, these boots are worth more than you," she said coldly.

My heart sank as I waited for Mr Kohl to let us begin.

"GO!" he shouted.

I began running happily into the forest following the simple tracks. I paused and looked behind me to see Elizabeth in tow looking bored, I continued to follow the tracks until they stopped.

"Why have you stopped?" asked Elizabeth narrowing her eyes.

"The tracks stop here" I explained.

I tried my hardest to smell thorough my blocked nose but it was hard, I immediately regretted taking the dare to dive back into the lake just before curfew, usually my wolf side would have prevented me from developing an illness, but I had been drinking wolfsbane with the rest of my pack to try and build up a resistance and I forgot to eat this morning so my immunity was down hence these stupid side effects.

"Whats wrong with you?" she asked.

I looked at her blankly not wanting to say that I had something as stupid as a common cold, besides she wouldn't believe me anyway.

"Can you not track by scent? you're even more useless than I thought." she scoffed.

"I can actually," I said slightly hurt.

I took in a deep breath and picked up the scent, although it was really faint I still had it.

"Its this way" I gestured proudly.

She rolled her eyes and I sprang forward to run in front of her.

I followed the scent and the trees became thicker towering above us, allowing the sunlight to pierce their thick layers in beams of brilliant golden light so it could cast down onto the forest floor illuminating it in a soft, calming glow.

I sniffed the air but only found the intoxicating smell of the rich pine trees, skidding to a stop I looked around frantically.

"Whats wrong this time?" questioned Elizabeth placing her hands on her hips.

"I... I... think we're lost" I whispered quietly.

"What?" she asked stomping over to me.

"I've lost the scent... we're lost" I confirmed completely embarrassed.

"How the hell could you lose the scent? your a bloody werewolf" she exclaimed angrily.

"I have a... erm... cold," I said rubbing the back of my neck.

"And you didn't think to tell. me before I followed you into the middle of nowhere?" she screamed, disturbing birds who were nestled in the above branches.

"You called me useless, and I... I wanted to prove you wrong" I confessed looking at her angry face.

Her features softened for a second before regaining their angry complexion.

"Well you didn't, did you mutt?" she spat making me wince under her words.

I shook my head in shame and looked at the ground.

"I'll find the way back," I said quietly.

*_*

We kept walking silently through the trees, well not silently, I began humming nervously and when I started doing that I couldn't stop, Cobalt purred softly at my voice and looked around at the towering trees curiously.

"Will you shut the hell up? your gonna wake the entire forest" said Elizabeth who had been quiet for the last half an hour.

"I think that you already did that when you took it upon yourself to remind how useless I am," I said my voice cracking slightly before continuing to hum softly.

We walked for another ten minutes or so with no sign of getting out.

"Do you even know what you're doing?" she asked watching me stare around the forest.

"No, no I don't, tracking was never my speciality it was always Max's," I confessed.

"Well, that's just great" she huffed.

We continued to walk a couple of paces before I stopped.

"Why?" I asked barely audible.

Cobalt picked up my negative emotions and sent me some of his love towards me, giving me some strength and courage to continue.

"What did you say?" she asked angrily.

I stopped in my tracks and turned around to face her.

"Why do you have to be so mean? what did I ever to make you act this way towards me?" I asked feeling water coat my eyes.

She stopped and looked up at me her hateful features softening at my distraught face. We stood there for a couple of minutes before she decided to answer.

"I'm sorry," she said quietly looking at the ground.

"That didn't answer my question," I said pushing back the tears that threatened to fall.

She looked up at me slowly and I was beyond shocked to see that tears were rolling down her small face.

"You remind me of someone," she said wiping her tears away.

"You must have really hated that person" I scoffed turning away.

"No... I loved him... and he was taken away from me" she stuttered through heavy tears.

I turned back to face her.

"He was killed..." she began.

"No... murdered" she sobbed.

"I'm sorry," I said confused at the guilty feeling that rested in my heart.

*_*

We walked silently for the remaining time, more comfortable in each others company.

"Do you hear that?" I asked, picking up on the slight mumbling of people.

She stopped and listened hard.

"No, I can't hear anything other than the birds," she said looking around at the tall trees.

"This way" I called running on ahead.

She ran slightly behind me, her brown curly hair flowing gracefully behind her.

"Almost there" I shouted, almost tripping over a tree root.

I heard her laugh behind me and smiled before bursting through the trees into the open glade to see everyone staring at us.

"Where have you been? we were just about to send a search party out for you" Asked Mr Kohl looking slightly amused.

"We uh... kinda got lost," I said grinning sheepishly.

Elizabeth stood next to me and yanked a branch out of my messy hair.

Mr Kohl nodded and turned his attention back to the picnic he had set up.

"See you later Elizabeth" I smiled, proud that she had opened up to me.

"Yeah... ugh... Chase?" she started.

"Yeah?" I asked.

"You can call me Lizzy if you want and I'm sorry... I'm sorry for everything, your not a useless mutt and I had no right to call you one." she finished giving me a small smile.

"Its ok Lizzy, and um... you should smile more often" I grinned looking down at her happy face.

"It suits you" I finished before waking over to the others who I could tell were listening in on our conversation.

"Lizzy aye?" grinned Orpheus wiggling his eyebrows.

"How the hell did that happen?" question Max ruffling Chases hair.

"Come on guys this is Chase we're talking about. Who doesn't love him?" laughed Aurora.

I grinned at them all and shook my head.

"True" they all agreed.

"How'd you get lost anyway?" asked Aurora.

"One word, 'Wolfsbane'" I sighed eyeing the food hungrily.

"I'll fill you all in on the details of my stupidity later, I'm starving," I said shoving a sandwich in my mouth.