Gods of Blood and Bone (Seeds of Chaos Book 1) by Azalea Ellis

bigger than any dog I’d ever seen, and they had teeth that curved out of their mouths like saber-tooth tigers.  
    “What the hell are those?” I whispered, afraid to draw attention to myself with noise.  
    “The same monsters that attacked us in the forest,” Chanelle whispered back.  
    “When ‘Dinner Time’ is called, my wolves will eat you,” he waved a pointed finger, encompassing our group, “who are dinner. If they can catch you before you get back past the safe line again, that is. If you can make it out of the light, you’ll be safe. So run fast, little bunnies.”  
    The gorgeous girl with the Spanish accent cracked her knuckles. “How do we win this game?”
    He focused on her intently for a few, incredibly long seconds.  
    She didn’t seem fazed by the psychological pressure at all, as I knew I would have been. Instead, she took the time to crack her neck again and roll her shoulders backward in a circular motion.  
    “The game is won either by surviving for twenty rounds, or if one of the prey is able to touch me before I call ‘Dinner Time.’ Everyone who makes it to the end will be rewarded with Seeds, according to their performance, as always.”
    “Got it.” She nodded. “But…I’m not the prey here. I’m the predator.” She licked her chops exaggeratedly and grinned.  
    Mr. Wolf threw back his head and laughed. His eyes shone wetly when he looked at us again. “Let the Trial begin.”
    Chanelle gripped my hand and pulled me out of the circle.  
    I stumbled, my legs feeling weak. Outside of the light’s edge, I couldn’t help but look at the fresh twin trees.  
    She let out a sigh, gripped my face, and pulled, forcing me to bend over and look her straight in the eye. “Things are about to get dangerous, okay? You need to pull it together. Focus. From now on, concentrate on staying alive. Don’t think about what happened to those other people. There’s no room for that.”  
    I stared into her big blue eyes and tried to stop trembling.  
    She gripped my face tighter. “Do you want to live, newbie?”
    I swallowed and nodded. “Yes.”
    “Then stop thinking about those two. Forget them. The Trial and surviving it are the most important things in the world to you right now. Got it?”
    “Why are you being so nice to me?”
    She let go of my face and stepped back, turning to face the light. “Does there need to be a reason? That’s not important.”
    Mr. Wolf placed himself in the center of the circle, his hands covering his eyes. “Let the Trial begin. Loudly, now, and all of you together.”  
    “What’s the time, Mr. Wolf?” we chorused.  
    “Twelve o’clock, little bunnies!”
    We stepped forward twelve times, moving from the outside of the circle inward. This repeated with different “times,” until a few Players drew dangerously close to Mr. Wolf and his saber tooth dogs.  
    It would be the next round, I knew. And it was.  
    “Dinner Time!” he sang, uncovering his eyes as he turned around to look at the majority of us, who’d walked toward him from behind.
    His stuffed animal head was no longer stuffed. It was a grotesque, huge wolf’s head, alive atop his human body. His too-large eyes moved, taking in our positions relative to him, and the dogs sprang forward. His nostrils flared, and saliva swung from his hanging tongue, falling toward the tip of his polished shoe.  
    Seeing it hit snapped me out of my trance, and I turned around to sprint back to the safe line. Someone screamed. I didn’t turn my head to look back, didn’t wonder about the safety of my fellow Players, and didn’t think about my own already aching legs. I just ran.  
    Ahead of me, a guy stuck out his foot to trip another, and the second guy went down hard. I jumped over him, and kept running.  
    I passed the line by quite a bit because of my momentum, and turned around to make sure I was safe. Others stampeded toward and past me, obscuring my view of Mr. Wolf for a