Angol
Seventeen year old Cal Beck was supposed to be ordinary.
In the mountain town of Briar Glen, Colorado, ordinary means school, work, family arguments, cold mornings, and pretending the future does not feel like a road leading nowhere. Then a hidden chamber beneath an abandoned mine changes everything. Cal leaves with a cut on his hand, a low body temperature he cannot explain, and a hunger that begins as something small enough to lie about.
At first, he tries to ignore it.
He goes to class. He talks to his friends. He avoids worrying his mother. He keeps his distance from Mara Ellison, the girl who keeps looking at him like she can see something wrong before he has words for it. The symptoms do not explode overnight. They creep. His body grows colder. His senses sharpen by degrees. His temper slips by inches. The smell of blood becomes harder to ignore each month.
Cal is changing slowly.
Everyone else changes fast.
When a single scratch, bite, or trace of his blood can turn another person within twenty four hours, Cal realizes he is not just sick. He is dangerous. As fear spreads through Briar Glen and the first infected tear through the edges of normal life, Cal must decide how much of himself he can hide, how many people he can protect, and whether the boy he used to be is already gone.
Because the hunger is growing.
And it knows everyone he loves.
