Noah crouched near a wide scorch mark burned deep into the tree bark, running two fingers along the char.
"Fresh," he said. "Days old, maybe. Not weeks."
Storm hovered a short distance off, wings beating slow, still tracking something in the far distance with the same unbroken focus he'd carried since the crash.
Noah straightened, scanning the wider clearing. More scorch marks scattered through the trees around them, some old and weathered, some fresh enough the bark still smelled faintly of smoke. Deep gouges ran along several trunks at roughly chest height, claw marks spaced too wide for anything human-sized, and further out, a wide swath of flattened undergrowth stretched in a rough trail, grass and brush pressed down like something massive had dragged itself through repeatedly.
'Territory markers,' he thought, following the trail with his eyes. 'Or feeding grounds. Something big enough to leave claw marks that spaced apart, and it's been through here more than once.'
