Part IIISounds touched him first. When they became words, the man woke up with a sudden and painful jolt, and he remembered he was Iain and slowly opened his eyes to see an odd-looking, blurry face. The nose was too shot, the eyes the wrong shape and color. The smell was wrong. He reached up slowly, stopped to stare at his hand, and Iain remembered why this face was odd. No muzzle, no fur. No sharp teeth.
“Gods, another injured werewolf, out of the Night Forest. I guess they know I am the healer for the magical. Ahh, you’re awake. Can you sit up?”
His hands shaking, Iain touched the face that was now close to his: the short nose, the cleft beneath it, the lips, the shape of its jaws. The not-wolf knelt beside him, its hands carefully touching him. He cried out when the hands touched the
