For safety’s sake, since I was still within sight of the city and the bordering homes, I stayed in human form during my meal. Shifting my teeth to allow for tearing, I finished off the sheep, leaving bone and wool behind. Sky paling, I crept back to the city, washing the blood from my face in a stream.
Bruising stretched across my left eye and cheek. Tenderly, I touched the marred skin and willed my disguise to heal. I appeared unharmed, but I was sore underneath. In an alleyway, I piled Alafaire’s bedding with which she’d used to carry me in and curled in the nest, exhausted. Burrowing, I breathed deep the scent of earth and decay from the forest, piss from the alleyway, and blood from me.
Underneath it all was the floral desert, stinging me with memories of long ago and seeping into my
