Only then did I notice Luke and his condition. I felt much colder when I saw him.
He was standing near the burning house, which was slowly collapsing into its foundations, shifted into his semi-animal form. He was still upright on the balls of his feet, tense, with his claws exposed. His uniform shirt hung from his torso in tatters, and there had been no shortage of blood—you could see the light sand-colored fur of his chest between the red stains swaying in the wind.
He wasn’t wearing his hat or regulation boots, and he looked truly sinister, fearsome. His body turned out to be much more muscular than I had first thought, though still stylized and harmonious—perhaps a more adult and honorable version of Álvaro, with a different hair color. He definitely didn’t resemble the puma-man I ha
