"Kestria?"
Her eyes are open.
Human eyes. Brown, warm, clear. The same eyes that were laughing at my pink chicken yesterday morning.
"Mel." Her voice is a rasp, barely there. "You look terrible."
My whole body goes loose. "You got stabbed by a poisoned sword and turned into a wolf in my front yard. I think I'm entitled to look terrible."
"Fair point." She shifts and winces. "Ow."
"Don't move. The wound's still closing."
"Everything hurts."
"You got stabbed. That tends to hurt."
"How long was I out?"
"All day. All night." I hold up a finger. "Which I spent sitting on this floor. My entire skeleton hates me. When you can walk, you owe me a cushion. A good one."
"Noted." She's almost smiling. Weak, barely there, but real. "Have you eaten?"
"Don't change the subject."
"That's a no."
"I was busy keeping you alive. Eating seemed selfish."
"Mel. Go eat something."
"When I'm done checking your wound." I pull the blanket down. The bandage is stained but the bleeding's stopped. The skin around the wound is pink, healthy, new. "Healing well. Better than I expected, actually. Is that a—is that a wolf thing? Faster healing?"
"Faster than humans, yeah."
"That's incredibly useful information that would have been great to have at literally any point in the last decade."
She winces, and not from the wound. "I deserved that."
"You deserve worse. I'm being generous because you almost died." I pull the blanket back up and sit back on my heels. My knees pop. Both of them. Loudly. "I have questions."
"I figured."
"Many questions. A truly unreasonable number of questions."
"Ask."
"How many of you are there?"
She hesitates. "In the pack? Thirty. Thirty-five, depending on—"
"Thirty-five."
"Give or take."
"There are thirty-five werewolves in the forest."
"Not all in one place. We're spread—"
