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No, instead, I throw back my head and howl my satisfaction. My pleasure.
I’m about to howl again when the pained whimper of another wolf grabs my attention before I can do it. In the light from a burning tree, I see a witch bearing down on a wounded wolf, a silver dagger held high. There’s no question in my mind what she plans to do with it.
It isn’t a fair fight anymore. The wolf is bleeding, one of its legs broken, and it can’t get away. I feel its pain, sense its fear, and it’s clear what I have to do if I don’t want my pack to lose a member.
Leaping off the dead, broken body, I hurl myself in their direction, throwing myself between the menacing witch and the wounded wolf. My hackles rise, legs planted, my head low as I glare up at the figure cloaked in black—but my focus lingers on that dagger, gleaming in the fire’s light, promising death to the wolf whose flesh it slices.
The witch freezes for an instant. Is it surprise? Fear? I can’t feel her emotions the way I’d feel those of a wolf, but the fact that she goes still and the dagger begins to shake, tells me I have an advantage.
So I take it, lunging for her before she can get her bearings. Again, I move entirely on instinct, closing my jaws around her arm and sinking my teeth in until she drops the dagger, eliminating that threat. Her blood-curdling scream thrills me, making me tear at her flesh, shaking my head violently until she falls to her knees.
“Help me!” she shrieks as she struggles to free herself, and it’s a sound filled with terror, pain, and even disbelief. They weren’t expecting this. None of them were. As if they had the balls to invade sovereign territory and expected us to sit back and take it. The idea closes my jaw tighter than before, my teeth hitting bone while she beats uselessly against my head and neck with her other fist.
With one final, mighty pull, the sound of tearing flesh mixes with her shrieks, and I’m left holding her arm, having ripped it clean off at the shoulder. Blood pours from the socket, and the witch fumbles around, her mindless shrieks rising in volume and pitch while she tries in vain to staunch the flow.
It’s no use. She falls to her knees, then onto her side, the shrieks now nothing more than faint moans until she goes silent. Still.
Another kill. And it isn’t enough. More, more, I want more.
And so much prey is still running freely through the grove, practically begging to fall before me. The power! I went so long without any power, any strength, or respect.
I have so much lost time to make up for.
A flash of movement from the corner of my eye keeps me from checking the fallen wolf, now fighting to get to his feet. It’s the gleaming of yet another silver dagger that gets me moving, the metal glowing in the fires these filthy, murderous witches caused. Righteous indignation gets me moving before I have the conscious impulse to run.
I close the distance with no problem, the witch and her billowing cloak in my crosshairs, but another wolf slams into her from the side and cuts me off. I’m almost disappointed they got to her before I did, but the sound of snapping jaws and strangled screams are welcome music, just the same.
There are plenty more for me to choose from, what’s left of the band of witches now scattering, some of them retreating but most deciding to stand their ground like the stupid, stubborn creatures they are. They don’t know when they’re beat.
More, I want more! Until they’re all dead. I want every inch of me coated in the blood of as many of them as possible by the time I stand atop a pile of dead bodies. I’ll sleep tonight with their screams still ringing in my ears, a chilling lullaby.
My ears perk up at the sound of a high-pitched whine. There’s trouble nearby. A wolf in need of backup. Following the sound and the sense of pain and fury, I take off at a full run, barely dodging a falling, burning tree and the embers floating around it. The heavy smoke threatens to blind me, but I scramble past it, through it, until the air clears and the stench is no longer so heavy.
Up ahead, a pair of witches have a wolf cornered against a thick, ancient oak tree. He whimpers slightly, one leg raised like he can’t put weight on it, and his shallow, labored breathing screams broken ribs. Blood soaks his black fur, shining in the firelight—I can’t tell from the smell whether it’s his or that of a witch, not with so much blood already in the air and on my own fur.
