We circled each other again, breath rasping in the cold air, and I watched him for damage. My punches , blows I knew could break a human bone , had barely nicked him. I ground my teeth. What the hell was this wolf made of?
While my broken bones knit beneath my skin , a hot, stinging ache that never fully left , I scanned the clearing for anything that might pierce thick fur and hide: a stout branch, a thorny root. Most things would have snapped uselessly against him. Then my gaze found a rock, not huge but with a jagged edge, the sort that could open a wound. At last, a target.
I made for it in a blur, covering the short distance with a single loping run. Fingers closed around the cold stone. For a heartbeat I felt triumph swell , and then a force hit me like a thrown boulder. Air whooshed from my lungs. The wolf had guessed my intent; it had read me and tried to stop me. The keyword here was tried. It slammed into me hard, a brute shove that sent me flying and skinned me into a tree.
I tumbled down, pain erupting through my body as bones popped back into place with that sickening, glorious ache vampires endure. My knee snapped, ribs shifted, the seams of me reknitted themselves, and I screamed. The sound was animal and raw, a jagged sound that split the forest quiet.
Gripping the stone tightly, using it to ground myself back to reality not wanting to lose myself in the pain, I barely had time to steady my breath before the wolf was on me again. Despite its bulk, it moved with a speed that should not have been possible. Its jaws gaped, a crescent of teeth aimed at my throat. I darted to the side and met its skull with the rock. The impact sang up my arm. It retaliated with a paw so fast I just barely managed to duck beneath it but not fully. Pain flared where claws shredded my skin.
I distanced myself quickly, seeing the blood drip down its face , told me I had broken the skin. I had finally hurt it.
Even as the wolf staggered back, growling, doubts rolled through me. Had I simply angered something I could not kill? The sound it made vibrated in my chest; anger and wounded pride radiated off it like heat. Its eyes shifted. The playful cruelty drained out of them and something darker pulsed in the green: predatory focus, cold and certain.
Before I could prepare, it struck with a force that blurred the air. I couldn't dodge. The blow landed hard across my sternum and I was sent flying like a rag into two trees, cracking them like twigs. Pain exploded in my ribs; organs convulsed. I coughed, tasting my own blood, and some stupid thought whispered that maybe dying then would have been mercy.
Bones fractured, then stitched themselves in a sick rhythm as the vampire in me did its terrible work. I barely drew breath before the wolf snatched my leg with those iron jaws and began to drag me. It shook me like a rag, tore me across the undergrowth, and hurled me into another tree. My world was a carousel of pain and leaves and the metallic tang of blood. The wolf howled into the canopy, a sound that made the hair on my arms stand up.
I tried to get up. Every ruptured organ, every shattered bone screamed protest. Still, I forced myself to crawl. Tears cut hot tracks down my face , not just from pain but from the humiliation of being toyed with, of feeling my life dangled like a plaything. I whispered to myself, I have to get away, and pushed harder.
I managed two meters and then it was on me again. Escape had not been granted. I had imagined an end to this torment; instead I had found only new ways to be broken. It watched me as I crawled, its dark eyes almost amused at my efforts. The look told me plainly: this was my punishment for injuring it.
It stepped forward, heavy paw planting on my back and pinning me. The weight drove all the air from my lungs. With a slow, deliberate movement it flipped me onto my back so I would have to look up at it. I stared into the face that might end me. There was a cold amusement in its gaze that made bile rise in my throat. Rage steadied my hands. After everything I had endured to be brought back, was I to be ended by a forest monster? The thought burned.
Something flickered in its eyes. It leaned down, about to clamp its jaws on my throat, and I reacted with a raw, animal desperation. I reached and gripped its head with a strength I did not know I possessed. The tightness in my fingers was followed by a strange itch crawling up my skin , the same itchy insistence I'd felt when my fangs pushed through. My nails hurt, then stretched. The wolf yelped and recoiled as I realized, with a stunned kind of clarity, that my nails had become claws.
They grew fast, six centimeters long, curved and tipped in blood. The wolf drew back, surprised by the sudden turn. My wounds sealed around me, the vampire's healing finishing its work. I rose slowly, clothes hanging loose from my bandaged frame, and watched the beast's amusement drain from its eyes. It was not playful anymore. It was wary.
I forced the transformation in my other hand. A sharp, satisfying sound , like bone snapping into shape , echoed in the clearing. Chang. A grin crawled onto my face. Weapons in both hands now, raw and primal, I felt the balance of the fight tilt. Not by much, perhaps, but enough.
The wolf lunged. I sidestepped, wrapped my arm around its neck, and dug my claws in until they found flesh. It thrashed, smashing me into trunks and brambles, but I kept my hold. Each stab was a contact of claws and muscle, a trade of pain for blood. The beast's motions slowed. Its thrashing lost rhythm. The once-fluid strike became a stagger, the limbs heavy.
Finally its movements stuttered and then ceased. The great wolf slumped to the forest floor.
I lay sprawled on the forest floor, every muscle screaming mutiny. The damp earth pressed cold against my back, the scent of moss and iron thick in the air. Above me, through the ragged opening of the canopy, the sky stretched vast and bruised , streaks of cloud drifting past a swollen moon that watched in silent judgment. My breath came in shallow bursts, each one a struggle against the pain still threading through my limbs. The wounds were healing, but sluggishly this time, each stitch of flesh pulling tighter, slower, like my body was exhausted from the constant demand to rebuild.
I wanted to move, to at least sit up, but even the thought made my bones ache. So I just lay there, counting the tremors in my hands, the tiny throb of pain that pulsed with every heartbeat. The forest had gone quiet again, unnaturally so. No rustle of wings, no chirp of crickets , just the faint whisper of wind pushing through the trees.
For a moment, I let myself stare upward, losing focus in the stars that peeked between the branches. My mind was foggy, caught somewhere between relief and disbelief. I had survived. I had killed the wolf.
Then movement.
A sudden, sharp flicker at the edge of my vision.