Sloane awoke with a splatter of dreams, with too much knowledge whistling in her brain and settling into her bones. The energy pulsed and concentrated in the bed of her palms. It pulled. A final generous tug, and she rose panting, hunger still aching in her belly. The knowing was immediate, pulsed in her brain as if she had merged with another.
What the fuck?
Her mind swept over the details, unable to process the weight of change in that very moment. But it blurred so quickly when her eyes settled upon the outside. Her legs stumbled, moved from the enclosure towards the outdoors almost immediately.
A forest. A fucking forest, so alive, so lush, so green that it felt like a hallucination.
It must be.
How could it be?
She stared at trees so tall they rose to vanish into mist, at leaves so large they dwarfed her body, capturing the gentle spill of the sun. She tasted the air, heavy with moisture, warm and delicious from the perfume of the trees. She drank every breath like it was water and felt as if she could weep at the sounds.
The sand was gone, and there was no unforgiving, torturous wail of the wind.
It had been replaced by a world that breathed.
Alive.
How was this possible?
Sloane sank into a cushion of richness, thick with the promise of food. Not the shit from the can, not the scraps from a bloodied bone. She could almost taste the flavours of nature, sweet and heavy with juice. Her fingers dug into the grass, forced the green to her lips.
Grass.
There was fucking grass.
She chewed. The taste was bitter, but fresh and filled with water. Not the ashy shit from her past. It was almost like vegetables, and God, Sloane had forgotten what vegetables tasted like. She cried as she swallowed, sobbed from the memory and promise of what it was like to be full.
This was a body that was not her own.
She knew it almost immediately from the change in the way the muscles wrapped over her bones. The way her teeth settled in her mouth. The rustle of her hair at the nape of her neck, not shaved off as it had been before.
This was a body that lived in a time when water still rushed, clean, crisp, and cool. A time when the sun no longer burned, softened by the most generous of clouds. And the fucking winds did not tear upon her bleeding flesh with blades of sand. Instead, this world kissed her skin. This world provided.
Sloane was reborn.
And she was rich.
She noticed the rustle too late, too enraptured by everything to care. Another Sloane would have read the land, the prints of feet, the break in the soil, the crackle of leaf. The elusive teasing remains of another. But this Sloane had forgotten to be alert, could only remember the imprints on the sand, could only think of the nightmares of her previous life.
And then the wind shifted, and she smelled him.
Richer than the world. A hot punch to her gut. It was not like anything she'd ever known from a man. It was sweet and clean. A scent that seemed almost maddeningly soft, like honey warmed in a glass jar, like the crush of wildflowers in a palm, like the heat of the earth after cold, like the sweetness of petrichor.
And under it all was the lace of a powerful musky spice.
She froze, felt as if the scent held her captive as her eyes swayed to the man. He stood a distance away, concealed carefully by the golden bark of trees, watching through the branches in the shadows. He was lean, too awfully thin, perhaps generously built for speed and silence. But it was his posture that disturbed her, idle as if not threatened, staying as if he meant to watch.
The silhouette of his body was what struck her first. The long black ears that twitched high upon his head. They sat on a crown of hair that shimmered like moonlight. Softness grew in tufts from the base, and his ears revealed the sounds of the forest, twitching to every hiss and crackle in their environment. But they betrayed him, drooping with submission, flickering nervously to her every breath.
A bunny.
A man.
Her body's memories shivered.
A half human, half rabbit.
A beast man that had the blood of animals.
And he was a beautiful rabbit man with features only from the depths of nature's deepest folds, so far from the ugliness of her old world that it had her shuddering from his gorgeous looks. He was so beautiful he was almost godly.
His raven hair was messy, falling to his back and tangled from neglect. It caught the light when he moved, glowing a sweet gold when the sun filtered through the trees and caressed his face. His features were soft yet sharp, cheekbones prominent, nose gorgeously tall, lips full, lashes that were too fucking long.
Doe-like eyes.
Something tugged in her chest for him. And his wide eyes were on hers, a dusky, gentle rose that rimmed a generous liquid-dark. The colour was softer than the sweetest carnations, aching with something more. The sight of them had her pulse racing in an instant.
There was no panic on his face, no immediate need to bolt towards safety. Instead, he studied her, searched her gaze. A lush lashed blink, and a tilt of his head had her frozen. The pout of his lips was a rosebud tease.
His smile grew, and the corner of his lips curved into the teasing beginnings of a giggle. And her spine felt as if it straightened to attention, tension thrumming through her. The grass warmed on her tongue.
He was laughing at her for eating grass.
He was giggling at her.
She swallowed.
There was mischief in his eyes, an intelligence, a flicker of curiosity. The questions were obvious, darting in those orbs as if begging for her to speak first. But it was the greeting in his eyes that alarmed Sloane.
He knew her.
He knew this body.
Who was he?
Her mind stretched for the memories as her eyes searched him. The pale, barely clothed body. His skin, thin to almost translucent. The threadbare tunic, grimy with dirt, mud caked his nails. Familiar hunger curving in his cheek, stretched to his bones, a split in the middle of his lip that had yet to heal. Something clicked in his eyes, and suddenly his expression seemed to break and tumble under the weight of her gaze.
The fear rose like a tidal wave, eclipsing him as he fell to his knees, shivering, eyes darting over her hands as if searching for weapons, for cruelty. He quivered, and his voice whimpered from his lips as he tilted his head to offer his throat.
Submission.
Sloane froze, breath catching as her memories clicked into place. The last of the jigsaw pieces was settling.
"A-Alpha," he whispered. His voice was a gorgeous, melodic dream. "You're awake."
The bunny was her mate.
The gorgeous man was her husband.
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