Wild at Heart

The blood in his fur was slick and hot as it hit the cold air. The autumn air was barely crisp, the difference in temperature between blood and air was not enough to sting. But the searing pain of the bullet wound at the center of the dripping patch made up for it.

It was difficult to breathe, and the wolf whined softly as once-sure paws padded clumsily through the underbrush. He left a trail in his wake: bloody leaves, too heavy with the dew of his blood to stick to his paws; bloody branches and twigs as the wound at his side grazed the foliage that he was hoping to use for cover.

The wolf did not blame the shepherd for taking the shot when he had it. Doing that would be akin to blaming the moon for setting at the end of the night, or the tides for changing at the call of the moon. No, the wolf did not blame the man for protecting his flock.

He blamed himself for being the stupid bastard that stalked the sheep in the light of day.

Pain. His legs trembled, and his paws would not stay under him.

The craft that existed in and around his body pushed at his form, and he shuddered as he resisted the instinct to fall into the shape that might better suit his needs. Resisted it not because he disagreed with the needs of his body, but because he knew that if he gave in, the more sensitive nerve endings of his human shape would light up and leave him paralyzed. At least for the moment, the pain was bearable. At least for the moment, he could keep moving.

There were no sounds except those of the forest around him and his own wheezing whines. Nothing to indicate that he had been followed.

A wild shiver ran beneath his fur, a movement unnatural for the body that he wore, and the involuntary twitch of his muscles sent him stumbling to the already slick and greasy ground. He slipped on half-decayed leaves, rain-slicked pebbles, and soggy twigs.

Four legs had become too much for him to manage, and so when he hit the ground and rolled onto his back, it was in an unruly sprawling of pale skin and sparse hair that only vaguely matched the colour of those few rusty leaves still clinging to the canopy above him. The cold of the air on naked skin was almost a relief in comparison to the pain that enveloped him.

It was hard to imagine that in the face of a bullet wound, his body would bother taking the time to note the hardness of the ground, the bitterness of the air, or the sharp pinch of rocks and stab of twigs as his weight shifted on top of them. But whatever filter that allowed his body to create a hierarchy of his senses was gone, and he was left feeling every sensation as though it were the primary concern.

Now he did not whine. Now he gritted his teeth in silent agony as the pain in his ribs intensified. Now his weaker body trembled with the shock of the blood he had lost. Now he was confronted with the reality that his choices were to take action or let himself fade into nothing.

The wolf, who wore the shape of a man, lifted a trembling hand to the wound at his side. If he could remove the bullet, he would begin to mend. That ability to heal quickly was part of the magic that governed who and what he was. One of the few benefits of wearing the body of a wolf and the body of a man.

But he had to remove the bullet first.

He did not cry out as his fingers dug into the wound. He told himself that it was because he did not want to draw attention to where he was in case he had been followed by the shepherd. But the reality was that he wasn’t sure he could muster the energy to scream while so much of his concentration was settled on the white-hot pain that radiated through him.

The blood on his hand was as slick as it had been in his fur, and just as warm, but the trickle of it had slowed to a viscous ebb, and the cold air made it sticky where it clung to his body. Spots appeared in his vision, and once his sight had faded, it was only the vague sensation of his fingers digging into the warmth of his side and the smell of copper and iron that assured him he had not lost consciousness. Not entirely.

He found the hard metal pellet more by luck than anything, and heedless of whatever other damage he might do to himself, he dug and pinched and clawed until he managed to catch hold of it and pull it free.

The sight of that little brass lump swelled and swam before his eyes, magnified and morphed around the edges so that it was both crystal clear and frosted over. How strange that something so small could be so painful…

It was a thought for creatures more philosophical than the wolf.

He threw the bullet away or dropped it, perhaps. He couldn’t tell which. Then he rolled onto his side and curled up, waiting either for the magic that was in his body to begin to work, or for his life to end. There was another bullet still lodged somewhere in him. He could feel it, feel the way his body tried to heal around the wound.

But he couldn’t bring himself to dig in a second time.

His fur helped. He wasn’t sure it kept him warmer, or that the temperature of his body made any real difference, but it made the ground more bearable. It lessened the pain he felt.

And it was honest.

If he died, it would be as he had lived: wearing his fur. Not masquerading as a man, wearing skin and legs and arms. Not wearing the form of the two-legged animals that had chased him out and taunted him, and set traps for him and shot him, claiming that he was less of a man than they.

He did not blame the shepherd. Just as he did not blame the moon, or the tides. He understood that humans were as they always had been, and that they would remain exactly as they were for the rest of time.

But that did not mean he was one of them. That did not mean that he wanted to wear their form if he should die.

The blood in his fur was drying now, and there was nothing he could do but wait for his body and the magic that moved through it to decide on which side of the veil he would wake.