My eyeteeth itched. That wasn't the first thing that told me she was coming, but those phantom feelings of what was coming were hard to ignore. She rattled me like a cage, ready to jump free the moment she was born.

I was born Talutah Little Crow, now I can hardly use such a sacred name; no, I am little more than meat holding her inside, trapping my wolf in an awkward prison of flesh she would rather eat than live inside.

Once again the silver edge cast its shadow on me, I had no excuse, I knew it had taken, I knew what she would do when I set her free. I knew the sharp taste of burning pain that would come when it entered. The thick rancid scent of charring flesh and death that accompanied the blanket of flesh that incubated me after I was bitten. My scar throbbed, the flesh jagged white not far above the sharp edge of the blade.

I stared at the edge, pressing it just into my skin, the sharp hiss of silver against my flesh a further reminder of what I had become. I dropped the blade, ashamed, what kind of hunter was I that I couldn't take myself when it came time? A coward, she called me, howling in anger at being stuck with a weak, pathetic excuse for a hunter. She would show me whom the real hunter was. Her claws itching to come out and rend warm red flesh.

Little beads of crimson welling up between broken flesh, it reminded me of my bite, the thing didn't heal. It was bleeding for days, lulled me into thinking that maybe I had escaped the curses fangs. That was before she came. The wolf, the monster... me.

Her first words were that she would kill me. That she would eat my insides like fresh carrion and crawl her way out between my bones. Winter, I named her. She is cold, and dark and angry, like that little girl that watched her brother die.

I stared at the silver on the ground, the moonlight in the window reflecting off its polished surface. I failed to kill her, I couldn't do it, and I knew what was coming, what she would do when I set her free, yet I had neither the strength or the desire to die and take her with me.

---

Platinum-white fur bristles in the wind, a mighty predator shifting through trees, the snow piled high matching the color of its fur, and the coldness of its heart. The red of its eyes, and pink tip of its leathery nose shifting about in the moonlight. It growled, stalking up on its back legs, clawed hands steadying.

The wooden logs stacked into a thick wall hid nothing from the beast, its ears finding voice, and laughter inside the core of the human nest. Eyes tracing the familiar yet strange construction like an ancient enemy. A low growl again, moving to open the rind of the thing like an orange. A door silently gone, as if the portal had always been open.

A fire, and two tiny pairs of eyes filled with bewilderment inside. There is the tinny sound of laughter from elsewhere. The creatures hackles rise at the humans noise, their horrible stench. Hatred borne on its dead heart and it tasted joy when the soft flesh of one of the tiny-things filled the creatures gullet.

The laughter stopped, now strange voices and a high pitched wail hit the wolf's sensitive ears. A claw held the other uneaten tiny man-thing within. Red orbs found purchase on the loud one, a female its nose told it.

Discarded, the real prize found, teeth silence the wailing, claws removing meat. The wolf pauses, sniffing at the fallen male creature, red eyes searching its form and the fresh scent of urine filling its nose. A heart thrust toward the man like an offering, the white beast's head tilting almost curiosity in its gaze. There's a momentary disappointment when it has to silence the wailing again.

---

She came on fast, far faster than she had any right to; tearing her way out of my flesh under the moon's glorious light. She found her freedom in my death, the death of everything that I still clung to that made me human. That painful rending as her claws tore free, shedding my nails absently like any sense of morality I had.

I wasn't prepared for the pain, nobody is. The fucking thing is you delude yourself that you can control it, that you won't let the beast roam free. They call it a curse for a reason; the more resistance provided the stronger it is when your wolf comes. She tore through my heart, clawing at my veins as she spread like wildfire. The raw anger and hatred shot through every ounce of my being, dwarfing anything I had ever felt, even at the great Black Wolf who was my childhood nightmare.

I could pretend that I was stoic, lie and say she didn't win, that she didn't make me cry, but what would be the fucking point? She came, I wept even as her teeth emerged. I shivered like that little girl in a hole as a new beast tore my very soul out and devoured it whole.

---

Blood streaks red through winter's white like warpaint. The small home with shattered walls and furniture torn like the owner's corpses. Chewing at leftover meat, followed by stretching and a maw wide open to yawn. A small snap breaking silence as her teeth come together. Boredom overtakes quickly, motion returning; padding back into the frostbitten wood on bloody paws. Direction less sure than stride, the creature content to run, muscles fueled by unnatural strength bounding and leaping through deep winter effortlessly, crimson trails clinging to the frost far from the source.

Freedom, heart singing harmony with the stars and enormous wide glowing moon. Peaceful, human-less... scentless, the stench of man long distant carried only by the remains clinging. Wide open sky reflecting off the field around, wide trench dug in the loose snow. Gait long and elegant, contrast to the flesh still stuck to thick black claws. Loping directionless with sheer abandon, the hatred silent.

A head jerks upward, black nose twitching, the creature's crimson eyes twist with hatred. Fur bristles and ground disappears beneath the creature, muscles twitching with a frenzied lust. Goal returned, scent of man carried on its tongue.

---

I hate her with every fiber of my being. I want nothing more than to break her, to see her torn apart and humbled, her hatred filled spirit sundered and chained. She took what I never thought I had, my innocence, a raping of my spirit. Her fur tore through my skin, emerging in great white clumps, patches in odd and uncomfortable places, my mind too concerned with the agony of my bones breaking and twisting. She took my hands, great lumbering paw-like things making it difficult to remove the chain growing increasingly tight around my thickening neck. It was choking the life out of me, like she was. I wanted to hack my warped limbs off, like it would stop the spreading infection.

She laughed at me, pushing my feet into her preferred lengths, throwing me to the ground. The patina on my dagger reflecting blood red overtaking the brown of my eyes. The sting of the reminder of what I once was, and what I failed to do when the time came. Fuck her, she took even the one thing I was proud of. How she reveled in taking that from me, even as she strip mined my humanity, gobbling up my shape as a newly formed waggling thing on the end of my spine expressed her joy.

Winter came, her cloak covering all of me, my face twisted in her visage, her maw ready to tear, her sensitive nose already searching for something to fill her belly. She showed me the twisted monster I was, the pleasure I found as she made me eat that happy little family, the thing I always wanted and never had. Now I had them, their souls and flesh and happiness devoured and taken inside me. I let her destroy it, and enjoyed every moment of it.

---

Monstrous paws collide with stone, the snow cleared from the bare cobble. The clack of claws across the hard surface the only sound, a squall colliding with civilization. Red orbs searching the stony structure, walls towering above and casting a shadow over winter. Cautious steps, the creature aware of it's own presence and noise, the cloying stench of man-things all over. Nose pressed to cold ground, sorting through the bouquet, a single thread guiding the beast.

Scent quickens, tongue hanging out in the cold air with frost dangling and clinging to the organ like ornaments. Three long loping steps before a body crashes through wood, and glass. Wrought iron grasps at the broken glass not even phasing the enormous creature treading upon the rubble. The neck swings, searching for the source of food. A black dressed seal of a man sits perched, a cooked meal half eaten bearing witness.

The man moving his arm in a curious yet familiar pattern, the beast, tilted head at an angle watching with quiet beauty. The two pairs of eyes meeting in a peaceful moment. Jaws meeting the white collar a heartbeat after, blood flowing like wine as the creature lapped at the torn flesh. The man clinging to life touched the muzzle of the beast, patting at it gently as if to say he forgives it. The beast's hatred returns swiftly, claws rending at flesh and jaws clamping down on his skull.

---

Of course it had to be a priest. Fuck me.