Word Count :: 252
The tawny fighter was almost never afraid, or at least the kind of afraid that had her heart pounding and her body tensing, fear-stench leaking from her pores. But her skin remembered the knife, remembered being punctured again and again, and it crawled under stiff fur. She remembered another blade too, a crooked spiral bloody against white. Daggers were sharper than fangs, with more reach, and she was probably right to be afraid.
The other hybrid questioned her fear, and Vesper blinked once. Everything came into focus then: the stranger crumpled against the forest floor, streaks of blood blossoming from a mostly-wrapped leg. When the luperci managed to find her feet, she simply thrust the blades into the tree.
“You mistake caution for cowardice,” came the Infernian’s retort. It was a bluff from her younger months, when she was only a yearling yapping indignantly at crook-backed old wolves. There was a caw of laughter from the tree above, and she bared her teeth at the raven before realizing her folly. Large ears folded back into her cropped smoky-wood mane, and she sighed. “You get cut enough, you start freezing up at anything sharp,” she admitted, the spirit gone from her. Like as not she’d start trembling at bears too.
“Anyway, what the hell happened to you?” Vesper went on, her voice crisp and cocky and close to normal. “I guess you’re training to face whoever will take advantage of your bad leg? It seems altogether safer to stay in your pack lands.”
Image courtesy of venomxbaby@deviantart; Table by the Mentors!
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