The snow was falling, thick and merciless, already up to you knees as you pulled the bowstring back—farther and farther, until your arm trembled. Behind you, a shadow lurked —no, watched. You didn't dare turn to look at it, to see who might be within that shadow, observing, not as the wolf stared at you across the clearing.

Just staring. As if waiting, as if daring you to fire the ash arrow.

No —no, you didn't want to do it, not this time, not again, not— But you had no control over your fingers, absolutely none, and he was still staring as you fired.

One shot— one shot straight through that golden eye.

A plume of blood splattering the snow, a thud of a heavy body a nighs wind. No.

It wasn't a wolf that hit the snow no, it was a man, tall and well formed.

No-not a man. A High Fae, with those pointed ears.

you blinked, and then-then your hands were warm and sticky with blood, then his body was red and skinless, steaming in the cold, and it was his skin his skin —that you held in your hands, and-

You threw yourself awake, sweat slipping down your back, and forced yourself to breathe, to open your eyes and note each detail of the night-dark bed-room. Real— this was real.

But you could still see that High Fae male facedown in the snow, your arrow through his eye, red and bloody all over from where you’d cut and peeled off his skin.

Bile stung your throat.

Not real. Just a dream. Even if what you’d done to Andras, even as a wolf, was ... was ..

you scrubbed at your face. Perhaps it was the quiet, the hollowness, of the past few days —- perhaps it was only that you no longer had to think hour to hour about how to keep your family alive, but .... It was regret, and maybe shame, that coated your tongue, your bones.

You shuddered as if you could fling it off, and kicked back the sheets to rise from the bed.