[the signal is given and the sleek, bare shapes of bodies leap forward, into the moonlit night and beneath her wolf mask, shauna can smell them, can smell heat and blood and heart and breath, and she bounds after them, thrilling at the hunt (returning to her again and again, reliable and true as the tide), but beneath it, oh beneath it she can smell nat. months in that cabin meant the sharpness of their bodies had become familiar, a musky perfume of rotting youth and simmering rage that nearly drowned out everything else that had happened that winter. shauna knows the scent of each of her teammates, each girl distinct, each tang of sweat and grime as recognizable as walking through a mall food court after skipping breakfast.
shauna can smell nat and it makes her enraged and it makes her hungry and it makes her swerve suddenly, towards the pale-tipped bounce of her hair (smooth and washed and combed, like that'll change anything, like shauna won't be able to scent her with her eyes closed) and she doesn't think about it, doesn't consider how much it's going to hurt, she just flings herself through the brush and the trees and collides with nat, using all her strength like she had chasing mari, like she had chasing javi, like she had running out of the cabin through the snow to uncover jackie.
it knocks the breath out of shauna, sends her staggering, breathing raspy and hollow, shuddery with the rush from making contact with a shape she knows so well -- you can't huddle for warmth for a hundred nights in the dead of winter and not know someone. but she bites out, staggering:] Watch where you're going, Scatorccio!
cupid's arrow
shauna can smell nat and it makes her enraged and it makes her hungry and it makes her swerve suddenly, towards the pale-tipped bounce of her hair (smooth and washed and combed, like that'll change anything, like shauna won't be able to scent her with her eyes closed) and she doesn't think about it, doesn't consider how much it's going to hurt, she just flings herself through the brush and the trees and collides with nat, using all her strength like she had chasing mari, like she had chasing javi, like she had running out of the cabin through the snow to uncover jackie.
it knocks the breath out of shauna, sends her staggering, breathing raspy and hollow, shuddery with the rush from making contact with a shape she knows so well -- you can't huddle for warmth for a hundred nights in the dead of winter and not know someone. but she bites out, staggering:] Watch where you're going, Scatorccio!