Devious Claws

Chapter Seven

I wasn't sure how we got to the outskirts of town as quickly as we did, but I was soon let down on wavering feet by the tree line. I couldn't see my house but I knew it was a few miles away. That was little comfort given what I'd seen and who was standing by me, holding my upper arm to make sure I didn't actually fall.

My eyes couldn't seem to move from the forest in front of us. Dark. Thick. Cold.

"What are we doing here?"

"There's no people here. We don't have much time."

"For what?" I asked meekly, watching him take a few steps back.

"I'm taking you home, but we won't get far if I'm contained to my human form."

I opened my mouth to speak but soon realized I wasn't sure I could ever speak again. My mind had begun processing the extent of his words at the same time he took his coat and shirt off.

And then my mind stopped processing for a bit.

"You okay, Cindy?"

"Err, yes." I tried to tear my eyes away from his rippling muscles but it was truly impossible. The run had made a sheen of sweat play across his abdomen. He looked cut from marble. "I'm fine."

"You look like you're in shock."

I made an undecided noise and dismissively waved my hand. "No, I'm okay, keep going."

Eros did keep going. He tossed the shirt and coat to the side and tore his hat off. His hair fell down his back. He didn't say anything yet but I could sense something had begun.

An almost unnoticeable movement had started in Eros' abdomen. It looked like a muscle twitching, but it soon grew to become his whole torso changing. It seemed his skin was nothing more than a tarp and underneath his muscles and bones were moving freely.

When his knees gave out with a crack! I screamed.

I turned my back to the horrific scene, pulling my hat down to my ears and folding into myself. My knees hit the snow. It seemed like hours I crouched there, almost blacking out.

When something touched the top of my head, I already knew what I was going to see.

As I actually met the eyes of the giant wolf, I screamed again.

It was rather pointless trying to scurry away, but I tried it nevertheless. My heels pushed into the dead grass and I tried to lift my body up from the ground. The snow was making my hands numb and for every centimeter I covered, the wolf was right there. He was black, a deeper black than I'd ever seen, and his size would be comparable to a small horse or even my mom's car.

His snout was in my face.

He huffed.

I fell back as my hand went against something sharp. My feet gave up in their quest to push me. I was laying in a star-fish position, sunken into the snow. Above me was a grey sky, but it didn't take long for two yellow eyes to enter my field of vision.

I wondered if he was going to eat me.

"Eros?"

The wolf didn't respond, but I had a feeling it knew it didn't have to. Those eyes were hard to misplace. It kept its gaze on mine, its body above mine, and for a second I wondered if I actually felt excited at the prospect of seeing a werewolf. It was harder to differentiate between good adrenaline and bad than I would've imagined.

I pushed myself to stand, and thankfully the wolf backed off. I brushed myself off and had to take a few breaths before I could look at him. He was towering over me even as I stood.