The Wild Hunt (Downworlder Series, #1)

Chapter Eight: Wild Cravings

Too much for my sight and my nose. Too much of everything. It made me feel as if I had a thick sludge on my skin. It was something the beast and I couldn't clean off, no matter how hard we tried. It made me angry, a thick sludge of filth on our skin we couldn't see or clean and the heavy burden of what was our humanity.

It was simpler in the wilds.

I walked towards the tall nature ravaged buildings. It pleased us to see some of the confining areas being reclaimed by the nature we loved. The closer we grew the more we could see it. There was dull glow around the tall buildings. We didn't like it. We could not see the stars or the moon we so cherished when it was there.

I didn't need to go to see my Doyen, he had told me I could leave for a few moons but I had two moons of my own thoughts and it was too loud. I needed to drown it out. I needed to drown everything out. I didn't need to think anymore. There was no reason for it, no reason for my head and mind to be so loud on my own. I was so used to the thoughts of the beast.

Kill. Eat. Sleep. Survive.

Simple and no need for these things coursing through me that weren't instincts. My Doyen called them emotions, he also called them weak. It made me curl up my lip. What my body did for me, while it made hot anger boil in my stomach, was never weak. We were not weak.

The beast growled his agreement, the sound rumbling my chest. We moved through the bare streets, our eyes searching the shadows. We didn't like the many hiding places that an enemy could lurk in. In the wilds there was always sound and scent for us to watch our surroundings with when our sight couldn't be used. They failed us now, it was too loud and there were too many scents.

"Hello, big man." The voice had the sound of false of sensuality to it. I glanced in the direction of the speaker, it was a scantily clad woman. Darkness hung off her, and her eyes raked over us as if she were starving. I bared my teeth at her, my muscles tensing. "Wanna come inside? I can warm you up." She stroked her neck, her hand moving down to caress the top of her ample chest. The motion didn't nothing for us.

"You smell foul." I looked her over and looked away. So many women acted as they did. My beast did not like her scent. It was off and foul in our nose.

"I'm the best, love." She gave a low moan but it didn't hide the slight hot scent she gave off. She was angry at our words. We had learned that the emotions our Doyen told us about, hung in the air around the other beasts. I wondered if we smelled like that as well. She moved closer, reaching for me. I grabbed her wrist, my skin crawling at the feeling of her underneath my fingertips.

"My skin crawls. Don't touch." I shoved her hand away and gave her a deep growl that had her cowering. We preferred their submission. Submission meant they would listen to us like we listened to our Doyen. We weren't submissive to our Doyen though. We simply listened because we wanted to.

"If you didn't want a girl to look or touch, put on some clothes." Her words were spat at me and I gave another low growl but walked away. We didn't care about her words enough to want to teach her to never disrespect us, doing so would mean we needed to be close to her, having her foul scent in our nose and the overpowering fake smell of flowers that she had doused herself into to hide the foul scent that hung off her.

The small amounts of people left in my Doyen's territory avoided me, their eyes on the ground. The beast and I liked it when they did. We didn't like being watched by anyone. The territory had too many eyes for me to feel comfortable. I clenched my firsts at the beast growled. We didn't like it.

The urge to turn around and run back into the forest was strong but I pushed it away. My new found ability to think when alone was not something my beast and I enjoyed. I had been a passenger in his mind for years, I thought how he did and then our Doyen changed it, reminded me of what I was. Reminded me I had the ability to think on my own, separate from the beast.