I flattened myself to the ground, then realized how stupid it was. My fur was black and it was broad daylight now. I stuck out like a sore thumb. But it was too late to move—the large beast crested over the cliff, in full view. If I could see him, he could see me, too.
It was a huge, scraggly alpha wolf. The cruel gleam in his eyes revealed that it was a shifter, not a mute animal. No animal was capable of the evil thathewas.
A sick feeling of recognition spilled over my guts. I knew him.
Klimt.
He didn’t seem to notice me yet. He hauled a dead deer in his jaws, a young doe, barely a yearling. He disrespectfully tossed it over the side of the cliff where it landed in a crumpled heap, then let out a smug bark. My skin crawled. Klimt didn’t treat living shifters well—of course he wouldn’t treat his prey with respect, either.
But it was no time to think about the prey. I had to leave before he saw me. My eyes darted to the alcove. If I hid there until nightfall, I could slip away undetected.
My heart raced. I took a slow paw-step in the direction of the alcove.
Please, if the gods are done laughing at me, I wouldloveto escape from this shitty situation,I begged silently.
Klimt let out a loud groan, then shifted to human form. I watched him from the corner of my eye. He hadn’t seemed to notice me yet. To my utter disgust, he began pissing in the water—the water that led down the waterfall and fed into the local streams and rivers. Nauseated, I ground my teeth and tried to crawl faster towards the alcove.
But of course, things were neverthateasy for me.
There was a loud, obvious sniffing of the air, followed by, “Holy shit.”
I bit my tongue enough to draw blood.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” Klimt called loudly. “If it isn’t my favorite omega.”
Cold dread gripped me. It wasn’t just Klimt’s declaration that filled me with despair.
It was also the fact that, at that precise moment, I became aware of a familiar, warm throb beneath my stomach.
The telltale sensation of my heat about to begin.
4
Nero
No offenseto my brother and every other freshwater fish out there, but this watersucked ass.
After a few hours of attempting to swim in the river, I gave up. My shark form didnotlike the tingly, ultra-fresh sensation of non-salty water. It was like swimming in diluted toothpaste—doable, but why the hell would I ever want to? It was easier to get out, grow legs again, and just walk the old-fashioned way. I was a little jealous of those wolf-people and their useful animal forms. They got to be cool, four-legged animals. I just turned into a carnivorous fish.
It wasn’t all bad, though. My sense of smell was now highly attuned. That took a while to get used to. I could smell specific scents from miles away—blood, mostly. Stereotypical, I know.
Honestly, I didn’t know where I was going. I was just following the river since it was a source of water, food, and transportation all at once. It was my only lifeline in the middle of fucking nowhere.
I left home a few days ago. I’d hopped the fence to a nearby wildlife reserve (thanking my delinquent teenage self for the prior experience) and journeyed ahead from there, leaving the canyon far behind me. The landscape turned from dusty desolate rock to lush, vibrant fields. I had to admit, even though the canyon was beautiful in its own way, this place was gorgeous. It was untouched and picturesque, like a photo on a postcard.
Still no Wi-Fi, though.
I sighed. What was I doing here? It was pretty and all, but I didn’t exactly feel spiritually enlightened or whatever was supposed to happen. I hadn’t found my asshole Dad, I hadn’t discoveredwhyI could shapeshift into a bloodthirsty fish, and—to be honest—I was lonely as hell. Even though I argued with Nishiki often, I missed having someone around.
I thought about that family of shifters. They were all so happy, and not the kind of fake happy I saw on social media all the time back when I actually had a phone. Were the shifters inherently obnoxiously joyful all the time, or were theythatsatisfied with their lives?
A huge span of grassy wilderness stretched out before me. Wherever I was going, I obviously had a long walk ahead of me, so I paused to stretch and groaned as I cracked my joints.
Maybe this is a waste of time,I thought.I don’t see any leads here, and—
A strange scent tickled my nose. My brain short-circuited.
I stared. There was nothing ahead but grass.
