Chapter 9
Taylor
CW: death of a predator animal
Brexl was looking irritable and not at all relaxed as he scanned the forest while I searched the trees for mushrooms and the vines for berries. I’d never met anyone in my entire life who was so bad at taking a rest when they needed it.
His color had returned, and he was more active today than yesterday, but I still caught him holding his side and winching when he thought I wasn’t looking.
I plucked another berry off the vine and placed it in my satchel. When I turned to check on Brexl again, he straightened and let his arms that he had grumpily crossed over his chest fall to his sides.
With a sigh, I turned back to my work. I was happily harvesting another delicious mushroom when I heard a wet slicing sound followed by the yelp of a small animal. I ran thought the trees to find Brexl in his shifter form holding onto a dead rabbit-like creature.
This time, it was my turn to cross my arms over my chest with a sour expression on my face.
As soon as our eyes met his tail started to nervously thump the ground, and he wore a sheepishly apologetic expression much like a child who just got caught with their hand in the cookie jar.
“I didn’t move much. It was basically right in front of me.”
When I continued to stare at him, he added, “It would have been less restful to watch the animal scamper by instead of just going for the easy kill.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose and sighed.
“Sit.” I pointed to the fallen tree that he had been sitting on earlier, and he obediently sat down.
“Stay.” His shoulders slumped and he nodded his head.
“and thank you, for hunting that for us.” I couldn’t help but add. We did need food, and I wasn’t going to begrudge him for providing some.
Brexl gave me a proud smile before promising he’d stay put this time.
I returned to my work of gathering forageable food, but it wasn’t long before I heard the familiar wet slicing sound of Brexl’s claws sinking into an animal.
I huffed, and readied myself to deliver another speech on how important it is for an injured person to rest when I came out from behind a tree to find a dead jagwa hanging from his claws.
“Our foraging trip is over.” He said with a grimace that told me whatever he had to do to bring the jagwa down had caused him pain.
“That sounds good to me.” I swallowed hard as I watched blood from the animal’s neck drip down to the ground. It was a ferocious creature that resembled an earth jaguar, but instead of fur, it had thick green tendrils that resembled the vines that clung to nearly every tree in the forest. And yet there it was hanging from Brexl’s claws as if it were nothing.
His skill at killing things was unmatched by any of the other guys, and unfortunately for me, I had a weakness for a man with talent. His skills were impressive and on the few occasionsthat he’d threatened violence on my behalf, it excited me. I should probably unpack that sometime, but not today.
“Should we head back to the cave?” I suggested and Brexl nodded his head.
Once we’d returned to the spot we’d claimed on the beach, Brexl got to work skinning the animals and I laid out the mushrooms on a rock to dry in the sun.
Brexl had just finished skinning the rabbit and was about to start skinning the jagwa when I asked, “can you teach me how to skin an animal? I’ve watched you do it a of couple times now, but I’d like to learn the technique. I might be stuck alone in the woods sometime and get tired of surviving off of berries and mushrooms.”
“You’ll never be alone in the woods.” His tone was even, and measured and his expression was serious. I had meant it as a joke, but he did not take it as such.
It didn’t even take him half a day to rescue me from Scaron, I had no doubt that he could rescue me from anything or anyone.
“But I will show you how to skin an animal if you’d like.”
I watched as Brexl pointed to where he would cut the hide of the jagwa.
“If I cut it here, the skin will be harder to pull off, but here, down the middle, it will come off in one large piece instead of many smaller ones.”
“That makes sense,” I commented.
