Wolf
The wolf opens his eyes drowsily when he feels a sudden chill in his bones. His head snaps up, and his hackles raise in unease as he takes in the strangely motionless canopy, the smothering heaviness of the limp wind, the stench of decay in the air, the unnatural silence. He leaps to his paws and bares his teeth, backing up against a nearby tree trunk. His sharp senses tell him that ahead in the bushes, something is approaching at rapid speed.
Tendrils of grey smoke curl into view, wrapping around trees and shrubbery. Everything touched by its toxic fingers are wiped from colour. Lush leaves shrivel and dry; a bird crashes through stony branches and tumbles to the ground, colourless wings frozen in flight.
Dark magic.
The wolf turns and runs; not a moment too soon, for he feels ice cold breaths on his tail which seep through his bones even as he shoots through the dying forest. He is faster than the advancing line of magic, but he knows better than to slow. However, when the unaffected landscape ahead of him begins to transition into the same withered and dull-coloured scenery, he skids to a halt as he realises where the smoky wall has driven him.
Long ago, before his ancestors had arrived at this forest, there lived a malevolent hag who murdered woodland creatures and used their body parts to replace her own. This tale had been told to his ancestors by other animals who had managed to escape from her hut, each missing an assortment of limbs, eyes, or teeth. Eventually, the hag had been killed by a passing centaur with his wood axe. It is said that her heart kept beating after it was separated from the hag's body, and could not be destroyed no matter the woodman's efforts. Ultimately, all the centaur could do was cast a spell of dormancy and bury it deep in the floor of the hut, unwilling to carry it elsewhere for fear of further pollution. Soon after, the forest was restored and no trace of the hag's magic remained, save the circular area around the hut that had been damaged beyond recovery.
The wolf has been driven into the old hag's former territory. He had not sensed it before, but now he tastes the bitterness of dark magic, faint as the stench is, emitting from his east as well as the menacing wall of mist on his west. Although the hag is long vanquished, he has no desire to go further into her territory. He is trapped.
As the stronger magic closes in however, he is left with no choice but to flee further to his east. The more he runs, the more desolate the landscape becomes. All of a sudden, he bursts into a small clearing and immediately skids to a halt.
In front is the hag's dilapidated hut, its decayed ruins spilling the stench of murder and terror. He only just manages to stop himself from backing away in revulsion. The mist is seconds away now, but he can't bring himself to go closer to the hut or even around it. His body tenses and he braces himself as the magic reaches the clearing–
Without warning, or any reason as far as the wolf could detect, the smoke suddenly stops advancing. His eyes flit around warily, for he wonders if even worse than dark magic is something with the power to stop - or control - it.
The sound of a snapped twig is like a gunshot in the eerie silence. In the blink of an eye, the wolf is crouched behind a wilted bush, his grey-brown fur camouflaged with colour of the lifeless plant.
A young girl steps into view on the other side of the clearing. She wears a bright red cloak, vivid against her bloodless skin. Her face lights up with a smile as she skips toward the ruins of the hut.
"Grandma," she sings. "I've come to make you better!" Her voice sends chills down the wolf's spine. Piercing yellow eyes follow the girl as she enters the shack and kneels to the ground. She presses her hands to the earth, and the wolf feels tremors disturb the earth beneath his paws. Then the girl stands up, something dark red and pulsing in her fist.
Fear floods ice through the wolf's veins, and he scans the clearing urgently for an escape route. He realises that the wall of magic had in fact been a ring, which now formed a complete barrier around the clearing.
"Now for the body," the girl announces, attracting the wolf's full attention. She turns around and stares directly into his eyes. "The wolf will have to do."
Heart in his throat, and the wolf wills his limbs to move, to flee, but they are locked in place. The girl takes a step towards him, blood red lips curved into a falsely charming smile. "Don't worry, Wolfy. This won't hurt."
She giggles and looks apologetically at the thing in her hand. "Sorry grandma. I know I'm not supposed to tell fibs." She moves closer, and the wolf sees the glint of metal in the hand held behind her back.
"Oh, what nice fur you have, Wolfy," she coos. An unsettling gleam appears in her eyes. "All the better to dress grandma in…" Still, his muscles will not obey his mind. For the first time, the formidable predator feels the fear of its prey.
"What beautiful eyes you have, Wolfy." The girl steps closer. "All the better for grandma to see with…" The wolf regains enough control of his body to bare his teeth in a snarl. The girl is unperturbed. Instead, she tilts her head to the side innocently.
"What beautiful teeth you have, Wolfy," she observes. "All the better for grandma to bite with." Before he has time to blink, she has raised the knife in a fluid motion above her head. She slashes it down.
But the wolf is still a predator, his reflexes as sharp as the blade poised in her hand, coupled now with the desperation of a cornered animal. He sees it coming. He had been crouched like a coiled spring, but now he bursts forward. He bites and tears at her throat, ripping through her pale skin. All of her former grace and delicacy is gone as the girl stumbles and falls heavily, limbs strewn awkwardly on the ground. Round black eyes widen, showing their whites, glazing over as her lifeblood seeps into the dry, bleached earth. The wolf feels the life ebb out of her as her heart stills.
The wall of dark magic surrounding the clearing retreats as suddenly as it came, and the wolf senses the outer forest slowly being restored to life. But there is something stopping him from returning to the safety of familiar territory yet. The wolf narrows his eyes at the old hag's pulsing heart on the ground, fallen from her granddaughter's hand. He knows he has to destroy it – but how?
Without thinking, the wolf takes the heart in his mouth and swallows it whole. Though it barely has time to skim across his tongue, he gags and retches from the putrid taste and the slimy texture. When the taste has subsided, he twitches his nose in satisfaction and leaves the clearing.
But strange feeling comes over him as he slinks into the trees.
Cold seeps into his own heart and his body creaks with unusual weariness. His eyes become clouded. The wolf shakes his head to clear his sight. He feels suddenly irritated by his limited lupine eyesight. He longs for the vision of an eagle, or perhaps a leopard. Somehow, a knowledge and lust to harvest another animal's vision for his own infiltrates in his mind as a pulsating beat grows from within his belly, and the rhythm inside his chest weakens…