"Carlin" he seemed to shout through his blue eyes. She had never seen the humanity fight its way to the surface of a shifted wolf. The abnormality startling and wrong. He was on top of her now pinning her to the dew scattered grass, confusion fought to take over the long snout and glowing eyes.
What was he waiting for? Why didn't he go for her throat? She had wiggled the lethal knife she had woven in her curls free but something in his face stayed her hand. The wolf whimpered miserably before springing to life in a fury of fangs and fur. Snapping one warning at Carlin before disappearing from the clearing completely.
She shivered as she clothed herself and replaced the knife to her tangled curls. Walking home in numb silence unwilling to entertain the idea that she recognized something in the wolf, unable to place exactly what that might be.
...
She would write it off to his human eyes, that was the best explanation as to why she didn't kill the beast last night. She needed to speak with Kain. Perhaps he could untwist the distorted pile of thoughts plaguing her mind.
Carlin's mother stood in the door way of the kitchen watching her daughter mutter as she cleaned her axes on the table.
"Little Red those blades already shine." She murmured softly to keep from startling the mess of red hair.
Carlin's predatory eyes flashed to Clarissa. Her mother was a soft and inviting woman with a hard edge people were surprised to find. Carlin was a harsher carbon copy, their single difference in the eyes. Clarissa had sweet honey eyes with soft green flecks that could cut a man to the quick under her thick lashes. That intensity was passed down through the line of hunters that made up her family. They had been hunting wolves for years. Her mother had stopped hunting when she had children. Never wanting that life for her daughter or son, Clarissa discouraged Carlin's grandmother from feeding the obsession rooted in her little Red. Oliver she didn't have to worry about. As a small child he had been maimed by a huge grey beast one full moon. That same night at only twelve Carlin had taken down the wolf by herself. An unheard of event. Hunters didn't kill their first wolf until they were sixteen, even then they never hunted alone.
Carlin stood sheathing her axes and sighing. Dropping a soft kiss to her mother's cheek she sauntered to the door yanking it open. Clarissa watched her daughter in a storm of emotions reach the door, her moods were famous village wide. Then Carlin turned, her face dissolved into a rare smile, the clouded anger and confusion almost leaving her emerald eyes.
"I'm heading to find Kain." She explained with a tilt of her head.
"Bring your brother's medicine from the merchant when you return."
A swift nod and flurry of red hair and cloak chased her out the door with a final snap. Clarissa stood for a second starring at the oak and brass. She should have pushed Carlin's marriage. No girl should be unmarried at seventeen. Woman. She corrected mentally. A fierce hardheaded woman. Turning away she admitted to herself, Carlin could never be pushed into anything.
...
Notes Notes Notes:
If I can organize the scattered notes and thoughts lounging in my phone into something productive with the help of the Twin I'll create another chapter...