The other part of me, calm in a strangely disconnected way, was a sharp beak and feathered wings

turning in a tight circle and diving, air flooding past and a fierce hurtful joy spilling through the

rage to turn it wine-red instead of crimson. It struck to kill, its target the oddly colored cat crouching

on the mats. They crunched together again, in a ball of exploding feathers and multicolored fur.

I got an elbow in the face. She was impossibly fast, but I hadn’t been raised to back down and I was

moving pretty fast myself. Too fast, as if I was like her.

Move it move it move it! Dad yelled inside my head, and for once it didn’t hurt to think of his

voice. I did what he’d taught me—I moved, fist blurring, and the aspect poured through me. I

blocked her strike, almost swept her legs out from under her, and drove her back across the mats

with a flurry of punches. Hooked my fingers and got my fingernails in her skin, yanked on her hair

when she tried to flee. She hit me a good few times, too, but I was past caring.

You can’t fight past a certain point if you care about getting hurt, and I’ve had some practice in running for my life. That will kind of put a different shine on anything, even a girl fight. Only this

wasn’t just a catfight. This was something else. I didn’t even know what word to put on it, unless

that word was serious.

We broke apart as if we’d both planned it that way, as if we were dancing. And I could not ever remember the world being so vividly bright before, each color painted on with deep acrylics, the texture of the mat surfaces achingly rough, every chip and fleck in the paint on the walls crying out in

its own voice. I tasted copper, the smell of her blood in the air mixing with mine, and the fangs in

my mouth physically ached to get some flesh underneath them.

The way my throat ached for hot blood to stroke the rough spot, to soothe the raging thirst threatening to swallow me whole.

I skipped back, she straightened, and the cat leapt as my owl-part missed it by bare millimeters. Another wing-snap, and it veered away, the gym opening like a flower under its belly.

Anna stared at me. My eye was puffing shut, but I could still see her. And the warm balm of the aspect soothed the hurts all over me. I could still feel them, twitching and twinging, but they were

strangely unimportant. She snarled, her upper lip wrinkling, and I snarled right back. The dual

sounds hit an impossibly deep register, stroking the walls and rattling the wooden bleachers.