I held out my hand for him to see. As we watched, my skin slowly knitted itself back together. Obviously, we both knew that shifted wolves had the ability to heal. We’d grown up hearing people talking about it, and from time to time, we’d seen our parents heal. It was normal. It was to be expected. But up until that very moment, it sure as hell wasn’t normal for me. I was completely amazed, and I think Jules was, too.

When we finished eating, I pulled on a pair of sweatpants and hit the sack. I was so exhausted and my belly so full, I was only very slightly bothered by the fact that Jules was lying next to me in nothing but his boxer briefs.

“Sully,” Jules mumbled before drifting off, “I don’t mean to alarm you, but there’s something weird going on with your hair.”

I was drifting off and thought it was the food coma talking, so it didn’t alarm me in the slightest.

That night, we shifted again. I ran through the woods with Jules at my heels. That time, the second time we shifted, we hunted together. I caught the scent first. A deer. A doe. A good size but old. Slow. Definitely something worth killing. My memories of the hunt are hazy. There were flashes of brown, green and red. The sound of blood rushing through my veins and my paws hitting the ground. Inside me there was a bloodlust so strong, I couldn’t feel another thing. In human form, I had mixed feelings about hunting. Strictly speaking, I was against it. I thought it was cruel. My wolf saw it differently. It relished the hunt, the chase, and, yes, even the kill. Especially the kill.

When it was done, I became aware of myself snarling as I stood over our kill. I felt as far from human as it was possible to feel. Jules’s wolf eyes were lowered. He was salivating down his canines. He took a tentative step or two back, and even though I’d had my doubts about whether I would be able to do such a thing, I stepped forward and took the first bite.

I woke up on the soft grass that grew on the banks of the river. It was a surprisingly sensible place for a wolf to pass out. I was covered in dried blood. I needed a bath and I needed it fast. Jules was already in the water. His hair was wet and slicked back off his face. Tiny droplets of water had collected on his thick, dark lashes and they were glittering as they reflected the sun. I joined him in the water.

“Was that some night, or what?” he said as we both scrubbed ourselves.

“You’re telling me. It was way different from how I imagined it would be.”