The day passed in a haze. I’m not entirely sure what we did with our time. I seem to remember going fishing again at some point. I was having a hard time thinking straight. Jules was talking a lot and I was struggling to follow what he was saying.

We sat on the logs around the fire pit and watched the moon rise as evening drew in. The moon was swollen and full. Heavy. Ripe. I felt the same way. The shift came upon me suddenly. It felt almost like the first shift. Like I didn’t have a whole lot of say in the matter. My run that night was different, too. It felt more like a shifting dream than reality. Just like the dreams, that night I felt one thing. One thing, only.

Rage.

Hot, burning rage.

As I ran, the trees and the branches flashed past me in a blur. The forest was alive with sounds of alarm. Every living thing seemingly aware that I was in play. That I was there. That I was a danger to them. That I was there to deliver what I was made for: death and destruction. And deliver it, I did. I unleashed nothing short of carnage. I was a predator and everything in my way was prey. I was hungry. Insatiable. The night felt unending. It went on and on. In fact, it was still going on when I became distantly aware of something. A sound. A word. It was strangely familiar. It sounded like something I’d heard before. It was already light. I was at the river, quenching my thirst when I heard it.

“Sully.”

I looked up and snarled when I saw the shape of a man. It took me a second to register that it was Jules. It took me even longer to register that I was me. “Sully, it’s over,” he said. “The moon’s waning. The night is over. It’s daytime. You need to shift back.”

I blinked at him for several long moments.

“I’m serious, Sully. You need to shift back now.”

There was an edge in his voice and my wolf didn’t like it.

You don’t control me, it snapped, and I stepped forward toward him.

As I did it, my vision brightened. The whole world snapped into sharp focus. Jules crouched down onto his haunches, so that we were eye to eye. I could see the whites of his eyes, and I liked it. He held his hands out, palms outstretched, where I could see them. “Sully,” he said gently, “your eyes . . . there’s . . . look at your eyes, Sully. You need to see them.”