Only a thread of moonlight shaped him. Still, something seemed wrong. In the darkness, she leaned, trying to see.

“Wolf?” she said.

As he drew closer, she gasped.

The beast that came toward her—she could scarcely recognize it. It was matted. Rank. Monstrous. Its eyes were filled with a desperate, vicious hunger.

It bared its teeth.

She shrank away.

The noise that was coming from it—high-pitched, unnatural—she could not bear it. She scrabbled, backing herself against the stones. Nowhere to go, she closed her eyes. She put her hands to her ears. Some terror of hunger had overwhelmed the wolf; it had become something monstrous. This creature would tear her apart.

Heart beating through her skin, she braced, expecting to feel its jaws rip through her flesh.

“Wolf,” she forced herself to say. She would not leave the wolf alone in the horror that had overtaken it. Disintegrating with fear, she patted the ground beside her. “Wolf.” She could manage no more than a whisper.

The creature slunk closer, shaping itself out of the shadows.

What had happened to it? A scar, hot and raw, twisted over its face. Had it always been there? Had she simply not seen it before? The wound cut across its head and muzzle, a long carving of cruelty.

Teeth gleaming, it made again the same unearthly growling noise.

Trembling, she reached toward the beast. Hardly daring to breathe, she laid her palm on its head and, light as air, ran her fingers over the wound.

The creature was burning—its pelt, its scar so hot, she almost drew her hand away. But she left it, gently patting its head. “There you are,” she said softly. “It’s all right. You’ll be all right.”

The creature’s whole body shook as though it were sobbing. It curled onto the straw; she let it lie beside her. For a long time, its chest heaved—over and over—great gasping, desperate breaths. Then, slowly, slowly, the beast grew calm; its ribs rose and fell with the steadiness of sleep.

Rae, keeping her hand on its shoulder, closed her eyes, relieved that whatever ferocity had gripped the wolf seemed to have passed.

The creeping things—beetles and mites and sow bugs and grubs and worms—still clinging to the pelt they had unpicked, stirred. A new body was holding the pelt. Ooooohhhhhh, they sighed. Ooooohhhhhh. They shivered with excitement. What was this?

Delicate legs, delicate mouths, they felt all around the sleeping body. It was a man, but… there was not much there that was man. Not much really alive… or even dead—at least in the way they knew life and death—green, burgeoning, spirited—even in decay. Such a shame, they thought. Was there anything to do with this figure?

The man felt hot. Dry. Almost crumbly. Like clay dried by the sun. Like cake overcooked in the oven. Like cheese left too long in the air.

The creeping things skittered over the dry-cheese-man’s form.

There. Dainty stick legs, they discovered a gap. A fracture. A rift along his brow and cheek. They tapped at it, pinched at it with their shiny-dark mandibles. How curious, they thought. A way in.