Blood-smell. Close. Mine.
The thought wasn't shaped like words. It was a pressure behind my eyes, a pull in my gut so strong it hurt. My fingers—claws—tightened around the torn strip of meat before I realized I was holding it. Warm. Slippery. Too soft to be anything but fresh.
The forest breathed around me.
Leaves rustled high above, disturbed by frantic movement. Something heavy crashed through undergrowth to my right. To my left, a shrill scream cut short with a wet, choking sound.
I jerked my head up.
The world snapped into brutal focus.
The carcass lay between roots thick as walls, its ribcage split open like a broken crate. Steam curled up into the green-tinted air. Pale yellow lights drifted lazily overhead—moths, too big and too bright, their wings shedding a sick glow as they dipped and rose. Each time one brushed blood, the light pulsed stronger.
Shapes moved around the carcass.
Goblins.
Three of them, maybe four, all gray-green like me, all smaller than I remembered people being. They snarled and shouted half-words, voices sharp and ugly, tugging at the carcass with hands and crude tools. One held a bone knife. Another had a sharpened stick. The smallest had nothing at all, just fingers sunk into meat as if letting go would mean death.
Opposite them, crouched low and tense, were the things I'd glimpsed before.
Needlewolves.
They were wrong in a way that made my skin crawl. Too lean. Too coiled. Their fur bristled into stiff, needle-like quills along their backs and shoulders, rising and falling as they breathed. Their muzzles were stained dark. Their eyes caught the moth-light and reflected it back, bright and unblinking.
One of the goblins lunged forward, shrieking.
The Needlewolf snapped.
Jaws closed around the goblin's throat. There was a sound like cloth tearing, only wetter. The goblin's scream cut off instantly, replaced by a bubbling rattle as the wolf shook its head once—quick, practiced—and released.
The body collapsed into the mud like it had never been alive.
For half a heartbeat, nobody moved.
Then the others surged forward with renewed desperation.
My stomach twisted hard.
I didn't think this is dangerous or I should run. My mind was still tangled in shock, in wrongness, in the lingering echo of dying breath.
My body moved anyway.
My legs pushed off the ground and I sprinted, low and fast, feet barely slipping despite the mud. The forest blurred at the edges as something inside me sharpened, every sound separating into clean layers: wingbeats above, snarls ahead, the wet squelch of feet in soil.
I shouldn't be able to do this.
The thought barely formed before one of the Needlewolves turned its head.
It saw me.
Its lips peeled back, revealing rows of narrow teeth slick with blood. Quills rose along its spine like a crown.
It sprang.
I ducked without thinking. The wolf sailed over me, jaws snapping shut on empty air where my neck had been. Hot breath brushed my ear, carrying the copper stink of blood and animal musk.
Pain exploded in my hands as I slammed them into its side.
The quills stabbed deep, sharp and unforgiving, punching through skin. I hissed and almost let go—but something inside me snarled louder. My fingers dug in anyway, claws hooking into fur and flesh.
I heaved.
The Needlewolf yelped as I wrenched it sideways and slammed it into the carcass. Bone cracked. The sound vibrated through my arms. The wolf thrashed, claws scrabbling uselessly in the mud.
The other Needlewolf lunged at the goblin with the bone knife, teeth sinking into its shoulder. Flesh tore. Blood sprayed. The goblin screamed and stabbed wildly, blade skittering uselessly across quill-fur.
The moths dipped lower, their glow intensifying.
My vision tunneled.
Move.
I bit.
I don't remember deciding to do it. My mouth opened and my teeth sank into the wolf beneath me. Fur gave way. Skin split. Hot blood flooded my mouth, thick and salty and wrong.
My stomach lurched—and then roared.
I clamped down harder.
The Needlewolf shrieked, a high, furious sound that rattled my skull. Its body convulsed under me, muscles spasming, quills shuddering. I felt something give. A final tremor ran through it, then nothing.
It went limp.
For a fraction of a second, the world went quiet.
Then a translucent blue window flared in front of my eyes.
Needlewolf — Killed+5 EXP
The letters hovered, crisp and unreal, before vanishing as quickly as they'd appeared.
I barely noticed.
Because the fight wasn't over.
The second Needlewolf was still tearing into the goblin with the bone knife. Its jaws were clamped around the goblin's upper arm, shaking violently. Skin peeled back in ragged strips. Muscle stretched and snapped. The goblin's scream degenerated into hoarse, animal sounds.
I gagged.
The goblin tried to pull away. The wolf yanked harder.
With a wet crack, the arm came free—not cleanly, but in a mess of sinew and bone fragments. Blood fountained across the leaves. The goblin collapsed, clutching the stump, shrieking in agony.
I staggered back a step, breath coming in ragged gasps.
The wolf turned toward me, eyeing me with one uninjured eye, the other already darkening from a shallow cut. It circled, quills raised, weight low. Not charging. Measuring.
Smart.
The goblin with the spear—where had he come from?—charged in with a desperate howl. He slammed the spear into the wolf's ribs. The point punched in, but not deep enough.
The wolf snapped sideways and caught him.
Not in the arm.
In the face.
Teeth sank into nose and cheek and lip. Flesh tore free in a spray of blood and teeth. The goblin screamed, the sound muffled and distorted by the wolf's jaws.
I felt something inside me crack.
This wasn't a fight. This was slaughter.
The goblin with the spear convulsed, hands flailing, then found the shaft and drove it forward again and again without aim, just pushing. The spear point punched into the wolf's belly.
The wolf howled and reared back, ripping its jaws free.
The goblin's face was ruined. Half of it hung in strips. One eye dangled uselessly. His scream turned into a choking gurgle as blood flooded his mouth.
The wolf staggered, wounded but alive.
I moved.
I don't remember deciding. My body just surged forward, grabbed a half-buried rock slick with moss and blood, and swung.
The first blow landed with a dull thud against the wolf's skull. Not a crack. Not enough.
The wolf snapped at the air, jaws clacking.
I hit it again.
Again.
The third strike made something inside give. The skull softened under impact, collapsing inward with a sickening crunch. The wolf's quills sagged. Its legs buckled.
I brought the rock down one more time.
The Needlewolf went still.
The blue window flared again, uninvited.
Needlewolf — Killed+5 EXP
I dropped the rock.
My arms shook violently. My hands throbbed where quills had punctured them, pain bright and insistent. My mouth tasted like blood and iron and something else—something feral.
I swallowed hard and almost retched.
Around me, the forest was a tableau of ruin.
Two goblins lay dead in the mud. One stared up at the canopy with empty eyes, throat torn open so wide I could see spine. Another lay twisted beneath the wolf, half his face gone, mouth frozen open as if still trying to scream.
A third goblin sat a few steps away, clutching his severed arm's stump, rocking back and forth and making small, broken noises that were worse than screams.
The goblin with the bone knife crouched near the carcass, shoving bloody meat into his mouth with shaking hands, eyes wide and unfocused.
The moths hovered lower, greedy and bright.
And then—
Movement.
A small shape burst out of the underbrush to my left, tripping over roots and nearly falling flat.
A goblin.
Smaller than the others. Thinner. A scrap of vine tied around his head like a headband. His eyes were huge, white showing all around, and his chest heaved like he'd been running for his life.
He saw the bodies.
He froze.
Then he saw me.
Relief crashed across his face so hard it almost hurt to see.
"Vark!" he squeaked.
The name slammed into place inside my head like it had always been there.
Vark.
Not Patrick. Not anymore.
The goblin stumbled toward me, waving a short stick like it might help. "Vark! Help! They— they—"
Something burst from the brush behind him.
Another Needlewolf.
It moved like a thrown blade, low and fast, jaws opening wide.
The goblin—Mogrin, my mind supplied without asking—turned just in time to see it.
His eyes went impossibly wide.
He raised his stick.
I grabbed him.
My fingers hooked into the back of his tunic and I yanked him sideways with everything I had. Mogrin flew through the air and landed in the mud with a startled squeal.
The Needlewolf's jaws snapped shut on nothing, teeth clicking together inches from where Mogrin's neck had been.
The wolf skidded, snarling, quills flaring.
It turned on me.
My vision blurred at the edges. My chest burned. Thoughts started slipping, turning jagged.
Too close. Teeth. Move.
Mogrin scrambled behind me, trying to stand, failing, pushing himself up again. "I— I scout!" he blurted, voice cracking. "I brave! I not scared!"
"Quiet," I snapped, the word coming out harsher than I meant.
Mogrin flinched, staring at me like he hadn't expected me to sound like that.
The Needlewolf lowered its head.
It was going to spring.
I shifted my weight without thinking, feet sliding into a stance that felt natural and alien at the same time. The carcass was behind me. Roots to the left. Mud everywhere.
The wolf leapt.
I ducked again—but it didn't sail over me this time. It twisted midair, clever and cruel, angling to land behind me and rake my spine.
Something slammed into its side.
The goblin with the spear—face ruined, blood pouring—had lunged one last time. His shoulder smashed into the wolf, throwing its trajectory off. They crashed together into the mud.
The wolf reacted instantly, jaws snapping shut around the goblin's face again.
Not the cheek.
The mouth.
Teeth crushed jaw. Bone snapped. Flesh tore away in long strips as the wolf shook its head.
The goblin's body spasmed, then went slack.
The wolf panted, blood dripping from its muzzle, still alive.
I was already moving.
The rock was still at my feet. I snatched it up and brought it down.
Once.
The wolf flinched.
Twice.
Its quills rattled.
Three times.
The skull collapsed with a wet crunch.
The wolf went still.
The blue window flared again.
Needlewolf — Killed+5 EXP
I staggered back, breath ragged, ears ringing.
Silence fell in a strange, hollow way, broken only by the goblin with the severed arm's soft keening and the distant rustle of leaves.
I turned to Mogrin.
He was crouched in the mud, staring at the dead wolf, then at me. His mouth hung open. His eyes shone with fear and something like awe.
"You… you smash," he whispered.
"Move," I said, because if I didn't give my mouth something to do, I was going to scream.
Mogrin scrambled up and obeyed immediately, staying close behind me like a shadow.
More shapes emerged from the forest.
Goblins.
They approached cautiously, drawn by blood and moth-light, eyes sharp and appraising. They took in the dead wolves. The dead goblins. Me, standing there with a rock dripping blood.
Murmurs rippled through them.
"Wolf-dead.""Who kill?""Blood-bring.""Bad luck."
One goblin stepped forward, older, scarred, one ear torn halfway off. A necklace of teeth and bone clicked against his chest as he moved.
He sniffed the air, eyes narrowing on me.
"You," he said, pointing. "You Vark?"
"Yes," I said, swallowing hard.
"Vark talk clean," he said flatly. "Weird."
A few goblins snickered.
Mogrin puffed up behind me, trying to be brave. "Vark good! Vark save Mogrin! Vark smash wolf!"
The older goblin's gaze flicked to Mogrin. "Mogrin little scout," he said dismissively. "Mogrin always trouble."
Mogrin's shoulders slumped, but he stood his ground.
The older goblin looked back at me. "You smash wolf," he said grudgingly. "You bring fight. You bring moth."
He gestured at the carcass. "Meat is tribe. We take."
As goblins began hauling meat and wounded away, the older one leaned closer, eyes hard.
"Boss want see you," he said. "Boss decide if Vark stay."
He drew a finger across his throat.
The message was clear.
Mogrin clutched my arm, whispering, "Boss maybe okay. Boss strong."
I didn't answer.
I looked at the bodies one last time as the forest swallowed the blood-stained ground behind us.
I had survived.
Barely.
And now every eye in the tribe was on me—not with gratitude, but with calculation.
Because in this forest, strength wasn't safety.
It was attention.