Cry Wolf by Aurelia T. Evans

him.
    When he slipped out of her, his seed dripped down her thighs to join the wetness of her own pleasure.
    “But hopefully not in the ways that count,” Kelly added. She helped him to his feet. “Am I like Grant, Malcolm?”
    “No. You’ve got some of the things that he had, but you’re not him. You’re not,” he replied, reassuring her.
    “Then why do you suspect that that’s what you’ll become?” Kelly asked. “Grant was insane. Everyone’s a little nutty, but he was completely pecan pie. Yes, you’ll have some adjustments to make, but I’m here to help you. I’ve got the experience and control that you’ll learn in time. And I also know when to let experience and control fuck off and give the wolf room to stretch its legs.”
    “I’m just so angry,” Malcolm said. “I’m furious at people I love. All the time.”
    “The wolf makes it worse, but that kind of anger is normal,” Kelly said, stroking his black hair and running her claws over his scalp. “It’s called grief, honey, and it’s okay. It’s okay to miss what you were. But change is the only constant in life. As therianthrope and now lycanthrope, you should know that better than most.”
    “I didn’t choose this,” Malcolm said, gesturing to his human body, but Kelly watched as fur began to climb up his torso like vines. He truly had a gift.
    “Neither did I,” Kelly said. “Most werewolves don’t. But there’s nothing we can do about it. So let me show you the other thing that makes it worthwhile. Change and run with me.”
    Kelly fell forward onto her front paws, creaking back into her wolf form. Malcolm joined her in wolf skin, and after some hesitation he followed her into the woods.

Chapter Three
    The next morning found them curled together in wolf skin, for closeness rather than warmth.
    Before Malcolm could wake up, Kelly transformed back into her human skin and tucked herself against the rise and fall of his chest. They had run until dawn tinged the horizon and each breath had been a cold, exhilarating knife in her lungs.
    She stroked his wiry fur and slipped into his mind like a warm bath until he surfaced into early wakefulness. His dreams were that of a man, but his wakefulness was that of the werewolf, simpler and more straightforward. Hunger. To his wolf’s nose, though, she would smell like kin rather than prey. She might look like a woman, and she might call what she was human skin, but she wasn’t human anymore.
    His eyes opened, abruptly focusing on her.
    “Malcolm,” Kelly said. “I know you’re hungry. But if you hold yourself together and turn back into a man, we can have breakfast with the others. Do you think you can do that?”
    Kelly eased closer as his body shrank underneath her. His emerging expression was pained. He let her lay against him, however, so his regret wasn’t necessarily for what he had done with her. Kelly knew from experience that the actions of a night could seem embarrassing at best in the morning.
    “Do you feel any better?” Kelly asked, now running her fingers over the dark hair on his chest instead of his fur.
    The whirl of his thoughts came through her fingers like wisps of smoke. She needed him to answer out loud, because that made it truer than if he kept it inside. Inside, he could talk himself out of it. Inside, he could return to the moribund quicksand he had created for himself after his transformation. The hunger that no ordinary food could satisfy, the way his friends now smelt like enemies or food, the violence of his desires—these things only confirmed to him that he was a monster. And if he was a monster, then he deserved every bit of the dreadful loneliness that he’d believed he had left behind him once before.
    And so the thoughts went around in circles, deeper and deeper and deeper. Kelly knew where the whirlpool would take him. As she’d told Ki, it would end in blood either way. Kelly didn’t think Malcolm would ever forgive himself if he hurt any