The Rogue

XXXIV

*Rian*

One week. Seven days. A lot of hours, although I didn't have the patience to calculate the exact amount in my head. I had been alone for a week. In the woods.

I had never indulged in my wolf for so long without restraint. It was liberating, in a sense. No one was here to make demands of me or slay my heavy shoulders with more responsibility. There was no one for me to answer to but myself. All in all, the experience should have made me glad that I was banned from my pack.

Instead, I found it working against my favor. Each day I felt weaker. I struggled to find the motivation to get up and move, to hunt, to stay alive. Because even though I could do whatever I pleased, I had no real purpose out here. A man without purpose is not a man at all. That was something my scum of a father used to say.

Then there were the memories. I couldn't go longer than two minutes without thinking of Faye. Our memories haunted me. The deeper I fell into my wolf, the heavier my sorrow grew. I just wanted to see her again. To hold her, to kiss her, to bury my face against the mark I left on her neck...it would mean more the world to me.

I wondered if eventually I would just die out here. If one day I decided to simply not move at all. If I let myself melt away. Life without Faye was unbearable, but life without her and purpose was inconceivable. I would choose death over that kind of fate.

Something within me wouldn't let that happen, though. It had been seven days since I'd worn human clothes and eaten human food, and my desire to rekindle my humanity was nearly extinguished. I was contemplating my meaningless life when a deer ambled through the trees about ten yards away. The animal should have been able to smell me. I wasn't exactly hiding here in the leaves or behind a tree.

Instinct propelled me to my feet, the natural inclination to survive overcoming my depression. I scrutinized the small doe for several seconds before deciding the best way to go about this. The neck would be the most efficient way to handle this. My legs were unfurling beneath me with a vicious snarl before my conscience understood what was happening.

The doe lifted her head. Her wide, brown eyes flashed with fear at my sight. Yet when she spun on her hind legs in an attempt to flee, I leapt onto her, knocking her to the ground. My teeth sunk into her neck. I felt the life leech out of her warm blood as energy poured into me.

A burger would have tasted better, but I was getting used to living off the forest animals. My wolf preferred them anyway. Everything here was completely natural and organic.

I was tearing into the deceased creature's hind leg to feast on the muscle when a sound caught my attention. A sound that did not belong here, in the forest. My head snapped up. The smell of flowers reached my nostrils with the breeze. Every cell in my body froze.

She was here. I could smell her. I could hear the gentle patter of her heart and the soft cadence of her voice.

Without giving any thought as to what I was doing, I bolted in the direction of her essence. My love had come for me.