Page 53 of Marked By His Hunger
Like wild thyme crushed under boots.
Wet moss.
Summer roses growing stubbornly between ancient stone.
Memory I couldn’t have owned slammed into me so violently I nearly dropped from the sky.
My village before the curse deepened.
Mornings before hunger ruled my blood.
Sunlight filtering through fir branches.
This scent did not belong to this gray island.
It belonged to something living.
I inhaled again, desperate, greedy.
Then, I saw her.
She stood near the back of a line of students, feet dragging slightly as she walked.
Curves soft and generous beneath her long coat clothes.
Dark hair pulled back.
One hand pressed to her lips, pale from something, sickness maybe?
Another girl held her elbow, whispering reassurance.
Human.
No.
Human-adjacent.
There was something beneath her skin. Something old.
What supernatural got sick crossing the veil?
I frowned.
My hunger shifted.
Not gone.
Never gone.
But narrowed.
Focused.
Instead of devouring the entire dock in a red frenzy, my Bloodlust sharpened into a single, blinding point.
Her.
The idea of harming her sent ice through my veins.
