Homecoming

All at once dozens of bones cracked, breaking and splitting apart almost in unison, shifting their pointed shards through contracting muscles as his limbs forced themselves into those old familiar shapes. His hands and feet split open, dripping viscous blood onto the ground as he squirmed and clawed, pushing the transformation to happen faster. Within his torso ribs cracked and collapsed; he sucked in a breath and tears rolled down his cheeks as the crushing weight of his shifting organs and reforming ribcage stole away his ability to breathe. In his belly organs squirmed and writhed like snakes, twisting and knotting until they found their new places in his changing form. His bones snapped and reformed again and again, growing in size by forcing themselves to heal and splitting open his skin all over his body. Gaping wounds tore wide on his chest, back and hips. Savage spikes of blood soaked bone pierced through his darkening skin; muscles fibres raced in twitching tendrils to cover them and a sudden snapping in his hips threw him onto his side. From the base of his spine a tail had begun to extend, and fur sprouted all over his body, covering him thickly as the final parts of him began to change. His face caved in upon itself, the sockets of his eyes shattering and his mouth collapsing as the bone fragmented and was rebuilt anew.

-----

For a long time after their clash with Nanisca’s clan there was relative peace within the pack. They no longer lived as one under the same roof, but for a time were stronger than ever. Of course, nothing ever lasts, and peace could never be eternal.Hunter and Eve began to struggle, trapped in the futility of what seemed to the once pack alpha to be an eternity of unknowing. With time, her sanity began to slip as stress consumed her.
When they were at their weakest, a familiar face emerged within the forest, full of hate and harbouring twisted intentions. In the wrong place at the wrong time, Eve was captured and dragged away to face a demon she ought to have put to rest long ago.
The pack was on her tail, but time would soon run out. Could they get to her before it was too late, or had their luck finally run out?