𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐢𝐠𝐧 𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬. sam uley

𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐭𝐰𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐲-𝐨𝐧𝐞

Mourning is muted. It is soft rain on leaves, dripping onto the forest floor. It is Sam's wolf, running across the country, howls breaking through his body in broken wails. It is the thunder that cracks through the sky. It is the lightning cracking in front of him, striking through a tree with anger. With vigor and malice, a destructive force that takes.

Takes and takes and takes.

Sage.

Sage is gone.

We are gone.

Gone, gone, gone.

No more.

His wolf is sullen. The ache is deep. He is the wolf and the wolf is him.

He doesn't mind.

❧

Where is she?

They sniffle into the ground, the big black wolf, running through the forest, searching with unseeing eyes.

They search for her in green trees, look for her in shadows. She curls around them, they think.

Ours.

And it is followed by the deep, guttural ache, the sense of gone.

Of longing.

Of desperation.

They look for her in shadows.

Night is their favorite because she loved it. She loved the moon, thought the stars were painted for her. She traced them in the sky with her fingers, wondered if vampires could go to space. She was curious, they thought. Curious and inquisitive.

They look towards the moon sometimes, as though she's far away, visiting the vast craters rather than burnt into the ground as ashes. That way, there is hope.

Even the impossible is better than the alternative that Sage is dead.

They howl most nights.

Most nights, the shadows resemble a person.