Black stitches of tree shrouded the sky, blanketing the forest in a meditative, balming darkness. All around, the air was cool and wet as Isol padded over a bed of moss.
Ah, yes. The floor of a forest was meant to be trod by four feet, not two. Isol’s tail swished with satisfaction. Minty fingers of forest air stroked his fur as pines whistled to his left and to his right. In his human form, he would have shivered and prickled, but today, he was a stag. Brilliant and unbothered.
Water pittered in the distance, echoing, drumming softly off the tree trunks as Isol trotted by. His ears flickered, attempting to track the sound. His mouth felt very dry. The bubbling grew louder, and the canopy grew more sparse, letting golden tongues of sunlight poke through as Isol came to the edge of a glade. Isol bounded towards the clearing, eager for the crisp drink, but when the stream came into view, he froze.
He had never seen water so cherry red. Crimson trails of blood snaked down the stream, marbling it like the grain on a tree. Isol approached the fallen deer, its ruptured flank sagging into the peat, and stared with wet eyes.
Through the unwatched door, Death always intrudes. The Druid Mother’s words echoed in Isol’s mind as he gazed upon the hunted creature. He sighed with disdain, wishing the blame fell on Death for intruding and not on the tiny fawn for turning its back. But this was a fleeting thought, for Isol was not so naive. Listening for heavy footsteps, Isol padded over to the clear part of the stream and drank.
As he bounded through the woods, Isol grasped for the peace he’d known just minutes earlier, but the breeze was still, and the trees were quiet. Isol wondered, bitterly, if the spirit of the forest had died with the fawn in the clearing. He knew this wasn’t so, but the forest’s gentle beauty seemed suddenly sour and foreign. Isol dug his hooves into the dirt, channeling the currents of brisk, sacred energy that thrummed through every root of every plant in the dark expanse. Finally, his mind felt clear, and he continued on.
He felt the shot before he heard it. A burning, ripping feeling as flesh was torn from bone. A shattering of the misty ambient. Isol jerked through the air, his mind a sudden firestorm of light and adrenaline. Through the piercing ring in his ears, he became numbly aware of boots crunching towards him, and instinct seized control.
Isol’s bones snapped and melted as he gave himself up to the chaotic, shadowy nexus of power burning in his core. A torrent of smog clogged his eyes and throat as the primal urge to live screamed between his cells. It was painful, inelegant, not at all the peaceful transformation he’d become accustomed to, but then again, he’d never been shot before. The fear in his heart stretched outward like arcane fingers, pulling at the edges of his amorphous shadow and molding his body into the thorny, black jaws of a dire wolf. Stalking towards the hunter, Isol’s consciousness gave in to the snarling, hungry spirit of rage.
(original painting Deer in a Pine Forest by Gustave Doré)