Our skin gets thicker, living out in the snow
CREVAN
Crevan thinks. And thinks. And thinks some more.
He's not sure he likes the thought, but boredom is all too real and a curious question had staggered drunkenly across his mind just as he was waking up. ("Those fucking half-formed ideas," He thinks as he pads along, "Are fucking bird food.")
And this is what the tawny wolf repeats for the remainder of the day as he hunts, eats, rests, and runs. ("Bird food, useless fodder that will end up as shit. Bird food.")
Still, the curious question refuses to be shaken free. He pants through a row of jagged teeth, slows his run to an ambling walk along the Riverbank, and tries to convince himself that no, just because years have passed since he'd last worn his horse skin, it doesn't mean that he won't be able to shift back. The idea was perposterous! And even if it was true("Not true, it's a stupid idea." He thinks,) even if it was true it certainly wouldn't bother him.
Would it?
See, what the warg knows but won't admit is that for the first time in a while, that other, less-appealing horsey side is calling to him. Crevan can hardly believe it, but Nature is working against him with the turn of the seasons and he feels almost sick with desire to be a horse. To walk among the others and not recieve curious stares, to find a companion that truly was his species ...
"God you're an idiot." He chides himself aloud, shaking his bulky head side-to-side with an exasperated snarl. "Merida is horse too, just as much as you. What's so different now?!" He argues with himself, lost in the idea that he's alone out here in this sometimes forgotten expanse of territory. "If you're so afraid you might never fit in, just fucking shift already!" He screams at his own body, angry that he even wanted to change back.
Regardless of intent, his body complies.
Like a rubber band being snapped back into place, he shift simultaneously and painfully. The shape of his skin bursts at the seams, ribbons apart to allow his true form expansion and growth. His mouth, parted in a squeal that turns to throaty roar, snaps and rearranges itself as the rest follows suit. Crevan the wolf turns to Crevan the horse - in a blink - and when he's left standing on four hooves, there's not much left for him to do but crumple.
He's not in pain (not anymore, at least) but he's certainly in shock. Wide-eyed and motionless, Crevan watches nothing but the occasional blue of his navy mane as it dances across his vision now and then. He was a colt the last time he'd worn this skin ... just a boy.
He thinks he might actually be sick.
@[Solace]