Who is the lamb and who is the knife?
The woman before her morphed from blonde to the warm, dark amber she knew well as Dr. Hart. Where the stranger once stood, blurred static, was now the helper she knew well.
She drew in a breath, slow and tentative at first, the city scent filling her lungs and anchoring there. Her shoulders trembled as she held it, chest tight, then let it go in a shaky exhale that felt like it dragged some of the panic with it. Again, she breathed, eyebrows knit tight, counting without realizing she was counting. Her pulse still raced, but it began to stumble out of its frantic rhythm. The world narrowed to sensory fragments she could catalog: the warmth of the bricks of the buildings that stood shoulder to shoulder to make the alley, the ache in her skull, the smell of the cafe she had just run from.
Wren didn't move from where she had frozen herself, spine still rigid from the spike of panic. The woman’s presence lingered at the edge of her awareness, the mirage of Dr. Hart shifting away and the flick of blonde hair in the breeze returning. She breathed again, this time her brain fixating on a new scent. The scent was wrong for the alley. It cut through the stink of stone and sweat and sun-baked dust. She swallowed and forced herself to breathe again, shallow at first, then deeper, drawn unwillingly toward it.
Just off the path, half-hidden where the light spilled unevenly, a dense cluster of plants thrived in the heat. Wren loosened her grip on herself by degrees, fingers uncurling from her arms. She did not step closer, not yet, but her gaze lingered on the plants as if they were an answer she hadn’t known how to ask for. "What's that?"
She drew in a breath, slow and tentative at first, the city scent filling her lungs and anchoring there. Her shoulders trembled as she held it, chest tight, then let it go in a shaky exhale that felt like it dragged some of the panic with it. Again, she breathed, eyebrows knit tight, counting without realizing she was counting. Her pulse still raced, but it began to stumble out of its frantic rhythm. The world narrowed to sensory fragments she could catalog: the warmth of the bricks of the buildings that stood shoulder to shoulder to make the alley, the ache in her skull, the smell of the cafe she had just run from.
Wren didn't move from where she had frozen herself, spine still rigid from the spike of panic. The woman’s presence lingered at the edge of her awareness, the mirage of Dr. Hart shifting away and the flick of blonde hair in the breeze returning. She breathed again, this time her brain fixating on a new scent. The scent was wrong for the alley. It cut through the stink of stone and sweat and sun-baked dust. She swallowed and forced herself to breathe again, shallow at first, then deeper, drawn unwillingly toward it.
Just off the path, half-hidden where the light spilled unevenly, a dense cluster of plants thrived in the heat. Wren loosened her grip on herself by degrees, fingers uncurling from her arms. She did not step closer, not yet, but her gaze lingered on the plants as if they were an answer she hadn’t known how to ask for. "What's that?"
wren
