I was up before the sun cleared the trees. Didn't sleep much anyway, so I was already tired when I got up from my bed.
I pulled a shirt on, went out to the same spot on the grounds I'd used the day before, and stripped it back off. It was a cold morning, colder than yesterday. But nobody around yet except a scout on the far fence who pretended not to watch me.
I focused and let the shift come.
Bones moved first, then fur pushed up through my arms. I hissed at the pain but I held longer this time, maybe forty seconds, and I let myself think it might catch. Then it locked up somewhere in my spine and dropped me. I landed on my knees in the wet grass, breathing hard, half a man and half nothing.
Come on. Don't stop now.
The wolf was there. I could feel it pressing harder than before, clawing toward the surface.
Then something caught.
