Scent of the Heart Read Free Page A

guardian for them was he if he didn’t even know where they were?
    Tightness gripped his chest and the world tilted on its axis. He needed to run, hide for a while. Maybe shifting would give him some perspective. He hated shifting. It always hurt, but when he finally finished, his form opened up the world for him. He was ruled by his beast, but Sev didn’t mind. He didn’t have to make choices or decisions. He could simply let go. So many days he wished he could just give in, let the animal inside become his dominant nature, but he had his brothers to think of.
    The woods were so fragrant in early spring. Fresh buds pushing from the ground heralded a bountiful year ahead. The tree’s sap ran, sweet and enticing, and animals were looking for mates or already rutting. The whole forest was alive, and it made Sev feel the same.
    Fallen logs provided a bounty of grubs and beetle larvae, a delicacy for a hungry skunk. Sev dug in, savoring each morsel. If his brothers had been shifters, feeding them would have been easy. But, while Sev got the ability from his father, his siblings took after their mother, a human. Yet another thing that made Sev stand out from them and made him feel looked down upon. A shifter who couldn’t even control his family.
    He’d just dug beneath a rotted stump, littered with his favorite fungi when the smell drifted to him. His mate was in the forest! His meal forgotten, Sev rushed toward the intoxicating aroma. He found Casey kneeling on a patch of spring grass, plucking delicate strands and putting them in his pouch. He sang absently, a tune unfamiliar to Sev, but Casey’s voice was sweet, and Sev knew he could listen to it all day. He found himself striding toward Casey, drawn by the delightful combination of scent and song. He was less than ten feet away when Casey looked in his direction and his eyes went wide.
    ***
    “Goddamn,” Casey muttered. Maybe his friends had been right when they called him skunk bait. The skunk waddled toward him, its long hair flowing in the breeze. White bands bloomed across the chest and ran down the legs. Not that Casey made it a habit of looking at skunks, but this one was beautiful.
    He clutched the satchel at his side, cursing himself for wanting the fresh blades for a new ointment he wanted to try. “Hi. I see we have a problem here. I don’t want to scare you and you don’t want to spray me, I’m sure. How about you turn around and go scamper back to the forest and find Bambi or Thumper to play with.”
    Casey tried to rise slowly, but the skunk stamped its feet.
    “Shit. Okay, so how about I don’t move? Would that make you happy? If you have rabies, I’m going to be so pissed. I don’t have the things to make a balm for that.”
    The skunk continued to advance.
    “O-Okay, I can see we’re going to have problems, aren’t we?”
    The skunk cocked his head and flopped onto its belly. Casey breathed a sigh of relief. He tried to back away again, and the skunk leapt up and crept closer.
    “Right. Okay. Don’t move.” He put a hand in his bag and drew out some fly agaric fungus. He tossed it a few feet from the skunk, who eyed it apprehensively. “Why not have some? You’ll probably like that a lot more than me.”
    When the skunk passed the mushroom completely, Casey knew he was screwed. “Fine. Can we move this along? You spray me. I’ll go home and wash it off. Of course I’ll have to run through the village and everyone is going to be really pissed because I’ll stink to high heaven, but at least I can get going.”
    Casey stood, waiting for the inevitable. The skunk sauntered up to him and wound around his legs like a damn cat. It made a strange chittering noise, almost like it was happy, and Casey wasn’t about to get on its bad side. When it put claws to his leg and attempted to climb him, Casey knew he’d have to make a run for it.
    “Hey now, be careful. You’re getting near some pretty tender areas, and I might need those at some