Page 339 of Pucking Feral: Part Two

I don't mean it at all.

Wraith abandons the axe and crosses the campsite toward us. Every step shifts the hard muscle in his thighs beneath his wet pants clinging to them. He rolls one shoulder as he walks, loosening it after the repetitive chopping, and my mouth goes dry despite being surrounded by an entire river.

Rain beads on his lashes as his eyes flick toward Valek’s bruised face, and the easy predatory weight in his stride falters.

There it is again.

The guilt.

Valek notices too. He casually moves the fish to his other hand and steps closer to the fire, forcing Wraith’s attention onto the task instead of the damage.

“Can you clean these?” Valek asks.

Wraith stops and looks at the fish, then at Valek like he’s just been handed two severed human heads.

No.

“You don’t know how?”

I don’t eat flesh.

Valek lifts the fish and looks doubtfully at them. "Fish is flesh?"

Yes.

Valek tilts his head. "But do you know how to clean fish?"

Why would I know how to clean fish if I don’t fucking eat them?

Valek blinks.

Wraith points toward the river. Put them back.

"They’re dead."

Wraith’s shoulders slump.

Oh no.

I pull my feet from the water and stand on the boulder, dripping everywhere. "Val caught them for himself. He’ll clean them."

Wraith looks down at the fish again.

His expression somehow gets more miserable.

Valek sighs. "You're not eating them either, I take it?"

"Solidarity," I tell him, but it's also because Wraith looking with sad blue puppy eyes at the dead fish has completely ruined my appetite.

"Fine. They won't go to waste."

Wraith gives him a flat look.

"I’ll eat both."

The fish are each almost the length of my forearm. "Can you eat both?" I ask, blinking.

"Of course," he says, but he doesn't seem completely certain himself.