You stand there in the clearing, surrounded by the howling, casting your gaze about. You can't seem to find the road back in your confusion.
Remembering what you were taught about what to do when lost, you sit down in the clearing, not wanting to make any rash decisions. You smooth down your skirt and comb the burrs out of your bobbed black hair.
Slowly the howling seems to die down, leaving you in the clearing in silence. Truth told, this almost scares you as when the howling began. The forest is silent, even birds and night insects hushed.
Trying to calm yourself, you feel a curious warmth seep into your ears, followed by a tugging sensation. You at first dismiss it as anxiety, until you feel something brushing against the tips of your ears followed by the unnerving feeling of your ears actually twitching.
In alarm, you reach up with your hand, only to have your fingertips greeted by the fleshy, tapered nub that your ear has become, pointed and elfin. It twitches again at your touch, and you lift your other hand up to find your other ear has followed suit. You gasp, tracing the contours of your altered ears only to feel your hair brush past, wild and unkempt. Your black locks are inching downward, thicker and longer by the moment.
You bite your lower lip, afraid to scream in case whatever was howling decides to come for you. To your further surprise pain shoots into your lip as you draw blood. You allow yourself a strangled yelp before probing with your tongue, running it along the smooth ivory until it slides over something alien.
Your canines.
They've distended, sharpened, and if you had to guess they feel like they're still growing. Curving daggers in your mouth, both uppers and lowers, a sinking sensation in your stomach confirming your suspicion.
Fangs.
Water wells up in your eyes as you continue to fight the urge to cry out, an ache seeping into your fingertips. Your hair slides along the skin of your neck with a faint rustling tickle, now hanging about your shoulders and soon reaching beyond, draped in your face. The ache in your fingertips becomes a throbbing, and you hold your hand up to look at it.
Your nails are thicker, darker, curving past the tips of your fingers like claws. Writhing black hairs poke forth from your knuckles, soon joined by more on the back of your hands. They bring a tingling like pins and needles, and a sudden rush of sensation leads you to suspect that your hands aren't the only places sprouting hair.
The prickling races like wildfire up your legs and arms. It pools palpably under your arms, and embarrassingly enough between your legs. It fades, but leaves behind a soft thickness, leaving you breathless as raw silk suddenly rubs against your secret.
Your hand rubs the front of your skirt before you realize what you're doing, cheeks flushing in shame.
What on earth are you becoming? What if anything can you do?