Felltree Marsh sunflower silence

merrick was not alone, as he soon found. there was a ghost behind the friendly voice that filtered toward him, and the coywolf paused in his aimless, pointed search.
blood here, seeping from the body of a duck somewhere below the earth. merrick knew the iron tang when it hung in the air. by now, there was rarely blood the boy had not been stained with.
his single eye began to glint with the light that suggested merrick's attention had been captured. with him in the rain a spectral figure wearing a black cap fitted over his wildling hair, and a pair of dark seawater eyes. "hello," merrick vibrated in return, a shark who cut closer to test the edge of the channel between them.