Duck Lake trapdoor

It didn't strike him as strange in any way that the pale woman would be so disinterested in him. She hadn't ever shown a great attachment to him or his brother in the past. It wasn't until those eyes settled on him a second time, holding an invitation, that Karst felt that something had shifted with her.

She must have been possessed. That was the only logical conclusion Karst could reach; she had to have done something to summon a spirit, to give herself over to it. Her eyes were wrong — a burning set of suns, not the ominous fog-white he was used to. Maybe her eyes had always been this way? Karst had never studied Averna's face with great intensity; he knew it was wrong to do that to his superiors. He had the scars to prove it.

He did not dally after that shared look. When the ghost peeled her eyes away from him and set them on something else, Karst moved in. He was reluctant; his tail a straight line to his hocks, not moving. His ears remained pinned. He crawled in an arc towards the carcass and stopped when he saw the one-eyed beast staring back at him.

An empty black socket on one side. So, she had stolen the beast's life; imbued herself with its sight, perhaps. A new reverence overwhelmed Karst as he drew this conclusion, looking carefully between the dead cat and the wolf.