Noctisardor Bypass [r] fevered

merrick was thrilled; he had come for laurel but had found a greater thing and a more direct way to shatter her.
and then she was upon him. his teeth tightened once upon her child and then merrick released, buffeted away from the girl and back into the darkness. pain illuminated the side of his face, blood rivuleting down his right cheek.
"there it is!" the bearwolf laughed. his unhinged guffawing filled the cave.
for now he had forgotten the child who wore the face of his mother;
run and i'll find you
and once more his virulence birthed a new hate and one that brought him forward. merrick reared, hoping to wrap his forelegs around laurel's shoulders, her nape, her throat.
his own teeth bit and tore and slashed; his single eye was wide, unblinking;
he expected her snaps to open new wounds along his muzzle, his mouth, but when merrick did not have his fangs full of laurel, he was laughing, endlessly cawing a raucous trail of boyish giggles into the unlit recesses of the place that he meant to be a tomb.