Luneshale Pass [m] casado dicha

Sangre treats him gently now.
Like something of her own to prime.
The hound feels the narrow length of her pressing into his side and cloaks her dark shoulders with a heavy arm.
Chases the corner of her maw with his teeth.
He reigns her red figure into the warren, then squeezes through the threshold after her.

Instantly starts checking it out, doing a mental inventory.
Place looks good.
Just big enough for them.

A dangling tree root brushes past his eye and he snaps it in two.
Stalks towards Sangre, with that same nothing-look in his eye.

But he watches what she sees.
As if searching for signs in her face;
Her body.
Attentive.

It was the only shared language, what they said with their bodies.
Sangre told stories on her face.
Disgruntled– then he’d know it.

If she didn’t like it, they’d go someplace else.
He’d do that.
This was affection, on his part.

He knew what he was.
Criminal.
Killer.
Monster.
But she treats him like something worth having.

Towered in the entryway.
Too large for the space that now smelled like her, and what they’d done all morning.
The coldness finds her brazen gold eyes and from his throat is uttered:

“Octavio.”