Anna von Wessen Read Online Free PDF Page B

sending the poor wolf into a terrible tailspin of confusion. He shivered; his lip trembled; and he looked for a moment as if he might cry. In the end, though, he simply broke into a smile – a smile quite different from the one he had worn previously. This one was bright, and joyful, and made his face shine pleasantly. His wan cheeks seemed almost to glow; and his sunken eyes seemed almost to gleam.
    Though Anna had never struck him, you see, or spoken to him a cruel word, neither had she ever spoken to him a kind one. She knew far better than that. It was her custom merely to nod, and sometimes to let just the smallest trace of a smile play round her lips, when Hyro addressed her. This night, however, she answered him! Perhaps she did not realise she did; but she did nevertheless.
    And so Hyro was left, awe-struck, staring after her as she passed out into the courtyard. He stood for some time in the open doorway, looking into the darkness, even after she had disappeared. But finally, he smiled once more, and shut the door.
    As Anna walked along, she felt a relentless twinging in her legs and feet, which made it impossible for her to slow her pace. It seemed as if she were actually flying from Thayer Street, past the comfortable houses which sparsely bordered it, and on into the slums of the city. Despite the fact that there was no one about, she knew that she was moving too quickly – more quickly than any human could ever manage to move. Yet she strode on, and on; and after a little ran on, and on; and after that began to shift indiscriminately through the air, from one street corner to the next in the blink of an eye.
    As she went – whether you will believe it or not – she was stricken by hunger pangs. What she had eaten earlier seemed somehow to have already burnt away, and was sitting now as nothing but a few scattered crumbs, over the hard rock bottom of her stomach.
    How was it possible? Well, it had not been unknown to happen on occasion. Probably Valo, whose appetite was akin to nothing so much as a full-grown swine, would see nothing unfeasible in it. Strange, yes – but not unfeasible.
    As she criss-crossed from street to street, the pulse of people to either side of her seemed to grow steadily thicker. She drew her hood over her head, so that the smells wafting round her were not so strong; but the discomfort grew only more severe, till finally she was overcome with hunger. She looked every which way, and saw billows of human breath pouring out into the winter night; spied soft throats in the moonlight, the bare flesh of arms hanging unsuspecting in midair. And she could smell the blood just beneath, the blood that ran under the skin. White skin, yellow skin; red skin, brown skin, black skin; it would all taste the same. She licked her lips, and felt her teeth begin to hone to jagged points.
    She spotted a young man, then, standing on a dark corner. He held his leather jacket open with one hand, and with the other offered something to a small boy who stood just before him. The boy snatched the something from his hand, gave him money in exchange, and then ran away.
    Anna lost no time. She flew forward like a loose cannonball, and pulled the young man into a narrow side alley. She had not time to make out even the slightest detail about his face or person, before she tore him quite to pieces, and devoured every last bit of him. The only things left were his clothing; a wallet, stuffed with cash; a pistol; and several small bags of white powder. Anna gathered all these things up off the ground, and tossed them into a nearby dumpster.
    Wiping the blood from her face, she made towards the mouth of the alley. She glanced down at herself, and was glad to see that her black raiment betrayed nothing. Yet there was an inevitable odour clinging to her, which surely would not be noticed by any of the passers-by – but which most certainly would be detected, by the first Lumarian nose which encountered her. Therefore