midday heat bearing down. gods' marble flesh-warm to the touch. proletariat in shade. children in fountains. sweat running down backs of slaves.

his lectica travels the forum. fine dark wood, four broad shoulders. canopy thin enough to show him, in repose. a horseman for every direction. he thinks on consulship.

his colleague, weak-willed. their predecessors, inefficient. the senate, scheming. pragmatic men would raise this nation to greatness.

today, they will convene - arrests will be issued. the republic will expunge its putrescent. he believes in reason over cowardice.

the rostra rises. the crowd coalesces. mutters. glances. steel glints.

the praefectus leans in, whispers through silk. dismission from within, demanding peace. continuation. palms gripping hilts.

he thinks of merchants, plotting over wine and figs.

it begins.

they are one hundred wronged plebs armed with indignance. they are a handful of men with kindling tongues. they emerge from shaded corners, from shuttered houses. they have the names of his opponents on their tongues. they have glinting blades in their grips.

they flood the equites, drowning them in bodies, in hot blood and hate. horses crush more than blades could cut. in seconds, he is without entourage.

slaves scatter. lectica topples. he is ejected, crawling on hands and knees for the steps, to reason with the mob atop the dais - they reach him in heartbeats.

mothers of corpses grip his soft parts, screaming for gods to hear. crippled fathers pull his joints, cursing the wrongs of those not him. children pinch off bits of him, to feed their sunken bellies. paid blades pierce his skin, claiming their proof in meat.

he feels horror, and horror,

and then, almost nothing.

they tear him apart at the steps of the rostra. the senate had not come that day.

mists sink low.

the vale is thick with white, air biting frigid. snow a slush beneath the boughs.

tangled into the roots and slurry - a shape, a figure.

clumped black fur. forelegs too long. a hindpaw, disfigured. ears placed too low on a skull with a face so wrong--

and to assure the world this were a work of cunning nature: rise and fall. rise and fall.

breath in this half-buried creature.

laws at work. ancient and new. compromises made in the space of a skull.

they order thoughts and wipe reminders. the man is engulfed in fog. he fades to a silhouette. it disperses, too.

she opens her eyes in the way of daytime dreamers. a flutter. a soft look.

until in her mind is gently placed the concept of teeth.

with a small noise - first tell of her species - she moves herself back by the elbows, until head touches bark of tree. there is the sensation of frigidness, and of wetness. there is the snout, with all its whiskers, and dark fur and flews which could at any moment pull. she is seized by fear that is new, and is all she's ever known.

the caged dancer of her chest picks up its pace. her eyes are rimmed with white as she watches the wolf.

words. does she know words?

a law says yes.

you- and her voice is for a moment alien to her, a woman's - then it is as it has always been.

i'm a poor meal. one hand splays over her collarbone. i- you wouldn't like the taste of me.

she shuffles nearer the bark, pushing her back up it, supporting herself into a half-sit.

please-

and her breath is held, watching the beast.

teeth.

teeth teeth teeth.

the words catch on them, the accent of predators, of hungry things with tongues too shriveled by hunger to tell the truth.

she feels the ramming against her ribs. hand on clavicle drags lower, to feel the warm pulse fill her palm with each heartbeat.

what use am i alive? and in her desperation, there's anger. indignation. you- you don't even- your ilk doesn't-

she'd like to throw accusations, but panic rises as she realizes the black gaps in her knowledge.

there's only teeth, and the implication on them.

why? and she throws her arms up, a sudden movements she could regret if the coil of emotion would leave room for it.