The mortal realm was flawed, Ethan had decided shortly upon his forced arrival after the Nightmare had ravaged Faerie. Humans were stupid creatures, amusing to hunt and stalk and frighten, fun to maim and drink in screams and blood, but stupid. They had turned their world into a concrete jungle, taken away the wilds of nature. How was one supposed to properly hunt in this place of unnatural noises and chemical fumes and humans everywhere?
But Ethan was a skilled hunter. He would adapt. Was adapting.
The wild wolf moved with a lithe sort of grace through the streets. Humans tended to steer out of his way, not realizing they were doing so, or knowing why, but due to some deep lingering instinct that could still recognize a predator. Even if on the surface he looked like a young man in his twenties, with unruly wild hair and jeans and a leather jacket. Although his pale blue eyes were always a little too intense.
The changeling had a few particular preys in his sights these days, and was stalking one in particular at the moment. The little pooka with eyes like a doe and the prettiest little whimpering noises. He’d been close to the kill, but stopped at the last minute. Ethan had decided to draw it out instead. That could be fun too.
The pooka was fairly oblivious, and Ethan hung well back, Rowan’s scent familiar enough that he could track it even over the odours of exhaust and human sweat and garbage and everything else that clogged the hair. He watched the pooka disappear into an alley and Ethan decided to round about and cut him off on the other side, which he did, strides quickening. He went around the block and entered the mouth of the alley from the other side – and paused. Both voice and scent told him that the little pooka was not alone. The voice that spoke came from a human – he could tell by the smell of him – and the words were harsh. The sort of voice that would intimidate many, but not Ethan. He could hear and smells the signs of what the man really was – someone acting far more tough than he was.
And he was thinking to hurt Ethan’s prey. Well, that just couldn’t happen. No one touched Ethan’s prey, once he set his sights on it.
He crept up silent and swift as the wind and then launched himself at the man, tumbling him to the ground easily and swiping out with a fist before the human could even figure out what was going on, catching him square in the nose, feeling bone and cartilage crunch and watching blood spill like rubies. Ethan laughed in a feral way.