Abby runs the entire length of the ship, from compartment to compartment, hold to hold. She rushes past the compounds and cages and cells, hearing their occupants screeching at her passing and growling at her meaty presence. She shoulders by things milling in corridors, creatures with dripping maws and the blistering stares of memories given a second chance. She even speaks to some of the things in the ship — a man who lives by drinking blood, some women with the tails offish bobbing in a huge water tank — but she is nothing like them. They are blanks upon which Blake has cast his anger and rage. However smart they may seem — and in one room there is something like an angel, singing songs of deliverance and growling the threat of vengeance falling from above — Abby is running with her own mind, not standing around waiting in tune with the mind of another.
She wonders briefly why that can be, but dwelling on it will make her just like them.
She hopes that news of her impending escape will not reach Blake's ears. By its very nature, the ship contains things that run, fly, or squirm their way back and forth, and she does not seem to attract any undue attention. Yet intent is there, and she hopes it will not mark out this particular running woman as something different.
At last, at the giant ship's stern, with the cold night pressing in and the promise of colder water already tingling her skin, she hears the voice she has wished to never hear again.
"You can't leave me," Blake says.
Abby pauses, panting, and turns to face her father. "I can. I am. I'm not like you, not like any of them." She waves her hand back the way she has come. She is terrified. She has no idea how he got here before her — the last she saw of him, he was bending over the black dog back in the birthing chamber — but there is still so much she does not understand.
"No, you're not," Blake says. "You're unique. Every one of you is unique."
"I'm not a monster."
Blake steps forward, and a light on the bulkhead stutters on. He is unruffled and calm, though he looks older than she has ever remembered. "What is a monster?" he says.
"Something ... something that ... "
"Yes?" He moves closer still, and she sees what he is trying to do. Shadows flit at the extremes of her vision, and though she cannot see them, she can sense the drones creeping into position. Soon they will grab her, and then she will find herself imprisoned until freedom is Blake's choice, not her own.
She steps to the rail and curves one leg over. The cool metal sits across the underside of her thigh, and she realizes this is the first time even a part of her has been beyond the ship.
"Full moon soon!" Blake says, glancing at the sky. "The hunger will be upon you. The griffin will come in with your food, and you'll rip and tear and thank me. But if you go ... what then? What will a werewolf eat in a world she doesn't know?"
"Stay away from me!" she says, holding up a hand. The nails are longer, fingers more muscled. Full moon tomorrow, yes, but tonight the tides are already at war in her blood, and her flesh is weak.
"Look at me," Blake says. "I'm no monster. I bring my children back to the world simply because they've been forgotten, allowed to fade away. That's no way to treat a child."
"They're not children!" she snaps.
Blake shrugs, and she sees a glimmer in his eyes — amusement. She is amusing him. He's talking to her, biding time while his drones prepare to grab her, and he's finding this humorous.
"You're mad," she whispers.