From The Ashes (Life After War) by Angela White

detour the ants, but all of the mutations avoid places where you’ve rolled off dead fur.”
    “ Yes, that’s good. And smart to have noticed. Perhaps you were a wolf in a previous life?”
    Adrian realized the animal was joking with him and shrugged. “Perhaps you were a human.”
    The Wolf growled lowly . “I was cleaner than those here.”
    “ We’re rationing, cutting shower times,” Adrian explained, missing the wording in his exhaustion. “Three hundred of us use more water each week than what we're finding.”
    Dog looked up in golden-eyed amusement. “ Have you encouraged licking?”
    Adrian snickered. “If I did that, our species would die out from lack of mating.”
    “ In exchange for being able to lick myself, I've been given a tongue that takes layers of skin with each stroke. Why create such horror?”
    The wolf snorted in bitter amusement that almost made Adrian recoil–it was much too human.
    “ Maybe that's why pups are so wild. It drives them crazy.”
    “ Not pups,” Dog corrected gently, sensing this leader was ready for guidance outside the realms that he was already familiar with. “Men. Each life born into the animal kingdom now is a human spirit, paying for its mistakes.”
    Adrian's mind shuddered, step pausing as that awful truth locked into place. It fit too perfectly.
    “ Nature was gentle in the Garden. When it was Sealed for man's crimes, the world changed.”
    “ Because evil was born unto the animals,” Adrian guessed, voice dazed as his mind sorted a batch of puzzle pieces in a back corner. This was an ancient mystery–one mankind was cursed by–and Dog may have just given him a center piece.
    “ Yes. They only began killing when the evil of men took control.”
    “ And the apple?”
    Dog looked up in confusion. He'd forgotten most of the world he came from, the fast vibrant life he'd held before. He remembered his part in it, but only that much.
    Adrian rephrased the question. “What was the crime that got man banished from the Garden?”
    “ You already know what they did to curse us ,” Dog scolded. “It's why clean spirits pass on, but evil stays–constantly repeating in both human and animal populations.”
    “ They lay down with the beasts,” Adrian muttered the theory he'd held for some time now. “ HE stepped away for a breather, and they went crazy with their discovering.”
    “ And cursed an entire world.”
    “ The first births?”
    Dog wasn't sure how much the man was ready for now–Adrian's eyes were slightly feverish in the coming light–but he answered. “Was animal-like. Its sibling was human. When the mistake was understood, the first son was banished to the wilderness, where he watched his brother with jealousy that became hatred. How could he do anything else but kill to reclaim what he'd lost?”
    “ So earth...”
    “ Is Hell, yes. There is no better place to punish, than where the crime was committed.”
    Adrian was aghast. “How do we fix a curse like that?”
    “ You cannot change what has been, only what may be.”
    “ Meaning?”
    “ The War gave one single chance for mankind to repent, to get it right, and you are leading that grueling charge. You have to convert them, rip away the evil, and make them believers.”
    “ That's what Safe Haven already does,” Adrian stated. “One ugly step at a time.”
    “ The head start is too big. You could convert every survivor on the entire planet, and it would not be enough.”
    “ How then?”
    STOP!
    There were rules, and Dog heard the mental warning clearly–he wasn't allowed to share the answer.
    “ I only want human suffering to end. I'd never use anything you tell me to gain power,” Adrian pled.
    Dog broke the rule without caring what punishment he might receive. Adrian was the shepherd. He needed this information.
    “ If drawn by a bright enough light, lost souls might come, ready to mend old hatreds and be reborn in peace. Such might shift the balance of good and evil