by Casey Morgan
“Celeste. I’m a werewolf.”
I laughed at his oddly timed joke.
“It’s okay,” I told him. “I have a bit of a temper too. We’ll figure it out. All couples fight. Even my parents.”
I put my hands in the air, palms up, and shrugged my shoulders.
“Celeste. I’m a werewolf and you are too. The more time we spend together…well, it’s going to drive you nuts. You’ll get violent and start killing.”
My eyes found his. Deep brown, the color of chocolate chips, they didn’t look back at me in merriment. Mason wasn’t making a joke. He was serious and he was worried.
Is he nuts?
Fear blossomed in my chest. What kind of joke was this? He was saying that I was some sort of monster. I had heard of werewolves before. I had read about them, but I knew they weren’t real.
Mason stood. His eyes glowed more, becoming bright as street lamps. The air around him shimmered and the lines of his body became hazy.
And then it happened. His legs compacted, as I jumped off the bed. His nose elongated.
I backed towards the door. His teeth lengthened, becoming fangs, sharp and vicious. When my back hit the door, there was a large brown-furred wolf standing before me.
What the fuck!
I grabbed the handle, turned and ran. I tore through the parking lot, tripping over stones and kicking piles of snow. I ran through the dark woods, hardly caring where I was going.
That’s not real! I didn’t just see that! Mason’s not a monster and neither am I!
Tears filled my eyes, making it harder to see. I wiped them away often but still I trampled bushes and ran into trees. A mud puddle caught my shoes.
With my leg trapped, I went down hard. My stomach and hip bones hit the ground first with a hard slap. Sand scrapped my skin and rocks cut into me. It hurt but my heart hurt worse.
I froze for a minute and just panted, with my face to the freezing ground. I couldn’t get up.
All the rage and sorrow I had felt for the last two days was a heavy weight in my chest. Crying wasn’t enough. Running wasn’t enough. These emotions wouldn’t leave me alone and I was drowning in them.
My fingers dug into the dirt in front of me. Mason was a jerk; every logical thought in my mind confirmed that. But my heart wouldn’t listen, and my body ached for him.
Every instinct I had told me that he was mine. He was going to be my husband and that was just the way it was. That he suddenly didn’t want to and pushed me away— it made no sense. Confusion was tearing me apart.
And what had just happened at that motel? He didn’t change into a wolf. That wasn’t real. I was just imagining things. It was a fantasy brought on by too much stress over the last few days.
Pulling a big clod of soil out of the dirt, I imagined crushing something with my rage. I wanted to punch and kick and fight until life made sense again. So, I did just that.
I brought my leg up and kicked it into the ground with a yell. Pulling up to my knees, I grabbed and scraped and punched at the ground.
My pulse sped up and my chest clenched. Everything I was feeling was taking over my body. It ached and burned. My legs twisted and contracted. Even my face hurt. I felt like I had been punched or like my face was being rearranged.
I screamed again. It came out as a howl, a long low, mournful wail.
I clawed at the dirt with my hands, which shook and burned. Suddenly, I was digging a hole. The dirt gave way beneath my paws. My claws cut into it easily, making it loose and malleable. I was an animal and the rage was gone.
What?
I glanced back at my fur-covered legs and my long graceful tail. I even wagged it just to see if I could. I sure could.
My body was smaller and covered with silver-gray fur. My nose was keener. I could smell the squirrels sleeping in the nearby trees. A cat had walked this path in the last few days; not a wild cat but someone’s loved pet—I could tell that just by the smell. Everything was new and different and interesting.
My bliss was short-lived, though. I understood that I was a wolf now, but for how long? How did I change back?
I didn’t want to be a wolf for the rest of my life. I liked being human.
Whatever this was, I needed it fixed and fast. I needed help.
I headed through town to the one person who I knew wouldn’t turn me away.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Celeste
Mary’s bedroom was on the ground floor. Her reading lamp was still on, so I knew she was up.
All I had to do was get her attention and somehow let her know that this was me—but in the body of a wolf. I rose up on my hind legs and put my nose to the window.
“Mary,” I yelled.
It came out as a low bark. I tried again, and again it was a bark.
Looks like this will be easier said than done, I thought.
However, my barks worked because my small friend came to the window and stared down at me with wide blue eyes. I barked again and paced a bit, never leaving the light of her window. She opened the glass.
“Go on, dog,” she whispered. “You’re going to wake up my parents. Shoo!”
I sat right below her and whined. I tried to look into her eyes and get her to realize it was me.
“Go away,” she hissed. “I can’t have a dog. I’ve always wanted one, but my parents say I’m not allowed. I don’t know what you want.”
I howled.
She frowned.
“Fine, I have cookies, but if I give you one, you better go away.”
She popped out the screen for the window and put it to the side. As soon as the window was bare, I jumped through, pushing her out of the way, and let my paws hit the carpet.
Mary fell back onto her butt and started shaking. I didn’t want her to scream, so I put my snout to her face and started licking her.
“Oh! Oh, stop!” she laughed. “You’re a nice dog, aren’t you?”
Her small hands reached out and rubbed my fur.
I nosed her and pushed her with my head, until she got to her feet. When she did, I trotted over and put my nose to the picture of me. Mary gave me a wide-eyed look. I gestured a few times, each time pointing to myself with my snout.
“Celeste?” she whispered.
I nodded my head as much as I could in wolf form.
“Celeste? Are you a dog?” she gasped.
`I jumped up and down and yipped a bit. Mary waved her hands to quiet me down. She sat down hard on her bed and looked me over.
“You’re not a dog, are you? You’re a wolf.”
I nodded again.
“Did Mason make you like this?” she asked.
I didn’t nod or do anything. I wasn’t sure. He told me that he would cause me to shift, but he didn’t say that he caused me to be a werewolf.
Mary watched me for a few minutes, but when it became apparent that I wasn’t going to answer, she moved on to her next question.
“Can you change back?”
I shook my head and whined.
“Can Mason change too?”
Nod.
“Did you ask him how to change back?”
I whined and growled a bit, trying to explain that I didn’t want to ask him. I was mad at him. Besides, he said that I would be more dangerous around him. I wasn’t sure what that meant but it didn’t sound good.
Mary sat forward on the bed.
“You have to ask him, Celeste. You can’t stay like this forever. And I have no idea how to help you.”
I shook my head no and turned my back to her. Mary’s little hands wound around my neck and buried into my gray fur. She pulled me back to her and held me in a hug. As a wolf, it wasn’t something I particularly liked, but I allowed it, since it was Mary.
“Okay, you don’t have to talk to Mason,” she told me. “But you can’t stay here. Any noise and my parents will find you and call the dog catcher. How about we go over to the shed at the high school, the one we used to hide in? That should be warm
enough for one night. Then I will head to the library in the morning and see what I can find to help you change back.”
It was a decent plan. I didn’t love the idea of sleeping in a shed, but it was better than sleeping outside in the bushes. I gave her a lick on the cheek and pulled myself out of her arms. Mary grabbed her coat and we both hopped out the window.
Her house was just a block from the high school, so it didn’t take us long to walk there. I caught Mary staring at me while we walked; her blue eyes wide, but she didn’t ask me any more questions.
She really seemed to be taking this whole experience very well. I had no idea how I would act if she turned into an animal.
The shed on the football field was unlocked, just like it was in the days when we attended the school. It held the various sports balls and gardening equipment for the grounds.
Most everything was flat or broken, which had to be why none of it had been stolen. There was a low shelf I could burrow under to keep warm. It wasn’t the best way to sleep, but it would do.
I looked up at Mary and wagged my tail gratefully.
“Good enough?” she asked.
I barked that it was. I wished I could tell her how much I appreciated her help. Hopefully, my wagging tail would let her know.
“Okay, get some sleep and I will come check on you in the morning.”
She gave me a final pet on the head and closed the door behind her. I snuggled down to get some sleep.
I woke up around midnight because I felt very cold. My fingers stretched and slid over a deflated football that was next to me. I gripped it and pulled it towards me like it was a teddy bear.
Then I froze in place. It took me a few minutes to figure out what happened. I had changed back. I was human again…and nude.
I jumped to my feet. I could go home, but first I needed to find something with which to cover myself.
I looked around the shed. Some wonderful soul had left a windbreaker handing on an old nail. It wasn’t much but at least I could cover part of myself. I grabbed it and pushed my arms through the sleeves.
It was a men’s extra-large, so the sleeves flopped over my hands, but that was fine because the jacket covered my butt and part of my thighs. I zipped it up and buried my hands in the sleeves. This was going to be a cold walk, but at least I could go home.
I opened the door to the shed, glad to be on my way. But just then, something crashed into the back of my head and everything went dark.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Mason
The full moon pulled at me, but I held back the shift. I would not change to wolf form tonight. Wolf form was about instincts, not reason. Once I was on paws, I would just go looking for Celeste.
That couldn’t happen. I was not good enough for her. The other alpha would help her find herself. He would protect her, and they would start their family together. I would be a lone wolf again.
Hopefully death would come quickly. I didn’t want to live a life without Celeste in it, now that I had met her and had seen what a great mate she would have made, had I not been defective thanks to the military.
There was a gentle knock at the hotel door and my whole body rejoiced at the sound. She had come back.
Part of me wanted to cry out with joy and take my mate into my arms. But I reminded myself that nothing had changed. We couldn’t be together and that was that. Celeste coming back, begging, was not going to make anything different.
My temper flared. She had disobeyed.
“I told you to go home, Celeste!” I yelled towards the door.
She knocked again. She was determined.
My body got up with a will of its own. She had come back, and I needed her so much. I tried to stay angry, but the rage fell off me. I just wanted her in my arms again. It was stupid and selfish, but I couldn’t do anything else.
“I’m so sorry, my love. I don’t want to push you away, but I don’t know how to fix this…” I swung open the door and looked down at Mary.
I must have blushed. I could feel my cheeks go hot.
Mary looked a little embarrassed for me. She gave me a sideways glance but didn’t quite meet my eyes.
“Hello, Mr. Whitepaw…” she stuttered. “I mean Mason. I’m sorry… I’m not Celeste.”
Her shoulders were hunched, and her voice shook as she spoke.
“Come on in from the cold, Mary.”
I walked away from the door, so the girl could come inside. She followed me, inching forward reluctantly and eyeing every bit of my dilapidated room.
I sat in one of the kitchenette’s chairs and looked at her. Mary was so small. She was hardly five foot tall. Had Celeste sent her closest friend to plead with me? I had heard that humans did that sometimes. It seemed weak for a wolf.
She settled into the wooden chair opposite of me, looking like a child pretending to be an adult. We sat in an uncomfortable silence. Mary’s eyes roamed all over my face.
I wasn’t sure what her scrutiny was for. Was she deciding if I was good enough for her best friend?
“Can I get you a drink?”
“Celeste is a dog.”
We spoke at the same time.
I felt like I had been punched in the gut.
“What?”
Mary’s hands fidgeted on the arms of her chair.
“She’s a dog. Or a wolf, really. I guess she is a wolf. Big, gray and fluffy,” she rambled.
I couldn’t find my voice.
Celeste had shifted?
It was so soon.
Or was it?
I had never gone through this process before.
Oh, God!
I should have warned her about how much it hurt. Hell, I should have been there to guide her through it!
“…and well, I read a book that had werewolves in it. It was a fantasy. I think. Maybe not. But that is what she is, right? And you, too?”
Mary’s big blue eyes searched my face.
“Yes,” I told her, deciding that she deserved to know the full truth, after coming here to help her friend. I knew she wasn’t normally so brave.
Her lips clamped together, and her eyes went wide.
“Did you make her a werewolf? Did you bite her? Or…”
She leaned in.
“Was it a sexual thing?” she whispered, a hand held up to cover part of her mouth.
I tried not to laugh.
“No. No, Mary. I didn’t do anything to her. She has always been a werewolf. You knew she was adopted, right?”
Mary nodded.
“Do her parents know?”
“Yes, but they don’t like it.”
My mind snapped back to the issue at hand.
“So, she’s in wolf form now?”
She nodded again.
“But unharmed.”
Another nod.
“Where is she? She didn’t go home?”
“There’s a shed on the grounds of the Gray Acres High School. The lock has been broken for years. We used to hide there at lunch, for fun, or sometimes when we got bullied, which wasn’t very fun. I told her to go there.”
She glanced away from me.
“She didn’t want to come here, but I knew we needed your help.”
“Smart girl!”
Mary smiled under my praise and seemed a little taller.
I stood and grabbed my duster.
“Lead on,” I commanded. “The sooner we get to her, the sooner I can guide her through the change back.”
Mary jumped up and we both hurried out the door.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Mason
It started snowing as we walked through the town. I offered Mary my duster, but she refused. She just huddled further into her own thread-bare coat and wrapped her arms around her chest.
After about three blocks, she was shaking so visibly that she could hardly walk. She had her head pulled down so low, she bumped into a mailbox.
“Stop.”
I reached out and put a hand
on her shoulder.
I took off my coat and set it on the mailbox. I pulled my hoodie off next. Mary looked up at me with large blue eyes.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
I handed her the hoodie.
“Put this on over your coat,” I ordered.
She blinked at me and didn’t move.
“Go on. You’re freezing. Put it on.”
She pulled my ratty blue hoodie over her head and then smoothed it down. It came to her knees and the sleeves flopped over her hands.
“Now the coat.”
She pulled the duster from the mailbox and wiggled into it as well. It was going to drag on the ground as she walked, but there was little I could do to prevent that.
“Better?” I asked.
She gave me a small nod; her breath was more even, and her face was less pale, so I knew it helped.
“I’m going to shift. Don’t be scared,” I told her. “I can still understand you in wolf form. Just please pick up my pants and the rest for me.”
Mary’s eyes were a bit wide with fear, but she gave me another quick nod.
I woke my inner wolf and gave him the power. I felt my eyes start to glow and Mary took a few steps back.
Fire burned in my limbs as they moved and shrunk. My nose broke and elongated into my snout. Fur covered my skin. My paws hit the ground and I shook my clothing off me.
I looked up—it was only a few inches—into Mary’s eyes. Her mouth formed a little O and she was frozen to the spot where she stood.
I nudged her with my head, trying to get her to gather my things and go. She wasn’t quite sure what I wanted, so she petted me and scratched my ears. I had to pull back. It felt good but was a bit undignified.
“Let’s go!” I tried to bark at her, and I circled my pile of clothing.
She shook herself a bit.
“Oh! Okay,” she muttered. “Sorry, Mason.”
The small girl took the time to fold my things and set them into a nice pile, before she pulled them into her arms. Then she continued down the street towards the High School. I trotted at her side, just like a trained pet.
As we walked, I caught her glancing at me. I gave her a look and nodded my head to tell her to say what she was thinking.
