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  She took another step back. She was on the point of whirling to run when the fox leapt at her. Uttering a shriek of fright, she jumped back, tripped and went down even as the fox struck her chest. Disoriented by the fall, it took several moments for Aslyn to realize that the fox was standing over her, on top of her, his forepaws planted firmly on her breasts.

  She stared up at him, holding her breath, fearful that any moment he would go for her throat and rip her to shreds. Instead, after several long, agonizing moments of fright, the fox stepped off of her. Watching him warily, Aslyn lay still for several moments, hoping that he would be satisfied with having felled her and flee into the woods once more. Instead, he sat, still watching her.

  She frowned, wondering at his curious behavior. It was almost as if he was tame. Slowly, she sat up. When the fox made no attempt to pounce upon her again, she

  began struggling to her feet. As she placed her palm against the ground to push herself up, however, the fox darted forward, nipping her hand with his sharp teeth. She wasn’t even aware of the branch she’d clutched when she’d fallen until the fox darted at her, but the moment he did, she swung, catching him on the shoulder. What he might have done had she not struck him, she was never to know, but the branch was sufficient to dissuade his attack. He broke off with a yelp and loped off, disappearing against the background of the snow long before he could have reached the trees.

  Aslyn stared after him, trying to spot him against the mounds of snow, but she caught no more than a glimpse of him before he vanished completely. The throb in her hand finally caught her attention and she lifted it to examine it. Despite the blood, she discovered it was little more than a scratch. Undoubtedly, he had only caught it with the edge of his teeth. If he’d had time to bite, he would have inflicted a good deal more damage.

  A sense of uneasiness filled her, and she glanced back in the direction that the fox had disappeared, wondering if it had been mad after all. As bizarre as its behavior, however, she knew it could not have been mad. If it had been, nothing short of killing it would have stopped its attack.

  Finally, she was forced by her stomach’s demands to dismiss it. Reaching down, she grasped a handful of snow and rubbed it across the back of her hand until the bleeding slowed. Returning to the cottage, she cleaned the wound thoroughly, then soaked it in a dish of steeped herbs and salt to promote healing and prevent the wound from putrefying. When she was satisfied, she collected her cook pot and walked down to the well to fill it.

  She had just filled the pot and turned to start back when a woman’s screams rent the air. The sound tore through Aslyn like the slash of a knife. She dropped the pot from suddenly nerveless fingers. Her head whipped around from side to side as she searched for the source of the horrible sounds. Around her, she saw the villagers pouring from their cottages as they, too, were drawn by the cries. Almost as one, they began to move, slowly, but quickly gaining speed. Many grasped broomsticks, axes … anything they came across as they rushed toward the shattering cries.

  As one, they halted abruptly as they reached the next street and saw a man and woman on their knees in the middle of the muddy road. The man was covered in blood. The woman was holding a wad of bloodied rags, rocking back and forth. With an effort, Aslyn forced her feet forward, moving almost like a sleepwalker until she was near enough to recognize the woman.

  It was Ana Halard, little John’s mother .

  A terrible dread seized Aslyn as she stared at the distraught woman, studied the torn rags the woman was clutching. Even as one of the nearer bystanders gagged, turned and threw up, she knew what it was.

  The man kneeling before Ana looked up at Aslyn, tears streaming down his cheeks and Aslyn finally recognized him as John’s father. “I tried to fight ‘em off. I did. But it was no use. No use a’tall. Them vicious bastards ‘ad already torn ‘im to shreds.”

  Aslyn felt the strength leave her knees. She sank onto her knees beside them. “John?”

  Ana Halard turned to look at her. “I told ‘im not to take me baby to the woods. I told ‘im. He said I was pamperin’ ‘im. Said he’d never be a man if I kept ‘im tied to me apron strings.”

  Aslyn touched the woman’s shoulder. “Hush. Don’t say these things.”

  “It’s true!”

  Aslyn turned to Halard. It was impossible to tell, however, if the blood spattering his face and covering his chest and arms was his or the child’s. “Are you hurt?”

  He ignored the question, climbed awkwardly to his feet. Swaying slightly, he looked down at his wife, blubbering now like a hurt child himself. “I only did what I thought was right.”

  “You got ‘im killed!” she screamed at him. “He was too small to be out gathering wood. You should’ve taken one of the older boys.”

  “Stop it!” Aslyn cried angrily, but she knew that both the boy’s parents were too hurt and shocked to really know what they were saying. She glanced around at the villagers. “Someone help Mr. Halard to my cottage so I can see to his wounds.”

  The crowd around her simply stared at her blankly, too shocked and horrified themselves for anything to filter through to them.

  “I don’t need no tending. I’m for finding those damned wolves and killing them, ever last one of them! Who’s with me? Who’ll help me hunt them down and slaughter them? Before they pick us off one by one!”

  A low rumble began amongst the villagers. Like the growl of an animal, it built into an enraged howl. They surged forward, following Halard as he lurched toward the woods he’d so lately exited. Stunned, Aslyn watched them race into the woods, most of them completely unarmed, those few who were armed carrying little more than sticks. A very little thought told her, however, that they were mad with fear and fury and nothing short of a hail of cannon fire would halt them. They could not be reasoned with and might well turn upon her if she tried to stop them.

  In any case, Ana needed her. She turned her attention to the boy’s mother. She was still clutching John’s torn and battered remains to her, rocking him back and forth. She touched the grieving woman on the shoulder. “Mrs. Halard, please, let me help you. Give him to me. I’ll take care of him.”

  It wasn’t until the woman turned to look at her that she realized there were tears streaming down her own cheeks.

  “There ain’t nothin’ nobody can do fer me baby anymore.”

  Aslyn swallowed against the lump in her throat. “We have to … prepare him.”

  The woman began to wail aloud. “No! No, no, no! He’s scared of the dark. My baby’s scared of the dark. You can’t put ‘im in a dark hole.”

  Aslyn glanced around helplessly. To her surprise she discovered a half a dozen women standing around the two of them, their faces filled with pity and horror. As if they read her mind, they surged forward, grasping the woman and pulling her to her feet and then half carried her to her cottage. Aslyn remained where she was, watching them, slowly becoming aware of her own wrenching sobs.

  She could not force the image of the battered child from her mind. Image after horrible image clicked before her mind’s eye, each one banished by one more horrible than the last.

  He had been a weak, sickly child. She had known in her heart that he would never grow up, but she had thought he would die in his bed, not in terror and pain. She couldn’t bear the thought of the torment he’d suffered before he’d found peace. What must his mother be going through? Small wonder the woman was out of her mind with grief, to lose a child under such terrible circumstances.

  It made it worse that he had been doing so well when last she’d seen him, his face smiling up at her, glowing with growing good health. Had it been only the day before that Ana had brought him to show her how much better he was doing?

  It dawned on her then and a coldness crept through her that had nothing to do with the icy ground.

  John had been to see her only the day before…. The last victim of the wolves had been Will the Red, and she’d seen him the very morning of the day he was at
tacked.

  Chapter Eight

  Was it only a coincidence that the last two victims of wolf attacks had been with her only hours before their attack? It seemed too absurd to believe, and yet the attacks that had begun months ago had always been close by, where ever she was. She had assumed that she was responsible for at least some of the attacks, but had also known she could not possibly have been responsible for the majority of them. She had also assumed the attacks were wide spread, not concentrated to her vicinity. But, what if she was wrong in that line of thinking? What if she was somehow drawing the wolves?

  She had been told that the soldiers had decided to camp in the area because the last several attacks had been nearby. They were tracking the pack, had been tracking the pack for months … and they had been led virtually to her door.

  Shaking her head, she mopped the tears from her cheeks and slowly got to her feet and looked around. She was alone.

  It had grown dark. She lifted her head to stare up at the sky. The moon had risen, but it was no more than a pale sliver in the sky. Tomorrow, or perhaps the day after, it would not appear at all and the dark of the moon would lie upon the land. For how many days, she wondered? Did it matter? Soon the full moon would rise and her time would be upon her.

  It seemed impossible that she could have lingered so long, impossible that she could have so completely lost track of passing time.

  A sudden urgency filled her to leave Krackensled, at once--that very night.

  She was running by the time she reached her cottage.

  Flinging the door open, she did no more than push it toward closed, only vaguely aware that she had not shut the door completely, nor bolted it, as was her habit. It nagged at her, but she dismissed it. It could take no more than a few minutes to gather her things and she would be on her way anyway.

  In truth, she had brought very little with her. Deciding to take the ragged quilt, she rolled it and bound the ends with string, then spread a cloth on the bare mattress and retrieved her spare shift and gown from the pegs on the wall, bundling them quickly and placing them in the middle of the cloth. Her healing herbs were always kept in their own pouch and she merely grabbed it up and set it beside the bundle. Looking quickly around, she saw that she had gathered all she had brought with her, but her stomach was rumbling once more, reminding her she’d not eaten. Taking her knife, she cut a large wedge of cheese, meat and a chunk of bread to bundle in her pack and then cut some thin slices to stack together so that she could eat it as she walked.

  She had just slung the blanket over her shoulder when she heard a sound behind her. It froze the blood in her veins.

  “Going somewhere?”

  Slowly, she turned and stared at the man filling the doorway.

  She did not recognize him. It was the first time she’d seen him without his armor. Instead, he was dressed in leather, as Kale usually dressed, a dark cloak slung about his shoulders.

  But it was not the way he was dressed that made him unrecognizable. It was the wildness in his gleaming, golden eyes, in his wind swept hair … the blood smeared on his jerkin and breeches.

  Aslyn’s heart slammed into her chest so hard all the strength went out of her body and it was only by force of will that she kept from wilting into a puddle of terror on the floor. “What are you doing here, Algar?” she whispered through parched lips.

  Instead of answering at once, he lifted his head, sniffing the air. His eyes were gleaming with malice, and lust, when he looked at her once more. A savage grin curled his lips. “How could I resist the scent of a female in heat?”

  Aslyn felt her jaw go slack as the words sank slowly into her fear numbed mind. Insulting as the comment would have been under other circumstances, she was no longer human … but she-beast. Why had it not occurred to her before? Even when she had speculated the possibility that the pack was trailing her, that she was leading them, it had not dawned on her to wonder why they might be drawn to her.

  It made so much sense now of things that had seemed to make no sense at all before.

  Small wonder Kale had needed only to brush against her, to leave his scent on her skin and her mind had clouded with the need to mate with him.

  “Good God!”

  His grin widened. “I doubt there would be many who would be willing to agree HE has anything to do with us.”

  Sluggishly, her mind worked its way around the comment. “You knew!”

  He chuckled, stepped inside and pushed the door closed behind him. “The moment I saw you again.”

  “How? How could you possibly know--again? What do you mean, again?”

  He cocked his head to one side, studying her. “I’m hurt. You don’t remember?”

  She stared at him, cast her mind back, but no matter how hard she jogged her memory, she was certain she had never met him before she had come to Krackensled.

  “You bore the mark. It distressed me no end that I had not been the one to give it to you, but I knew you were meant to be mine. Unfortunately, your father had seen fit to bestow you upon another. I had to … dispose of my rival. But when I looked around again, you’d vanished.”

  Aslyn swallowed against the lump of sickness welling in her throat. “It was you? You … butchered Wilhem?”

  He stared at her a long moment and began to laugh. “You thought you’d done it?”

  Fury surged through her, suddenly, violently, pushing all other considerations to the back of her mind. “You killed John! You monster!”

  He shrugged. “When the beast is upon me….”

  Aslyn shook her head, too angry to think straight, but one fact stood out. “No. It doesn’t make any sense. The moon isn’t full.”

  A thin smile curled his lips. “It makes no sense to you, my dear, because you were not born into the clan. You were marked, long ago, chosen as mate by one of the brethren. But his loss is my gain,” he added with a chuckle, beginning to advance slowly toward her.

  “You summon the beast. It doesn’t control you.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Then you are a monster! You chose to slaughter that poor, innocent child!”

  Again he shrugged. “The hunger must be appeased when it comes upon me. I only chose the one handiest to feed upon.”

  Aslyn backed away. “You marked me! You stole my humanity, made me into a monster like you!” she exclaimed, lifting her hand.

  His eyes narrowed, all traces of humor vanishing as he stared at her hand. “What happened to your hand?”

  “As if you didn’t know!”

  Rage filled his eyes. He leapt at her, grasping her hand and lifting it to sniff it. He growled, low in his throat. “You are mine! I meant to have you when you came into your first season, but you escaped. I’ve searched for you for three long years. I’m of no mind to allow you to escape me again!”

  Aslyn snatched her hand from his grip and leapt away from him. “Nay! I’ll not allow you to touch me, you monster! I’d die, rather!”

  He lunged for her. She screamed as his arms closed around her. Dropping down, she managed to slip from his grasp, but he caught hold of her hair before she could get away. Pain shot through her scalp as he jerked her upright and flung her toward the bed. She skidded across it and slammed into the wall so hard it shook from the impact, clods of dried mud raining down around her.

  He reached for her again, dragging her toward him so that her gown rode up around her waist. Aslyn kicked him, rocking him back momentarily. Knocking her legs out of his way, he tried to grasp her flailing arms. She slapped at him, curled her fingers and clawed his arms, but the leather made her efforts ineffectual. He lunged at her, forcing the breath from her as he landed on top of her. The bed creaked, groaned and finally gave way under their combined weight.

  Aslyn was still struggling to drag air into her lungs when Algar flew from her. She blinked, rubbed the dirt from her eyes so that she could see.

  Kale was standing over Algar, breathing heavily.

  Relief and joy flooded h
er, but both vanished almost immediately as it dawned on her that Kale was no match for Algar. As strong as he was, Algar probably outweighed him by twenty pounds or more. Moreover, Algar was not human. He had the strength of the beast.

  She screamed as Algar bounded from the floor and crashed into Kale. Forced back by the other man’s superior weight, Kale slammed into the table, shattering it into splinters of wood. Before Algar could leap upon him, he rolled away, coming to his feet once more in the half crouch of a knife fighter’s stance, a wicked blade gripped tightly in one hand.

  Algar drew his blade as well, circling Kale, blocking the only way in or out of the cottage.

  Aslyn scrambled crab-like across the floor, seized a piece of the table leg and hurled it in Algar’s direction. His eyes widened in surprise as it struck him on the shin. Distracted, Kale’s head whipped around. Algar roared and charged. Aslyn grabbed up another board and hurled it. His eyes widening in surprise, Kale jumped aside. The block of wood missed him by mere inches and smacked into Algar’s forehead. He stumbled. Before he could recover, or Aslyn launch another missile, Kale launched himself at Algar, swinging his blade so fast it was a mere blur of motion, slicing three long cuts across the leather jerkin Algar wore.

  Algar leapt back, landing on one of the pieces of wood Aslyn had thrown at him. It rolled, pitching him backward through the doorway.

  Kale rushed at him, launching himself at the fallen man, but Algar recovered quickly. Jerking his feet up, he connected with Kale’s belly as he descended. Lifting the huntsman, Algar used Kale’s own momentum to pitch him head first into the cottage yard.

  Aslyn could no longer see Kale, had no idea of whether he was too hurt to recover quickly enough. As Algar scrambled to his feet, she caught sight of her own knife. Snatching it up, gripping it tightly in her fist, she rushed Algar even as he turned to attack Kale once more. She wasn’t even aware of screaming until Algar swung back toward her, but she was far quicker than he. She embedded her dagger in his shoulder up to the hilt before he could swing at her to fend her off. He roared as she sank the blade home, swinging at her with his balled fist and catching her across the jaw.