A Justified Kill (14 page)

Amber lay on the ground panting
, struggling to draw deep breaths in to her new
ly formed
lungs
. H
er yellow eye
s glowed from the
depths of the
shadows. The moonlight was bright
shining in through the cave
s
entrance
and she could see as if it were daylight
. The forest had grown quiet
at her first
painful
cries
. The creatures of the night knew
there was a werewolf
among them.

Gaining he
r senses after a few minutes of
hearing her heart-beating loudly in her ears and the air entering and leaving her lungs, the wolf climbed to its feet and stood for a moment
,
looking around.
Amber felt herself present in the mind of the wolf and wondered if this is how it felt
when
her wolf
was
inside her. Was her wolf
fully
aware of what she was doing
in her human form
? I
f
s
o, then
it
would explain
why she had felt the nudges and some of the urges she
’d
had lately
. Jumbled thoughts bounced around in her mind, it felt
like
the wolf had a mind of her own
, yet mingled with hers at the same time
.

She was not quite in control of
what her body was doing and
wondered if the w
olf would
govern all her actions.
Strangely, she
wondered if
the wolf
could take over and
be in
charge
even in her human form.
Even with her mother’s explanations of what would happen, this was nowhere near what she had expected.
Would
her wolf
take over and make her react to situations she found herself in? She had assumed her and her wolf would be one, not thinking and reacting separately
. So much for understanding
once she shifted.
With no other werewolves around, s
he had no one to talk to, no one to ask questions
of
like most werewolves did. She had been on her own since leaving the shelter at eighteen
, which was not that big of a deal. O
ther than Blake, there had been no one at the shelter for her to talk to either. She had been a pariah among misfits,
and like
always, she resolved that she was going to have to figure this out on her own
too
.
And she would, no other choice.

Stretch
ing and yawning as if waking from
a long nap, the wolf
looked lazily around its surround
ing
s. She sniffed the air,
threw her head back and let out a long soulful howl. The grey wolves in the area answered with a
resounding
howl of their own
echoing through the
eerily silent
night
. She was finally free. A true werewolf and the feeling
s
of power were
unmistakable when
she pushed off with her hind legs and ran.
The wolf enjoyed the freedom and stretched her legs in long galloping strides, reveling in her str
ength. Jumping over fallen branches
, running, darting in and out of trees and brush until the urge to run was satisfied.
She ran deep into the woods, where no there was no presence of humans.

The wolf
stopped in her tracks and looked up into the
brightly lit night
sky, a wolfish grin on her face
, and then
she
turned and
walked in silence
.
All at once
,
t
he forest came back to life.
Her
small triangular ears caught the sound of the
hoot
ing
owl
and
the chirping of
her
chicks of
f
in the distance.
H
er sharp eyes saw a
mouse scampe
r
daringly across the leaves
in front of her
, trying to reach its burrow before
she decided to make him a snack.

The
slightest of
wind
s
blowing through the trees
caused the wolf’s ears and nose to twitch when the
deep rich
scents
and sounds
of the forest hit her senses
, her fur ruffled in the breeze
.
She enjoyed the freedom, running hard and fast, until she was panting, her tongue lolling out the side of her mouth, her teeth showed in a grin.  Standing
on the side of the mountain, overlooking the clump of trees below, the wolf threw her head back and howled once more. Her eyes took in the views and Amber saw farther than she had ever seen in her human eyes. She could hear so many things that she just stopped and listened. She was as eager as a newborn pup to explore her surroundings. Then the wolf remembered she was on a mission. She could explore later.

Turni
ng in the direction she needed to go
, Amber loped through the trees and unde
rbrush which
grew densely in the Northern California
pine wood
forest. Her
solid
black fur gleamed in the moonlight
when
she stopped and stood in
the
shimmering glow
that
bathed a swatch of light
through
open branches overhead.
Much lar
ger than the average wolf, she
was sleek and lean, and she felt strong
.

Although Amber was
aware,
she
knew that she was not in control, not yet anyway
. S
ince this was her first change, s
he
had no clue what her wolf was going to do until she was already in motion and making her way towards the campsite. Amber was hopi
ng
she could block out what her wolf was
about to do, but she kne
w
the probability of that was slim, probably impo
ssible
, so she s
et her mind to the task. T
he wolf
was eager
to greet the camper that her human form had been stalking.

****

Gerald’s campsite was not hard to locate. His odor had been engrained in
to
her wolf’s memory the moment Amber had smelled him with her human senses.
Rubbing her side along the bark
, Amber’s wolf left her markings on the trees. Although she didn’t have a territory,
she
wanted other
wolves
in the area to know
a
dominate
female
had been there.
At the back of the wolf’s mind, Amber pushed for her to remember that she had to stay hidden
. S
he couldn’t allow other
were
wolves to know she existed.
Snorting, as if reluctantly
agreeing,
the
wolf
kicked up leaves and dirt with her hind legs before she
straightened and moved away from the trees, avoiding any further contact.

When
Amber
realized
she could communicate with her wolf. S
he had actually heard her thoughts, and listened, she began to feel more at one with her wolf,
not
so much
a separate being.

Picking her way silently
across the pine needles and leaves
,
Amber
came upon the campsite and lowered her body
to the ground
.
In her human form, she knew it was
Sunday
,
the bar was closed and
there was nowhere for Gerald to go. So, he shoul
d be at the campsite all night long
, unless he decided to try to find another girl. At the thought her wolf growled. Since shifting into her wolf form, Amber
had
lost all sense of time while out running,
but
the hour
was
no longer
relevant
. What mattered now was she could hear his heartbeat.
She
could
hear him breathing and
smell the
blood singing through
his veins
,
her body began to tremble.
Her ears perked up and her teeth
were bared
in a silent grinning snarl when the
generator kicked in and the
light came on
.
Gerald was
moving around inside and
when his hand r
eached for the flap of the tent
she readied herself.
She lifted her body up slightly off the ground. Holding herself up on the fore paws, her hind shimmied when she shifted her back feet. Digging into the ground she positioned her body to make the leap.
His heartbeat pounded in her ears and hers sped up in anticipation, she was eager to make her
first
kill.

The zipper was
only halfway down when the bloodlust
took over
and
rational thought
was lost, all she saw was red
. The wolf lunged,
ripping through the wall of the tent with a savage growl. Snappin
g at the man’s wrinkled face her snout opening to sink her teeth into the tender flesh of his
neck. Before her jaws clamped tight
,
she felt a stabbing and slicing pain along her ribs.
Out of reflex th
e wolf snapped its jaws shut and
with a ferocious shake of her head,
shredded Gerald’s throat
. Her
huge
sharp claws ripped
long
ragged
gashes across his chest
, down and through his belly
. He fell into a bloody heap on the floor
inside the tent
.