Chapter 1

I look out over the river coursing by me and sigh sadly. The Canadian geese and their fuzzy babies glide by as the sun sets in the distance, a bright orange glow on the horizon. Hidden as I am underneath a willow tree I can see the beautiful landscape before me safely.

I turn sixteen years old in less than a week and instead of being thrilled at such a momentous time in my life I am depressed. My dad lost his job at the dairy farm where he works and has spent the last two days drinking nonstop as a result. I am old enough to get a job in town to help out but life at home has become unbearable.

I go over in my mind my dream from last night of the stranger that has haunted me in my sleep since I can remember. He has curly short dark hair, hazel eyes, patrician nose, and a well-trimmed beard. I cannot tell how tall he is from my visions, but he just feels as if he is at least six foot tall. He is muscular with wide shoulders and a narrow waist and looks to be around his late thirties or early forties somewhere.

I have always had dreams that come true and over time I have learned to trust them to be fact. I have saved the life of students I go to school with as well as my father. I learned from a very young age not to share my dreams with others because they do not seem to have the same ability that I do and they usually find it hard to believe.

I get the distinct feeling that the man I dream of is somehow tied to my dead mother, but I cannot tell how. I have a sketchpad that is full of drawings of him, but no name to put with the face.

Last night was the first time in any of my visions of him that I got a hint as to who he is or where to find him. I saw a sign that said Crescentwood Manor. I have done some internet searching at school today and found one property in Washington State that has that name and it is located outside a town called Black Hollow.

I have a month of school left for this year before summer vacation and I plan on going down to the local IGA grocery store to see if I can get a full time cashier job.

With a sigh of resignation, I get to my feet and slowly leave my place of peaceful solitude and make my way home to make dinner. The house is quiet when I enter and I see that my dad has gone somewhere, thankfully. I quickly whip up a batch of spaghetti and leave it on the stove for him to eat when he finally comes home. I look around the place that has been my home for the last fifteen plus years with a grimace of shame. There are holes in the walls from my dad’s many temper tantrums and the carpet is worn nearly bare in spots. The walls needed a good painting at least ten years ago and our furniture should have been thrown away before I was born. My bedroom is the cleanest and best kept room in the house because I spend what little bit of money I come into to brighten it.

I take the time to soak in the bathtub since my dad is most likely drinking down at one of the local taverns until closing time and won’t be home to bother me. Gazing at myself in the mirror I grimace as I wish with all of my heart that I looked like the other girls at school. I have waist length black ringlet curls with violet eyes and porcelain skin that doesn’t tan or burn. I really wish I had blonde hair and a tan with blue eyes like most of the other girls. I only stand at four feet ten inches tall and am by far the smallest girl in high school.

I am fast asleep when I am woken up by my father stumbling into the house in the middle of the night. He yanks me out of bed by my hair and pulls me into the kitchen.

“Look at all of this food that you let go to waste!” He screams as he backhands me across the face. “I wasn’t home for dinner and you should have put this in the fridge so it didn’t spoil. I am not working right now and can’t afford this!”

Sobbing at the fire radiating through my cheekbones I curl into a fetal position on the floor as he kicks me mercilessly. Finally, he gets tired and shuffles off to bed leaving me alone. I limp into my room and fall into bed hoping my bruises will heal before I have to go to school in the morning.

Morning comes too soon and when I climb from my bed I realize that I am much more than bruised from my beating last night. My ribs hurt and it is excruciating to draw any more than a tiny breath. When I look in the mirror I see that my bruises are healing but they are still an ugly yellowish-green color across my cheekbones.

For some strange reason I heal much quicker than others and normally the bruises I sustain from one of my father’s beatings are gone by the next day. Unfortunately, he came home from the tavern well after closing so this beating took place just a couple hours ago.

I leave my hair loose today and part it to the side so that my long curls will fall over my face and hopefully hide most of my bruises. Unaccustomed to the pain that I am feeling I try really hard not to limp once I am inside the school but the pain in my ribs and hips is just too much to bear.

Walking into my first hour AP Chemistry class I make my way to the back of the classroom to my desk and sit quietly. To my dismay we have a different teacher today. It seems that our normal teacher was in a car accident and won’t return until next year.

The new teacher, a Miss Danvers, seems to have noticed something unusual about me because I can see her gazing at me all hour.

“Miss Mazzariello, can you stay after class please?” She asks me as I try to slip from the room after the bell. I groan with frustration as I anxiously hang back until all of my classmates have left the room. She closes the door and turns to me with sympathy evident in her green eyes. She is a pretty lady with long blonde hair and a trim build. She looks like she just graduated with her teaching degree probably last year.

“Will you tell me how you received those bruises?” She asks me in a soft tone.

“I fell.” I reply as I drop my gaze to the floor and allow my hair to cover my face.

“I can help you if you will only let me Nikolette.” She whispers sincerely.

“There is nothing to help.” I retort crisply. “I fell down the stairs, I’m fine. May I go now?”

“Yes.” She replies in a sad voice as I hurry from the room so as to not be late for my next class.

I can feel the rage building because I have lived my whole life with this problem and the only people willing to even ask me if I am alright are the new teachers who come here from out of town. Everhill, Wisconsin is a tiny town of just over a thousand people and I am positive everyone knows that my father beats me at least weekly.

Lucky for me my sixteenth birthday falls on a Saturday and since I have no friends I get to spend it alone. My father is hungover from the night before and as soon as he feels better he heads for his local hangout to drink tonight away as well.

I walk down to the river and sit under my willow tree and watch the sunset. It is peaceful with only the sounds of nature and the water gurgling as it works its way past me. The full moon rises and for some reason I am absolutely captivated by it. Lying down on my back I relax and just stare at the bright expanse of the moon above me.

Suddenly, my hands and feet start to feel as if they are going to split apart. The agonizing sensation spreads to my arms and legs and then my torso as it feels as if my body is contorting itself into a completely new form. Screaming through the pain as I hear my bones snapping and cracking I can actually feel my body shifting into something foreign. The torment seems to continue on forever until just as suddenly as it started the pain is gone. As I look around me I notice that I am seeing things in a completely new way. Gone is all of the color I am accustomed to seeing with yet everything seems sharper somehow. When I look down at myself I see that I have hairy dog legs and can feel panic building. Stepping up to the water’s edge I gaze down at my reflection and see a wolf looking back at me, a small black wolf.

Stamping down the panic that is flowing through me I force myself to stare down at the wolf gazing back at me from the water’s reflection. I lift my left hand and splash at the water and the wolf in the reflection does the same thing. Moving my head to the left and then to the right I see the wolf make all of the same moves as me. Is that really me?

I close my eyes, draw in a deep breath and am amazed at the plethora of scents that invade my brain. I can smell a whitetail doe off in the distance, a male fox sniffing around for a female’s den, and an owl flying low to the ground to snatch a chipmunk off of the ground.

A hunger such as I have never felt overwhelms me and draws me away from the water and towards the doe that is off in the distance. Giving my instincts free reign I run silently through the trees following the doe’s scent with my now sensitive nose to where she is grazing in a small meadow. My mouth salivates as I watch her munch on the green succulent grass, unaware that a predator is watching her, upwind where her sense of smell cannot smell me.

I attempt to stalk into the meadow so that I may kill her and satisfy this hunger that is driving me crazy but I step on a twig that snaps, drawing her attention. Her head flies up and upon seeing me drawing close to her she turns tail and flees into the trees. Howling with frustration I race off into the trees after her but am unable to catch her.

I slowly meander my way back to my willow tree so that I can lie down to just rest for a moment and when I next open my eyes the sun is coming up. When I look down at myself I see that I am again in my human form. Did I dream last night?

Looking around for my clothes I see that they are shredded, no doubt from my transformation, and I push away the panic that tries to overwhelm me again. I use the tatters of my clothes to cover myself as best I can and make my way back through the trees to the back edge of our property and pray that my dad is still sleeping.