Half Wolf by Linda Thomas-Sundstrom

Longer fingernails. Brighter skin. Hunger.”
    Hunger.
    Inadvertently, Kaitlin again curled and uncurled her hands, already sensing the arrival of more of those changes. The smells at school and the anxiousness over being confined in the library had to be part of the change. The white, haunting reflection in her mirror was part of it, as were the quaking limbs and the sinking sensation in her stomach each time she felt as though the moon was watching her. The treacherous moon that turned humans into wolves.
    “Must be hell on clothes,” she said, remembering her dream of running barefoot in the grass beside a half-naked Michael, then having him turn up tonight in the buff. She also remembered that in one of those dreams, she had felt light and joyous and had wanted to jump Michael’s bones.
    “Maybe being a werewolf isn’t all bad?” she whispered.
    “It can be quite beautiful,” Michael said.
    She believed him because Michael was beautiful, and nothing that special could step out of a bad reality.
    He was smiling sadly when he finally released her and she was able to look at him.
    “How many nights, Michael? How many nights will I be affected?”
    “Two or three. You’ll change as fully as your body determines, and only during the full-moon phase when moonlight touches your skin, though you will be vulnerable to moonlight one day before and one day after that.”
    There would be a full moon two days from now. Michael said she wouldn’t change until then...so why did she feel moonlight sliding down strands of her tangled hair right that moment? Why did her fingers feel strange, as if claws might appear any second?
    “The imagination is a strange beast,” Michael said, reading her. “You will adjust when the real thing happens.”
    “I don’t want to do this. Be this.”
    The moonlight was stifling. Chilling. She felt so very cold when the wolf was supposed to be hot.
    Her knees buckled without warning. Next thing Kaitlin knew, she was on the ground, head hanging forward, sickness roiling through her.
    The hands clamped around her waist were Michael’s. With a single heave and the slightest grunt of effort, he had her on her feet, then up in his arms. In a move reminiscent of some distant time when damsels were weak-hearted and repeatedly in distress, he turned, holding her tightly to him, and ran.

Chapter 9
    K aitlin squeezed Michael’s shoulders, silently begging him to stop running. They were heading the wrong way. Her apartment was in the opposite direction. Michael was moving fast, as if he was aware of where he was taking her, which turned out to be the closest cover.
    Beneath the protection of the roofed park bench, he set her on her feet and waited while she leaned over to wretch, but although her stomach heaved, nothing came up.
    “This, too, will pass,” Michael said gently. “Fear is making you sick. Nothing else.”
    Kaitlin wasn’t so sure about that. Her blood, as well as her body, had turned icy. She didn’t know whether to laugh maniacally or cry, and made a Herculean attempt to stand up straight in spite of quivering abdominal muscles.
    “Please, Michael. Make this go away. I’m begging you.”
    “I’m sorry,” he said again, and she recognized his sincerity. He was sorry, and she had to go through this.
    “Let’s cover you up, and I’ll take you back to your place.” He was already pulling Cade’s shirt over his head without bothering to use the buttons.
    Her eyes went to his chest and the scrolling tattoos that left her feeling dizzier. “You said it wasn’t going to affect me tonight.”
    “Hell, Kaitlin. I’m not sure the wolf is doing this. Everything about tonight is strange.”
    She said, “I can get home on my own.” I’ll crawl if I have to.
    But could she get there? Kaitlin gazed out at the darkness with new eyes that were no longer so innocent, and mindful of the danger. Although clouds partially covered the moon, she could feel threads of silver gathering.