He longed to prove himself to her somehow. Perhaps his chance would come if he secretly watched over her and saved her from harm on that unlucky day when she finally shifted for the first time.

Grandfather warned that first time shiftings were the most dangerous because they were unpredictable. If seen by normal humans, the shifter could be hunted and killed by the frightened men. Especially if they used a silver weapon. Shifting was always painful and, once begun, it was all but impossible to stop the change and revert to human form. Even worse, when he woke up naked as a man again, the shifter didn't realize how the beast had howled for blood under the moon. Whatever the beast did while shifted remained unknown to the man.

I'll protect Cecelia, no matter what, Wolf vowed. "Tomorrow I'll be the dragon," Arno announced, half his words Russian, half English. "Ivan can be Dobrynya. But my dragon won't die."

"Hush," Natasha murmured and began to sing a Russian lullaby about the moon shining on a baby's cradle.

It was then Wolf noticed that a silver sliver of light had slipped through a slit where the window draperies failed to meet. He walked to the window and peered at the sky.

Only a sheer veil of mist covered the full moon, riding high in the heavens. Concerned, he hurried from the twins' room and ran along the hall toward the Kelloggs' suite. Before he reached the door, he heard Liisi chanting inside and paused. His grandmother must have conjured up a charm for Annette Kellogg.

"Dark spirit," she intoned, "do not ride the silver moonlight. Remain in Tuonela's depths where you belong. Evil one, seek not the light. You of the dark, remain in darkness...."

On and on she chanted, her voice raising the hair on Wolf's nape. Just so had the Kamchadal shaman chanted when he plucked Wolf away from his dead mother's side and thrust him into the animal pen, calling him an evil spirit from the darkness between the worlds.

Yet the boy he was then hadn't been evil. That boy hadn't contained a dark spirit any more than Wolf did now. Was it possible Grandmother Liisi, like the shaman, could make a mistake? He tried to erase the frightening thought from his mind but it clung, as sharp and prickly as a goathead seed.

The melancholy five-toned notes of his grandmother's kantele wove through her chant. Her instrument was made of bone. "Like Vainamoinen's," she'd told him. "Vainamoinen, the greatest Finnish noita--he lives forever, somewhere between the worlds."

Wolf waited outside the door, chilled by the music and the words. He didn't believe his grandmother would fail to control Annette's beast but he wanted to be sure. He had his baby daughter to protect as well as the other children.

He was leaning against the wall when the chanting finally stopped. Wolf straightened when the door eased open. Grandfather ushered Grandmother Liisi from the room, nodding approval when he saw Wolf.

"Annette's asleep," Sergei said softly. "Liisi's spell seemed to work but, for safety's sake, Guy tied his wife to her bed. He'll stay with her--no need to stand guard any longer."

Dismissed, Wolf ambled along the hall and around the corner to his room. He wished he could go to Mima instead. He hadn't slept in Mima's bed since Druse was born, though sometimes he had to fight the urge to go to her. But he'd promised Grandfather he and Mima wouldn't have any more babies and, while there were ways to avoid creating a child, Mima had told him no method was altogether certain.

Tonight he needed Mima's warmth and comfort as much as anything else. But if he went to her one thing would lead to another.

In his room, Wolf stripped off his clothes and slid beneath the covers. It had taken him some time to grow accustomed to sleeping in a bed. He'd never gotten used to nightshirts; he slept naked.

Reassured by his grandfather's words, he allowed himself to be sucked down sleep's dark tunnel into the world of dreams.

And nightmares.

He ran along a street, the paving cracked and rubble-strewn, toward a forest of greenery. Among the trees and bushes death waited. The metallic taste of fear fouled his mouth, terror clouded his mind, but he ran on.

Ahead, the dark spirit hidden in the greenery screamed a challenge, a caterwauling cry more chilling than any cougar's. He longed to stop, to turn back. He could not. All he could do was race toward his doom....

Wolf sprang from his bed, heart pounding, the cry echoing in his head. As he grabbed his trousers and pulled them on, he assured himself the cry must have come from his evil dream. Unconvinced, he padded to the door, opened it and looked into the hall. In the brass wall sconces, oil-fed flames flickered behind their protective chimneys as he listened.

The caterwaul came again, rising and falling in a eerie pitch that brought gooseflesh to his arms. A man shouted. A heavy object thudded to the floor. Glass shattered. A door crashed open. A woman screamed.

Wolf ran along the hall toward the commotion, driven by his fear for the children. As he rounded the corner, he stopped short. Something half-human, half-beast thrashed furiously in the grasp of Guy and Sergei, yowling as it fought to get away. Farther along the hall, a white-garbed figure flitted down the front stairs, disappearing from view. Forcing himself on, Wolf hurried to help Guy and Grandfather as they dragged the snarling, spitting half-beast back into the Kelloggs' room where moonlight streamed through open draperies. Wolf jerked them closed.

As Guy and Grandfather forced the half-beast onto the mattress, Wolf wrapped rope around its taloned hands and its human feet and tied it, spreadeagled, to the bed frame. The half-beast continued to struggle, yowling. Knowing this had to be Annette Kellogg, Wolf took only one appalled look before averting his eyes.

As Guy had told Grandfather, her shifting wasn't complete. She wasn't really a beast but fangs, a coarsely feline cast to her features and black patches of fur on her torso separated her from being human. And her abnormal strength-it had taken the three of them to pull her into the room and onto the bed.

"I'd hoped Liisi's noita charm would prevent this," Guy said wearily, "so I'm afraid I nodded off. I promise I won't let her get loose again."

"I'll sit up with you until morning," Grandfather told him.

Realizing they didn't need him any longer, Wolf made for the door.

"Thank you for your help, Wolf," Guy said. "I'm sorry you had to witness this."

Wolf mumbled that he was glad to help and fled. About to return to his room, he recalled the figure in white who'd flitted down the stairs. He was sure it had been a woman. He couldn't imagine Natasha leaving the safety of her room and he knew Mima would stay with Druse. Liisi would have come to help, rather than fleeing. That left Cecelia.

Was she all right? Was she in danger of shifting? Wolf ran down the stairs.

When he reached the bottom, he heard the plink of a single note on the piano. Heart pounding more from anticipation than fear, he padded toward the music room. Though the wall sconces in the entry were lit, the music room was dark except for the silver glow of moonlight slanting in through the open draperies.

Wolf paused in the doorway and drew in his breath. Illuminated by the moon, Cecelia, in a white nightgown of some gauzy fabric, stood by the piano picking out a plaintive melody with one finger. He watched her for long moments, certain he'd never see a woman more beautiful or desirable. She turned away from the piano and drifted to the window where she stood with her back to him, the silver moonlight showing her woman's curves through the thin gown. Unable to wait any longer, he crossed the room to her, his bare feet silent on the floor and on the carpet.

"Cecelia," he breathed when he stood behind her.

She gasped, whirling to face him. "How you frightened me!" she cried.

"I'm sorry. I only wanted to--" He paused, unable to find words to tell her she aroused him. She smelled of some mysterious flower--a tropical flower that bloomed only at night, he decided--and of herself, infinitely alluring.

"Are you all right?" he finished.

"No." Her head drooped. "I'm frightened."

"Of me?"

"Why should I be afraid of you? I heard a terrible noise and I saw--" She broke off. "Never mind."

"I know what you heard, what you saw," he said.

"You do not!" She stamped her foot.

Wolf thought he understood. She was afraid to admit to him that she suspected her mother was the half-beast that had frightened her.

"Cecelia," he said gently, thinking her name was like the sound made by a mountain stream. "I do know because I helped your father and my grandfather tonight. Your father came here in the hope Grandfather had a cure for your mother."

"There's nothing wrong with my mother!"

Longing to touch her, he rested a tentative hand on her shoulder. "I don't mean to upset you."

She shrugged free of him. "Then go away. I don't want you here."

But he couldn't make himself go away. She was far too fascinating. Besides, she needed to be warned about what lay ahead for her. Even without Samara, his touch had confirmed what he'd felt in her earlier. She was a potential shifter. "Cecelia, it's dangerous to close your eyes to the truth," he said at last. "There are such things as shapeshifters."

She turned away from him and started for the door. He caught her arm.

"Listen to me!" he ordered. "Never mind your mother's affliction--this is about you. I can sense shifters before they change. I have to warn you--you're one. You're a shapeshifter."

Ceceila raised her hand and slapped him hard across the face. Startled, he released her.

"Liar!" she sobbed, tears streaming down her face. "There's nothing wrong with me. Nothing. Do you hear, you stupid boy? I hate you! I'll hate you forever!"

Chapter 3.

Still smarting from his grandfather's stern words, Wolf let himself out the back door and loped toward the barn. A chill wind from the north had blown away the last vestige of fog and today the sun shone. But Wolf was in no mood to appreciate the fine weather.

Jose had already driven the cows into the field and Wolf hurried through the still open rear gate. He circled back along the outside of the wall, on his way to the pine grove west of the grounds. He preferred being outdoors even during the best of times and when he was upset his craving for being under the sky and among the trees surpassed all bounds.

Today was not the best of times. Early this morning, Cecelia had sailed past him on the stairs with her head held high, not sparing him a single glance. Guy, following her, had greeted Wolf coldly. He'd more or less expected such treatment from the Kelloggs but Grandfather's subsequent tongue-lashing was a surprise.

"I told you to keep your mouth shut," Sergei had begun. "Why did you defy me?"

Wolf tried to explain his feeling that Annette must be warned of what she was to become but Sergei cut him off. "None of us, including you, know for certain you have the power to sense potential shifters. What if you're mistaken? You may have ruined Cecelia's life because you presumed to 'warn' her of something that may never occur."

Wolf hung his head. He hadn't thought about being wrong and he was forced to admit it was possible.

"You will apologize to her," Grandfather ordered. "And to her father."

"Yes, sir."

And then Grandfather said the words that cut to the bone. "I'm deeply disappointed that you've betrayed my trust in you."

Tears stung Wolf's eyes at the memory of that moment. He blinked them back. He was too old to cry. Besides, his hurt went too deep for tears, too deep for anyone to heal. Even if he wanted to turn to Mima for comfort, her parting remark to him when he left the house would have turned him away.

"Didn't I warn you to stay clear of that French girl?" she'd said.

I won't go home tonight, Wolf told himself as he approached the grove. He wished he didn't have to go home at all.

I did what I thought best, he told himself sullenly. They may not believe me but I could be right, couldn't I? Why does everybody blame me?

As the pines closed around him, a squawking bluejay flew ahead of him into the grove, warning of his coming. If Wolf had been feeling better he might have smiled--he'd always admired the feisty jays, the sentinels of the woods.

He wandered aimlessly among the trees, breathing in the fragrance of the evergreens. Brown needles crunched under his feet and the wind whispered to him from the overhead boughs. At times he thought he was on the verge of understanding the wind's message but not today. He was too disturbed to let himself drift into the spirit of the grove. A pine cone plunked onto the ground in front of him, followed by the angry chirr of the squirrel who'd been harvesting the cone. Just as Wolf glanced up at the squirrel, something moaned. He froze.

No animal or bird he knew moaned in such a way. Only humans did. Humans in pain.

The sound came again. Ahead of him to the left. He eased toward it cautiously.

"Please..." A woman's voice, her plea no louder than a sigh.

Abandoning caution, Wolf strode forward only to stop, staring, when he saw her. She was as out of place in this pine grove as he would be in the czar's court. A young woman sat propped against the trunk of a pine, her fair hair tumbled over her shoulders, her pine green riding costume rumpled and soiled.

Evidently hearing him, she turned her head. "Thank God!" she cried when she saw him.

Wolf knelt beside her. "Where are you hurt?" he asked. "My--my ankle," she faltered, raising her riding skirt to show her left foot.

Uncertain if he should touch her, Wolf tentatively reached for her foot. When she didn't object, he lifted it gently. She wore a short black riding boot, coming just to the ankle. The silk stocking above the boot was torn and he couldn't help savoring the warmth of her bare skin against his fingers.

"I don't think your ankle's broken," he said after a careful examination. He was no doctor but he'd treated broken bones in animals.

"Merely twisted, would you say?" she asked, her eyes wide and trusting, eyes as brown as sable.

"Probably." He released her foot with great reluctance. She was very pretty with her blonde hair, brown eyes and trim figure. She'd opened the front of her jacket and it was an effort to keep his glance from the soft rise and fall of her breasts under the white shirtwaist she wore.

"What shall I do?" she asked plaintively.

He hadn't really paid attention to the difference in her speech until now. Though she spoke English well, she had a faint, charming accent.

"Don't worry, I'll help you," he assured her. "My name's Wolf Volek--I live near here. What happened to you?" She put a hand to her cheek. "Oh, it's too embarrassing. My friends will scold me when they discover how foolish I've been."

"I won't scold you."

She smiled at him, a flashing, brilliant smile, like the sudden appearance of the sun. Wolf blinked, dazzled.

"You are a wonderful man! What would I have done if you hadn't found me?" She shivered. "When night came I might have been killed and eaten by wolves or bears! But you don't want to hear about my fears, you wish to know how I came to be here. It's very simple--my horse bolted and threw me. You didn't happen to see a dappled gray, did you?"

Wolf shook his head.

"I dragged myself into the trees here and collapsed," she went on. "Perhaps it was foolish of me to venture to ride from Thompsonville on my own but I was so tired of being shut in because of that awful fog and today was so lovely and clear..."

"You're staying with friends in Thompsonville?"

"Not exactly. I'm staying in that charming inn in the town waiting for my friends to arrive from San Francisco. Alas, they've been delayed."

"I'll be happy to escort you to the inn, Miss--?" "Wainwright. Linden Wainwright."

Linden. The name was as lovely as she was.

"I do hate to be such a bother, Mr. Volek. I've been enjoying every minute of my visit to your most interesting country--until that unpleasant animal bolted. If they ever manage to arrive, my friends are planning to take me on a camping trip into the mountains so I won't be homesick for Switzerland. They've assured me the Sierras are the American Alps. I rode out alone today to try and see for myself if they were right." She smiled again. "I confess to being a goose."

Wolf was only vaguely aware that Switzerland was in Europe and he was still more uncertain about the Alps. His lack of education bothered him as it never had before.

"Let's see if you can stand up," he said.

Linden Wainwright, leaning heavily on him, found she could hobble slowly if she didn't put too much weight on her injured ankle. As he helped her along, her dependence and trust warmed Wolf's heart--and her softness pressing against him created an entirely different sensation in another location. She smelled of roses and of horse, an earthy scent that aroused him. The trip home couldn't be too long for him--he never wanted to let her go.

When they came in sight of the wall, Linden slumped against him. "I--I'm afraid I can't go on," she admitted, biting her lip. "The pain--"

"I'll carry you." Without waiting for her to agree, he scooped her into his arms.