Kiera

My head felt sore, and I felt something warm drip from my nose and spatter against my top lip. Somebody was holding me up and gently shaking me. I opened my eyes to see Potter staring at me.

"Kiera, are you okay?" he was asking me, but his voice was groggy, as if coming from far away. I felt my legs begin to buckle at the knees and he gripped me by the shoulders. "Kiera?" he said again.

Then I remembered him shouting at Isidor and breaking hard. I could see the world tumbling out of control and my face hitting the windshield.

"You arsehole," I mumbled and went to slap his face. But I was still disorientated and he easily took hold of my wrist.

"Don't get so excited, sweet-cheeks," he half-smiled at me.

"You crashed the car on purpose," I said, my eyesight starting to focus again, and the feeling returning to my legs.

"It worked though, didn't it? Those cops are dead," he said, looking back over his shoulder at the police car, which now sat on its roof spraying flashes of blue light into the night from its crushed emergency lights. Then, letting go of me, Potter shouted, "Isidor watch your back!"

As if the world had been paused, I watched as two guys in police uniforms sprang from beneath the upturned car and into the air. Their transformation from man to wolf was so rapid that if I'd blinked, I would have missed it. Their crisp, white shirts, their trousers, and their boots flew away in ragged strips, revealing the giant wolves that hid beneath them. With snouts similar in size to that of a lion's, the two wolves launched themselves at Isidor. Everything happened so fast, that Isidor was unaware of the creatures that were about to rip him to pieces, just like their clothes that now fluttered away in the raging wind.

"Isidor!" Kayla shrieked, and I snapped my head right, to see her standing next to me in the pouring rain.

There was a vicious-sounding snarl that was so loud that I threw my hands to my ears. I watched Isidor glance up at Potter as he raced towards him. And as fast as the wolves had shed their uniforms, Potter had removed his long, black coat, his wings were out, and he was speeding through the air. Realising that something wasn't right, Isidor spun around. It was then that I saw the wolf on his back. It was Sam. The boy's face was still half human and half wolf and his eyes glowed so bright that they looked like headlamps. He opened his mouth, foamy lengths of saliva swinging from his ivory-looking teeth. Sam threw his head back and roared. Fearing that he was going to tear Isidor's head from his neck, my claws and fangs sprung out without me having to think about it. It was as natural as breathing to me now. With my head still feeling foggy, I was just about to spring into the air, when I was grabbed from behind. Swiping my claws in the air, I spun around as Kayla ducked to avoid me taking her head clean off. It was Kayla who had hold of me.

"Let go of me!" I shouted at her.

"Look!" she cried, pointing back at Isidor.

I glanced back over my shoulder to see Sam leap from Isidor's back and drag one of the Skin-walkers out of the air.

"Sam's helping Isidor," Kayla shouted over a sudden rumble of thunder. "Sam won't hurt him."

Isidor fell forward onto his knees, rolled over, and within an instant he was on his feet again, crossbow in hand and firing off wave after wave of stakes at the Skin-walkers. Potter snatched the second Skin-walker from the air by wrapping his arms around the creature and dragging him away from Isidor. He flew backwards into the air. The wolf kicked wildly with its huge back legs. With the creature's chest exposed, Isidor seized his chance and filled it with stakes that whizzed through the air with lightning speed.

With the wolf going limp in Potter's arms, he threw it aside and performed something close to a loop-de-loop in the air above the road. I felt Kayla loosen her grip on me. She was then flashing past as she raced across the road towards Sam, who was now lying on his back and struggling to fight off the Skin-walker that was poised over him. Just like the rest of us, Kayla released her fangs and claws, throwing off her coat so her glitter-coated wings could be freed.

Screeching like a wild bird of prey, she shot through the dark and clattered into the wolf that was now biting and snapping at Sam. The wolf looked confused, though, like he wasn't sure whether to kill one of his own. Maybe he couldn't figure out what the odd-looking wolf-boy was. But in those few seconds of doubt, Kayla sunk her fangs into its neck. Blood jetted from its throat and turned her face the same colour as her hair. I could see her throat bobbing up and down as she drank from the wolf. Her eyes rolled back in their sockets, showing their whites. She looked as if she were in ecstasy.

The Skin-walker went crazy as it lashed out with his giant paws and snapped at the air with its teeth. It howled and roared, black jets of blood shooting from its mouth like vomit.

"Kayla!" I roared, pulling her from the wolf, fearing that if she drank too much of the red stuff, her cravings would never again be sedated by Lot 13.

She made a gargling sound in the back of her throat as she momentarily tried to fight me off. I gripped hold of her and watched as the wolf's blood ran from the corners of her mouth. My stomach began to cramp as I fought my own sudden urge to let go of her and drink from the wolf myself. Watching the thick, black globules of blood drip from her chin made my head spin, and I looked down at my claws which held her, and saw that the skin on them was starting to crack. I released her, and she fell backwards onto her arse and into the nearest puddle. With my claws held out before me, I gasped in horror as my flesh turned grey and began to break. My claws disappeared back into my fingertips and the cracks went with them. But those sick, cramping feelings in my stomach remained, and the urge for the red stuff was stronger than ever before.

Wheeling around, I watched as the wolf that Kayla had fed on struggled to its feet. It whimpered and then collapsed onto its side as Potter dropped from the sky and removed its head with one quick swipe of his claws. Blood pumped from its neck and clouded the puddles that covered the road. With my eyes fixed on the blood, I stepped forward, as if I were sleepwalking. I ran the tip of my tongue over my lips. All I could see was the blood. The wind and the driving rain had gone, everything had gone, except the red stuff pumping from the neck of the Skin-walker.

"No," someone whispered in my ear.

As if waking from a dream, I looked right and could see Potter.

"No, Kiera," he said again, and took my hand. "You don't need that."

"But..." I started.

"Later," he said back.

"I'm cracking up in more ways than one," I told him, feeling scared all of a sudden.

"I'll take care of you," he said, gently squeezing my hand.

"Someone give me a hand over here!" Isidor shouted, as the sky lit up with another fork of lightning.

Potter let go of my hand and ran through the rain towards Isidor, who was trying to lift Sam off the road. I looked down one last time at the blood leaking from the wolf, and reluctantly crossed the road to join them.

"We need to get him some help - and quick," Isidor said, crouching, so he could place one of Sam's arms around his shoulders. Sam's black hair, which covered his cheeks and chin, glistened with rain and was matted and tangled.

"We should leave him," Potter said. "He's not one of us."

"He saved Isidor," Kayla spoke up from behind us. We turned around to see her get up from the puddles, arming the blood away from her mouth.

"We can't trust him," Potter snapped.

"He attacked one of his own to protect Isidor," she came back at him, wiping the water from the seat of her jeans.

"So you admit that he is one of them?" Potter shot back.

"Look, until we know for sure what he is, Sam comes with us," I cut in. "We can't just leave him. He is obviously going through some kinda change. And Kayla's right. He did help Isidor."

"I think he's part wolf and part human," Isidor said.

"No shit, Sherlock!" Potter glared, picking his coat up off the road and putting it on.

"Why do you have to always..." Isidor started, but Potter spoke over him.

"Look, it isn't going to take the Skin-walkers long to figure out what just happened here, and they'll come after us," he said. "We need to get away from here fast. The wolf-boy will only slow us down."

"We could fly," Kayla suggested, helping Isidor get Sam to his feet.

"What, in this storm?" Potter asked, glancing up at the night sky as it split in two with more flashes of purple lightning. "It's too dangerous. And besides, I don't fancy being the one carrying wolf-boy when he decides to start fitting again."

"We go on foot then," I said. "We find some shelter until the storm passes, and by then, Sam's fever might have passed."

"Whatever we're gonna do, we better decide quickly," Isidor said and pointed into the distance. "It looks like we've got company sooner than we thought."

I looked in the direction he was pointing and across the bleak fields, I could see flashes of blue and white light. At first I thought that Isidor was wrong and the blue shocks of light were the storm. But the flashes of blue were coming closer and at speed. It was the emergency lights of police cars that I could see.

"Potter, help me get our stuff from the boot," I snapped, racing towards the car. I knocked my wet hair from my eyes and fumbled with the lock on the car, but it was jammed, busted shut during the crash.

Potter pushed me aside as the sound of police sirens grew ever louder behind us. Making a fist with his claw, he smashed through the boot, peeling back the metal, like opening up a can of beans. Reaching into the hole that he had made, Potter yanked out our backpacks.

"Take these," he said, piling the bags into my arms. "Now get the others into that field and run."

"What about you?" I asked.

Potter took his lighter from his pocket and said, "I'm gonna get rid of any trace that we've been here." Then turning, he stuck his lighter to the petrol that bled from the car. The petrol lit at once, and a streak of blue and orange flame raced towards the car. "Run!" he roared, as we were lifted off our feet and thrown into the air under the force of the explosion.