Stepping off the soft glow of the porch was a relief. The light was bright as he rounded the corner, the darkness inviting him back to the world of four legs and teeth. Caelan rubbed his eyes, felt the human membranes slid off wet and watery into his palm as wolfsight made its first appearance, turned an already wild gaze into something truly feral. As he blinked away the lingering tears of humanity the world turned lighter, deep greys and blue shadows.  The light of Marcy's kitchen window illuminated a soft square on the hedges separating her home from the neighbor's.  The concept of home was always interesting to him, as he folded his shirt into a pile by and leaned on the siding to undo his boots, and it was always interesting how warm any home could feel when you're on the outside looking in. 

He knew what terrible things had happened in this particular dwelling, but from out here on the lawn, it could have been any other regular night, and that little kitchen window with the tear in the screen was bright and relaxing and tugged at instincts in a way-

"Hey, boss! Wait up!" Jorge's key chain jiggled as he jogged down the stairs. He was half out of his jeans, hopping the rest of the way to the sheriff with a funny little kick in his step to get free. He bounced up to the sheriff still struggling free of his last pant leg. 

Caelan hardly had to turn his head to detect him; the first couple seconds of a shift were a bit vertigo-inducing, but the widened peripheral vision and increased ability to detect movement was rather enjoyable- granted gaining better nighttime visuals wasn't exactly a perk when the trigger point was  the younger male wiggling out of banana -printed briefs.

"What?" he asked with a bit more snap than intended. He rubbed at his temple; the skin slid easily, readily. Pressure built inside his head. The eyes were ready. The bones were ready. The wolf was ready. 

Jorge pulled a couple bracelets off his left wrist next, pulled off his undershirt and was free. He made a loud, satisfied sigh and stretched out with crackling joints. "Jali doesn't like you going alone. Come to think of it, I don't want you going alone, either.  You haven't been right since coming back. I don't know if it's you've lost a step-"

The fur underneath the sheriff's skin bristled. "I've lost Marcy. I haven't lost a step."

"Yeah," Jorge said dismissively, reaching for his toes and getting about as close as his calves. "I know and that sucks, but listen, boss. Have you seen yourself wolfed out lately?"

"Haven't stopped to check myself out in the nearest puddle, no. Why?" 

"Well, see, there's something wrong about you."

Caelan took his shirt off slowly, and the first thing Jorge saw was an incredulous frown. 

"I mean," he said, starting off with a couple jumping jacks, realizing this wasn't the time, and stopped. He gestured at the glowering  hunk of muscle across from him. "I'd take a body shot off that any time, any place, but you look weird. It's your fur, I think. Your fur's not right. You used to be this handsome grizzled thing, with that cute tickle of white under your snout and the grey here"-he reached out to pat his friend's chest, saw the fangs and retreated a pace- "and now you're black all over. Don't get me wrong, I dig it, but we're not supposed to change like that, you know? Hey, my phone's in my pocket, lemme take a picture so you can see for yourself." 

Jorge's vision was also changing, or he might've seen a flush of embarrassment on the sheriff. His fur had changed from blacks and greys to all black and he, trained to notice everything, experienced in picking up the tiniest details, hadn't noticed ? 

"Aw, fuck," Caelan said, "What in Sam Hill am I supposed to do with that observation?"

Jorge shrugged. "Don't bite the messenger. "

"How long've I been like this?" he asked.

Another shrug. "Sorry, bossman. You were gone. I'm not sure."

"Okay," Caelan said. He did not want to think of this right now. He wanted to tear the sheepskin off and kill something. "Okay, fine. Have you noticed anything else different, anything I should be aware of this very instant?" And he said it with enough of an undertone to indicate that if it wasn't life-threatening, these currently human ears were gonna go deaf to it.

Jorge's mouth opened and closed. A few teeth popped loose and landed on his pants. He dropped onto his knees. "Nope," he said in a high-pitched lie and a touch of lisp. "Such handsome. Very wow. Run now?"

Caelan took a moment to consider the possibilities, made sure his articles were in a tidy pile beside the house, then strode up to Jorge and grabbed him by the shoulder. The skin stretched, the man yelped, and Caelan hauled him onto his elongated human legs. "Change in the back, not on the side. Most of the houses in their neighborhood are on the market, but that doesn't mean someone isn't home."

"Yes, yes," Jorge said, helped stumbling around the corner. "Sorry, very excite." When they were clear of the porch, out near the birdfeeder, Caelan gave a nod. The younger man practically howled in relief, throwing himself onto the ground, stretching into the leaves and grass. About halfway through, as skin split and the acrid steam of transformation filled the air, Caelan caught Jorge's luminous eyes looking over at him.  He hadn't transformed, not yet. 

It was generally safer to transform one at a time- werewolves, at least those in the force, tended to go one or a few at a time, taking turns, making sure the vulnerable state was protected. Granted, if he'd been following protocol he's still have his gun with them, but he hadn't intended to babysit the excitable werewolf this evening and with the front of the house crawling with cops, was less concerned. 

Lost a step, indeed, he thought. Careless. Troublesome. But what was troubling was the thought that his fur had changed. When? Why? Marcy's hair had been turning silver; she pegged the wendigo's curse as the start of it. 

Over the crack and hiss of changing, breaking, binding bone, he thought back to the night at Fronterland, back when the wendigo had clawed his throat and snapped his jaws. The muscles in his chest tightened at the thought, and his skin prickled with the unpleasant memory.  Neither himself, Marcy, nor Calico had any clear recollection of what happened after they each had fallen unconscious...Had his near death experience been a lot closer than he'd assumed? Miss Finn, prior to her disappearance, had been normal. She'd looked exactly the same as always right up to the moment she killed his brother August. 

So what would-

The scrap of human flesh through the leaf litter shifted into the quiet, wet swish of a tail sweeping through brush. Jorge trotted into a big circle around the sheriff, tail low and wagging, head bobbing tentatively. Always a submissive creature, Jorge, pureblood as they come, was a small, sleek wolf with a narrow skull and peppered tawny pelt. As far as werewolves went, about the size of a pony and about as dangerous as a golden retriever.  Black ticked his shoulders and his eyes were a warm shade of caramel. Covered in the remnants of his sheepskin, he was a good deal darker and bloodier than usual.

The wolf was watching him. 

"Hold your horses," Caelan said, waving him off. The wolf sat back on his haunches and started cleaning the blood off his shoulder as if to say, 'I'm waiting.' 

It was always toes first. The lengthening of bone and nail to sharper points that made tearing off the flesh that much easier. It was quick this evening, out here in the strange air with too many thoughts in his head and the instinct to crush something in his fangs. The pain felt good. It was different from wounds suffered in a fight-hurt like hell in the moment but once all four paws were braced against the earth and steam rolled away into the night and  his head swung toward the endless heavens the intensity was forgotten and all that existed was the pounding heartbeat of the wild.

That sheriffs were known among the supernatural community as 'reapers' made perfect sense upon seeing a full-grown wolf in his prime. He was of the old race, the guardian race, the one of ice and prehistory and centuries of careful cultivation to kill. Where Jorge was a pony, the sheriff stood tall and sturdy as a draft, with thick muscles, short ears, flat fur and teeth built for shearing flesh from prey and predator alike. This was why he did not often transform within sight of humans- he was noticeable, and for so very long werewolf law dictated that anyone who did notice wouldn't be around to share their discovery with anyone else.

Stretching into a low bow, Caelan looked down at his paws as they pushed through the scraps of sheepskin. Dark, but they'd always been dark. He glanced over his shoulder, felt his chin brush the slick, bloody fur, and noticed his tail was dark. The underside had been a little lighter before, hadn't it? 

Jorge woofed, canted his head and wagged the tip of his tail. Waiting for instruction, waiting to run. 

The pair of wolves buried the strips of skin under a small layer of leaves and dirt, and then Caelan stepped deeper into the woods. They circled around the main street, Jorge always a length behind his boss. For a time they'd waited on the edge of the road, about a mile out from the accident, waiting in the brush as cars and even an ambulance rushed past. When the road was clear in both directions, they'd trotted across to the far side, navigating the woods, one with his nose up, the other with it down, searching for the scent of the thing that had caused the crash. 

They caught the scent of something unnatural. It was always the unnatural scents one had to worry about and keyed in a sheriff to the usual target. This didn't smell like Zakar. He hadn't thought it would, but taking a deep, whuffling breath of a pawed impression in the mud, it smelled similar. 

The thing was feline and a shifter, that much was obvious from the shape of the foot and the off and on presence of retractable claws- a scratch here, no claws there. The smell was floral, peppery, filled with a tropical sweetness. 

Jorge dropped his head to get a scent. The two wolves regarded one another for a moment, then split to circle around- with Jorge following the main track and the sheriff breaking off to detect whether there was a fresher path, as these were headed toward the accident site. They found a second trail- a second creature most assuredly, and came together to track it. 

Caelan took the lead, jogging on several meters ahead with Jorge bringing up the rear, tongue lolled, ears pricked, looking left and right with the joy of someone let out of the office for once. 

Then suddenly it was quiet behind Caelan. A wolf had an unshakable instinct of pack and presence and  it had gone very quiet behind him and that gave him instant pause. He slowed, head canted, one ear rolled back, listening for the blundering wolf. 

Crickets.

He turned fully, head lifted, catching the scents on the wind.

Rabbit, deer, meat. Blowing wrong direction. Useless. Have to investigate. 

The wolf loped back where he'd last remembered hearing Jorge, rushing forward then slowing as he neared the small clearing. The wind changed again. Jorge was there. Jorge reeked of fear. There was something else here, too, a shape crouched on a tree branch. Jorge was staring up at it, hackles lifted,  ears flat and snarling as he backed up to the edge of the clearing. Neither him nor the shape paid any attention to Caelan as he came at the scene from the backside of the shape. Its long tail curled and uncurled. In the dim gray of wolf vision he could clearly make out spots, and the large, broad shoulders and wide head of a jaguar. Its belly was pressed tightly against the branch, but with every step Jorge took the thing's muscles would twitch and it would half-rise as if contemplating a pounce. 

That made one, he thought, unable to find a second shape between Jorge and the cat.

Jorge spotted Caelan. His head lifted, attention shifted for just a split second- and the creature launched itself from the branch. It crossed the clearing before Caelan could bound through. Jorge yelped and turned tail. Three powerful strides later and the jaguar had leaped onto his back. The wolf went down squealing and thrashing. 

Caelan was only halfway into the clearing when the second one dropped from the trees. He twisted around as it fell, sank his fangs into the claws scrambling for purchase on his back. Bone crunched in his grasp. A heavy paw swatted the side of his face below his eye, once, twice, three times in rapid succession, but he did not relent, ripping the cat off his shoulder and onto the ground. With one sharp kick of its hind quarters against his chest, it slid like oil out from beneath him and scrambled into the nearest tree where it waited just out of reach, one paw broken and dangling. The wolf was tempted to give chase, but there was nothing but a weak scramble and whimper from Jorge's direction. Without another thought, he ran for his packmate.