It had not taken Fenton long to find the right place. He had gone into the farmhouse one night, just to check, while Jehona and her family slept, and he knew there was no suitable space there, nor in any of the farm's outbuildings. All were made of wood, and while they were sturdy enough in their way, none of them could have contained a transformed lycanthrope, not even a scrawny female one, for more than a single full moon. No, they would have to keep her somewhere in the forest, near the house, but as far away from the village as possible.

He knew it at once when he saw it. The pit was deep and broad, its sides almost perpendicular to the earthen floor, which was pounded flat and hard by dozens of nights of pacing paws. No roots protruded from the sides of the pit; all have been carefully shorn or torn away to prevent the beast from catching hold and climbing out. A tall wooden ladder lay off to one side, almost concealed by fallen leaves and wildflowers.

On the evening before moonrise, Fenton washed himself in a chilly mountain stream. It was not only that he did not want her to be able to sense his presence too soon; cleansing and purification were a part of every ritual Fenton had read about. Other factors were said to add power to the ritual as well. Blood. Fire. Certain words or runes. A virgin sacrifice would have been best of all.

He doubted Jehona had been a virgin. All the virgins Fenton had ever known had been dry and tight, and had bled the first time. She had wept and screamed just as they had, but her cunt had been slippery wet, swallowing him greedily, and he had felt her climax.

Slut, he thought, irritated. Why could women not keep their legs together? Was it really so difficult?

But there was no help for it. Young female werewolves were rare, and he did not want to waste time hunting down another one. She would do.

He had been disappointed, at first, that she was older than him. Eighteen was aging out of the range Fenton usually enjoyed, but she was small and slim, with narrow hips and negligible breasts, making it easy for him to imagine her no more than thirteen. She had not been pretty, scarred and lame as she was, but it had been an entertaining game to pass the time until the moon waxed full, seeing what it would take to make the prey offer its throat willingly to the predator.

After washing, he rolled up his clothes and stowed them in his pack between the roots of a large tree. He removed an object from the pack, then went to a place downwind of the pit, with a view of the trail, and sat down to wait.

They came down the path as the evening light grew dim beneath the trees. Mother and daughter. The mother looked grim. The girl walked with her head down, her limp more exaggerated than usual, arm held awkwardly. Fenton supposed he had broken one of the bones of her wrist. She had not told her mother what had happened, and perhaps could do no more than give a vague warning about dangers in the forest. The Silencing rune he had placed on her lips had been enhanced by the use of blood. It was not permanent, but should be effective for several days at least. Not that Fenton required her to keep her silence for that long.

At the edge of the pit, the mother let down the ladder while Jehona undressed. Moving slowly and quietly, Fenton let a hand fall to his lap, and began to stroke himself, eyes running over the girl's slender body. Even from where he sat, he could see the dark spots of bruises on her skin. The mother said something, touching one of the marks, but the girl only shook her head, unable and perhaps unwilling to voice an explanation.

Before climbing down the ladder into the pit, Jehona embraced her mother. The woman kissed her daughter on the forehead and stepped away. She carefully folded the girl's clothing and put it into a bag, which she left, along with a folded blanket, near the edge of the pit, before drawing up the ladder once more. With a word of farewell, she turned and walked back the way she had come.

Fenton waited until she was out of sight before approaching the pit.

"Hello again, slut," he called down to her.

She did not seem surprised to see him, nor did she make any attempt to cover her nakedness, but glared up at him with hatred burning in her eyes.

The wolf knows no shame nor modesty, he thought with approval.

"What do you want now?"

"I thought you might want the company of a friend, all alone down there, waiting for the moon to rise."

"You are no friend to me," she spat back at him. "Come down here soon, and I will tear your throat out."

"I'll come down now, if you want me," he teased, stroking his naked cock. He was hard with the excitement of the moment. Three is a number of power, he thought. It should be three times, taking her power for myself. But there was no time for that now.

His belly clenched in anticipation. The time was almost at hand, after so many years of planning and dreaming. He raised the axe and drew the blade across his fingers. The axe head was pure silver. He had bought it in Knockturn Alley, inscribing the runes on it himself - runes for Power, Blood, and Taking - and had spent hours honing the blade. Blood welled from his cut fingers. In the pit, Jehona's head jerked up, scenting the blood, as Fenton carefully drew the rune for Protection on his chest.

"Why are you here?" she asked. She was pacing back and forth now, never taking her eyes off him, her speech slow and slurred. The moon would rise in a moment.

"Because he promised me," said Fenton. "My grandfather. If he had lived long enough, he would have turned me himself, and I would not have needed to seek out a wolf bitch to do it for me."

One day, you will be like me, Fen. Powerful. Special.

"You don't want this," she told him between gritted teeth. "It is pain. It is fear. It is your people turning their backs on you."

Fenton laughed and shook his head. "The power you have is wasted on the likes of you and that fool, Cesare. I will embrace it. I will use it. Men will tremble at the sound of my name."

"Where is Cesare?" she demanded. "What happened to him?"

"He is dead." He raised the blade in his hand and waved it at her. "I told you; he misjudged the stroke of an axe."

Jehona screamed with rage, beating her fists silently against the wall of her prison, and howling curses up at him. Suddenly her scream became a high-pitched shriek, and she staggered backwards, hugging herself as if trying to hold her body together.

As the change began, Fenton watched in fascination. The stretching, snapping sound as the bones changed shape and the sinews realigned. The elongation of the skull. The brutal rearrangement of the brain and other organs. The sprouting hair and curving claws. And over it all, the undiminished howl of pain from the woman trying to resist the hostile takeover of her body.

Fenton shook himself and pulled away from the sight. There was no time to waste. Seizing the ladder, he lowered it into the pit and climbed down, jumping the last few feet, the silver axe in his hand. The grey-brown beast lay on its side, panting in the shadows, exhausted from its transformation. It was not as big as Fenton had thought it would be - barely twice the size of an ordinary wolf - but then, the girl was small. He hoped its relative scrawniness would not have an adverse effect on his own transformed size and power.

The wolf saw him, and struggled to its feet, lips drawn back in a silent snarl. Its eyes, like molten gold, still burned with hatred.

Fenton crouched, grinning, arms spread. "Come here to me, my little bitch."

The beast lunged at him, and he danced away, making a feint with the axe. They circled one another warily. The wolf was limping. It was lame in one of its forepaws as well as the left hind leg. Fenton smiled. This would be child's play.

He feinted again to the left, and when she snapped at him, he swung around the other way, striking a heavy blow to her neck. There was a sudden smell of burning, and the wolf howled as the silver seared its flesh. Blood poured from the wound, but still she came on, stalking him, eyes intent.

Her next lunge was slower, and the axe caught her in the flank this time. She stumbled. Fenton could see she was weakening, but she was still a threat. If he did not time it just right, she might kill him, even now. He kept his eyes on her, moving always backwards, always away, around the curving edges of the pit. She almost had him for a moment when he forgot about the ladder, and tripped over it, but he rolled away as he fell, narrowly avoiding her gnashing jaws.

After that, it was only a matter of time.

At last she staggered, falling on her side, and lay panting, bleeding from half a dozen smoking wounds. Her eyes stayed fixed on him as he stepped nearer, holding out his left forearm.

"You want it," he murmured to her. "Your kind always do."

Her muscles bunched, and with a last surge of strength, she threw herself at him, teeth sinking into the flesh of his arm. Gritting his own teeth against the pain, he swung the axe down hard, burying the blade at the base of her skull.

The heavy body shuddered and went limp, crushing jaws loosening their grip. Fenton threw her off and stared down at the curving row of deep punctures that encircled his forearm. The wounds stung and bled freely. He grinned, his belly quivering with excitement. He had done it. Now there was only the ritual to complete.

This was not something Fenton had learned in any of his books; he was improvising. The moment was too important to be allowed to pass without at least a symbolic gesture, and a properly-performed ritual would only add to his power. Kneeling on the ground beside the wolf's body, he dipped his fingers into its wounds, using the blood to draw runes of Power, Fortune, Taking, and Victory on his own skin. He slit the beast's throat, cupping his hands to catch the blood that still flowed in a slow trickle, then threw his head back, raising his hands towards the moon.

"I am consecrated in the blood of the Wolf, and by the light of the moon," he called out, "reborn and renamed upon this night as Fenrir Greyback." Bringing his cupped hands to his lips, he drank deeply, the tang of hot silver on his tongue.

There was blood everywhere. Much more than when he had killed the old man. Cesare had refused to turn him, but even so, he deserved some reward for leading him to Jehona, so Fenrir had granted him his greatest wish: he had not died alone.

He laid a hand on the beast's flank. The wiry fur was sticky with blood, but the body was still warm, and Fenrir was still hard with the excitement of what he had accomplished.

It should be three times, he thought again. Three times, to take her power and make it mine.

When he had finished, he picked up the axe once more, using the heavy blade to knock loose one of the wolf's teeth. This, he would take with him - a keepsake and memento of his quest, and of the great thing he had achieved. Out of curiosity, he touched the silver axe head to his arm. Immediately, the flesh began to blister. There was a smell of burning hair. Fenrir grinned.

Climbing up the ladder, the new-made werewolf sat under a tree, laying the blood-smeared axe on the ground before him. He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply all the scents of the forest, now sharper and clearer to his nose. Leaves and grass, earth and wood, small animals and decomposing plant matter. And overlaying it all, the thick, rich scent of blood, making his belly rumble and his mouth water.

He would wait there for the dawn, and the return of the mother. Then, he would go back to the farmhouse, where the father and young sister lay waiting for him.

Fenrir Greyback stretched and leaned back comfortably against the trunk of the tree. He looked up into the face of the last full moon he would ever see with human eyes, and sighed with satisfaction at a job well done.