Read Long Shadows: The Lycanthropy Files, Book 2 for Free Online

and he later told me he could tell she was excited about a new puzzle to solve. We ate a light dinner and waited for it to get dark.
    “Are you physically changing or using the aconite?” Joanie asked. “I have extra if you need some since I’m not using any right now.”
    “I brought some, but I’m reluctant to take it. It’s taking longer and longer for it to wear off,” I told her. “Did your grandfather say anything about that?”
    The tears returned to her eyes, and I regretted my direct question.
    “Pregnancy hormones,” she said again and wiped at her eyes with the backs of her hands. “No, he didn’t say anything about tolerance or withdrawal effects. I don’t know how much he’d studied it in others.”
    “Hey, don’t do that,” I said and took her hands in mine.
    “What?”
    “Pretend you’re not grieving. It’s important that you allow yourself to.”
    “So says the social worker.” But she allowed a tear to drip off her cheek without catching it. “I really miss him. I lost him right after I found him again, and I have so many things I wanted to ask him and tell him.”
    “That’s normal. Not that it makes anything better.”
    “No, but you’re right. I can’t approach everything like a research question, especially my own emotions.”
    “Exactly.” I looked at my hands, which, if I had been physically changing regularly, would be rough and calloused. “I’ll physically change tonight, and then let’s get manicures tomorrow. We need some girl time.”
    She laughed. “Deal.” She stood and gave me a hug. “I’m glad you came back.”
    “Me too.” As a hunter, I knew that the respite from being the prey would be short, and I had to get what I needed here quickly and move on. I only wished I knew how much time I had before they found me. It was only with strong effort that I kept myself from shivering.
    I hope you’re still glad tomorrow. I hope I am.

Chapter Four
    I hadn’t physically changed since the first time six months before. Then, in a trance, I had opened the front door to my apartment, taken off my clothes, and changed into a wolf with the world watching. Okay, not quite the world. It was pretty late, and my apartment complex was quiet. Since then, I had spirit-walked with the aid of the aconite, which caused me to create an astral projection of my wolf self rather than physically change. Somehow I could still eat what I hunted, and I hoped that wouldn’t translate into bad blood work. Who knew how much wild critters would raise one’s cholesterol? A stupid concern, I know, considering everything else. It’s funny what the mind latches on to.
    Now I sat in the living room at Joanie’s and Leo’s house with them, all of us wrapped in sheets, as we waited for the moon to rise and for its light to sing in our blood. We could change without it, but it was easier in its light, which compelled us when it was full. I suppressed the urge to giggle at the sight, like we were at the most boring toga party ever. Joanie caught my eye, and her lips twitched like she thought the same.
    The moon rose, its light spilling through the bank of windows.
    “It’s time,” Joanie murmured.
    My inner wolf stretched and yawned, unfurling to her full spiritual presence.
    “We can change? she asked. Really change?”
    “Yes, just be gentle with me.” Again I stuffed the urge to laugh. I hadn’t said those words in a really long time.
    I gasped when my human spirit shrank. The sensation was that of hurtling down a long hallway, then landing in a warm pool and expanding within it to fill a new shape. The inner wolf and I became one. I heard tendons snapping and bones cracking in new arrangements and suspected I would be sore the next day.
    “Not sore. Strong and healthy and whole. We are one.”
    “We can’t be one. I am not a wolf.”
    But I was. I shook the sheet off and looked around with new eyes. Although my senses were heightened in human form now that I had these new