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train car, Jack knew that they had left true civilization behind when the S.S. Kraken had left port in Seattle.
    "Jack?" the Reverend prodded.
    Jack focused on him. Somehow he had persuaded these grizzled men, these weary, vicious beasts, to follow him. Though he had the wild in him, in the end Jack was only human, and one with a mere nineteen years upon this Earth. But Louis and the Reverend, and Maurilio and Vukovich, had been plucked away from their human lives and taught how to be monsters by the werewolf Nilsson brothers. They'd been made to believe they had no alternative other than monstrosity and savagery. Jack was striving to show them that there were other options, and that they could define themselves if they worked at it, and suddenly he was the human leader of a pack of werewolves who'd pledged loyalty to him and to Sabine.
    His strange world kept spinning.
    "I've learned that anything is possible," Jack said, glancing from one to the other. "And I'd like to think that Ghost can change. If I believe that's possible for all of you — and you know I do — then I must believe it for him. But does he want it? Ghost forged himself into a creature of evil and brutality as an act of will. To transform himself away from that, he must crave it."
    Jack looked from Louis to the Reverend, but the answer came, instead, from beside him.
    "Does it matter?" Sabine asked, her voice a quiet, sleepy rasp.
    "Sabine?" Louis said.
    The sea witch looked up at them, then focused on Jack, pushing the veil of hair away from her lovely eyes.
    "Unless we're willing to kill Ghost, we can only ignore him," she said softly. "That does not mean we trust him. His true nature will show itself in time." She smiled, tired. "Now, shush. I'm sleepy. We should all rest while we can."
    The three of them looked at her a moment, but Sabine ignored them, settling deeper into her seat and leaning against the window of the train. The rattling did not seem to bother her.
    Jack glanced at the Reverend, whose brows were knitted in worry and consternation.
    Louis exhaled, sinking down into his seat as though to follow Sabine's example. "I just hope that when his true nature does emerge, we see it coming."
     
     
    Jostled awake by the motion of the train, Jack reached up to rub sleep from his eyes. Sabine had snuggled up tight against him and he had an arm around her. He wondered if he ought to have argued against her sitting beside the window, where the cold night air snuck in around the frame. In her years on the sea, Sabine had surely been much colder than this, but being away from the water was having a detrimental enough effect on her without the chilly fingers of the Yukon night wrapping themselves around her throat. He gazed at her sleeping profile, then kissed the top of her head. She would be all right, he decided. Sabine had lived uncountable years without Jack London to watch over her. A little chill would do her no harm.
    Both Louis and the Reverend had also drifted off. Louis had curled up against the window, his face smooth and innocent as he slept, with no trace of the beast in evidence. The Reverend, though, reminded Jack of a sleeping tiger he had seen once at the zoo. His face twitched and his brow was knitted, perhaps stalking tender prey in his dreams.
    A glance around revealed that many of the train's passengers were also napping, including Maurilio and Vukovich. Had the rail line from Skagway to Whitehorse been straight and flat, they'd have long since arrived, but with the precarious curves and long inclines along the route, the train never had the opportunity to build up any speed. Still, Jack thought they must be nearly there.
    He turned to look at the landscape slipping by outside. Moonlight played amongst trees' branches and threw shafts of golden illumination into the deeply shadowed woods. As Jack relaxed into this picture, wanting to explore the terrain on foot and lose himself in the Yukon wilderness, something moved through the