The Crane and the Wolf

by Sabrina Lonewalker

A totally original story. Caine's wife, Laura, was actually someone else, someone with a hidden history. She believed both he and their son were dead but, she finds Peter first. In the midst of reunion an old foe reappears and the one secret she has kept from Caine is finally revealed. Will they come back together or be separated forever?

1. Chapter 1

THE CRANE AND THE WOLF

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA

PART ONE

by

Sabrina Lonewalker

She hadn't been in this part of the country for a very long time, almost seventeen years now. She looked up at the plateau where the ruins were. She sat on her motorcycle and stared at what was left of the building. A big part of her life had taken place in this area and she wondered why she had even come back here.

She slowly drove to the grove of trees that was next to the plateau and saw the wooden markers standing there. She shut off the bike and walked over to them. Two in particular caught her attention. She crouched and looked at them, remembering when she had met the older one of the two, the light in his grey eyes and the kindness in his soul.

She sat down, looking at the marker. Then, she looked at the one next to it and her eyes teared up. She had so hoped that this one would have been safe and he had been, for a time. She had regretted having to leave them the way that she had but, she had had no choice. To keep them safe, she had to leave. She couldn't even tell the man she loved more than life itself why she had to go or even who she really was.

It had been one of the hardest things she had ever done but, she knew that it had to be done if her husband and son were to survive but then, the one time they had needed her the most, she had been nowhere to be found and now, they were dead, both of them.

She rose to her feet, silently damming this nomadic existence of hers but, it was the life that had chosen her long before she had met him. She hadn't been looking for someone to fall in love with when they first met but, something about him had drawn her to him. His gentleness, the laughing spark in those warm, grey eyes of his, had warmed her in a way very few had ever managed to do.

She couldn't tell him her real name so, she used one of the many identities she had created for herself over the years. The background for each identity carefully built up and maintained so as to pass any scrunity necessary. She had had no idea that this, to her, passing friendship would have ever developed into what it had become. Their souls had been drawn together and she knew that she had found her match, her equal.

She had been content with him but then, a true miracle had happened. She had been told a long time ago that she would never be able to have any children but, four months after she married this man, she was pregnant. They had both been estatic and she was in awe. There were many things about herself that she hadn't told her husband.

She wasn't sure just how to tell him, after all, how do you tell the love of your life not only that you're a mercenary, who sometimes has to kill people but also, that part of you isn't even human? How do you tell him that you're a werewolf? In a way, she was glad that her son had died young. That way, he never had to worry about what he might have inherited from her.

She took her cycle down to the lakeshore where she and her husband had walked and sat, having picnics, talking about their coming child and then, she saw the gravestone. She walked over and looked, her eyes widening. So, this was how he had dealt with her leaving. He had told her son that she had died. Even better, that way, he had turned more fully to his father and he had a pleasant memory of her. Too bad it hadn't lasted very long.

She got back on her bike, started it, and roared away from the city of Braniff in Northern California and the ruins of the Shaolin Temple on the plateau. She also left behind that life, the man she had loved, the son she had borne. They were dead now and she had her life to live.

Sabrina Wolfe roared away, tears smarting behind her eyes as she remembered the man who had consumed her life and the child they had made together. It was strange to her that she, a mercenary, a werewolf, had fallen in love with a Shaolin priest, a man of gentleness, kindness and non-violence.

She wondered how their son would have been if he had lived to be an adult? She'd never know now. That was what hurt her the most, never knowing the promise and potential of their son.

She made her way back to the little hotel she was staying at and went up to her room. Once inside, she sat down and let her mind wander back to that first time she ever met the one man for her, a Shaolin priest named Kwai Chang Caine.

End Part One