Up until the confident age of seven, Scott Prince, Jr., was an average sort of boy. He had wild reams of energy, able to last from 7:00 in the morning to 9:00 at night without fail. His sleep was heavy, he had twinkling green eyes and blond hair, and an affable grin.

But that grin began to fade after the incident. Slowly, it faded away into an emotionless mask with hard marble green eyes and a set mouth. Scott Prince would never be the same.


"Scott! Wait up!"

Scott, in a torrent of pedaling feet, raced forward on his bike. Joey, his best friend, hollered for him to wait up, but Scott's ears were closed with the excitement of the ride. The shiny blue ten speed that his father had given him for his recent birthday sped happily over leaves and dead branches and upturned roots. Joey was still stuck on his pokemon bike.

"Scott! I've gotta go in! Mama wants me in early today!" Joey called to his best friend and turned his bike around. "Wanna come over?"

"Nah! I'm checking out bike trails today, Joey!" Scott replied. "See you tomorrow."

As Joey turned around and pedaled off, Scott turned his green gaze upwards and noted the falling darkness and the shining light of the full moon. His mother would want him in soon as well, so he started to turn around to pedal back to his house on the edge of the woods.

Crack.

"What was that?" Scott asked wildly, whirling around to the sound of the twig snapping. This motion cost him his balance and he landed on the forest floor with a thump, scraping his elbow a bit. "Hello?"

A low rumble met his nervous call. Scott began to shake. Suddenly, something snapped and he turned and sprinted away.

A terrible roar filled the air and then suddenly a gray creature shot out after him. Scott screamed and ran for his life, tears flowing down his cheeks. The creature was getting closer. He could feel its hot breath on his neck, rankly reaching his nose. Suddenly, it leapt and landed on Scott's back. Scott went down.

*********************
"Will he be okay?"

Mrs. Prince stood worriedly in the waiting room, pacing back and forth in front of her husband, who was just as worriedly smoking his pipe. Scott Prince, Sr., never smoked a pipe unless he was worried. Now that their son was sitting in the emergency, blood flowing from his back and arms, they were nervous wrecks.

Scott's younger sister, Adelaide (Addy for short), was asleep in her chair. Scott had been found at midnight, at the base of the tree, bleeding. It was a wonder he was not dead from blood loss. He was receiving a blood transplant, because none of the doctors knew any spells that could fix blood loss. His broken arm could be fixed easily, though, and was.

"Mom? Dad?" Scott's voice, seemingly hollow, entered the room first followed by the actual boy. At three o'clock in the morning, he didn't look very awake. His wounds, however, had been closed up by spells, giving him an unharmed look. But his parents knew that the boy would never be the same. "What's going on?"

"We'd better take you home, son," Mr. Prince said. "Lacy, you sign him out of the hospital. I'll get the kids to the car." He gently scooped up Addy in his right arm, and, holding Scott's hand in his left, headed for their junker car, The Boss. It was a beat up blue Volvo, but it still ran.

Scott didn't know why his parents were so worried until the next month. He had been given rides to and back from school, watched almost every minute of the day, and cut off from the woods completely. For a seven-year-old, the constant attention was very stifling.

It was nearly late afternoon when his father got home and took him out to their metal storage shed a couple miles away. He was carrying a bag and told Scott to get into old clothes. Scott obediently went and did so, wondering why. Then his father took him out to the shed, placed a bowl of water on the ground, some raw meat, and a metal collar. "Put this on," he instructed Scott.

"Why?" Scott asked as he slipped the collar over his head. It hung off of one shoulder. Dusk was just settling.

"Scott. We've got bad news. That creature that scratched you up last month was a werewolf. Your mother and I talked to the person, and he said this was best for you. I'm going to lock you in this shed and then come get you in the morning. Don't be scared. It'll be over in the morning."

That night was one of the most difficult in Scott's life. Just as the moon shone full into the window, with bars over it, and hit Scott's shoulders, he felt the changes start to begin. With a sickening twist of pain, his body lurched forward and the bones started to change inside of him. His face grew out, twanging pain so loudly that he screamed. With that, he collapsed into a pained heap.

And emerged a wolf.

He was big. He was mean.

He was hungry.

He was trapped.

The creature that had been Scott howled loudly and went crazy, running in circles, shrieking, biting himself. And then daybreak came.

***********************
Years flew by and once a month Scott went crazy. He slowly grew, became more and more distant from his friends. Addy, Joey, and some of the other obnoxious guys from school started calling him Wolf because his secret had been found out. He had been home-schooled after he turned eight because people tended to be afraid of him and flinched whenever he came into the room.

Today was a special day for Wolf. Everybody had slowly picked up, calling him that, except for his mother, because it sounded cool and Scott had decided that he liked it. He had turned thirteen the previous week, and, to everybody's surprise, had been accepted to the best witchcraft and wizardry school in the world: Hogwarts. Of course, he'd be starting as a third year, but he was as far along magically advanced as the rest of them, so he wasn't worried about that aspect.

Addy, young and bold, redheaded, thin, and green-eyed, stood next to him, arms crossed. "How come he gets to go and I don't?" she muttered. "After all, he's a - "

"Addy!" Mrs. Prince scolded before Addy could give away Wolf's secret. "We're tying to keep it as secret as possible. And he's a person, like you and me, so, unless you want to be grounded from Shiara and Temm again, you'd better start treating him like one."

"Why?" Addy questioned petulantly.

"Just because," Wolf replied, looking around the muggle station nervously. He had grown up with muggles, but he had recently slipped more and more into the wizarding world when he had visited his cousin for a month. His cousin, Ray, was the only person that truly accepted his being a werewolf except for his parents.

"Mom, I'm not sure I want to go," Wolf muttered, not believing his ears.

"Nonsense," Mrs. Prince replied, brushing her fingers though Wolf's hair to tame it out. That was one of the problems with being a werewolf - you always had messy hair. Wolf sighed once, used to her maternal actions but embarrassed. "You go on through the barrier now. We'll follow you."

Wolf, sighing, pushed his trolley through the barrier and stared at the crimson train that awaited him. Students and parents milled around.

"Don't lose your toad, Neville!"

"Grandma, that was years ago..."

Wolf stared around in wonder. He hadn't really been close to that many people since he had become...since when he was seven, because his parents didn't want his secret getting past school. They'd moved three times since then, and the last had been in the muggle and wizardry worlds both. So Wolf had his wizard friends and his muggle friends alike.

But his wizard friends had all gone to Eton and he was going to Hogwarts. With another sigh, he pushed his trolley forward and searched the row for an empty compartment. Upon finding one, he loaded his cart into it and shoved it into a corner. Then he leaned out the window to say goodbye to his parents and Addy.

"I'll write," he promised, just as the train's engine started up. He glanced around, and then turned to Addy, "I promise."

"Sure you will," Addy said, raising a cocky nine-year-old eyebrow at him. "You'll write lots, I'm sure of that." She sounded sarcastic. But the train started there and Wolf waved to his relatives and leaned back into his seat.

"She's going nowhere in life," he muttered to himself.

"I found one, Ron!"

Wolf looked up as a boy with tousled black hair stuck his head in the compartment. "It looks empty!" he yelled, disappearing. Wolf, who was tall and thin by now, hadn't been seen.

Another boy, Ron obviously, entered. He was taller than Wolf with flaming red hair and a rather large nose. "We're fifth years, Harry! I can't believe it!"

"And prefects." Harry, the black haired boy, grinned and held out a polished badge. "They must have been crazy to let us be prefects." He turned slightly to lug another trunk into the compartment and saw Wolf. "Oh, hello. Can we sit in here?"

"It's fine with me," Wolf said, wondering who these two were.

"I'm Harry Potter - " the name sounded familiar " - and this is Ron Weasley." The black-haired boy introduced them. Ron nodded.

"I'm Wolf," Wolf said. He stopped, then said, "My real name's Scott Prince, Jr."

"That's an odd nickname," Harry said. He was about to go on, but a girl with a lot of brown hair entered the compartment, smiling. "Hey, Hermione. This here is Wolf. What house are you in, Wolf?"

"I don't know yet," Wolf muttered.

"Ah, first year?" Hermione asked, flopping down into one of the seats.

"Actually, no, I'm going to be a third year, but I haven't gone yet, due to some problems." Wolf smiled grimly, trying to get them off the subject. To his luck, none of them pursued.

"I wonder what evil dude is going to pop up and try to kill us this year," Ron remarked with a slightly sardonic look on his face. "It hasn't failed yet."

"Ah, ah, ah, Sirius Black wasn't trying to kill us," Harry remarked, leaning back in his seat and lounging easily.

"No, it was the bloody Dementors," Hermione cut in. Harry looked at her, a bemused expression on his face. "Last year it was - "

She was stopped as the compartment door flew open. A silvery-blond boy entered, followed by two other boys, looking like goons or apes or something. "Who's the new kid?"

"Wolf. What do you want, Malfoy?" Harry asked, rolling his eyes. He didn't bother to get up.

"You know that you and I are the best at Quidditch, right?" Malfoy asked, giving Wolf a look through the slits of his eyes.

"What are you getting at, Malfoy?" Ron growled.

"Nothing, nothing. I want a duel, though, to see who's better."

"A duel is nothing to Quidditch," Harry remarked lazily. "Besides, I already know who's better. I'm not interested, Malfoy."

"I just - " Malfoy started.

"I'm not interested," Harry said.

"Fine, then, if that's the way you want to be," Malfoy said. "But you'll die this year, Potter. You've made it so far, Potter. But no more."

Wolf watched him walk away. He got the strangest feeling he was the only one that felt Malfoy's threats were geniune.