It was easier than breathing and like nothing else in the world. In only a few brief moments, everything changed. First came the fire; an insatiable heat that blazed through every inch of her body, burning away all conscious thought and physical sensation. Her heart pounded frantically, as if it were trying to escape her collapsing form and a vicious wave of euphoria washed over her, threatening to swallow her whole.

Every one of her muscles quivered ecstatically as she neared the inevitable climax that was quickly building, and finally with a gasp she tipped over the precipice, falling deeper and deeper into something far older and more primal than perhaps humanity in and of itself.

She would never forget the first time she'd ever been called by her secret name and the wolf within her clawed it's way out through her skin, how she'd stumbled shakily into her second form like a new fawn taking it's first steps. The way the night bloomed in front of her with new sounds and smells, both blinding and intoxicating; how drunk she'd felt with the sheer power.

That had been several years back, and with every coming and going of the lunar cycle sense, she'd delighted in the calling, and fallen so gracefully into the change, even Sorin had said she made a better wolf than a girl, and he was right; there was nothing she did better, or gave her more pleasure. But from the very beginning, there was something very different about her.

Even when the sun was up, she could remember the song the moon used when it called to her, the way her name hummed through the darkness, anchoring her with the night as if a thin silver chord hung from her very soul, and setting her free only when it was struck in just the right way. At least, that was until she discovered the secret.

It was an accident in the beginning, in a fit of pre-pubescent rage over some stupid thing she could barely remember, she'd simply given in, and threw all of her humanity away, a gift to the wolf in exchange for a relief for all the aforementioned affliction entailed. It was strange in the beginning, forcing herself to hear the call, but despite the overwhelming wrongness of it, it felt right, and after a while, she couldn't stop.

"Adelina Rodica Vasile. Ceea ce am creat?" Sorin had said, pulling her head in between his ruff hands and pushing his angry gaze against her face. She knew she was in trouble when she became not only Adelina, but Adelina Rodica Vasile. Usually Addie was more than enough, and sometimes when it suited him Sorin simply called her "hey you" or "babe" twice less ALL of the name's he'd given her. He'd only ever whip out the Adelina treatment when she'd really earned it, and to say that she'd earned it then would be an understatement of biblical proportions.

It was wrong, and unnatural to change without permission. He told her that she would turn into something different, something that wore her pelt but didn't belong to her. But mostly he told her that nothing came without a price, and sooner or later she would have to pay for her choices.

But as time went on, and nothing appeared to change. It would seem that she really was different, that she'd already payed her price when she was first born into the new strange world of the dark night. That she'd earned the right to her fur when she'd lost the beauty she'd once had to the scars she would wear for the rest of her life.

Even if she wasn't exempt from the rules that governed her kind, it was nearly inconceivable from which direction her up pence would come, at least, that was until from across the only corner store in the small town of Aelbank Colorado, she spotted a young man with dark skin, dark eyes and a dark smile who smelled of wolf and tobacco smoke.