Sam sighed, looking back over his shoulder at the large rocks that littered the hillside before the farm fields began. They were in England, where Cas had sent them, staking out the edge of town since word was something strange had been going on there during the night.

"Sammy? Do you have the silver bullets?" Dean's voice cut through his thoughts.

"Yeah, Dean, why—"

Dean sent a hard elbow to his ribs, making him cringe as he gazed from between the bushes toward what Dean was looking at.

"Oh—" A sight unlike any other he'd before seen met his eyes, a large, furry gray form, something between humanoid and canid had appeared from thin air on the hillside in front of them.

"Oh's right. We've got ourselves a werewolf." Dean grinned.

"Yeah, but, where'd it come from?!" Sam exclaimed.

"Hell if I know! What are you waiting for, are you gonna insist on going up and shaking its paw and asking it 'Hi wolfie, how do you do," before you admit it's a friggin' monster and gank it?"

"I dunno, though. Something about it seems a little off," Sam said cautiously. "I mean, since when do they just appear like that?"

"Dude, you do remember what happened last time you started screwing around with werewolves, right?"

"You don't have to bring it up," Sam snapped angrily, covering his pocket that had the bullets in it. "But this isn't then. And something about this doesn't feel right. I'm not willing to do this until we know for sure what's up."

"Still, we need to be ready in case something happens," Dean argued. "What if it jumps on somebody ready to rip their heart out, huh? Waiting to give me the damn bullet til then will be too late."

"Fine," Sam muttered, grudgingly handing over a handful of bullets to Dean, who loaded the gun with them.

"There. Now if you really insis—"

Sam heard a pop! and felt a whoosh of air. Then there was a dull thud, and the sound of a crack, which made him whip around simultaneously, reflexively brandishing the angel blade he carried at his hip.

"Oh, sh—" He barely had time to grunt before another, far larger werewolf leapt off of Dean and came crashing down on him.

Its front paws contacted his chest, sending him sprawling before he could recoil to get a decent swing in . He managed to slice at the creature's shoulder with his blade before it ripped it from his hands with its jaws, slinging it away.

"Oh, my God," he breathed as the creature stood, over him, its massive front paws pinning him down. "Oh, my god….Dean! De—" he rasped, fear wracking his mind as he tried futilely to wrestle against the creature, but it's weight pressed so hard on his chest, even if Dean was alive or conscious, he realized, his voice was so stunted it was unlikely he'd hear it.

"Remus!" A sharp female voice cut in. "Merlin, what happened?!" A woman in a long dark robe came running, a cloud of curly brown hair whipping around her in the wind as she came to a stop standing over Sam and the beast.

The werewolf, still standing on Sam's chest, looked up at her for an instant, growling in a low voice, a sound that made his skin crawl perhaps even more than the fact that it was pinning him to the ground, making him want more than anything to stab it or get away.

Yet, the woman tilted her head, as if listening to it as the wolf finished his guttural utterance, which began with a growl, segued into a whimper, and finished with another sharp growl. "No, I see. Please, let me."

"Stupefy!" She proclaimed as she whipped out a thin stick, which for a moment had Sam wondering what she was doing, at least in the split second before the red flash appeared, and everything went numb.

The next thing Sam was aware of, it seemed as if his head was full of flies, buzzing, like his sinuses were thick with them. He heard a groan, one he realized slowly, was his own, as he came back to his senses.

A chair, he was sitting in a chair, he realized, feeling the warm wood beneath his legs. His head rather hurt, and as his eyes opened, he saw the same woman from before standing in front of him.

"If this is merely a strange misunderstanding, as I hope, then I'd like to go ahead and apologize for the invasion. But if the situation is as it appears, then I'm afraid such extreme measures were justified, given the alarming way you threatened my friends," the woman spoke distinctly, pointing the stick….a wand?...at Sam's throat.

"Now, understand," she continued, "I won't hesitate to stun you again if I have to, but I know it's not the most pleasant experience, so for your own comfort, if nothing else, you shouldn't do anything rash. I won't restrain you if you cooperate."

Sam nodded, looking down to realize he indeed wasn't bound to the chair he sat in.

"Yeah, no," he cleared his throat awkwardly, trying to get rid of the strange itchy feeling the spell had left. "I don't, I won't uh, do anything. You don't have to do that again. I don't have any weapons, anyways," he shrugged, "Since it looks like you and your uh, werewolf werewolf friends took care of that."

"You're American," the woman frowned. "Well, that might at least explain your proclivity towards firearms," she sighed, glancing at the rifle she must have gotten from Dean, which was leaning against the wall next to the fireplace, "But I have plenty of other questions I'd like to have answers to."

"And, by the way, don't bother with that. It's not loaded anymore," she added quickly, noticing Sam's gaze following hers.

"So do I, have questions, I mean," Sam returned. "Like, first of all, who are you, and what sort of magic are you practicing, teaming up with a werewolf?"

"I'm Hermione," she frowned. "And you are?"

"Sam. And that's my brother, Dean," he nodded to his brother, who was still unconscious, laid on the couch.

"Yes, and you asked me about magic?" Hermione pressed, frowning.

"Yeah, you're not the first witch we've run into. But what's with that wand? I've never seen that. I mean I've seen a staff, but, really? Isn't that kind of…well, trite?" Sam managed a weak laugh.

"Trite? Oh, the ideas stories put in peoples' heads," she muttered, shaking her head. "You're correct, I'm a witch. But all wizards I've met use wands. It's the most precise manner of channeling magic."

"Yeah, uh, OK…" Sam trailed off. "You said wizards. What, are you in a coven?"

"A coven? No, no." She shook her head. "But, how do you know about us, the Wizarding community?"

"Wizarding community? We don't have anything like that where we're from," Sam said. "There's individual covens, but I don't think there's any larger association—"

"That's truly odd," Hermione mused. "The Americans have their own forms of Ministry and regulatory bodies. For a Muggle who knows of our society, you're quite misinformed. Also, I find it doubtful they'd be so careless as to leave a Muggle wandering about with such knowledge, unless, of course, are you related to wizard of any sort?"

"Wizard? No. Closest we have to anything of the sort in our family was our grandfather. He was a Man of Letters. We're all hunters."

"A Man of Letters? I haven't heard of that before."

"They documented the supernatural," Sam explained. "At least, until demons killed them all off. My brother and I are all that's left of them, I guess."

"But then, you said you were hunters. Do I even want to know what it is you presume to hunt?"

"Monsters, demons, pretty much anything that gets out of control and kills people," Sam said.

"And, I suppose," she said, her face growing dark as she spoke, "That is what you assumed my friends were. Monsters, to be killed."

"Well, in fairness, we've seen our fair share of werewolves, and very few of them are friendly. Most of them will sooner rip your heart out than look at you." Sam said, shaking his head. "Although, not all. We were watching, seeing what was going on when your werewolf friend jumped on us."

"Then why did you have a rifle loaded with silver bullets?" Hermione asked grimly producing a handful of the bullets from the pocket of her robes.

"Please, try to understand," Sam said cautiously, feeling terribly aware of the thin wand she held in the other hand, "In our line of work, it pays to be prepared."

A scrutinizing silence met his statement.

"We weren't going to use it if we didn't have to," he added quickly, trying to suppress the fear he felt so it didn't show in his face.

"Use what?" Dean muttered from where he lay on the couch, stirring quietly.

"Oh, I see your brother's waking up," Hermione nodded toward Dean.

"Hey, Dean," Sam said, turning to look at him as far as he could in his seat, "Just relax, OK? I think she just wants to talk."

"Talk?!" Dean sputtered. "That friggin' thing jumped on me and knocked me out. First chance I get, I'm gonna-"

Hermione cleared her throat vociferously, frowning sharply at him. "That 'thing' was my friend, Remus. In case you didn't think of it yourself, if Remus was really out for blood, he'd have killed you. Instead, however, he just knocked you unconscious and waited for me to come manage things with magic since he's unable to perform controlled magic while transformed."

"Yeah, well, this ain't no picnic in Poughkeepsie for us, either," Dean retorted, sitting up despite the obvious effort in his face.

Sam raised his eyebrows, shaking his head slightly at Dean, hoping he got the idea. The trouble with code words, he thought silently. Don't do it, Dean... "Just chill for a minute," Sam pressed as it became obvious he wasn't making any moves to relax, Dean struggling to sit up straighter, the muscles in his face tense portending the attempt he was about to make.

"Yeah, well, chill ain't in my vocabulary right now," he muttered, shooting Sam a look that said, 'you better be with me.'

"No," Sam said again, rolling his eyes. "Just...shut up and-"

With that, Dean jumped from the couch, attempting to dive for the rifle where it was propped against the fireplace.