I settled between Jake and his friend, Quil. The sun was setting quickly over the horizon, and there was barely enough light to finish drawing the crazy wolf-person from my dream. Jake kept glancing over my shoulder, and smiling. He and Quil kept nudging each other and giggling.

I rolled my eyes. The sun shone for one last second, before dipping into the ocean. I closed my book and shoved it into my bag. I was tired.

There were other people sitting in our circle, most of whom I didn't know. Mostly it was just a bunch of gangly teenage looking boys, except for one older looking guy, who sat next to Billy at the head of the circle, and a few girls. Next to him was a beautiful girl with black hair, and dark skin, like most of the other people in the circle. I looked around at everyone, and realized I was the only fair-skinned person there. I twirled a strand of my hair self-consciously.

Finally, everyone started quieting down. Billy reached his hand out at me, and gestured for me to join him. I stood up and quickly skipped up to him.

He patted the space next to him, and I sat down. He turned to everyone, who were peering curiously at me. I glanced down at the floor again, since I could feel the embarrassment starting to show on my face. Billy put his hand on my shoulder.

"This is Winnie," he said, "Micheal's youngest daughter."

Someone started chattering, but quickly stopped when Billy stared her down. "As you all know, or most of you, he left about twenty years ago, when he was done with high school, and married a Polish woman in Chicago. Their children have visited since the oldest was six years old, and I've seen them grow old, and move on, without anything extraordinary happening to them."

"Recently, though, we've noticed Winnie has been going through some changes that her siblings didn't go through. And Micheal revealed to us that she's the only child he has fathered."

I glanced up at him , shocked. "What?" I asked.

Billy glanced down, as if he didn't expect me to speak. "Your his only kid with your mom."

I frowned. "So where did Katherine, and Weronika and Mike and Betsy and Meghan and Johnny and Artie and Miguel come from?"

billy raised his eyebrows at me.

"My mom was a whore?" my jaw dropped. I knew there was a reason that my parents had problems, but I didn't know that was the reason.

Billy ignored my question and went on. "Micheal told me that he hasn't reminded Winnie of the Quileute legends lately. He wanted us to remind her before anything happens to her, so she wont panic." he turned to the girl next to the tall older guy. "Emily?"

She smiled at him and stood. She walked over to us and sat next to me on the log. It was then that I realized that one side of her face was completely scarred. I looked away, not wanting to be rude and stare. "Do you remember any of the old Quileute legends, Winnie?"

I frowned, trying to remember, and then I nodded. "Taha Aki, and Utlapa, and and the spirit warriors..." I gulped, remembering my dream. "And the werewolves."

Emily nodded and smiled again. "Taha Aki was the last spirit warrior."

I nodded back, remembering. "Because Utlapa was trying to be the chief, he wanted to take over, enslave the surrounding tribes."

"What did Utlapa do?"

The memory flooded back to me; it had been a warm spring afternoon. I had been sitting on my dad's lap, I was seven, maybe eight years old. Weronika had been acting up, and he told us he had to tell us a story. "Utlapa stole Taha Aki's body, while Taha Aki was in the Spirit world. He murdered his body with Taha Aki's hands. Then he convinced everyone that he was the real Taha Aki."

"Yeah. What did Taha Aki do then?"

"He saw a wolf, and was jealous of it, 'cause at least it had a body, but then he asked the wolf to make room for him, and the wolf let him in."

Emily smiled lovingly at me. I wondered if she was the mother of any of these other kids. No, I immediately pushed the thought out of my head. She looked way too young. Or maybe she was a teacher. She had the characteristics of it. I tried to remember what came next in the story, and instead I got the memory of my father.

"is he like the big bad wolf in the three little pigs?" I asked.

My siblings laughed at me. "No, stupid, it's a werewolf."

I stuck out my tongue at my brother. "Then what happened daddy?"

he grinned at me, and continued in a spooky voice."

"Taha Aki ran back to the village, to try to warn the people of what was happening. One man was able to recognize that the dog was no ordinary dog; it was being propelled by some sort of spirit. So, he went against the fake Taha Aki's wishes, he'd said no one was to go to the spirit world anymore, and saw the real Taha Aki. Taha Aki told him what had happened, but before the man, Yuta, could return to his body, Utlapa had him killed. So then, Taha Aki saw Yuta's body joining the other ancestors, and he got pissed, 'cause, he'd never be able to join them until he dies, which wasn't possible, because he had no body to die in. his anger was so powerful that he morphed into one with the wolf. Werewolf." I turned to look at the others. They all sat attentive, which I assumed meant that they hadn't heard this story before. "so, from then on, all his descendants have been able to morph into dogs."

everyone applauded when I was done. Emily squeezed my shoulder. "You did a great job."

I smiled. I still felt like a retarded kid, being congratulated and praised for the smallest things, but I still smiled.

Billy's voice boomed over everyone's other sounds. "Do you know the other occasion when they morphed into wolves? The story about their enemies?"

I frowned. My dad hadn't told us that one. "Werewolves have enemies?"

"Yep."

"Who?"

"The cold ones," Jake bellowed from across the bonfire. He stood up and walked towards me. "Popular culture likes to call them vampires."

Alice, Carlisle, and Edward popped into my head. I don't know why. I shook their images from my head and let Jake and Billy go on. "What about vampires?"

"To werewolves, vampires have a bittersweet smell. They are still rather beautiful, but their scent is what pushes them away. A female vampire showed up in the village, her hair red, like fire, but only the werewolves would know who she was." billy turned towards everyone, directing the story to the whole audience, not just me. "There was only one werewolf around, a small boy, who clung on to his mother, shrieking about the smell."

I closed my eyes and leaned against Jake. I pictured the scene, and tried picturing the woman. Red hair like mine? No, red fiery hair. My hair was probably a few shades darker. And the little boy. Dark, like the rest of the Quileutes. Terrified, of course, because of this terrible creature Billy was illustrating. He hung on tightly to his mother, who asked him what was wrong, and all he could reply with was a piercing scream. I covered my ears, although the scream was in my head, not out in the woods.

But, oh, it sounded real! If I didn't know any better I'd probably assume there was someone out in the woods, shrieking at the sight and scent of the red-haired woman. I turned to see if maybe Jake had heard it too, but his face was as serene as ever. I buried my head in Jake's chest.

"Are you okay?" he whispered, patting my back.

"Can you hear it?" I whispered back.

"Hear what?"

"The screaming. It's hurting my ears."

Jake frowned at me. Oh, lord, he thought I was insane. Now how would I explain the dreams he wanted to know about? He'd probably have me committed. "Go to sleep, okay? I know it's kinda late, but these meetings always kind of drag."

I nodded. I closed my eyes, and drifted off to sleep.

That, as it turns out, was a horrible, terrible mistake.

The shrieking got louder, and louder, and I turned and turned until I found the source: Bella.

She was sitting in a meadow, same one as before, I realized, holding on to herself, as if she'd rip at the seams if she let go. I ran over to her, concerned.

"Bella, are you alright?"

she glanced up at me, her face tear-stained, and pronounced, "he's gone."

I had a vague idea who "he" was, so I asked. She whispered the name: "Edward."

I was confused. Just the other night, they'd seemed insuperable. Why would he leave her? "Where did he go?"

she started sobbing. "Victoria took him."

I grimaced. "Who's Victoria?"

my senses were alert at that moment. I smelled something, something sweet.

I imagined I must have shuddered, because I could faintly feel Jake's reassuring hand rub my back.

Back to sleep.

It was sweet, and I felt myself freeze. Not the kind of freeze where you're so scared that you freeze in place, I mean literally freeze. As in, my skin was ice cold. "Bella..." a soft childish voice behind me said.

It was gently, like the coo of a baby. I imagined it belonged to a child. I smiled at Bella reassuringly, and turned to face the person behind me.

I had pictured the red-haired woman tall, thick, wicked looking. Almost like a witch, not really like a vampire. All the mental pictures I'd constructed were nothing like what I was looking at. I had no idea who this woman was, yet I could feel that it was the red-haired woman Billy was talking about. Victoria, I sensed. She smiled at me.

I was careful not to do anything that would provoke her. Bella said that she'd done something to Edward, and for some reason, I felt a closeness to him. I was immediately on the defensive.

"Move out of my way, and you wont get hurt." the baby voice was all wrong. Her red eyes were on fire.

"No," I found myself saying.

She smiled. "I don't want to have to hurt you, little girl, so just please, step aside, and let me have her." she looked beyond me at Bella. I didn't glance back to see her reaction, I knew Victoria would take that opportunity to strike.

"Winnie," Bella crowed, as if she were choking. I was stupid enough to turn at the call of my name, and that's when Victoria pounced. I met her halfway, the dog instincts taking over. I threw her on the ground, and started attacking.. Bella shrieked. Out of nowhere, Edward jumped in. he pushed me out of the way and finished off Victoria. I turned to Bella, and suddenly the scene was different: we were on a cliff, and Bella was holding a rock at the inside of her wrist. Another dog bounced out of the woods, carrying chunks of white rock in his mouth. There was a horrible smell in the air. I grimaced and started coughing.

"I'm not going to hurt you." I turned to see Edward walking towards Bella, his arms raised. She collapsed into his arms, and I turned to give them a moment. I turned back to the wolf. "Who are you?"

he cocked his head to the side, as if in confusion. I looked deep into his eyes.

I was startled awake. "Winnie, we're leaving."

I wiped the sweat from my forehead. "Okay..." I mumbled.

I stood up, and he walked me over to his friends to say goodbye. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and glanced up. There was a boy standing in front of me, about fifteen, or sixteen. "Hey, you look familiar..."

he frowned, and cocked his head to the side, just like the werewolf in my dream. I was alert right then. "Oh, my god," I mumbled.

"What's wrong?" Jake asked.

"Oh, my god!" I shrieked, shoving away from him. "He's a—you're telling me—it's all true?"

Jake put his hand to my forehead. "Are you okay?"

I stopped to think for a moment. Was I okay? "I'm not sure. I had a dream, and I thought I saw him in there."

"Okay, well, say goodbye now, we're leaving."

I waved absently and rubbed my temples. I was getting a migraine.

I could've sworn he looked just like the wolf in my dream...