A/N: Another update! I'm feeling generous, and my muse has taken pity on me and given me a break from painting... thank you to those who have read and reviewed so far. Following feedback, I have changed my settings to allow PM's and anonymous reviews. Apologies; I didn't realise that these had been disabled. My bad.

It was into the darkness that we ventured that night. I was so sure that by finding the Countess I could lay the whole case to rest quickly. Your Change was still so very recent; neither of us had fully realised the extent of your abilities and I was keen to study you further. I feel I must apologise again, Watson – I must have treated you like a specimen under a microscope those first few weeks, or like a volatile chemical that might react unpredictably with whatever it comes into contact with!

I have commented upon the number of changes that came over you, my dear fellow. However, all pale in comparison to the one. The Change.

For when you take on your wolf-form, Watson, you are indeed an investigative force to be reckoned with – forgive the obvious simile, but when you are on the scent, you are as tenacious as a blood-hound!

The cobbled streets were wet and shone in the light of the gas lamps that lined the streets as a steady rain fell upon the darkened city. Holmes moved quietly though the shadowed streets at a languid, measured pace, as Watson slunk along beside him, his greyish-brown wolf-form flitting between the shadows like a ghost.

In the dim light, Holmes's face was in shadow beneath the brim of his hat, from which rain steadily dripped, to land at his feet, splashing into the puddles on the ground.

"Damn this weather," Watson growled, "it's washing away all of the scents... I can't even tell you which way the Count went when he left earlier…"

"That is unimportant," Holmes told him, quietly, "now, let us reason. The Countess, like the Count, will be a respectable lady with disreputable intent. She will be travelling alone, no doubt with modest funds available at her disposal. She will seek cheap lodgings where she will be neither questioned nor remarked upon. The best disguise to adopt, therefore, is one of a traveller – she knew her husband would follow her to London, a convenient port-city. I suspect that she wishes to kill him here and immediately leave, probably for another continent…"

"She will be staying somewhere near the docks, then?" Watson suggested.

"Exactly!" Holmes spun around and crouched down, so that he was eye-to-eye with the wolf at his side, spreading his hands dramatically; "She waits, like the black widow spider, for her prey to flounder into her net and there... there she will devour him before making good her convenient escape…" Holmes clenched his fist to emphasise his point, and then leapt to his feet, walking on quickly. Watson padded along beside him, listening as Holmes continued; "She will have left a trail for her husband to follow, and he does not strike me as the most intelligent fellow… it should not prove too difficult for us to find her."

Watson ducked his head and hugged the shadows as a young, giggling couple passed them on the pavement, fortunately too wrapped up in each other to notice the tall, thin man in black apparently talking to a gigantic dog.

"I still fail to see how we're going to find the Countess without a scent to track or a physical description…" Watson commented, once the couple were out of earshot.

"We do not need either," Holmes murmured, "I suspect that the Count has hired us as a mere decoy. He already knows where the Countess is, and once we are close enough, he will counter-strike. He clearly underestimates our mutual advantages."

"I am sure you know what you are doing, Holmes," Watson began, "but…"

He trailed off, as a distant sound split the air. Holmes listened; it was the howl of a dog, low and mournful, not an unusual night-time sound for the city. However, he had since learned better.

"Hemmingway?" he hazarded a guess, naming the only other known werewolf in London; an elderly member of parliament who spent most of his time at the Diogenes Club, who resented Watson's presence in the city, but was prevented by age and infirmity from doing anything about it.

"No," Watson pricked his ears up, "no, it's not… good God, Holmes; it could be the other wolf – the one who killed the vagrant!"

"Where is he? Is his close?"

"He's not far," Watson replied, leaning forwards slightly, "wait… there is an answer!"

To Holmes, the second howl sounded exactly the same as the first. He slowly bent his knees until he was crouched next to Watson, and they were virtually on eye level. Watson's lips curled back in a snarl, looking slightly alarmed. Holmes rested a gloved hand on Watson's canine shoulder, a silent entreaty to be cautious.

"Do you understand them?"

"Yes. They are hunting for something – or someone," Watson responded, glancing across at Holmes, "Not me, if that's what you're thinking, but they might well pick up my scent, even in this weather. I don't think they know I'm here yet. Holmes, they sound… small. Two small wolves would not have done the same damage to the vagrant that we saw… that was done by a lone, large wolf."

"Interesting," Holmes mused, "I understood from the writings of Stapleton and Hemmingway that there were very few wolves in England; now we find three that have suddenly appeared in this city?"

"These two are definitely new here," Watson informed him, listening to the barks and howls on the night air, "they do not know the city, or their way around; they speak of a confused, masked scent… this way, Holmes…"

Watson padded silently down the alleyway, and Holmes slipped along beside him, moving as silently as his lycanthropic companion. Watson's fur bristled as he paused, sniffing around. A stray dog saw them, took one look at Watson, yelped, and fled. In the distance, a loud, fierce barking suddenly rent the air, and Watson jerked to a stop, raising his head and pricking his ears up. Barks and yelps carried on the night air, and Holmes observed that Watson's eyes were wide with trying to interpret the noise, even as human voices angrily cut in, disturbed by the canine racket. A very human, very female scream of terror went up, and Watson suddenly bolted.

"Watson! Wait!" Holmes lunged after him, but Watson was faster; and soon disappeared from view down the winding back-streets. Holmes was less than amused that now it was he who was having difficulty keeping up.

A movement above him caught his eye and Holmes froze, whipping around; he could have sworn, for one moment, that he had seen a figure leaping across the rooftops. Glancing around quickly, he saw no other sign of the shadowy movement, whatever it may have been.

Trying to recall the direction in which Watson had been heading, Holmes began to track him using his own observational methods. He was not deterred; a paw-print here, a snag of fur in the brickwork of the wall there – his friend was easy to track.

A loud snarl not far away told him that he was closing in on his friend's location. It also told him that he might be helpless to assist with whatever transpired in that dark alley.

In the early days, we feared a pack of wolves moving into London – we both silently feared what they might do. For your part, you feared the effect upon the city. I know that you were afraid of wolves preying on the people of the city, worried about the human cost, and the bloodshed that would inevitably follow in their wake. I know you were also concerned about the possibility of the age-old war re-erupting on our streets between lycanthrope and vampire.

Of course this concerned me, but I did not fear it.

I feared what they might do to you, my dear Watson.

Watson bounded along as fast as he could, knowing that he had to outpace Holmes – what he had heard was the sound of no less than three werewolves fighting, and two of them were practically screaming for help to anyone who could hear and understand. The humans who had stumbled across the scene, whoever they might be, had put themselves in mortal danger. Watson did not want Holmes to be in the same danger he was now running to face. He leapt around a corner, and snarled to announce his entrance.

The first wolf which stood before him was bigger than any he had seen before – even bigger than Stapleton. The two others were only the size of a large dog, something like an Alsatian, much smaller than Watson. One of the small ones yipped and whined, wanting to run but unwilling to abandon the other, which was pinned down by the giant wolf.

"Brother," whined the wolf pacing nearby, "my brother…"

Watson did not know whether the creature was speaking to him or to the poor figure pinned down by their assailant, but the bigger wolf growled it into silence.

"Who are you?" it challenged.

Watson glanced around – whoever had screamed and shouted was long-gone, probably to fetch a constable.

"I could ask you the same question," he replied, with a nod towards the hapless wolf squirming beneath the bigger monster's claws, "release that poor creature – we will have no territorial disputes in this city."

"Hah!" the wolf barked a laugh, but released the smaller one anyway. It yelped and limped off, joining its brother; the two of them quickly vanished, "Those two stupid half-breeds couldn't hold a territory if their life depended on it… and your territory does not interest me. I only come to hunt."

"Nobody hunts the humans in this city," Watson growled, his hackles rising, "I protect them. Feed on the rats and strays… but not the people. It was you that killed that poor beggar the other night."

"My journey was long and he was easy prey," the wolf replied, taking a few paces forwards, "I warn you, little cub – stay away from me. I shall conclude my hunt and leave you to your territory. Much as I would love to tear out your throat, I simply do not have the time!"

With that, the huge hound turned and bounded away down the alley. Watson leapt after him, but, suddenly, there was the scent of the change in the air – that indescribable shifting of wolf to human scent, and at that, an oddly familiar smell…

The heavy fist that came crashing down onto his skull was like being hit with a hammer. Watson yelped, and slammed down to the cobbled street with a bone rattling thud. He was unconscious before he even realised what had happened.

Holmes turned a corner and was very nearly bowled over by two terrified dogs running in the opposite direction. He remarked their passing with little more than a slightly quirked eyebrow; he had seen how dogs, horses and other animals reacted with terror to Watson, whether in human or wolf-form; there was something about the scent of a werewolf that activated the terror-sense in the animal mind that the human mind had long since worked to distance itself from.

However, he had no doubt these were the two smaller wolves Watson had alluded to… Holmes wondered, briefly, what would cause them to be so small… perhaps they were only young? Further evidence was required; Holmes refused to draw conclusions without facts. He did theorise, however, that those two poor wolves, big as they were by dog standards, had been terrified by the sight of a hound much bigger and more ferocious-looking than themselves – though whether this was Watson or their other mystery wolf remained to be seen.

A very canine-sounding yelp of pain made Holmes pick up his pace for a reason that he could not fathom. Turning the corner, his keen eyes picked out a huddled mass of fur slumped on the cobblestones, and he approached it cautiously, every sense alert for danger.

"Watson?"

He held his hand out, cautiously – although the darkness of the night disguised the markings of his fur, Holmes nonetheless recognised his friend and colleague in wolf-shape, lying unconscious on the floor. He frowned – as a werewolf, Watson had become very hard to injure. The only things that had ever caused him harm were other wolves, silver, and aconite, the latter of which they had used as a remedy of sorts to control the worst effects of the full moon. Whatever had done this must have been extremely powerful.

"Watson," Holmes hissed, "Wake up, old chap!"

Watson whined softly, as his eyes flickered open. Holmes's smile was hidden in shadow, as Watson gathered his legs beneath him – all four of them – and pushed himself upwards, to sit on his haunches. His head hung down and his ears comically dipped forwards, the very picture of misery and dejection.

"Oow," he moaned; his voice a very quiet howl, "Holmes, the other wolf…"

He tried to raise his head, but was forced to close his eyes briefly against the pain. Holmes rested his hand on Watson's shoulder, examining him for injury. One eye was swollen shut, but Holmes could already see the injury healing.

"Who did this? Did you see him?"

"Only his wolf-form," Watson replied, "but I caught his scent – he changed, briefly, to hit me, but I think he went wolf again to carry on – I can track the scent, before the rain washes it away… Holmes, I recognised the smell, I know who the big wolf is!"

"My dear fellow, I had already deduced it. It is the Count de Silva."

Watson, I have observed that when you are in wolf-form, you have all the advantages of canine kind, and more besides. You are fast; fast enough to outpace a galloping horse, which I have seen you do, much to the consternation of the rider!

Your sense of smell, enhanced in your human form, becomes truly exceptional. All of your senses become magnificent; distant sights and sounds are as clear to you as if you were standing right beside the source. You are stronger than a bear and as invulnerable as steel…

… But even so, you still have your weaknesses.

"The scent leads this way, Holmes, but it is fading fast in the rain…"

Watson pounded down an alley, loping along with an easy, bounding stride. However, the scent of de Silva was fading, and when it came to an end, he growled in disappointment.

"I'm sorry, Holmes, I've lost the… Holmes?"

He turned; the detective was nowhere in sight, and Watson cursed himself, remembering that he was much faster on four legs than on two. He knew, however, that Holmes would easily track him, and without the use of the enhanced senses that Watson now revelled in.

Watson sniffed around; there was nothing to be detected, no faint traces to see or smell, and no sound carried to his ears that would give a clue as to the direction his quarry had taken. He sighed, but did not give up.

Instead, he raised his head, shivering slightly; his fur was damp with the rain, and the wet smell of the precipitation masked many scents. His head still throbbed dully from the punch de Silva had rendered – he had expected the other wolf to attack in wolf form – somehow, changing back into a human to simply render him unconscious with a punch felt a little like cheating!

There was no scent of wolf on the floor, walls or in the breeze, only damp and dirt and cold rain… However, there was something distinctive on that wet breeze... He sniffed again, closing his eyes; tasting the air as a connoisseur samples fine food.

Padding forwards, he followed the metallic smell. He paused a few times, and pricked up his ears. The two smaller wolves had stopped calling to each other, and seemed to have disappeared into the night to lick their own wounds. Watson had already concluded that they were no threat at the moment.

Watson made his way down another alley between the back entrances of a row of shops, and found a gated entrance to a yard used for storing rubbish. The gate was ajar, and he forced his way in, following the new scent. There, he stopped, hesitating. The smell was overpowering, calling to him, but he resisted. Stepping slowly forwards, he sniffed cautiously.

There… between two bins, there lay the body of a man. From the smell of him, he was homeless, a beggar, recently dead – very recently. The blood at his throat was still wet, glistening in the rain. Watson crossed over to him, and sniffed deeply. He'd been dead for no more than an hour, but the rain had washed away most of the other smells. His throat had been slit; he had clearly bled to death, but there was little blood around the scene, likely soaked away by the incessant rainfall. Watson cursed the weather for the thousandth time that evening.

He turned away, intending to leave, and then cursed his own lack of attention; a woman stood in the gateway, face pale in the night. She opened her mouth, and screamed; a loud, shrill, terrified sound that made Watson physically flinch. Distantly, a police whistle rent the air in response, and Watson could already hear running footsteps coming in their direction.

With a silent curse, Watson bunched his muscles and leapt. The woman screamed again as he caught the top of the wall, bounded over it, and went tearing off down the alleyway. He encountered Holmes coming from the other direction, no doubt following his own trail of evidence to lead him along the path Watson had taken.

"Run, Holmes!" Watson barked out, quickly, slowing his pace slightly to match the detective's, "dead man in bin store. Police on their way. A woman saw me near the body. Expect Gregson or Lestrade will be over soon; we need to get back to Baker Street!"

Accepting the breathless explanation, Holmes nodded, turned direction, and pursued Watson. He paused before crossing main roads, taking great care not to be seen, before they reached Baker Street.

"Wait here, old fellow," Holmes gestured, "I shall open the door…"

Holmes crossed the road, opened the front door and stepped inside, leaving the door open. Watson checked every direction, sniffed the air, and, convinced that the coast was clear; he bounded across the road and leapt through the open door. Holmes closed it quickly behind him, even as Watson made his way slowly and quietly up the stairs to his chamber.

Holmes stepped up and into the sitting room, and, several minutes later, Watson joined him. Holmes was amused to note that Watson's hair was wet from the rain, even as the doctor rubbed it dry with a towel. There was an impressive bruise on his face which was fading quickly, even as Holmes watched in fascination. Watson gave him a dark-eyed glare, as if challenging him to say anything, as the doctor settled himself in his armchair.

"I should like to know what it was you saw, Watson," Holmes said, as he crossed to the sideboard and poured them a brandy each, "You mentioned a body?"

"Yes. I lost the scent of the Count, but when I caught the smell of blood, I followed that trail instead, thinking that the Count had killed again," Watson replied, accepting the drink, with a mutter of thanks, "It was a homeless man, with his throat slit – and it wasn't the Count that killed him, though. I was investigating, but a woman saw me and screamed."

"I heard," Holmes responded, dryly.

Watson opened his mouth to continue, but a pounding on the front door stalled him. Knowing Mrs Hudson was still abed; Watson gave Holmes a quick nod, and ducked out of the room to answer the door himself. He checked his appearance in the hall mirror first – the bruise had faded, but exhaustion and a lingering headache gave his eyes unappealing dark circles. At least his hair had properly dried. Feigning an air of casual sleepiness, as if about to turn in for the night, Watson opened the door to find Inspector Gregson standing there, rain soaked, pale-faced and wide awake.

"Inspector?"

"Is Holmes awake?"

"Of course; come on in."

"Doctor, I would rather the two of you came out, if you can – we have found a body, in most unusual circumstances…"

Watson heard footsteps on the stair behind him, and turned to greet Holmes as he came down to greet them, already reaching for his coat and pulling it on.

"A body, you say, Gregson?" Holmes commented, in a vaguely disinterested tone, "Under what unusual circumstances? Not another dog attack, is it? If it is, I am not interested. I have already given my advice on that matter."

"Oh, you'll see, Mr Holmes," Gregson said, sounding more worried than Watson had ever heard him, "you'll see…"

Ah, yes; Scotland Yard. Inspectors Lestrade and Gregson – worse than a pair of bickering children, and at their throats more often than wolves over territory! As often as I was called upon to shed the light of my deductive prowess on their clumsy investigations, I was forced to bring a cloak of dark deception over them, lest they accidentally uncover your secret.

I was not to realise at the time that they were not our enemy.

Holmes suppressed his amusement as Gregson led him through the alleyways and back streets that he and Watson had run through scarcely an hour before.

"He looks like a beggar," Gregson was saying, as they jogged along the paths, twisting and turning towards the bin store, "another one of the poor buggers…his throat was cut, but there was very little blood… well, you'll see…"

Holmes glanced back at Watson; the doctor was being careful to maintain the pretence of the limp he had sustained years before, and which had become such a natural part of his gait that it would have been remarked upon had he kept an easier pace. Holmes knew that Watson could easily have outrun both himself and Gregson, whether as a human or a wolf, and he smiled inwardly at his friend's admirable caution in maintaining his façade.

Eventually, they reached the bin store. There was a woman sobbing to one side, outside of the gate; Holmes's slight glance in Watson's direction and the doctor's almost imperceptible nod confirmed that this was the woman who had seen him in wolf-form and had screamed so piercingly.

"In here," Gregson gestured, "the woman found the body – she won't admit it, but I think she's one of the local whores. She says that she heard a noise in the yard, came to see, and discovered the body. She said that standing over it was a gigantic dog, apparently licking the blood from the man's throat! The gigantic hound, Holmes – it must be the one that killed the other vagrant! We've had other reports in the area of dogs fighting in an alley nearby – at least three of them – we've got constables all over the area looking for the brute, with instructions to shoot it on sight."

Holmes felt Watson stiffen slightly beside him. Shooting a werewolf with anything but a silver bullet would do little but irritate the creature – if any of those constables were unlucky enough to come across the Count, they would not live to see the morning.

In his pocket, Holmes felt the weight of the gun he had grabbed on the way out – he was forced to carry it, for Watson could not. In each of the six chambers was a perfectly cast silver bullet.

However, Holmes said nothing, but simply raised his eyebrows to Gregson.

"Pray, Inspector, continue," Holmes invited him, as he crossed to the body, and crouched down.

"Well, one of the constables on the search heard this woman scream and came running, thinking she was about to become our next victim," Gregson advised them, as Watson knelt beside the body, opposite to Holmes, running his expert eye over the unfortunate decedent, "He didn't see the dog, but he did see the body."

"Where did the dog go?" Holmes asked, deliberately not looking at Watson.

"She says it leapt clean over the wall," Gregson replied, doubtfully, casting a glance at the nine-foot-high brick structure surrounding the compound, "I know we're on the look-out for a massive dog, but… that man's throat… well, it wasn't a dog that did that."

"Indeed," Holmes agreed, as he inspected the corpse, "this gash was made by an extremely sharp knife, at least seven inches long, I should think, with a slightly curved blade. The cut is deep, and there is great strength behind it, from a right-handed person with long finger-nails, if the marks in the skin are anything to judge by. But, I do not recognise what weapon would have made these underlying marks…"

Gregson made a noise of agreement.

"Holmes?" Watson leaned forward in interest.

Holmes pointed; "Here, Watson; two puncture wounds beneath the slash…"

Watson leaned in, and examined the wound carefully, sniffing subtly so as not to alert Gregson to the unusual nature of the examination he was making.

Holmes leaned over the body as well, and murmured to Watson; "Licking the blood?"

"I assure you not, Holmes!" Watson hissed; his face colouring slightly with indignation and revulsion. Despite the more bloodthirsty tendencies shown by the few other werewolves Holmes had met, Watson had, thankfully, never shown any inclinations in that regard.

Holmes gave a low chuckle; "I never doubted you, my dear fellow."

"Distract Gregson for a moment, will you, old chap?"

Holmes nodded, and glanced over at the Inspector. Getting to his feet, he took the Inspector to one side, turning him away from the body, but giving Holmes a clear view.

"Who else has seen the puncture wounds?" Holmes demanded, eyeing Gregson meaningfully.

"Not the woman, but certainly the constables," the Inspector replied, "Holmes, there's hardly any blood! The lads are already starting to mutter about vampires! Next they'll be telling me they think a werewolf killed the other vagrant. It'll be ghouls in the basement next."

"Feeble-minded nonsense," Holmes said, airily, "Tell them to keep their opinions to themselves, lest they cause a panic. No; my theory is that this man was killed elsewhere and then dumped here."

"Why, Holmes? Why slit the throat of a beggar somewhere and then carry him here to leave him pretty much in plain sight?"

"I do not know yet," Holmes replied, "and I fail to see why I should get involved. For all we know, it was nothing more than a drunken brawl. Why call me in? I have a very busy case load at present…"

"The puncture wounds… the lack of blood… the sighting of that massive dog…"

"The man clearly was not killed by a dog, and the woman is almost crazed out of her mind with hysteria," Holmes replied, dismissively, "no dog could clear that wall in a single leap, unless you think that the hound of the Baskervilles has come back to life and is stalking the streets of London…?"

"But Holmes… the puncture wounds…"

"Could easily have been pre-mortem, or caused in the fight," Holmes replied, "an intriguing addition to the case, no doubt, but I decline to attach any significance to the wounds. Surely, in this modern day and age, you do not believe in vampires, Gregson. Inspector Lestrade would be most amused at that..."

Over the Inspector's shoulder, Holmes could see Watson leaning over the corpse, sniffing intently and examining the man's body. He glanced up, and nodded to Holmes. The detective turned his gaze fully towards Watson, even as Gregson turned.

"He died about two hours ago," Watson reported, as they approached, "throat was cut, obviously, single slice, with some strength. The rain seems to have washed away a lot of the blood – either that; or he was killed elsewhere. The puncture wounds are superficial, not the cause of death, nor contributory."

"Are there any other traces on the body?" Gregson asked, quickly.

"Traces of what – a gigantic hound, or maybe a vampire?" Watson quipped, to Holmes's dry chuckle, "Sorry, Inspector – it looks to me like a drunken fight gone too far; the man reeks of alcohol, and there's no money on him. I'd say he got drunk, had a fight, was killed in the scuffle and then robbed."

Gregson made a non-committal noise, and then gave a sharp whistle, ordering two constables to arrange to have the body taken away. Holmes and Watson lingered long enough to see it go, and bade farewell to Gregson.

I recall our investigations after your Change were also different; I relied on you more than I ever had. Always remember, dear Watson, that you were invaluable to me even before your change. Without your popular writings of our little adventures, fictionalised though they were, I would never have become such a household name, attracting clients from all over the world, let alone London. You were always the human face of our investigations; your empathy was the sharp contrast to my intellect, and your medical skill was virtually unparalleled in forensic circles, even by police surgeons with twice your years of experience.

And yet you still followed me with such loyalty, that to this day I am at a loss to comprehend. I do not understand – I doubt I ever will – what I did to deserve such unbidden devotion.

Man's best friend, indeed!

A/N: Another long chapter... where am I going with this? As soon as my muse gets his butt back in here and stops looking at tattoo magazines, I'll let you know.