Free First Bite (The Dark Wolf Series) by Dani Harper Page A

was really sleeping—more likely, he was ignoring her—but there was no denying that the need for rest was a heavy weight pressing down on
her
. She gave in and stretched out under a low-hanging sumac shrub. How odd to be so comfortable lying on the ground, she thought. Didn’t werewolves get cold?
    One of the perks of being a Changeling—you can camp anywhere.
Travis’s voice in her head sounded far away.
    Werewolf. And get out of my head.
    Changeling. You’re the one who’s thinking too damn loud.
    See? Grouchy.
If there was a reply to that, she didn’t hear it before sleep claimed her.

    The full moon’s light turned the fifty-foot circle of smooth white stones to glowing silver orbs. The flattened grass within the circle gleamed, too, liberally coated with white ash and pale corpse powder. Nine naked humans, the latest inductees, had been thickly painted with a mixture of the noxious stuff as well. They stood huddled together in the very center, not knowing what was about to happen to them but not willing to make a break for the thick, dark forest beyond the bright ring, either. Not with the cold light reflected in the eyes of several dozen wolves.
    Her
wolves, Meredith thought with satisfaction. She owned them, all of them, and after tonight, she’d own the ones in the circle as well. Of course she’d enjoy having more servants to order around, but that was simply a nice perk. The real prize was power, and while all living creatures produced energy, werewolves produced it in spades. With the level of magic she now commanded, she could draw raw power from all of them. And they wouldn’t even know what was happening.
    Meredith’s pack stood as silent sentinels as the moon reached its highest point and the magic infused in the ashen mixture was activated. Miniature whips of red lightning crackled along the pale ground within the circle, licking at the feet of the captives. Most, however, weren’t paying attention. Instead, some clutched at their heads or their stomachs, some fell to their knees and retched, one slapped at himself as if bees were attacking him.
    It wasn’t long before all were writhing on the ground.
    One after the other, most of the humans in the circle began to scream. As their bones reshaped themselves, as their skin stretched, as their muscles tore and reformed. Meredith didn’t need to use her preternatural senses to hear the wrenching and popping of joints over the hoarsening cries of her victims, all signs of the shift progressing nicely. She still wished they’d hurry the hell up—she was anxious to get to the next part,
her
part.
    At least a ninth conscript had been found in time for tonight’s turning. The guy didn’t have much between his ears, but any port in a storm. The circle now contained six men and three women. Numbers were as powerful as words, and Meredith had been concerned that she’d have to make do with an inconvenient
eight
instead of a potent
nine
. She put aside the fact that there could have been
several
more if she hadn’t been so distraught over Geneva’s escape and killed them. Three times three would work well enough, however. No volunteers, of course, but that was immaterial. By this time tomorrow, they’d believe they’d signed on of their own volition.
    They’d believe anything she told them.
    Meredith rubbed her finger over a tiny snag on one of her freshly done nails, and hoped the nail would hold out for a little while longer. Not that she minded the cost of the exquisite black-diamond polish, but the manicurist was presently on her hands and knees in the middle of the circle. What if the woman hadn’t recovered sufficiently to redo her work tomorrow? Meredith could attempt a binding spell on the nail, of course, but magic was so very difficult to finesse on teeny-tiny things—it didn’t have the laser-like precision to work only on her nail without affecting the finger.
    Finally the dark blush of fur covered the contorted shapes, and a few