New Orleans

Fury Kattalakis was about to walk straight into the drag­on's lair. Well, not exactly. There was a dragon in the attic of the building he was headed toward, but that dragon wasn't nearly as dangerous to Fury as the bear guarding the door.

That nasty sonofabitch hated his guts.

Not that he cared. Most people and animals hated his guts which was fine by him. He didn't have much use for the world anyway.

"The things you do for family," Fury said under his breath. Though to be honest, this whole family concept was still new to him. He was more used to being screwed over by everyone around him. It wasn't until his brother Vane had taken him in during the summer of '04 that he'd realized not everyone in the universe was out to kill him.

The bear, however, still was.. .

Dev Peltier tensed as soon as he saw Fury step out of the shadows near the door of Sanctuary—a rough biker bar and dance club that stood at 688 Ursulines. Like that address hadn't been chosen intentionally by the bear clan who owned it. They were nothing if not ironic.

Dressed in a black Sanctuary staff t-shirt and jeans, the bear looked human at present, complete with long curly blond hair, black biker boots, and a pair of sharp eyes that missed no detail or weakness, not that Fury had a weakness. But for all of Dev's human appearance, to those lycanthropes such as Fury, Dev's alternate form was like a thrumming beacon that warned all otherworldly types that Dev was fe­rocious.

Then again, so was Fury. What he lacked in magick abili­ties, he more than made up for in sheer strength . . .