I finally touched Dontaine's shoulder, reeling thick fur brush coarsely against the smoothness of my palm. The creature reached up as if to grip my hand. Then remembering his own claws, he dug his hands into the ground instead, sinking the long sharp nails deep into the dirt, forcing that part of him, at least, to lie still while the rest of him spasmed and shook. His chest bucked and heaved, trying to draw in breath. But how could you breathe when your windpipe was torn out?

I felt Dontaine quiver under my hand. As I touched him, his power zinged into me and my palm started to tingle. Nothing unusual with that. I was a healer and I wanted to heal him. But then my whole body started to tingle, to pulse, and that was not usual. The smell of blood and the scent of raw meat filled my senses, blinding me until it was all I could see, smell, taste. I could almost roll the coppery sweet tang of blood on the back of my tongue and taste the salty sweetness of warm tender meat in my mouth. My skin began to itch, to burn, to heat. And the cloth rubbing against my skin suddenly seemed unnatural, unwanted.

"Her eyes," I heard a woman gasp.

"She's changing," Amber said. "Dontaine's beast is triggering her own."

It took a moment before I understood what he had said. I was starting to lose myself. "No," I growled. My voice was rougher, deeper, as if I had swallowed gravel and it was rubbing against my throat. I lifted my eyes up to Amber and shook my head, fighting it. "No."

Gryphon spoke quietly to Amber, gazing down at me. "Take her, watch over her."

"No," I gasped, fighting desperately not to rip my clothes off and free my itchy, prickly skin.

Amber scooped me into his arms like a little child and ran from the clearing, away from ail the people, the curious watching eyes. He loped into the woods, away from all that raw pungent meat. But the smell of blood still rode thick in the air, right beside me, up against me.