The massive beast stood before Emma, grinning as he watched her clutch her bloody arm. His eyes glowed with a sadistic joy and he made sure his lycanthropic curse was passed, biting her again and again on the same arm. Emma screamed and stumbled backwards, swatting at the werewolves bloody maw uselessly.

With a last growling laugh, the wolf leaped away, trailing blood from his mouth as he did so. The girl laid her head on the mossy earth, her head swimming at the sight of her own blood, and the loss of it. Soon it stopped swimming and dove into a pitch black oblivion as she passed out, images of full moons and pentagrams glowing in her unconscious mind.

She awoke from her slumber a few hours later with the gentle light of the full moon glittering behind her eyes. Was that all a dream? Why was she in the forest? Was she really bleeding? She stared at both her arms, seeing no wounds but clearly recollecting the occurrence of the wolf that had recently stood over her. The moss around her was blood drenched, so what had happened?

Her queries were interrupted by a shooting pain down her back. She arched it and was speechless at the intensity of the pain. Her vertebrae felt like they were grinding into each other, lurching against one another as she was thrust to her arms and knees. The vertebrae protruded up through her skin, causing blood to slowly pool on her shirt. The spine itself became hunched, squashing her lungs and ribs, Emma gasped for air, only increasing the pain in her chest. With a crack larger than the loud crackling of the refiguring back, her rib cage angled forward, making room for her lungs against the new hunch of her back.

All was still for a few moments. The last drops of pain dripped away with the blood that did the same. Was it over? No.

Her jaw began to crack, her ears and throat swelling and popping as her face slowly reconfigured. A pain like an intense toothache began throughout her entire mouth as her teeth grew and became sharp, puncturing the skin in her mouth. Hot blood and drool not dripped, but poured from her mouth, again dampening the earth below her. To accommodate her new teeth, her lips were pulled and reshaped, tearing and healing. Her mouth stretched, cracked, and shifted into a square muzzle. Her scalp tightened as her hair seemed to be sucked by into it, becoming wiry and fur-like in the process. She tried to scream at this new pain, but all that came out was a choked, blood filled gurgle.

A new pain from her legs. Her bones creaked as the bones above and below her knees shrunk, splintering and healing repeatedly. Again, an attempt to scream, again a choking gurgle. Her feet grew and thinned, creating almost a new joint. Her hands panned out and fattened, creating horrific half-paws. An intense pain came from their tips as the nails slowly curved and grew into claws. The end of her spine grew and lengthened, creating a thin, near skinless tale.

At the moment, she looked like merely a deformed, semi-lupine human. This began to change when Emma's skin began to turn a sickly, clay shade of grey. Soon, it felt as if bugs were squirming and pinching beneath it. Shaking with pain and horror, she lifted her arm to observe it in the moonlight. Small bristles began to appear on her deformed, twisted knuckles, and then spread to the rest of her arm. A thin layer of this hair grew on her entire body, each hair feeling like a pin prick as it punctured the skin. Immediately, a thicker layer stabbed from beneath her skin, actually drawing blood as they protruded. Again she screamed, only this time it was neither a scream nor a choked gurgle. It was a screeching, pained roar! The transformation nearly complete, she rose to her feet, her entire body quivering in fear and pain.

She was still clothed, and she looked like a mere skeleton of what could only be called a werewolf. With an immense rumble, churning, twisting knots of pain surfed through her body as rippling muscles began to be revealed. She hunched over once more with the pain, clawing at whatever part of her body the wave of muscles hit. She cut through fur and skin with her new claws, unable to take the pain any longer. At some points, such as on her arms and legs, she cut through her new muscles, leaving glistening white bones protruding from her fur. The new muscles ripped her clothes off, but her decency was saved by the fur that now covered her body. When this was over, she relaxed and suck to her knees, shaking and matted in blood and sweat.

Weakly, she lifted her head to gaze at the moon that had done this to her. She couldn't be angry; the werewolf had taught her that anger only causes pain. Instead, she howled a low, mournful cry to the glistening sphere so high in the sky. In her howl she added all the pain and suffering that she had just been through, the fear of the future, and the confusion she now felt. When she lowered her head again she was startled to see that the despicable creature that had done this to her was standing five feet away. He leaned casually against a tree, glowering at this lesser being that was panting and shivering before him. He chuckled,

"Don't worry, my friend. Not every transformation will include such pain. Most are easy and smooth," his voice was deep and rough as he showed the girl his own smooth transition between beast and man. It seemed like the wolf part of him melted away, to be replaced by a rugged man with slightly long hair and a goatee, grinning maniacally, as he changed back again.

"There will always have to be blood though...but it doesn't have to be yours, if you get my drift," the man winked when he said this, but Emma had no idea what he was talking about. She stuttered as she attempted to speak in this new form,

"W-what are y-you t-talking about? D-do I have t-to k-kill people?" she questioned, finding the growly sound of her own voice extremely odd.

"Yep, well, unless you want to go through that pain again. If you don't kill on one full moon, the transformation on the next will be as gruelling, if not more so, than that one," he chuckled again as he turned to walk away,

"By the way, your transformation is not yet finished," he barked an abrupt, loud laugh as he disappeared within the shrubs.

Emma cautiously raised herself to her feet as her shaking had almost stopped. She looked down at herself, concluding that this was basically what a werewolf was supposed to look like. There shouldn't be anything else to change.

A splitting pain rode a lightning bolt through her head, ears, tongue and nose and she grasped her skull with her claws. An explosion of senses echoed through her mind as she lost control of her instincts. Her ears and nose ached with a new found assortment of sounds and smells lingering in the air, and she was blinded with a new, vivid sight.

Despite her new visual take on life, her human self saw only blurs as she galloped through the forest, subconsciously hunting for a victim.

*

She awoke the next morning as the sun reached it golden arms high above the trees. The camper she had killed and feasted on last night lay ripped to shreds beside her. She had the coppery taste of blood on her teeth and she was sore everywhere from the transformation the night before, which she could barely remember. It was with regret that she realized that murder would be her life forever more.