Moon - New Moon Part 1

New Moon.

By Rebecca York.

CHAPTER ONE.

THE FOREST AT night was his playground, his domain. And werewolf Logan Marshall ran for the sheer joy of taking in his kingdom. A lithe gray shape, he was one with the night, the wind ruffling his fur and the sounds and scents of the night tantalizing his senses.

Tomorrow he would go back to work, focusing on the project that had brought him to this patch of Maryland woods. Tonight he ran free. Or as free as a man could be who must try to fit into two very different worlds.

His campsite was a mile back, in a patch of woods scheduled to be demolished by developers in the next few months. It made him sick to think that next year this magnificent hardwood stand would disappear-driving the forest creatures who lived here from their homes.

But tonight he could enjoy the ripple of the wind in the trees and the moonlight dappling the leaves.

He was two miles from camp when a new sensation crept into the edge of his consciousness.

No ordinary human would have noticed the subtle difference in the night air. But a werewolf was blessed with senses that no man, except his brothers and his cousins, possessed.

He stopped short, lifting his head and dragging in a deep draft of the humid air. Unfamiliar scents tickled his nose. It was as though a door had opened, letting in dank air that had come from some other time and place.

In this one patch of woods, he sensed a rip in the very fabric of the universe.

A rip in the fabric of the universe? Yeah, right.

Yet he knew it wasn't impossible. The Marshall clan had fought a monster from another world. A creature that had lurked in the underground reaches of a private club in Washington, D.C., where the rich and powerful came to indulge their s.e.xual appet.i.tes-egged on by the monster who fed on their emotions.

They had killed the creature, although the werewolves had only been the a.s.sistants. It was the strong Marshall women who had joined their mental energy in battle.

He had left while they were still celebrating their victory, because watching the other men and their life-mates had made his chest tighten.

In the distant past-some twenty or thirty years ago-the werewolves had ruled their families like despots. Things had changed with the new generation of Marshall women. They were the equal of their men. And Logan could easily imagine living out his life with a mate like that.

But he'd met no women who could be "the one." So he kept to his bachelor existence, carving out a name for himself as a landscape architect who specialized in native plants. Which was why he was camping out this weekend, harvesting ahead of the bulldozers.

Only tonight some outside force had disturbed this patch of Maryland woodland.

A man might have backed away from the danger. The werewolf knew he had to investigate. Or was the compulsion to rush toward danger coming from outside his own mind?

A command below the level of his wolf's hearing seemed to pull him toward the unknown. And he obeyed, taking one step forward and then another, when deep inside he knew that he should turn and run for his life-for his sanity.

Disaster struck like a sharp-toothed animal lurking in the underbrush. But no animal could have possessed the steel jaws that suddenly snapped around his ankle.

The pain was instantaneous-and excruciating, He went down, howling as he rolled to his side, leaves and debris clinging to his stiff fur. For long moments, he was unable to move, the agonizing bite of the claws in his flesh mirrored by savage claws in his brain.

He had to... He had to...

It was impossible to complete the sentence. He was caught in a snare, and the saw-toothed steel that dug into his flesh did more than hold him fast. It made coherent thought almost impossible.

As waves of pain radiated through him, he knew on some deep level that he must free himself or die. He lay panting, gathering his strength, struggling to focus on wrenching himself away. But when he tugged against the thing that held him fast, a burst of agony seared his nerve endings-then shot upward through his body.

All he could do was lie there in the leaves with his eyes closed and his breath shallow, feeling his consciousness slipping away. He would die here in this patch of woods. Or perhaps fate had something worse than death in store for him.

He was trying to remember something important. A prayer his mother had taught him long ago in his childhood?

Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

They had said that together at night as part of his bedtime ritual. It wasn't until later that he had known why she asked G.o.d to watch over him.

Still, when he had changed from child to man-and man to wolf-he had come to believe that he was no longer under the protection of the Almighty.

In the back of his mind he knew that it wasn't the prayer he was trying to remember. It was something else. Something vital to his life.

He had to remember... remember the words that would set him free. But he couldn't pull them into his mind.

Not with the horrible burning pain.

A long time pa.s.sed. Or perhaps it was only seconds. His eyelids fluttered closed, and he drifted on a sea of agony. A noise somewhere close by made his eyes snap open again. Blinking, he saw a shape coming toward him through the forest. For a moment, he was sure he was hallucinating.

He saw a wolf.

CHAPTER TWO.

LOGAN HEARD HIMSELF make a gasping sound as the wolf trotted toward him.

Thank G.o.d! One of his brothers, Lance or Grant, had figured out what had happened to him, and they were going to set him free from the terrible pain. Or maybe it was his cousin Ross. He was the one who had started the cooperation in the family.

Squinting, he tried to figure out who had come to his rescue. But the longer he looked at the wolf, the more he thought that it was none of them. The size seemed wrong. This wolf was too small, and the coloring was off, too-more whitish than gray. Or were his senses fading?

He stared at the animal. Could it be a real wolf? From where? The forest? A zoo? There were no wild wolves in the eastern part of the United States, as far as he knew. Only his own relatives.

The animal was pretty. And delicate. Definitely no match for Logan-freed from his trap, that is.

So who was this guy? n.o.body he knew in the Marshall clan. And in the wide world, they were the only werewolves that existed.

Or was that wrong?

He tried to focus on the animal as it walked toward him-with purpose and also with caution, as though it knew he was in trouble and had come to help, yet it didn't want to suffer the same fate.

It stopped a few feet away, sniffing at him and sniffing at the trap, obviously afraid to get too near the thing.

"Don't worry," he wanted to say. "It's already got me. It can't grab you, too." Or could the mind-numbing power of the thing reach out beyond the physical contact?

He tried to puzzle that out. But his brain was too dull to hold any thought for more than a few seconds.

Cautiously, the wolf circled him. He saw the wary eyes, the tense body. Then it moved in, nuzzling and licking insistently against his face as though trying to get his full attention.

He nuzzled back because the contact was strangely comforting. But there was little more he could do.

The wolf made a frustrated sound and stepped back to look him in the eye. He answered with a gurgling noise low in his throat.