Acharya smiled and shook his head, "I'm a little older than you, Keva. I have a little more experience. We have never done anything like this, not in a long time. Maybe it's past time, but I would much rather know that I am going on a killing spree for the right reasons."

"We wolves have long been guides for our human counterparts," Aceso said. "It was wolves who first taught humans how to be civilized, how to be a family, how to care for each other, how to hunt, how to survive. We have stayed in the shadows too long, and let the vampire's sway grow too much, and over influence humankind. We hunt now as a reaffirmation of our kinds promise to guide and nurture mankind along the paths of civilization and justice. We are cutting out a cancer from the city, not committing murder."

Acharya bowed to the werewolf, "Eloquently put. And a much-needed reminder. Thank you."

The double doors leading into the room violently shoved open and one of Derceto's three Greywolf pups stood there, shifted and looking at Elder Huan Li

"Elder, we have a problem."

Huan Li moved to the side of the grey werewolf and moved with him down through the building back down to the ground level, the rest of the group followed behind wondering what could have possibly happened now.

In the courtyard, still shrouded in a heavy rain, the grey werewolf's brother was standing very protectively in front of a small girl, who looked to be no more than ten years of age. The wolf had not shifted and the girl clung to his grey fur with white knuckles. His brother was standing next to him, communicating in their wolf language, and the one protecting the girl was only getting more agitated. The girl was soaked and barely wearing any clothes at all, if the sopping wet rags that barely hung onto to her small fragile frame could be called clothes.

"What is the meaning of this?" Huan Li asked, his stern voice cutting through the sound of the pelting rain around them.

The wolf didn't shift, instead he moved to be even more in front of the girl, protecting her from the gaze of the Elder Shape shifter.

The grey that had gone to get the Elder spoke for his brother, "Elder, we were hunting in the outskirts of the town. We went up into the mountains, thinking it would be easier to avoid human contact in those jungle areas."

"A wise decision," Ansuya said.

"We were following a set of tracks that we didn't recognize. We knew it was big; it's prints in the dirt were deep. We followed the trail for a little while maybe two or three hours and then our brother howled and bolted off. We followed even though I hadn't picked up any scent yet. Our brother knew something and that was good enough for us. So, we followed. By the time we met up with him, he was nuzzling this child. She was dirty and cold and shivering. It looked as if she hadn't eaten in days."

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"I would think a wolf would understand the laws of nature better than any of us," Ansuya said. "We don't belong here, and you should understand we can't take her with us."

The grey wolf only seemed to press his body more protectively against the child as the elder spoke.

The grey werewolf answered, "That's what we've been trying to tell him, but he won't listen. He says that if Derceto had let the laws of nature take us, then we would be dead too. That this child should be given a chance at life just as we were."

Keva tried to get a better look at the soaking wet child, who looked to be more bone and sinew than muscle and flesh. The grey wolf growled, low in his throat, at her.

Keva smirked, "She's here now, and it doesn't make much difference how she got here. She's shivering and will probably die from the cold and wet, if we don't get her inside and warmed up soon." She spoke to the grey wolf, "Now, you can either let me take her inside and give her a bath and some clean clothes, or I can put you down, and take her anyway. It's your choice, do you want to be conscious and watch over her or not?"

The grey wolf stopped growling and moved off to the side of the girl. Keva nodded and reached for the girl, but that just made her cling to the wolf's fur even more tightly. Keva looked over at the Elders and shrugged. "Alright, I guess I'll be giving both of them a bath."

The grey wolf looked insulted but the girl's grip tightened and he turned his head back to her. His look softened and he nuzzled her neck and licked at her cheek. He slowly guided her away from the wall and into the building.

Keva wouldn't call herself the motherly type. But she was pretty sure most kids didn't fight and claw and scrape and scratch and bite like this little girl did. Even with no apparent muscles clinging to her bones, she was incredibly strong. Dropping her into the tub, even with the grey wolf already in the warm water was a fight to the mat as it was. Forget about trying to get shampoo into her tangled mess of thick black hair that fell in drapes over her face and shoulders. Her skin was dark brown and at first Keva couldn't be sure what was skin and what was dirt.

The child thrashed and kicked and grunted, and screamed the whole time. Putting clothes on her was impossible and so Keva draped a towel around her and just barely bobby pinned it into place before she almost lost an eye from the girls long sharp nails.

Dinner was equally impossible. Ansuya tried to calm the child with her pheromones. If anything, whatever Ansuya was doing was just making the child more upset. She threw away the rice and lentils and spicy curry that Ansuya had tried to feed her. It was the local food, nothing that the girl wouldn't have been exposed to.

Through the rain, the wolf born were outside eating there meals. The girl threw herself out of her chair and ran to the window. If Keva hadn't been there, she was sure the child would have thrown herself down to the ground off the second floor balcony. The girl kicked and screamed and reached out for the wolves below her. Keva struggled to keep her grip on the child as Ansuya hurried to the balcony.

Keva looked down to see that the wolves were eating their meal of raw meat. The child started to drool as she kicked and lurched, trying to get free, ripping her towel off in the process.

"Raw meat?" Keva asked. "Is it even healthy for a child to eat that?"

Ansuya helped to drag the flailing, screaming child back inside away from the rain, "I think it's better than having her run out into the rain and dying of hypothermia."

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