A cab isn't exactly a racing car, no more than I'm a racing driver. Was the werewolf a racer? I hadn't a clue, but he certainly drove better than me. By the time I got the cab going, Cooper had already swung around the corner. Perhaps the creature's lycanthropy-enhanced reflexes helped, or maybe it was his experience pretending to be a cabbie. Or maybe the bloody Cooper was just lighter. Whatever it was, I was barely managing to keep him in sight, catching brief glimpses of the battered car just before it made the next turn.

And with every new turn, I caught less and less. After three corners, I was only glimpsing Cooper's dented rear bumper vanishing around the bend. One or two more and I'd lose him completely.

"He's getting away!" Simon helpfully pointed out the obvious.

"I can see that!" This is where Knuckles would wring every last drop from this wreck.

Then it happened — a turn too far. I lost sight of Cooper. But every pedestrian on the street turned their head to the right. I doubted they'd all looked that way if it had just been a regular old heap rattling past. I took the risk and followed the clue, trusting the crowd's reaction, but, as expected, saw no one ahead. Again, I had to rely on where people were looking.

"Give it up, Duncan," Simon said, clearly not getting where I was going. "It's useless."

As luck would have it, a random patrol car took an interest in us. Despite the insistent whine of its siren, I had no intention of stopping. But at the next turn, our sudden appearance caused much more of a stir than the previous heap had. I lost my bearings for a second, so I ordered Simon to roll down the window. I braked beside a respectable-looking couple and shouted:

"Where did he go?"

The police car skidded to a stop behind us. The constables jumped out, weapons drawn. But the woman I'd shouted at turned her head in the right direction. I slammed the accelerator again. Tyres screeched, a copper fired at our wheels. Missed, thank God, and we shot off down the road while the police scrambled back to their car.

The siren blared again, dragging the eyes of every passer-by. I braked sharply at another turn and shouted "Which way?" to an elderly lady, but this time the coppers didn't overshoot, they braked hard and parked crosswise, blocking the road.

A young constable jumped out, pointed his baton at our windscreen, and barked:

"Out of the vehicle!"

"Simon, take the wheel!" I ordered and got out. "Lord Loxlin! We're in pursuit of a werewolf driving a stolen Cooper!" I flashed my signet ring, though I doubted he recognised it. Then I turned back to the elderly woman.

"Did you see him? Back window smashed. Which way?"

She hesitantly pointed left. The constable still hadn't lowered his baton, and I kept my shield ring at the ready. Just in case.

"You heard her!" I said to Simon, then addressed the constables, sharply now. "In the car! I'm riding with you."

I stepped forward with purpose.

"Stay right there!" the one with the baton ordered. He didn't shoot, but backed up a step, bumping into the car door behind him.

"Get in!" I barked, louder and harsher. "If he gets away, I'll personally make sure you lot are out of a job!"

Simon began reversing behind me to go around the patrol car, and that seemed to break the younger constable. He lowered his baton and reached for the cab door.

"No!" A better idea struck me. I pointed to the cab. "You, there!"

"That's not how it's done, my lord," muttered the driver, an older, more seasoned officer.

"I don't care! Time!" I all but shoved the younger one toward the cab and took his seat in the police car. "Time! And don't even think about turning on the siren."

The driver was older than the younger constable, much older than me. In fact, he was around forty, about the same age as my cousin Evan. Yet issuing orders came to me far more easily than I'd expected. For him, obeying some upstart lad must've been a proper challenge. He pulled away, but reluctantly, and of course he started to argue.

"The siren should be..."

"It spooks him! Makes him run!" I snapped. "I want him to think he's lost us. I want him to ditch the car."

"And how do we find him without the car?"

"There are ways," I said evasively. In truth, I had only one very unreliable option: ask Ellie to sniff him out. She wasn't canine, of course, but deer had decent noses too. Family knowledge — generations of hunters speaking. Predators always approach them from downwind. A werewolf is definitely a predator. And Ellie… well, she was definitely never trained to follow a scent.

Three more times we had to ask passers-by for directions before we finally spotted the battered Cooper parked on the pavement in the Old City: driverless, of course. I could only hope he hadn't switched vehicles. The idea had crossed my mind, and it made me anxious as hell.

The Old City of Avoc wasn't quite like the Old City of Farnell, if only because it didn't have a castle looming nearby. Every Earl of Bremor had always relied on the forest more than on stone walls. History held stories of entire enemy armies "accidentally" getting lost in there. Back in those days, there was no Avoc. The clan village had come first, tightly guarded and closed to outsiders. It was only later they began trading their crafts in the budding market town nearby.

From a handful of specialist shops, a full-on fair grew up, and around it, workshops and businesses. What we called the Old City was, in fact, the homes of well-to-do craftsmen and merchants. Farnell's Old City, on the other hand, was built by an aristocracy born of the sea, some would say piracy. Just three centuries ago, Queen Elizabeth herself was handing out titles to privateers who remembered to send a cut to the royal treasury. To be fair, back then their "cut" could equal the entire yearly budget.

Farnell's architecture reflected that: a certain flamboyance, a bit of chaotic charm. Avoc, in contrast, favoured order and restraint. Straight streets, neat right-angled turns, modest houses — every one of them tidy and nearly identical.

The police car braked. The cab followed close behind. I jumped out. Not towards the Cooper, but towards the only pedestrian on the short, quiet street.

"Sir! Did you see the driver of that vehicle?" I asked, pointing to the shattered rear window of the Cooper.

"No, young man," he replied warily, giving me and the officers behind me a rather suspicious once-over.

Fair enough, the werewolf must've abandoned the car when the street was empty.

I rushed to the cab. Ellie was just stepping out.

"My sweet, can you catch his scent?"

"I've never…" she began, but I grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the Cooper, flinging open the driver's door.

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"Just try!"

She glanced around, at the coppers, at our friends, all watching the scene unfold, and whispered:

"I can't change just my nose."

I remembered how flawlessly she could shift just her ears. Most shifters couldn't even manage that.

"Full transformation," I suggested.

Ellie let out a deep, reluctant sigh. And what for? Even when partially shifted, she never lost her charm. Not the sort of cuteness that makes you want to pet her, she's no kitten, but a roe deer, graceful and, well, still rather fetching.

Her ears stretched out and curled at the tips, sliding to the sides. Her pert nose melted into her upper lip and turned black, her jaw clenched and pushed forward, and her eyes doubled in size, orange glow spilling into pools of gleaming black. Her ears crept further up towards her crown, cheeks hollowed dramatically, and soft white fur appeared under her lip, grey on her cheeks and higher still. And you know what? It rather suited her.

What the hell was I thinking at a time like this?

Ellie stuck her head into the car and sniffed audibly, then stepped back. She stood for a moment, took a couple of steps one way, then the other.

"Smells like sour sweat, wet dog, and cheap cologne. I can do this," she said, and shot off toward the nearest corner. Simon bolted after her.

"In the car, you idiot!" I barked. "We drive!"

Trying to outrun a shifter and a werewolf — bloody daft idea. And I needed my strength for the fight.

Ellie was running, while the werewolf had to walk to avoid drawing attention, or so I hoped. He followed a learned route: right turn, left turn. No imagination. But it almost worked. We caught up with him at the very last moment, around the fourth corner. Ellie turned first, saw him, and shot forward like a cannonball.

"Go!" I shouted at the constable, realising she'd be face-to-face with a predator any second now.

The police car squealed as the tyres bit into the tarmac and swung sharply round the corner. The werewolf, a hundred metres ahead, was getting into another cab as a passenger. One second more and he'd have vanished.

He didn't take Ellie seriously, just some mad goat dashing through the street, but the police car? That made him flinch. With a snarl, he lunged into the back seat, scrambling forward to the front to throw the driver out. The cabbie didn't wait — he flung the door open and shot out like a cork from a bottle, bolting across the street at record speed. He tripped over the kerb and went flying, but I didn't look back. The chase had reset, but now we were the ones in motion, and the werewolf's cab was still stationary. Ellie was nearly on him.

Before he could get the cab moving, Ellie leapt, landing beside the open passenger door. Thank God she didn't try to climb in. Instead, she raised my bulldog revolver and fired three times. The shots forced the werewolf to duck, and the jolt of movement nearly flung him out the open driver's door, but he caught the steering wheel with one paw.

"Ram him!" I ordered the copper.

The constable probably meant to just block the cab's path, but he followed my command without hesitation, wrenching the wheel. The front end of our police car smashed into the open door, crumpling the frame, but missed the werewolf. The bastard had scrambled to the passenger seat a second earlier, just as Ellie sent more bullets flying over his head.

The impact rocked us both, but we'd braced for it. No injuries. I drew my FN, smashed the window with the grip, and fired, keeping the creature from raising its head. Ellie was pressing from the other side, stopping him from slipping out. It gave our driver and the others behind us time to catch up.

But the werewolf still found a way out.

He tucked his legs beneath him, raised his arms to shield his face, and launched forward, shattering the windscreen as he burst onto the cab's bonnet.

Ellie leapt again, landing a good ten metres in front of the cab, cutting off his escape down the street. My driver fired a couple of rounds, forcing the beast to slide off the bonnet. The second constable and Simon, with Finella behind, couldn't see past the cars and began circling round. I simply fired two more shots through the windscreen.

The first enchanted bullet melted the glass with heat; the second fractured it. I could no longer see outside, so I exited the same way the werewolf had, through the windscreen.

My way was a bit more controlled, though. I landed squarely on the bonnet just as he was getting up from the pavement. Ellie's last bullet tore a chunk from his shoulder. She'd lost count, never did learn to track her shots. The next click was a dry one, the hammer striking an empty chamber.

The constable and I fired at once, his bullet ripped through the injured shoulder, mine shattered the beast's cheek and broke two yellow fangs.

The werewolf roared and, unexpectedly, drew a revolver from beneath his jacket. The first shot sent the constable diving for cover, the second struck my shield, and the third...

Ellie saw we were in trouble and lunged at him with the cleaver, but he managed to swing the barrel toward her a heartbeat before steel met furred wrist. The gun fired. The third bullet struck her in the abdomen, sharp steel came down a fraction later, severing his clawed hand, revolver still gripped tight in the lifeless fingers.

They both recoiled at once, Ellie collapsing to the ground, the beast stumbling back onto the bonnet. The car stopped him from falling off, and he recovered first, raising his remaining clawed hand high above his head.

"No!" I shouted.

Our friends had finally made it round the cars. A fat bolt of lightning leapt from Simon's hand, arcing through the air and crashing down onto the werewolf's wrist. I fired, tearing a strip of scalp from the beast's head.

What the hell? Two metres away — how did I not kill him?

The pressure of our combined assault made him falter. That was enough. I smashed the edge of my ring-shield into his skull, not the devastating blow I'd hoped for, but enough to send him staggering. Deathly pale, Ellie twisted away and rolled aside.

He raised his arm again. I activated stone skin and threw myself under the blow, shielding her with my body. Razor claws scraped down my back like forks across granite, ripping my clothes and carving deep, bloody furrows. My ribs burned. The force of the strike slammed both of us into the asphalt.

But the second the weight lifted, I wrapped my arms around Ellie and rolled three full turns, each one sending fire lancing through my ribs, my shield ready. The earth reservoir in my ring was nearly dead.

Ellie lost control for a moment, but once clear, she pushed herself onto all fours and leapt away. The landing didn't go well, she thumped hard onto her back in the middle of the road and clutched her belly wound.

"Goat!" Finella screamed, and unleashed two blazing streams of fire. Wrapping around the werewolf's figure, they coiled into a whirling inferno.

I rushed to Ellie, pulled a healing potion from my satchel, and froze, remembering how healing had worked on me after the rat bite. I looked at the wound with my third eye, into the subtle planes.

There, inside the hole, a small white star shimmered: death.

Shifter regeneration had already begun drawing green threads of blood toward it. I exhaled and put the potion aside. First, I had to neutralise the death. And what better to do that than blood?

I dumped out several boxes from my satchel, found the one with the blood reservoir, and channelled a powerful flow of magic straight to the enchanted bullet, through the bleeding wound.

Ellie screamed in pain, but the tiny star in her abdomen flickered, and went out. Death stopped poisoning the body, stopped turning flesh to ash. I emptied the entire reservoir into the wound. It should be enough — enough raw power to close the outer wound and stop the bleeding, though who knew what state her internal organs were in.

At least she'd live long enough to reach a healer.

The fire vortex held the werewolf trapped, forming a kind of magical circle that stopped him from moving. Only Kettle's lightning pierced the flames, making the beast twitch and shed flaming scraps of what remained of his clothing. What hadn't burned outright tore and flew in all directions, soot and sparks spinning on the wind. The air stank of scorched fur.

But the beast wasn't writhing in agony. He merely shuddered from the shocks.

His skin didn't blister. The rune chains across it burned brighter than the fire itself: water, air, ether, blood, swamp, ice, and mist. Damn it! It wasn't a berserker's runework like the first one had. This was high-grade magical defence, specifically skewed against fire. Exactly the kind hunters used when going after monsters.

Runes. A circle on his chest. Only runic interference could explain this. Magical resistance and deflection, same principle as my bloody brick!

I opened my third eye.

The werewolf was engulfed in a crimson storm of flame, but beneath it shimmered so many elemental currents it was staggering, where the hell was he drawing all that magic from?

Finella's reserv drained suddenly. She'd poured everything she had into that storm: full force, fuelled by fury. Anyone else… damn it, even a master vampire would've been reduced to ash by now. But this one-armed, naked beast just stepped out of the molten tarmac and growled, deep and menacing, trying to intimidate us.

And it worked. The constables flinched. Finella staggered back, spent.

Then I saw it, beneath the runes on his chest, the elemental stars were burning.

I drew my left-hand bulldog, levelled both pistols at the centre of his chest and pulled both triggers. One bullet missed clean. The other, unsurprisingly, veered off, but clipped his temple, taking some arrogance and a spray of blood with it.

Simon pulled his revolver and landed a lucky pair in the beast's side. Third shot — miss. Fourth — miss. Fifth — hit the belly. Sixth — caught the collarbone.

The werewolf roared and lunged, straight at me.

One step.

The FN clicked empty. I dropped it without hesitation and reached for my dagger. The constable emptied his revolver. My bulldog was dry. My final shot struck the werewolf square in the mouth, ripping part of his jaw clean off, but it didn't stop him.

Stone skin! The last dregs of magic from my ring surged into me, just as the claw came slashing for my face.

I didn't have the reach to drive the dagger into his chin, but the trajectory was locked, the distance close. I activated the spell in the hilt, the blade shot forward like a bullet, drove up through his jaw, and the clawed hand slammed into my skull.

Then...

Darkness.

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