the door a good five minutes or so before a bleary young maid opened it cautiously.
“Yes?”
Beyond the maid, Lyall saw a head stick out of a bedroom far down the hall—Mrs. Tunstell in an outrageous sleeping cap that resembled nothing so much as a frothy lace-covered mushroom. “What has happened? Are we on fire? Has someone died?”
Professor Lyall, still carrying Biffy in wolf form, muscled his way past the astonished maid and into the house. “You might put it like that, Mrs. Tunstell.”
“My goodness, Professor Lyall! What do you have there?” The head disappeared. “Tunny! Tunny! Wake up. Professor Lyall is here with a dead dog. Arise at once. Tunny!” She came bustling down the hallway wrapped in a voluminous robe of eye-searing pink satin. “Oh, the poor lamb, bring him in here.”
“Please do forgive me for the presumption, Mrs. Tunstell, but yours was the nearest house.” He lay Biffy down on the small lavender couch and quickly reached behind it to draw the curtains over the window, just as the sun’s first rays peeked above the horizon. Biffy’s previously still form stiffened and then began to shudder and convulse.
Throwing all decorum to the winds, Professor Lyall rushed at Ivy, got one arm firmly about her waist, and hustled her to the door. “Best you not be here for this, Mrs. Tunstell. Send in your husband, would you, once he awakens?”
Ivy opened and closed her mouth a couple of times like an affronted poodle, and then whirled to do as he had bidden. There was a woman, Lyall thought, forced into efficiency through prolonged exposure to Alexia Tarabotti.
“Tunny!” she called, trotting back down the hallway, and then with far greater sharpness, “Ormond Tunstell, wake up. Do!”
Professor Lyall closed the door and turned back to his charge. He reached into his waistcoat for one of his trusty handkerchiefs, only then remembering he was wearing no more than a greatcoat, retrieved from the shore, having dressed for change, not company. Wincing at his own temerity, he grabbed one of Ivy’s pastel throw pillows and wedged a corner of it into the new werewolf’s mouth, giving Biffy something to bite down upon and also muffling his whimpering. Then Lyall bent low, bracing the shuddering form of the wolf with his own body, curling about him tenderly. It was partly Beta instinct, to protect a new member of the pack, but it was also sympathy. The first time was always the worst, not because it got any better, but because it was so unfamiliar an experience.
Tunstell let himself into the room.
“God’s teeth, Professor, what is going on?”
“Too much to explain fully right now, I’m afraid. Can that wait until later? I’ve got a new pup on my hands and no Alpha to handle him. Do you have any raw meat in the house?”
“The wife ordered steak, delivered only yesterday.” Tunstell left without needing to be pressed further.
Lyall smiled. The redhead fell so easily back into his old role of claviger, doing what needed to be done for the werewolves around him.
Biffy’s chocolate fur was beginning to retreat up to the top of his head, showing skin now pale with immortality. His eyes were losing their yellow hue in favor of blue. Clutching that writhing form, Lyall could feel as well as hear Biffy’s bones breaking and re-forming. It was a long and agonizing shift. It would take the young man decades to master any level of competency. Rapidity and smoothness were markers of both dominance and age.
Lyall held Biffy the entire time. Held him while Tunstell returned with a large raw steak and fussed about with varying degrees of helpfulness. Held him until, eventually, he was left with an armful of nothing but naked Biffy, shivering and looking most forlorn.
“What? Where?” The young dandy pushed weakly against the Beta’s arms. His nose was twitching as though he needed to sneeze. “What is going on?”
Professor Lyall relaxed his embrace and sat back on his heels next to the couch. Tunstell came over with a blanket and a concerned expression. Just before he covered the young man over, Lyall was pleased to notice that Biffy appeared to be entirely healed from the bullet wound, a true supernatural, indeed.
“Who are you?” Biffy focused fuzzily on Tunstell’s bright red hair.
“I’m Tunstell. Used to be a claviger to Lord Maccon. Now I’m mostly just an actor.”
“He is our host and a friend. We will be safe here for the day.” Professor Lyall kept his voice low and calm, tucking