A burning sensation filled my mouth, my gums, my teeth, as if that part of me wished to morph, to change, also. Into what? Dear God, into what? What was I becoming?

Tomas. I forced his name into my mind, tried to see him as a person, and not something I could drink to quench that burning, aching thirst. Wounded, bleeding Tomas. He protected me from a threat in front, already gone, when the real threat now lay behind him, so close, a hand grasp away. My fingers spasmed where they lay planted on the ground as I desperately fought the need to reach out and grab that bleeding wrist, touch my fingers to that blood, squeeze it tighter to wring out even more of that redness. The need punched me hard in the gut, drew a small sound of distress from my throat.

At the sound, my men turned back to look at me, saw me doubled over. "Mona Lisa," Tomas cried, reaching for me. "What's wrong?"

"No. Don't touch me!" I choked, throwing myself back away from him, my eyes fixed on the jagged holes of his pierced wrist, on the torn flesh that cried red tears of sorrow at being wasted so, untasted, unsavored. It drew me, beckoned me like a siren's call. Taste me. Taste life.

I shook my head violently, dragging myself farther away from his dripping temptation, frightened that if I tasted his blood, I would have fangs in truth; it was a burning promise a thin skin away from a violent, erupting birth. I pulled myself back until I came up against something solid, something warm, something electric as my skin met it. I tamed my head to see Dontaine crouched down behind me, hands set carefully on his spread knees. "Tell me what's wrong," he said in a gentle soothing voice, the kind of voice that one used to talk a jumper down from the roof.

I looked at him with wide wild eyes. "His blood." My voice cracked on the words, on the intensity of my hunger.

"Tomas, leave," Dontaine commanded.

Tomas's honey brown eyes flashed with ire, with rebellion. "I will not leave her like this," he said with a fire I had not seen in him before.

I whimpered as he took a step closer, my eyes fixed on that dripping, red blood.

"Look to where her eyes gaze, Tomas. Your blood is calling her beast's hunger up, and she is trying to fight it. The only way you can help her is to leave."

It was a hunger, all right, but not that of my beast's. That animal hunger was at least something I could understand, relate to. This... this was an undead hunger, thirsting for life itself. Heavenly Father, how had Lucinda been able to walk away so calmly from him after she had pierced his skin? How had she not slaughtered us all? Drank us all down?

"Is he right? Do you wish me to leave?" Tomas asked, and I had to force myself to concentrate on his words, to understand them.

"Yes. Please go," I said in a careful trembling voice, forcing the words out when a larger part of me wanted to scream for him to stay. Stay and feed me!

Head bowed, he turned and left us, and that hungry, thirsty part of me howled inside as I saw my food walking away, punished me by driving that sharp longing deeply and fiercely into my body like a dagger thrust. I put my face into the ground and screamed, my fingers digging into the cool damp earth, anchoring me there so I did not ran after him, chase him down, and sink my teeth into him.

Little electric jolts ran through me as Dontaine touched my shoulder, trying to distract me, I think, bring me back to myself. But it only served to draw my attention to another food source. Here, too, was blood.

Slowly I turned and looked at him, at his hand, smooth and white, skin so soft-looking, so easy to pierce, to tear open to get to that rich flowing blood beneath. That call of life.

"Your eyes," he whispered. "Dear Goddess, they're blue like Mona Louisa's." And I felt his fear jolt through me with thrilling pleasure, almost as sweet a sensation as blood smeared upon my lips would have been. Crap.

"Don't... don't be afraid," I said, my voice strained as my own fear  -  fear of myself  -  flooded over me.

"Mona Lisa, what's happening?" he asked like a child begging a grown-up to tell him there was no bogeyman in the closet. That he was only imagining it. But he wasn't. And the bogeyman wasn't something hiding in the closet. It was me.

"Touch me, Dontaine," I whispered. "Hold me. Make it go away."

Carefully, he sat me up and held me from behind, so he would not see my disquieting eyes. And perhaps, so my teeth would not be near his throat, a wise move. But though he pressed his chest again my back, wrapped his arms around me, encircling me with his electric presence, it did not chase that terrible blood thirst from me. I was aware, so aware of that slow, beating heart that pounded against me like an ancient primitive dramming. Calling: Here. Here I am. Come get me.

And how I yearned to do so. So much that I shuddered.

"It's not working, Dontaine," I said, trembling against him, my voice tight. God, how it was not working. I pushed to free myself from his hold, from that terrible dramming heartbeat pressed against me, but he would not let me go. His arms tightened and that strength inherent in a Full Blood warrior kept me chained, kept me captive for a moment, as long as I did not fight him.

"What are you doing?" I demanded.

"Please, my Queen, I feel your panic... Don't run." I felt him tremble against me. Felt his heart quicken under the flooding surge of adrenaline. "My fear. Your fear. It triggers my beast. If you ran..."

His words gave me an idea. Made me think of that other thing that dwelled within me  -  so many things inside me now.

My own beast.

I tried to call it forth, tried to unleash my tiger self to drive out that other thing  -  and it was a thing, not truly a person  -  possessing me with its hungers and desires. Come out, kitty cat. Come out and play.

Always before it roared out of me. Rushed out the moment I unleashed it. But not this time. There was the faintest stirring, the brush of fur inside me. Then it subsided, once more quiescent within me, unable to come out and save me.

"Dontaine." My hands squeezed the arms holding me, kept them pressed down against me. "Call out my beast."

His arms spasmed around me for a second. "You're asking me to change into my Half Form, and I cannot do that. I will have to leave you then. I will not be able to change back until I have hunted. You will be unprotected."

"Dontaine..." Against my volition, my head lowered. My hands wrapped like shackles around his strong, pulsing forearms. And with but a thought, gently, easily, I broke his hold on me and lifted his pulsing wrists up to my mouth. I kept my lips closed, fighting myself, but could not stop myself from whispering those closed lips over that white fragile skin, so thin, where just beneath the surface pounded sweet flowing blood. I smelled it. Literally smelled it like the most alluring perfume. And my mouth, my gums, burned again like something set aflame, and my teeth ached to change, lengthen, become dagger-sharp fangs.