Just plain dead and forgotten looks kinda good from here.

The majority concludes that too.

My two hairy guards march me back to the huge curving redwood staircase to the main hall and then out onto a main-floor balcony six feet above the ground, facing the great American Western night. Huge torches flutter with the sound of eagles' wings on either side of the lodge doors. By their light I see that Sansouci isn't here. Neither are Flamingo and Chartreuse. Maybe they've "changed" already. Or maybe only strangers will be in for the kill. Maybe even werewolves observe the niceties.

The mountains around us loom dark, rocky, empty of everything but a hoot owl's cry.

Before I know it, a pack of half-weres have gathered below me, including Haskell, whose now-elongated jaws are slavering silvery strings of spit like a born lycanthrope. Cicereau must have decided he deserved a piece of the action, after all. My mind flipped back to Los Lobos. They'd be dancing the Change there now, the awed tourists watching the werewolves two-stepping themselves into their four-legged selves, howling for freedom. But those werewolves were a different breed, and probably didn't hunt humans.

That's not a problem for my circle of furry admirers. A mob of full werewolves gathers, also slavering, beneath my balcony. I feel like Evita. Don't weep for me, Argentina, send reinforcements!

Haskell's police department issue handcuffs still bind me. Just when I'm hoping for a silver accomplice, an innocuous wrist bangle suddenly wreathes my wrist. Before my eyes it changes back to a charm bracelet of keys! I struggle to manipulate one into the cuff lock without attracting too much attention.

Snap! One cuff loosens into the palm of the other hand, but by now the werewolves are snuffling and whining with canine excitement and hear nothing. If only Quicksilver were here! Maybe he'd somehow sensed something wrong and had secretly tailed me to the Gehenna. Maybe he'd run alongside the van, unseen, the whole way here…Maybe pigs like Haskell could fly as well as slobber.

On a higher balcony, as if enjoying box seats at a theater of blood, Cicereau and a few still-human guests are sipping red wine (I hope) while I wait to be signaled to run for my life.

I unsnap the second cuff and hold it one-handed so I can swing the other cuff as a weapon. The best defense is a good offense, Irma whispers. Right. I bound over the balcony into the midst of the werewolf pack, slinging handcuff.

I'm on my back in a pile of scrabbling curved claws. Glad I wore long sleeves and pants. The deep, burning scratches even penetrate my nylon Spandex. Whoever thought trendy workout togs would get a workout like this?

I grab wolfish ears and struggle to my feet, avoiding the huge snapping muzzles.

Amidst my enemies, my handcuff sling looks as threatening as a linked pair of sleazy big-hoop earrings.

And then I feel the silver charm bracelet icing down one wrist, streaking over my shoulders and capturing the other wrist.

In the wavering torchlight I see silver cuffs three inches wide on each of my wrists, linked together by a piece of Quicksilver's heavy pet store chain. Shackles! I've now got metal-cuffed wrists with a two-foot-long swag of thick chain between them, which make even better bonds than police-issue handcuffs. Now I'm handicapped big time.

Damn Snow! His freaky invasive "gift" is gonna bind me for the kill.

Which is even now heading this way.

As the rising werewolves scrabble for purchase so they can press in to devour me, their combined meaty doggie breaths are enough to knock over a bank. I dodge, turn, elbow their jaws and rib cages, kick their knees and knee their furry little balls…

Wait! A half-were charges me, fanged jaws wide. I raise my shackled hands without thinking to defend my neck from a fatal wound. He bites down, hard, on industrial-strength chain and howls with pain. I lift my hands over his shaggy, fanged head, cross my wrists to circle his furred throat with chain, and presto! He falls, throttled. I've got a built-in garrote.

Someone…something…grabs me from the rear.

I feel a swift, cool, dry tremor down my legs…suddenly I have silver spurs to kick out and back with. Screams from my attackers are followed by a warm thick bloodbath on my ankles. I'm so grossed out at the idea of wading through blood that I literally climb over the oncoming half-were and werewolf forms, momentarily standing on free ground again.

I turn. Three of the half-weres are down and howling, but most of the werewolves throng me again. The shackles are gone but I feel something cold flooding over my chest-not a touchie-feelie diamond necklace in the night, but enough snaky metal tendrils to form a Victorian rainfall necklace over my entire chest. Very vintage.

Snow and his heavy metal games! This is no time to go vintage and cop a feel! Oh. Wait. This damn metal necklace is prickling, not tickling. It's icy cold, like someone's reputed prick.

I glance down. Silver martial arts hurling stars dangle from every multitudinous chain of my sudden new necklace.

So. Live, learn, and kick butt. I pluck those saw-edged stars off that new hanging arsenal one by one, and send them slicing into oncoming furred throats, chests, and femoral arteries.

That's enough to halt the werewolves. I run into the darkness, my thin-soled ballet slippers finding every sharp rock. Heavy panting, wet slobbery breaths, and frenzied whining barrel right behind me.

Where do I think I'm going, and why? Muscle stitches scream in my side and scratches burn everywhere. I'm finding that the terrain is rarely flat and always ends in rocky walls not even rosined soles can climb.

And then the bullets start flying.

Oh, my lucky throwing stars!

I spot a human on two legs, standing on a rocky rise holding a big black semiautomatic-something with a lot of rounds, treating the packing werewolves like ducks in a carnival shooting gallery.

It’s Ric!

His white shirtfront is like a feral grin in the moonlight. How on earth did he get here? Never mind. I can use the distraction, and hopefully his shooting-gallery aim. Hey, my ballet slippers have sprouted silver pitons. Wings would be better.

With the harsh stutter of the semiautomatic gun, and silver bullets striking werewolves and even the ground near me, the scene is all gunfire, screams, and confusion. I hurl silver stars at the fallen wolves as Ric pauses to pump in more ammo. The werewolf pack retreats behind rocks. Ric empties his weapon again, then throws it into a knot of standing werewolves.

Ric races down the incline to me as the survivors reassemble and we escape onto the dark, cool night.

Together again.

But the full moon pins us in a relentless spotlight and night creatures see well in the dark. Howls and whines echo from the rocks all around, concealing their direction.

The howlers are closing in, packs of maddened, frustrated, rabid wolves and half-weres. They're beyond the control of the mob bosses who run the lodge, who've sent delinquent gamblers, failed hit men, and their rival mobs' soldiers here to die for decades.

This is a killing ground where the unhumans take out the humans. Every time.

Ric pulls a nine-millimeter pistol from his belt.

"Too bad you had to ditch the big gun," I say.

"Silver bullets aren't exactly sold at Wal-Mart, and I didn't have much notice, but I've got a bunch of rounds left for the hand-gun. So you run. I shoot."

"No!" I don't want to leave him.

But the wolves keep coming, centering on me. I'm suddenly standing on silver platform boots, ready to race into the raw desert for my life.

"Ric?"

He's not looking at me. The semiautomatic pistol clasped in both his fists looks pathetically small. He's a dead shot. When he shoots, a werewolf drops, but two will spring up in its place.