The Sookie Stackhouse Companion

was another serious shock. My favorite boss, Sam Merlotte, was the first person I saw in both forms.
    There are apparently two kinds of the two-natured: shifters, who can change into any type of animal, and weres, who change into only one animal. By far the most numerous clan is the werewolves, and they’re so proud of that that they just refer to themselves as Weres, with a capital W . Of course, in the strictest sense, they’re all shapeshifters. They can change their physical form. But you wouldn’t ever hear a Were refer to himself as a shapeshifter, and Sam would never call himself a were-anything.
    Within those two big divisions, there’s a caste. You’re either bitten or born. If you’re born, you’re the child of two pure-blooded two-natured humans. And you’re the first child of that particular pair. Your little brother or sister won’t be able to change. If you’re bitten, you had an unfortunate encounter with a two-natured individual when he or she was in animal form, and you got (of course) bitten. Most often, that won’t take, and you’ll be fine. But if it does take, you’ll start feeling weird at the full moon. You’ll assume a half-human, half-animal form when the moon is up. (Think Lon Chaney Jr. in The Wolf Man .) You’ll maintain your health and vitality longer than your regular human buddies, but sad to say you probably won’t live as long.
    Sam’s a pureblood shifter, so he can change into any kind of animal form, though he prefers that of a dog. Most shifters tend to stick to a form they’ve become comfortable with, like a favorite shirt or a pair of shoes that fits just right. But Sam makes a great lion, let me tell you.
    The wolves are a lot more secretive than the vampires. Let’s face it—not having to sleep in a coffin and remain unseen during the day lets them blend in a lot easier. I know a lot of Weres, and I’m still finding out things about them. If someone had told me there is a hidden shapeshifter bar in Shreveport, I would have thought they were nuts, which is probably the pot calling the kettle black, if you stop and think about it. Quinn took me to a drinking establishment called the Hair of the Dog, and it’s not a place for the fainthearted.
    Most wolves group together in packs, with the strongest taking the role of packleader, a position that must be defended against challengers. I’ve been around Shreveport’s Long Tooth pack mostly, and it certainly isn’t a democracy. What the packmaster says goes. And if the packmaster needs backing up, the pack enforcer steps in.
    There are some negatives to dating one of the two-natured, though the facts that they can go out in the sun and are physically warm are huge plusses as far as I’m concerned. But the icky part is that the necessity to keep breeding true can dominate mating choices. And if you’re a rare breed, like a weretiger or a werepanther, you’re kind of obliged to seek out a same-breed mate of the opposite sex and try to have a baby. Take Hotshot, for example. It’s a tiny enclave way out in the boondocks, and the werepanthers who live there form a nearly closed society.
    Breeding true is all the more important because the two-natured have a high mortality rate. So the leader of a pack is required to have children with as many of the pureblood women in his group as possible. I found this out from Calvin Norris when we were semiromantically involved for a while. As much as I thought I might care for him, this secret breeding program was something I couldn’t handle. I’m the sort of woman who wants her husband home in bed with her, not out having kids with the nice lady down the street.
    The two-natured young start manifesting their abilities when they hit puberty, as if teenagers don’t have enough problems already. According to what I’ve been told, the kids are mentored and taught how to handle both the physical and emotional changes that their condition entails.
    Sometimes, though, shapeshifters will find that they have to mentor a nonchild. That’s what happened with my brother, Jason, though there are times when (with the way he acts) you’d think he was a prepubescent kid. After he got involved with Calvin’s niece Crystal, one of her werepanther ex-boyfriends took it into his head that the only thing that attracted her to Jason was that he was a full human. So he decided to turn Jason into a werepanther and win Crystal back that way—which, by the way, didn’t work. This