booksabaking (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
booksabaking) wrote2021-04-01 10:37 pm
booksabaking) wrote2021-04-01 10:37 pm
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A WEREWOLF IN OCTOBER - CHAPTER 1 (DONE)
It's funny the things that spring to mind when you're being chased by a big, hungry-looking wolf.
Jayla had always thought the mind went blank when thrown into life-threatening danger. At least, she'd thought that'd be her reaction. She'd been sure she'd freeze up; locked muscles and hollow head. Though, as dread went, failing an exam couldn't be compared to this. Angst over an F could be fixed by going home to cry and binge eat ice cream.
The wolf's panting breath stayed close. The noise brought on flashes of scrapes she'd luckily gotten out of. If they'd gone on longer or been worse, would she have managed to think beyond a litany of oh shit, oh no, oh shit then too?
Feet smattering against snow and asphalt Jayla ducked under the odd branch that grew over the path, lungs burning. One part of her focused on running, on the growling right behind her and her weakening legs. Another part noticed that the park she was fleeing for her life through was pretty nice. Unlike her crappy new apartment this would be a pleasant place to spend an afternoon, when summer hit, and the forest it bordered offered hiking paths. There were plenty of comfy-looking benches made for reading a book and enjoying a hot cup of coffee on.
Too bad she'd be dead before she could finish that library book she'd accidentally stolen. Karma?
Fangs snapped at her heels. Jayla dodged off the path and darted in among the trees. The wolf let out a promising yelp of pain. Drawing in a desperate breath she forced her shaking legs to run even faster. She weaved between the trees as randomly as her panicking brain knew how.
Outrunning a wolf. Yeah, this was totally going to work.
The snow wasn't deep here, but it hid the icy patches. Claws scraped and skittered behind her; the beast's panting and growling drew closer. She had no idea if she was tearing up from fear or simply from the wind and the cold.
If I die here, I'm blaming Brandon. She grabbed hold of a trunk and used it to spin and go left. Blaming Brandon wasn't fair, but nothing about this was, so screw it. What did it matter that the decision to up and move to Merrihollow had been hers? Brandon should have known better than to goad her by mentioning how he was 'going places' and how his company was going to turn the small university town into the next Silicon Valley. He should have known she'd reply with: "Then maybe I'll go to Merrihollow and get a Real Job, just like you've always wanted!". He should have known she'd be too proud to take that back.
She doubted he'd known about the literal hungry predators that hung out in the local park. They usually came in the human creep package. So this particular situation? Technically not Brandon's fault. Damn.
A howl broke through the night. Not from behind her, but from somewhere to her right. That ain't fair! Wasn't having one wolf hunting her bad enough? Was she being toyed with? Was that why she hadn't been eaten yet? Cursing, she did what you shouldn't do in a situation such as this: she glanced over her shoulder.
The wolf was still there and still big. Too big, unnaturally big, and its amber eyes were glowing. What. The. HELL??
A root came out of nowhere (or rather, was in front of her while she was looking behind her, like a chump) and tripped her, sending her sprawling in the thin snow. The impact knocked the air out of her. She couldn't scream when fangs sunk into her leg.
Not how I thought I'd die. Struggling to inhale Jayla stared down at the wolf tearing at her ankle. She couldn't feel anything but pressure and heat. Must be the shock.
The beast let go of her to lick its muzzle, savoring. Its lips drew back in an eerily human grin. That's good nightmare fuel.
As if in reply the wolf opened its jaw wide, its eyes rolling, darting to her leg, over to the nearby trees and back to her leg. Jayla traced its line of sight in time to catch a shape rushing out of the tree line. Fangs once more lunged for her leg, snapping shut inches from their target as the shape crashed into the wolf, tackling it.
It was another wolf. An even bigger one. Like, the size of a horse.
Either I got roofied at the bar or this is blood loss messing with my head.
The two wolves squared off. The smaller one, snout smeared with Jayla's blood, had dark gray fur with specks of brown in it. The larger wolf was white, blending in with the park's winter landscape. Both wolves' eyes glowed golden, but the white one's stopped when it turned toward Jayla. Almost as if the wolf had decided to try to act normal. It gave the faintest of nods, which was insanely out of place yet strangely reassuring.
The smaller wolf growled. Looking down her body, Jayla spotted a growing pool of red spreading from her pant leg, discoloring the snow. Yup, blood loss. So much blood loss.
Again, true panic failed to hit. Or, likelier, she'd begun to drift into full-blown shock territory, and the only friendly person around to give her first aid was a wolf. A wolf. Thus, not a person. No opposable thumbs, no first aid. Dying is trippy.
More howls rang out. The smaller, gray wolf had gotten back to its feet and was skulking toward her, eyes continuing to roll in their sockets. The white super-sized wolf took a step closer and grabbed Jayla's jacket by the collar. It began to pull.
Great. They're fighting over food. At least I die popular. Jayla kept her eyes on the smaller wolf, stalking them with its hackles raised. A not insubstantial trail of blood followed in Jayla's wake as she got hauled backward through the snow. How much blood can a human body lose before death? I think I failed that question at a quiz night once.
Two more shapes made their way into her fading field of view, flanking the gray wolf. They weren't as large as the wolf pulling her, but they were bigger than the gray one and their eyes did not glow. They had dark fur; one of them pitch-black, the other a color Jayla knew dog lovers preferred to call 'blue', though it wasn't the kind of blue hair she'd dreamed of daring to get. Should have gotten started on that bucket list when I had the chance.
The gray wolf's eyes, wide as saucers in its bloodied face, locked on her. When the two new wolves silently fell upon it, it didn't flinch. It kept staring at her, dragging itself toward her despite a restraining jaw clamped around its neck, and a second one around its hind leg.
That's probably what a zombie wolf would look like. The edges of Jayla's vision grew dark, tunneling in on the gray wolf's amber eyes. They dug into her, lanterns of sheer hunger.
A voice in the distance, an unfamiliar woman's voice, called a name. Something that began with an 'M'. Melinda? Melvina?
At that point, the loss of blood pulled her under.
Jayla woke up to howling. Not the howling of a wolf, as she'd expected, but the heartbreaking human noise people make when they've gone through the wringer and barely come out the other end.
Is this my funeral? Surprisingly, all her limbs felt whole. Nothing even hurt. Not the usual result when you'd been torn apart by a wild animal. Death, less dramatic than advertised. I can't believe I died before my parents, that's just not okay. Wonder if the Alzheimer's got me after all. Wait a minute...
Opening her eyes took effort. Staying up way too late was a time-honored tradition in her single person household, but lingering nightmares could mess with the greatest of night owls. She must have slept three hours at most. Again. The weekend couldn't come soon enough.
A white ceiling met her bleary vision. This was not her apartment.
Oh right, I've moved. She pushed aside the bizarre dream about wolves and funerals. The room she was in refused to become familiar. Wasn't the ceiling at her new place beige with telltale spots of indoor smoking? The flowery wallpaper was foreign too, and the bed covers matched it, a thing she'd never personally bothered with in her life. From the other side of the tulip-dotted wall came the muffled sound of crying that had woken her up.
Okay, I was at a bar last night. Did I go home with someone? No hangover.
The old digital clock on the bed stand read 08.03 am. Despite the dream and the early hour she felt remarkably refreshed after the initial heaviness of waking up faded. No headache, no nausea, no regretful memories. A little hungry and thirsty, but all in all ready to get on with her day. Weird. Moving has turned me into a morning person. Did not see that coming.
Throwing aside the duvet she'd been nestled under, Jayla put her feet on the cool floorboards and made her way to the door. Wherever she'd wound up it looked like a guest room. It was spacious, sunny and held one narrow though comfortable bed, a bed stand, a wardrobe, two empty bookcases and a mirror. With a glance at her reflection she noticed that her braids were a bit of a mess. Otherwise she appeared no different than when she'd left the bar. Where did my socks go?
The door out of the room led to a hallway with three other doors and the top of a spiral staircase. In contrast to the guest room, the hallway had a lived-in look to it with mismatched paintings on the walls and an old basketball lying in a corner. Bright light filtered in through panorama windows, but it was off somehow. Was it too bright? Too dim? The wrong color? Did I drink something that clashes with my meds?
Jayla took a step toward the stairs, then stopped and looked back. The heart-wrenching crying was coming from the door to the left of her guest room. Should she go check on them? Did she know them? Had she joined a maudlin drunk for a private afterparty?
She stood frozen outside the door, hand an inch from the doorknob.
After a moment of careful listening she made out another sound alongside the sobbing: someone going "there there" and "it'll be okay, you'll see, it'll be okay" over and over. Her voice had a raw, tired quality to it. Don't know who that is either. What did I do last night? Had she finally become that bar-hopping wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am gal that the high school gossip machine had insisted she was?
Now that she was on the move, Jayla took in something she'd only noted in passing as she'd gotten out of bed: her right pant leg had several long gashes in it. Each of them had been repaired with skillful stitches, near invisible but obvious when touched. Who had taken a sewing kit to her pants and why?
The memory of fangs ripping at flesh crashed into her. She bit back a gasp and hurried to the stairs.
She got halfway down before she registered the angry voices drifting up toward her.
"I thought better of you!"
"I told you, it was an accident! A horrible, horrible accident, but an accident nonetheless."
Guilt instantly overtook the worry mounting inside Jayla. Besides minor clothing alterations and a bad hair day she was fine. That, combined with the word 'accident' and the crying upstairs did not bode well for her conscience. What could she have done? Better ask than start guessing. Whatever happened my imagination can definitely come up with something much worse.
The voices downstairs kept whisper-yelling, seemingly unaware of anything but each other. The first voice, another worn and tired one, continued, "Accident or not, it's still unacceptable. I know Melissa didn't mean any harm-", only to be cut off by the second one:
"Of course she didn't mean any harm! She wasn't in her right mind!"
"Which is what you lot are supposed to be! Always! That's why I deal with you at all."
"You deal with us? Is that what this is?"
Whoever the women arguing were, they both talked with the hurt and betrayal you'd expect from a couple who'd caught each other cheating. Whatever she'd been part of, it had left one person crying their eyes out and two fighting.
Jayla's stomach sank further but she soldiered on down the stairs.
The hallway on the first floor was larger than the one on the second. A porch and snowy garden showed through the nearest window, a peaceful scene at odds with the ongoing argument. The staircase continued farther down, but the voices came from somewhere on this floor. Straight ahead of Jayla was a door that had to lead out. She barely glanced at it. No matter what kind of accident she and this Melissa had been involved in, she needed to know. She needed to see if she could help.
"Lisa, you can't ask me to look away from this. You should have noticed Melissa's absence and gone after her sooner. Instead you were in your lab, playing with your newest toy."
Brief, frosty quiet followed. A line had been crossed. Jayla stifled a curse. This fight clearly required outside interference.
She picked the farthest of the two doors on her right. It seemed the most direct route to the voices' source. An unmade bed was all she caught sight of before automatically nudging the door shut again. Let's not make this worse by wandering into someone's bedroom. Could have sworn the voices came from behind this door. The walls must be super thin.
The second voice broke the silence. It shook as it said, "I know you're angry, but you should think twice before you talk like that."
"Is that a threat?"
"A threat? Is your trust in us, in me, that fragile?" Whoever she was, her emotions had been punched in the gut. Jayla winced in sympathy.
Feeling a growing urgency to intervene Jayla backtracked to the first door. It led her into a room full of bookcases and with a large, paper-covered table in its middle. She dashed through it, ending up in a smaller room with yet more doors. Well, two door frames and what looked to be a cupboard.
"I'm appalled that you-"
To the right, an empty kitchen. The voices came from the left. Jayla squared her shoulders, held her breath, and stormed toward the voices. It wasn't easy to storm barefoot.
She found herself in a dining room with two women facing off across a huge table. The woman on the right sported an impressive and neat afro. Its professional air clashed with her oversized red jumper and gray pajama pants. The woman on the left had a shock of wavy brown hair pulled back in a tight pony-tail. She wore a pantsuit that screamed Dour Specialist. Both women looked older than Jayla herself; mid-thirties or early forties. Neither face rang any bells.
Their argument came to an abrupt halt. Jayla took up position in the doorway, arms crossed over her chest, and tried to keep her gaze steady and no-nonsense.
The eyes of the woman on the right went wide when they landed on Jayla. "You're awake! How are you feeling?"
The woman on the left fixed Jayla with a searching glare and said, "Do you remember what happened to you last night?"
"Uhm." Jayla made a valiant but futile effort to form a coherent timeline of the previous night.
"Here, have a seat," the woman in the bulky jumper said and pulled out a chair at the end of the table.
The chair in question looked expensive and comfy. With answers possibly within reach and the argument interrupted, Jayla let herself dwell on the fact that this mansion - because she was in a frikkin' mansion - had to have cost an arm and a leg.
"Where to begin?" the woman in the jumper muttered after Jayla had caught up with herself and sat down. "Best to do as one usually does, I suppose. My name is Lisa Williams, and this here," she gestured at the pantsuit woman, "is Ava Sledge. This must be confusing for you, but please hear me out fully before you leave. Please."
"I don't have shoes," was the first thing out of Jayla's mouth, which made Williams flinch. Bracing for the building awkwardness Jayla hurried to add, "I mean, I'm not about to bolt. I just want to ask where I am and what's gone down. Sounds like it was bad?"
Another clear flinch from Williams. Sledge had a good poker face, but her ramrod straight posture reminded Jayla of a fighter ready to dodge a punch.
"Eh, do you know where the rest of my clothes are? And my phone and wallet?"
Williams grimaced in possible embarrassment. "Yes, my apologies. You'll have your belongings returned right away. Ava, could you?"
Sledge's neutral expression fell, changing into an eye-roll as she threw her hands up in exasperation. She stomped out of the room with odd grace for a person making that amount of noise.
"So." Williams sat down in the chair closest to Jayla's, diagonally to her right, back-lit by the dining room windows. "You likely don't remember much of last night, or believe you don't remember much. I'll do my utmost to fill in the gaps. You are free to leave at any time. You are not a prisoner. We only brought you here after..."
Pain stole across Williams' face. Jayla could still faintly hear the sobbing from upstairs.
"...after the incident because there are things you need to understand. Important things. Things-," She gave a weak laugh. "Darn. I had this all written down in case of an event like this, but I couldn't find my notes before Ava came back. Sorry, I'm rambling."
A thrill went down Jayla's spine as Williams' cryptic monologue stumbled on. Her traitor brain steered her thoughts toward Brandon again. She knew this was the exact sort of situation he'd hate, and hate her for getting herself into. He's not here and you are. Ignore what he'd think.
"Did I hurt someone?" Jayla asked, ripping off that band-aid before she could chicken out.
The surprise on Williams' face sent relief washing through her, along with curiosity and the flavor of dread she associated with a good horror movie. Whatever twist was coming up next could be worse or better than what her brain had cooked up.
"No!" Williams shook her head furiously, almost comically. "No, no, no, it's rather the opposite. I... We... Damn, I really need my notes for this."
"There's no rush. Take your time".
Movement to Jayla's left caught her attention. Her brain filled in the blanks of what she'd seen, interpreting it as Sledge reentering the room, so she didn't pay it much mind. Then Williams' gaze darted off and froze on a point over Jayla's shoulder.
Jayla turned to look behind her.
A huge wolf stood halfway into the room. Its fur was whiter than the chalk-colored ceiling and it narrowly made it through the door frame without losing the bed sheet draped across its back. It held a manila folder in its formidable, rip-a-person's-arm-off jaws.
Jayla hardly registered Williams' relieved, "Thank you, Dorothy! I'd forget my own head next, and so on." She stared as Williams got up and walked around the table, taking the folder from between the wolf's teeth as if it were a family pet delivering the morning paper.
Giant wolf. In a bed sheet. Right. Heck. This is happening. Which means last night also happened. Which means...
"I'm starting to think that nightmare I just had wasn't a nightmare."
"Right on the money, sweetheart," said Sledge, her boot heels clicking an impatient rhythm across the floor. She had a canvas bag with her, a jacket sleeve Jayla recognized poking out of it. "These idiots hurt you. I'm here to judge the extent of that hurt."
Jayla nodded dumbly, her mind stuck in a loop of wolfwolfgiantwolfwolfgiantwolf.
When she found her voice again both Williams and Sledge had seated themselves at the table. The massive wolf hovered in the dining room's second doorway. The room it led to had to be the bedroom she'd peeked into earlier. How had she not seen that in there?!
"I don't feel hurt," Jayla said, realizing they'd been waiting for her to speak. The tension between the two other women could've been cut with a knife and the empty chair between them might as well have been on fire. This obvious emotional rift hurt worse than any nightmare-memories. Jayla supposed that said something about her but she couldn't be bothered to mull it over.
"I feel great, actually. But I had a dream about being chased and bitten by a wolf with glowing eyes, which was kinda unsettling. Guessing that wasn't a dream?"
The wolf whined in such a dog-like way Jayla had to bite back a snort of laughter. Grinning didn't seem the appropriate thing to do in this situation, what with Sledge's stern presence and Williams' doe-eyed worrying. It was hard to resist though. Should I pretend to freak out? Should I pinch myself? Would scared be the correct reaction here? Angry?
The sensible voice of Brandon echoed through her mind, saying words like "shock" and "trauma" and "break from reality". She tried to brush that aside. Mental health was no joking matter, no, but no one in her closest family had that type of medical history. The kind of lost in your own head we're prone to doesn't involve colossal wolves, as far as I know.
Still, Brandon-tinted doubt kept trickling in. The giant wolf seemed real, but you don't realize you're hallucinating during a hallucination, do you? Is this my meds acting up? Didn't mom say I had an 'episode' when I was a kid? Like, bugs crawling under my skin? Though that might have been that fever. Plus, ADHD medication has come a long way since the 90s. I should probably call someone.
"Last night," Williams began, hesitant but determined, marching across metaphorical eggshells, "you were bitten by a werewolf. I'm sure you've heard of some iteration of werewolves?"
"Yup." Definitely calling someone. That or becoming queen of a fantasy land. This second possibility caused a flare of hope that blindsided her a bit. But only a bit. Most of her favorite books had opening chapters similar to this situation.
"Dorothy here," Williams indicated the enormous white wolf, "is a werewolf, as am I. Melissa, the werewolf who bit you, is upstairs with Vivian, the fourth member of our pack. Ava is our law enforcement liaison and local magic user."
"You can say witch," Sledge cut in, absolutely and utterly done. "I'm a private detective, not police."
Could this be a hidden camera show? Do they still make those?
"Any vampires?" Jayla said, aiming to lighten the mood.
"One, Arturo," Williams answered, no hesitation. "I'm hoping he's in bed. He keeps a different sleep schedule from most of us due to his sensitivity to sunlight. For his sake, please don't open the windows while you're here."
"Sunlight sensitivity? That can't be fun." The light through the windows here did look wrong. How sensitive were real vampires to sunlight? Bad sunburn or certain death? How stressful was it for them to go out for groceries? Could vampires eat food? Could werewolves? Stay on track.
"Did you find my stuff?"
Sledge pushed the canvas bag across the table. No comment, poker face back in place.
She's acting as if she's the one who's been bitten, jeez. Giddier and giddier, Jayla stopped herself from sticking her tongue out at Sledge. If this turned out to be imaginary, she'd use it for inspiration when planning her next D&D one shot - after she'd finished bawling her eyes out. The university had to contain a bunch of dice rolling nerds.
As Jayla began rummaging through her bag to make sure she hadn't lost anything, Williams opened the manila folder and continued her mini-speech.
"Here is the basic information you should have about werewolves: Bites often transfer the werewolf condition. This is why you still have two whole legs. Forced transformations vary from person to person, lasting one to three days per month, but the change invariably coincides with the full moon. There is yet no conclusive evidence as to why that is. You'll transform tonight as this will be your first-"
"Hold on!" Jayla raised her hands in a 'slow down' gesture, her mind racing. "You're saying I'm a werewolf. As in, howl at the moon, eat people and No Shave November all year round werewolf?"
Williams nodded, hurrying on like a teacher trying to finish up a lesson before the bell rang. "This condition isn't as dire as mythology and folklore make it out to be. The general culture of werewolves is sadly geared toward the less savory elements of humanity, but we're working on getting that sorted."
The emphasis on 'culture' seemed to be for Sledge's benefit, who crossed her arms and looked away.
"As long as you eat a proper meal before transforming you won't go hunger-mad. You'll just be a big wolf for four to eight hours. You'll also have the ability to enact the change at will. It's... it's enjoyable, once you get used to it."
Sledge coughed curtly, as if to interrupt, but the giant wolf drowned this out with a happy bark. Its tongue lolled in a dog smile and it wagged its tail.
Jayla did her best not to crack an answering smile; she got the feeling that would disturb Williams and Sledge. "Huh, that sounds neat."
It honestly did. Actually, she'd upgrade that to fantastic.
"Aging will no longer be an... how to put it? Issue?" Williams' brow creased in a thoughtful frown, a pensive look taking hold of her eyes. "Or perhaps you'd say it'll become an issue. Unlike vampires we do tend to age after the bite, but most people get 'stuck' at about thirty or forty, physically speaking." She sighed. "I'm getting side-tracked. The werewolf condition has some benefits. You'll experience increased speed, strength, heightened senses and self-repair. All of this will come naturally to you. Outside of dealing with hunger, you'll not have to worry about controlling your new abilities. There are diseases and injuries that can harm us, but we're more resilient than regular humans. You should however avoid direct skin contact with pure silver. That's one thing pop culture got right."
Immortal-ish too? Dump that on me, why don't ya? Not that Jayla actually minded. Having the situation laid out this quickly and neatly was genuinely nice. It also helped that she now could wave goodbye to worries about dying before her parents and older brother. Guaranteed to never become a vegetable they'd have to take care of and watch slowly die. This might just be the best day ever.
"I'm terribly sad to say this, but you won't be able to have children. Biological children, that is."
Jayla bit the inside of her cheek in surprise. Deja vù, hello. "That's no worry. Couldn't to begin with, so no big deal."
Sledge simply raised an eyebrow, but Williams looked like she'd swallowed her tongue. She cleared her throat three times before saying, "I'm sorry to hear that."
"Don't be!" Jayla allowed herself a laugh. No way was she sitting through another Poor Women Who Can't Have Children speech, especially not here. "I'm not sorry. Never wanted kids and it's not like I'm dying. I just can't get pregnant."
"I understand." Williams got that thoughtful look about her, eyeing Jayla up and down as if she were a tricky puzzle or a chessboard left mid-game."You seem to be taking this well."
She was, wasn't she? Then again, she'd started the morning thinking she'd caused a fatal accident and now it turned out she'd been nominated for main character in a fantasy story with health-related superpowers. Is this how the Narnia kiddos felt when they went through the wardrobe? Would those books be as good if I reread them?
"Let's just say that I'm pretty convinced I'm hallucinating and that I'll wake up in a week's time in a hospital to my ex readying a lecture on mental health care." Hopefully they'll buy that. Better excuse than 'I'm 100% down with this werewolf thing'. The instant she could be sure no one would freak out since she wasn't, she'd treat everyone in the mansion to pizza.
"Fair enough," Sledge said. She'd relaxed a little, resting her elbows on the table and her chin on her clasped hands. While Williams' scrutiny of Jayla was analytical, Sledge's was shrewd. "Are you going to make that call or what?"
"What call?" Jayla answered. She felt suddenly defensive and on edge, the sort of brewing panic that the presence of cops stirred up even if you'd never in your life considered committing a crime.
"The one you're looking for an excuse to make. It's fine if you want to contact the police."
Jayla tried to stare Sledge down. Her unspoken message seemed to get across because it got her an apologetic shrug. As if I'm stupid enough to get people with guns and badges involved in this! The single white 'person' in here is a wolf.
"I'll phone a friend, have her do a reality check on me. I figure it's better than nothing, right?" It was the best solution she could come up with. Was there a surefire method you could use to tell if you were seeing things? She'd have to google that as soon as she got home.
"Have you experienced hallucinations before?" Williams leaned over the table, eyes fixed on Jayla, almost hungry. "You are of course not hallucinating now, but I'd love to hear about possible previous episodes."
Behind Williams, the huge wolf whined.
Sledge sat up straighter and smiled in that way people did when they weren't happy. Through clenched teeth she hissed at Williams, "Don't tell me you orchestrated this for the sake of your cursed research!"
The change in Williams was so immediate it was whiplash inducing. The sparks of curiosity in her eyes turned to thunderclouds. She whirled in her seat and pinned Sledge with a glare that could have set her on fire - if werewolves had pyrokinetic powers, which admittedly, would be cool.
"How dare you?" Williams shouted, her brown irises flashing a shining amber yellow.
This evoked a similar golden flash from the wolf and a neon green one from Sledge. Jayla's eyes felt funny for a second, but she wrote that off as a reaction to the sudden unnatural yet amazing light show.
"How dare you sit here, in my house, and accuse me of inhumane experiments?! I am well aware that I can get carried away, but I would never willingly-"
"Yes, willingly-!"
"That is not what I meant, and you know-"
Not again. Jayla resisted the urge to join in the yelling. That would be the opposite of helpful. They needed a distraction.
Carla should be awake. She gets up beyond early to go running. Attention on Sledge and Williams, and the huge wolf, Jayla pressed the call button and activated speakerphone.
The ringing, combined with fierce barking from the gigantic wolf, brought the argument to a standstill. The ringing ended with a click.
Moment of truth. Or as close as I'm getting to it today.
"Hey, Carla, you're on speakerphone! Tell me what you hear."
"What?" replied a familiar, slightly out-of-breath voice.
"I see." Sledge's lips twisted in a smirk. "Clever move. Just don't turn on the phone camera."
Williams nudged her glasses up her nose and pulled at her jumper, as if preparing to introduce herself to an auditorium of students. If no one has nicknamed her The Professor I should get on that.
"I am fine with being filmed. Dorothy can go back into her room, should it be necessary."
Dorothy answered this with a short bark.
"I can hear you, two women and a dog. Jayla, are you all right? This is weird, even for you. You're never up this early."
Yes! Holy fucking yes! That tipped the scale. Supernatural adventures of my teenage dreams, here I come.
"Doing great, sorry to bother you! Keep on running, you crazy morning person!"
With much cheer and no pause to listen to Carla's protests, Jayla hung up.
She beamed. Sure, she could sit and worry and question her reality, etc. etc., but would that improve this situation? No. Better to enjoy it.
This time she managed to silence the Brandon-esque voice of adulthood spitting warnings at her.
Sledge heaved a sigh that could have come from the bottom of a well.
"All right, this is enough excitement for me for today. You," she nodded to Jayla, "stay with them for a while, at least through your first change. Go to the hospital if you can afford it. They won't find anything unusual but that info might help you sort things out. Call me, any time you need."
She retrieved a business card from one of her suit pockets. This she presented to Jayla with practiced ease, securely pincered between her index and middle finger.
Jayla took the card. "Thanks."
Williams watched Sledge leave without a word. As the front door slammed shut she sank further into her seat, a deflated balloon.
"Wow," Jayla said to break the tense silence. "This has been one hell of a morning. I knew there was a reason I usually sleep until ten."
"I'm sorry you had wake up to us fi-, arguing."
Tears glimmered at the corners of Williams' eyes. Jayla managed to not cringe. Seeing people cry without being able to comfort them was the literal worst.
"I'll let you digest your new circumstances in peace and go fetch the others. We could all use some breakfast. Dorothy, if you would be so kind?"
The wolf in the doorway gave a huff of affirmation and Williams left the room. Jayla stared in fascination as the beast began to shrink. Its fur grew in reverse into its skin, its forelegs shortened, its paws split into fingers and its snout dwindled to a human nose. The swift transformation had a neat, bloodless and tidy look, far from the many takes on the process she'd seen depicted on TV. Jayla found herself applauding.
In the wolf's place stood a motherly white woman with red hair, wrapped in the bed sheet. She took a cheerful bow at Jayla's applauds.
"Hi!" Jayla knew she was grinning like a fool. Werewolves were an actual thing, she was one, she didn't have to turn cannibal, she'd gained healing powers and she'd be introduced to several potential future friends. Friends in a new town a week after moving! A dream come true if there ever was one. Possibly a very realistic dream that'd end eventually. Either way, worth enjoying.
"I'm Jayla. Jayla Govender."
"Hello! It is so nice to meet you, despite the circumstances." This redheaded woman - aka huge white wolf aka Dorothy - sounded pleased as punch to have Jayla there. This made Jayla smile wider.
"Now that that's taken care of," Dorothy said, wrapping the sheet around herself toga style, "would you like pancakes for breakfast or bacon and scrambled eggs?"
The soft chirping of birds and slow brightening of his bedroom niggled Arturo awake. The glowing numbers on his wake-up light announced it to be the unholy hour of 08.00 am. Groaning, he dug his head into his pillow and granted himself a little extra shut-eye.
When he opened his eyes again, it was 08.30 am. This dragged another groan from him.
His shoulders tensed and he waited. Hopefully it would be Dorothy who'd come get him. Vivian was too much energy to deal with this early and Lisa was equally bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, particularly the morning after transformation. Melissa, on the other hand, would be as grumpy as him and that rarely ended with anyone's mood improving.
He waited. And waited. And waited.
He rolled over on his side and peered at the alarm clock. 08.45 am. The ice-cold core that loved to occupy the pit of his stomach expanded and rushed up his spine, flushing adrenaline through his system.
Sitting bolt upright he threw himself at yesterday's clothes. It was Sunday, yes, but he knew his house mates. His room should have been invaded twenty minutes ago. He had to initiate the emergency protocol.
Heart in his throat, Arturo stumbled to his computer.
The surveillance camera logs were intact, but not encouraging. The back porch cameras had recorded a glimpse of the whole pack, minus Melissa, barreling out at top speed around 9 pm. All of them leaving the house during a full moon night.
A film festival of worst-case scenarios started up in his mind as he skimmed through video thumbnails. Finding the relevant one took ages. He accidentally opened the wrong file and gritted his teeth as it slowly shut down, allowing him to backtrack.
He let out a string of curses, mixing English, Spanish and a pinch of Mandarin he'd picked up from Vivian, as the footage began to play.
The pack had returned. This video was longer than the first, triggered by movement at the border where their property line met the forest. The white outline of Dorothy made its way into view. On her back a young woman lay prone, unconscious or dead. Keeping pace with Dorothy was Ava Sledge, face a grimace of icy rage, one hand placed on the young woman to steady her. Next, Vivian and Lisa came into frame, dragging a wild-eyed Melissa between them as well as two wolves could tow another.
Melissa had gone feral.
Arturo didn't remember going upstairs. He must have put on a burst of speed because suddenly he was standing face-to-chest with Vivian and Melissa.
"Morning, Art!" Vivian said with her usual brusque cheer, but there was a strain to it. Melissa cowered behind Vivian. Cowered. The sight slapped Arturo in the face.
"Good morning," Arturo said, hardly finding air to speak. "What's happened?"
No answer from Melissa. She had her eyes on the doorway to the library, jaw painfully clenched. Arturo was used to seeing her as the hyper-competent med student, but right then every inch of her was wracked with insecurity. He had only seen her look guilty a handful of times and never about anything serious. Had...had she...?
"What's happening," Vivian said, pitching her voice to carry, "is that we're going to the dining room to say hi to the new girl. You are welcome to join us."
New girl. Oh god.
It could have been worse, Arturo tried to persuade himself. Someone could be dead.
But someone was dead. Even if bringing up the concept of undeath in this house earned you deep disappointment from Lisa, there was no ignoring the fact that a werewolf bite brought more than involuntary shapeshifting a few hours a month.
"I smell breakfast," Vivian said, throwing an arm around Melissa's shoulders and steering her toward the library. "Better get some before it all goes cold."
Arturo followed them, feeling like a lumbering giant. He wasn't impressively tall but Melissa and Vivian were both on the shorter side and Melissa currently slumped to the point of nearly doubling over. He'd have better luck trying to hide behind the rose bushes in the backyard.
The dining room looked provocatively normal. Lisa sat in her customary chair at the far end of the table and Dorothy bustled about putting egg and bacon on plates. The girl from the surveillance tape sitting in Sledge's usual spot added a surreal touch to the otherwise familiar scene.
Melissa's breath hitched. Vivian didn't do anything, but the absence of mile-a-minute small talk spoke volumes.
Tearing his eyes from the woman in Sledge's chair, Arturo noted that the curtains had been haphazardly drawn. Anti-sunlight enchantments or no, this was the first time Dorothy and Lisa had treated the curtains that casually.
Arturo took the seat on Lisa's left-hand side. She looked like she hadn't slept in a week, her cloud of well-kept hair the lone trace of her habitual neatness. Dorothy set out plates for them with manic energy, smiling a Stepford wife smile. Her penchant for dressing as the 50s housewife she'd once been magnified the wrongness of her expression.
Only the new girl seemed comfortable. Based on appearance Arturo guessed her to be in her twenties and not a local, assuming Melissa hadn't managed to get her teeth into a recently arrived exchange student. Merrihollow's ordinary population required little practice to memorize. The new girl wore a jean jacket and wine-colored pants, the same clothes as in the camera footage. Someone, probably Dorothy, had done a good job of stitching up the holes Melissa had torn in the right pant leg. Overall the sole clue to her having been savaged by a werewolf was the rumpled look of her braids. In comparison with Dorothy's stiff smile and Lisa's worried frown, the newcomer was all but beaming, shoveling pancakes into her mouth with gusto.
She had to be in shock.
The new girl paused in her eating when Melissa sat down. Out of the corner of his eye, Arturo saw Lisa give Melissa a nod while Vivian hovered next to her, a supportive hand on her shoulder.
"I'm so sorry," Melissa said, nearly whispering. Her red-rimmed eyes teared up and her lips trembled. "I'm a fucking idiot and I am so, so sorry." The dam burst. She raised her hands to cover her face, but froze midway as the new girl brought her own hands up in a clear 'stop' signal.
"Whoa there!" the new girl said, smile turning into a look of concern. "No need for that! I get being upset about losing control. That must have been scary as hell. But I don't want any apologies from you. I might not know the full story, but I get the impression you're not in the habit of running around attacking people. Right?"
Melissa simply stared, stunned. Arturo was equally caught off-guard. Dorothy's expression softened a little and she finally took a seat, filling up her plate with pancakes. Lisa remained thoughtful while Vivian went from prepared for a fight to prepared to make friends. Arturo had seen that change many times before, sometimes mid bar brawl.
He wasn't too sure of his own feelings on this matter and thus he locked that question in a mental box and focused on listening.
"No," Melissa whispered, tears drying up. Her reddened eyes and wet cheeks were the only signs of grief, the rest of her face a blank mask of shock. "No, I definitely didn't mean to hurt anyone. B-but I did hurt you."
"You didn't do any permanent damage and you're clearly sorry, so I'd say we're square." The new girl made jazz hands at her right leg. Jazz hands. Trauma can affect people in strange ways. "Especially as it's given me a chance to eat these pancakes! Dorothy, you're an amazing cook."
Dorothy said something that Arturo didn't catch, too busy trying to read the new girl. She looked eerily happy.
To distract himself from that uncanny image, Arturo began picking at his food, ignoring the lack of taste and what that meant. His dietary issues weren't a priority right now.
Lisa stood up. "A round of introductions is in order." She was going for friendly and up-beat and missing it by a mile. Sledge must have read her the riot act before leaving.
"Dorothy and me you've met. Here you have Vivian, Melissa and Arturo. In werewolf society, such as it is, we form the family unit of a 'pack'. As you can probably tell, we aren't blood relations." Her eyes swept over the gathered group as if to point out the variations in skin color, noses and similar supposedly giveaway differences. "Please do not ask about 'alpha' and 'beta' wolves. They don't exist in nature. I hope you already knew that or our education system has failed you. All other questions you may have are very welcome."
At least Lisa had added a science tidbit in with the introduction. If she hadn't, Arturo would've had to hunt down Sledge and drag her back to the house to fix whatever she'd said in the heat of the moment. I shouldn't have let it get to this. I should have woken up and helped.
"Yeah, uhm, hi everyone! I'm Jayla." The new girl sent off another beaming smile. "I'm okay. I mean it!" she said to Melissa. "I'm not mad about this and I feel normal. Lisa will be giving me a ride to the hospital for a checkup, just to be safe, but I'm sure I'm right as rain!"
Melissa's eyes sunk to her plate of cooling pancakes. Arturo wanted to reach out and put a hand on her shoulder, but Vivian had that covered and it would startle Melissa more than it would calm her down. It wasn't as if he was known for providing hugs and hand-holding, much as it shamed him to admit it.
"Alright, I can tell I'm not convincing you." Jayla's bright smile had given over to a confused frown. "I get that this isn't an every day problem, but exactly how unusual is it for werewolves to lose control and bite people?"
"Werewolf mythology is based on guesswork and outright lies," Lisa said, slipping into lecture mode. "The assumption that werewolves must lock themselves up or go on a murder spree is a widespread misconception. The truth of the matter is that we only enter a 'mindless state' if we transform without consuming a sufficient amount of sustenance beforehand. Transformation is rough on the body and you need plenty of energy to go through a change influenced by the full moon. Other transformations-"
Lisa forced herself to not go down whatever side-track she'd begun traveling, and instead said:
"We'll get to that later. But know that if you eat an extra helping at dinner, the full moon transformation is perfectly safe. If you don't..."
Lisa trailed off, her attention on Jayla, not straying to Melissa once. Jayla opened her mouth, ready to comment or ask a question, but Melissa beat her to it.
"I hadn't prepared enough," Melissa said, monotone and faint. "I couldn't read the notes I'd taken during this week's lectures and I'd forgotten the moon would be full, so I went over to Leda's place to cram for the exam on Monday. I turned my phone off to not get distracted, like a moron. We were so stressed we didn't eat."
She sped up, her pronunciation slurring, her eyes staring at nothing.
"When I felt the hunger pangs, I panicked. I-I completely blacked out on our emergency plans. I knew that I had to get away from Leda and her parents. I said I needed to go, blamed terrible period cramps and I just... I just ran." She choked back a sob. "I tried to get home, I really did, but I'd waited too long. I," another sob, "I made it to the park, but after that it's blank. It's like I was hit over the head with a hammer. All I remember is pain, and then I woke up in my room and Vivian told me what I'd done."
Vivian moved to wrap Melissa in a hug. Melissa stifled her sobs with the back of her hand, close to suffocating on despair. "Sssh, it's okay to cry," Vivian murmured into Melissa's ear. Arturo flinched. Sometimes he hated the 'heightened senses' that came with being a vampire.
Correction: he always hated it.
"You so have nothing to apologize for!" Jayla still sounded genuine. The explanation of shock had begun to wear thin. She could be a great actor who didn't want to piss off a room full of werewolves. Outside of that remote possibility, this was a far cry from what could be considered 'normal' behavior for a newly turned werewolf, or vampire for that matter.
Jayla reached across the table to cover Melissa's free hand with her own and gave her an encouraging smile. "I've done plenty of stupid shit because of upcoming exams and after failed exams, trust me. Making mistakes sucks, I won't argue with that. I can't tell you not to be upset with yourself, but I'm not angry. For real. Not even about the whole immortality thing. Got it?"
Melissa blinked once, twice, and then nodded.
Her nod sparked a yet wider smile from Jayla, who leaned back in her chair and said, "Great! Take the time you need to process everything. No rush. If you have questions, feel free to ask! I'm an open book."
"I should be saying that to you."
Jayla shook her head. "Seriously, again, I'm not upset. Do you want me to pull the 'respect your elders' routine? I'm guessing here, but I suspect I've got a couple of years on you."
Arturo appraised everyone's reactions to that. Lisa maintained her concerned expression and Melissa's face stayed blank with shock. Dorothy and Vivian were buying the newcomer's act. If it was an act.
"How did you guys end up sharing a house in Merrihollow?"
"A long and funny story," Vivian was quick to answer, grinning ear to ear. "Lisa and Dorothy brought us together. Every one of us has been through the chased down and almost eaten by something with fangs deal. You've got my sympathy. That part sucked."
Jayla laughed. "Man, we should get matching tattoos."
The look of delight that claimed Vivian's face let Arturo know Jayla had merited immediate friend status.
"Get out! I've been saying that for years! We absolutely should. Pack tattoos!"
Lisa's shoulders relaxed a fraction. "Vivian, you're free to do as you wish with your own skin but don't pressure anyone else to do the same with theirs."
"Heh, sorry."
"Yeah, fair point. But I'm up for one, if you'd like to be tattoo twins!"
The brightness of Jayla's grin persisted. Unbidden, wheels began to turn in Arturo's mind. This person was too comfortable talking about werewolves. Extremely amicable too, in spite of them being complete strangers who'd basically kidnapped her. She could be after the research projects Lisa kept in the basement safe. She could be sent by someone. She could have voluntarily-
"Sorry, my memory is crap. Which one of you is the vampire?"
This question derailed Arturo's train of thought with expert precision.
Leaning over Melissa, Vivian waved in his direction. "He is."
Arturo fidgeted in his seat, wishing the floor would swallow him whole.
"Wow!" Jayla pinned him with a far too keen look of interest. "This is all so awesome. I really hope I'm not having an acid trip or a psychotic break. Waking up from this would ruin my day."
Reflexively Arturo hunched forward and avoided Jayla's gaze. He distracted himself with a new realization: she'd likely brought up psychosis earlier too and Sledge had been in the room. Wonderful. As if Sledge wouldn't be upset enough by their lapse in security, she'd presumably also had to sit through jokes about hallucinations. That could be accident or design. A move to divide and conquer.
"Before I forget to ask: what was that eye thing you did?"
Lisa's frown deepened. "Eye thing?"
"When that other woman was here. Sledge? Your eyes and Dorothy's went yellow for a sec and Sledge's shone green." Jayla made a vague gesture at her face. "I remember the wolves - sorry, you - having shining eyes last night. Did I imagine that?"
"No, you didn't." Lisa flashed her eyes gold before Arturo could look away. He felt his own glow in answer to hers, as did everyone else's - including Jayla's.
Jayla blinked rapidly and laughed. "That felt strange. Is it a kind of werewolf hello?"
"More or less," Lisa said. "It has a variety of uses, one being the ability to identify others like ourselves. The flashes happen in a way that regular people don't notice. Unless you're in full wolf form."
Jayla frowned. "So yellow means werewolf and red means vampire. What does green mean?"
"Witch," Vivian said, shrugging. "Or magic user or any fancy title you want to pick."
Lisa took over from there, lecture mode reinstated. "There's not as much consensus on what we should refer to them as there is for vampires and werewolves. That said, our kind has monikers other than 'werewolf'. In literature we're frequently mixed up with shapeshifters, also called shapechangers, in addition to a number of terms that apply to completely different beings, real and mythological, or not yet proven real. For example, the Scandinavian huldra are suspected to exist, but no solid proof of that has been found to this date. People who fit the descriptions of selkie or sirens do exist, though what they choose to name themselves varies." The sigh that followed landed between pleased and frustrated. "Becoming an immortal creature of the night sadly doesn't give you access to all knowledge of the so called supernatural and not every legend is true. This is why research is imperative."
"Okay, okay, there's magic. Magic is real. Got it. How many other-," Jayla broke off, her eyes going so wide you'd think she'd seen a ghost. "Fuck!"
"What?" Vivian shouted. Arturo glanced over his shoulder, instinctively searching for the cause of Jayla's horror.
Jayla got out of her chair, its legs slamming hard into the floor, barely avoiding tipping over. "I have to go back to my apartment! My cat must be worried sick about me!"
Silence followed. Vivian was the first to laugh out loud in relief.
"Wake up."
Isha sighed and forced her eyes to open. Her neck twinged in protest as she straightened up and looked over at Rahul, sitting upright and proper. He smiled at her in that teasing way only a younger brother could. Outside, the night rushed past in darkness and the slow strobes of streetlights. No sign of other cars on the road.
"I just managed to fall asleep," she said, throat dry and achy. She reached for the water bottle in the seat pocket in front of her and took a swig. The water had gone stale, but remained drinkable.
"That's what you think, missy!" came Woxell's merry voice from the driver's seat. He could be uncharacteristically cheerful while driving, though rarely even then. "We're about to camp for the evening. You've been out since we set off from the last gas station and that's a good three hours ago."
Isha squeezed her eyes shut until they ached. All the blood in her body shot to her face. She prayed the dim light of the car kept that hidden from Jamerson and Rahul. She had no illusions of keeping secrets from Woxell. Pathetic.
Rahul's teasing look changed to one of sympathy, which did nothing to ease her embarrassment. She took another gulp of stale water.
"You'll be in charge of securing the perimeter," Woxell said, washing off Isha's shame with a flash of pride. She hurried to conceal any hint of this before Woxell could see her in the rear-view mirror, as fruitless as her efforts would be. Trying was always preferable to giving up.
"Make sure you do it right. Don't give the werewolves free snacks."
The wink Woxell tacked on to the end of his words held no mirth. Neither Isha nor Rahul had yet gotten permission to encounter a living werewolf, but they'd been shown the remains of them and their attacks enough times to know the danger they posed.
On reflex Isha's hand went to the silver-lined knife, sheathed and hidden under her shirt, a twin of her brother's. She and Rahul would be permitted guns. The thought both thrilled and terrified. No one walked the perimeter without a gun, a silvered knife, and at least one piece of iron ore. Anything less would be tantamount to suicide.
No taking risks, she reminded herself, holding back a smile. If she and Rahul impressed the others tonight, they might be allowed to join the hunt when they arrived at their destination.
The last sign she saw before they turned off the road for the night read 50 miles to Merrihollow.
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At least I die popular. *dies!*
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