by Stead, Nick
“Leave him, John. I think we’re going to have to get him to a doctor. It’s not like him to pass up a cooked breakfast – he’s obviously not well.”
I imagined Dad opening his mouth to argue and then thinking better of it, for Amy’s sake. But I was already up in my room, pacing again with worry. I had the nagging feeling that darkness hung over our house, a feeling that only grew as the day wore on and the clouds thinned. The universe had turned against me. I was fated to transform under the moon as normal, and death would be coming for one of us, I was sure of it.
There was a knock on the door and I opened it to find Mel’s freckly face, looking nervous as she met my eyes. Did she sense the resentment I felt towards her for the added temptation she presented to my lunar hunger? Was there bitterness and fear she mistook for hate? Or did she see the wolf?
“Amy, Mel’s here,” I shouted. My next words came out as a growl and I hated myself all the more for it. “Come in.”
“Mel!” Amy squealed. The wolf was already stirring and I fled back to my room.
After a while, Mum was calling up to me again. “Are you coming down for dinner, love? There’s plenty of party food and a share of the cake if you want it.”
“I’m still not feeling well,” I called back. She came up to talk to me a moment later.
“You need to eat something, Nick. Come on, I bought some of those cocktail sausages you like and I know you’re not a fan of drumsticks so I got barbecue wings special for you.”
“Can you save me some for tomorrow, please? I really don’t feel like eating tonight. I’m going to go back to bed and get some more rest.”
“Well, more rest will probably do you good but you must eat something. First thing Monday morning I’m ringing the doctor – it’s about time we got you checked out.”
“No, Mum, I’m fine, honest. I just need to rest, please.”
“Okay but if you don’t eat anything tomorrow, we’re seeing the doctor – no arguments. I hope you feel better for some sleep.” She kissed my cheek. Her eyes were no less worried on her way out of the room but she’d probably put my gaunt appearance and lack of appetite down to Fiona’s death. If only she knew that was just the tip of the iceberg.
The change couldn’t have been far off then. It was too much to hope the cloud cover would return to protect me from the moon, but what else could possibly hide me from it? My curtains were far too thin to keep out its light and I could think of nowhere in town that would offer the shelter I needed. If only I could have been spared this final night, then I’d have had a whole month to prepare for the next one!
There was one thing I could do though. From what I’d seen in the wolf’s memories, it wouldn’t risk smashing the window to get outside, so I locked it and hoped that might keep it in. The door was closed behind me, and I was confident the doorknob would be impossible for a paw to turn. I prayed the wolf would not risk breaking out again, yet I still couldn’t shake the doomed feeling that hung over the house. Was I doing the right thing locking myself in? I had to try and stop myself from killing, and this was the best I could think of, so why was I suddenly filled with doubt? Then came the stab of pain. It was too late for anything else – the transformation was upon me, and there would be no reversing it this time.
I was trapped. The window refused to open and there was no way through the door without breaking it. Defeat drove me to the floor, the need to eat giving rise to the pitiful whines sounding in my throat. Then there was the moon, brighter than before and staring at me with such mocking contempt that my whines turned to snarls, and before I knew it I was back on my feet, rearing up against the door and sniffing the wooden barrier standing between myself and prey. All to no avail.
Hours passed and a kind of madness took hold, the hunger devouring my ability to reason. I went back to the window, my muzzle banging against the glass as I attacked, struggling to find something to bite through. The sound of people on the other side only drove me into a greater frenzy, and I threw myself against the wall it was set in. The glass shuddered but miraculously it held. I was about to try again when a new noise came from within the house, drawing me back to the door.
The hour had grown late and the humans had long since retired to their own rooms. But one of them had woken. Her scent snaked round the door, her heart beating hard and fast as she stood on the other side, listening. I must have disturbed her slumber, the need for quiet forgotten in my frenzied state. And all notion of any dangers associated with killing in my own den were reduced to a distant echo. There was only the hunger, and the terrible need to obey.
I wanted to jump at the door and throw my weight around until the wood cracked and splintered beneath my might. But I had enough cunning left to resist that particular urge. It would not do to send the human running to wake the others, not when she presented such an easy meal while she was alone and vulnerable. So I settled into a crouch and waited.
Time seemed to slow. I imagined she had her ear pressed to the wood, listening for more of the strange sounds which had lured her from sleep. My own heartrate was quickening in anticipation, threads of drool hanging from my great maw. Slowly, so slowly, the doorknob began to turn. I tensed, sensing my moment drawing nearer.
The door creaked open and the girl stepped inside. What possessed her to enter I can’t say. Was it worry for the human I had been? Curiosity at what could be making the noises she’d heard? It was a wonder none of the others had come to check on me, but my senses told me they were all deeply asleep. I wasn’t complaining. If they’d explained away any growling they’d heard as nothing more than a DVD that was only to my advantage, and I was grateful for the opportunity I’d been given.
The girl locked eyes with me and stiffened in shock. Time felt to have come to a stop now, the two of us frozen in a primal moment, one which stretched back to the dawn of time. The world seemed to still with us, the universe centred on this age old scenario of predator and prey, and it seemed fate held its breath, the path it would take placed firmly in our hands. Then I was up and lunging with a new strength, pinning her to the ground and sinking teeth into her throat before she even had chance to scream.
Flesh and cartilage came free in a hot wave of crimson, bursting with flavour made all the more intense for the extreme hunger I’d been suffering all night long. A soft gurgle bubbled through the river of blood bursting its meaty banks, and her hand rose to her throat, her eyes wide as she felt the mangled tissue. It fell to her side moments later and her gaze fixed on something only she could see, settling into the sightless stare of the dead as the spark of life in them faded. And so she turned from living thing to corpse, in the passing of a moment. How fragile life is.
I swallowed the bite I’d taken and helped myself to another, fangs raking her face as I pulled the meat from her skull with a wet tearing sound, exposing grinning jaw bones and a section of nasal cavity, creepy and macabre. A sharp snore sounded from one of the bedrooms and I froze with the meat grasped between my jaws, listening for any signs the others were waking. But the snoring started again a moment later and I relaxed.
The brief interruption was enough to bring back some of my reason. My prey had gone down in the doorway and we were sticking out, onto the landing. Caution had me drag her back into the room before I resumed feeding, attacking her abdomen now. But I was permitted only a few bites before fate turned on me again, the moon sliding behind a fresh wall of clouds and new agony lancing through my gut.
The flesh in my stomach squirmed as if it had been given a second chance at life. I had to fight to keep it down, roaring in fury at being denied the meal I’d waited so long for. Then there came the sensation of my hind legs being pulled at either end, my femurs stretching outwards to form the longer structure of my other nature. More bones changed shape, muscles shifting, and the human part of my mind grew stronger. I roared again and struggled for ascendancy, the moon wreathed in black clouds and yet, such was its power that night, still a little light penetrated th
rough. It no longer held its sway over me, but I had not yet been released from it either. The transformation ground to a halt, and I was neither human nor wolf, but something in between – a true hybrid.
For I had become a beast straight out of a Hollywood horror movie. My head was still lupine, as were my hands and feet, more like paws than human appendages, but with more dexterity than they’d had as a full wolf. My body was humanoid and capable of standing upright more easily, though it hadn’t lost its thick pelt and it would have been more muscular, if the human hadn’t been starving us.
The curvature of my spine hadn’t completely returned to its original state, causing me to stoop like a hunchback, my knees bent forward and my arms trailing closer to the ground. And I still had a tail. I’d also retained the digitigrade stance of my hind legs, my feet too close to paws to allow me to stand on the flat of them. As for my mind, it was suddenly neither human nor wolf, for we were of equal strength in the semi-moonlight and somehow we were both in control.
My reasoning fully returned, I looked down at my kill and knew it meant trouble. By killing in my own house, in my own room, I had signed my death warrant. It would summon the Slayers, and no matter what excuses I might think to give them, there would be no question in their minds as to what had happened. The hunger would have to wait. I relinquished my hold on our body entirely to the human, and prayed it would know what to do.
I was sickened to find myself trapped in the nightmarish form between boy and wolf, and tried to force my body back to full human. It was no use, the moonlight was too strong. Even more sickening was the realisation of the blood in my mouth, still fresh and dribbling from my jaws. And with this realisation came the discovery of what lay at my feet, and it was all I could do not to cry out and awaken the others.
Sightless eyes stared wide and accusing, devoid of life and yet still filled with the horror of her final moments. Bloody jaws grinned beneath them, where her freckly cheek had been ripped away, the end of her nose gone with it.
Her throat gaped open like a second mouth and her stomach was now a grisly demonstration of the innermost workings of the body, loops of intestine showing through torn muscle. It shone in the light from the street outside, raw tissue made darker by the shadows and the skin all the paler for it.
The body lay in a pool of her own blood, barely recognisable as the girl it had once been. And now I had to clean it up. I don’t think I could have brought myself to touch it if it weren’t for the thought that it might be putting my family in danger from the Slayers, as well as myself.
It. That was the only way I could rationalise what I was doing, my mind refusing to accept the corpse as a her, another person I had killed and started to feed on. And not just any person. This had been Mel, my sister’s friend. Amy would be devastated.
Shock helped keep everything else at bay while I mopped up the blood with old towels. Thank God we had varnished wooden floors and not carpet – that would have been impossible to hide, especially on light coloured fabric. Then there was the matter of any fingerprints. There didn’t seem much point in trying to wipe her prints from my door – not when the police were going to find out she’d been staying the night. But what about my prints on the body? I didn’t know whether I was leaving any with my paw-like hands, but I decided if I had and the corpse was found, they’d be too lupine to identify as mine anyway.
Once I’d done my best to clean the blood, all that was left was to dispose of the corpse and the filthy towels. It was with great reluctance that I handled the body, first wrapping it in the towels and then picking it up and slinging it over my shoulder. More flecks of blood splattered across my room as I did so and inwardly I cursed. Leaving them there didn’t feel particularly ideal but I didn’t see any other option – they’d have to wait till I came back.
Unlocking the window was another challenge. I couldn’t grip the key properly in my paws and it was a struggle to turn it in the lock, but somehow I managed. Then I was jumping out the window and landing in my usual cat-like crouch. Except it wasn’t a game anymore.
I stood and forced my protesting spine upright and my knees straight, just while I paused to clear my mind. Some part of me was vaguely aware of the fact I was naked, and on two legs I was much more exposed than on four. But I was too lost in my emotions to care. The shock of finding Mel’s corpse was wearing off and I could feel the guilt creeping into my tormented soul. I didn’t want to hide her body. Her family had the right to know what had happened to her, and to give her a decent burial. They deserved to grieve and a chance to heal, not the unending agony of not knowing whether their missing daughter was alive or dead. At least Fiona’s family hadn’t been made to wait too long to find out what had become of her. Mel’s family might never know if I hid the body well enough. That felt almost as bad as the act of killing her, but what choice did I have? I had to do it for my family’s sake as much as my own.
The body seemed to grow heavy on my shoulder then. I let it slide into my arms, gentle as I could, despite the fact she was beyond any pain or discomfort. My gaze fell to the mutilated face peering out from its gore sodden shroud, beautiful when I’d opened the door for her earlier, but now rendered ugly by death. No, not death. Me. I’d done that, with the very fangs still lining my lupine jaws. It was enough to make me want to pull them out.
Muscles twitched and I almost dropped her. The body had still been warm when I’d first picked her up, but the bitter cold was already creeping into her dead veins, flakes of snow cooling her skin. It should have been hours before she was cold to the touch, but winter was speeding up the process, turning her as cold as the snow beneath my feet.
Snowflakes collected in my dark fur, tinting it with white, and I could see the breath steaming out of my muzzle. I had to close those empty eyes, no longer able to stand their horrified, accusing stare. And once again time seemed to stand still, as if we’d become frozen in that moment, a living sculpture of grisly beauty and beastly monstrosity. Minutes passed, then the urge to howl her name took over. So I sent up my lupine cry into the night, a prayer to ensure she wouldn’t be forgotten, and that broke the spell. I started walking, cradling her in my arms like an overgrown baby with my head bowed against the icy strength of the wind.
The snow covered my bestial footprints as I walked and blew into my face. I felt like nature was trying to drive the evil in me from the world, its gales trying to force me back. It might have succeeded if I’d been able to regain my human form like I’d wanted, but my fur kept me too well protected from the cold. So I pushed on, ever aware of the dead weight in my arms. The sooner I could bury her the better.
I reached the same field where Fiona had died, thinking that if they ever found Mel they’d assume ‘the rogue wolf’ had killed her as well, and that it had taken up residence in the woods. The Slayers wouldn’t believe that, and the fact she had been sleeping at our house couldn’t be overlooked, by either Slayers or the police. But my greatest fear was that the Slayers would not overlook the fact that it had been a full moon when she went missing either. It seemed far safer to hide the body and cope with any police suspicion than let the authorities find it and the Slayers connect the dots.
I picked my spot and lowered the body to the frozen soil. Digging was hard work and it felt like an age before I’d created a deep enough grave to hide her in. Finally I was able to lay her to rest, setting her down in the hole I’d made with all the care and respect I could muster.
The hunger chose that moment to return and suddenly I was looking on her small form and seeing her as prey like the wolf had done, less appetising now that her flesh was freezing over but still satisfactory. I couldn’t keep from throwing up that time. The foul geyser erupted from my mouth and splashed the side of the hole, steaming in the bitter air. And then I began to really feel the horror of what I’d done.
Roaring my anguish for the world to hear, I filled in the hole and watched the snow cover it over again, until all evidence of my terrible deed l
ay hidden. If only my lycanthropy could be buried so easily.
I stood watch over the grave for most of the night, mourning all those who had died at the jaws of the wolf, including myself. Fiona’s body might have been moved, but she had died there. It wasn’t hard for my guilty conscience to hear their voices screaming in the howling wind. I can still hear them to this day, screaming in pain; screaming in terror; screaming for the help that never came. And it was unending, as if their very souls were trapped in my head, the terrible sound reverberating endlessly round my skull. I crouched down and covered my ears, whimpering.
“Leave me alone!”
It would have been a scream if I were human, but the sound came out bestial, more like a roar.
“I never wanted this! I never meant to hurt anyone. Please, leave me alone. I didn’t want this, not this.”
But I had wanted it. Hadn’t I spent most of my childhood wishing I were a werewolf? As a young boy I used to stand by my window, staring longingly at the moon. In all our childhood games I’d been the monster, slashing my friends with imaginary claws, and now it had become reality and I hated it.
“I never wanted to be a killer,” I whispered. There was no reply. The wind ravaged me with renewed strength, and I closed my eyes against the force of it. I couldn’t stay there any longer. I couldn’t bear to listen to those imaginary voices of the dead, and the cold was piercing me to the bone now, despite my thick pelt, driving out the warmth until I might as well have been just another corpse.
There was only an hour left till daybreak. I couldn’t stay in the field, but I wasn’t ready to go home either. It would be some time yet before Amy discovered her friend missing. She usually slept in till lunchtime given the chance, and her friends were the same.
I resorted to walking aimlessly again, lost and alone. My wanderings took me to our town’s big park area, with its playgrounds and tennis courts, and a lake. It was by the lake I found myself, looking across the frozen water at the island in the middle which the ducks called home.