by K. J. Emrick
This is where Parker told me the werewolves have their home here in Detroit. The cemetery itself is a historical landmark that dates back to the 1800s. A lot of it was here before the city even sprawled this far north. There’s old, weathered gray stones and newer shiny marble markers, spires marking family plots and mausoleum crypts for the wealthy. Even though the neighborhood itself is a little sketchy the place gets hundreds of visitors every month. Tourists mostly, looking for the graves of famous people, including Rosa Parks and Aretha Franklin. The Dodge family—yes, that Dodge family—has a section here with a freaking vault flanked by two huge stone sphinxes, standing watch over the graves of their dearly departed.
There’s another mausoleum in there with a family crest carved into the stone over the doors, an honest-to-God coat of arms, with the head of a wolf lifted up in a howl. In fact, it looks almost exactly like the emblem on the Garoul Necklace that Molly showed me. Now I have to wonder who might be buried in that crypt. Distant relatives of the Dachiana family, maybe.
Werewolves, buried right here in Detroit.
You can see the whole cemetery on Google Maps, standing there in all its glory behind the low wrought iron fence. What you can’t see on Google is the modest-sized mansion sitting just behind the edge of the cemetery boundary. I imagine when you have enough money to build an estate like this in the middle of an otherwise middle-income suburban area, then you also have the money to keep it off the internet, away from prying eyes.
Three stories high and nearly square all the way around, with those gabled windows you see in the movies on old creepy houses, the Dachiana estate sits huddled and brooding behind weeping willow trees. For all of that, it looks beautiful. The walls are painted in bright colors. The roof is multicolored shingles. There’s a freaking hedge of rosebushes out front with flowers on it even now in September. Funny thing is I’ve driven past this place probably a dozen times and never given it more than a passing thought. Nothing more than to wonder who lived there.
Well, now I know.
At the edge of the cemetery fence a stone wall sits twice as high, topped with black metal spikes and security cameras. Set into the stonework a little further down is a keystone arch with a gate of iron worked to resemble branches and leaves. A brick driveway leads off from Woodstock Drive through this gate and then meanders on to the house. Except, the gate is closed when I pull Roxy up to it.
In the driveway at my window there’s a metal pole with a speaker box on top and a white button. The button isn’t marked, but it’s fairly obvious what I’m supposed to do. “Fancy,” I mutter to myself as I roll the window down with the hand crank and then reach out to push the white button.
There’s no beep or warning before I hear someone answer, but I do hear the voice with my future-sense before it barks at me, “Private property. Go away.”
The speaker box gives the voice a tinny quality but it’s definitely a woman’s voice with a distinct accent, like German or Ukrainian. It is also definitely not friendly.
I push the button again, holding it down this time as I explain myself. “I’m here about Kurt Dachiana. I’m a friend of Molly’s. She sent me.”
Releasing the button, I wait, and wait some more, and wait again. I kind of thought Molly would have told the Dachiana family about me by now. Not that I was expecting a warm welcome, but I wasn’t expecting the cold shoulder, either.
“Can you hear me?” I ask, pushing the button again. “Did I do it right? Hello?”
This time when I release the button the woman is already talking back to me. Kind of hurts to hear her talking over herself in my mind.
…whatever Molly told you…”
“…whatever Molly told you.”
Turn your car around…
“Turn your car around, and go…”
…before I call the police.
“…before I call the police.”
And that’s why it helps to be able to tune out those future flashes whenever I can.
Okay, I’ve dealt with uncooperative clients before, and I get it. Sometimes people are embarrassed by whatever has happened to them to the point that they block you at every turn, even though they want you to fix it for them. But calling the police? That’s a bit much considering the Dachianas want to keep their secrets to themselves.
Leaning out over Roxy’s doorframe, I press the button again. I hope there’s a camera somewhere so they can see the mocking smile on my face. “My name’s Sidney Stone. Who am I speaking to?”
Release the button.
“We know who you are, Miss Stone,” the woman growls at me. “My name is Ulva Dachiana. I am Kurt’s sister and I am telling you that we do not need you here. Kurt does not need your help, no matter what Molly said. Now leave, before I call the police.”
Press the button.
“Yeah, I don’t think you’re going to do that, Miss Dachiana. Somehow I doubt you want the police trying to talk to Kurt at the moment. I think we both understand why.”
Release the button.
Silence.
Push the button again.
“I’m here to help. Let me through the gate so we can talk about this in private, okay?”
Release the button.
I wait again, stretching out with my future-sense for any response. There isn’t one coming. Just a buzzing sound that’s going to signal…
Bzzzzz.
…the opening of the gate.
I put Roxy in gear as the two halves swing inward on silent, hidden motorized gears. The tires are loud as I drive up along the paving bricks, past evenly cut grass and squarely-trimmed hedges. Not a weed in sight. Not a thing out of place. Yeah, this whole place just screams money. Old money. The kind that never runs out.
At the end, the drive loops around close to a wide set of curving stairs, leading up to the house. The thick wooden door at the top opens and an honest-to-God butler steps out, wearing a gray suit with a puffy white ascot at his neck. He meets me in the driveway as I step out of Roxy.
“Greetings, Ma’am. I was instructed to bring you to the front room. Only the front room, I feel obliged to mention.”
I hear every word he says, in my mind and out loud three seconds later, but my attention is riveted to the thin slice of a mustache perched on top of his lip. It keeps wriggling with each precisely pronounced syllable and it’s kind of impossible not to stare. “Uh, thanks. I’ll follow you, I guess.”
His mustache twitches. “Quite. This way, Ma’am.”
I tag along through the door behind him—tails! His coat has actual tails!—and just up the entry hall to the right where he shows me through a door. I can see further down where stairs go up and rooms branch off like the start of a maze, but I have a feeling I’m not going to get to see any of that. I might have been invited in, but I’m certainly not a guest.
In the room there are several people, sitting or standing and all of them staring at me. I feel kind of like I’m on stage in a spotlight, expected to perform. The illumination from the heavy chandelier hanging overhead is nowhere near as bright as stage lighting. It’s actually kind of nice. Sparkles cast through the beveled glass pieces hanging off the metal frame send little rainbows into the corners.
Definitely fancy.
The only one I recognize in here is Molly Knowell. The wolf sitting next to her…well I’ve never met a wolf before. Not until now.
“Hi, Sidney,” Molly says to me, kneeling down to put her arm around the shoulders of the big animal. On her knees like that, the two of them are the same height. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“Uh. Me, too.” I’m not sure how sincere that sounded, but I’m looking into the big orange eyes of a beast, and I don’t mind telling you it’s very unsettling.
I always assumed wolves were just really large dogs, but that is not the case. This one is all sleek black fur from the tips of his tall ears to the end of his long, tufted tail. There’s maybe a little white across his broad chest but it’s hard to say fo
r sure with the way the light glosses off his coat. His long muzzle is lowered, his eyes on me. His front paws are huge. I have no doubt, none at all, that he could launch himself from where he is and reach me on this side of the room.
In his brilliant eyes there’s something intelligent. Something…almost human.
He tilts his head to one side and just looks at me. Guess that answers my question about whether werewolves can talk when they’re in wolf form. Even so, I can tell he’s communicating a greeting to me.
And with that I relax, realizing that if there’s danger in this room, it’s not from him. “Heh. Hi there, Kurt. I’m here to help you.”
His little whuff sounds like ‘thanks’ to me.
“Thank you,” Molly says out loud for him, squeezing her wolf-fiancé tight. “We were just talking about Kurt’s problem with his family. Not that we’re getting a lot of sympathy from them.”
Not true, the man in the thickly padded leather chair is about to say.
“Not true.” He has the same sharp accent I heard in Ulva’s words over the speaker outside. “We have every sympathy for Kurt’s condition. We were simply reminding our young witch that there is not much we can do to solve the issue.”
He looks just as pompous as the rest of the house, actually, with his brown turtleneck and blazer jacket and velvet riding gloves. His legs are crossed over themselves in finely-tailored slacks. His face is angular, his eyes sunken. The word that best comes to mind is ‘wolfish.’ Maybe that’s just the way it looks to me considering I am standing in the house of the ruling werewolf clan.
Werewolves…
My hand reaches down to the little bit of string I have tied to my belt. My fingers feel along the tight braids as I study each of the people here in turn. Everyone in this room, except for Molly and me, must be werewolves. Who else would they let in here? I practically had to use blackmail to get inside and I was invited, for crying out loud.
“You guys…you’re werewolves.” My thoughts tumble out of my mouth, stating the most obvious thing in the world.
“Oh, look who’s catching up,” the one woman on the couch says to me. I recognize her voice from the speaker at the gate. This is Ulva, sitting there in a tight black dress and sheer stockings and long stiletto heels, her black hair flowing in curls down past her shoulders. The diamonds on her necklace are large enough to pose a choking hazard. Her red nail polish matches her lipstick. Her features might be softer and more feminine under the speckled chandelier light but there’s no denying the family resemblance to the guy in the leather chair. A family of werewolves.
My issue, and why I was so suddenly tongue-tied, is this…I can hear them in my future flashes. I can see what they’re about to do. Like how Ulva is going to cross her leg in the other direction now. Like how the woman next to her, a lean and hungry-looking blonde, is going to lean in close and whisper in Ulva’s ear. If werewolves are magically endowed then I shouldn’t be able to see or hear any of this…
Oh. That’s right.
It clicks in my head a moment later. Harry told me that being a werewolf was hereditary. It’s a genetic condition, not a magical one. Werewolves aren’t People of Magic. They’re shapeshifters, and as human as anyone else, apparently.
Which means I’m going to be able to see and hear everything they might do just before they do it. I can’t help but smile because they don’t know it, but I’ve got my edge back. Sidney Stone is back. After pixie witches and Li Qiang Chen and the freaking Taffy Man, it’s nice to be back to my old self. Even if I am standing in a room full of werewolves.
Speaking of which.
“You’re Ulva,” I say to Ulva, getting back on track. I double checked online before getting here and sure enough, those names on Molly’s lists were relatives all right. “I think that makes the guy in the chair your brother Lowell. That amazing black wolf over there next to Molly is your other brother Kurt, stuck in that form without the Garoul Necklace.”
Kurt made a little whining sound in the back of his throat.
“Shush, brother,” Ulva snaps at him. “The private investigator is trying to sort things out. Don’t make us put you outside.”
The wolf’s eyes flash, but he doesn’t argue with her.
“Miss Stone,” she says to me, “we do not need your help. I understand that Molly hired you so we will pay you for your trouble, but we do not need outsiders interfering with our private affairs.”
“I don’t need your money,” Molly mutters.
Ulva smirks. “Yes, you do. Why else are you here?”
Molly presses her lips tight rather than answer that. Kurt’s tail flicks.
The man in the leather chair—Lowell—leans forward and waves a gloved hand through the air in Molly’s direction. “Speak for yourself, Ulva. I say all the more help, the better. I mean, this outsider can’t possibly understand our family well enough to help, but I want the Garoul Necklace found and returned to our family. We rule the rest of the clans, but that rule is tenuous. If they find out we have lost the very emblem of our dominance, it won’t be long before they band together and try to overthrow the house of Dachiana. Finding the necklace is essential to maintaining our family’s rule.”
Kurt’s long snout turns his way and he growls this time, adding a flick of his ear.
“And for getting you back to your old self, Kurt, naturally.”
“Lowell, you’re getting ahead of yourself,” Ulva tells him. “I am the next eldest in the family and these decisions are mine to make. With Kurt stuck as he is, I am now the next in line for mother’s throne. My word is now law for this family.”
With another low growl, Kurt looks her way, and their gazes lock together for a long moment. It’s Kurt who looks away first, bowing his head low and dropping his ears flat against his head. Molly holds onto him tighter, whispering to him that it will be okay.
Interesting. Molly had told me all about how Kurt was going to change the way the werewolves did things. With him stuck like this, his sister Ulva will be the one to take over and everything can go on just like it always has. The hunting, the killing of humans, all of it. I can tell by looking at her that her family ways don’t bother her conscience in the least.
I look at her sitting there on the couch next to the blonde, and I let my thoughts roll. Taking over control of the family from her brother would be a great motive to steal the necklace, knowing it would keep him in his wolf form and keep him from taking on the duties of leader.
Lowell seems to honestly want the necklace back, even if it’s for his own selfish reasons. It doesn’t necessarily knock him off my suspect list, but it certainly puts him way at the bottom.
That just leaves the blonde…
“Who are you?” I ask her, trying to be just as rude as that.
Her eyelids droop low as her nose wrinkles. None of your business, she’s about to say.
“It is my business,” I cut her off before she can even get the words out. Sometimes using my gift like that keeps people off balance.
Unfortunately…it doesn’t work. “We know about your little magic gift, Miss Stone. Don’t try to impress us. I’ve seen better acts at a carnival sideshow.”
Oh, yeah. I don’t like her. Not one bit. “I need to know all the players in the game if I’m going to find that necklace so yes, it is my business.”
Ulva interrupts whatever answer the blonde is about to give me. “Maybe,” she says, “you should start your questions with Molly. She was the one entrusted with keeping our necklace safe. She is the one who lost it. The fact that Kurt is caught in his luping is her fault, and her responsibility. Perhaps our brother Kurt should have been more careful about who he takes into his doggie bed.”
Ooh, that’s a low blow.
In a heartbeat, Kurt is up on all fours, snarling at his sister, showing teeth and dripping saliva from the corners of his thin lips. His fur is bushed from neck to tail. Without meaning to, I take a step back.
Ulva shrinks into the couch
, even as she tries to keep her face disdainful.
Now that’s something. Kurt wasn’t willing to stand up for himself, but he’s leaping to Molly’s defense. In fact, if it wasn’t for Molly’s small fists in his fur, holding him back, I have to wonder if I wouldn’t be seeing a future flash of Kurt tearing out Ulva’s throat.
And I thought family get togethers at my house were tough when I was a kid.
“Excuse me,” I say, bringing everyone’s attention back to me before things can get really out of hand. “I still don’t know who our blonde friend is here.”
She’s wearing a red dress just as tight as Ulva’s but there’s no resemblance between them. Round eyes, dimpled chin, straight hair and whiter-than-white skin. Leaning an elbow on her knee, she gives me a wink. “Well, since you asked so nicely. My name is Harper Radley.”
I remember that name. It was on Molly’s list, right along with Ulva’s and Lowell’s. Well, well. The gang’s all here. “So what’s your stake in this, Harper?”
“Oh, I’m not part of this. I’m just a friend of Ulva’s.”
“So, wait…you’re not…?”
“A loup-garou?” she laughs. “Oh my, no. I wasn’t lucky enough to be born into Ulva’s family. My parents are quite boring, I’m sorry to say. We’re just friends. I’m the sister Ulva never had.”
Ulva smiles along with Harper and reaches over to stroke the blonde’s hair. Not so much a friendly gesture as it is the way an owner treats a pet. Harper’s lips part to show she likes it and it’s not for me to judge somebody else’s relationship, but this is sort of like, this is my loup-garou, back off…
Oh! Now I get it. Loup-garou is another name for werewolf. Loup-garou. The Garoul Necklace. Of course. Makes perfect sense.
“You must be a pretty good friend,” I point out. “Seeing as how you’re here in the inner circle and all.”
“Ulva trusts me. We’ve known each other since the seventh grade. We don’t,” she says, pausing for emphasis, “know you from Eve.”
“I’m just saying, you’re here in the middle of the family while they’re discussing the next step in a very private matter but you’re not actually family. I can count on one hand the number of friends I would trust like that.” I can, too. There’s Chris and there’s Harry, and maybe one or two others. I can only imagine the level of trust it would take for the Dachianas to let anyone know about their peculiar problem, let alone share with anyone the secret of them being shapeshifting werewolves. “So if you aren’t family, I’m guessing you don’t get a vote in what they do next. Then why are you here?”