by Steve Feasey
Trey looked past the big man at the bloody carcass lying in the grass. It was a huge elk of some kind. Or it had been. Now it was a grisly mess; its innards strewn out about it, one dead eye staring up at the blue sky overhead. He noted how it had been half eaten, great rents visible in the flesh where hunks of meat had been torn loose, especially around the hindquarters where the damage was greatest. Trey tried not to imagine himself with his head buried in that bloody mess, but the evidence caked over his skin suggested that that was exactly what had happened, and he knew that he’d taken part in the creature’s demise just as much as the others.
Jurgen followed his gaze and then turned and walked towards the crimson chaos. He bent down, picked up a torn length of the creature’s intestines and threw them in Trey’s direction so they landed with a wet thud at his feet. ‘Maybe you’d like some breakfast before we start off back home?’
Trey turned quickly, bending at the waist, and vomited on to the grass. The other members of the pack laughed at this, and Jurgen in particular seemed delighted with the boy’s discomfort.
‘It seems the youngster doesn’t like his meat too rare,’ he shouted, joining in with the laughter at his own joke.
Once the hilarity had died away, the mood sobered as if by some invisible signal. The other members of the group stared at Jurgen, and they began to approach the big man, forming a loose circle. They joined hands, glancing around at one another with a look of eager anticipation. Ella looked at Trey, and smiling her reassurance, she nodded her head at him to fill the gap in the circle beside her. The teenager could feel the tension that had suddenly built up among the other members – it was almost tangible. The look on all their faces was the same – an excited expectancy.
Jurgen was almost directly opposite him in the circle. Trey could hardly take his eyes off him; that same unsettling look that he’d witnessed the night before was on the Alpha’s face again: hungry and angry and, to Trey’s mind, more than a touch psychotic. It was the face of a drug addict preparing for their first fix of the day. But if the other members of the pack noticed, they chose not to draw attention to it.
Trey slowly linked hands with Ella on one side and a tall, ginger-haired teenager who Trey guessed to be about seventeen years old on the other. As soon as the circle was joined, he could feel it. The power that passed through him was something that he had felt before, and he waited for the Change that he knew was coming.
It was mercifully short. Like the other transmogrifications that he had experienced before coming to Canada, the group Change from human to Wolfan was intense but short-lived, and when he opened his eyes he looked about him at the giant wolves that made up the pack.
They were huge creatures: great solid slabs of muscle and sinew that moved around each other warily, eyeing the other pack members, their movements and body posture instantly displaying how they were feeling. For Trey it was as if his mind had simply switched to ‘wolf’. He could instantly tell who were the more dominant members of the pack, noting how these members approached the others with an upright posture, and how the more submissive pack members would lower their own bodies in response. Jurgen-wolf was by far the largest of the animals; his great black pelt seemed to suck in the light, creating some great living wolf-shadow that padded noiselessly on the leafy carpet. The Alpha paraded among the others, pacing about high on its paws, tail held straight out behind it. As it approached the members of the pack, they would sink down in front of it. One wolf, presumably the weakest – the Omega wolf – lay down on the ground as the pack leader approached, turning on its back so that its belly was exposed to the huge black beast in a display of complete and utter supplication. Trey knew that the subordinate wolf had been the tall ginger-haired boy that he’d linked hands with only moments before.
The animal that had been Trey Laporte took all of this in without question. He was no longer human, and yet in some part of his wolf brain there remained a tiny element of his human self that seemed to be looking in at the whole thing from the outside – just as his uncle had described it. Trey took in the smells and sights and sounds of the forest, his brain decoding the stimuli in a way that it had never done before. He caught the scent of a rabbit brought to him on the faintest of breezes, and he knew that the creature was no more than forty metres away off to his right. The overriding stench of blood from the animal carcass caused a shiver of excitement to pulse through him and his mouth filled with saliva. He could sense the same exhilaration in the other members of the pack as the smell of death stirred them, wanting nothing more than to feast again on the dead body. But they had to wait. Wait until the Alpha had started. Trey eyed the dead body hungrily, so caught up in his thoughts of sinking his teeth into the meat again that he missed the Alpha’s approach.
The black werewolf slowly walked towards the newcomer, its dark eyes never leaving the youngster as it did so. It stopped no more than a couple of metres away and looked hard at the new pack member, its head cocked slightly to one side as if puzzled by something that it saw. At the last moment the new pack member became aware of the dominant Alpha and turned to face it, too slow in showing the subordination that was expected of him. The pack shifted in anticipation of the Alpha’s response, knowing that violence would ensue.
The werewolf that had been Jurgen bristled its pelt, the raised hackles making it appear even bigger than it already was. Its eyes took on an angry look and its lips peeled back to reveal the teeth and gums. A low rumbling growl issued from the huge creature’s chest as it prepared to attack the impertinent young upstart.
Trey knew that he didn’t stand a chance against a beast that was almost half as big again as he was. His rewired wolf brain took over, instinctively bending his front legs in a bowing motion that lowered his head below that of the Alpha. He kept his eyes glued to the other wolf’s, sensing that the attack would come anyway; that the Alpha would need to prove its dominance over him to the other pack members and reassert its number one rank within the group.
When the attack did come it came fast and hard, and took Trey by complete surprise. His eyes were still fixed on the great black head of the Alpha when the white furred bitch bowled in low from his side, biting into his shoulder and causing him to cry out in pain and shock. Trey turned to face his attacker, backing away to keep both her and the male Alpha in his vision. Ella-wolf growled back, revealing rows of teeth, some of which were still stained with his own blood. Trey recognized the signal and lowered his head in acquiescence.
The huge black Wolfan that was Jurgen eyed the scene, weighing up its options. Eventually it turned its back and walked away, seemingly satisfied that the female Alpha had dealt with the matter.
The situation defused, Ella-wolf approached Trey, and the youngster moved forward and licked her on the muzzle, thanking her for her intervention, which had spared him from the much worse savaging that the pack leader would have meted out. They moved against each other, their bodies pressing together at the flanks, sharing scent and reinforcing their friendship.
Jurgen-wolf approached the dead elk and sniffed at the blood on the ground. The others started to move towards the corpse, but the pack was not to eat that morning. The Alpha turned to look at them, its eyes resting on Trey again, taking him in. Suddenly the black wolf turned away and sprang forward into the forest, leading the way for the others to follow.
They raced between the trees on paws that barely stirred the mulch beneath them. They were like one unified beast as they ran, each knowing the others’ position and taking it in turns to lead, then follow. Their scent from the night before was unmistakable, but they hardly needed it to find their way back through the forest. Some wolf-sense had kicked in, and each and every member of the pack instinctively knew the way back to their own territory. For the creature that had been Trey, the world was a tsunami of sounds and smells and sights that were woven in and through each other so that he believed he could have closed his eyes and still run through the densely wooded landscape without co
lliding with anything in his path. He was a creature in complete unison with his surroundings; tuned in to everything around him and part of an even more perfect entity – the pack. He was in ecstasy. Later, he would remember this feeling of pure elation, the feeling of the rightness of what he now was.
They emerged from the woods, eating up the ground that led down to Frank’s cottage with huge, loping strides before coming to a halt; circling each other, rubbing their flanks against one another and exchanging scents. Eventually Jurgen-wolf turned from the group and looked away at the trees in the direction of the lake and the cottages that they inhabited. Trey looked off in the same direction, and even though he sensed it was some distance off, thought he could detect the smell of the lake on the air.
Trey knew that they were about to leave him, and he sounded out his dismay at the prospect of this. Once again the white-furred Ella-wolf was the one to come over to him. She used her muzzle to push Trey in the side, ushering him towards the building and letting him know that this, at least for now, was the way that it had to be. He turned and looked towards the wooden building again, taking his eyes off the other creatures for a second, and as he did so he felt the pack start to leave. He could feel the power and magic that had united them begin to ebb away as they moved off. He threw back his head and howled, his wolf voice turning into a strangled human cry as he transformed back again. There was no answer from the pack this time.
He looked about him. He was alone and naked and standing in front of his uncle’s house.
18
Philippa woke up and slowly opened her eyes. The room she was in was nothing short of spectacular, and she propped herself up on one elbow to stare about her in wonder at the opulent surroundings. She had no recollection of getting here. The Ashnon had told her that this would be the case, and that she would feel disorientated for the first few hours. She glanced across at the digital alarm clock on the bedside cabinet – it was a little after five p.m. The bed that she was lying on was unimaginably large and she had to roll over twice to get to the edge, where she let her feet hang down and gently bounce against the deep pile of the carpet. She was incredibly thirsty. Looking about her for some sign of a drinks cabinet or fridge, she stood up and padded over to a walnut cabinet that looked as if it might conceal a refrigerator, her face breaking into a broad smile as the interior lit up when she opened the door. She grabbed a large bottle of sparkling water and a chocolate bar and carried them over to the window.
Park Avenue was the bustling mass of life that she had always imagined it to be. The view from her window was not what she had hoped or expected, and she was disappointed that she could not see any of the more famous buildings and monuments that she associated with the city. Everything was hemmed in; huge buildings stood shoulder to shoulder in the street opposite, and even from this height, they obscured the view that the hotel must have once commanded. She reached forward and grasped the handle of the window, hoping to open it to allow the sounds of the city, which she could just make out through the glass, to enter the room. But the handle wouldn’t budge, and the angry horns of the taxis as they pushed their way through the mass of moving metal below remained muffled and indistinct. She sighed. She’d always wanted to go to New York. She’d watched countless films and television series that had featured the city as a backdrop, and she had always hoped that her dad might take her there one day so that she might see it for herself. The unbidden memory of her father darkened her mood and she had to fight back the tears that inevitably threatened whenever he wandered into her thoughts.
Her father would never be taking her anywhere again; the Necrotroph had seen to that.
That was what she was doing here – in this mirage that looked and sounded, and no doubt smelt, like New York, but was really … she shuddered. She didn’t want to think too closely about what and where this place really was.
The Ashnon had told her that she was perfectly safe here, describing the safeguards and sorcery that kept its guests completely protected whilst they were in its charge. Protected, that is, as long as they stayed inside the hotel and did not venture outside. If they did that, the demon was powerless to help them.
‘Think of it as one of those all-inclusive resorts that they have in some of the less pleasant destinations,’ the demon had said, sounding like some kind of supernatural travel agent. ‘Everything is on tap at the resort, and you’re perfectly safe – as long as you stay on the resort complex. Go outside, and the bad guys might get you.’
‘It shouldn’t be for very long,’ Alexa had added, shooting the Ashnon a withering look. ‘You’ll be out of there and back with us before you know it.’
Philippa took a big gulp from the water bottle, enjoying the feeling as it fizzed in her mouth. Her head felt weird, as if it were stuffed full of cotton wool, and she thought that it might be a good idea to lie down for a while. She reached out, taking hold of the curtains to draw them against the world, and as she turned her head to do so, the scene outside the window changed. It was quick and almost imperceptible, but it made her heart jump in her chest, and she stopped, freeze-framed with her arms spread wide to the world outside. It seemed to her that, for a tiniest fraction of a second, from the periphery of her vision, she had caught a glimpse of the real world on the other side of that glass – a world that was darker than anything that she could imagine. It was no more than a flicker caught from the corner of her eye, and was gone almost as soon as it had appeared, but for that fraction of a second she knew that she had somehow caught a glimpse of what lay beyond the illusion, and that glimpse was enough to send a knife of the purest terror through her.
She became aware that she was holding her breath, and she let it out, breathing rapidly in time with her heart, which was galloping away inside her.
There had been something else. In that momentary flash she had seen something else – no, not seen, but sensed. Something in the shadows opposite the building. There had been something lurking in the shadows, and it seemed to her that it had been looking up at her window.
She pulled the curtains shut and looked over at the phone on the bedside table. Alexa had given her a number that she could call in an emergency. In reality, it wasn’t a number at all – any more than the telephone was a real telephone – but a spell that was activated by her performing a certain action in this realm, and Alexa had thought that a phone call would be the simplest thing for her to remember.
She looked down at her hands and saw that they were shaking. She was spooked. No, more than that, she was terrified by what she thought she had seen in those shadows because she had seen something outside the window. She told herself to calm down, to get a grip. The situation didn’t really constitute an emergency, not yet, and she remembered how Alexa had told her to only use the spell if she had to – as a last resort. She pursed her lips and chewed at the inside of her mouth, something she always did when she was nervous, and forced herself to turn away from the phone.
She wished that Alexa were here. She’d grown to like her, and thought that they were becoming good friends. She was somebody who seemed so normal, and had managed to cope with all the crazy and terrible things around her in a way that Philippa didn’t believe she would ever be capable of. She looked down at the water bottle in her hand and thought of how Alexa would react in this same situation. She wouldn’t make the call.
Resolving to try and be a bit more like Alexa – to stop being so weak and helpless – Philippa took a deep breath and started to hum tunelessly to herself. She would take the nap that she’d planned. Then, when she woke up, hopefully with a clearer head, she’d work out what she was going to do with her time here.
When she woke again it was morning. After the window incident she remembered getting changed into a pair of light blue pyjamas that she’d found in a drawer. The drawers were rammed with clothes of every type, all her size, with a note on top of the wooden chest of drawers from someone called Hugo, who had been assigned as her personal shopper, and who
would, at her call, happily get anything for her that she wanted in order to make her stay here more comfortable. She’d lain down on the bed, not believing for a second that she would sleep, and now here she was having dreamlessly slept her way through to the next day.
She threw the covers back and got up, cautiously approaching the window. Wrenching the curtains apart in one large, quick movement, she stared out at the view.
It was pouring. Great sheets of rain were blowing up the street and the sound of them against the glass was like somebody throwing handfuls of grit against the hotel’s exterior. If anything, there were even more cars on the roads than she had remembered from the evening before. She experimentally flicked her eyes to one side, expecting to catch a glimpse of the black and malevolent world that she had seen last night, but the scene didn’t change. New York, or this version of it, stayed as New York.
She was on edge, every nerve in her body tightly wound to breaking point. Get a grip, she told herself, moving back away from the window. She needed to keep control of herself. She couldn’t afford to freak out at every little thing that she saw, or thought that she saw. She had agreed to do this. She’d listened to the Ashnon and Lucien, and she’d told them that she would do it – convinced them that she could do it – that she wanted to help. It was a chance for her to exact revenge on the thing that had tried to kill her and had killed her father.
They had told her that she would only be here for a matter of days. That they were confident of getting this mess sorted out quickly so that she could come back and start to live her life again.