by James McCann
Then she recalled the boy who had handed Betty the beer and said, “This one’s special for you.” Bastard!
The only thing she knew for certain was that she wouldn’t fall back asleep tonight. Climbing out from her warm bed, she dragged her blanket to the wicker chair, nestled into Pooh Bear’s lap, and relaxed as its arms embraced her. As she leaned her head against its chest, she stared out her window at the foreboding red moon.
“The Alsandair hated me for the kindness I had shown our enemy, and they also hated my brother for that which he had shown me. It would not have mattered to my clan even if we had gone on every day after that living the evil they worshipped. We were now an abomination, because we were not the same.
“And now I must wonder which the greater deed was: my liberation of our prisoners, or Kendil who had set me free?”
-Wulfsign
CHAPTER NINE
Day Two was not Alix’s favorite part of the week. Not only did she have Math again, but today she’d have to figure out an excuse for why she had missed class on Friday. Thank goodness I finished most of the homework, at least, Alix thought, as she turned back to her locker. Until now she’d all but forgotten the events of the party, especially since news of another wolf attack had overshadowed her drunken blackout.
She grabbed her copy of Hamlet for first-period Lit, and her algebra for second period as she shuddered away horrific thoughts about the attack. She didn’t even notice that her jacket had caught in the locker as she closed the door.
“Hey rude-baby!”
Alix jerked and spun. Her jacket, still caught, forced her to pull back and hit herself against the lockers. The surprise broke her trance and sent her heart racing, but it was only Betty. Betty of the embrace-with-Carl Betty.
Closing her eyes, Alix calmed down and told herself not to show her jealousy.
“Hi.” Freeing her jacket, she tried to regain some composure.
“What happened to you Friday? Why haven’t you been answering my calls?” Betty threw her long, dark hair back.
“I think I blacked out. I thought I was outside. Then, suddenly, I was at home.” She tried to say this as calmly as possible. “You can thank your friends for spiking my beer.”
“There’s no way my friends would spike your beer.” There was a pause. Then Betty sighed and added quickly, “I heard you left because you saw Carl and me in the kitchen.”
Alix felt her face turn warm and hoped she wasn’t going red. “What if I did?”
“We were just goofing around. It wasn’t what it looked like.”
“Whatever,” Alix said, trying not to sound like she cared.
“You worried us, y’know. Lara and Lenny were found dead. Totally ripped apart by a wolf. The ground’s so frozen Carl’s never going to get the blood out of the grass.”
“Lenny and Lara?” This time Alix knew she was turning red. Chills shot through her as she recalled how she’d seen a hog-tied corpse torn to pieces.
“Want better news? Guess who’s asking you to the dance today?”
Alix didn’t answer her because now she was recalling Rellik at the scene. He’d had a sword, and fought some huge guy who also had a sword. Had that been real?
“It’s Carl!” Betty squealed. “Isn’t it sweet? You have Carl, I have Simon.”
“What class do you have first?”
“Psych. Are you even listening to me?”
“Fred’s in your psych class, right?”
“The geek with the A-plus? Why do you talk to him?”
“He’s been my friend since kindergarten. Deliver a message for me, ’kay?”
“I’m not talking to that dork!” Betty turned her back on Alix. “And if you want popularity you won’t, either.”
“C’mon, Betty! Tell him to meet me in the library at lunch.”
“You owe me big time, girl,” Betty said, without even glancing back.
Minutes that day crept by as though Father Time had fallen into a deep slumber. Ten minutes into Math, even after Miss Whelps’s emotionless voice had lulled Alix into near unconsciousness, one disturbing thing stopped her from succumbing to slumber. Lenny really was missing from class. And until today, Lenny had boasted of a perfect attendance record.
“I need a volunteer. Who’ll put number five on the board?” Miss Whelps always sounded like a mare caught in a barbed wire fence when she asked for a volunteer. It was the only time her voice didn’t sound like a droning engine. She scanned the room with eyes as piercing as a raven’s, until they landed on . . . “Simon! Simon, come up here and put number five on the blackboard.”
“I didn’t understand number five.”
“Then do as much as you can!”
Simon looked at Alix and started for the board. When he slapped Carl’s hand on his way, she knew he was up to something but was just glad the teacher hadn’t called her. The only two she couldn’t understand were numbers five and–
“Number six, Miss Conway.”
“I didn’t understand it.”
“Then I better see you in here Thursday morning.”
“I have–home obligations.”
Miss Whelps shook her head. Just as she was about to lace into Alix about priorities, Simon returned to his seat. “I’ll speak with you later, Miss Conway,” the teacher said.
She turned to the board. “Now then–who did number five?”
“That would be me.” Simon couldn’t conceal his smile.
“All you did was write the number five.”
“That’s all I understood, and just so you know, I have football practice Thursday mornings.”
As Miss Whelps preoccupied herself with Simon, a girl beside Alix threw a note on her desk. Large black lettering on the front read: ALIX. She opened the note.
“Meet me by the dumpster at lunch. It’s important.–Kim Q.”
Alix folded the note and stuffed it into her binder, glancing at the clock. Another thirty minutes of class remained. She wondered what Kim wanted. Should she bring Carl in case there was trouble?
When at long last the bell rang, Alix hurried to join the mad rush of students. She fought her way against traffic, away from the cafeteria, toward the exit. Once outside, she walked to the dumpster. Kim was waiting.
“Hi, Kim. I got your message. What’s up?” She did her best to sound casual but stayed alert to her surroundings.
Kim sighed and rolled her eyes. “Look, Blondie, I don’t have some posse waiting to kick your ass. But my brother is going to fight Carl today.”
“Oh?”
“I’m making a stand. You can either make one with me, or stay a Barbie doll forever.”
Alix was a little shocked by Kim’s abruptness and didn’t exactly know what to say. She also didn’t know what she could say that would somehow stop Carl from getting into a fight. It wasn’t as though she’d been close friends with him for years. In fact, from what Betty kept reminding her, it was still being decided if she was friends with the two of them at all.
“What are you going to do?” Alix finally asked.
“Embarrass some sense into them.”
Kim stared at Alix. Another long silence ensued until Kim said, “Be a sheep, then,” and stormed off.
Fred, his face buried inside a World War II history book, waited for Alix in the library. He sighed, his thoughts drifting to Betty and away from his book. She’d looked so beautiful when she spoke to him in class today. He couldn’t believe she really had spoken to him! He sighed again, and his glasses slipped down the slope of his nose. Catching them with his middle finger, he pushed them snug against his brow and looked up to see Alix.
“Hi,” he said, indicating with a sweep of his hand that she should sit in the chair next to him.
“Hi, Fred. Thanks for meeting me.”
“You look worried. What’s up?”
“I had the oddest thing happen this weekend, and I don’t know what to make of it.”
As Alix unfolded the events of Carl’s party an
d her blackout, she avoided Fred’s analytical gaze. She picked up a book from the table, flipped through the pages, and though she tried not to, she periodically met his eyes. Fred sat straight up, listened intently, and tried not to look hurt that he hadn’t been invited to the party.
When she finished, Fred just stared at her through his thumbprint-stained glasses. He took them off. After wiping them with his tie, he put them back on and asked, “Is there anything special going on in your personal life? With Carl, perhaps?”
Alix frowned. “Y’know, all you did was smudge your glasses more.”
Taking the glasses from Fred, she cleaned them with a tissue. Quietly she answered, “Nothing’s happening . . . not really. Though I did see him kiss Betty.”
“All right, then.” Fred’s face turned red. “Did you eat anything substantial, or different, before going to bed?”
She gave him back his glasses and shook her head.
“Is there anything going on with school? Home?” He sounded desperate now, searching for a logical explanation.
She suddenly smiled and her face glowed. “Sam’s reopening the store. He’s trying to quit drinking.” Pausing, she added, “But he still came home loaded last night.”
Fred relaxed his thinker pose and slouched in his chair, as if relieved that logic could answer everything.
“Alix, it’s all very simple.” He emphasized his words with chopping movements of his right hand. “Your blackout was a dream. Obviously it’s symbolic of this change in your life, the murdered body being your fear that your father will fail.”
“But Lenny and Lara really were killed.”
Fred’s face drew tight. “A pure coincidence. You probably added the details after you heard about them.” Fred pushed his glasses up his long, thin nose. “Forget about it. You have a wonderful opportunity ahead of you. Don’t let this weird circumstance take that away. Do all you can for your father.”
“Thanks. I guess you’re right.”
“Anything else I can help you with?”
Betty, leaping into the private conversation, slammed a chair between them. She sat in it backwards, completely oblivious that she had interrupted Fred, and stayed silent. By her pursed lips, it was obvious she was holding back some incredible news. She just stared, her eyes wide.
Alix took a discreet gander at Fred before asking Betty what was new. Fred had never spoken of his affection, nor would he ever admit to it. But Alix knew. She also knew he was wasting his time if he thought he could wait until Betty realized the sexiest muscle of all was the one within a man’s head.
Fred tried desperately to remain calm and relaxed, but his face was burning to the point where his nose turned purple. He tapped his foot. He looked into Betty’s eyes, as opposed to most boys, who stared elsewhere.
“What’s the news?” Alix asked, saving Fred from further humiliation.
“Carl and Derrick are ready to fight in Dead Man’s Alcove!”
Betty nearly burst as she sprang from her chair. She pulled Alix’s arm to force her friend to come with her.
CHAPTER TEN
Alix looked at Fred apologetically. He’d never be enticed into going with them. Not even his crush on Betty was enough to tear him away from his principles.
“Alix! Hurry!” Betty said in a harsh whisper, sensing her friend’s hesitation. Then she noticed Fred and replied in disgust, “He can come, too.”
Betty never used Fred’s name when she spoke of him, not even when she spoke to him. With that insult Fred regained color in his cheeks, buried his narrow face deeply into the center of a book and replied, “Alix, I refuse to be swayed into witnessing such barbarous actions.”
Betty clicked a photo of Fred with her iPhone and said, “That’s going in the Loser Files.” Tightening her grip on Alix’s arm, she demanded, “Coming?”
Rising from her chair, Alix asked Fred, “I’ll see you later?”
Fred kept his face buried deeply in his book and pushed his fallen glasses up his nose. He nodded to let Alix know she had nothing to prove to him. No matter what, he’d always be her friend.
Then Alix followed Betty to where the fray was about to happen. The place that Rellik had deemed as his turf.
Dead Man’s Alcove.
Alix stood beside Betty as she watched Carl at center stage, where the whole school could see. Her mind was racing, wondering when Kim was going to make her move. More so, Alix wondered if she was willing to sacrifice having the star football hero for a boyfriend.
Just as she wondered where Kim was, Alix swayed and suddenly had to catch her breath.
“You okay?” Betty asked as she caught her arm.
Alix felt light-headed and the world started to darken. She closed her eyes, and when she awoke . . .
She was a woman dressed in sackcloth living inside a drafty wooden cabin. Alix poured steamy water into two bowls and placed them on the table, one before a cloaked stranger and one before herself. The stranger’s hood, catching his long, dark hair like a valley would a waterfall, lay around the back of his neck. His rigid jaw reminded her of rocks that built a slope up into a peak. Her heart beat faster, but at the same time his soft gaze relaxed her. His eyes, whenever they looked upon her, moistened.
He cupped his hot bowl, neither flinching nor backing away from the pain. Lifting it toward his lips he leaned into it, sniffing its aroma like a beast would a fresh kill. When he drank, he did so as if to extinguish a fire within his stomach, finishing it in only two gulps. The girl wondered, as he returned the bowl to the table, why she had let such a frightening person into her home.
But when he sighed and met his eyes with hers, she knew.
“You have lost someone dear to you?” she asked.
“I ’ave.”
He rose and turned his back to her. His squared shoulders slumped, and the head he held so high fell. He sighed again, this time wrapping his arms tightly around his chest as if to block any more pain from escaping. The girl bit her lip and considered for a moment what to say. He turned to her and when their eyes again met she knew in her heart they needed one another. Their meeting was not so much chance as it was fate.
“You could call my abode home if you wish.”
He smiled, his gesture meaning so much when it came so awkwardly to him. “T’would please ma much. Ya kindness would please ma.”
She rose and shot him a frown. “I ask only because my family was taken by the fever and I need help with the land. You, Sir, may sleep in the barn.”
He was still smiling, and when he saw her do the same he said, “Way th’other beasts. ’Ow appropriate.”
The girl smiled back and motioned to his bowl. “Would you fancy another?”
“Noy, but I thank ya. Whoy I fancy is sleep. I bid ya farewell till ta morrow.”
He turned and walked out the door without waiting for her to respond. The girl stared after him, wondering in what strange adventure she had found herself.
“ALIX!” Betty shouted, snapping Alix back from her dream.
Alix was no longer a woman in sackcloth, no longer in a cabin, and no longer serving a hooded stranger.
“Kick his butt!” Betty shouted to Carl, who was standing before Derrick. Then she muttered furiously to Alix, “What’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing.” But Alix knew there was something.
Alix rubbed the bottom of her nose and stared at Betty, wondering if she really did want to become like her. Were popularity, attention from boys, and a party-filled-last-year-of-high-school worth sacrificing her morals?
Shaking off those thoughts, she turned her attention to the ensuing battle, feeling a sense of déjà vu. She was still unsure whether she would help Kim or not.
Kim stormed into the alcove, struggling to get near her brother. Alix stayed where she was.
Carl pushed Derrick and said, “Ready to have your other hand broken?”
“You’re dead!”
“Wagon burner!”
“Enough!” K
im’s voice cast everyone into silence. Derrick faced his sister.
“Kim, go home or stay silent, but don’t embarrass me.”
Carl laughed. “I always knew you needed a woman to do your fighting.”
Everyone started laughing. Kim refused to move. She said to her brother, “You going to hit me, too?”
Derrick glared hard at his sister. “You’re a disgrace.”
“Derrick!” Kim shouted after him, as he stormed out of the alcove. She looked at Alix, frowned, and said, “You Barbie dolls are all the same,” before she chased after him.
Carl was about to say something to the crowd when he heard, “Sir, if you might excuse me, I’d like to get to my locker.”
There was another new kid. This one was tall, thin, and had no sign of muscle. His short blond hair and brown eyes made him look peaceful. Sporting a mahogany pinstriped suit, he had an aura of timidity.
Carl held his ground and gave the new kid a shove against the lockers. The newcomer let his backpack drop to the ground, and at first Carl thought he wanted to fight.
“Perhaps I should introduce myself. How rude of me. I am Shay Jackson. Now, if you will pardon me. Please,” said the stranger, baring his bright teeth in a smile.
Carl almost laughed. Puffing out his broad chest to dwarf him with his bulk he again pushed the stranger. “Sorry, pal. This here is Dead Man’s Alcove. Nobody uses these lockers.”
“How odd. I pray you will tell me then, if they are not to be used, why have them?”
“For fighting.” Carl tensed his muscles and puffed himself out.
If nothing else in the jock’s attitude gave provocation to fight, then the look on his face should have been enough in itself. And it was. Shay lashed out, grabbed Carl by the throat and lifted him off the ground. The crowd stepped back, shocked at the ease with which the stranger had lifted their prized football star.
“Do you wish to fight me?” Shay asked with a cool serpent’s breath, yet never losing his hint of charm.
This guy’s grip was like iron and Carl wished the whole school wasn’t watching. Gasping desperately for air, he tried to say “No,” before his eyes lolled into the back of his head. But no sound came from his constricted throat. He managed to only mouth the word.