“Alright.”
“They are very good. Neither is as well rounded as you…Justin favors firearms, while Damon fancies himself a Shaolin. They are, however, extremely talented.”
Aedan nodded, but his face had taken on a grimace.
“I can see you know where I’m going with this.”
“Yes, sir, I think I do.”
“One hunt, Aedan. That’s all I’m asking. One hunt, but it’s going to be a doozy.”
“How so?”
“Pack of wolves…about twenty members…”
Aedan shrugged. He was not impressed.
“To be killed on the full moon.”
Aedan smiled. “Why’s that?”
“I’ve a fear that the newer hunters are…soft.” Caulfield thought for a moment. “Men like you and me, we thrive under the worst circumstances…we are at our best when the odds are stacked against us. So many young hunters never develop that kind of spirit, that fire. It has to be developed, and I’m convinced that the only way to do so is to survive those awful situations, to be forced to adapt, to evolve.”
“Evolve?”
“In a sense. You’re not the boy you once were. You’re not the young man you were on your first mission. You’ve been molded by your experiences.”
“Wouldn’t that happen to any hunter?”
Caulfield shook his head and let out a low, sad laugh. “We’ve grown too smart for our own good. We rely so much on knowledge of the creatures we face and technology designed for each specific problem…God forbid anything deviates from plan…in that case everyone involved is usually killed.”
Aedan nodded. He was old school. He could relate to Caulfield more than the new crop of hunters. He saw the changes that were occurring, saw the self-reliance of the hunter transform into a reliance on everything but the man involved.
“So you want me to show these kids the old way of doing things?”
Caulfield smiled.
Aedan saw death in that smile—it was as much a growl as an expression of happiness.
“Will you?”
Aedan thought for a moment. He was thirty-four. He knew he couldn’t be the last of his kind. The old way needed to continue. If not, the evil they fought would gain the upper hand.
“Alright,” Aedan said. “But only one time. I’m not going to make a habit of training rookies.”
The young men stood there like saplings, straight and stern in spite of their youth.
Aedan paced before them. Justin’s eyes followed his movements, though he never turned his head. Damon stared forward, seemingly oblivious to the man in front of him.
Aedan stopped and stood facing them. He looked from one to the other. “My name is…”
Justin smiled.
Aedan took a step towards Justin. “Why are you smiling?”
“Because…you’re Aedan Halloway. Everyone knows who you are.”
Aedan nodded. Part of him wanted to smile, but he refused that part. Instead he scowled at them.
“I’m taking you out on your first hunt.”
Now both young men smiled.
“Collect your things. Be in the armory in exactly one hour.”
Both men said, “Yes, sir,” in voices that were loud and stern but distinctly not yells. They remained standing at attention.
“Go. Now.”
The two men hesitated for a moment. Then they bowed and rushed off.
Now, alone, Aedan let himself smile.
An hour later, Aedan stood before them in the armory. “Choose weapons that you know, weapons that feel like part of you, but make sure they have at least a component that is silver.”
“We’re hunting wolves?” Justin asked.
“Don’t make assumptions. Silver is effective against a lot of things. Werewolves are rare,” Aedan said. He looked at a clock on the wall. “We leave in forty-five minutes. Get what you need and be at the car. If I have to come looking for you, you’ll regret it.”
“Sir,” Damon said. He bowed slightly. “How do we know which weapons to choose if we don’t know our enemy?”
“That’s the important question, isn’t it? You’ve got to know what you’re dealing with to be fully prepared.”
The young men nodded and waited for him to go on.
“It’s forty-two minutes now,” Aedan said. He headed for the garage.
Damon looked at Justin.
Justin shrugged and said, “When in doubt, over-prepare. Take one of everything.”
Damon just shook his head.
Forty minutes later, Aedan leaned against the driver’s side door of a dark green pathfinder with tinted windows. His arms were crossed. His eyes were narrowed so that they appeared closed from a distance.
Justin and Damon stepped outside, each holding a black duffle bag. Justin carried what looked like an oversized briefcase in his left hand. Damon had a monk’s spade over his shoulder.
“Load your stuff in the back,” Aedan said. “We’ve got a long drive.” He got into the truck and keyed the ignition.
The rookies were quiet as they loaded up the back. When they came around to the side of the truck they hesitated, each offering shotgun to the other.
Finally Justin got in the front and Damon got in the back.
Aedan accelerated away.
After a few silent moments, Justin said, “So…where are we headed?”
“I was waiting for one of you to ask. Central Pennsylvania. A small town has been… bothered by a pack of werewolves.”
“Really?” Justin smashed a hard fist into his open palm and smiled. “I knew it was wolves.”
Aedan looked at him from the corner of his eye. “Don’t get so excited.”
Justin’s smile dropped from his face.
“Damon, has Sifu Li ever told you the story of how he lost his hand?”
“No, sir.”
“Don’t be so formal.” Aedan adjusted his rearview mirror so that he could see Damon, but his tone assured Justin that he’d better listen as well.
“Li was one of the best hunters of all time. Now he’s one of the best trainers. I think he’d still be hunting now if it wasn’t for losing his hand.”
Aedan paused.
The young hunters waited silently.
Aedan adjusted the air to cool things off, letting the young men wait.
“Li was hunting a pair of werewolves. Shouldn’t have been a big deal, wouldn’t have been a big deal for a man like Li, except there weren’t two of them. Although all of the information indicated a pair, those two were a splinter group that was actually part of a much larger pack.”
“How many?” Justin asked.
“Twelve.”
Both young hunters exhaled loudly at the size of the number.
“Can’t believe he survived,” Justin said.
“I can,” Damon said.
“I wouldn’t bet against Li no matter what the odds,” Aedan said.
He let that sink in for a moment.
“Li has always been partial to the sword, double swords when he had both hands. As he tells it, he was holding his own against the pack, using his chi to sense their attacks and avoid them, focusing it into his weapons with each strike…”
“You really believe in that chi stuff?” Justin asked.
Aedan grinned. “I’ve seen a lot. I’ll believe almost anything.”
“So Li fights his way through the pack to reach the alpha male…”
“I thought the alpha male is usually up front?” Justin said.
“Nine times out of ten, but every once in a while you’ll get a real smart one, one that fights his urges and lets the weaker pack members tire the prey out.”
Aedan looked in the mirror. Damon was watching him. The young man did not avert his gaze when Aedan looked up.
“Li focused on the alpha. He says he focused too much, narrowed the scope of his vision. It was a weaker member of the pack that got his hand. Li was able to protect himself from a fatal wound, but his hand wa
s bitten and held in the wolf’s jaws.”
Aedan looked at Damon. The young man’s eyes were wide.
“Li knew that a werewolf bite meant damnation, but he reacted so quickly…he lopped his own hand off at the wrist, did it so fast the corruption couldn’t spread into the rest of his body. He killed the alpha and the last few members of the pack while bleeding out.”
Aedan laughed, a slow, ominous sound. “Li told me once that he’d expected to die that night. He felt himself getting weak and lightheaded while he fought. He said that he focused his chi into the attack, to be sure the wolves were all killed. It was only after he’d wiped them all out that he tended to himself.”
Everything was quiet for a moment.
Then Aedan said, “There’s a lesson in there. Aside from being inspired by it, what can you learn from Li’s last hunt?”
“Never assume you know everything about a situation,” Damon said.
“Complete the hunt no matter what,” Justin said.
Aedan nodded. He knew that the kids still had a lot to learn.
Just over four hours later, Aedan parked in the lot of a small motel just outside the town of Forked River.
“Once we check in, put all the bags and weapons in my room. I want to see what you’ve brought.” He turned and looked past Damon at the crescent moon shaped blade at one end of the monk’s spade. “Leave the spade in the truck for now…we don’t need to attract attention to ourselves.”
They gathered in Aedan’s room ten minutes later. Justin and Damon had spread their weapons out on Aedan’s bed.
Justin had a variety of guns, from a fully automatic assault rifle to pistols of various calibers, as well as a customized Bowie knife with silver inlaid in the blade and a number of small grenades.
“I’ve got silver tipped ammo for all the guns,” Justin said.
Aedan nodded. “Good, but you should have brought more mele weapons. One knife…if it comes down to you and that knife against a handful of wolves, then you’re in deep shit.”
Damon grinned.
Aedan turned to him. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”
Damon had brought a number of blades, all inlaid with silver.
“And the monk’s spade in the truck…” Aedan said to himself. “No guns?”
Damon shook his head. He looked at Justin, then at Damon. “Do you guys realize how stupid it is to limit yourselves?”
The two young men stood at attention. They were used to being reprimanded.
“This isn’t class. I’m not your teacher. Stop standing at attention and look at me.”
They did.
“You’ll get yourselves killed…use everything you have at your disposal. The things we hunt have the advantage…even when we’re armed they’re better equipped to kill than we are. Don’t be dictated by the childish vision you have of yourself. Having a specialty is fine, limiting yourself to that is suicide.”
He stared at them for a moment.
“Go back to your rooms. Try to sleep for a few hours. Meet me back here at midnight.”
They bowed quickly and rushed out of the room.
Aedan shook his head and looked over the bed loaded up with weapons. Damned kids had over packed. He knew that a very few reliable weapons were worth far more than an arsenal of impressive-looking ones.
He took out his tools and placed them on the writing desk that sat opposite the bed. He’d brought two Glocks, each with extra clips of silver-tipped ammo, two custom brass knuckles with silver spikes extending from the knuckle surfaces, and a single short sword with religious symbols inlaid in silver down the blade.
He ran his fingertips over each of the silver symbols: a cross, a horn of Odin, an om, and a lauburu. He’d chosen each one because it had special meaning to him. Each was a memory; each was a part of him.
He noticed that he’d left fingerprints on the shining surface of the silver. Silver is a miraculous substance; highest electrical conductivity of any element, highest thermal conductivity of any metal, disinfectant and antimicrobial properties. Silver is unique. The werewolf is just one of many supernatural entities to be vulnerable to it.
Aedan wiped the fingerprints away with his sleeve and decided to go out and do some research.
Aedan knew it was going to rain. He knew it would be a powerful thunderstorm. As the barometric pressure dropped, Aedan’s old injuries ached and throbbed: the right knee that he’d dislocated when dropped from the sky by a demon with enormous, leathery wings; the spot in his lower back where the vertebrae had ground together when a hunger-crazed vampire had tried to fold him over backwards; the left shoulder that had been wrenched out of the socket more times then he could even remember; and, of course, his hands.
Aedan’s hands had been through more punishment than a carpenter’s hammer. He’d spent years hardening them and even more years using them. Whenever the weather was in flux, his hands felt like they belonged to an old man, a man bent with age and twisted with arthritis. They pulsed with a dull, persistent ache that radiated out from the center of his palms.
Rain had its uses. It would cover their scent enough to keep it from being so obvious to the pack.
Aedan stood on a wooded hill just to the south of the small town of Forked River. Initial reports suggested that the pack moved in and out of town from the south, and Aedan guessed that the hill overlooked the pack’s favorite route. They would be funneled into a low straightaway that ran between the hill and another that rose about two hundred yards away.
A pack moving at top speed travels with the land. That slope would guide them.
Aedan decided to bring the rookies back that night, when the rain hid them. That way they could be sure.
Aedan lay in the mud as the thunder roared overhead and the rain poured down, ice cold and blown sideways by the wind.
“Are you sure about this?” Justin asked.
“No. If I was sure, we wouldn’t have had to come out here to check,” Aedan said. “Look at the topography. It makes sense. I’ll be surprised if…” Distant movement caught Aedan’s eye. He held an extended finger to his lips and then pointed to his left: south.
The wolves ran as a unit, spread out but moving together. As they approached, the hunter’s could see them more clearly. They moved with fluidity, legs always bent, backs hunched, arms hanging so low that they occasionally clawed at the ground for an extra burst of speed.
They moved through the valley between the two hills, weaving around trees, moving like a flock of birds, as if a single consciousness controlled them all.
Aedan thanked God for the rain.
The wolves were out of sight in a matter of moments.
“So fast,” Damon whispered.
“But predictable. We know where they travel. We’ll take the high ground.”
“There are so many of them,” Justin said.
Aedan pushed himself up out of the mud. “Let’s get back to the motel. We need to dry off and warm up.”
He headed back towards the truck. The rookies followed.
After cleaning up, they found a small diner at the edge of Forked River, sitting on the main road right where it led out of town and into the middle of nowhere.
The place was empty.
Damon ate a salad, slowly chewing every bite. Justin ate a rare burger, swallowing bites like an animal that hadn’t eaten in days, each bite still largely whole as he choked it down and moved on to the next.
Aedan drank tea.
“Sleep as late as your bodies will let you tomorrow,” Aedan said. He took a sip of steaming hot tea. “You’re going to want to be nice and rested tomorrow night.”
Damon’s brow furrowed; his gaze drifted up to the ceiling for a moment. Then he said, “Isn’t tomorrow a full moon?”
Aedan smiled and nodded.
Justin stuffed the burger into his mouth and bit off a chunk. “Aren’t we supposed to wait for the new moon, when they’re weakest?” he asked.
“Don’t talk with your m
outh full. It’s disgusting,” Aedan said. “Normally you would wait…but this is still part of your training, and I believe everyone should take on a full-power werewolf at least once.”
Justin swallowed. “Isn’t that asking for trouble?”
“Yes.” Aedan sipped his tea.
“Have you ever done this before?” Damon asked.
“By myself, plenty of times. Never with rookies.”
Justin and Damon looked at each other.
Aedan smiled. He saw fear in their eyes. They would have to learn to get past that.
The next night they met in front of the truck.
Aedan went out at ten to midnight and waited for Justin and Damon. He had already loaded all of the weapons in the back. He wore black steal-toed boots, black pants, and a black t-shirt. His left arm was covered in black tattoos, some of the same symbols that adorned the blade of his sword.
Damon came out a few minutes later. He wore loose clothes that hung off his body, light, breathable material that allowed him to move unhindered.
“Change,” Aedan said as Damon approached.
“But…” Damon started.
“Loose clothes just give them something to grab if they get close. Dark clothes cut tight to your body. Nothing restrictive, but nothing that’s easy to grab either.”
Damon nodded and headed back the way he’d come.
A few minutes later, Justin came out wearing a black jumpsuit made of thick material. It was bulky but flexible.
“What the hell are you wearing?” Aedan asked.
“Soft plate body armor. It lets me move, but it’s knife proof, bite proof.” Justin said with a smile.
“You can move in that?”
Justin nodded.
Damon came back out in black clothes that clung to his body.
“Everything we need is already loaded up. The moon’s supposed to rise at a little after one. Let’s get moving.”
They set up at the top of the hill, where they’d first observed the pack.
Aedan stood with his sword strapped to his back, an unorthodox place to sheath his weapon that he’d picked up on one of his earliest hunts.
“Justin, I’m told you’re quite the sniper,” Aedan said. He took a rifle from one of the cases he’d carried. “Are you comfortable with this?” Aedan held up an M40.
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