Indigo Moon

by Gill McKnight

  “I don’t know. She’s had a terrible shock.”

  “She’s shaking. I can see her in the mirror. We need to stop soon. Get some food? Stretch our legs.”

  Hope twisted in her seat. Isabelle was shivering all over. Two bright spots colored her cheeks, a thin sheen of sweat beaded her upper lip. Tadpole lay across her lap, his head resting on her forearm. He flicked Hope a morose look.

  “Honey,” Hope said, “are you cold? Can I get you a blanket?”

  Isabelle shook her head. “I think I’ve got motion sickness.”

  “I think it’s a little more than that. Godfrey’s going to find somewhere to stop and grab a bite to eat. Maybe you just need some food?”

  Isabelle nodded. “I’m famished.”

  The light was leaving the afternoon sky. Winter wasn’t ready to surrender the season, and twilight still came early. The weak light filtered through a jumble of darkening storm clouds and treetops whipped in the heightening wind.

  “It’s getting stormy.” Godfrey squinted at the sky. “Rain’s coming.”

  Up ahead the red and blue lights of a service station winked in the lowering gloom.

  “Tack-a-rama, but it’ll do,” Godfrey said, pulling up before the Lucky Seven diner as heavy raindrops started to splatter the windshield. “Considering we haven’t eaten since breakfast, it looks like the Ritz.”

  The Lucky Seven was just as garish on the inside, but its bare strip lights and loud music provided security. Hope hadn’t realized how tense she’d been until they took a seat near the door. She cricked her neck and stretched her back before reaching for the menu. Their booth was retro fifties with plastic ketchup bottles and a paper tablecloth dotted with the standard western motifs of horses, cowboys, and teepees. It was all so tackily familiar, a million miles away from werewolves and gory mutilations. Would wolven even frequent a bright place like this? If she hadn’t taken a werewolf lover, Hope would never have believed in the supernatural beasties. Her thoughts returned to Isabelle, sitting opposite. She had been attacked and survived, but barely, from the ghastly look of her. Isabelle had not taken a wolven lover; she had simply been taken. Stolen away like a shiny trinket. They had to have a talk about Ren. Was she the murderous feral? Was she tracking down her runaway mate? Knowing what fierce possessiveness Jolie was capable of, Hope would bet money Ren was hot on Isabelle’s trail, itching for retribution. The thought chilled her.

  “If this place did martinis, I’d have a bucketload,” she murmured scanning the menu. “Tuna for me. Godfrey?”

  He didn’t even look over, intent on three young men who’d just entered. They were dressed in work shirts and jeans, and rainwater dripped from them.

  “Same as you,” he muttered.

  “And I know what you need.” Hope turned to Isabelle. “The same thing Jolie and Andre order when we’re on the road. A big blue steak. Don’t worry. I’ll eat the fries.”

  The waitress arrived and Hope fussed over their order.

  “What are you looking at?” she asked Godfrey once the server had gone.

  “Those guys over there. They’re staring at us.”

  “Perhaps because you stared first?”

  Godfrey shook his head. “I’ve been looking at them indirectly through the whiskey mirror on the back wall. They followed us in, and they’ve not ordered anything to eat or drink. In fact, the waitress is getting pissed with them.”

  “What do you think?”

  “They smell like wolf,” Isabelle spoke up. “But new. Newish. There’s no strong scent, so I’m guessing they’re not long changed. Two of them smell sickly.”

  “I was worried they were feral.” Godfrey slid lower in his seat, a gloomy look on his face. “How do we work this?”

  “Call Claude. Tell him where we are. We’ll sit here and wait it out until he arrives. They’ll hardly start something before all these witnesses,” Hope said. She glanced around and was relieved to see a small security camera above the bar. It was some measure of protection.

  The waitress appeared and deposited their order.

  “The weird thing is, though I can identify them by smell, you two know more about wolven behavior than I do,” Isabelle said, cutting open her steak.

  “Only the snuggly sort,” Godfrey said. “When they creep into bed beside you and curl around you. Then you wake up an hour later dripping sweat like you sleep in a sauna.” He looked mournfully out the rain-lashed windows. “It’s been cold these last nights. I miss him. By the time he gets back I’ll probably be as dead as this dolphin-friendly bluefin. Which tastes surprisingly good, by the way.”

  “Stop being so maudlin and call Claude. Let them see we have resources at hand,” Hope said. “Let’s relax and eat and show we’re not intimidated. It’s all in the psychology.”

  “Ah yes. Psychology will save us. We can Jung-fu our way out,” Godfrey said, his cell phone pressed to his ear. “It’s cutting out while it’s ringing. He must be somewhere with bad reception.”

  “Eat and we’ll try again later.”

  “What’s it like? Having a wolven partner, I mean,” Isabelle asked, and then blushed furiously.

  It was the opportunity Hope had been waiting for. “It’s intense. It’s a honeymoon period that never ends, but that doesn’t mean real life stops. We still have our arguments. We still go to work, earn money, eat, drink, rest, play…but the heightened emotional element, the time in our relationship when we first fell in love, that intensity never seems to fade.”

  “Would either of you become wolven like Andre and Jolie? Would that double the emotion, make it stronger, almost unbearable, even?”

  “I don’t know about both partners being wolven making the emotion stronger. What I feel is enough for me,” Godfrey said. “The reason I didn’t want to change is that I have a wonderful life already. I’ve found my soul mate, even if he is a werewolf. I love my job. I live in a fantastic city and have the best of friends around me.” He reached over and squeezed Hope’s hand. “All of my time and energy is used up with this life I’ve made. Weird as it seems, I don’t think I could fit a call-of-the-wild thing in. I’d be afraid it might take me over, and it took me a long enough to find myself as it is. I feel so lucky in my life. I’m satisfied. I’d be worried something as big as lycanthropy would fuck it all up. Andre has never pressed me, and I really, truly feel no inclination. Does that make sense?”

  “Yes. Perfectly.” Hope nodded. “You are happy with life as it is. You don’t need another bolt on. I think that’s a sensible and mature approach.”

  “What about you?” Isabelle asked her.

  Hope pointed at her glass eye. “I had intraocular melanoma—eye cancer—and had to have my eye removed. My big issue is my ongoing health. No one has any idea how cancer cells react to lycanthropic mutation. I’ve had some good news recently, but I’d never risk my health doing something so potentially dangerous with so many unknowns. Jolie would never ask it of me. Plus, I don’t think a one-eyed wolf would be any more capable than a one-eyed human, so I’ll just stick with what I got.” She finished with a smile.

  Hope and Godfrey finished their meal, but Isabelle still poked her steak around her plate in a pool of bloody gravy.

  “Is the steak not good?” Godfrey asked, picking up the cell phone for the umpteenth time.

  “I’m hungry but my stomach’s in knots.” Isabelle pushed her plate away.

  “Your turn now. Tell us about Ren. Is she your partner?” Hope asked, finally getting the conversation to where she needed it to be.

  Isabelle’s face closed over.

  “You can trust us,” Hope said. “Are those her guys over there?” She nodded at the three young men hunched in a booth in the far corner. “Is she chasing you, Isabelle? Did she kill Barry?”

  “No!” Isabelle jerked in her seat. “Ren is kind. She would never do that.”

  “Kind? She burned your car, took your passport and money. Hid you away in some valley of the damned,” Hope said. �
��That’s not kind. That’s a dog with a bone.”

  “She is kind. She has all these kids that belong nowhere—”

  “They had to come from somewhere, Isabelle. How do you know she didn’t ‘make’ them, just like she made you?”

  Isabelle was floundering. “I know she didn’t. She’s looking after them. She’s trying hard, but sometimes it gets to be too much. I’ve seen her worry about real things, like money, the kids, about work and the future… Look, I just know, okay? I just know.” She bit her lip and looked away. “You don’t fret about next season’s workload if you’re making werewolves for the fun of it.”

  “So she has a pack of what? Runaways? Feral kids from the city? Where does she find them?” Godfrey asked.

  “I think they find her. I’m not sure. I couldn’t…didn’t ask. When I found out what they were I ran, remember?” There was bitterness in her voice. “I wish I’d known you then. I wish I’d someone to talk to.”

  This was not what Hope expected.

  “But I do know this,” Isabelle said quietly. “Those kids adore her. Whatever they are, and wherever they came from, they are lucky to have found her and they know it. They’re nice kids. I don’t know how any of them could have survived without her.”

  Isabelle stood. She was obviously upset. “I need the washroom.” She slid out of the booth. The young men watched her every move, then relaxed as the ladies’ room door swung shut behind her.

  “Do you need to go with her?” Godfrey asked anxiously. “What if she makes a run for it?”

  “I don’t think she will. Where’s there to go around here?”

  Hope threw a look over to the three guys. They shivered over their glasses of tap water under the scathing eyes of the waitress. Two of them looked very poorly, their faces waxen under the harsh light. Hope had seen that look before, in lines outside homeless shelters. A great sorrow filled her. She thought of Ren’s pack. Isabelle was so certain they were the lucky ones. Yet she’d run away as—

  Godfrey’s phone rang.

  “It’s Claude,” Godfrey whispered excitedly. He passed on their information and listened carefully to Claude’s instructions. The three guys fixed on him, making Hope suspicious. They hadn’t minded while they sat and ate their meal, but now that Godfrey had received a call they were getting edgy. It dawned on her that they were waiting on instructions, too. Their job was to keep them under surveillance and in one place until reinforcements arrived. They became agitated when it looked like Hope and Godfrey might be making tracks with Isabelle in tow.

  One of the youths caught her eye and bared his stained teeth; the other two tried to scowl menacingly but only managed to look more bilious.

  “We need to get going.” Godfrey ended the call. “Claude says to get out of here and keep to the original plan. We’re a harder target if we’re moving. So much for brazening it out here and waiting for help. Go get Isabelle.”

  Hope entered the ladies’ room. It was small, just a waiting area with a sink and a lockable door to the toilet cubicle.

  “Isabelle.” Hope rapped on the locked door. “Claude called. We need to get going.” Her knock was greeted with silence. She grew uneasy that Godfrey had been right, and Isabelle had run for it. She knocked again, more vigorously. “Isabelle!”

  This time she was answered with shuffles and some wet sniffs. It sounded as if Isabelle was crying.

  “Let me in. Let me help,” Hope said softly. The lock snipped and she gently pushed the door open and froze.

  Isabelle stood in the middle of the small room, her face wet with tears, her thin body trembling. Her fingers were stained dark with blood and a sour smell assaulted Hope’s nose. The floor was littered with the contents of the sanitary bin.

  “Oh, honey,” Hope whispered, shocked.

  “I couldn’t help it.” Isabelle choked on a small sob. “I just had to tear it apart. I’m insane. I’m crazy for the smell of blood, yet I can’t eat the steak I’m craving. This morning I emptied your fridge, this afternoon my guts are on fire. I’m changing and it’s going to kill me. I know it will, and I don’t know what to do, Hope.”

  “I know you’re going through hell. I’ve seen it with the young Garouls. The first time is hard, but once we get you to Little Dip, Marie will have potions and stuff to help.” What else could she say to make this any better?

  Hope wrapped her hands in toilet tissue and scooped the contents back into the bin. She dragged Isabelle to the sink and briskly scrubbed her face and hands with cold water and ran wet fingers through her disheveled hair.

  “Okay?” Hope rested her hands on Isabelle’s skinny shoulders and gave her a small shake of encouragement. “We need to get going. Godfrey will be freaking out.”

  They left the washroom arm in arm and strolled back to their booth and Godfrey’s fretful face.

  “Those guys were snarling at me. They need some serious dental work,” he said as they sat down beside him. “What the hell kept you?”

  “What happens in the ladies’ room stays in the ladies’ room.” Hope patted his arm comfortingly. “What’s the scoop?”

  “We run for it. That’s the scoop.”

  “It might be difficult shaking these guys on the way to the car,” Hope said.

  “We need a distraction. Oh! Maybe we could set fire to the tablecloth? It deserves it,” he said.

  “That would bring everyone’s attention on to us. Hardly ideal for sneaking out.” Hope shook her head in disbelief.

  “Order them some food,” Isabelle said quietly.

  “What?” Hope turned to her.

  “They’re broke and famished. Look at the way they’re watching everyone else’s orders pass their table. They’re practically salivating. Have some burgers sent over. If their hunger is anything like mine, they’ll be distracted all right.”

  “But you didn’t eat your steak,” Godfrey pointed out.

  “I don’t feel good. I’m starving, but I can’t eat.” Under the garish lighting Isabelle was paler than ever.

  “Why’s that?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe it’s shock,” she said.

  “Okay. Let’s do this.” Godfrey waved for the waitress. “Excuse me, miss.”

  “When we make a run for it, will you hold my hand?” Hope asked Isabelle. “My depth perception is out of whack. When I move too fast, I get disoriented and fall over my own feet.”

  “Deal.” Isabelle reached over and gave Hope’s hand a reassuring squeeze.

  Fifteen minutes later the young men were staring in confused longing at the food set before them. While the waitress unloaded her tray and explained the people at table two had already paid, Hope, Godfrey, and Isabelle slid outside as quickly as possible.

  They were halfway across the parking lot when the diner door crashed open behind them. Godfrey reached the car first, jumped in, and revved the engine savagely into life. Hope and Isabelle, running hand in hand behind him, piled into the backseat, squashing Tadpole.

  Godfrey shot out of their parking space before the rear door was shut, narrowly missing their closest pursuer. Hope looked out the back window, puffing with exertion and relief. All three guys had backtracked and were piling into a beat-up Ford Escort.

  “I think we’re okay,” Hope said. “They’ll never catch us in that old bonerattler.”

  A huge, hulking shadow dashed across the road before them, just out of range of the headlights. It was a meaningful charge, more for show than an attempt to halt the car.

  “What the hell was that?” Hope asked, her heart sinking. She clambered in beside Godfrey. “Reinforcements?”

  Godfrey tightened his grip on the wheel. “I don’t know. But I don’t think they’ll be coming after us in a bonerattler, somehow.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Ren stood on the roadside opposite the trim, well-ordered house with its happy yellow door and neat flowerbeds. She could tell by its quiet demeanor, from its blank windows and general stillness, that no on
e was home. The air around it, though, that was a riot. Wolven musk, den markings, warnings, mate claiming, there was a lot of werewolf activity at this house.

  She glanced up and down the street. It was empty of people and traffic. Lunch was long over, and the schools had not closed for the day. The early afternoon lull in neighborhoods such as this would continue for at least another forty minutes. Taking advantage of the quiet, Ren crossed over and disappeared around the back of the house.

  In the secluded yard she took her time and soaked up the multilayered smells. It was a wolf den, calm and well-ordered, and Isabelle had been here. Had this den taken her in? Ren growled, but it came out sad and lowly. Not the aggressive claiming growl that had rumbled from her chest at the strangest, most inappropriate moments. The one that had alarmed fellow passengers on the plane, or the line at the car rental kiosk, and the ATM. Even the staff at her motel were avoiding her.

  Ren hung her head. This home shamed her. It was happy, full of love and positivity. It shone with all she had failed to bring to her own den. This house had become a cornerstone of the Portland circuit she constantly trawled looking for Isabelle.

  She had started by skulking around Reed College and the surrounding area. She hung out around Isabelle’s old address in Billinghurst. But the For Sale sign, and the weaselly little man who stormed in and out, became another dead end. In desperation she had taken to following Barry Monk. To his work, his parents’ house, the gym, his therapist…anywhere. But he never went near Isabelle.

  She had done this for weeks. Going over the same old ground, ever hopeful of a new clue. One whiff was all she needed. Around and around she went in her self-styled circuit. At night she’d change and do it all again, only better. And she’d found her. A trace of her in Sellwood Park. Sweat and stress poured out off her. She’d been running, and Ren knew what she was running from and that it would eventually catch her. She had to find Isabelle first. She had to be there for that first change. It was dangerous for Isabelle to be alone.