Cure for Wereduck

by Dave Atkinson

  “Ugh,” said Bobby. His rubber boots squelched in the mud. A cloud of mosquitoes swarmed around his face and neck. “Remind me again why we’re in this swamp?”

  “It’s not a swamp,” said his sister, three steps ahead. “Swamps are deeper and usually have trees. This,” she said, sweeping her hand at the long grasses and cattails growing in the shallow water, “is a marsh.”

  “Okay, remind me again why we’re in this marsh, then,” said Bobby.

  “We need cheese root,” she said, not looking back.

  “Right. Cheese root.” He swatted a mosquito on his neck. “Remind me what that is again?”

  Kate sighed. She pulled her knapsack from her back and slid out an old, yellow book. She opened it to a page marked with a slip of paper.

  “‘Cheese’ is the folk name for a plant called swamp rose mallow,” she said, pointing to the illustration of a large flower. “The Cure for Werewolf calls for the ground-up root of one of these. If we’re going to make it, I’m going to need it.”

  “Right,” said Bobby. He took the book and examined the page. “Remind me again why we’re doing that?”

  “At first, I just kinda wanted to see if the cure even worked,” said Kate. “Now I think it would be cool to take a month off of being a duck to spend some time with Wacka when she’s human.” She smiled at the duck paddling in the shallow water beside her. “Right, Wacka?”

  “Wacka,” said Wacka proudly.

  “Right,” said Bobby, tucking the book under his arm. “I still don’t really get why Wacka turned into a girl.”

  Kate lifted a pair of binoculars to her eyes and scanned the east bank of the marsh. “Marcus bit her. Usually, a werewolf bite turns a person into a werewolf. I guess, in this case, it turned Wacka into, like, a reverse wereduck.”

  Bobby scratched his head. “Hear that, Wacka?” he said, looking back. “You’re a reverse wereduck.”

  “Wacka,” said Wacka.

  Kate lowered the binoculars and pointed. “I’m going to go over to the east bank,” she said. “Why don’t you keep looking along here?”

  “Sure,” he said. “Can I keep the book? I need to know what I’m looking for.”

  “Okay, but be careful,” said Kate, handing it over. “That’s the only copy. Marty The Librarian would flip if anything happened to it.”

  Kate strode through ankle-deep water, past lily pads and long grass. The cattails on the bank grew from a thick mat of entangled roots floating on the surface of the water. The book called this an ideal spot to find swamp rose mallow.

  She picked her way through the water, careful to stay in the shallows. Her boots slurped in the mud as she worked along the edge of the cattail mat, searching among the long stems for a bright pink flower.

  Kate had been searching this side of the marsh for several minutes before she realized she was alone. “Bobby,” she called. “Do you have Wacka over there with you?”

  “Nope,” he yelled back. “I thought you had her.” He grabbed at a small tuft of grass and pulled himself up the bank. Kate saw the old yellow book tucked into the back of his pants.

  “Be careful!” she called to her brother before continuing her search. “Wacka! Where did you go?”

  Kate heard a faint quack a short distance away. The duck must have paddled around a curve in the bank and was just out of Kate’s eyesight.

  “Coming!” yelled Kate.

  Water and mud pulled at every step, slowing Kate’s progress. “I’m on my way!” she called. She found the little duck swimming in frantic circles at the edge of the cattails.

  “What is it, Wacka?” said Kate. “What’s wrong?”

  Kate gasped as she caught sight of the pink flower. The large blossom—light pink on the outside, fuchsia on the inside—looked just like the illustration in Muriel Tuttle’s book.

  “You found it!” said Kate. “You’re a genius!”

  Wacka closed her eyes and quacked proudly.

  Kate dug a hand trowel from her backpack and attempted to dig the root from the marsh mat. She thought it would slide easily from the wet ground, but the finger-like roots of the plants around it held it fast in their grip. She sliced through them with her trowel, slowly freeing the mallow from the ground.

  “Got it!” she said, holding her prize aloft like a sword. A long white root, thin like a carrot, dangled at the bottom of the plant. “Bobby, look! I got it!”

  “All right!” he yelled. “Let me see!”

  Bobby slid down the far bank, but missed his footing when his boots hit the mud. He swayed for a moment, flailing his arms for balance, and toppled head-first into the water.

  “Bobby, no!” screamed Kate. She dashed across the marsh.

  Water and mud dripped from Bobby’s face as he pulled himself up. He wiped a layer of muck from his face. “Yuck,” he said, spitting out a mouthful of water.

  “Oh, no! Bobby!” cried Kate, rushing to his side. “No, no, no!”

  “It’s okay,” he said, sitting up. “I’m all right.”

  “Not you!” she yelled. “This!”

  Kate reached into the water and pulled out the old yellow book. Even after just a few seconds in the marsh, its cover was swollen with water. Its pages were covered in muck.

  “Oh god, oh god,” she said as she flipped pages. What little of the original ink that had remained was smeared beyond all legibility. “Bobby! It’s ruined!”

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “But that was the last ingredient, right? We won’t need the book for anything else.”

  Kate whipped the recipe card out of her pocket and read it over. “Second last ingredient,” said Kate. “I still need something called Kronos’s blood. And without this book,” she said, holding it like a club and whacking Bobby with every word, “I’ll. Have. No. Idea. What. That. Is.”

  She sighed and slumped onto the ground at the water’s edge. “And Marty is going to kill me,” she said, thinking of the librarian. “It’s his favourite book in the whole world.”

  “What are you going to do?” asked Bobby.

  Kate thought. “I gotta tell him. He’d be even more upset if he thought I just stole it.”

  “What about the cure?” he asked.

  “What about it?” said Kate. “Unless we have some other way of figuring out what Kronos’s blood is, there’s no use in even trying.”

  Kate stood in the entrance of the library, wondering whether she had the courage to do this. Confessing to Marty that she had ruined the book would destroy him. It would be so much easier to walk away and never show her face here again.

  Kate sighed. No, that would be wrong. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

  Marty sat at his desk, copying information into his ledger. Kate approached quietly and stood before him. He looked so peaceful, so focused; Kate almost didn’t have the heart to disturb him. When he didn’t look up at her, she cleared her throat. Marty kept scratching away at his ledger with a pencil.

  Kate looked around. She really didn’t want to bug him when he was so deep into his work. She cleared her throat again, a little louder.

  Marty kept writing. He turned a page in the ledger and started a new column.

  “Um,” said Kate softly, bouncing slightly on her heels, “Marty?”

  Marty’s pencil was flying across the page. He sat hunched so far over his work, his nose nearly touched the page.

  “Marty,” said Kate, full-voiced.

  No response.

  “MARTY?” she shouted.

  Nothing.

  Kate stepped forward. Short of driving a truck through the library, she wondered if there was any way to get this man’s attention.

  “EXCUSE ME,” she said, placing her hand on the ledger in front of him.

  Marty leaped screaming from his seat, knocking over the plant beside him.


  Kate was so startled by his response that she, too, began to scream. She jumped back, knocking into a small library cart. The cart toppled over, spilling dozens of books on the floor.

  “Aaaaaaaagh!” screamed Marty, looking back and forth from the books to Kate.

  “Aaaaaaaagh! Sorry! So sorry!” screamed Kate. She reached across Marty’s desk to pick up the overturned plant and accidentally bumped a glass of water, spilling it all over the open ledger.

  “Aaaaaaaagh!” screamed Marty.

  “Sorry! Aaaaaaaaagh!” screamed Kate.

  “Aaaaaaaaagh!” screamed Marty. “Aaaaaaaagh,” he said again, a little quieter. “Agh,” he said again, his enthusiasm for screaming apparently fading.

  Kate and the librarian stood looking at each other for a long moment, both breathing heavily.

  “So,” panted Marty, “Kate. Can I, um, help you with something?” His glasses hung around his neck from a thin, black cord. He polished one of the lenses with a tissue and put them on.

  Kate disappeared and returned seconds later from the bathroom with a bunch of paper towels. “I’m really sorry, Marty,” she said, sopping up the mess.

  Marty broke into a nervous smile. “It’s fine,” he said, taking the paper towels. “I guess I got a bit, uh, absorbed in my work there.”

  Kate smiled back. Marty was such a nice, lovable guy. She felt horrible that she was about to break his heart.

  “Marty,” she said. “I’m afraid I have something I have to…show you.”

  “Oh, it can’t be that bad, Kate,” said Marty, drying the last of the spilled water from his desk.

  There was nothing else left to do. Kate dug into her backpack and withdrew Local Flora, the volume Marty prized most in the whole library collection. It was a dirty, twisted mess.

  Marty’s hand touched his mouth. He squeaked and reached for the book.

  “I’m so sorry,” said Kate, handing it over. “I know it’s very special to you and I—”

  Marty’s mouth opened to speak, but no sound came out. He turned the book over in his hands, looking for evidence that some of its contents had survived. He flipped through the pages. Not a word was legible.

  “How—”

  “I was using it to identify plants in Hillman Marsh,” said Kate. She paused for a second, not wanting to blame her brother for dropping Marty’s precious book in the mucky pond water. Local Flora was, ultimately, her responsibility and she had let him down. “It just slipped from my hands and…oh, Marty. I’m so sorry.”

  Marty collapsed onto his chair, overcome with emotion. He carefully closed the book and hugged it close to his chest.

  “My…my baby,” he squeaked.

  “I know.”

  “Ruined.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  Marty sighed. “It’s…it’s okay,” he said, smiling bravely. “At least…you were using it the way Muriel Tuttle intended.”

  Kate felt horrible. She mustered a small smile. Marty’s attempt at sympathy only made her feel worse.

  “I’m really, really sorry,” she said again. “I wish there was something I could do.”

  Marty looked up. “I know you do,” he said. “Thank you, Kate. Why don’t you go see John at the microfilm station while I, um, finish cleaning up around here.”

  Marty ran his hands along the canvas cover of the ruined book. He appeared to be trying to revive it with his fingers.

  “Right,” said Kate. “Okay.” She surveyed the mess she’d made. “I can help—” she stammered, picking up a few books from the toppled cart.

  “No, no,” said Marty. “You’ve done enough.”

  Marty continued to cradle the old yellow book as Kate crept away. She found John at a desk in the back of the library, his face illuminated by a large projector screen. He was scrolling through what looked like images of an old newspaper.

  “John,” said Kate, touching his shoulder.

  He was so engrossed in his reading, he jumped at her touch.

  “What is with you guys?” she said. “Am I that sneaky?”

  “Sorry, what?” asked John. His eyes were wide. His breathing was quick.

  “Hey, are you all right?” asked Kate.

  “I’m fine.” John turned back to the screen. “But take a look at this.” He paused dramatically. “Kate, I think I just found my mom.”

  “What?” gasped Kate, totally thunderstruck. “I thought you said your mom was dead.”

  “That’s the thing,” John said. “My dad always said she died in a fire when I was a baby.” He turned back to the microfilm viewer and scrolled through a series of articles. “I’ve been looking through old newspapers for stories about the fire for weeks.” He gestured toward a stack of boxes. “My dad said I was born in Minnesota, so I started looking in their papers. Nothing. So I started looking in the papers from Wisconsin and South Dakota. Nothing. Marty has been awesome, getting microfilm records for papers all over the States, but there was nothing. So then I started looking in some Canadian papers. Look what I found.”

  He stopped scrolling and zoomed in on a headline: “A WOLF STOLE MY BABY!” CLAIMS MOTHER.

  “This story is about a lady who says a wolf showed up one night and stole her baby from his bassinet,” said John. “Neither the baby—or the baby’s father—was ever seen again. The police didn’t buy the wolf story. Called it a kidnapping and a hysterical mother.”

  “Creepy,” said Kate.

  “And,” said John, scrolling down, “check out this photo of the dad.”

  The black-and-white image showed a man with feathered hair and a bad eighties moustache, but there was no mistaking him. It was definitely John’s father, Marcus.

  “Holy crap,” gasped Kate. “So, where is this? Where did it happen?”

  “That’s where it gets even weirder,” continued John. “It was in New Brunswick. Some place called Boundary Creek.”

  “But that’s just a few hours from where Bobby and I grew up!”

  “I know. We were that close to my mom the whole time and I didn’t even know.”

  Kate stared at the photo of Marcus, letting the details of the story sink in. “So what do we do now?” she asked.

  “I know what I want to do,” said John, turning to face her. “But first I gotta know. Are we friends again or what? I have a hard time keeping track.”

  Kate blushed. She nodded. “I’m sorry. I’ve been kind of silly.”

  John flashed a crooked grin. “I haven’t really made it that easy, either. Buds?”

  Kate smiled back. “Buds.”

  “Good,” said John. “So here’s the plan: I want to go see my mom. And I want you to come with me.”

  “Whoa, what do I have to do with any of this?”

  “It’s just,” started John, looking down, “I don’t want to do this alone.”

  Kate sat quietly looking at him. She didn’t know what to say.

  “Please?” he pleaded. “When we’re actually speaking to each other, we make a pretty good team. Will you come?”

  Kate swallowed hard. “Yeah,” she said, surprising herself with how quickly she made the decision. She held his gaze for a few seconds.

  “Great,” he said. His eyes twinkled with mischief. He spun in his seat to face a laptop beside the microfilm station. “I already booked us two train tickets to Moncton. We leave a week from Tuesday.”

  “Wait, you already bought tickets?”

  “Yup.”

  “You just assumed I would say yes?”

  John beamed. “I hoped you would,” he said. “I can be pretty persuasive.” He fluttered his eyelashes.

  Kate snorted a laugh. “Okay. How’d you even buy the tickets? You can’t have made that much money picking tomatoes.”

  He shrugged. “Credit card.”

&nb
sp; “You have a credit card?”

  “No.” He reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a plastic card. “But our pal Dirt Bag does.”

  Kate yanked the card from his hand and stared at the name. Sure enough, it was Dirk Bragg—the reporter for Really Real News they’d dodged a few months earlier.

  “How’d you get this?” she demanded.

  John snatched it back. “Swiped it from his bedside table when we broke into his motel room last summer. Dad taught me to keep my eyes open for stuff like that.”

  “To be a thief?”

  “Pfffft,” he scoffed. “Cry me a river about Dirt Bag. That guy owes us.”

  “And you’re not worried he’ll notice a couple of train tickets showing up on his bill?”

  “Dirt Bag might be good at some things, but taking care of himself ain’t one of them,” said John. “It’s a miracle he puts pants on before he leaves the house most days. Plus, it won’t show up on his bill until next month. By that time, we’ll be long gone.” He turned back to the laptop. “I booked the tickets online. We leave on the third. Thirty hours on the train.”

  “The third?” she asked.

  “Yeah. Something wrong?”

  “The third is the night of the full moon, genius. You’d think a werewolf would be better at keeping track of that.”

  “Oh, crap.” He clicked back from the electronic receipt on the screen to the bookings page. “Crap.”

  “What?”

  “The tickets are non-refundable. I could buy us new ones, but that’ll probably alert his credit card company that something is up. We go the third or we don’t go at all.” John slumped in his chair. He drummed his fingers on the desk and muttered to himself. After a moment, he perked up. “Unless….”

  “Unless what?” asked Kate.

  “Unless we take a night off of being a wolf and duck. How are you doing with that cure?”

  Kate scowled. “I never told you about that.”

  John grinned.

  “Bobby told?”

  He shrugged.

  “I’m going to kill him. Anyway. It’s going lousy,” said Kate. She explained about the ruined book and the missing ingredient. “Something called Kronos’s blood,” she said. “Whatever that is. Without the book, we’re sunk.”