Unleashed

by Nancy Holder

  “No. I just can’t accept that,” Cordelia insisted. “Tell me about it again. Start from the beginning.”

  Katelyn shut her eyes as the memories washed over her, chilling her to the bone. “It jumped on me and dragged me. It bit me.” She couldn’t stop holding her breath. “It had blue eyes. It was huge.” She mimicked raising a tire iron. “I hit it and then it just kind of dissolved into the shadows. It was almost like it became the shadows.”

  Cordelia caught her breath. “Like how?”

  Katelyn ran her hands through her hair. She didn’t like remembering. But she needed to help herself, find out everything about what was happening to her. “I don’t know how else to describe it. I wasn’t sure what I was seeing. I thought I might be hallucinating.”

  “Hellhound,” Cordelia whispered.

  “Or … I was just really scared,” Katelyn protested.

  Cordelia shook her head and looked down.

  The silence stretched between them as Katelyn struggled to process everything. When the wolf had attacked her, she had thought she’d be killed, like the other girls. She’d been so relieved when she escaped. Maybe they’d been the lucky ones.

  “What about Becky and Haley?” Katelyn murmured.

  Cordelia hesitated. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I don’t know about them, and I don’t know about you. But you can’t talk about this. Not with anybody. Your grandfather, Trick. No one.” Her voice was stern and Katelyn knew she meant it.

  “Okay,” she whispered. She took a deep breath. “But how am I going to get through this?”

  Cordelia exhaled. “It’s going to be okay, Kat.”

  “You don’t know that,” Katelyn said angrily. “Forty years ago, a bunch of people were attacked. People are being attacked now. And I’m one of them. You can’t tell me that I’m going to be okay. You don’t even know what bit me!”

  “Girls, dinner!” Her grandfather’s voice made her start.

  “I need help,” Katelyn went on, ignoring his call.

  “I said I’d help you,” Cordelia snapped, looking up at her. Then her face crumpled. “And I’m really sorry, Kat, but I’m all the help you’ve got.”

  Dinner was spent in painful silence. After Cordelia left, Katelyn scoured all the books she had, looking for more information about the Hellhound, the silver mine, and the wolves of Wolf Springs. She had practically memorized the story about Xavier Cazador. But there was nothing new.

  Later that night, Katelyn lay in bed and raised her hand to the skylight, a rectangle of black raindrops. Exhausted, she let her arm drop back down. But she didn’t sleep. She stared into the dark and couldn’t seem to stop herself from shaking.

  She got up and took another hot shower. Her heart was pounding as if it were too big for her chest. And then, as she climbed into fresh fleece pajama bottoms and a tank top, she realized that what she was hearing was not her heart, but the pounding of drums. Howls wailed, blasting through the layers of black on black on black, weaving through the treetops. Jack Bronson’s disciples.

  She listened for a while, then went downstairs. A fire was burning in the fireplace, but the front room was empty. She flicked on the light switch and the howls rose, then poured down one on the other like a cascade of sound. The drums pulsed like blood through veins.

  And something inside her urged her to go outside to join them.

  No, she told herself firmly.

  Leaving the light on, she turned to go back upstairs. Her gaze was drawn once again to the painting of the deer and the tree. And the boulder. The heart-shaped boulder, in the foreground.

  She remembered where else she’d seen it: in the piece of parchment on top of the stack of clippings Sam had given her.

  “Katie?” her grandfather called from the top of the stairs.

  “I can’t sleep with all that drumming,” she said.

  He was silent a moment. Then he asked, “What drumming?”

  14

  It was hard to get through the days—and the nights—pretending that nothing was wrong. That Katelyn wasn’t keeping track of every single hour. She had figured out there were 408 hours in seventeen days. She spent many of those precious hours searching for more information about werewolves and Hellhounds and what had happened forty years earlier in Wolf Springs. She told Cordelia to ask her sisters to tell her the Hellhound stories again, and to go through her house for anything else that might reveal what was going to happen to Katelyn on the full moon. Cordelia insisted that there was nothing new. But Cordelia was so afraid of the Hellhound that Katelyn had trouble believing her, and she realized her trust in the only person who knew her secret was getting shaky.

  At night, she tossed and turned, listening to the drums, to her heart. Tortured by worry, tormented by strange dreams … and the realization that she might never make it back to Los Angeles.

  She had her next rabies shot and didn’t even bother to ask about side effects anymore. The last innoculation would be on Halloween. It seemed ironic to her. What she really wanted was to ask the nurse if she had a werewolf vaccine, but she didn’t dare breathe the “w” word most days, not even to Cordelia.

  Katelyn was beginning to understand what it was like to live in a small town. It was smothering, unnerving. She needed privacy with Cordelia if she was going to get her to talk, but it was difficult, if not impossible, to find any. Cordelia’s house was out for obvious reasons, and Katelyn’s grandfather’s cabin was too small for them to be able to talk freely. And every building they entered seemed to contain someone who wanted to get to know the new girl.

  One afternoon after school, Katelyn and Cordelia went driving. Katelyn had found a book in her grandfather’s shelves called Tall Tales of the Ozarks. As they bumped along the dirt road in Cordelia’s truck, brilliant autumn leaves fell like sparks into the bogs and floated down the river.

  “Listen.” Katelyn began to read from the book.

  In early 1937, a man named Barry Cazman arrived in Wolf Springs. He claimed to be a descendant of Xavier Cazador, the man who had rediscovered the Lost Mine of Madre Vena in 1868. Cazman, described as a handsome man with blue-black hair, said that Cazador had left him a map.

  Cazman hired local Wolf Springs men to help him locate the Madre Vena, but he ran out of money with nothing to show for it. He then tried his luck at the Wolf Springs Club, gambling at the illegal casino located at the mineral-rich hot springs that gave the town its name. For a time it seemed his luck had turned, and he amassed enough money to resume his search for the Madre Vena mine.

  Then, on Christmas Eve, he staggered onto the grounds of the Wolf Springs Club, his clothes in tatters. His hair, once so dark, had turned completely white. He said that he and his men had finally found the distinctively shaped rock they had long sought. As they raced toward it, a wolf stepped from behind it. Cazman raised his rifle to shoot it. And in that moment, the wolf transformed into a “hideous beast” and attacked the party. Cazman alone survived, or so he said.

  “That monster came from hell,” he said. And then he died. The map was found inside his pocket.

  Katelyn stopped reading. Neither spoke. She closed the book with shaking hands and looked at Cordelia, who clenched the wheel tighter.

  “Another Hellhound sighting,” Katelyn said, even though she was stating the obvious. The part about the rock tugged at something in her memory, but she couldn’t place it.

  “My dad asked me how we’re doing on the mine project,” Cordelia murmured in a low voice. “I told him we’re stuck.”

  “We’re probably lucky he hasn’t asked your sisters to look for it,” Katelyn said.

  Cordelia swallowed. “I think he has. I think he just didn’t tell me that he did.”

  “Have they said anything about it? Or about the Hellhound?”

  “Please stop saying that word,” Cordelia said angrily. She gazed in the rearview mirror, then out the side window.

  “We need to talk about it,” Katelyn insisted.

 
“No. We don’t,” Cordelia retorted. “It’s going to get dark soon. You need to get home.”

  And that was the last they spoke of it that day.

  The rough draft of their paper was due a week before the final paper was due. Katelyn and Cordelia turned it in, and the next day, Mr. Henderson asked to see them after school.

  He was sitting at his desk, but when they came in, he rose and perched on the corner, casually holding their paper in his hand.

  “I want to tell you this is really great stuff,” he began, smiling at the two of them. “Your bibliography’s a little skimpy. Is it complete? You didn’t by chance come across a book by Theodore Switliski?”

  “Sorry, no,” Cordelia said. “Who’s that?”

  “An archaeologist. He studied this area in his seminal work: Ozark Folklore. I’ve never been able to locate a copy.”

  Katelyn recalled that Mr. Henderson had been an archeologist before he’d relocated to Wolf Springs.

  He looked disappointed. “Well, okay. If this is all you could find, I can’t fault you for it. Thanks for coming in.”

  They left the room and walked down the hall toward their lockers.

  “Why do I not care what grade I get in history this semester?” Katelyn asked. “And that’s a rhetorical question—you don’t have to answer it. I can’t concentrate. I can barely even think. I’m too scared.”

  “I know. I’m scared, too. But …” She gave her head a little shake.

  “What?” Katelyn asked.

  Cordelia didn’t answer. They moved down the hall together. Katelyn was so numb that she could barely feel the floor beneath her feet. Then Cordelia tensed up beside her, and Katelyn raised her gaze.

  Trick was coming toward them from the other end of the hall. Katelyn had been trying hard to act normal around him—like he was just a friend and her ride to and from school—but right then she wanted to run to him and throw her arms around him and tell him exactly what was going on. She took a deep breath and steadied herself.

  Trick smiled at her, then slid his gaze warily toward Cordelia.

  “Why don’t you like him?” Katelyn whispered to Cordelia.

  “He broke Becky’s heart,” Cordelia murmured.

  “No,” she said. “Sam told me—”

  “Hey.” Trick came straight up to Katelyn. “How you doing? You okay?”

  “Yes,” she said, too quickly.

  He cocked his head. “Are you okay?” he repeated.

  “Yes. I’m fine,” she said more firmly.

  He didn’t even look Cordelia’s way. “So, I wanted to make sure you knew my Halloween party’s on. I just hung up with my parents and they’re good with it.” When Katelyn just stared at him, he gave her a perplexed look. “The one we talked about this morning in the car?”

  “Oh, um. Right,” Katelyn said. She had obviously zoned out.

  “You’re coming, right, Cordelia?” Trick asked, lifting his chin as if daring her to say no.

  “Everyone goes to Trick’s Halloween parties,” Cordelia said to Katelyn, as if Trick wasn’t there. “Even people who don’t like him.”

  “Because I don’t really care who shows.” He focused his green eyes on Katelyn. “Except, I want you to come.”

  “We are.” Cordelia glared at Trick. “Kat, we can go over to Babette’s to look for costumes. In fact, we can go right now.”

  “Cool. I’m headed that way,” Trick said. “Kat, would you ride over with me? I want to talk to you for a second. Then you two can go shopping and I’ll leave.”

  “Well,” Katelyn said, hesitating. “I’m hanging out with Cordelia.” She wanted to go with Trick so badly. She needed to. She needed him to tell her that everything was fine and her great, amazing life was going to happen, and she wanted him to put his arms around her, and—and—but she knew she couldn’t tell him a thing about what was going on.

  “Okay,” Trick said, looking disappointed.

  “Yes,” Cordelia replied. “Let’s go, Kat.”

  The three of them turned to go to the parking lot, Katelyn between Trick and Cordelia. She stumbled, too full of emotion, fighting to keep herself under control. Trick took her hand, his fingers warm around hers. Cordelia didn’t seem to notice, or if she did, she didn’t show it.

  Cordelia’s truck was closer than Trick’s Mustang. The two girls climbed in. Trick stood at the passenger side, and Katelyn rolled down the window.

  “Be careful,” he said. He was very serious. The sunlight bronzed his cheeks and lips. So handsome. So human.

  Katelyn smiled at him and nodded and Cordelia started up the truck. They pulled out of the lot and began down the road. Glancing in the rearview mirror, Cordelia huffed.

  “Can you believe it? I think he’s following us!” she said indignantly.

  Katelyn said nothing; she only leaned her head against the window, staring at Trick’s car in the side mirror. If she tried really hard, she could pretend that Trick was coming to her rescue from a great distance.

  It wasn’t far to the center of the quaint town, and almost as soon as they merged onto the town’s main artery, Cordelia pulled over and turned off the truck.

  “Ready?” she said brightly.

  “Cordelia, I can’t,” Katelyn said. She’d made up her mind. “I’m not buying a Halloween costume. I’m not going to a party.” She pressed her fingertips against her forehead. “Please, let’s just go.”

  “C’mon, let’s try,” Cordelia insisted. She opened the truck door. “It’ll be fun.”

  Katelyn got out on wobbly legs and caught up with Cordelia. The bell on the door tinkled as she opened it, and Babette was seated behind the counter, her phone to her ear. She gave the girls a welcoming wave as Katelyn shut the door behind her.

  “How about a sexy vampire?” Cordelia suggested, picking up a couple of pairs of fishnets. “Or a sexy witch?”

  Katelyn passed her by and went straight into the dressing room. She sat down on the bench and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “This is crazy,” she said as Cordelia came in.

  “No. It’s life.” Cordelia put the fishnets down beside her. “Here’s what I’m thinking, Kat. We’ll go to the party, both of us, even though, yes, Trick is a loathsome user, and then we’ll spend the night at Trick’s, like half the school is going to do.”

  Katelyn’s lips parted in surprise. “At Trick’s?”

  “That’s how we have parties out here,” Cordelia reminded her.

  “Girls, do you need anything?” Babette called, sounding perhaps a little too close to the French door.

  “We’re fine, Babette,” Cordelia called back. Then to Katelyn she whispered, “Okay. You’re not in the mood. We’ll deal with the costumes later. Forgive?”

  “Sure,” Katelyn replied, but she was still upset.

  The morning of Halloween, it was time for Katelyn’s final rabies vaccine injection. It was also when Ed presented her with Mason Slater’s Subaru Forester, an early birthday gift. He had bought it from the estate of his dead friend, swearing to her that the old man had not died in the car, which made it easier for her to accept the gift—although, in truth, it hadn’t been hard in the first place. With a car came more freedom.

  Her grandfather trailed behind her as she gripped the steering wheel of the Subaru, negotiating the two-lane road to the clinic. If she felt okay after the injection, she would drive on to school. If not, they’d leave the Subaru at the clinic and pick it up later. In a small town like Wolf Springs, no one thought twice about such a thing.

  She was thinking twice, three, four times about what would happen after school. The plan was to drive to Cordelia’s to get ready for the party and then go over to Trick’s. She was still amazed that it was all right with the parents of the partygoers for everyone to spend the night—and that it was just as okay with her grandfather. He told her it used to be very common in spread-out areas like Wolf Springs to invite your guests to stay. Because of the bad roads and the forest, the cust
om just hadn’t died out there as it had in other towns.

  What will I do if Trick tries something? Her face tingled; her palms were damp. Chills tickled the small of her back. Her imagination conjured up all kinds of images as she waited in the exam room. Luckily she didn’t have to wait long. As soon as she got the shot, she tried to talk to the nurse about possible side effects, but as before, it went nowhere. When the nurse said the doctor needed to check her sutures, Katelyn lied. She told her that he’d already taken them out. The woman believed her. Problem solved.

  Katelyn and her grandfather waited awhile to see how she was feeling, then got some coffee from the doughnut shop next door. This time Katelyn drank it down with no problems. It didn’t smell bad. Her grandfather’s voice wasn’t too loud. She had no headache.

  She could barely breathe she was so hopeful. Was it possible that after all that worrying, she was okay?

  “I can drive to school,” Katelyn said. “And everything else.”

  “So off you go,” Ed said. “Have a great time, Katie. And … be careful.”

  She climbed behind the wheel of the Subaru, and when she turned to say goodbye, she noticed that her grandfather’s face was drawn, as if he hadn’t slept. Fretting over her?

  If only he knew the half of it, she thought. What would have happened to him if she had told him about the actual attack? Were there people in Wolf Springs who knew the Fenners’ secret and helped them keep it? She shivered. She really didn’t want to find out.

  After school, Katelyn drove over to Cordelia’s. Cordelia had sworn to her that her father wouldn’t be home. Justin and Jesse were also nowhere to be seen, and Katelyn was relieved, but a little disappointed.

  The girls busied themselves getting ready immediately. Cordelia had ultimately decided to be a sexy vampire, but when they got to her house, they discovered that Jesse had smeared chocolate all over her costume.

  “Now what?” Cordelia wailed.

  Katelyn flipped through her friend’s rather large closet and pulled out a long black sleeveless silk dress. It reminded her of what she herself had been wearing in her dream the night of the earthquake.