Feral

by Serafini, Matt

  The collision gave a loud, echoing thock that sent Amanda's head crashing against the floor. Her eyes failed in that second. With a desperate writhe, her arm slipped free and clawed his face. He laughed her limb away, pinning her again, this time with a knee.

  She squinted her eyes back into focus just in time to see a billy-clubbed hand smash down. Another smash cut to white. Another blow was coming and she tried bracing herself for it.

  A gunshot boomed, freeing her of the excess two hundred plus pounds. She was unpinned.

  "Jesus," Jack said and helped her up.

  Amanda wiped wet blood from her eyes and nose. She stretched her eyes open and closed, hoping to reclaim her vision.

  "I think there's more of them," Jack said. "It's hard to tell."

  "How many shots do you have left?"

  "No idea. A few, I think. Here.”

  The familiar grip of a shotgun eased into her hands. "This was beside one of them."

  She pumped it while the grungy hotel surroundings came into sight.

  "We have to go now," she said.

  "Where are the keys?"

  "On the bedside table. In there." He flashed a thumb back toward their room.

  "Shit."

  "I'll cover you," she said, deciding that he didn't have to know about her faulty eyesight.

  Jack didn't argue. He stayed low and slipped back into their room. Amanda followed as far as the doorway, leaning against the jamb and facing both entrances. Her eyesight was far too muddy to see past the doors, but it was a safe assumption that this siege hadn't yet concluded.

  In a career of nearly eleven years, it had never been this easy. Not when an enemy wanted you dead.

  "Let’s go," Jack said, scooping the keys off the table and hurrying back. "Can you run?"

  She tested her weight on her wounded ankle. "I should be able to, yeah. More importantly, I can shoot." No way of knowing without careful examination, but it didn't seem like the shotgun blast had been a direct hit. More than likely, a few of the bucks had burrowed in. Digging them out and cleaning the wound should make her good as new.

  They eyed both exits with caution—no way of telling which one would yield better odds.

  Jack motioned to the door in the adjourning room. "Your truck is closer if we go through there, right?"

  "It's close, yeah. But they could be trying to lure us out."

  "What then?"

  Jack was right; their backs were up against the wall. She wouldn't normally engage the enemy on a battle of their terms, although it was in her favor that these goons weren't a professional hit squad. There were other cars in the parking lot. How would they know which one was hers?

  They have you and your new friend on camera after your jaunt to the Big East. That's how.

  Behind them, the makeshift barrier burst into a cloud of stuffing and springs. Buckshot nailed Amanda in the stomach, and she found herself tipping toward the floor, doubled over by the stinging pain. She sucked at air that refused to come.

  Above her, Jack returned panic fire. Amanda was dazed, but she counted each shot like their lives depended on it. Two, three, four, five, six, seven shots. Eight. Click.

  "Let's go," he was at the doorway now.

  Amanda was sure they were sprinting to their deaths, but gave reluctant pursuit. She saw the gunman as soon as they were outside, lying face-up in the parking lot, a pool of blood expanding beneath his head.

  Nice shot, Jack.

  They reached the truck without incident and Jack climbed behind the wheel, unlocking the cab as he went.

  She pulled herself up into the passenger's seat, bracing for a shot to the back that didn't come.

  He threw the transmission into reverse and pulled out, speeding for the road. Both of their heads were low to the dashboard, weary of hidden gunmen. At the road, he slammed on the brakes, bringing the truck to a smoking halt. Bathed in the yellow glow of headlights, against the dissipating rubber smoke, a wolf blocked their path. It was sickly thin with patchy, brown fur, towering on its hind legs and looking at them with a salivating grin.

  "Hit it," Amanda said.

  Jack gunned it. The truck darted forward, bearing down on the creature.

  The wolf parried the vehicle, sliding from its path just barely. Its hostile breath stained the passenger window as they slipped by.

  "Just go," Amanda shouted. In the rearview, the wolf dropped onto all fours to begin its charge. Another, smaller wolf appeared alongside its stride, throwing itself beneath the creature's gallop, tripping its legs and knocking it to the pavement. Jack kept a steady foot on the gas, putting some good distance between them and the quarreling creatures.

  Before the inexplicable sight faded from view, the smaller wolf dropped onto the other one, mauling it with a flurry of furious talons.

  Two animals fighting over a meal.

  Amanda's immediate worry was how big Rory Eastman's network was. If he could get the Greifsfield County PD to launch an all-out assault on a neighboring town's motel, the bastard wasn't that concerned about reprisal.

  "That's why we shouldn’t have gone to that resort yesterday. They know exactly who they're looking for now. And they've got our scent all over that motel room."

  Jack was quiet for a long time. When he spoke, he said, "Those were cops."

  "No. I don't think many cops in Western Massachusetts speak with European accents. They're wringers. No telling how many more of them there are, either."

  Jack lapsed into silence, focusing on delivering them from evil.

  You’re in, she thought while looking him over. His hands trembled, though his attention was on the road. His expression fought against fear, but his eyes betrayed that struggle. And yet, here he was. In one piece. He could handle himself, if need be.

  That made him an asset.

  Good thing.

  To clean up this mess, she was going to need all the help she could get.

  ***

  The red-maned wolf stood deep in gore, watching the truck's taillights shrink in the distance.

  Any later getting here and their escape might not have happened.

  She'd been forced out of an uneasy sleep by thoughts of her newly murdered mother. Imagery more real than any dream she'd ever had. She would do anything to refrain from seeing her that way again.

  Mom shouldn't be remembered that way.

  An urgency had burned in the pit of her stomach, telling her to find Jack; saying that the howling was after him. She had wanted to get closer to him, but not like this.

  Not when resisting the temptation to kill him herself had been so great.

  Her muzzle dipped toward the fallen creature, its eyes only now extinguishing the final signs of life.

  Lucy licked the roof of her mouth with excitement, eager to taste her spoils of war, curious to find out how wolf tasted.

  Ten

  Elisabeth wandered through the backyard, her feeble limbs brushed listless against the assorted bushes and shrubs that his parents had cultivated.

  Allen wanted to help, but only watched. This had been her daily routine—one he expected to continue into the foreseeable future.

  He sat at the rustic kitchen table, tapping impatient fingers against the thick oak surface. Despite being away less than a month, Mom's kitchen felt smaller now. As if it was no longer his home.

  Their enemies wouldn't find them here; at least he didn't think Jack would bother checking. They couldn't know that Elisabeth had lived, and would hopefully believe he'd taken her body and gone off to drown in grief.

  Throughout years of friendship with Jack, he couldn't recall a time when he'd taken him to his parents' house. It wasn't exactly near anything. Fifty minutes to Boston, but only if you traversed a lot of country roads to get out this way. If they'd had plans he went to Jack's place in Leominster.

  Here, they were safe.

  Thank God for small favors.

  Wasn't much point in thanking Him anymore. God, in all likelihood, didn't hav
e much to do with them. He was no longer a man made in God's image, but rather an unholy perversion of it. The guy who spent the first thirteen years of his life in Catholic school, and who never really doubted the existence of the good Lord, was suddenly public enemy number one in the eyes of every God-fearing Christian.

  The oversized cuckoo clock spit a tiny pewter rooster out of micro-sized barn doors, clucking the arrival of nine o' clock. He jumped at noise, and then swore about it.

  Every time.

  How happy he'd been to leave this disruption behind when he left for college. It took forever to get used it, and Elisabeth absolutely could not. She was up every few hours, tossing and turning over the fake bird and its hourly announcements. When her head was not cradled between his arm and his chest, it was hard for him to sleep as well.

  Then she'd go wandering, leaving him to sit here and wish there was more he could do to help.

  At least the folks weren't here. They were in Las Vegas, blowing through their Social Security money at a conservative pace, gambling on nickel slots. Dad was convinced that this was the best way to stretch a dollar, although he couldn't seem to grasp the fact that he was severely limiting his winnings.

  Didn't matter though, they'd made it a tradition over the last few years, speaking about it like there was no greater excitement in life. Who was he to tell them how to spend their retirement? Especially when their absence was a blessing for Elisabeth. She didn't need to answer Mom's twenty questions when she was trying to recover from a gunshot to the brain. He was also happy he didn't have to worry about her eating his family.

  Elisabeth's attention fell on him—a fleeting glance before she turned her back.

  Allen sighed. She had promised to tell him everything, but conversation had been decidedly minimal since leaving Greifsfield. It wasn't his lack of trying, either. She responded with one-word answers, refusing any offered services. No breakfast in bed, no hot tea from the kettle, and certainly no backrubs or contact of any kind. Resisting her was never easy, but more difficult now that she was off limits. Displays of affection, a kiss on the cheek or a gentle touch on the back, were met with utter hostility. And her glances were always sideways or secondary, no lingering contact. Allen wasn't much for insecurity, life was too short for it, but he'd felt an onset of it over the last twenty-four hours.

  It seemed all too clear that she regretted 'changing' him. Even now, she distanced herself so it would be easier to do the relationship fade. Nothing else made sense, and his rapping on the oak table intensified while he convinced himself he was on the verge of being dumped.

  Outside, Elisabeth was statuesque at yard's edge, staring through a line of tress, her mind lost in a veiled cache of memories that she refused to share. Maybe her current resentment wasn't entirely unfounded. It wasn't everyday that someone asked you to kill for them.

  "Ridiculous," she'd said upon his refusal. "You've taken lives already...what makes this any different?"

  It was a good point, but those lives haunted him nightly. Elisabeth didn't know that Sondra Gleason did more than visit him at night. He hadn't told her that she was on a mission to get him to splatter his brains all over Greyrock Mountain's nature trails.

  Last night, she'd been considerate enough to bring a silver pike into the dream, offering to help him sever the curse. He wondered how long he could resist that proposition, and knew he should probably cave soon. The hunger was alive inside him, mounting with the dawn of each new day. Even the much-coveted steak dinner did precious little to satisfy him now, with the juiciest, bloodiest cuts leaving him with hunger blue balls.

  Only time it wasn't a problem was when the wolf came out to eat. But no matter how hungry he got, the motivation to stalk and kill an innocent human being remained elusive, excluding that blonde trigger bitch. And Jack too, most likely, for putting her on their doorstep. That idiot looked like he hadn't intended the gunfire, and his battle with the psycho might've saved his life, but that wasn't the point.

  He couldn't be forgiven.

  Their friendship felt like it was decades ago at this point. He hadn't been walking this new world for a week, but yesterday's life was a distant fading memory. Not one iota of it had ever brought him as much delight as a minute spent at Elisabeth's side. Until her, he'd been biding his time. There was nothing worth missing in that life. Not when Elisabeth was his.

  Not for very much longer...

  He wouldn't let her go without a damn good fight.

  Elisabeth came inside and stood at the opposite end of the table. Her lips were a straight line and her eyes were glazed—if a raincloud could've followed her indoors, it would've.

  "Hey," he said, probably sounding far too eager and desperate. "You finished walking?"

  Her eyes refusing to settle on him. "It's gotten me as far as it can."

  Allen rose and started for it, ignoring the grim implication. There had to be another way. She stepped back and turned toward the window.

  "I do not want you this close to me."

  "Elisabeth." He went in for her cheek and wound up kissing a puff of her hair. "You're alive. You're healing. I saw you dead, and I don't know that I've fully been able to process this. Don't push me away...please. Let me help you."

  She turned. Raven-black hair obscured her grim features and sickly white complexion. Blue eyes peeked out from beneath vagrant stands, looking exhausted and defeated. Puffy. Little wet tracks ran vertical beneath them, staining her chiseled cheekbones.

  Her vulnerability was too much. He stepped inward and she backed off, but he was faster this time, and motivated by the animal's urges. He landed awkward against her mouth and his tongue tingled as it touched her salty stream of tears. Her thin and bony arms slid around him; the brush of her skin incited a spark.

  "I want you," he whispered, their mouths blowing hot air on each other.

  "Not now...not while I'm like this."

  She allowed herself to fall against him and her body, soft and firm in all the right places, burned away every thought, save for occupying her. He'd almost lost this. "I don't think I've ever needed you more."

  "What of the things I need? You know that is why I cannot do this now." She slipped past him and headed for the staircase. "I am weak and hideous. Hardly worthy of your libidinous urges."

  "Hideous?" He started after her, but she motioned for him to stay. He yielded like a trained wolf. "You're the most perfect thing I've ever seen. And goddamn you if you don't believe me."

  "Allen..."

  "Haven't I willingly given up my life to be with you? You took me away from my friends and I'm okay with that because you make me feel like we're the only two people in the world. So please stop distancing yourself from me."

  She pulled her hair aside to reveal the gaping bullet wound that hadn't yet healed. It was smaller now, but an angry infection remained. Its circular edge was ripe with rotted colors, green and purple, while the quarter-sized area extending outward was beat red. But it was healing—that's what mattered.

  "You're hurt," he said, matter-of-factly. "You're healing. That's what we do, right?"

  "We do."

  "So why are you being like this?” He grew indignant and didn't care. After the torture she put him through over the last few days, she could listen to what had been festering in his mind. "You're acting like you're permanently disfigured. Like this has somehow changed you and I."

  Her eyes remained on the cherry hardwoods, deep in thought.

  "Just tell me what's bothering you? It's more than the bullet. It has to be."

  She walked into the living room and sat on the wicker rocking chair. He followed, taking a seat on the edge of the tan couch and watched her expectantly. She was motionless, save for the chair's slow creak. She looked out on the desolate country road, and her eyes were a little less distant.

  Allen thought she might've been ready to speak. The room was steeped in silence for a long time—half an hour, maybe more. Then she finally turned to him with a quive
ring lip.

  "There was somebody else in my life...a long time ago."

  Allen wanted to do something, but stayed his urges. He thought about wiping her eyes and taking her close, but this was the most they'd spoken in days. Hearing her out was the better move.

  "He was one, too...varcolac. I loved him more than anything else." Her fingers rubbed that white tooth necklace. "We traveled the world, a pack of two, preying on anyone we wanted. The more fear we felt, the better we became. There was a lot of fear back then. A lot more superstition. Villagers holed up in their homes thinking that snarling beasts could not get them. Aetius lit fire to them, smoking them out. There was a time when the tortured cries of our victims, along with their smoldering bones, got me off. Other times, their screams worked me into such a frenzy that I would wait until they burst from their homes, their skin half boiled from their bodies. I'd snatch them as they headed for the lake, when they were within an arm's length of relief. Are you disgusted with me yet?"

  Yes.

  Not because of this confession: atrocities that equaled the Inquisition painting hanging in her home. Instead, he focused on Aetius, almost positive that he was about to be cast aside for the rekindled affections of an old and evil flame.

  Elisabeth leaned forward as if sensing his broken ego. "It was a long time ago, Allen." Her fingers stroked the back of his hand, closing around it and sending a shiver down to his soul. "I am yours now. That is why I feel the need to tell you this. Nothing more. Okay?"

  He nodded, aware that his face was marked with skepticism.

  "Our reign of terror continued for years and we could not be bothered to worry about consequences. Why would we? Back then, the world was larger. People in one province were barely aware of bordering neighbors, let alone countries across the sea. Fear of the dark was widespread, while fear of the devil was rampant. We exploited this. Made whole villages disappear, corrupted some, murdered others. Chaos and bloodshed were our only motivations and we could not be bothered to think about the future...do you know what happens when you overindulge, though? It loses its luster. My thirst for vengeance was quelled, and Aetius and I spoke of settling...as best as two monsters can. Understand, we were under no illusions as to what we were and did not intend to abandon our hungers. We simply...wanted more of the lives we might have had before our respective curses. I was an artist back then just as I am now. I wanted a studio somewhere where the creative process would not be disturbed. What we did not know, however, was that a secret order had been sent out after us. Our kin was hunted relentlessly, and this signaled the right time for us to realize our plan and set about finding a home. Several months passed and, in an instance of ironic timing, they caught us just as we were about to settle into new lives. Aetius was killed in an ambush...I was wounded. Would have died if not for...for my gift."