by Jen Haeger
“What did you do before…before this?” Evelyn ventured softly.
Philip appeared to regain some emotional control and straightened slightly. “I was a high school science teacher.”
“Oh,” breathed Evelyn, “I wouldn’t have guessed that.” She gave Philip a small smile. Again she pondered how lucky she was that she had been able to get back some semblance of a normal life after becoming a Wolfkin. Philip would never again have that.
“Do you miss it?”
He nodded. “Sometimes.”
*
Evelyn made her way slowly back to the kitchen lost in deep thought about what Philip had told her about he and The Scribe. She hoped that no one was awake yet, because she didn’t want to have to explain what she had been doing. She didn’t quite know why she didn’t want to tell David about the file, maybe because it admits doubt in my ability to find a cure? In any case, she didn’t want to talk about it or anything else right then, so when she rounded the last corner and peered into the kitchen to find it empty, she was relieved.
She set the scroll down on the table and crept back to her and David’s room. David hadn’t stirred. She watched him sleeping, with her and Philip’s conversation fresh in her mind. Evelyn’s heart was filled with sorrow and sympathy and longing. She touched his shoulder tenderly and whispered his name. It took a few moments of gentle prodding, but finally David awoke.
“Philip is done,” Evelyn said softly.
“I didn’t hear him come get us,” he replied groggily.
Evelyn shrugged and made a non-committed noise in the back of her throat. Then she stepped outside to wake Madeline who was at the door to her room after half a knock, and gave Evelyn an unpleasant look. By the time Evelyn, David, and Madeline had all used the facilities and got themselves packed up and headed to the kitchen, Philip was there waiting for them. His face was once again an emotionless mask. He handed the scroll to Evelyn again.
“Ready to go?” he asked.
They all nodded in agreement, and he began to lead them back out to the door. When they reached the door Philip started cranking it open, and as soon as it was wide enough for her to fit through, Madeline squeezed out without a backwards glance.
“Madeline, always a pleasure,” Philip said without amusement.
David turned to Philip.
“I’m sorry about before,” he said frowning. “You are a man of your word and I can respect that.”
He offered Philip his hand and Philip shook it without speaking. David then made his way through the door leaving Evelyn with Philip.
“You will tell him goodbye for us won’t you?” she asked him sadly.
“Of course.”
“And thank you for the affidavit for the little girl.”
Philip didn’t meet her eyes. “It may not help as much as you hope.”
“I know. But it might help a little. Anyways, thanks, and good luck with…with him. Be careful and take care of yourself.”
She didn’t know Philip well enough for a hug, but she held out a hand for him to shake, and he took it. Evelyn looked into his dark eyes and saw the despair hiding within their depths. She gave his hand a squeeze of understanding, and he returned it.
“You too.”
11
Roberto stared out the window of the manor at the grey light of another dying day. Rumors had been coming into the Council for several days now, very unnerving rumors. Some packs were starting to notice unfamiliar Wolfkin in their territories, and others had been taking in strays that had no idea what was happening to them. There had even been rumors that some of these strays were children. He let out a heavy sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose just under his brow. What was happening? There had been peace and hardly any conflicts needing Council resolve for centuries. When he had taken over his Council position from his ailing father ten years ago it had seemed a trivial thing. Nothing more than an occasional inconvenience more than made up for by a life of opulent luxury. Servants to attend to every human need, extensive grounds and abundant game to satisfy more feral needs, and guaranteed care after he was unable to care for himself. Everything a Wolfkin should want.
But then two years ago everything had changed. A stray had found his way to the Vulke, and then things had just gone to Hell. The delicate balance of the Council looking the other way while the Vulke killed and terrorized, a necessary evil in order for the Council to keep the peace, had crumbled with the Council ordained challenge. At first Roberto had thought that losing both their Alpha and Beta would weaken the Vulke such that they would fade away for another century or so and he would be able to finish his time with the Council in peace. But too soon it became clear that things were much worse now. Oh, the Vulke had slunk away with their tails between their legs, but their hatred had grown and festered and now Roberto feared the worst. The Vulke had been too quiet for too long.
And the trouble brewing somewhere in the cold mountains of Russia didn’t even take into account the girl. Dr. Evelyn Lucia Eisenhart was more dangerous to the delicate balance of the Wolfkin world than any single crazed pack could ever be; she who might be the key to a “cure”. Roberto had never given much thought to the possibility of not dying gibbering in a lonely cell somewhere. Generations of his family had been members of the Council, and he had been groomed at an early age to be prepared to accept his birthright and become a Wolfkin. He had never even considered an alternative, and thought it was his duty to accept the inevitable madness and death that accompanied it. But then Evelyn had come along and the Vulke felt so strongly about her ability to end Wolfkin kind that they had tried to kill her.
Roberto hadn’t wanted to believe it at first, but then a thought struck him. What if she could cure me? No longer would he have to embrace insanity and an early grave. He might marry, have children, grow old, and live to see grandchildren running through his garden.
On a personal level it was a heavenly dream, but for the Wolfkin world it would be a nightmare. To the Vulke it was a terrible threat to take away their power, but for others it would be destroying their religion. To many, becoming a Wolfkin was akin to a blessing or at least a great honor. Most Wolfkin felt that they were chosen for a special purpose, a special destiny. If they found out that it was merely a disease, an unusual but curable virus, there was no telling what might happen. There would be an uproar, of course, followed by chaos. Then two sides would form: those who believed it was a virus and those that held fast to the belief that there was something more spiritual or mystical or supernatural about it. Then, there would be war.
As a council member, he could not allow that. The Council’s only purpose, the reason it had been formed all those years ago, was to forge and maintain peace between the packs. However, after several months of internal struggle Roberto had given in to himself and secretly contacted Evelyn. He’d been funding her research ever since. He rationalized that it would take years of intensive research for her to make any real progress, and by then the Council may have come up with a way of controlling the cure and of presenting it in such a way that it didn’t threaten the packs. It would certainly help with the current stray problem, he thought idly.
Outside the day surrendered to night and darkness crept out from the forest and shrouded the garden in shadows. Roberto took out his silver pocket watch. It was shaped like a wolf’s head and when he released the catch, the wolf’s mouth opened to reveal the watch face. It was a family heirloom, and had been a gift from his father when he had become a Wolfkin. Thoughts of his father came in uninvited. He had been chained up in his underground chamber with no one but his caretakers for company for eight years before his body at last succumbed to the virus. Even Roberto’s mother stopped visiting his father years before, saying that his father had died, but his body just didn’t realize it yet. Roberto shivered. In his mind he could see himself incoherent and chained, slowly wasting away. He checked the time. The Council was meeting tonight to discuss the recent rumors and prepare in case any of the
strays became problematic as David did. He was late. Roberto turned from the window to make his way down to the meeting hall.
Just then there was a terrible noise and the floor shook beneath him. The bulb in the lamp next to him flickered and then the light when out. Roberto was plunged into darkness as a deafening blast knocked him off his feet. Several more blasts, not quite as loud, but still powerful enough to make the whole manor shudder, went off. Then, as if in slow motion, Roberto felt the floor give way and he began to slide. There was an agonizingly loud crumbling sound and a roar as some part of the massive structure gave way. And then he was falling. Bits of debris bounced off him as he fell, and it was then that he realized that the building was coming down around him.
He hit something solid without warning and landed in a painful heap. The noise of destruction was thunderous, but Roberto thought he also heard gunshots and screaming. He managed to curl himself into a ball and cover his head just as a large chunk of floor crashed down on his back. It hurt, but he thought that if he could just stay still like this, he might be safe. But then another, more musical sound caught his attention and an awful recollection bubbled to the forefront of his brain. There had been something very large and very heavy on the other side of the room, a grand piano.
12
The hike back to the plane was unremarkable and seemed to take no time at all to Evelyn. It could have been the fact that she felt happier than she had in a very long time. That was not to say that she felt happy exactly. There was just too much going on to feel happy. She had just discovered that The Scribe had succumbed to his mental infirmity, his caretaker who was forced to watch him decay mentally and physically had once been his lover, Clem was still missing, Katie was still just as likely to be condemned to death as not, and she and David were only just beginning their long, uphill road towards reconciliation. But she now held out some hope for her and David and she had a renewed fire in her belly to find a cure, for Katie’s sake. She found her mind wandering to the lab and their research. She tried to look at all of their work with fresh eyes.
When they boarded the plane David turned to Evelyn.
“Do you want to sit in the co-pilot’s seat for the flight back?”
This drew a seething look from Madeline, but it was a wasted effort since Evelyn didn’t want a front row view of the take-off and landing anyway.
“No thanks, I’m good.” She smiled and winked at David.
When they were once more off the ground, Evelyn settled into the back seats and munched on a Granola bar while she jotted down some notes in a small notebook that she had brought along in her pack. She wanted to focus on Katie specifically because even if Marcus did allow her to live, there was previous evidence that hinted that the retrovirus that was the cause of werewolfism was more virulent and progressed faster in younger individuals.
It would be helpful to know which pack infected her, thought Evelyn. She didn’t believe anyone in the Wahya pack or the Amaruq would do such a terrible thing. Granted she didn’t know even a fraction of the members of either pack, but she found it difficult believe that anyone that Clem would be associated with would be capable of something like that. Also, it was likely that a few of the older members of those packs would be able to recognize the scent of someone they knew at the house where the attacks took place. Evelyn felt that it was a safe bet to say it was the Vulke. They had attacked people on American soil before. In fact, Clem had been infected by a Vulke while hunting in Alaska. As Evelyn remembered the story of his contraction of the virus she frowned. The Vulke had ravaged Clem and left him for dead. Katie had appeared mostly unharmed save a small scratch on her forehead. That seemed quite odd.
“Where do you think she was bitten?” Evelyn shouted up to David.
He turned to face her. “Who? Katie?” David furrowed his brow in thought. “I don’t know. Marcus didn’t say, did he?”
Evelyn shook her head.
David ran a hand through his hair. “Maybe the scratch was a tooth scratch? The one on her forehead.”
Evelyn frowned deeper. “I guess that’s possible, but it seems awfully delicate for the Vulke,” she countered.
David gave her a quizzical look. “Who said anything about the Vulke?”
Evelyn narrowed her eyes and her gaze turned steely. “Who else would do something like this to a child?”
David shrugged. “They are crazy and sadistic,” he said darkly, but then shook his head as if trying to physically remove the thought of some terrifying wolf-like monster holding Katie down and deliberately infecting her that way. “Maybe we just didn’t see it.”
“Maybe…” said Evelyn uncertainly.
But something about it all just didn’t seem right. David turned back to face the front of the plane. Evelyn tugged at her lip thinking. Another thing was bothering her. The Vulke that had bitten Clem had been way up in the middle of nowhere Alaska, and had come in a hunting party across the Bering Strait. They hadn’t been in rural Indiana. But then Evelyn thought of two years ago when the Vulke had attacked her in Michigan. I guess they just get around, she thought grimly.
*
The plane ride and subsequent car ride back to civilization were long and tedious, and Evelyn got more and more apprehensive the closer they got to Mount Pleasant. She dared not even call Marcus for fear that he would make a rash decision about Katie without allowing Evelyn to defend her. Even though the best defense that Evelyn had was to say that she might be able to cure Katie, and she was certain that revealing that David and she were secretly, actively researching a cure to Marcus was a bad idea at this stage. She had read over the document that Philip had prepared for them and found that it was pretty much as she suspected. He had worded it very carefully, but it still said exactly what he told them before. While Katie’s existence didn’t technically violate any Wolfkin laws, the history of child werewolves was clearly one of danger, misery, pain, and suffering.
When they were only about ten minutes from the casino, Evelyn called just to make sure that Marcus was there. Caroline answered the phone on the second ring.
“Caroline.”
Evelyn’s teeth gritted involuntarily at the sound of the other woman’s voice.
“Hi, Caroline, it’s Evelyn. We’re about ten minutes out. Is Marcus there?”
“I’ll inform him your arrival is imminent.”
Evelyn rolled her eyes at the phone. Seriously, who talked like that?
“Thanks,” Evelyn took a deep breath, “any word on Clem?”
There was silence and at first Evelyn thought that the other woman had already hung up on her.
“Nothing new. We’ve sent a team to Sault Ste. Marie to speak with Clem’s family there.”
Evelyn’s attitude towards Caroline softened slightly when she heard the weariness and concern in her strained voice.
“Oh, O.K….erm…we’ll be there soon.”
Evelyn hung up the phone on the awkward end of the conversation. She thought that it was strange that Caroline hadn’t asked her anything about what the Scribe had said about Katie. It started a worry gnawing inside her stomach that Marcus had already made a decision without waiting for their return.
David glanced over at her. “Any news on Clem?”
“No, but they’ve sent some Wahya up to talk to Karen.”
David nodded, but didn’t comment. Evelyn chose not to tell him about her concerns regarding Caroline not asking her about the outcome of the trip. She thought that he would probably say that it was possible that Caroline just didn’t want to prolong her conversation with Evelyn, and maybe he was right.
*
They arrived at the Casino and were led back to Marcus’s office again. Zachary wasn’t with him this time and Marcus looked a bit rumpled, as if he may have spent the entire previous night in his office. Evelyn mused that she and David were in desperate need of showers as well after their travels.
“Thank you for doing this,” Marcus said as Evelyn handed him the scroll.
She and David nodded then sat quietly while he read it. Marcus’s face became more and more drawn as he continued to examine the document. When he finished, he set the parchment down on his desk, still looking at it.
“It is as I feared,” he said softly.
“But, you won’t…won’t hurt her will you Marcus?” Evelyn pleaded. “You can’t. She’s just a little girl.”
Marcus hesitated, then looked up at Evelyn, “No, I will not harm her now,” he began, “But it is Wahya custom to reclaim those who…become lost to themselves,” he finished carefully.
“You mean that you won’t hurt her until she goes insane. Which could be soon, right?” Evelyn demanded evenly.
Marcus nodded gravely, “Even so.”
Evelyn sagged in her seat. On the one hand she was glad that Marcus hadn’t just decided to kill Katie outright. On the other hand he had still signed her death warrant. Evelyn had no idea how much time she had just bought Katie, but there was no sense in arguing with Marcus. Evelyn had argued with him before and it had done absolutely no good whatsoever. There was nothing left for her to do now…except find a cure. She looked at her hands.
“Thank you again for going. This,” Marcus held up the parchment, “will certainly help if trouble should arise. You should go home now. I will let you know if there is any word on Clem.” Marcus stood and motioned towards the door.
David also stood. “You’re welcome,” he said to Marcus politely then changed his tone, “but please don’t try to keep us out of the loop again. We live here too, and we should know what’s going on, even if you don’t think that we can help.” David leveled a stern gaze at Marcus then turned towards the door.