THE HOWLING II

by Gary Brandner

  "I saw Dirty Harry," he explained patiently. "Tonight it's Magnum Force."

  "To bed," Karyn said firmly.

  "Oh, okay," Joey said, with all the martyrdom a six-year-old could muster. In another moment, though, the defeat was forgotten as he kissed first his father, then Karyn, good-night.

  "Will you come up and tuck me in?" he asked Karyn with his arms tight around her neck.

  "I'll be up just as soon as Mrs. Jensen gets you ready," she promised.

  At the sound of her name, Mrs. Jensen appeared in the doorway. To Karyn and David, she said, "He was trying to get you to let him stay up, I suppose."

  "There was some mention of a Clint Eastwood movie," Karyn said.

  Mrs. Jensen clucked her tongue in disapproval. "Always he wants to watch the shoot-'em-ups. Such trash. You couldn't force him to watch a nice wholesome Walt Disney."

  "They're dumb," Joey complained. "Nobody ever shoots anybody."

  "That's enough, Joey," David said, not unkindly. "Go along up with Mrs. Jensen now."

  From a standing start the boy took off and dashed past the housekeeper and out the doorway. They could hear his small feet pounding up the stairs to his bedroom. Mrs. Jensen sighed and rolled her eyes in a long-suffering expression that did not hide her affection for the boy. She followed him out of the room.

  David stretched and yawned. "I think I'll turn in early myself tonight. How about you?"

  Karyn felt the tightening of her skin that always came when she thought about sex. The years of therapy had helped her considerably, but she still had problems.

  She could never completely forget those last weeks with Roy, when he was going through the terrible change. She had not known at first what was happening to him, but found his touch suddenly repellent. Then after Drago, there was the crazy time with Chris Halloran. They had plunged into wild sex games, hoping to dull the remembered horror. Finally, inevitably, they had failed.

  David Richter was a gentle, if unimaginative, lover. Sex with him had been satisfactory most of the time. Still, for Karyn, the residue of fear remained. Naturally, she had talked about it with David and with Dr. Goetz. They were both most reassuring and supportive, but there was always the worm of doubt.

  She took David's hand and pressed it warmly. "I'm not really sleepy," she said. "I think I'll stay up and read for a while."

  "Do you want me to get you a pill?"

  Karyn did not miss the flicker of David's eyes as he glanced through the window at the rising moon. Normally he did not approve of her taking sleeping pills, but he knew how the full moon disturbed her.

  "I don't think so," she said. "I haven't used a pill in months, and I'd just as soon stay away from them."

  "Would you like to play a little backgammon? Give me a chance to win back some of my losses?"

  Karyn smiled at him. She knew he was reluctant to leave her downstairs alone, and she loved him for it, but it was high time she made it clear that she was not an invalid.

  "You go on to bed, dear," she said. "I know you have to be up early. I'll be along in a little while."

  Mrs. Jensen reappeared in the doorway. "The young man is ready to be tucked in."

  Karyn and David went up together to Joey's room at the head of the stairs. The wallpaper featured the exploits of Spiderman. It was chosen personally by Joey to replace what he called "those dumb ducks" that had decorated the walls when the room was a nursery.

  Karyn smiled down at the boy and remembered how the idea of being a stepmother had worried her at first. When she was married to Roy, they had talked now and then about having children, but there was always a list of things they wanted to do first.

  David Richter had become, unexpectedly, a father at forty-two. He treated the child with a kind of careful affection, as though afraid he might somehow damage the boy. Joey was three when his mother had died of cancer, and David had a couple of rough months trying to be both parents until he found Mrs. Jensen. Karyn was the first woman David had been seriously involved with since his wife's death, and he was delighted when she and Joey had hit it off.

  The boy sat up in bed and hugged first his father, then Karyn. He lay down again while Karyn went through the nightly ritual of tucking the blankets close to his firm, wiry little body.

  "G'night, Mom," the boy said. "G'night, Dad."

  David and Karyn had spent considerable time discussing what Joey should call her after they were married, but the boy solved the problem for them immediately, figuring that if the blond lady was married to Dad, she was Mom, and that was that.

  Leaving the door open a couple of inches, the way Joey liked it, Karyn and David stepped back into the hall. Karyn kissed her husband lightly.

  "Go on to bed," she said. "I'll be in soon."

  She went back downstairs and into the living room. A stack of magazines was spread across the coffee table. Karyn picked out this month's Redbook and carried it back into the family room. She could hear Mrs. Jensen's television set playing faintly in the housekeeper's room at the rear of the house. Karyn smiled at the distant popping of gunshots. Mrs. Jensen was watching Magnum Force.

  For perhaps a quarter of an hour, Karyn tried but failed to focus her attention on the magazine. What she needed, Karyn decided, was something to really occupy her mind during the day. Something that would take enough effort to leave her honestly tired at bedtime. There was little for her to do around the house. Mrs. Jensen ran it with cool Scandinavian efficiency. Karyn was grateful for the help, but secretly wished that once in a while the housekeeper might leave something for her to do.

  To help fill in the days, Karyn spent a few hours a week doing volunteer work at the Indian school. It was useful work, but also very "in" this season, and they had more volunteers up there now than Indians.

  What she really wanted to do was to go back to work. Karyn had experience in working with conventions, and felt she could find some sort of related work with one of the large Seattle hotels. She could handle it now, physically and mentally,

  Karyn was sure. David might not be enthusiastic, but if she really wanted to do it he would not stand in her way.

  Finally she laid the magazine aside and stood up. She was still not sleepy, and did not want to go up and lie awake in bed, disturbing David. She wandered into the kitchen and took down the plastic spray bottle and long-nosed watering can she used for her plants. Karyn had an understanding with Mrs. Jensen that Karyn alone had responsibility for the plants. It pleased her to look after them—tiny living things which were hers alone, and which depended on her for their existence. After the sadistic slaughter of her little dog that summer by the creatures of Drago, Karyn would never again keep a pet. The plants were as close a substitute as she felt she could handle.

  They grew in pots in an airy room at the side of the house. David liked to call it the sunroom. It amused Karyn, a Southern Californian, that any room in any house in Seattle should be called the sunroom, but she never told that to David.

  Karyn went first to the chlorophytum, the spider plant. The graceful green leaves, with their white stripes, arced like a fountain up and over the edge of their hanging pot. Karyn felt the soil with her finger and found it moist.

  No drink for you today, she thought, just a nice little spray to perk you up. She pushed the plunger on the plastic bottle, and a fine mist of water dampened the leaves. Talking to plants, Karyn knew, was foolishness for addled old ladies. But it didn't count, she told herself, if you didn't do it out loud. At any rate, she stopped short of giving them personal names.

  Her next stop was the Boston fern. She stood back a little and admired the buoyant arch of the fronds, their fine, lacy detail. She stepped closer and saw that a little spider had moved in and was busily spinning a web among the leaves. Karyn started to pinch the spider off in a piece of Kleenex, but stayed her hand in midair. You have a right to live too, she thought, and balled up the Kleenex and stuffed it into her pocket.

  She always went to the philodendron last
, because it was her personal favorite. It was a masculine plant, growing strong and glossy, climbing the moss-covered pole like an athlete. We'll soon need a bigger pot for you, my friend, Karyn thought. She gave the healthy leaves a light spray and added a touch of water and plant food to the soil, where the tough, sinewy roots drew their nourishment.

  When she was finished Karyn stood back and smiled at her little garden. Then she took the spray bottle and watering can back to the kitchen. She went around the house, checking all the doors and windows, making sure they were all locked. She knew, of course, that Mrs. Jensen did that every night before she retired, but it made Karyn feel better to see to the locks herself. The last thing she did was draw the draperies across the French windows, shutting out the cold light of the full moon.

  6

  MOVING IN STRONG strides across the moon-bright clearing, Roy Beatty reached the edge of the forest. It was like coming home. He stripped off all his clothes and let them fall to the ground. Standing upright made him feel constricted, and he sank gratefully to his knees, leaning forward to dig his fingers into the soft earth. He stretched out full length and lay for a moment with his face pressed to the sweet-smelling carpet of moss and leaves. With a deep sigh he rolled onto his back. Above him, through the cross-hatching of branches, he could see the full moon riding high and cold. The rush of blood through his veins became a roaring in his ears.

  A short, sharp pain stabbed into his forehead, and he cried out. His body jerked over onto one side as though controlled by wires. He cramped into a curled, fetuslike position. As he lay there, the man's face stretched and distorted like modeling clay until all resemblance to Roy Beatty was lost. His nose and jaw thrust forward and became a muzzle. His ears grew longer and tapered themselves into blunt points. A series of convulsions seized his body. When the tremors quieted he stretched again, and new, powerful muscles moved under the skin. Where there had been bare flesh, thick fur, golden tan and glossy, now covered his body.

  In minutes the change was complete. The creature that had been a man rose to its feet, unsteadily at first, then more confidently as it gathered strength. Braced on four sinewy legs, the beast pointed its muzzle to the night sky.

  The wolf opened its throat and howled. A quavering cry that chilled the blood of the gypsies locked away in their trailers nearby. The wolf exulted in the renewed power of its body. It moved easily through the forest, picking up speed as it went. Finally it charged ahead at its full speed—faster than a man could run, faster than any natural wolf. It crashed heedlessly through the undergrowth, the thick coat of fur protecting its hide from thorns and broken ends of branches. The essence of the man that had been Roy Beatty shrank and retreated to a dark tiny corner of the mind of the beast. All rational thought was wiped out. There was only the raging hunger of the werewolf.

  The inhuman howling carried clearly to the trailer where Marcia Lura was locked away from the night. The thing on the floor scrambled over to the door and pressed its face against the cool metal. From the misshapen mouth came a sound—something between a woman's sob and the growl of a wolf.

  Through the forest the huge pale wolf loped on. Dimly remembered in the animal brain were those other nights when the sleek black she-wolf ran at his side. Then the way she looked, moving powerfully, gracefully, and her sharp female scent on the night air, had driven the pale wolf half-mad with animal lust. Three years before, on a night of terror in the village of Drago, he had lost the female forever.

  On that night, as the fire consumed the village and destroyed the others, the huge, pale wolf had broken through the flames to where the female lay wounded and dragged her to safety. The silver bullet missed ending the dual life of the black wolf and Marcia Lura by the breadth of a hair. Over long agonized months, Roy Beatty had nursed the woman back from near death. Now, at least in her human form, the only mark of the wound she bore was the silver-white streak through her midnight hair. As to the other—Roy could only imagine the things that happened to Marcia on the nights she locked herself away from him. He knew only that the lean, beautiful she-wolf would not return. That hunger would never be fed.

  But there was the other hunger, the hunger that drove the werewolf endlessly through the night. The killing. The tearing away of living flesh, the crunch of bone between powerful jaws, the sweet-salty taste of warm blood.

  As the werewolf reached the far side of the wood, it slowed and moved cautiously through the last of the trees. Roy Beatty had learned much in the three years since he went down under the slashing teeth of the she-wolf and awoke to find himself forever changed. He had learned to move with stealth and to kill with the smallest possible commotion.

  The wolf checked abruptly as a change in the night breeze brought the scent of living prey. Moving crouched and silent through the shadows, he inched to the top of a grassy knoll that overlooked the moonlit meadow. The great yellow eyes searched out the quarry.

  Along a rutted dirt road that wound through the pasture land walked a boy of about ten. He was headed toward the lights of a farmhouse a mile away where the highway skirted the fields.

  The black lips of the, werewolf twitched as the boy scuffed along the road, whacking idly at tall weeds with a stick. The boy had short, reddish hair and a spattering of freckles across his face. He wore faded jeans and a light jacket. The scene stood out in sharp relief under the bright moon.

  The muscles bunched in the wolf's haunches as the beast gathered itself for the attack. It would be over in seconds. Before the boy could cry out, the wolf would have him by the throat.

  At the last possible instant, the wolf held back. The breeze carried a new scent that held him motionless. As he watched the boy, a shaggy white dog bounded up the road from the direction of the farmhouse, flapping its great brush of a tail happily.

  The wolf crouched low again, its belly brushing the ground. Although the wind was in his favor, he saw the dog break off its playful romp around the boy, then brace stiffly, testing the air. The fur ruffed up on the back of the dog's neck as it felt the presence of danger. He barked a warning into the darkness.

  It would, of course, be no contest. The dog did not live that could last two minutes against a werewolf. Still, there would be a delay in getting at the boy. The clamor might arouse someone in the house. The boy might escape and alarm the people with a story of seeing a huge, pale wolf.

  The boy walked on, calling for the white dog to stop fooling around. The werewolf watched from the top of the knoll, its cruel teeth gleaming in the moonlight. With a last half-hearted bark at the night, the dog trotted after the boy.

  Slowly the muscles of the wolf relaxed as the boy and the dog rounded a turn in the road and went out of sight. The wolf turned in a slow circle, sampling the air, sorting out the many night smells. Finding what it wanted, the beast loped off over the meadow, away from the lights of the farmhouse.

  After a quarter of a mile the werewolf slowed. Straight ahead was its kill for this night. There a black and white Holstein cow stood methodically chewing her cud. Beside the cow, its gangly legs folded under, rested her calf.

  Killing this defenseless creature would not bring to the werewolf the fierce, orgasmic joy that came from killing a human, but it would deaden the wolfs awful hunger. The wolf eased closer. The cow raised her head, listening to the rustle of grass behind her. He reflexes were far too dull for her to sense the danger.

  Anger and frustration at losing the boy aroused the killing lust in the heart of the werewolf. He sprang at the calf, hitting the awkward creature as it was trying to rise. The terrified calf was knocked sprawling at the feet of its mother.

  The cow mooed in fear, and lowered its head in an ineffectual attempt to defend its calf. The wolf merely turned to snarl at the cow, then returned to the business of killing.

  While the cow stomped helplessly around, the wolf clamped its fearsome jaws on the neck of the calf. The spine snapped like a dry branch and the struggling young animal went limp.

  Unde
r the sorrowful gaze of the mother the wolf fed on the tender flesh of the calf and drank its blood. With an occasional growl he kept the cow from coming too close.

  When the wolf had eaten its fill, it used its teeth to crack away the ribcage. Almost gently the bloody muzzle pushed into the chest cavity and tore loose the still-warm heart.

  With the bloody organ in its mouth, the wolf rose from its kill and loped away across the meadow toward the forest. The cow lowered its head and nuzzled the mangled carcass.

  The moon was low over the far horizon when the werewolf returned to the gypsy camp. He crossed the clearing between the forest and the little cluster of trailers with the heart of the calf still in his mouth, stopping at the trailer where, hours before, Roy Beatty had left Marcia Lura. The wolf dropped the heart outside the door and stood for a moment, his head cocked, ears pricked, listening. Then he turned and moved back to the edge of the forest.

  Minutes later, as the pale wolf lay out of sight in the underbrush, the bolt lock of the trailer door shot back and the door scraped open. The pale wolf heard, but made no move to approach as something snatched the heart of the calf inside and the door slammed shut again. The sounds that came from the trailer then made those gypsies who lay close enough to hear sweat cold in their beds.

  Hours later, with the first light of dawn streaking the sky, Roy Beatty stretched his aching body, pulled on his clothes, and walked toward the trailer.

  7

  HE KNOCKED LIGHTLY at the door of the trailer. Inside, the bolt scraped back and in a moment the door opened. Marcia reached out her hands to him and helped him inside. Roy clung to her and felt some of the woman's strength flow into his exhausted body. He stepped back after a minute and looked at her. Somehow, after she had gone through one of the agonizing transformations, Marcia looked her most beautiful. The silver-streaked hair fell loose to her shoulders. Deep fires glowed in the green eyes. Roy's breath caught in his throat.