by Amy Boyles
FIFTEEN
I rose. “What? We’re supposed to guard the werewolf? No way. No how. That thing almost bit my head off last time I saw it. There is no way on all of God’s green earth and then some that I’m going to guard a werewolf.”
“It’s not like you won’t have silver bullets,” Betty mumbled. “What do you think? I’m going to put you in a dangerous situation?”
I nodded. “Yes. Yes, I do think you’re going to do that. Worse, I don’t think you care.”
“Oh, she cares,” Cordelia said. “Enough to give us silver bullets.”
Betty pointed at her. “Watch it, or you’ll be out your dinner.”
Cordelia gave her plate a bored look. “I have to watch my figure anyway.”
Betty’s hard glare ripped into me, making me feel bad for not immediately jumping on the let’s-go-watch-a-werewolf bandwagon.
“Okay,” I said, hanging my head. “I’ll help watch the werewolf.”
“Good,” Betty said. “‘Cause you girls are going to be late.”
She crossed to the hearth and picked up the shotgun resting on its butt beside near it. She cracked it open and pulled out the slugs. She looped her finger in the air and two more slugs hovered in the air. Betty thumbed them into the barrels and shut it tight.
“He’ll show up right before you and chain himself. Don’t look at him. Don’t watch the transformation.”
I raked my fingers nervously through my hair. “Why? Is it bad luck or something? Will I turn into a werewolf if I see someone else change into one?”
“No,” Betty snapped, “it’s just plain rude. Would you want someone to watch you?”
“I guess not.”
“The only rule is, make sure he doesn’t escape. No matter what, the wolf is not allowed to be unchained. He can’t control what he does in the animal state. So what’s the rule?” Her steely gaze landed on me.
I wagged my finger at her as if I were a four-year-old giving her what for. “No setting the wolf free. You don’t have to worry about me on that one. I won’t be letting that creature loose. I’m scared to death of it.”
Betty dragged her gaze from me to Cordelia and Amelia. “Girls, get your skillets. You’ve got some flying to do.”
I hopped on my cast iron skillet and readied to follow Amelia and Cordelia to the Cobweb forest. The moon hadn’t started to rise yet, but it would be soon.
“Come on,” Cordelia said, “we need to put the pedal to the metal.”
Wind whisked my hair as we rode through the quiet night. We reached the forest and landed inside a square copse of hedges.
A slab of concrete had been poured in the middle and a chain secured to it.
Cordelia pointed to a corner. “Let’s stand there until he comes and changes.”
There was one burning question I couldn’t keep inside me any longer. “Who is it? Who’s the wolf?”
Right then, a figure appeared from the other side of the hedges. He had arrived. The werewolf.
I couldn’t see his face and that’s what I wanted. I gave him a hard glance as Amelia tugged my sleeve.
“We’re not supposed to look.”
I frowned. “Right.”
Poop. Rain on my parade, why don’t you?
I glanced at my feet as I heard the shuffling of clothes and the chain being secured. I didn’t want to stare at a naked man, so I waited, watching my toes.
Then the ripping began. It sounded like bones breaking and crushing. Skin ripped. The gasps that the man released scared me more than the sound of muscle tearing and sewing itself into new shapes and sizes.
I held my ears, not wanting to hear too much because, to be honest y’all, I thought I might throw up.
After a minute or two, Amelia poked me in the ribs. I glanced up to see a snarling, pawing werewolf.
“Holy shrimp and grits,” I said.
“I thought you’d see it before,” Cordelia said.
“I had, but not quite like this.”
Moonlight sliced into the copse, lighting the animal. Powerful jaws clenched as the creature growled. Massive legs extended from a thick body. The wolf’s muscles quivered and twitched, making me feel as if the animal wanted to spring for us, but knew the chain kept it locked in place.
The creature growled, glaring right at us.
“What are we supposed to do?” Amelia said, “We can’t stand in this corner all night.”
“We can move,” Cordelia said. “It’s not like he can break free.”
Amelia toed forward and the wolf lunged for her.
Look, I was not about to spend an entire night afraid of some stupid werewolf. I grabbed the shotgun from Cordelia, took a step and said, “Listen here, you leave us alone and we’ll leave you alone.”
The wolf’s gaze switched from the shotgun to me. It cocked its head as I talked.
“We’re here to make sure nothing happens, so quiet down. I’m not feeling like using these silver bullets, but if I have to, I will.”
The beast dropped to the concrete. It wrapped one paw over the other and panted.
“Do you think it needs water?” Amelia said.
Cordelia glared at her. “Sure. Go get it some.”
“I was just wondering,” Amelia whimpered. “It’s a perfectly legitimate question.”
“Not when there’s a werewolf involved,” I said.
Cordelia patted my shoulder. “Good work. Wow. You’re some animal tamer.”
I handed her the shotgun. “It probably has something to do with my ability to talk to animals more than anything else.”
Amelia eyed the creature. “I don’t know. He seems to like you.”
I sat on the soft grass and stretched my legs in front of me. “Do y’all know who it is?”
They exchanged a look. Cordelia spoke. “We do, but we’re not allowed to say.”
I frowned. “Why not?”
“It’s weird,” Amelia said, “It’s not like it’s a secret in town. Everyone knows who he is, but we don’t talk about it.”
“Why not?”
Cordelia plopped beside me and set the shotgun down, pointing it in the wolf’s direction. “We’re not supposed to.”
“You’ve already said that,” I pointed out.
“Okay,” Amelia said, “I’ll tell her.” She leaned against the hedges, which were so thick they were nearly wall-like. “When he came to town, he was being chased by a band of witches. Some of our own. Well, not exactly our own, but witches. They said he was killing livestock. Because he’s also a witch, Magnolia Cove took him in, but our police did their own investigation.”
I rested my head on the hedge. “What’d they find?”
“That he wasn’t guilty,” Cordelia said. “So we let him stay. He lives here, and even though he’s never done anything wrong, there are folks who don’t trust him. They think he’s a killer or that he’s capable of it.”
I glanced at the massive jaws. “He’s definitely capable of it…So who is it?”
“So,” Amelia answered, huffing out a breath, “the town decided the people who already knew about his condition could remain in the know. But to stop any unjust prejudice against him, the council deemed it illegal to tell anyone else that he can transform.”
“That is so stupid,” I said.
Amelia and Cordelia both laughed. The wolf’s ears pricked toward us.
I tossed my head from side to side. “You would think it would keep the town safer if everyone knew who he was.”
“It stops bias,” Amelia said. “At least that’s what they say. If someone knew what he was, they could blame almost any crime on him. That’s why Betty watches over him every full moon and that’s also why it’s all kept very hush, hush.”
I shrugged. “Whatever floats your boat, I guess. It seems to me that the more people know, the safer the whole town would be.”
“It’s for his own protection,” Cordelia said.
“I get it. I just think it’s weird.” I paused. �
�So how’re we doing this? Are we taking sleep shifts?”
Amelia’s eyes sparkled in the moonlight. “Great idea, that way I don’t look like a total hag tomorrow when I get my new hair in.”
I laughed. “Yeah, that sounds about right.”
Cordelia rubbed her forehead. “Amelia takes first shift. I’ll take second—which is the worst one—”
“—Thank you for bearing such a burden,” Amelia joked.
Cordelia rolled her eyes. “You’re welcome. Pepper, you get third shift.”
“Sounds good. Wake me when it’s my turn.”
I rolled over onto my side, unsure exactly how well I would sleep on the ground. But before I knew it, Cordelia was shaking me awake.
“It’s your turn,” she said.
I stretched and yawned, working a stiff kink from my neck. Oh, my Lord. I felt like I’d fallen asleep in a child-sized box. Every muscle hurt to move.
Cordelia handed me the shotgun. “It’s been pretty quiet. It should be an easy few hours for you.”
I rose and rolled my shoulders, shook out my legs. “What should I do when he starts to change?”
“Same thing. Don’t watch. He’ll unlock himself. He has the key.”
I agreed. “Okay.”
I paced from side to side as she curled into a ball to sleep. Amelia already snoozed soundly, letting out little snores now and then.
The wolf watched me at first, but then turned his face away as if my padding to and fro was too boring for him.
Time passed slowly. After I tired of pacing, I sat for a while, watching the beast.
“Do you know me?” I said to it.
The wolf cocked an ear toward me. I knew it was stupid, talking to it. I had no idea if I knew the creature.
But I wondered…was the man who lived in town in there somewhere? Or was this just a beast?
I rose and crept forward until I reached the edge of the slab, which I knew to be the creature’s barrier.
“Are you in there?”
The wolf rose. I immediately backed away. Right. I might know how far the beast could walk, but that didn’t mean I was one hundred percent certain it still couldn’t kill me.
The creature crossed to me. It sniffed the air as if drinking in my scent. It glanced at me for a long time, holding my gaze.
“Who are you?” I said.
The wolf lowered to its haunches and rested its head on the slab. I wondered…Could I pet it?
Okay. Right. Like, clearly I was out of my gourd—but I felt a string unwinding between us, connecting us together.
I extended my hand.
The beast growled.
Well, I guess that answered that.
I tucked my hand in my pocket as the creature rose, growling as it padded in the opposite direction. The fur on its back rose stiffly.
I peered into the darkness, but I saw nothing. Yet the werewolf continued to growl, low and guttural.
With the shotgun clenched between my hands, I crossed around to see what the heck could make a werewolf’s fur stand on end. I’m guessing a friendly neighborhood squirrel wouldn’t exactly do that.
The beast snarled. I wasn’t sure what to do. Wait? Go look?
Probably I shouldn’t look. I mean, I was here to guard the werewolf until dawn. That was my job.
Turned out, I didn’t have to wait.
A figure burst through the hedges, coming to rest inside the open square. A blue ball of light flickered from his fingers. The serpentine smile sent a shiver ripping along my spine.
“Rufus,” I said.
His gaze narrowed. “I said I’d get you.”
SIXTEEN
I bolted toward my cousins. I had to wake them, get them to safety.
A blue light shot out in front of me and encircled the two women like a band.
I whirled around. Rufus slinked forward. “Don’t worry. They’re not harmed, though they’ll sleep through this.”
I gritted my teeth. “What do you want from me?”
He slanted his head. “Why, your mind, of course. You’re a head witch. Knew the moment I saw you. What power. You don’t even know how to use it. Such a waste.”
I leveled the shotgun at him. Sweat sprinkled my brow and my knees rattled. “Leave me be. Go now.”
The werewolf snapped at Rufus. Rufus glanced at the beast. “What? Angry you can’t help her? Now, now. It’ll all be okay.”
His gaze swiveled to the weapon and me. “You can’t use that against me.”
“Oh, I can’t?”
Rufus glided over and tapped the barrel. A blue spark lit the end and I could feel his power like a low hum vibrating the metal. I had the distinct impression if I attempted to pull the trigger while pointing at Rufus, the gun wouldn’t discharge.
And when it came right down to it, I didn’t know if I had the guts to shoot anybody, anyway. That seemed horrible and bloody and terrible.
I narrowed my eyes. “I might not be able to shoot you, but there’s something else I can shoot.”
“What’s that?” he asked, his voice carrying a lilt of fake innocence.
I aimed the shotgun at the chain holding the werewolf. “This.”
The barrel exploded as gunpowder and silver spewed from the opening. The gun kicked my shoulder like a donkey that had just fueled up on breakfast.
When I was little, my dad would take me to his parent’s farm for Christmas. We’d always go a few days ahead of the holiday, right when school let out. There, my grandad and I would shoot mistletoe out of trees. You see mistletoe is a parasite and it grows on branches—way up in the branches.
I’d shoot and after a few hours, we’d load up a barrelful and take it to the farmer’s market and sell it to folks. Who the heck didn’t want real mistletoe to kiss under for Christmas?
As you can imagine, it was totally popular.
And that also meant I knew how to point, aim and shoot a shotgun without missing. Which also meant that when the slug connected with the chain, the metal exploded.
And the werewolf was free.
The beast leaped toward Rufus, who was clearly having a very bad day when it came to animals. Rufus barely had time to throw a handful of blue light to the ground. He disappeared in a flash of smoke.
Then I realized something very, very, bad.
The werewolf was loose.
The one thing I wasn’t supposed to let happen, I let happen.
The wolf threw back its head and howled. I heard Cordelia and Amelia stir and in the distance, the horizon lightened.
Daylight cracked the sky.
The wolf glanced at me. One paw moved in my direction. I leveled the shotgun at it. Without a flicker of doubt in its eyes, the beast lunged into the forest.
“Up,” I yelled. “It’s loose! The wolf is loose!”
I didn’t wait to see if my cousins heard. I grabbed my broom and threw one leg over it. In half a second I was zooming over the trees, the shotgun slung across my back. It took maybe fifteen seconds to find the wolf. He ran at full speed and was heading toward town.
I glanced at the horizon. The moon was slinking, but not fast enough.
“Please. Please don’t do anything stupid,” I said to the wolf.
This was all my fault. I didn’t have to shoot the chain, but what other choice could I have made?
Oh, maybe I could bother to learn how to actually work my magic so that if I ever came face to face with Rufus again, I’d actually be able to fight him instead of relying on other folks to save me—which had happened at every possible turn up to this point.
And now a werewolf—a snarling, man-eating creature, was loose in Magnolia Cove.
“Good job, Pepper. Keep up the excellent work,” I said to myself.
The trees cleared to a meadow. I swooped down, no idea what I was going to do. I kicked into high speed and nearly caught up with the wolf.
I figured in a few more minutes the beast would shift into his human form. If I could keep up with it unt
il then, without anyone finding out, then everything would be okay.
But I had to stay on its heels.
The sun didn’t have too much farther to go.
The werewolf raced on. We were still in the meadow. I pushed my skillet farther, close to the ground.
It was apparently too close. The tip grazed earth, sending the back of the skillet up into the air—with me still on it.
The world turned topsy-turvy. I didn’t know which way was up and which was down until my back hit the ground.
The wind knocked from my lungs and I lay on the grass, sucking in air like a fish out of water. Something poked my back and I realized it was the shotgun.
And then growling filled my ears. I shivered, mostly from fear and not the wet grass soaking into me.
I tipped my head back. There, maybe twenty feet and only one or two leaps away, stood the beast.
He snarled and growled, shifting right and left. If I made the move to grab the gun, he would pounce. I could feel it.
“Stop,” I said. “I didn’t shoot you when I could have. I didn’t harm you. There’s no need for you to harm me.”
Saliva dripped from its jaws. The creature sank onto its haunches as if about to launch itself toward me. I moved to grab the shotgun as daylight cracked across the sky.
And the creature shrank. The fur dissolved from its skin, the muscles contorted, diminishing and erasing. The bones popped as they reconstructed into a human form. To be honest, I couldn’t take my eyes away.
It was kinda like watching a car accident—or being a gaper driving past an accident after it’s happened. I just had to keep watching.
So I did, y’all—I ain’t ashamed to say it.
I watched, holding my breath until what was left of the beast had vanished, and in its place stood the form of a perfectly naked man.
Yes, naked.
The collar hung around his neck, the broken end of it dangling on his chest. Dark hair hung to his shoulders and his blue eyes pierced my heart, sending a shudder straight to my core.
Axel’s gaze dragged over me from foot to head. “So now you know what I am. I’m a werewolf, the most dangerous creature in all of Magnolia Cove and if the sun hadn’t come up just now, I would’ve killed you.”