The Wolfstone Curse

by Justin Richards

  “Expensive,” she countered. “You owe me. Or rather, you owe Mum. When she gets her credit card bill, she’ll do her nut.”

  “She’ll do her nut before that,” Peter murmured.

  Carys glanced across at him. “I’ll call her from the airport when we’ve checked in. She’ll get over it. Probably.”

  “You reckon?”

  Carys shook her head. “No. She’ll be livid. But what can she do?”

  She was livid. Peter could hear Faye Seymour’s voice through Carys’s mobile. Guiltily, he moved away and rang his dad. He was glad to get voicemail, and left a brief message saying he had gone away on a short trip with Carys and that her mother had the details. He texted Abby and Mike with a similar vague message. Then he texted Mum, just to say hello.

  They changed planes in Berlin, where Carys picked up their visa documents.

  “We’re down as students, and I said we’re researching Russian art and architecture, and only just discovered about the tour of the palace. It seemed too good to miss.”

  As soon as they were in the air, Carys produced a book from her rucksack.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “You’re a student now. It’s homework. This is the real reason we’re going. At least – it’s the real reason I’m going. I’m still not sure exactly why you’re here.”

  “For Annabelle,” he said simply. He felt a lump in his throat as he said it. A flash of images – the deserted bedroom, the ripped teddy bear… Annabelle at the window of the tower like Rapunzel calling for help… Then Annabelle trapped in the cage – the smell of roses and her lips pressed against his face… And finally, the girl in the wood – bedraggled, afraid, alone.

  “Annabelle,” Carys said.

  “I promised to help her.”

  “By going to Russia?”

  “By going to Vrolask. Everything we find out seems to lead back there. Maybe I’m clutching at straws, but I don’t know what else to do. What else can I do? I thought you wanted to help me.”

  “I hoped you wanted to help me,” she said sharply.

  “What do you mean? What have I done now?”

  She handed him the notebook. It was well-thumbed, with a cardboard cover. The yellowing pages were breaking from the spine. The handwriting was faded, but clear and neat.

  “Mum showed me this yesterday. She’d read it before, of course. But I’dnever seen it. It’s Grandad’s journal. Or one volume of it anyway. I read the others too, but this one’s the important one. It tells you what happened to him, why he was like he was… That’s why I’m going to Russia.”

  “How do you mean? What’s it say?”

  “Read it, and you’ll see. As soon as I saw that mention of the Crystal Room at Vrolask… Just read it. I want to understand what happened to Grandad.”

  Peter didn’t know what to say to that. So he just took the book.

  It’s what you don’t know that kills you.

  But I do know this: the next 24 hours could change the course of the war.

  Am I exaggerating? I certainly feel like I have the whole future of the world in my hands. Not just me of course — Acer is in charge. And Boffin’s the man who first discovered the terrible secrets of Castle Wolfenburg.

  I keep this journal to take my mind off little things like that.

  Boffin has briefed us on the background — the why. He told us about the Nazi experiments — as much as he knows, as much as his colleagues in the Special Operations Executive have managed to discover. It sounds incredible — incredible but grotesque. Inhuman. Devilish.

  WOLFENBURG – 1943

  The room was made of glass.

  The walls, ceiling, even the floor was polished glass or crystal. It had a strange milky quality, like quartz. The light of the candles positioned in glass-shelved alcoves was magnified and echoed all round the room, and the whole place seemed to shimmer. Only one of the many alcoves didn’t contain a candle. Instead, a sword handle projected from the glowing wall, the blade visible as a shadow thrusting deep into the crystal.

  In the centre of the room stood the SS officer – the only dark shadow in a world of shining crystal. The light threw his gaunt features into stark relief. His jutting chin, thin nose, the arrogant set of his jaw. His eyes were dark, set deep within hollow sockets. His hair was cut short and swept sideways.

  The man’s voice was a deep rasp – full of hate and anger. It was a voice used to giving orders.

  “Welcome to my lair.”

  It took Copper a moment to realise he had said it in English.

  The man’s next utterance wasn’t in any language. He threw his head back and roared – a tremendous, guttural burst of sound. Saliva dripped from his mouth. His whole face seemed to shimmer and crawl in the glowing light. Like something was trapped under his skin, and trying to rip its way out. The man’s eyes had taken on a red tinge. The gun clattered to the floor and the man spread his arms, his hands clenched like claws. His teeth glinting and yellow. The death’s-head emblem on his lapel glowing angrily.

  Claws.

  Teeth.

  Death.

  Another roar. The creature in the SS uniform hurled itself at Copper, snarling with rage and anticipation. Claws raked down towards him. Elongated jaws snapped hungrily at his throat. The pervasive glow of the crystal was blotted out by darkness – by black uniform, dark fur and death.

  Just as the claws were about to shred Copper’s face, the creature fell backwards. Acer’s arms were locked round its chest, heaving it away. The creature fell, pinning Acer beneath it. For a moment, it seemed to Copper that Acer was also changing – becoming a creature like the SS colonel.

  “Find a weapon,” Acer gasped. “Anything silver.”

  “Silver?” Copper struggled to his feet.

  “There must be something.”

  With a roar, the creature broke free of Acer’s grip and hurled itself again at Copper. He dived to one side, felt the claws catch in his uniform, tearing at his sleeve. His eyes had adjusted now. He could clearly see the long table in the centre of the room, the chairs alongside it – all made from the same glowing crystal. Like amber, lit from within.

  The walls shimmered so that they seemed insubstantial, like they were actually made of light. Only the hilt of the sword was stable and steady.

  The sword.

  The creature seemed to realise what Copper was thinking. It bounded across the room towards the silver handle projecting from the wall. But Copper was closer. He raced for the alcove, grabbed the handle and pulled.

  For a moment, the sword remained stuck, like the legendary sword in the stone, but then with a creaking protest, it moved. The creature was almost on him. Copper wrenched the sword from its crystal sheath. He swung it in the same movement – a great arcing blow. The crystal blade glittered and shone.

  The animal’s claws skittered on the smooth floor as it tried to avoid the blow. It almost succeeded. Almost…

  The sword struck it in the shoulder, biting deep. Copper felt the blade connect with bone and judder to a halt. The creature fell, tearing the sword from Copper’s grip. The enormous wolf fell on its injured shoulder. Copper heard the shattering sound as the sword blade fractured. The scream of animal pain.

  Acer was there already, grabbing at the hilt of the sword and pulling it from the creature’s shoulder. He paused, sword raised, the crystalline tip of its blade broken off in a ragged line. Inside the crystal ran a thinner, finer blade of silver. The whole length of the blade was slick with the creature’s blood.

  “Finish it off!” Copper yelled, running to help.

  The creature groaned in pain.

  Acer stabbed down. But the creature rolled aside at the last moment. Sparks erupted from the floor where the silver core of the blade struck. Shards of crystal flew like broken glass. The creature cried out again. But the sound of its pain was blotted out by Copper’s own cry as a sliver of the sharp crystal tore into his leg. It burned like ice, and his leg gave way b
eneath him.

  Acer raised the sword again, turning to pursue the creature.

  “Kill it!” Copper yelled. “Kill the thing. It’s an abomination.”

  But his last word was lost in the roar of the explosions. The whole room shook around them. A crystal chandelier crashed down onto the translucent table.

  Acer grabbed Copper, hauling him to his feet. “This place is finished. Let’s get out of here.”

  But the doors were jammed shut, refusing to move.

  “There’s no other way out. This is our tomb.” Copper cried.

  Acer was looking round. “The wolf – where did it go?”

  “Wolf?” It seemed an inadequate description. “I don’t know.”

  The floor trembled under their feet as more charges went off in the castle above. Acer dragged Copper with him, supporting him, as he followed a trail of red to the side of the room. It disappeared into the wall.

  “Another door?” Acer wondered. He handed Copper the broken sword. “Hang on to this. If we meet the wolf again, we’ll need it.”

  Copper took the sword. He leaned heavily against the smooth wall, gasping for breath as Acer searched for a way to open the door. Finally he found an indented groove that served as a handle and swung open a section of the wall. Grinning, he turned back to Copper.

  “Looks like we have a way out after all. Bring the sword. If we don’t need it, you can give it to Boffin. A souvenir – he’ll be fascinated.” The grin became a frown. “Are you all right?”

  “I got hit by some of that crystal,” Copper said. “But there’s something else you should know. That creature – before you dragged it away and I got the sword…”

  “Yes?”

  Copper swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. “When it came at me the first time,” he confessed, wiping blood from his throat. “It bit me.”

  Peter finished reading ‘Copper’s’ account. He closed the book and leaned back in his seat. The sketched pictures were almost as unsettling as the text – an upright wolf in German SS trooper’s uniform, the stark forbidding castle with the craggy mountains behind it, a rough plan of the maze of underground tunnels through which Copper and Acer had escaped to return to the beach rendezvous and then the submarine that returned them to Britain…

  He was aware of Carys watching him.

  “So it happened in a room made of glass?” he asked.

  She nodded. “That’s when he was infected. Grandad was ‘Copper’ of course. And Acer was actually Lionel du Bois. Or so Mum says. She says that when they got back, du Bois changed his name to Forrest.”

  “Why?” Peter wondered.

  “A patriotic gesture. Before the war, du Bois spent a lot of time in Germany. He was said to be a friend of Himmler, but maybe that was all bluff. And we now know that du Bois was the best person to lead the raid. He had unique knowledge of what they were supposed to be searching for.”

  “The Nazi experiments, whatever they were.”

  “Right,” Carys agreed. “So they destroyed the place, and when they got back, du Bois set Grandad up at the Red Fleece. I guess he blamed himself for what happened to Grandad.”

  “He sounds like a hero,” Peter said. “But that doesn’t seem to fit with the current Mr Forrest.” He handed the notebook back to Carys. “And this room they found. Made of glass… When we read up on the Vrolask Palace it mentioned a Crystal Room.”

  “It could just be a coincidence. But I doubt it. That’s why, as soon as I found out about it, I booked the visas and tickets. Do you…” She looked away. “Do you really think Annabelle Forrest is in Vrolask?”

  “No. I did. But now I’m sure she’s still in Wolfstone.” He ought to tell her he had seen Annabelle. But it was awkward – why hadn’t he mentioned that earlier?

  Carys interrupted his thoughts before he could decide what to say. “So, like me, you’re just along to find out what you can? You don’t have some grand plan?”

  “Discover what Einzel Industries is up to, how it ties in with Wolfstone and everything that’s going on there. Once I know that, then I can start thinking about a plan. If it’s involved at all.” Now he was actually on a plane flying to Russia, Peter was wondering what he was really doing. A good idea in the middle of the night or the heat of the moment didn’t always translate into something sensible in the cold light of day.

  “Oh it’s involved all right,” Carys said. “Here’s a company that’s making vials of wolf venom, sponsoring a wolf sanctuary, setting up some mysterious meeting at Wolfstone, linked to Forrest and his family, and headquartered in a palace that has a Crystal Room just like the Nazi scientists had under the castle where they did their werewolf experiments. Whatever they’re up to, it isn’t good. Whatever they’re up to, I’m going to stop them.” She wiped her hand across her eyes. “No one should go through what Grandad did. No one should suffer like Mum had to.” She turned to look out of the plane window. “One way or another, it stops.”

  The train from St Petersburg to Vrolask was pulled by an old steam engine.

  “Diesel probably freezes in the winter here,” Carys said.

  They met the rest of their tour group at St Petersburg station, Carys checked the print-out of her emailed instructions. There were about a dozen of them in all, mostly Americans on a set tour. Peter and Carys were the youngest by a long way. A tour rep with a fixed smile ushered them onto the train, which had separate compartments with a corridor running alongside. Carys and Peter found a compartment to themselves.

  The phone signal came and went, so Carys called home from the train when she got a chance. From the side of the conversation he could hear, Peter could tell that Faye had calmed down. She seemed more worried about how much the long-term parking at Heathrow would cost than whether Carys and Peter were safe.

  They settled in for a long journey, heading west towards Poland. The landscape soon became bleak and grey, and the windows steamed up from the cold outside.

  “What were the Nazis doing?” Peter asked after they’d sat in silence and stared at the misted windows for what seemed like for ever.

  “There are some hints in a couple of the other journals.” Carys ran her finger down the window, drawing a rough outline of a castle like the sketch in the notebook. “Nothing specific that I saw, though.”

  “Experiments, obviously,” Peter said. “But were they experimenting on, well – on werewolves? Or just trying to create them?”

  “They took people from the local village. Not volunteers. Just young local people. About our age.” She drew jagged mountain peaks behind the castle. They looked like sharp teeth. After a moment, she wiped her hand across the glass obliterating the picture. “It was horrific.”

  “The journal mentioned kids going missing in the night. Genetic experiments,” Peter said. “Those poor people. But then there’s that SS colonel who bit your grandad. Maybe he was a volunteer, or maybe he was ordered to take part. I wonder what happened to him.”

  “Probably crawled off to die in one of the tunnels somewhere.” The window was already misting up again. “I hope it took a long time.”

  Vrolask was a small industrial town with no hint of a phone signal. Before Einzel Industries arrived, it had settled into dilapidated obscurity.

  “We shall shortly be arriving at the Vrolask Palace,” the guide announced from the front of the minibus. Her name was Ludmilla and she was a severe-looking, middle-aged woman.

  The minibus turned through huge ornate gates. The driveway curved gracefully round a vast lake, and ahead of them was the Vrolask Palace.

  Peter had seen the picture on the website, but that did nothing to convey the scale of the place. It was an enormous ornate stone structure with more windows than Peter could easily count. The Vrolask Palace certainly dwarfed Wolfstone Manor.

  Stone steps led up from the terrace, where the minibus parked, and into the wide hallway. Inside was even more impressive. The whole group looked around wide-eyed. The floors and walls were lined with polishe
d marble. The ceiling was painted to look like the sky. Giant crystal chandeliers were almost lost in the enormous space.

  A security guard checked their names off on a list and examined passports. Ludmilla explained that they had to submit details of everyone on the tour in advance. Peter and Carys were obviously lucky to have made it.

  Ludmilla led them down the hallway, her heels echoing on the marble floor. Finally they all trooped into an enormous ballroom. At the far end was a raised platform. Standing there, staring down at the tourists, one black-gloved hand gripping the top of the stone balustrade was a man.

  Peter went cold. His legs were suddenly weak and he felt light-headed. He grabbed Carys’s arm for support.

  “What is it?” Carys whispered.

  Peter hardly trusted himself to answer.

  “We are most fortunate and honoured today,” Ludmilla was saying, “that Herr Einzel himself, the chairman and chief executive of Einzel Industries, is here and has graciously agreed to greet his guests.”

  There was a smattering of applause. The man on the dais acknowledged it by raising his arm. His good arm. Because his other arm hung uselessly by his side. Under the harsh light of the chandeliers, Herr Einzel’s skin was even more grey, his features even more sunken and emaciated than when Peter had last seen him. He wore a light-grey suit rather than the long, dark leather trench coat but there was no doubt at all that it was the same man.

  “That’s him,” Peter whispered, his mouth dry with fear. “That’s the Old One.”

  Herr Einzel’s eyes were as grey as his skin. They lingered on Peter for a moment, but then moved on. He welcomed his ‘guests’ to the Vrolask Palace and promised them a unique experience. He spoke briefly about the work his company did in pharmaceutical research. The introduction was confident and brief.

  The guided tour of the palace took in the more impressive state rooms. Some areas were off-limits, as they were used as offices or laboratories by Einzel Industries. But Peter paid little attention. He was desperate to talk to Carys, but that would have to wait until the tour was over and they were alone again. The ornate splendour of palace rooms seemed to merge until he could not remember one from another.