“Fancy a cup of tea?” he called to her and drew a strainer out of the kettle. “It’s not precisely tea, mind you. But there are patches of mint and lavender growing over on the east side of the island. It can be very soothing, if you’d like to try?”
She sat hard on the grass outside her cave. Of all the laughable, unbearable things Brandon could have offered . . . The funny thing was, her mouth watered. She did want tea. Wanted nothing more than to sit with a hot steaming cup in her hands, breathing in the smell of it. She didn’t dare.
They both looked down the hill when a new scent came to them. Sergeant Cox, approaching, carrying his own offering. She squinted, not sure she could trust her eyes. But her nose told her: he carried a bundle of scruffy-looking wildflowers.
“What’re you doing here?” Cox said in greeting and stopped on the hill some dozen paces from Brandon.
“Exactly what it looks like. Don’t be cross just because I thought of it first. And what did you bring?” Cox held out the bouquet, and Brandon snorted. “Very traditional. Well done.”
Except that he let the flowers fall away, and hidden within the bundle was a dagger. The kind of thing a soldier might use to cut a rope or slice a throat on the battlefield. He walked a little ways up the hill, set it on the grass, and retreated.
“I see that you’ve been putting together weapons. Or trying to, rather. This one’s not got any silver in it, but it’ll do some damage. If you think it’ll help.”
Brandon scowled as if he wished he’d thought of it himself. Cox gave him a smug smile and hooked both thumbs in his belt.
It was a valuable gift. Couldn’t be that many knives or blades of any sort on the island. He was right, it might not kill, but she could do damage. She could defend herself a little better. She didn’t dare take it. She didn’t dare choose.
“Oh, I almost forgot. The second half of my gift,” Brandon said then, and reached behind him to a small hooded lantern with a candle burning inside. He put it on the grass next to Cox’s knife.
Fire. He offered her fire. Warmth, cooked food. And hot tea. She’d only been a few days in the wet and cold, and what they both offered seemed like heaven. Seemed worth whatever price. Her shoulders slumped. She scrubbed her hands across her eyes because she didn’t dare let them see her cry. Never mind that they would know, that they would smell the tears on her.
“You’re trying to buy me. Both of you,” she called to them.
“Let’s say bribe, rather,” Brandon said, with a wry wink. “So? What say you?”
She couldn’t. She simply couldn’t. Silently, not sure of her voice, she shook her head and looked at the damp, oppressive sky.
They watched her silently. They didn’t cajole, they didn’t mock her. They simply waited, their gifts sitting in the grass.
“Will you take a cup, Cox?” the gentleman asked his rival.
“That’s very upstanding of you, Brandon. I think I will.”
So Brandon poured out two cups of a pungent, acrid liquid that was in fact not very much like tea, and they sipped companionably.
She called to them, “How is it you two are even here and not tearing each other’s throats out?”
Brandon chuckled. “Turns out there’s nothing on this island worth fighting over. Might as well get along, eh?”
“Except . . . now there’s you.” Cox grinned.
“I won’t let you fight over me. I will not be a prize.”
“She’s a regular Anne Bonny,” Brandon said to Cox. “A Boudica.”
“Fierce,” Cox agreed. “Can see why the Lord exiled her.”
“It’s Edgerton himself dumped me out of the boat. You know ’im?”
They both did. Their lips curled, their bodies braced. The fur of their other selves would have been standing on end.
Cox said, “Edgerton is a sniveling, toadying, cowardly piece of shit. I’m sorry he ever laid a hand on you.” He settled with a growl burring the back of his throat.
“Just so,” Brandon added softly.
She glared. “The Lord and Edgerton and the rest are all right bastards. Why’d they exile any of us? We’re none of us a threat. They could have just killed us, executed us for standing up to them. Heads lopped off, no coming back from that. But no, they dump us here. Why? Why go through the trouble? I still don’t understand.”
Cox stared into the murky water in his cup. “They keep us here in case they need us. An army of chaos. We are here to cultivate our wildness, so that they might come back, capture us, cage us, and let us loose upon the world when they have need of beasts. If Napoleon makes for England, they will send us into his camp at night. Can’t say I wouldn’t enjoy it myself. But. They could have just asked.” He spat the last word.
“So you see,” Brandon said. “We resist by being civilized. As much as we can, with no bloody tea to be found.” He shrugged and finished off the rest of his cup. Pursed his face and hissed at the taste of it. “Ah well.”
“Then can’t you be civilized and leave me alone?” she pleaded.
“Why would you even want to be alone? It isn’t natural,” Brandon said with an offended, gentlemanly sniff.
“There are twenty-three wolf men on this island,” Cox said. “Our command of the others is vague at best. Some of them won’t ask. In the end, we’re all beasts, and the full moon is coming. Let one of us look after you.”
They would save her from damage, and keep her for their own use.
“Let me look after you,” Brandon said pointedly.
“You’re a fop,” Cox spat. “You hardly know which way you’re pointed.”
The gentleman laughed. “We settled this once before, we can do it again. It won’t come to a draw next time, I’ll warrant—”
“That’s right, it won’t—”
“Stop it!” she shouted. “I’ll look after myself!”
The two wolves stepped a pace or two apart and had the grace to look abashed.
Brandon gave a quick nod. “My dear, at least tell us your name.”
Right now, her name felt like a weapon they would use against her. To civilize her. “No,” she said, and the growl came through. Her wolf had fought before, she would do again.
“We could just carry her off,” Cox said to Brandon.
“The entire point of the exercise was to have the lady’s cooperation.” The gentleman called back up the hill, “What if we shared you? A month with me, the next with Cox—”
Then she did scream, hands tangled in her hair, and the sound had the edges of a wolf’s howl to it. She doubled over as the beast cried out. Wolf would break free and tear them all to pieces, she could do it—
“Girl . . .” Cox said warningly.
“Let’s be off, shall we?” Brandon said, brushing grass off his neat trousers. “We’ll leave you to it.”
The pair of them walked away while she crouched, gasping, struggling to keep hold of herself. At last, after a minute or so of breathing as slow as she could, the beast stilled and she was able to look out with human eyes and take stock.
The men left the knife and candle on the hill for her.
Since taking them would feel like putting herself in their debt, she didn’t. The knife stayed unclaimed and the candle burned out.
Five more days passed. She could feel the full moon before it rose, sense the coming light against her eyes, the tug against her gut. The creature within began scratching, pain on the inside of her ribs as if they formed a cage it could break free of. Nothing could stop what was about to happen to her. This was the true punishment. The Lord of Wolves, all the wolf packs, offered protection. That was the pact so many of them made. Submit and be safe. Know your place and keep to it, and those in power will shelter you. She had thrown it all away and hadn’t regretted it a whit until this moment.
She wondered which of the wolves on this island would find her first, then rape and kill her.
Refusing the tears that threatened, she carefully undressed, folding and setting asi
de skirt, petticoat, bodice, shift. She couldn’t afford to rip them during her transformation; she had no others. That she would return to wear these clothes again was an article of faith. She must believe it would be so. She was strong, her beast was stronger. Together they would survive. They’d made it this far.
She marked her territory, small as it was, again and again and again.
She and her beast had had nights on the moor that were glorious. Miles of space, no one to answer to, she could run and run and run, as free as she’d ever been, wind in her fur, dew on her tongue. Her first months as the beast were difficult, as her skin ripped apart and her bones broke and reknitted and her own mind felt otherworldly. But the reward had been those nights of freedom.
It hadn’t lasted. The Lord of Wolves, his dukes and henchmen, had wanted her. England wasn’t big enough for them all to run free, they told her. She must submit to one of them, any of them. Instead she fought, and fought, and fought. And now here was where fighting had got her.
The moon rose, her human body stretched and broke, and her long, despairing howls joined the others on the Island of Beasts, their song reminding her that the other wolves were here, they knew where she was, they could find her. She ought to be silent, she ought to hide—
But her beast was furious and so screamed out, Come find me if you dare, I am strong, I am monstrous!
A smuggler of whisky rowed his boat past the island that night, and heard such a cacophony of wailing and moaning that he knew the stories that the ghosts of every sailor and fisherman ever lost at sea had washed up on that desolate rock must be true. He dug into his cargo and threw a bottle of his best into the waves as an offering and didn’t stop praying until the shadow of the island was out of sight, and its terrible howling gone quiet.
She awoke naked in her den, tangled in her skirt, and safe. She must have snuggled into the fabric and used it as a bed. It smelled like home. The whole place did, which was why her wolf had come back here. She’d been able to come back here.
She never remembered much from the nights of running as a wolf. Images and feelings. The taste of blood on her tongue—so she’d been able to hunt. Her full belly told her she’d eaten. Her wolf had slept contented. Looking herself over, again and again, disbelieving—she hadn’t been damaged. No one had touched her.
After putting on her shift and skirt—she couldn’t be bothered to lace up her bodice or even put back her hair—she walked on the beach. Closed her eyes and breathed in the sea air. Smiled for the first time in weeks. She had survived. Somehow, she was still standing, and it felt glorious.
A glint in the surf caught her eye. A glass bottle shoved up on the sand, sliding back on the wave, then rolling up again. Splashing barefoot in the water, she grabbed it up, studied it. It was a full and sealed bottle of whisky. A blessing on her morning. She might not have much, but oh, this was a thing to bargain with.
She hiked back to her den to hide it away until she decided what to do with it. Found Brandon and Cox there at the same place, halfway up the hill. Waiting for her.
They looked like wolf men after the night of a full moon always looked, with shadowed eyes and unkempt beards. Even Brandon hadn’t shaved in a couple of days and had scruff on his cheeks. His waistcoat was unbuttoned, his collar open. Cox squinted in the sun, frowning in her direction, if not directly at her, and crossed his arms.
However much she wanted to turn and run, fast as her two legs could carry her—or better, let her wolf loose, she could run so much faster on four legs—she stood her ground. They didn’t seem angry. Their gazes turned away. Seemingly bored, Brandon scuffed his shoe in the grass. Cox went barefoot.
Brandon finally smiled. “Good morning, there. Did you have a good run? Can’t say you look particularly well rested, but then who can, after such a night?”
She looked frightful, her hair in a tangle down her back, her shift and skirt wrinkled and stained after so many days. And found she didn’t care. This was the Island of Beasts. Propriety was a secondary consideration. They regarded her exactly the same as they had before. She was a wolf woman after the night of a full moon, and that was fine.
“I had a . . . a decent night, I think. No better or worse than any other such night, I suppose.”
“That’s a way of putting it,” the soldier said. “No better or worse is a thing to hope for, sometimes. You hunted?”
“Yes. Rabbit, I think.”
“We got a sheep,” Brandon said smugly. “Was our turn for sheep, this month. They’ll get one next month.” He nodded to the other fellow.
“You take turns?” she said.
“Well, Christmastime we both get sheep. We have to be careful, not to completely depopulate the island. But you got a rabbit. That’s good.”
“Yes.” She moved closer. She wanted a better look at them. Wanted to know what had happened last night, how she’d managed to have the most peaceful full-moon night she’d had in months, here on the Island of Beasts.
“You have a question,” Cox stated, matter-of-fact. Brandon studied his fingernails, picking out a bit of dirt from one.
“You . . . you left me alone,” she said. “I was prepared to fight, to defend myself. But none of the wolves came for me.”
Brandon finished picking his nails and brushed off his hands. “We convinced our men to leave you be.”
“Or we’d rip their throats out. No argument.” Cox’s smile was mean, toothy. A fierce wolf’s grin.
“But why?” she asked.
“That is our bribe,” Brandon said. “The one gift you might accept. We leave you alone.” He flicked his hand, as if releasing a bird to flight.
“And what do you want in return?”
“Your name?” the gentleman said hopefully.
She thought about it a moment and said, “Lucy. I’m Lucy.”
“Glad to make your acquaintance, Miss Lucy,” he said.
“Likewise,” Cox said, more gruffly. “Three packs on the island, then?”
“Agreed,” Brandon said with a brief nod. “But Miss Lucy, I hope you’ll understand if we don’t allot you your own sheep every month.”
She shook her head. “Even my beast couldn’t eat a whole sheep on her own.”
“Just so.”
She didn’t know what to think, and felt as if she still swayed with the movement of the boat that brought her here. Her legs gave out and she sat heavily in the grass, cradling the bottle of whisky in her lap. Scrubbed her cheek and swallowed back a tightness in her throat.
“What’s that you have there?” Cox asked, pointing.
She held it up. “Found it on the beach.”
“Good lord, is that what I think it is?” Brandon’s gaze narrowed, amazed.
She studied the label, looked back at them. Relished the feeling of safety she had in that moment. The feeling of peace. It wouldn’t last, most like. Couldn’t last, on a windswept island wracked by storms and monsters.
Then again, maybe it would, if an island of monsters could choose civility for itself. Unlike the world that sent her here. She cracked the seal on the bottle and pulled the cork. Brandon might have moaned a little. Even from several paces off, his wolf could no doubt smell the heady, oaky aroma rising up. For a moment they simply sat quietly and breathed it in.
“I don’t have cups,” she said.
“Never mind cups. We’re monsters, after all,” Cox said. “Just take a swig and pass it ’round.”
She did so, turning up the bottle, filling her mouth, letting the liquor burn. Cox reached, and she handed it to him. Taking a chance on him. Trusting.
He drank, let out a laugh. “God that’s good. See, it’s what this island’s needed all along, a woman’s touch. Place looks better already.” He handed the bottle to Brandon.
“Barbaric,” Brandon muttered, but didn’t turn down his chance.
He took his drink and savored it, eyes closed.
Then he passed the bottle back to Lucy. That was when she knew she wo
uld be safe on the Island of Beasts. She stuffed the cork firmly back in the bottle’s mouth.
Still wincing from the liquor’s sting, Brandon said wistfully, “No offense to present company, but I was meant for better than this.” He gazed off at a distant point, maybe at a parlor fire or some fine park in London. Lucy would get his story someday.
“Aye, we all were,” Cox said. “They will come for us, you know. The Lords of Wolves and Masters of Blood and all the rest. They will come here expecting to find monsters. Tools they can use in their wars.”
The wind blew and smelled of rain. They turned their noses up to it, and Lucy breathed deep the free air.
“We will be ready for them,” she said.
The Beaux Wilde
IT WAS SAID of Miss Elizabeth Weston that she was a young woman of great fortune and little accomplishment. Since the former went some ways toward making up for the latter, all was well, or should have been. But at twenty-two years of age, Miss Weston remained unmarried.
She played the pianoforte adequately, but would not play before strangers. Her needlework was loose at best, her dancing merely functional. She was pretty, with honey-brown hair, a pert face, and clean skin; but she was shy, and so did not catch the eye as she might have if she smiled more. What she liked best was to read, and while conversations and games of whist might go on around her, she would sit alone with a book of Scott or Radcliffe. She could sometimes be prevailed upon to read aloud, but within a line or two her voice would grow so timid and constricted, she must leave off.
Elizabeth knew what people said about her in whispers, behind their fans and glasses of sherry. Since she could not help what they said or what she was, she withdrew further and avoided the kind of company a highly marriageable young woman in her prime should have sought out. It was a paradox that gave her mother and father some anxiety.
Elizabeth would not have attended the ball at Woodfair at all, but Woodfair was the home of the Brannocks. If Elizabeth had a best friend in all the world, it was Amy Brannock, because what Amy said and the feelings behind her words were just the same. When the invitations went out, Elizabeth accepted, because Amy would not question why she did not wish to dance.
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