by Amy Cross
When we get inside, it takes a moment for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. It's cloudy night, so moonlight only intermittently streams in through the large stained-glass windows. The church is quite large, but the walls are bare and it looks as if the place was stripped for anything of value long ago.
"Look," says Duncan.
I look down and see a dead body smeared across the floor. It takes a moment to register that it's an old man, a priest, ripped apart and with his guts and entrails wiped everywhere. The blood seems to have dried, but the body still seems to be fresh, so it's only been a day or two since he died.
I lean over and look into his eyes. They're wide open, staring ahead with a look of total horror.
"She's here," Duncan says.
I look up. "I don't hear anything," I say.
"I do," he says. "I hear her breathing."
I listen, but I still don't hear anything. I guess this is part of being a werewolf, and it's something I still have to learn.
Duncan walks along the aisle, and I follow. Our footsteps echo through the church. It's really cold in here, so cold that you can see your breath in the air.
"Don't come any closer!" shouts Darla. Her voice is coming from behind the altar.
"Darla," I say, "we need to find the baby. We need to return it to the humans."
"Keep away," she shouts, but her voice sounds very uncertain.
"Darla -" I start to say, but Duncan suddenly walks forward and around the altar. I follow, and we find Darla is kneeling on the ground, holding a blanket containing the baby.
"Give it to us," Duncan says sternly.
"I can't," Darla says. She doesn't look up at us. There's a distraught, traumatized look on her face.
"You have to," Duncan says. "You've already done enough damage. At least give us the baby so we can try to undo some of it."
"You don't understand," says Darla, looking up at us, tears flowing down her face. "I can't!" And with that, she slowly holds the baby out to us and it becomes shockingly obvious that the child is dead.
"What happened?" I ask.
"I thought it would be okay," Darla says. "I thought if I left it here for a day or two, it would be okay when I got back. I don't understand why it died." She starts to sob.
"It's cold in here," Duncan says. "It probably froze to death."
I push past him and kneel next to Darla. "Give me the baby," I say, but she seems reluctant. "Give me the baby, Darla," I say, and this time she hands it to me. I look down at its little white face. Touching its skin, I feel that it's cold.
"This is going to mean war," Duncan says. "Do you realize that? Killing a child is the worst thing you could possibly have done. They'll get miles and miles of propaganda out of this."
"Duncan -" I say.
"No!" he shouts at me. "She has to hear this. Killing that baby could be the single act that causes the war that ends the werewolf species forever."
"I didn't mean to kill it," Darla says. "You have to believe me."
"Doesn't matter," Duncan says. "The humans will use it as propaganda anyway."
I look at the dead baby's face, and a sudden moment of hope overtakes me. "Duncan," I say, turning to him. "When I was attacked, you saved me by turning me into a werewolf." I hold the baby out to him. "Is it too late?"
He looks at the pitiful little corpse. "It only works for a short period after death," he says. "That thing has been dead for far too long."
"You don't know that," I say. "You've got to try."
He shakes his head.
"Fine," I say. I stand up, place the baby on the altar and place my hands on either side of its head. "Tell me how to do this," I say. There's no answer. I look up at Darla, then at Duncan. "One of you! Tell me how to do it!"
"You can't," Duncan says. "Only a natural-born werewolf has that skill. A convert like you has no chance."
"Tell me!" I shout at him.
Duncan steps closer. He pauses for a moment, then he sighs. "Focus," he says eventually. "Focus on the child's life force, and on all the possibilities that are ahead of it. Picture its future life, its potential. Try to imagine that it has a full life laid out before it. Believe in the child's future existence."
I try to do what Duncan says, but it's so hard. I can't stop thinking about other things, like Darla's misery and Duncan's hard-hearted approach to all of this.
"Clear your mind completely," Duncan urges me.
I nod, and I try to clear my mind so that only thoughts related to the child's life are present. I imagine the child growing up to be a great political leader, or a great sports star, or a great thinker, or just a happy man with a family. I imagine hundreds if not thousands of possible future lives for it, stretching across the realm of possibility. And then I feel Duncan place one of his hands on the child's forehead.
"Focus," he says.
And suddenly my hands feel warm. It's the most unusual sensation, as if somehow I'm generating warmth that is being transferred into the baby. I keep my hands in position, and somehow the baby starts to feel more... real. It's as if I can suddenly see its future stretched out before me, millions of possible lives - not all of them good and happy, but all of them seemingly real - spreading out from this one moment in which the child has to live.
And suddenly the child starts to cry.
I remove my hands and look down as the child wriggles, opens its eyes for a moment, then closes then and cries at the top of its voice.
"I did that," I say, stepping back, shocked.
"You're a girl of surprises," Duncan says, smiling at me.
"I did that!" I shout. "I brought this baby back to life!"
"It must have been dead for just a few hours," Duncan says. "But still, that's impressive. For a new werewolf, I mean." He looks up, suddenly alarmed. "Darla!" he shouts.
I turn to see Darla running out of the main door.
"Wait here!" Duncan says firmly, and then he shifts into his human form and races after Darla. I grab the baby and run along the aisle.
When I get out of the church, it takes me a moment to understand what I'm seeing and hearing. All around me, in the dark, there's the sound of some kind of struggle. Holding onto the baby, which is still crying, I try to understand where Duncan and Darla have got to. Finally I see them around the other side of the church. They're engaged in full-on battle, both of them in their wolf forms.
I rush toward them. "Stop!" I shout, but they either can't hear me, or they refuse to hear me. They keep fighting, ripping chunk out of each other, fighting like beasts. It's a shocking sight, and one that I can hardly bear to watch. My two best friends, engaged in a fight to the death.
Suddenly there's a scream, and the fighting stops. Duncan steps away, limping and panting, and I see that Darla is still on the ground, apparently unable to move.
"What did you do?" I ask Duncan.
He shifts into his human form. "I did what I had to do," he replies. "She was a danger to everyone. Humans and werewolves alike."
"Is she -"
"Dead?" Duncan asks. "No, she's not dead. She's unconscious, and she'll remain unconscious for a few more hours while her bones heal. Then, we have to decide what to do with her."
"There's only once choice, isn't there?" I ask. "We have to take her to the estate in Scotland. It's the only safe place for werewolves, especially ones who are being hunted already." I look down as the child gurgles in my arms.
It's clear that Duncan doesn't want to save Darla, or to take her to Scotland. To be honest, I feel as if his gut instinct is to simply kill her once and for all, and to avoid the inconvenience of trying to find a way ahead that would mean she could live.
"She's my friend," I say. "She's not evil. You met her before. She saved me at the carnival, and without her I'd have died in the Underworld."
He stares at me. He's clearly not convinced.
"She killed Thomas Lumic," I say finally. "Or at least, she was the one who arranged for him to be killed. Doesn't that coun
t for something?"
Duncan takes a deep breath. It's rare that I feel that I've really got through to him, but this time it's as if he's actually listening to my point of view and is possibly wondering whether he should make changes to his plans.
"Fine," he says eventually. "We'll take her to Scotland. But she's your responsibility. If she does anything wrong, it'll reflect badly on you. Is that understood?"
I nod. "I'll look after her," I say. I look down at the baby. "And I'll get this baby back to its natural parents. I'll do everything. All you have to do is help me a little bit, and give me advice, and help me work out the best way to do things."
Duncan stares at me for a moment. "Take the baby back to its home," he says finally. "That's the first job, the most important. The humans will be ready to launch propaganda based on this child's death. If you can take him back to his parents and show them that he's alive, the propaganda will be neutered. At least for now."
I look down at the baby again. "Is he one of us now?" I ask.
"A werewolf?" Duncan asks. "Yes, though it's unclear whether he'll ever fully develop his powers, and if he does, he might not necessarily ever realize what he is. It depends on a lot of different factors, he might just go through life feeling as if he doesn't fit in, but not really knowing the truth. But fundamentally he's a werewolf, and that marks him out as being different."
I take a deep breath. It's time to take this baby back to its parents. And then we have to take Darla to the estate. She needs to be away from the humans, away from the violence, and she needs to be with other werewolves. Even then, I'm not sure if she's past the point of no return. But we have to try. And then we have to hope that our worst fears don't come true, that the humans don't attack.
Duncan and I walk out of the church. I carry the baby, and Duncan carries Darla. We step past the body of the priest. As we get outside into the cold Scottish night, it feels like we're so far from civilization, we can never really go back. But we do have to go back, because there's one final job to complete. I look down at the baby. He's stopped crying. He's just looking up at me. I know it sounds crazy, but from the look in his eyes, it's almost as if he knows what has happened to him.
Jess
It's dark, but lights are on in the house. I sneak in through the gate at the back of the garden, and I carefully make my way across the patio. From the house, there are sounds of talking and TV. This is a family still hoping against hope that their child will come back to them, that somehow the wolf will have left the baby somewhere to be found. They probably know that their hopes are doomed, that the chances of their child returning to them alive are almost nil. I'm sure they pretend to still have hope, that they pretend to still believe there'll be a miracle, but each of them - privately and alone, and in a way that they don't let the others see - believes that such a miracle can never happen.
The baby squirms a little in my arms. I look down and in the moonlight I see his little face. He's sleeping. What kind of dreams is he having? Is he dreaming of his old life, of his mother and father leaning over his crib? Is he dreaming of the time he was kidnapped by a wolf? Perhaps he's dreaming of the time he was left to die in the corner of a church? Or perhaps he's dreaming of the moment that new life was breathed into him and... everything changed? Whatever, I'm sure he's having bright, vivid dreams, and I'm sure he'll have bright, vivid dreams for the rest of his life.
For a moment, I think of what might have been.
If I hadn't left home, I...
No.
There's no time for that kind of thinking, not now. Everything's as it should be. The past is in the past, and I'm better off out here, far from home. If I ever went back, I'd cause more harm than good.
I have to force myself to remember why I ran away to London in the first place.
I reach the back window, but find it locked. Same with the back door. I'd been hoping to slip the baby in and leave, but I guess I'll have to go to Plan B. I gently place the baby on the ground by the back door, then I lean down to take one last look at his face. He's still asleep. I hope he stays safe, even if... even if all the other werewolves die, I hope this child survives and is happy. I kiss him on the forehead, then I stand up, take a deep breath, knock loudly on the back door, and turn to run away.
"Who are you?" asks a man, standing and staring at me by the gate at the bottom of the garden. He has supermarket bags in his hands.
"I -" I start to say, but at that moment the man spots the baby on the doorstep. He drops the bags and rushes past me, scooping the baby up just as a woman comes to the door.
"Where did you find him?" the man says, his eyes filled with tears of joy. He passes the child to the woman, who I guess must be the mother.
Damn it, I wasn't prepared for anything like this. I pause for a moment, like a deer in the headlights. "I... I found him in a church," I say. "I... there was a wolf there. I chased it away, and then I found the baby and I realized it must be yours. I read about you in the newspapers, so I..." I take a deep breath. "I brought him back. I was just going to leave him on the step -"
The man rushes forward and surprises me with a big, firm hug. "Thank you," he says. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."
"It's okay," I say, hugging him back without too much enthusiasm. "Anyone would have done the same."
The woman is crying. "We thought he was lost," she says. "We thought that wolf had taken him forever."
I shake my head. "He's back with you now," I say.
"And the wolf?" the man asks. "Did it get away?"
I nod. "But I don't think it'll cause any more trouble. I think I scared it pretty good."
"It'd better not come back here," says the man. "I'll fucking kill it."
I sigh, but I realize I can't say what I'm really thinking, so I opt for something a little more diplomatic. "It's just a wolf," I say. "It's not a monster."
"It took my child," the woman says. "It -"
The man interrupts. "But it didn't kill him, did it?"
I smile. "No," I say. "I guess things worked out in the end." I look at the child and see that it's awake. It's staring up at its mother.
"Funny," the mother says. "He always used to cry so much. Now he looks so calm and peaceful."
The man goes to take a look. "I guess an experience like that changes you," he says. "I guess it'll have an impact."
"Oh yeah," I say. "I'm sure it'll have an impact."
"I need to check he's not injured," the woman says, rushing inside with the baby.
"So," I say. "What's his name?"
"Robert," says the man. "Robert Edgar Wallace."
I nod. "Nice name," I say. "I should go."
"Wait!" the man says. "Won't you come inside? We have tea and coffee, and food. Please, let us do something to thank you for bringing out child back to us."
"It's not necessary," I say.
"Please!" he says, insisting. "It's the least we can do."
I look over at the window. It looks so warm and inviting in their house, so happy and contended, so comfortable, so... human. Truthfully, there's a part of me that would like nothing more than to go in there with them, to shut the door, and to forget about the wolves forever. To have a family, even for a few hours. It's so tempting.
"Come on," the man says, obviously sensing that I'm considering it.
"No," I say finally. "Thanks, but I have to get going. Really."
I turn and walk toward the gate, then I stop for a moment and turn back to the man. "One more thing," I say. "If Robert grows up and... anything strange happens to him... or he seems different or special in any way, just... don't give him a hard time, okay? Just go with it."
"Sure," says the man.
"Thanks," I say, and I head out of the gate. I walk along the street for a moment, to where Duncan is waiting. He's holding Darla in his arms. She's still unconscious, still healing.
Duncan and I look at each other for a moment. There's so much to say, but at the same time there's no obvious way t
o say it. Maybe that's one advantage that we have as wolves: we can sense so much about each other, but we don't have to put it into words. Unfortunately, we have to remain in our human forms for now, because we have to carry Darla all the way to the estate. It's going to take us a few days, but we'll get there in the end.
God knows what we'll find when we arrive.
Epilogue
General Chaucer lay back, listened to the silence for a moment, then closed his eyes. Peace at last.
"Sir!" shouted a voice, rushing into his tent.
Chaucer opened his eyes. No peace.
"Sir, the scout has returned from the estate. He has something urgent to report, sir."
Chaucer sat up. He was still wearing his uniform, so it would be no trouble to receive visitors, no trouble at all. Still, he wasn't really in the mood.
"Bring him in," Chaucer said wearily, hauling himself to his feet and stumbling over to his desk. He was so tired, so very tired, so desperately in need of sleep. But no-one around this damn place could make a decision without asking him first, so he was used to being interrupted every moment. Still, he looked forward very much to the day when he could retire. Perhaps after this campaign. Perhaps after defeating the werewolves...
"General Chaucer, Sir!" said a new man, entering the tent. Chaucer turned to find that he was a young, good-looking man with jet black hair and a fashionable amount of stubble.
"What?" Chaucer replied.
"Corporal Withers, Sir," the man said. "I've just returned from an expedition to the edge of the estate, and half a kilometer inside the border. I encountered no werewolves at all, Sir. I strongly suspect that they are massing in the center of the estate, preparing for our attack."