chapteR twenty.

It seemed like good manners to put Claude's keys back under the visor. Despite his truck having a passenger door missing, no sunroof, and being littered with broken glass. When she checked the bed, it was so bent it looked like a dairy heifer had parachuted into it. Well, Claude could just suck it up. He'd lied to her.

On rubbery legs she pounded up the trail to the compound to find it mysteriously empty of Garouls. Early evening was when they usually congregated around the barbeque or fire pit for beer and supper. Undeterred, she burst into Marie's cabin.

"Hello? Who's there...Amy? Is that you?" Paulie's croaky call came from Leone's bedroom.

"Paulie?" Amy found him struggling to sit up in bed. "Oh, hon.

I'm sorry I woke you. Here, let me help." She eased him into a sitting position. His wound still caused him pain, though it had been treated and bandaged.

"I see Marie has been working her magic," she said.

"Yeah." He wriggled into the pillows she had plumped up for him. "Thanks, Amy."

"Did he hurt you much?"

"Nah. Marie says she's more worried about dirt and infection-"

He pulled up short when he realized what he was saying. His face flamed at falling for her trick.

"I know Virgil attacked you," Amy said. He looked at her in amazement.

* 187 *

"The librarian? Wow. You know more than me. I just thought it was a rogue."

"Rogue?"

"Yeah. No clan. Dangerous guys with no proper Alpha to control them. They often snoop around other dens, drawn in by scent."

Amy sat back and digested all this. Virgil, she knew was a werewolf. But a rogue werewolf? They had names for him, for his kind? Dens and clans? What the hell did Paulie mean by clan?

"Paulie, can I ask some stupid questions? And please be honest with me, because I met with Virgil earlier today and only just escaped by the skin of my teeth." Thanks to the skin of Leone's teeth.

He tensed. "I'll try, Amy. But I'm making no promises." She admired his open honesty and plain common sense, something sorely lacking in his elders, as far as she was concerned.

"Okay. I know the Garouls have a werewolf." She came straight out with it. Out loud it sounded so stupid she immediately tried to qualify it. "Look, I broke the almanac code and found out some information. I know you guys have a beast to look after. Generation after generation." She took a deep breath. "And I know it's Leone."

"She told you that she was the only one." This was more a statement than a question. He almost sounded offended.

Unsure what she was really answering, Amy nodded. "Sort of,"

she said. Ambiguity seemed the best way forward.

"Typical."

"Huh?"

Paulie sighed. "We each have a werewolf to look after, Amy."

There was a twinkle in those black eyes that reminded her so much of Leone.

"That's ridiculous."

"Why?"

"Because the place would be crawling with..." Her sentence trailed away as the truth dawned on her.

"The Garouls are a werewolf clan, Amy."

"Jesus." Amy sagged onto the bed.

"I don't think you read that code right," Paulie said sympathetically.

* 188 *

"I don't think I did either." She raised her head to look at him.

"All of you?"

"The minute we hit puberty the change begins and we come here for Claude to train us. Little Dip is our family home. We learn to hone our wolven skills here on hunting breaks like this. We need to get by as hybrids in the modern world, but still be able to survive in the natural environment. So yes, I guess there is a beast. Many of them."

"Fuck. Excuse my language."

Paulie shrugged. "You should be with Claude when he gets stuck in a thorn bush."

Amy sat up. "Do you know what happened to Connie?"

He shook his head. "I only arrived last week to learn to hunt.

Connie was...ill, before I arrived. But she's safe." He shifted uncomfortably and Amy sensed there was something he wanted to keep from her. And guessed she knew what it was.

"If a rogue wolf attacked a human, would they become a werewolf, too? Like in the movies?"

"That's a really harsh thing to happen. Even if someone survives an attack from a rogue werewolf, the shock to their system when the change begins can kill them. Few get past that stage, and if they do manage, then there's the addiction. The wolven side brings such a high, and if you run with the change too long, or too often, it sort of psychos you out. It's one of the first things we learn." Paulie paused, and looked hard at her. Amy knew he desperately wanted her to understand. "The real struggle is to control your humanity, not your beast. The wolfskin is more real, more in harmony with the natural world than the human side. It's harder to be human."

"So it's easy to become addicted to the raw power of the beast side, and harder to revert back to human?" Amy mulled this over. All the movies she'd seen had it the other way around. The full moon had always been the struggle for Lon Chaney, not the twenty-eight days in between. She'd imagined the fight was to deny the beast inside, not the day-to-day struggle to survive in the human world.

"Paulie, Virgil bragged that he'd bit Connie. Could it be like that for her now? Shock and addiction?" She was scared at the * 189 *

possibilities of Connie's situation. Virgil had hurt her, but had he changed her?

"Connie's lucky. She has all of us, and Marie's specialized knowledge to help her through. But it'll be tough on her." He held her gaze. "Marie's been nursing her, but she had to be moved away.

Sometimes the change can get a little...violent. And Marie had to subdue her. Everyone has been caring for her, Amy. Please don't worry."

Again, Amy found some reassurance in his words. "I want to see her."

"Not tonight. It's the full moon; it's going to be hard on her.

Connie's not trained to cope with its pull. Look at the damage she did to her own cabin walls last time she went on a rampage. But now that you know, you can talk to Marie about it. There's nothing to hide anymore. No reason why you can't be with Connie."

"Why hide it from me at all?" She was angry now. Connie had damaged her own cabin? Amy was shocked, she'd thought it was Virgil torturing Connie just as he'd tortured her that day in the studio. Just how out of control was Connie, how bestial had she become? Paulie shrugged in a typical teenage fashion.

"Probably the work you're doing. I imagine Connie was attacked for what she knew. Bloomsy probably reckoned she was the weakest link, being the only human in the whole valley."

"An easy target. Why did he go for you?"

"The same reason. Easy hit. I picked up his trail from your cabin. I didn't realize what I was following." He smiled ruefully.

"Inexperience. I was lucky I hurt him harder. After he ran I found I couldn't hold my shape. I began to change back to human form too quickly. Not a good thing."

Amy nodded. "Claude said you were suffering from an overload. I wasn't sure what he meant."

"You would have been next, Amy. Virgil would have come for you. We were all guarding you. It's just a pity no one knew who the rogue werewolf really was."

"Bastard. I hope Leone got him."

"Leone?"

* 190 *

"When he was after me, a second wolf appeared and chased him away. He nearly had me. It was so close." She shook her head in wonder at her marginal escape. "It was Leone," she whispered softly. The mystery was no more. Leone's secret was out in the open. All that was left was what they had now.

"Well, she is your mate."

v Amy left Paulie tucked up and recuperating and started out for the most logical place she could think of, the storage cabin. Connie must still be there, being administered to by Marie and her horse-felling potions. Amy had to see her to set her heart at rest.

It was terrifying running alone along the forest trails. Amy failed to understand how her body was still operating and not curled in a fetal ball under a bush. The only thing that kept her going was adrenaline and her anxiety to see Connie.

Nevertheless, the nighttime valley had never looked so frightening. The full moon hung heavy, its bright light illuminating and shadowing simultaneously, giving her guidance on one hand but playing on imagined fears with the other. Every rut and stone along the track was visible, and her feet flew over them. At the same time, every darkened branch, hollow tree, or shady undergrowth hid another imaginary monster. Amy ran on, as if the hounds of hell were after her. For all she knew, they were.

Her mind was in turmoil, seething with questions, conclusions, and frustrations. The Garouls were werewolves. Had been so since time immemorial. Had Connie known this? Marie was her partner, so she must have known. It seemed only Amy was in the dark all these years. Why? Was she untrustworthy? Had her teenage romance with Leone tainted her into being the perpetual outsider?

It hurt an incredible amount, so much that her chest cramped at the implication that these people were not the second family she had always thought. That Connie, her only real family, colluded with the Garouls, and in doing so had been wounded and...and possibly mutated into a monster herself.

* 191 *

I should run away. Leave them all and go to Europe, like before. This secret could become a cage if I don't run now. But she remembered the massive furred beast in the cab of Claude's truck, leaning in to caress her neck with a maw that could rip a deer apart. And its clumsy attempts to get her to notice the cherry flavored candy, to bring her back to Connie. Amy knew there was nowhere else on earth she wanted to run but here, along this spooky moonlight path, straight into danger for the people she loved most.

The moon was clearly her ally, for she found the storage cabin easily. Cautiously approaching from the front, she could see the door lying open, swinging gently in the night breeze. There was no damage, but the air of abandonment didn't bode well.

The crawling sensation she now associated with Virgil slid over her skin again, like a cold, oily rag. So, he had escaped the library and the attention of the emergency services. She knew he was somewhere nearby, spying on her. Amy hesitated, fretful and uncertain. Where was the threat coming from? If she ran to the cabin, would he be in there waiting? Maybe staying in the woods gave her more options for escape.

A flutter of movement from the shadowy doorway nearly had her bolting for the river. He was in there! She caught a flash of red-a red jacket. Squinting, she took a hesitant step forward. Elicia appeared, quietly but frantically signaling her inside. Amy made a run for it and leapt onto the porch and through the door, slamming it behind them.

Elicia retreated into a corner, hovering anxiously beside the neatly made bed.

"Did you see it?" she whispered fearfully.

"Since I arrived in the valley, I knew there was something in the woods following me around. I thought it was a bear at first."

Elicia nodded. "I wasn't sure if you could sense it. Some people can't. They walk around blissfully unaware." She moved closer to Amy, whispering fervently, "But they're everywhere. Beside you in the supermarket aisles. Behind you on the subway. Teaching your kids, pumping your gas, cutting your hair-"

* 192 *

"Checking your books out at the library."

Elicia's dark eyes widened. "You know?"

"I know he's hurt Connie. I'm guessing he's outside waiting to try to hurt her again." Amy looked around the tidy interior. "I'm glad she got away."

Elicia shook her head slowly. "He's here for me."

"You?"

"He wants to rip out my cubs. They're Garoul cubs. He wants to eat them."

"Cubs..." Amy's mind was spinning. "Jori's? Elicia, you're pregnant by Jori, right?"

"Yes. We didn't plan..." Elicia began to cry; her shaking hands covered her face. "I love him so much, and now he'll hate me."

"Why did you say cubs?" Amy asked quietly. "Elicia, do you know about the Garouls?" Her answer was a sad nod.

"Well, you knew more than me." Amy sighed and moved to comfort her. "I've known Jori all my life, Elicia. And I know he won't hate you. He loves you. He'll be so happy about the...cubs."

Elicia sank onto edge of the bed, sobbing in deep cracked gulps.

Amy crouched and put her arms around her.

"He loves you. We all know it. That's why you're here, in the valley. No one comes here unless they're practically a Garoul." She tried her best to reassure Elicia, all the time keeping an ear open for any prowling outside. "Elicia. You'll be all right. Everything will be fine. I promise. Look, I have to go check that all the windows and doors are locked. Are you okay for a minute?"

"It's no use." Elicia wiped her wet cheeks with her palms and sniffed. Regaining a little control, she kicked off her shoes.

"Believe me, this is a stout cabin. I've seen the damage it took to get out of the damn thing, never mind in." Amy was rattling the shutters. Combined with the bars on the outside, she felt certain the windows were secure.

"It's no use." Elicia sighed dejectedly. She shrugged off her jacket and loosened her belt.

"It buys us time. The Garouls know who he is, and he's been * 193 *

stupid enough to come into their valley." Amy barred the door with a hefty plank used for that purpose. It should hold; she was sure it would.