“Impressive, isn’t he?” Voice familiar. From before. The pretender. The false Alpha. “Hold him.”
The light was a pillar, shooting straight into the sky. The snow melted. The air was thick. Earl could barely move, but he did. He would kill this challenger. Rip him apart. The light burned hotter, and Earl was blind. Cold metal hit him on both sides. Iron fingers locked together around his arms. Earl kicked and thrashed, snapping his jaws, but only filled his mouth with more of the poison blood-pus.
“I’m ready,” a female said.
“Do it, Lucinda,” the false Alpha shouted.
She began to chant. The sound of Old Ones’ magic.
The human part of Earl forced itself to the top. Concentrate. Get out of here. Can’t fight dark magic.
A human hand grabbed his throat. Earl tried to bite the arm off, but the other hand squeezed his jaws shut. The hands were strong. “I’ve waited for a long time for this, Harbinger.” The chanting was louder. Louder than the wind. Louder than the light that burned. The pretender shouted in his ear. Earl could smell him now. It was familiar. Long ago, but not quite right. “I brought you both here because the two of you were the finest of our kind. Nikolai would have done just as well, but I want you to know I’m glad it’s you. I’m glad you’re the one.”
Earl felt the light burning through him, pulling him apart. The pain was worse than changing. With his muzzle crushed closed, Earl choked on his screams of agony.
“You feel that? Do you taste it?” the pretender asked. “That’s your power being consumed. You need to understand how much this means to me, how much this means for our people. From your soul will be born a mighty army. In future generations, when our people rule this world, your sacrifice will never be forgotten.”
Something is wrong. Though his body was changed, Earl could think clearly.
Chaotic images flashed in his mind, one after the other, each one tearing through his head like the shuffling of cards. He could reason, he could remember everything, and he followed along as the magic cataloged his entire life. For one split second Earl’s mind was complete, the werewolf and the human, truly one, and Earl saw. The werewolf spirit travelled across generations; each life appeared for an instant then vanished. The visions came faster and faster as the pain grew to a crescendo.
Then the visions stopped, and Earl witnessed the beginning of all werewolves.
The agony pulled Earl back to the present. Wracked with horrific pain, it was as if his body were being unraveled like a great rope by the burning light of Old Ones’ magic. The rope split into cords. The cords split into smaller strings. Again and again, as he was spread through the light. The werewolf side broke away, and the ancestral memories disappeared with it. There was a sucking vortex on the pretender’s chest, absorbing every other string. Leaving some, harvesting others.
The vortex ended in a three-fingered claw.
I’m dying. For the first time, Earl smelled his own fear.
The false Alpha drew close and whispered in Earl’s ear. “Thank you, Father.”
Earl felt his life end.
The chanting reached a fevered pitch. The light consumed everything. A sudden concussion rocked the world as the vortex was filled.
* * *
The pathetic human body hung between the two diggers. The Alpha rested his hand on the side of Harbinger’s blood-soaked head. There was no pulse. No breath. The amulet of Koschei had been fed. A great man had fallen.
“It’s done…,” the witch gasped. She took a few halting steps, then sank to the ground, exhausted. Her metal hand made a clanking noise as it hit the bare asphalt. The spell had blown the parking lot clear of snow.
He should have felt triumphant, but instead he was plagued with a sense of loss. It made sense, he supposed. For a new age to begin, an old one had to come to an end. The Alpha removed his hand from Harbinger’s head and wiped the blood on his pants. “Release him,” he ordered the diggers softly.
The witch made a clicking noise with her tongue. Her creatures immediately complied. The joints of their metal claws snapped apart, dumping Harbinger’s body in an unceremonious heap. “Gently!” he bellowed, outraged at the lack of respect.
The snow had been temporarily burned from the sky by the amulet’s power. It began to fall again. Softly this time. In the distance his children howled as they continued their assault on the town. They were answered by gunfire. The prey were fighting back.
The witch placed her human hand on his arm. “There’s still much to do,” she suggested. “Our time’s short.”
He took one look at Harbinger’s still form, crumpled there. She was right. They needed to have everything in place by dawn. His mission depended on it. “I know,” he answered as he walked away. The witch was a few steps behind. Her diggers, one walking, and one limping, followed silently.
If the MCB didn’t slag this place with nuclear fire before the night was through, the Alpha promised that he would return to this spot someday and place a statue in Harbinger’s memory. He had been a hero to the werewolf race.
* * *
As a young man, I’d often been accused of thinking I was invincible. I took risks that others found mad, but I kept on surviving. As a boy I disobeyed my daddy’s orders and tagged along on all sorts of dangerous things. It was a game to me. I joined the AEF and survived bullets, disease, poison gas, and suicide charges across no-man’s-land. I came home and killed things that sane men couldn’t even comprehend. After a while, folks all said the same thing. I was either crazy or invincible or both. I suppose I even started to believe it myself. God had given me a mission, and that mission was to kill monsters. Becoming a werewolf was like God sending me a message.
“Yes, my son. You are invincible. Now get back to work.”
* * *
“Twelve. Thirteen. Fourteen—”
So cold…
“Fifteen. Sixteen. Seventeen—”
There was pressure on his chest as someone pushed down in rhythm with the counting.
“Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty—”
It was freezing. He was lying on the ice.
The counting stopped. Hands tilted his head back and opened his mouth. The soft lips that were placed against his were either feverishly hot or he was so cold that they just seemed that way in comparison. Breath was forced down his airway into his lungs. The warmth left him…
And returned to desperately pushing on his ribs. “One. Two. Three—”
I’m alive. Well, don’t that beat all?
Earl gasped and began to cough. The pressure left his chest. He cracked open his eyes. A woman was hovering over him. The thick snow falling past her created the illusion of a halo around her flaming red hair. “Harbinger, can you hear me?”
Heather…Why couldn’t he smell her? He tried to move. The blood splattered all over his naked body had frozen into slush, and his back was stuck to the pavement. He was dizzy. His hearing was muffled. Everything seemed dark, like his eyes were cloudy. Why was he so cold?
The Hum was gone.
“Harbinger.” Heather waved a hand in front of his eyes. “Stay with me.”
For the first time in over eighty years, the Hum was gone. The world had gone silent.
He was pretty sure that the moon hadn’t exploded. It was impossible. There was no way that could happen.
“What? What’re you saying?” she leaned closer and put her ear close enough to hear.
His voice was barely a whisper. “I’m human.”
* * *
I was mostly human by the time I was coherent enough to shove my guts back in.
Silver isn’t the only way to kill a werewolf, just the easiest. We heal at a remarkable pace, but it takes energy, and there is only so much available. Outpace that, and we die. Lose enough blood, and you shut down, or inflict enough damage, and we’re done. Or you could end up like Seamus, his head only barely attached to his body by a handful of bloody fibers. Apparently that worked, too.
Despite having his hands tied behind his back, Santiago had somehow managed to struggle ashore. He was hurt bad from the beating, bones broken, bleeding internally, I could smell the death building up in his tissues.
Santiago was delirious by the time I got him back in the boat and we set out toward help, the pathetic little motor running as hard as it could.
His eyes were unfocused. “You’re alive…”
“We’re going to get you some help.”
“I knew you could do it. I knew you could control the monster. God told me you would. He sent me to you.”
He was incoherent. “Just hold on, Santiago.”
“He has given you a gift. You—” He began to cough. I could hear the bones in his chest grating. “A great and terrible gift…Use it for good…”
Those were his last words. I was alone except for the sound of the motor and the noise of the tides. The ocean was a stark and endless blue that I’ll never forget.