Cold Moon Rising
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Part One
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A blood-curdling howl pierced the frigid evening air.
A fine spray of powder snow slewed out in a gentle arc as Mick pivoted both ankles sharply left and came to an abrupt halt. The hair on the back of his neck crackled. The werewolf was close, very close. What alarmed him most, however, wasn't the beast's proximity but its location. The spine-chilling howl only now beginning to fade from the still night air had come from a thickly wooded stand of trees somewhere to the rear of him, much higher up on the mountain.
How could that be? How could the beast have possibly doubled back? The pulsing trail of body heat he'd been following was still clearly visible heading down the slope ahead and he'd detected no change of direction in the traces of it's odour blowing from down wind.
He cursed. It was unthinkable, but no other explanation was possible. Two werewolves were on the hunt tonight!
The howl sounded again, only this time the cry was thin and high, a sure sign that the thing was moving back up the mountain and away from him, fast.
Beth!
Damn it! He'd left her alone at the cabin, told her that she was safe, that it was a well-known fact in his world that werewolves were solitary predators, and only ever hunted alone.
By the time he and Beth had found it's mangled victim, a lone winter camper with just a bed roll and backpack to protect him from the elements, the heavy trail of body heat the beast had left had been heading down and away from them toward the thickly wooded forest at the bottom of the mountain. He'd had to think fast. He needed to track the beast so he could prevent any further deaths and possibly discover it's human identity. Although the stench was so strong that he could hardly smell a thing past the cloying reek of werewolf, he knew that if he didn't leave immediately, the telltale traces of it's heat and odour would dissipate in the cold mountain breezes, leaving the creature a free hand to kill again. He'd never dreamt that Beth would be at risk if he left. Oh, he'd ordered her to lock the doors and windows, but that had only been meant to reassure her. He knew there was no real danger.
He had to let her know. He patted his pocket, then cursed as he realised that they'd both taken off so so quickly, that neither of them had thought to bring a mobile phone.
Oh God, if anything happened to Beth…
Mick cursed again, a fine sheen of sweat popping out along his brow. He hated having to leave the other werewolf free to roam tonight, but his priority was clear. He glanced back up the slope he'd just descended. Not even vampires could move quickly in five feet of fine powder snow and the chalet where he'd left her was half a mile straight back up a double black diamond run. There was no other solution, the quickest way to get back was to ski to the end of the slope and take the chairlift back to the home run.
Mick shoved off with a determined flex of his knees and bent low over his skis, counting the seconds as he sped down the mountain and away from both Beth and the nightmare heading directly toward her.
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Half a mile further down within the deep black shadows of the forest, a pair of blazing red eyes tracked his progress. A shadow, impenetrable and incongruously dense, separated itself from the tree line and followed with surprising grace along the twin tracks left by Mick's skis.
Beth shivered. She didn't care how safe Mick said she'd be. She was scared.
She seen a lot of things in her time, but the sight of the savaged remains of the man had frightened her in a deeply visceral way. The man, clearly a cross-country skier who'd been camping in the forest behind them, had literally been peeled open from stern to hip, the bright red of the arterial sprays almost beautiful against the stark white crystals of the snow. Even knowing about vampires she would have doubted the existence of werewolves had she not witnessed for herself paw prints as large as dinner plates surrounding the corpse. The poor man! She would never forget the look of pure horror on his face. She hadn't asked and Mick hadn't said, but she'd known just the same.
The man had still been alive when the beast had begun to feed.
At first Beth had thought the scream that had roused them from a light doze was from an owl or one of the other nocturnal birds that inhabited the woods surrounding their cabin, but Mick had been on his feet in an instant, tugging on his ski pants, his face a mask of bland indifference, a sure sign that he was deeply concerned and trying not to show it. She knew for certain that something was wrong when he snapped at her more harshly than he had ever spoken to her when she rose and made to join him.
If only she'd done as he asked and remained behind.
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Mick sped down the slope, pushing off with each stock as he powered through each turn. He gritted his teeth as he passed the scent of the beast he'd been tracking, noting that it had entered the wooded glade to his left. It was somehow stronger here, an anomaly that would have caught his attention had his other need not been as pressing.
He must be close, he had to be close, but he couldn't hear the telltale clanking of the chairlift, knew that the sound of its operation should carry in the cold night air. It should be around the next bend.
Mick hunkered down and doubled his speed.
It wouldn't occur to him until too late, that the reason the scent had been more dense in that location was that the beast he had been tracking had in fact doubled back and would now be hunting him.
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Beth had waited with the body while the ski patrol loaded the poor man into an ambulance and drove away. Turning back, she could see their cabin lights from the fringes of the forest where she stood, just inches away from the bloodied snow. She had shivered with horror as she surveyed the scene, noticing for the first time the victim's backpack, half buried under a reddened mound of the icy stuff. She hooked it out, slinging it over her shoulder. The authorities would no doubt need the contents to identify the deceased.
In the safety of the locked and bolted cabin, Beth's natural curiosity reasserted itself, and she unzipped the backpack gingerly, taking care not to touch any of the metal surfaces with her bare hands. One fewer set of prints for them to worry about, she thought. To her surprise, no wallet or any other form of identification were amongst the man's meagre belongings. The only things inside were a one litre metal thermos, a crumpled white silk shirt and an odd looking implement that resembled a compact crossbow. Several darts clinked together loosely in the bottom of the pack. The man was a hunter. No wonder he travelled so light and hadn't lit a campfire. She wasn't sure what the law was about hunting in these woods, but his gear was suspicious enough to make her think that perhaps his actions hadn't been entirely legal. She packed his few belongings away, the scent of the aftershave still lingering on his shirt. The whiff of cologne was strangely soothing, and for a moment she had a vision of the last moments of the lovely Christmas the man must have had with the people who loved him. Then she saw his face again, streaked with blood and snow, and her chest tightened with fear.
I need to calm down, Beth thought, stop getting so wound up about this. I'm perfectly safe. I'm just scaring myself. Mick said everything will be fine, so everything will be fine.
She straightened her spine, held her chin up, did what she always did when she was afraid but too courageous to show it. She forced herself away from the backpack and it's contents and headed toward the kitchen.
If ever there were a decent time for comfort food, this would surely be it.
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A pair of red eyes blinked from out of the darkness. They shifted left to right as they followed the woman outlined in the window, watching as she twisted a tap, filled a kettle with some water. As an apex predator, the beast's mind was a work of perfection. Within a heartbeat it had noted the easiest access points into the cabin, the fact that the woman was alone, the deliciousness of her fear….
With a grunt it shifted off its haunches, it's massive shoulders brushing aside snow-laden branches as it moved toward the golden light streaming from above the cabin's door.
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