Ellem smiled to himself as he polished his revolver, which was loaded with silver bullets. He playfully aimed it a nearby wolf and pretended to shoot, scaring him away. He chuckled to himself and returned to his polishing.
The stench of Lance's carcass would have knocked out a normal man instantly, but Ellem was used to it by now, though it didn't make him any less guilty for shooting his own brother. Fortunately, he wasn't carrying around much guilt from the murder anyway.
A young wolf, black with gray streaks, leapt beside Ellem and snarled at him. To the casual observer, though it was highly unlikely that anyone would be casually viewing this scene, the wolf was just muttering incomprehensive barks. To Ellem's trained ears, the wolf was communicating intelligently.
We don't like that gun, Ell-um, growled the wolf. We want you to put it away! It is ber-den to see brother cradling sil-vur as you are.
Ellem laughed, "This gun is what protects you and the rest of the family from our rival gang. It's just a shame I couldn't get the Kent boy to do the dirty work for me."
The wolf snarled, ,Yes... you seemed awfully close to the plaid one. No hew-man bonding, I hope?
"No. I told all of you my entire plan. I take boy in. I shelter boy. I give boy weapons of silver to protect him. He gets attacked. He kills wolf from other clan. It can't get much simpler than that."
Ellem sighed, remembering the events of the night he took in "Clark". He'd been out stalking the LuthorCorp helicopter in his wolf form, when he smelled Clark. Transforming back into a human, he confronted the farm boy, "protected" him, and took him to the village. Once the boy was asleep and after he decided it would be too difficult to trick him, Ellem merely transformed and knocked him out into a deep sleep, so he wouldn't awaken while he took him out of the building. Unfortunately, he was ambushed by Lance's clan and had to ditch Clark. A pity. He might have made a good feast for his brothers.
It failed! You gave him no sil-vur! He killed no one! He didn't even get bitten, so he can't be one of us! Now your identity is exposed! ranted the wolf.
"No one will believe him," said Ellem rather unsurely, secretly knowing that he would be ostracized from the village. He knew what he would have to do. Despite all his plans, it had come to this.
He had to declare war.
Chloe walked nonchalantly into the Talon, passing several empty desks on her way to the counter. Behind it, Lana was making herself a cappuccino, bored.
"Hey, Lana. Slow day?" asked Chloe.
Lana turned around, surprised. She smiled weakly and snickered, "Slow? You mean like the speed of a snail? No, that's much too fast."
Chloe nodded, "Ah. That's funny, this is usually rush hour around here."
"When half of the police force is dead and we have the National Guard patrolling every street, business tends to slow. You couldn't figure that out?"
Chloe was taken aback by Lana's sudden directness. Lana's smile faded and she practically collapsed on top of the table. Chloe nudged her gently. "Hey, are you okay?"
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have been so... sarcastic like that with you," she groaned. "I'm a mess today..."
"I gathered that when you accidentally poured orange juice in my dad's coffee this morning instead of milk. What's wrong?"
Lana held up her head to face Chloe, "How to put it...? It feels like everything around here is changing. Dread, fear, anxiety..."
"Since when has Lana Lang become Miss Clairvoyant?"
"If you just spend some time with the customers, it's amazing what you pick up from them. Lately, everyone that comes in – not that there's many of them – is worried, one way or another."
"Lana, there's just been a massacre. And... well, we both remember Edward's case."
"Edward? Have you spoken to him?"
"How do you explain to a potentially hostile guy that can turn into a wolf every night, 'it's over'? It's not exactly easy. I haven't seen him around lately anyway. I haven't seen Clark around, for that matter. Have you?"
"No, but Ms. Kent came in earlier to drop off some pies and told me that he was in Metropolis with his grandfather. She looked a bit upset, so I didn't ask anything else."
"Ah, of course," smiled Chloe. Something weird was definitely going around in Smallville. But of course, when you're in Smallville, there's always something weird going on.
Moonfur, a wolf with grizzly gray hair and a black streak running down his hunched spine, was very angry about the reports that Lance had been killed. He gave a great, loud howl that could be heard for miles, including the town where Lionel and Clark had sought refuge.
Blackpaw suffered Moonfur's rage, struck twice with his immense paws and left bleeding, but healing at the fire. The fire was where all of the wolves from Moonfur's clan met to eat and trade stories through their incomprehensive wolf tongues.
These wolves were once, very long ago, humans. Since then, they kept to themselves, but every once in awhile, some unfortunate victim would traverse into their territory and sometimes it would be human. They were entitled to eat, were they not?
Never had they suspected that there would be any danger in attacking mortals. But one night, over a month ago, one boy stumbled into their territory, and Sharpclaw tried to claim him as his meal. Sharpclaw died in his struggle with the boy, struck by silver, and since then, there had been two similar failed attempts.
The Wolf Clan was diminishing, and it had only recently come to Moonfur's attention that the rival clan was at fault. So be it. War would be declared.
At the fire, Moonfur mounted himself atop of a rock and bellowed his growling orders: "Tonight... we take the town..."