"Craig's been around," remarked Mrs Sinclair at lunch the next day. "He says the sheep attacks have gone on long enough, and it's time to put a stop to it." Rahne paused in the midst of raising a spoonful of soup to her mouth. What was the minister planning?
"Put a stop ta it?" queried Rahne's father. "And just how does he plan ta do that?"
"I'm not sure, Ian," she replied. "He said he wants the whole village out tonight, and it will be settled once and for all."
"This canna be good," grumbled Mr Sinclair. "Still, looks like we'll have ta make an appearance, then." Rahne's soup resumed its journey toward her mouth, but with a lack of urgency. The idea of Reverend Craig planning to settle the question of the sheep bodies made her feel distinctly not like eating. Did he want the whole village there for protection from the demon, or for a public denouncement of someone? Of her?
……
When the Sinclairs arrived at the church that evening a large proportion of the community was already gathered there, awaiting the Reverend's instructions. Claire came bounding up to Rahne, looking excited.
"Oh ye made it!" she exclaimed. "I was starting ta wonder where ye'd go ta."
"Aye, I'm here," said Rahne, noncommittally. She still wasn't sure what had happened to Claire in the pub, and she had no idea how she was supposed to act.
"I'm going ta be mighty glad when this is all over with," Claire continued. "Da's been a right pain over the last few weeks, very stressed out about everything." Rahne nodded, but said nothing. Claire paused for a second, looking at her intently. "Look, Rah, about that thing with Jess yesterday… ye did well – that Murray's a sneaky bastard. I'm… I… I just canna get involved in that kinda business, ye ken? Not with my da…." She smelled mostly sincere, but there was something she was holding back. Rahne noticed that her friend hadn't actually apologised, or said that she was wrong about what she did.
But nevertheless, she was Rahne's best friend, and despite her father, she'd always been open-minded about almost everything apart from mutants. "That's okay, Claire," she said. "I understand. And you know, whatever you do, you're still my friend, right?"
"Thanks, hon," Claire replied. They turned to go and join the still assembling group outside the church. As they walked, Rahne desperately tried to block out the annoying, nagging thought that kept turning over in her head – everything apart from mutants…. Somehow Rahne knew that it was doubtful that the minister's daughter would still consider her a friend no matter what she did.
Reverend Craig's plan was straightforward: the whole village would go out, all together, and apprehend the demon in the act of killing, or whatever fiendish thing it was up to this time. Rahne heard her father mutter that it had a snowball's chance of succeeding, but he, along with everybody else joined in the hunt. And it really was a hunt, even without flaming torches. The Reverend had definitely studied the role of crazed fanatic.
And so the whole village trudged out onto the moors. There was a kind of strange excitement pervading most of the community – this seemed like some kind of expedition, an evening's outing for all the family. It was too difficult to think of it as a search for some kind of evil being. For Rahne, though, it was all too real. She watched silently as people she'd known all her life laughed and joked about catching a demon – and she could all too easily imagine those jokes being about her.
Claire was also not treating this as an excursion. She was up in the front of the group, one of the people who were actively searching out the demon. Rahne trailed behind her, with a rather depressing conviction that they were going to find absolutely nothing while she was part of the group.
In actual fact, she was wrong about that. A sound came from out to the left of the group, something between a growl and a whine. "What was that?" Claire demanded, and began to stride forward to investigate.
"Claire, wait," Rahne called, but it was too late, the girl had pushed ahead, trying to uncover the source of the noise. Her call had also caught the attention of the rest of the villagers who were heading over, keen to have the demon's identity revealed. The growling continued as the blonde girl walked in the direction from which it was coming. Rahne followed her, still trying to keep her friend out of trouble. But it was too late. The growl deepened, and then Rahne heard a sound which she recognised as that of something preparing to leap. From out of the shadows of the area not illuminated by the torches and flashlights a shape appeared, springing directly at Claire's throat.
For a split second Rahne stopped to think. Revealing her abilities in front of a crowd of people who had gone out to find a demon was probably the most suicidal idea she could have had. But this was Claire, her best friend. And then she stopped thinking and leapt at the shape. She transformed midway through the leap, hitting it with her forepaws and driving it away from the girl. It twisted under her grasp, trying to find some way to break its fall. But Wolfsbane had too much momentum and it hit the ground with the sickening crunch that indicates a broken neck.
Wolfsbane stared down at the body below her without processing any of the information that was assailing her senses – smells and sounds and sights merged and mingled and bypassed consciousness. An almost total silence had settled on the moors – if she'd wanted to she could have made out the calls of owls miles away from her. Instead she slowly transformed again, concentrating on the concrete feelings of the changes in her bones, the rush of cold that indicated the retreat of fur and the dulling of perceptions that came with her human body. But then it was over, and she was back to facing the accusing stares. She rose to her feet slowly, but got no further.
Nobody spoke for what seemed like an eternity. Then finally the word she'd been expecting came again, like the crack of a whip. "Demon!" It was Reverend Craig of course. "What have ye done, ye spawn of Satan?" But sharper than the cut of the words was the press of silent glances fixed on her, surprise and fear and horror competing in multiple scents.
Rahne opened her mouth to speak, but wilted under the gaze of the entire community, which had taken on a disturbingly focussed attention. Her senses heightened by fear, she could pick out the sounds of individuals breathing interspersed with the muted crash of waves upon distant cliffs. The corpse at her feet had its own array of scents clamouring for attention. Her lupine instincts were telling her to run, to get away from the situation, to flee….
"Wait!" rang out a voice from the crowd. It was her father, pushing his way through to the front of the crowd, her mother at his side. "What my daughter has done," he said slowly and clearly, each word being nearly swallowed up by the silence of the crowd, "is get rid of a thing which has been destroying our livestock for months." He gestured toward the corpse which was still lying on the ground. "Have a look for yourselves… its mouth is covered with blood… And MacLennaghan?" The old farmer reluctantly came forward, pushed by someone near him. "Would ye say that looks a bit like the dog that went missing from your place a while back?" A short nod. In the silence that followed Rahne became painfully aware of the rapid thumping of her own heartbeat. "There's your demon, Craig. A farm dog gone wild, not a teenage girl…."
"A teenage girl?" spat the Reverend. "Are ye trying to deny the evidence that the Lord has laid before our eyes? That is nae girl ye're protecting Sinclair; it's a demon – a werewolf that has been hiding among us for the last fifteen years…" There were angry rumblings from the crowd as they processed this information. Eyes and teeth reflected the glow from the flashlights and in the overpowering scents, the sharp odour of anger spiked. Rahne shrank back against her parents, who placed themselves protectively between her and the crowd.
"A werewolf, Reverend?" her mother spoke up. "Last time I checked it wasn't full moon tonight…" And sure enough, there was only a pale sickle shape riding above the clouds. "Our daughter is no demon, as all of you should be able to realise, you've known her all her life. Yes she is a mutant, but all that means is that she has an extra gene which makes her somewhat different – she is still a human, just like you or I!" There were some in the crowd that seemed to be on the verge of agreeing with this statement, but then the Reverend spoke again, his words fast and venomous.
"Do nae listen ta the harbourers of evil! They want ye ta believe that ye are safe, that the devil is not a threat. They will try ta lull ye into complacency so that the child can strike when ye dinna expect! This, this thing…," he refused to name, or even look directly at Rahne, "is not like ye or I – she exists purely ta serve the evil plans of her master – it is likely that she drove this poor, innocent and faithful dog," he was indicating the body lying before them "ta madness ta cover her misdemeanours…."
The words stirred the mood of the community once again. Fear and confusion were rising off the crowd in waves, assailing her nose in turn and in tandem. And again she could smell the beginnings of anger arising from the mass. There were shifts of suppressed movement, flickering in the half light thrown by the flashlights. The crowd was beginning to turn into a mob.
But there was some kind of motion from one side of the crowd. Someone broke away to stand facing Reverend Craig, shaking off someone who had been trying to hold them back. A lone figure, with a distinctive shock of tangled dark hair. Tony MacLeod. "How can ye be saying this?" he asked, shaking slightly. Anger ruled his scent too, but at least his didn't seem to be directed at her. "Rahne just saved ye daughter's life from that beast! That isna evil!"
Rahne looked at Claire for the first time since she'd leapt at the dog. Her friend was sitting on the ground beside her father, completely silent – she appeared to be in some sort of shock. She met Rahne's eyes briefly, but looked away guiltily rather than deal with her friend's pleading look. Rahne sank back, defeated. She had known that Claire would do nothing to cross her father, but she had still had a faint hope… She turned her attention back to the Reverend, and Tony.
"Ye are young," the Reverend was saying to the boy. "Ye still have a trusting heart. But ye must learn that evil takes on many disguises. I will choose ta believe that ye are merely misguided and that there is hope for ye yet. But ye will not argue with one of the Lord's appointed again." Tony looked like he wanted to keep on protesting, but his family got hold of him again, and dragged him back into the anonymous depths of the crowd. The disturbance dealt with, the minister once again faced the Sinclair family, an expression of disturbing serenity fixed on his features. "Ye however, have knowingly harboured a devil in our god-fearing community for the last fifteen years. That canna be simply excused as misguided. Ye are tainted with the evil of this demon, and ye will be punished accordingly. But first we must go right ta the heart of the problem." He paused, menacingly and in the heartbeat's space between his words Rahne was curiously aware of the barking of a dog far off on one of the hills. "Eradicate the devil spawn which has defiled our community," he ordered.
Most of the crowd began to push forward, searching for Rahne with all the implacable force of a tidal wave. Standing against the rush, twin pillars of steadfast resolution, her parents placed themselves between the mob and their daughter. "Run lass!" her father ordered. "Get away from here, we'll be okay!" Her mother nodded, pushing her away from the crowd.
"We love you darling," she said. "But you have to run!" And so Rahne ran from the advancing press of people, once again slipping into her wolf form mid-stride. She looked back once to see the crowd converging on her path and then put her head down and ran.
NB: And here we have the stirring ringing climax…no, don't worry – there's still much more to come! Speaking conversationally – my, isn't the Reverend a nasty man?