Chapter Four

Are there any Werewolves in England?

It was after midnight when Buffy Summers got off a Gulfstream jet at the airfield in Kidlington, north of Oxford. Damn, it was cold, she thought as she buttoned up her jacket and slipped on gloves. She called Dawn on her cell phone. "Hey Dawnie, I'm gonna start walking towards Oxford, which road should I take?"

"Just go south on Oxford Road."

"Okay, that's easy."

"I'm heading that way, don't hide from cars."

"Got it."

Buffy adjusted her backpack and took off through town. This time of night Kidlington was dead, really dead. She didn't see anybody around, there were no open businesses, there were hardly any lights on in anyone's house that she could see. Except for a brightly lit hotel a few blocks away, and she avoided that like the plague since she would inevitably run into one or more of the really boring old guys she'd shared the plane with – that would raise a whole new set of expectations that she didn't want to deal with. She decided to increase her speed and started to run when she got to the city limits. The night was perfect. Her footsteps on the macadam echoed softly and didn't obscure the few quiet sounds from the largely hidden fauna in the woods to either side of the road. High clouds passed lazily in front of the moon, but her slayer vision could penetrate even the darkest shadows. She still shivered from time to time and she had to check to make sure her coat's zippers were tight.

She contemplated Dawn's letters from Oxford over the years, letters where Dawn extolled the virtues of living in a vampire-free place like Oxfordshire. That sounded really nice to Buffy, she thought that Buffy's really should have vamp-free vacays from time to time. So she was doubly irritated when she felt that sick feeling she got in the pit of her stomach when she detected an evil essence in the night. As she analyzed the feeling, she came to the conclusion that it wasn't a vamp, it was some type of demon. She really hated demons, the evil ones anyway, she thought as she continued her run through the murky countryside, just fucking hated the things.

The evil feeling wasn't very local, though. So it was going to be a hunt to find the thing. She noticed a set of headlights in the distance and just stayed to the side of the road instead of hiding in the dark. A few minutes later a white car zoomed past her, then she heard it slam on the brakes and come to a controlled stop. Buffy stopped, ready for any trouble heading her way and watched as the car, a new and very elegant S-Class Mercedes, backed up and stopped next to her. The window lowered smoothly on Mercedes Benz motors when someone leaned out.

"BUFFY! You should've waited at the airport," I yelled out the window.

"Dawnie, good timing."

"Get in! Why are you running around Oxfordshire in the middle of the night?"

"I was restless. I've been in the air or waiting at airports for most of the last twelve hours." Buffy shrugged and got in the car. She had to get into the back since Cully occupied the shotgun seat.

"Hi, I'm Dawn's sister, Buffy," she said.

"I'm Cully Barnaby, pleased to meetcha."

I started driving again after Buffy was properly buckled in.

Cully asked, "Erm, is that pink leather? Where do you even get pink leather?"

"Los Angeles, of course. And I like pink."

I could see Cully was getting buffied. Buffy's jacket had only a thin wool lining and it was – pink! Along with a pink scarf and red wool cap. At least her gloves were black.

Buffy continued, "When I look like a girly girl, vam-, uh, people underestimate me."

"You like being underestimated?" Cully asked.

"Yep. When it comes time to pound my enemies into the ground, they don't even notice me until it's too late. And I win – so yay me!"

"You have lot's of enemies?"

"More than a peace-loving California girl should have," said Buffy. "So how come it's so cold, anyway?"

"It's October, sister mine, it's almost winter."

"October isn't winter! October is still summer."

"Maybe in Los Angeles, but not in England. Unlike southern California, here we have four distinct seasons. And in Autumn – that's what this is – it starts getting cold, especially after dark." I wasn't about to tell Buffy how long it took me to get acclimated to English winters. And really, they aren't that bad compared to say, Alaska, or Sweden, for example.

"Oh. Well, I'd better get a heavier coat, a parka or something."

"They're called anoraks over here."

"Anorak? What the hell kind of word is that?"

"A word that means parka. Would you like me to discuss the etymology of anorak for you?"

"A world of no, Dawnie, please."

Cully interrupted our sisterly bickering. "I didn't know any airlines flew into Kidlington. Is that something new?"

"Oh, not commercial, I hitched a ride on a Gulfstream. Three rides, actually, I started in Los Angeles yesterday. LA to New York, New York to London via Greenland, and finally London to Kidlington where I'm a hop, skip, and a jump from Oxford."

"How do you 'hitch' rides on private jets?" asked Cully.

"You can fly private jets all over the world for nothing just by asking the right people," said Buffy.

"Who are the right people?"

"People who own business jets."

"Okay, I walked into that one."

"Yeah, that's the hard part, finding the right people. But rich old businessmen aren't just grateful to be able to talk to a young woman on long boring flights, they're pathetically grateful. So what the hell, I'm happy to take advantage, especially since I'm trying to save the world."

"Yeah, and do they expect anything in return?"

"Sometimes, but I'm pretty good at dodging grabby hands and deflating low intentions."

"Aren't we all."

"Hey Dawnie, where're we going?"

"First we're going by Cully's parent's house in Causton to drop her off, then we'll head over to Dorchester."

"Can I drive?"

"What!? No way, it's my car, I wanna drive."

"Oh come on, Dawn."

"I like driving and I like my heart rate to be normal."

Cully laughed. "She can't be that bad, can she?"

"You have no idea."

"I've never had an accident, except for that guy who hit me in Mom's car. But I'm really much better at dodging idiots these days."

"Maybe later." I sighed to myself. Buffy's driving scares the shit out of me, but she was right, she hadn't even had any close calls in years, at least not when I've been riding with her.

It was late, and after a while I noticed Buffy fall asleep. Cully and I didn't disturb her.

After we dropped Cully off at her folk's house, Buffy and I drove on to Dorchester. Buffy looked up from her phone and said, "Hey wait, Dochester is a hundred miles from here!"

"Wrong Dorchester, try Dochester, Midsomershire."

After a little tapping, she said, "Oh, okay, only a couple of miles."

"You really should switch it over to metric, now."

"It's bad enough I have to learn a new language, now I have to learn how to measure again?"

I thought about an insulting retort, but I knew she was kidding, Buffy knew about meters.

"Actually," I said, "The Midsomer Slayer Academy is in Lesser Wittenham, which is just outside of Dorchester. We bought a small farm, or part of one, the rest of the land is owned by some big agro company that didn't need the farm house or outbuildings and couldn't tear them down 'cuz they're all historical and protected. So our farm has about thirty acres, which is plenty of room to practice slayer stuff without being observed by the locals."

"Don't they use hectares here?"

"You'd think, but I guess the Tories got all hot and bothered by the EU's sinister plan to abolish the good old British acre. So they still use the old ways, except in some official records."

"Okay, so there'll always be an England."

"Maybe, maybe not. Did you know there are three 'barleycorns' per inch? Five and a half yards per pole? Forty poles per furlong? And then there was the 'hide'. It was about 120 acres, except just for laughs it varied sometimes for no reason that I ever discovered. And there were eight 'oxgangs' per hide and two 'oxgangs' per 'virgate'. I had to learn that shit when I was researching..."

Buffy frowned, interrupted rudely, and changed the subject. "So how many Slayers are at the farm now?"

"Last I checked, it was forty-eight junior slayers, eight senior slayers, and six senior watchers. With room to maybe double that someday."

"Okay. Are they expecting us? Expecting me?"

"Nopers, this will be a surprise. Although I often show up on weekends so it won't be an earth-shattering surprise. Maybe for you, but not me."

"So is Little Wittenham like a fork in the road with two pubs and a gas station?"

"Points on 'Pub', but you messed up on 'gas'. It's petrol. And no, this fork in the road is actually a surprisingly modern small city surrounded by farmland. It's right near the Thames so we can go boating if you want."

"Why would I want to go boating?"

"Oh right, I forgot, you're a philistine."

"What? No I'm not, besides you're using that word wrong. It's for arts, not sports stuff."

"I'm amazed, Buffy, you're right."

"Amazed, huh, that sounds like an insult."

"No, other way around, really. I wasn't trying to be insulting, not on purpose. Anyway, the kind of boating they do around here is pretty relaxing. You just kind laze along the river, watching the countryside and the skimpily dressed guys – or girls if you prefer – and stop for a picnic when you get hungry."

"That doesn't sound half bad."

About five minutes later, Buffy said, "Hey, that road sign was in miles!"

I sighed, "Yeah, metrication is still an ongoing process here. Personally, I think it's stupid not to go full-on metric, and stupider yet to go partway and stop, but that's England for you. I think they still use furlongs in in the more rural districts."

Buffy said, "Seriously?"

"I'm joking Buffy, they only use furlongs for horse races."

"Yeah, that makes sense. Horses don't like change."

On Sunday morning, early, Buffy was running through her tai chi exercises in what Dawn had assured her was an architectural folly. Buffy couldn't disagree with that characterization, but whatever you called it, it was an excellent place to watch the sun come up over the beautiful fields of Midsomershire and get in her morning exercise. When the sun was finally fully above the horizon, she sat down to contemplate and think about evil.

"I'm sorry," said Dr. Bullard, "but this one's beyond me." He stared at the section of tree trunk on his table and shook his head. "We'll need a forensic anthropologist and possibly a forensic taphonomist, if we can find such a person."

"Taphonomist?"

"Someone who studies how organisms decay. It looks to me like there are some oddities here. Off the top of my head, I am having a hard time reconciling the timelines of the body versus the tree growth, but I'm not any kind of expert on either trees or old bones."

"I see. I'll put the word out and see if we get anybody."

Jones looked up as a PC guided a youngish redhead into the squadroom. The PC said, "This is Dr. Rosenberg, for DCI Barnaby."

Jones stood up and smiled, "Dr. Rosenberg, I'm DS Jones, what can we do for you?":

"Someone called for a forensic anthropologist with a specialty in taphonomy. I'm your girl."

Jones smiled at her and asked, "So how many of you lot are there?"

"Umm, it's not a crowded field. I think all the forensic anthropologist-taphonomists in the world could fit in a Mini-Cooper for a conference – the old style minis, the really tiny ones."

Jones laughed.

Willow added, "Well, that's an exaggeration, but not far off. Maybe two Mini's."

Jones laughed again, perhaps harder than Willow's joke deserved. "Well let me me show you to the morgue."

"Um, what's the situation? I don't know anything about your problem."

"Well you see, the operator of a local sawmill got one hell of surprise when they found a corpse inside a tree, along with about a quarter million pounds face-value of old gold coins. Because they're collectors' items, the coins could be worth a cool million pounds or so."

"Still don't see why you need me."

"Hang on – the tree is known to be about a hundred and fifty years old, and the body has been identified as a Viscount Charles Walpole, who would have inherited an estate and become the Earl of Orford back in 1908 when the old Earl died, if the poor sod hadn't been murdered first. He simply disappeared one day back in the year 1896, and no has seen him since, until last week. The thing is, our pathologist can't reconcile the time lines of the age of the corpse versus the growth of the tree, so we're hoping you can help."

"So it's a cold case, then."

"Well, if it wasn't for the two murders last week, which seems to be connected to the Walpole estate and the corpse in the tree, if not necessarily to the murder of the Viscount."

"Oh, I see why you called me, let's go see this corpse of yours."

Jones showed the way to the morgue.

Dr. Bullard," he said, "this Dr. Willow Rosenberg, the taphono- whatever you needed."

"I'm a forensic anthropologist with certifications in human and biological taphonomy."

"Oh, you're just what we need. Take a look at this." Dr. Bullard pulled a sheet off what turned out to be a chunk of walnut tree and exposed a very old corpse embedded in the wood. It was mostly bones.

"Holy Hecate, you don't see that every day!" said Willow.

"No, you certainly don't."

Jones beat a hasty retreat before they started slinging ten-syllable words about.

"Wow," said Buffy, "this is nice. The river, the ducks, the trees, the temperature, these chairs, the beer. This deck on the river. You know, I've come to appreciate English beer, it's got some taste to it, even if it isn't quite cold enough." It was five in the evening, and the cold chill of the last couple of days had retreated, at least until nightfall.

Willow asked, "So are Adirondack chairs common in England?"

"I don't think so," I replied, "Xander made these. The chairs that were here were really uncomfortable and they were rotting away, so..."

"So what the hell is going on around here?" asked Buffy. "The murder rate isn't up to Sunnydale standards, but it's getting pretty bad for Oxford."

Willow said, "I reviewed the body in the tree. The Viscount of Walpole – I don't know if I have the titles correct – was killed by a werewolf back in 1896. He was buried, then fifty years later somebody dug him up, moved and stuffed the remains into the hollow of the tree, which was then tarred over. I don't know where the gold coins came from, but I'm still waiting for some lab reports."

"How is your report to the police going to read?"

"I thought I'd leave out any references to werewolves. And the next best perp would be bears, but darn it, there aren't any bears in England. I thought I'd try wolves, but, gosh, I don't think they have any wolves in England, either. Maybe they did a hundred years ago, I'll have to check. But even if they did, they aren't big enough for the size of wounds. I'd try dire-wolf, but they died out about ten thousand years ago and anyway they really weren't that much bigger than regular wolves. So..."

Buffy and I nodded in unison.

Willow continued, "I guess I can claim that it was an unusually large wolf, last of the breed of something. Worse than that, I don't know how I'm going to explain away the time inconsistency. The body was put into the tree along about 1950 or so, then the someone partially healed the tree with a spell. If I can't figure out how to explain that, then the timeline really doesn't work – there just wasn't enough time for the tree to heal naturally from that big a hollow."

"But who knows that? Are there any possible suspects old enough to have been alive in the fifties? And who would have had a reason to pay attention to the tree?" Buffy asked.

"Yeah, apparently there are three generations of Earls who tended it. Although it might help that two of them are dead and buried," Willow said.

"The current Lord of the Manor would have been a small child back then. If there is a viable suspect, they would have to be near ninety, or more," I said. "I think you're gonna have to BS the coppers."

"Yeah, and maybe I can put a little 'notice nothing unusual here' spell on the report."

Buffy said, "Be careful with that, but it's probably a good idea."

"So I have a questions," said Willow, "where'd the werewolf come from, and is it still around?"

"Ah, that's a good question. Say, how long do werewolves live, anyway?" I asked.

"Mostly they die from violence," said Buffy, "but if it was a peaceful enough area and there wasn't much competition, I think they'd last a very long time since they age very slowly. The beast would have to be very careful about who and where he made his kills, but yes, the creature that killed the Viscount more than a hundred years ago could still be living here."

"So," I said, "my friend Kitty could have been killed by the same werewolf. Can you compare the fang and claw marks? Would that tell you anything?"

Willow was thoughtful. "Well," she said, "a large difference would suggest different creatures. A small difference could indicate tooth or fang growth over a hundred years. It wouldn't be exact, but a comparison might tell us if it is possible or not. But just as in humans, bite analysis is not definitive unless you can get DNA. Sorry."

I asked Willow, "If you walked through the house of a werewolf who has been passing for a normal human, could you tell?"

"Depends on how long he lived there, but most likely – yes."

TBC

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