Chapter 7: House-pets and Strays
This was among the only times Sally was thankful that she couldn't touch anything in the living world. Otherwise she would be there with Hope and Thom as they crouched over the bathtub scrubbing the blood out of their fingernails and trying not to get the gore on their shirts stuck to their biceps.
Elda was elbow deep in George's skin, pulling infections and splinters of silver out from his flesh and into the plastic popcorn bowl that Sally managed to fight over to her.
There was werewolf blood all over the house, but more than that, there was vampire blood. Tearing through the one at the cellar entrance and the three at the back garden was gory—for monsters who need others' blood to survive, they sure carried a lot in themselves.
Thom and Hope were a deceptively vicious pair. They tore through the adversaries with their bare hands as if they were gutting pumpkins for the carving. They were efficient, trained, sure, coordinated. Everything a soldier needed to be. But they weren't soldiers, they were young and they were warriors.
It was pristine, until Thom turned his eyes on Sally and Annie, and lunged for them with his blood drenched fingers. He ripped through air, the girls screamed, he thrashed wildly at their presences some more, then Hope called his name- then the battle was over.
Less than a minute later, he reverted to being blind to the sight of them.
In the house they went to clean up after Elda said she didn't need them and they had spent over an hour running the water. Sally didn't complain, though she would have to kick the furnace a few times if the boys wanted a hot shower when they came home.
Hope came out first, as innocent as she had seemed the first day. She was wiping her white hands on Josh's blue towel as if she had just washed up after a meal. She cleaned up well: had taken off her outer shirt so that she was wearing some sleeveless black top. There were no marks on her, even the slices that she had cut on the back of her fingers healed completely. Werewolf blood probably did that for her.
Annie was shocked by the self mutilation, so much so that she flickered in and out of sight, even to Sally. Sally tried not to flinch; she had seen Suren do the same thing to her own kind—with more grace, but no less fatality. Still it unnerved the ghost that someone so young could kill so calmly. Suren was over a thousand years old; innocence should have been lost by then. Hope was barely twelve.
"How is the progress, Elda?"
"This is the 'wolf, Hope. Once the silver is out, he'll heal before morning."
"Good. See to it it's all gone. We can't stay in this house for too long. Too much blood will attract other hunters."
"Of course," Elda drained her towel in the bucket and shook out a few more silver shards.
"Must you use your hands?" Annie whined, her sleeves covering her face. She didn't want to watch.
Elda just chuckled, "this is faster than picking around with tweezers. And since he's already opened up, what's the difference?"
Annie decided that George's agony was the difference but Eldapulled out another silver fragment and a stretchy red string of some sort came with it. The ghost disappeared and not just from view.
"That is pretty gnarly," commented Sally, and Elda just smiled. "You're doing it on purpose?"
"She's an easy one to tease."
"Oh, that's just cruel."
"The silver is poison to a 'wolf's body, just like deadman's blood and 'wolf's blood is poisonous to a vampire. We would want to scrape the blood around the infection anyway—so it is just as humane with an experienced hand as tweezers and gauze."
"It's still gross." Sally decided not to fade out like Annie and instead concentrated on carrying another clean towel to Elda. The house could absorb the blood into the walls, she was not worried about that. But the towels came from the boys when they had moved in, they would not be so easy to clean.
The werewolves had laid out trash bags by the blanket, and shoved aside the coffee table and the couches. Thom had accidentally smeared a blood smudge on the bathroom door on his way in, before he realized Sally could have opened it for the both of them. Hope had already wiped it clean with a towel. But Sally still felt the 'wolf on the knob when she walked past it. She may scrub it supernaturally later, who knows what kind of infections they could bring to Aiden.
Annie had known about the blood poison. So when Hope and Thom ran the switch blades over the backs of her knuckles, Annie had been a little more prepared what to see. Sally had not, and stood stricken with shock when they rushed toward the guards barehanded.
But blood to blood contact itself was not enough to fell the guards; instead Hope and Thom had to crack heads, rip out throats and break bones before the dust of the dead floated in the air. Despite the ferocity and the feral attacks, they were quick, quiet, and cruel. And within no time, they had George bundled in a raincoat and were running out the back door.
And that feral attack was something Annie had not anticipated and she proceeded to jump and jerk every time the 'wolf legacies tore through vampire flesh.
Sally beat them to the house, and had the door open for them by the time they reached. Elda came first, on some mystical cue, prepared with rags and bags and cleaning solutions. The other two came less than half an hour later to a room prepared for 'werewolf E.R.'.
At the front step, Thom had lost the blood lust But Hope's eyes were still keen and ready—every part of her screamed alert. It didn't die down until Elda started her work—and Sally shut all of the doors and windows. She barred them locked, and wasn't sure if she could have opened it for even Josh and Aiden if they had returned some time during the entire gory episode. Looks like they would be finished before they got home-
-Late.
George was a pitiful thing, under that swamp of blood and bath towels and quivering sheets. Elda had covered what she wasn't working on and the pools of blood outlined the muscle definition around his raw and open wounds. He was past crying out, and instead gnashed his teeth till blood oozed out of his lips. Someone had stuffed a towel in his mouth and his moans rang muted by the fluffy pink textiles.
When the old wolf woman had finished with his thigh, she carefully smoothed his skin over the raw flesh, and this time Sally did turn away when she saw the exposed muscles clench and unclench. If a ghost could eat something, she would have thrown up.
"The bone's not broken—"
"What a relief," said Hope to herself.
"—and the skin will set now that the silver is out. When its firm, you can clean him up and see if Thom has any clothes to lend him." She got up from her knees, and Sally heard them crack. She acted as old as she looked in this brief moment. "I will phone the reserve. Ma'ma will be glad to know we've found him first."
"You were looking for him?" Sally asked, Hope was already gathering all of the bloody items and putting them into the popcorn bowl. "Why is it everyone's looking for him?"
The little werewolf didn't know what she meant, so Sally explained the episode in the Hotel, where John Mitchell, and then Annie Sawyer demanded they find George. So Hope too explained.
"Purebreds and Legacies have a supernatural bond with other werewolves. The moment this wolf landed in America, everyone with blood knew it. And not just those werewolves on the reserve: Thom's pack and my mom's pack knew it.
"When you run with a pack, you know that there is a pecking order. Alpha male before Alpha female, beta female before gamma male. Rank is slotted by bloodline. The parent's curse is passed to the offspring, whether the trait is inherited or imprinted. Part of it has to do with strength, but most of the status is supernatural—you don't chose your lot in the pack, the pack chooses you.
"This might be obvious for big wolf packs, but what most lone werewolves don't know is that they all carry the order's traits as well. All werewolves follow a hierarchy based off of their bloodline, and for those 'wolves who encourage breeding of purebreds, they know that there are desirable mates and undesirable mates."
Sally tried not to look confused, "So you're saying, packs pick their wolf partners based on how they'll make stronger babies."
"Basically. If you're a gamma, the only way you can move up to beta is if your offspring is beta. You don't inherit any of the beta's traits, but you collect their status."
"Okay. So living in a pack of wild supernatural shape shifters is virtually like living in the feudal ages of King Arthur's court.—"
Quietly Hope pouted, "We're werewolves, not shape-shifters…" Sally ignored her.
"—Then what exactly does that have to do with George?"
Hope hesitated. "George comes from a prestigious line of werewolves common on the British isles. They are cursed or blessed with the children of the dawn. The line has historically been loners, and very few are born as opposed to turned, and most turned are accidents. According to lore, all wolves from his bloodline can sire the child that will herald the eve of war and the ultimate destruction of all vampires or the destruction of all werewolves."
"That is poppycock." The two girls turned to the staircase where Annie had braved to sit. The ghost looked stricken, and hopeless as she grabbed the handrail's posts with her long and slender hands. "It's not logical. It's not even believable."
"There are wolves out there who believe in this as much as any one human believes in a god." Hope's implication was deep, and Sally instantly tightened herself up as if she expected a hundred werewolves to burst through the door and try to drag George's shivering body out of the living room.
"Say you are right and George is this great bloodline of supernatural werewolves. Why aren't people snatching up all of the werewolves that came before him? Or any of the ones he's turned?"
Hope's eyes widened in terror, "He's turned others?"
Annie flushed, hid further behind the bars and did not elaborate. This agitated the little wolf but she just shook her head as quickly as she could then ignored the question. "There is a common bloodline here in America known as the Shaman. Enough have the strain here to sense when an alpha Evebringer is a particularly potent threat. Ma'am is one of them, Elda is one of them…"
"Shaman," Annie spat, Sally could tell little-ghost-England didn't like the word. "What's so bloody great about that? Some hoodoo status?"
Hope's eyes narrowed dangerously, "Shamans are the first werewolves to harmonize their human and wolf halves. They were the first to remember and control their actions during the moon's phases. They're people to be respected."
Annie realized she had offended the little girl so she pouted to show her disagreement but said no more.
"Look, George here may not bring any purebred children into the world. But we can't take that risk. If we can bring him to the reserve, we can watch him so that his blood won't pass on to another generation. And no pack could take advantage of his bloodline."
"He's not a beast to be mated and bred!" This time Annie was clearly offended, "He's a boy! He has civil rights and freedoms and feelings and warmth and love! You cannot take him away from us."
"Do you love him?"
The sincerity in Hope's expression shook the rage out of Annie's features for half of a second and she quite flustered said: "What? No, not me! He's a friend. He's my best friend."
The little wolf looked deflated, "Oh." She considered it then said, "Well we can't let him go out and breed. His blood is strong… and should he meet another with the same curse who wants to take advantage of the prophesy-"
"Do you even hear yourself? You're mad. Simply mad!" and she flickered from her spot straight to the werewolf's side. "I appreciate what you have done to get George out of that awful place. But if you don't mind, I would like you to leave."
"We're not going to leave!" Hope wailed like the tween that she apparently was. Obviously, the little girl was convinced of her little story. And She didn't like 'no' as an answer, "He can't fall into the wrong crowd. One mistake is all it will take to bring ruin to werewolves and vampires."
But Sally had to agree with the other ghost and just said, "You guys better go. We'll talk with him after he heals up. Maybe he'll come with you willingly."
"But—" Hope was cut off, when Elda came from the kitchen.
"Perhaps it would be best if we gave them some time to think about it. Shouldn't we, Hope?"
The little girl shot the older woman an icy glare, but stilled her tongue. Then without any explanation she nodded, sighed, and then smoothed the wrinkles out of her little plaid skirt. "I guess so. We'll throw this out—" she indicated to the popcorn bowl, "—then call a cab. Elda, go find Thom, he should still be in the bathroom."
"I'll get him," and before anyone could stop her, Sally projected herself to the bathroom at the top of the stairs. The door was half open so she let herself in and promptly came up to the fine skinned trim of the half naked wolf-man in her bathroom.
He, like Hope, had taken his shirt off and was soaking it in the water in the sink. It had a barely peachy tinge to it and was as still as death, but Sally could see that he had drained, then soaked then drained his shirt several times for the floor was puddle in various shades of deep red water.
Under his shirt, Thom was a chiseled beast, cut and shaped with a tight chest and firm shoulders. But if there was something that caught Sally's attention, it was how thin he was; how sharply his ribs could be outlined under his pale complexion.
She yelped at the sight of him and he shot up a bit and sniffed the air. Looking frustrated he turned around and for a moment, among the suspicion, Sally thought she saw a bit of desperation.
"It must be Sally," he said.
She cursed herself quietly- she had forgotten he couldn't see ghosts very well. "Yeah, sorry. I… I just wanted to tell you that were leaving soon. But I totally spaced and now I can't speak to you and you can't see me and—"
She was about to materialize away and go find Elda, when Thom quickly said, "I'm sorry that I attacked you at the hotel earlier. Sometimes I can't control myself when I'm a werewolf."
"It's okay Thom, you can't hurt a ghost."
"It's even harder to stop when you run with a pack…" he continued. Sally listened to the bitterness that was laced in his voice. "It's just so easy to get caught up in the rush."
It struck her then, the realization that he couldn't know if she was listening to him or not. "You really upset about this, aren't you?" He was speaking to an empty space—she just happened to be filling it. And even as he approached, and she instinctively took a step back toward the wall, she realized he couldn't have known that she was trapped in the corner – surrounded by the heat of his curse and the cold wall of her house. The 'wolf rolled off of him in pulses—like a fluttering heartbeat. Like a tattered flag in a gusty breeze.
The supernatural power was broken in him—and he was broken because of it. And what was stranger still was that she knew exactly what he was feeling. He had lost—was robbed of— something that gave him life, and he felt the void and heartbreak that comes with the knowledge that he was now a creature less than what he had been. She knew it intimately for she herself had been stripped away of her vitality—and it pained her every day to think she would never again enjoy the pleasures of living, feeling or changing her own life.
Thom leaned his long elbows on the wall behind her and she felt his breath pass through her being—he had enough supernatural magic for her to feel the aura he gave off. She observed his face from there- and while doing so, told him vehemently, with all the feeling of her soul, that she was there. She asked him if he regretted it. She asked him if he hated the way he killed. And she asked him why he would do such a thing.
"I'm really sorry."
That was none of the things she expected to hear from him. And in her stun, she suddenly felt very small and insignificant. She almost winked out.
Unexpectedly he slumped over. His forehead dipping through her space and she caught a glimpse of the moon—and was overwhelmed by guilt and sorrow. Sally jerked from out of his mind and shrank below him—since he seemed to have given up believing she was in her tiny little cavern between his body and her bathroom tiles.
"I'm stupid," Thom muttered to himself. He chuckled angrily, "What were you hoping for, Thomas?"
The ghost-heart stung, and she felt a wave of pity for the poor, downtrodden soul before her. With some measure of determination, she walked through his body. Bits of her aura caught and pulled onto his supernatural presence and she shuddered at how it felt—'like jello through the bloodstream'. He too must have sensed her body for he tensed up, his hand flew to his heart.
She smoked up the mirror with some hot water then quickly scribbled, 'It's okay' on the glass. She put a little smiley face in the extra space just for good measure. Sally smiled when she watched Thom read the message. The tension lifted from his shoulders. He read her words with a strange look of relief in his eyes.
"Okay okay," Sally chuckled, pleased that she could get such a rise out of the werewolf stranger. "You don't need to start crying now, puppy." Then she fogged up the other half of the mirror and wrote, 'Elda wants to go home soon.'
He let out a pent up breath, smiled, then took his shirt from the sink and used it to mop up the last of the blood from the bathroom floor.
"Thanks," he said to the empty bathroom. Sally just happened to overhear it and smiled.