The Wolfman Page 17

  It was not the cry of a man.

  In that moment, in that hour, that form of Lawrence Talbot no longer existed.

  What remained—that thing that rose up on twisted legs and tore the air with monstrous claws—was no longer human. It was a monster from the oldest of legends. It burst from the mausoleum and stood in the cold wash of moonlight, and there, under the watchful eye of the Goddess of the Hunt, the Wolfman threw back its head and howled its fury at the night.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  A mile away, on the far side of Talbot Hall, Singh sat alone in his room, his kirpan loosened in its scabbard and a heavy rifle resting across his thighs. He sat on the edge of his bed, staring at the door, which was closed and sealed with three heavy hasp locks. A pistol lay on the bedspread beside him and a silver-tipped hunting spear stood leaning against the bedpost.

  Sweat and tears ran down his face.

  The howl of the Wolfman burst from the forest and raced across the fields and invaded the house through every crack and loose board. That sound beat at Singh’s ears. And he bowed his head and prayed.

  IN THE CHURCH Pastor Fisk was still ranting about the power of Satan when an unearthly howl shook the building to its rafters. It was far away and yet the naked threat implied within its urgency seemed to breathe against the back of the vicar’s neck. What little hair he had stood on end and gooseflesh pebbled his skin.

  He left a passage from the Revelation of John unfinished and instead bent and blew out his candles.

  The congregation stared at him in confusion and fear, their own candles trembling in their hands.

  “Quickly!” he shouted. “No light . . . no sound!”

  Everyone blew out their candles and for a long minute they sat in the darkness, safe within the church walls.

  The creature howled again. Louder. Closer.

  And suddenly the darkness in which they hid felt far less comforting.

  INSPECTOR FRANCIS ABERLINE paused with his glass halfway to his lips as the howl cut through the din of the tavern and smashed everything to silence. The echo of the creature’s call lingered in the smoky air for several seconds.

  And then Aberline slammed down his glass and jumped to his feet. He grabbed his coat and hat from their pegs, patted his pockets to reassure himself of his whistle and pistol, and dashed out into the night.

  The patrons stared at the open door for half a minute, and then Cramer raced over, slammed it and dropped the bar in place.

  ABERLINE DASHED TO the stable, kicked open the door and saddled his horse with desperate haste. He barely had the girths buckled before he swung up into the saddle, kicked the horse in the flanks and headed out of town at a full gallop.

  IN THE SHADOWS of the ruined abbey, the hunting party heard the howl and froze like rabbits. Colonel Montford cut a look at Strickland, who had gone as pale as the moon. Dr. Lloyd’s face was bathed in icy sweat and he looked ready to collapse. Only MacQueen’s face was neutral, though his jaw was set and he adjusted his grip on the heavy rifle.

  MacQueen turned slowly and scanned the terrain, first checking to see that each of the other men were invisible in their hunting blinds among the ruins and then eyeing the stag to make sure it was standing in clear moonlight.

  Everything looked perfect.

  The howl came again, cutting through the air like a scythe.

  “Did you hear that?” sputtered Dr. Lloyd.

  “Of course we heard it you old fool,” snapped Montford.

  “Begging your pardon, sirs,” said MacQueen quietly, “but it might be a good time to shut the hell up.”

  No one argued with him.

  The howl tore at the night.

  THE WOLFMAN MOVED like a ghost through the mist of the forest. Its huge feet made almost no noise as it ran along at a fast lope. It leapt gorges and ravines without effort, jumped atop fallen trees and ran their length before springing into the darkness. It never missed its footing. Where an owl might find the darkness and fog too gloomy, the eyes of the creature saw everything. Heard everything. Smelled everything. The woods withheld no secrets from it. If an insect wriggled beneath the loose bark of a sycamore three hundred yards down the slope, the creature heard it. If a fox two miles away sprayed a shrub to mark the edges of its territory, the Wolfman knew it. It could hear the thunder of their heartbeats, see the heat of their life force, smell the heady salt and sugar in their blood.

  It smelled water and stopped, bending to drink—and then it paused, muscles tense, muzzle wrinkled in anger as something else leaned upward from the pond toward him. The Wolfman lashed out at it, raking claws across its eyes and slapping water high onto the banks. The image of the other monster wavered and then settled as the agitated waters stilled. The Wolfman eyed the reflection warily. With a low warning growl, it bent to drink.

  Then all at once it was in motion again, running, leaping, moving at the speed of hate and hunger.

  The moon bathed the creature with silver light, and in that light it was the most powerful thing under heaven. It feared nothing, hungered for everything.

  It ran and ran and then stopped all at once, pressed up against the trunk of a tree, its claws digging into the bark, head raised to sniff.

  There, on the wind.

  Blood.

  Fresh and hot. Exposed, naked to the breeze.

  Drool fell from the creature’s mouth onto the tatters of its shirt.

  THE STAG COULD smell its own death out there in the shadows. It struggled against the ropes, throwing all of its weight against the restraints, crying out in the raw and strangled voice it only used in panic. Its eyes were wide and wild.

  COLONEL MONTFORD PEERED down the length of his rifle barrel, sweat running down his bruised and lacerated face.

  “Damn it, MacQueen,” he whispered. “What’s it waiting for?”

  “Shhh,” murmured the hunter.

  THE STAG STOPPED its tortured cry and stood stock still, and the whole forest around it went quiet as well. To the watching eyes of the Wolfman the stag’s blood was fire-bright and so hot and sweet. Though there were other prey in the forest, the bleeding stag was right here, its blood singing to the werewolf.

  The Wolfman’s muzzle wrinkled back in a silent snarl of unbearable hunger, and then it moved. Racing, running, its body a blur of impossible speed as it came out of the shadows and lunged for the bleeding stag. It leapt forward, a massive dive that cleared twenty feet so that it landed within inches of the deer.

  And then the ground beneath it collapsed, without sense or substance, dragging the creature down into darkness. It fell and fell and landed with a huge crash into the stone-lined depths of the abbey’s cellar.

  Trapped.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  The hunters rushed forward, opening fire in a haphazard barrage that tore chunks out of the ground and gouged trees. A half dozen whizzed past the stag, grazing its throat and chest and flanks and splashing it with blood, but none of the shots were fatal. The screaming stag lunged once more against its tethers and they finally snapped and it bolted into the darkness.

  Montford fired and fired and fired, working the level on his rifle, sending his bullets down into the darkness without aim. The bullets struck fire from the stone walls of the cellar, ricochets pinged and wanged and buzzed through the shadows like furious hornets.

  “Shit! Shit! Shit!” he cried as he fired, his eyes half mad with fear and murder. When his rifle clicked empty he drew his pistol and continued firing.

  MacQueen materialized beside him and slapped the colonel’s barrel up so that the last bullet blew a hole through layers of dried leaves overhead.

  “Enough!” cried the hunter in a voice so loud and commanding that everyone came to their senses and took their trembling fingers off of their triggers. The air around them echoed with the thunder of the gunfire.

  MacQueen crept to the edge of the cellar and peered down into the darkness. Below, the Wolfman screamed in fury and tore at the unyielding walls
of its prison.

  “Did I hit it?” demanded Montford breathlessly. He inched forward and dared a look down into the hole, but the bottom of the pit was black and half hidden by the remnants of the canvas screen they’d erected to hide the hole.

  “Get a light!” MacQueen ordered, and Dr. Lloyd stumbled away from the trap to secure a lantern. He removed the blackout shades and suddenly yellow light flooded the clearing.

  “I’ve got it,” he called as he hurried back to rejoin the others.

  “Bring it here,” said MacQueen. “Let’s see how bad we’ve hurt the bugger!”

  Squire Strickland took the lantern and knelt by the edge. “I can’t see it.”

  “Lower the lantern,” ordered Montford. “A little more—”

  Suddenly the Wolfman’s taloned hand darted out of the shadows, closed around Strickland’s face and ripped him down into the pit.

  Immediately everyone screamed and stumbled backward, firing into the pit, firing wild into the trees, colliding with one another.

  Something dark flew out of the pit and struck Montford in the chest. He looked down in dumb horror to see Strickland’s torn and severed arm, the hand still clutching the pistol, finger hooked around the trigger.

  “Good God . . .”

  Then something else came hurtling up from the shadows. Something larger. Something alive.

  The Wolfman crashed to the ground right in front of MacQueen. It landed hard on all fours facing away from him, and then rose slowly to its full, towering height. The hunter’s eyes followed it as it rose, his mouth sagging open with horror. But then he snapped his jaws shut, flipped his rifle in his hands, and with a fierce two-hand grip on the barrel swung it with all of his might, turning shoulders and hips into the movement, slamming the heavy stock into the monster’s back. The blow was so powerful that the stock shattered and flew apart and the impact staggered the creature. It should have killed it, snapped its spine, but all it did was make the werewolf take a single forward step.

  The Wolfman whirled around just as MacQueen flung the broken rifle aside and clawed for the heavy pistol shoved into his belt. MacQueen was fast. But he wasn’t near fast enough. The Wolfman slashed at him with both hands, the long claws cutting back and forth, razoring through clothing and flesh, sinew and bone. MacQueen seemed to disintegrate, to fly apart like a house of cards in a strong breeze. The fury of the Wolfman’s attack seeded the air with blood and for a moment all that remained of MacQueen was a bloody mist and a scattering of red debris.

  One of the other hunters buried his pistol against the creature’s side and pulled the trigger. The blast was muffled by the monster’s thick fur, but the Wolfman howled in anger and turned. The hunter backpedaled away but the monster leapt atop him with such force that bones snapped like firecrackers and blood gushed from the man’s mouth. The Wolfman’s head darted down and closed around the hunter’s neck. Vertebrae crackled and the man’s scream was cut off with abrupt finality.

  “Kill it!” bellowed Montford, and he swung his rifle up and fired.

  The Wolfman made a grab for Montford, but the colonel was backing away, firing as fast as he could work the action. One of the other men swung around to bring his gun to bear and Montford’s next shot took his hand off at the wrist. The Wolfman grabbed the wounded man’s arm and tore it out of its socket.

  The other hunters scattered like sheep.

  Dr. Lloyd and Colonel Montford among them.

  MONTFORD SPLIT OFF from the pack. Let them draw the creature, he thought. Let them die.

  He ran toward Talbot Hall. If he could make the house then he could barricade himself in. It was a tactical re treat, he told himself. He wasn’t running away, he was regrouping.

  He ran as fast as he could, trying to outpace the thunder of his own beating heart.

  In the darkness and the mist he never saw the bog until his leading foot splashed down in it and he pitched forward onto his face. His rifle went spinning off out of sight; he didn’t even hear it splash.

  Screaming in fear and frustration, Montford scrambled to find footing in the wet mud, but the harder he thrashed the more the bog pulled at him.

  And then he heard the thing. A growl and a splash and he knew that the werewolf had fallen into the bog as well. Montford righted himself and looked around and there it was! Not ten feet away, splashed with dark blood, its eyes as bright as the furnaces of Hell. Montford screeched in a high, shrill voice and sloshed backward away from it. The creature took a step toward him and sank to its knee, but with a huge wrench it pulled its leg free and took another step forward. And another.

  “God . . .” Montford whispered and he felt heat spread down his thigh as his bladder failed.

  The creature took another step, growling low in its throat as if it was enjoying the anticipation of what was to come.

  Montford knew that he had no chance. He drew his pistol, but it would not stop this thing. The rifle had been loaded with silver bullets. The pistol was not.

  “God save my soul,” he prayed, then he shoved the barrel of his pistol under his jaw and closed his eyes as the Wolfman took a final step.

  He pulled the trigger.

  And nothing happened.

  He pulled again, and again. A splinter of his mind remembered that he had not reloaded after the initial attack.

  The Wolfman loomed above him, its face almost calm in its moment of triumph.

  The screams of Colonel Montford frightened the night birds from the trees.

  DR. LLOYD WAS alone in the woods. He could not run as fast as the remaining hunters and he had no sense of woodcraft. He staggered from tree to tree, seeking cover, wheezing, weeping, coughing, all but blind despite the moonlight. In his mind the image of the creature leaping out of the pit played again and again. Roots caught his feet and tripped him, branches whipped his face.

  Dr. Lloyd finally collapsed with his back to an ancient elm. He clutched his rifle to his chest and rocked back and forth as he wept.

  Then he heard a sound. Something moving through the woods.

  He held his breath.

  God . . . let it be Montford.

  The sound came again, closer now. Stealthy, like a man sneaking through the brush.

  Unless it wasn’t a man.

  Lloyd raised the rifle and turned to point it into the darkness behind him. Leaves rustled as something moved through the mist.

  Please, let it be Montford.

  Then he heard the growl.

  It was so close.

  Lloyd fired his rifle and in the split second of muzzle flash he saw the face of the beast. Not behind him; not in the line of fire.

  It was right beside him.

  INSPECTOR ABERLINE HEARD the howls and the gunfire and the screams and he spurred his horse into a full gallop. The horse’s hooves kicked up ground mist so that the road appeared to catch fire and smoke behind him.

  As he entered the woods he saw a shape rushing toward him out of the shadows and Aberline drew his pistol, but the animal that flashed past was only a stag. But it had a tether around its neck and its body was streaked with blood.

  The sight of the animal and the smell of blood threw his horse into a panic and it suddenly reared up and Aberline was pitched out of the saddle. He fell hard onto the muddy ground, the air punched from his lungs and fireworks exploding in his eyes.

  He lay there for several minutes, barely able to gasp in a full breath of air.

  The forest around him grew still and quiet by slow degrees, and by the time Aberline could stand everything was silent. A few shreds of cloud had drifted across the moon and the inspector stood in total darkness for a moment. He fished for matches but just as he found them the winds blew the clouds away and moonlight flooded the entire clearing. He saw that he was in what had once been the courtyard of an ancient abbey. Nearby was the black mouth of what had once been the cellar, behind him were the jagged teeth of broken walls hung with creeper vines. The last wisps of cloud trailed away so that t
he moonlight shone full and bright, illuminating everything.

  What that cold white light revealed took his breath away more sharply and profoundly than the fall had done.

  There were bodies everywhere. The hunters, the men from town. A dozen of them lay scattered around him, their limbs torn and broken. Aberline stood in a lake of blood with death all around him.

  In the distance the howl of a wolf rose into the night sky and madness ruled the forests of Blackmoor.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  “Good morning, Lawrence.”

  Lawrence Talbot heard the voice but his brain was too numb to process either meaning or identity. It took every bit of energy he had to open his eyes. The morning sunlight was like a fist in the face, and each glistening dewdrop on leaves and grass was as sharp as a splinter in his eyes. He could see someone standing over him but everything was a smear of shadows and light. Lawrence could feel dirt and tree roots under his buttocks and the gnarled bole of a big tree against his back, and as sense and focus came to him in slow degrees he realized that he was crammed into the hollow of a tree on a grassy slope.

  “Can you hear me?” asked the voice. “Do you recognize me, Lawrence?”

  There were other voices in the near distance, and the sound of horses blowing in the cold dawn air.

  Lawrence blinked his eyes clear and what he saw tore an inarticulate cry from his throat. His hands . . . God almighty . . . his hands.

  He held up his hands and for a desperate moment he thought he was wearing dark red gloves. But he was not. He looked down at his clothes. His shirt was torn to ribbons; the legs of his trousers slashed and ripped along the seams, his shoes gone. And everywhere he looked—his body, his clothes—there was blood. So much blood, caked on and ground into the cracks of his skin and under each nail. He touched his face and felt dried gore around his mouth, on his chin and throat.