“Oh, my God!” Charlie yelled and scrambled out of the way before Morg appeared entirely in his lap.
“Oh, you’re here,” she said when she’d fully arrived. She brightened when she saw Lee, but Ellie couldn’t be sure if she actually liked Lee, or if this was just so she appeared nastier to Charlie. “Hi, Lee, nice to see you.” She flicked her hair over her shoulder and flounced out before either boy could respond.
“Your sister is here,” Charlie said.
“Yes, she is; well done.”
“Where’s your ferret?” Lee looked around. The ferret was usually tucked somewhere where could keep an eye on Charlie, but stay far enough away from Lee’s wolf smell.
“He’s not my ferret. Besides, I don’t know. He comes and goes as he pleases.”
“Have you not named him yet?” Charlie asked, lying back on his hands, his long legs – don’t think of that, Ellie thought to herself – stretched out.
“No, I haven’t.” Ellie felt funny naming him. He’d told her he had a name, but wouldn’t tell her what it was. She apparently had to figure it out herself. “I wish this potential familiar thing wasn’t so hard.”
“Consider yourself lucky.” Lee swung himself around on his stomach to better access the chips and dip. “Not many witches find their familiars these days, even ones who’ve had them in the past.”
“As Miriam keeps reminding me,” she said grumpily, finding it hard to look away from Charlie’s reclining body.
Stop that, she told herself. Things are actually going reasonably well with Mike lately.
He appreciated her coming to his practices and games and they’d become a little closer again. He didn’t hold back so much anymore, and they spent more time together. The best thing about that, in Ellie’s mind, was that there was less time for her to be alone with Charlie. They were working on his fluctuations while Lee was there. Neither boy appeared to mind at all.
“Ellie, how do you do that?” Lee asked.
Ellie pulled herself from her reverie and looked down; she was juggling three small fireballs in her hand. As she realised what she was doing, they snuffed out.
“Um, I don’t really know how to explain it. I guess I just imagine what I want to do and I can do it.”
“Does it work with everything?” Charlie asked, staring at the ceiling, exposing his slim neck. She had the distinct feeling he was half-referring to the curse, but was more asking out of curiosity.
“Nope.” She ate a couple of chips. “Some things you need spells for – as in you need to say the right words,” she hurriedly added, seeing Lee’s vacant look. “Others need elaborate rituals and ingredients, or you need to do them on the right day of the right year. Or sometimes you just need a butt load of emotion.” She let sparks play along her hands and arms.
“Like that curse you put on Charlie,” Lee said. Ellie had noticed lately that Lee had picked up on calling the former vampire by his pet name like Ellie did.
“Like that.” She saw Charlie watching the sparks on her body with a hint of a smile on his face. It was one of the rare moments where he allowed himself to look utterly content.
“How are the fluctuate-y-whatsists going?” Lee asked Charlie.
“Not as badly as they could be. I am stuck in human mode but I can turn on my vampire senses for a little while.”
“With my help,” Ellie smiled at him.
He smiled back. “Yes, only with your help so far.”
Lee sniggered and Ellie saw the smirk on his face.
“What?”
“No, nothing at all.” He looked like he was trying to stop smirking but was failing miserably. “How’s Mike?”
Ellie realised what Lee thought he was smirking at and she mentally jabbed him. She saw him wince and was pleased her jab had hit the mark.
“He’s fine thank you. His team is sitting second on the ladder, they’re very pleased.”
“I’m sure they are,” Lee said, no sign of a smirk now.
They sat in companionable silence for a while. Lee played on his phone a bit, Ellie played with her magic. Charlie appeared happy to just sit and watch everyone. When Charlie lay down completely, Ellie decided everyone was too comfortable and lazy, and that it was time for something more to eat.
“I feel like pancakes. Does anyone else feel like pancakes? Let’s go and get pancakes!”
Lee looked at her somewhat suspiciously and Charlie had a look of fondness on his face. She secretly really wished he wouldn’t use that look around her.
“Um...okay. I could do with pancakes.” Lee rolled over onto his back and swung his legs in the air, presumably in preparation for getting up, then stopped and let his legs fall. “Where are we going to get pancakes?” he looked at Ellie upside down.
“Ah... I hadn’t thought of that...”
“I can make them.” Charlie was already standing.
Lee and Ellie exchanged glances. “Why not?”
They followed Charlie into the kitchen where there was a lot of flicking flour at each other, eating uncooked batter, and a few too many burned pancakes. Ellie felt relaxed amongst her newfound friends, especially once the ferret came out from his hiding spot to join them, and found himself covered in flour and sugar. She was even, for possibly the first time in her life, happy about being able to use magic in a ridiculous food fight.
This not-quite-actually-getting-pancakes – or something very similar – became habit when the three of them got together. Ellie knew her mum hated cleaning up the mess, but she also knew she was pleased that Ellie was happy in her magic.
****
Lee had once again been told he wasn’t going to camp that month. After shifting all three nights and spending most of his time in the woods – or his otherwise unoccupied room – with Amber the previous month, he wanted to rant and rave against his parents, but he knew they wouldn’t change their minds. It made him feel a bit better that they hated saying he couldn’t go.
“We know how much more you enjoy camp these days, and how much better you’re taking to the whole wolf thing, but we just can’t this month, honey,” his mum said to him again the morning they would have left for wolf camp.
“I’ve got to work, and your brothers have exams at school. And you can’t miss out on so much, you need a good start for next year if you’re going to get into a good course at the Academy,” his dad said.
Lee hated to agree with them. He couldn’t afford to miss so much school, especially if he wanted to get into a human university instead of the Academy. A human uni wouldn’t consider his supernatural distractions when looking at his average marks like the Academy would.
“You can still have fun with your brothers at night. You know how they like to wrestle at the full moon.” His mum smiled.
Lee did know. He’d always had his butt kicked on the full moon... When he hadn’t been sitting around in human form watching.
“You can spend some more time with Ellie and Charles,” his dad suggested. That idea did brighten him somewhat, but hanging out with Ellie and Charlie wasn’t exactly the same as taking a tumble through the woods with Amber.
“Okay, okay... I don’t like it, but I accept it,” Lee said finally.
“That’s my boy.”
The three nights of the full moon were actually great for Lee. He shifted all three nights.
****
The night air sang with the wind and carried many smells to the wolf. All and nothing were familiar. He knew the wolves with him were part of his pack, but he did not associate them with the family of his human self. The moon shone bright and strong, and the wolf felt its life force humming through him, giving him extra strength and speed. The air brought to him a scent of fresh, living meat and he took off in the direction it came from.
The wolves with him followed him and he was pleased that they would be there to help him kill the source of the delicious smell. Once he was in front of the house he had come from, he r
ealised the smell came from everywhere around him, in various strengths and discrepancies. His nose was assaulted with smells to hunt, which left him momentarily confused. He shook his head and tried to concentrate on one. He found one, more gamey than the others, and followed that scent.
The smell brought him and his pack to a small woodland park. He was pleased to be away from the screeching metal boxes that rushed past them and showed no fear of him when he growled at them.
He stalked through the park with the pack, who appeared wary around him. He would have sniggered at them, if his mouth could make the right shape.
Finally he found the source of the smell; a small furry animal he could not name. It sat quivering as he stalked up to it.
Just as he was about to pounce, one of the older males of the pack batted him down. He growled and bit out at the other wolf, catching its leg in his fearsome jaws. The other wolf tore free from his grip and limped off, his front left leg bleeding. He growled at the others and they backed away, growling as well. Pleased they would not interfere again, he pounced on the poor, defenceless animal and savoured every bite.
Chapter Nineteen
L
ee woke the next morning with a horrible taste in his mouth and an uneasy stomach. He dragged himself down the stairs and stopped, horrified, at the kitchen door.
“What the hell happened?” Lee yelled.
Dwight growled at him and whimpered as his shoulder bled more.
Lee walked in and sat at the opposite side of the table.
“Seriously, what happened?”
“You happened, dear,” his mum answered as she dabbed the bite with something that made Dwight wince.
“What?” Lee almost fell off his chair and threw up simultaneously. “I did...”
“You did more than that,” Chuck answered.
Lee looked around at his family. He felt his stomach churn and rushed to the sink just in time. His felt a calming hand on his back and looked around to see his father standing behind him.
“What the hell did I do?” He sank to the floor and took the cup of water Chuck held out to him.
“You hunted an…animal,” his mother began, threading the needle to stitch Dwight’s shoulder – he’d heal faster than a human, but not as fast as a vampire. “Dwight tried to stop you. You know we don’t hunt when we’re not at camp, and you... Well, you attacked him. Then you killed and gorged yourself on the...animal.”
“Why won’t you tell me what it was?”
“It’s best you don’t know, dear. Hush.” She directed this last part to Dwight who howled in pain as she wriggled the needle through his skin.
Lee felt sick again and looked away.
“The wolf was strong in you last night, Lee,” Chuck said. “It’s good, but you’ll need to learn to control it. That’ll come with time.” He smiled in a reassuring way, but Lee could see the worry in his eyes. Lee didn’t feel very reassured.
For some reason, the first person he called when he got up to his room was Charlie.
“Good morning.” Charlie sounded as pretentious as usual, but Lee didn’t mind as much these days.
“Hey, Charlie, it’s Lee.”
“Oh, Lee. Hi. How are things?”
“Look, I know I don’t usually call you, I don’t usually have much to say, but I need some help with a wolf thing...”
“How can I help?”
“Well, I hoped... Since you went from human to, well, monster, you could maybe help me out?”
Charlie didn’t say anything for a while and Lee was a bit worried he’d offended his friend. But, Charlie finally answered. “I think I know what you mean. Would you like to come over? I do not think I would be very welcome at your house.”
“Ah...no, I suppose not. Well, maybe you would. I don’t know. Either way... I’ll be over soon.”
“All right. Mary... Mum and Dad are home, is that okay?”
Lee smiled at the frustration obvious in Charlie’s tone, but he didn’t have time to dwell on that now.
****
When he got to Charlie’s, Mary answered the door.
“Lee, how lovely to see you. It’s nice to see our Charlie spending time with someone other than that Cameron.”
“Thanks, Mrs Dumphrey.” Lee went inside.
“Charlie’s up in his room.”
Lee nodded, bounded up the stairs and barrelled into Charlie’s room.
“What the... Oh, it’s just you. I thought for a moment all my time training the parents had been wasted effort.”
Lee laughed and sat on the bed. Charlie was in his desk chair.
“Look, I wanted to talk to you about...” Lee stopped, not quite sure how to put it into words.
“I believe you called it ‘becoming a monster’ earlier,” Charlie said. Lee looked up, but there was nothing but understanding on Charlie’s face. Lee felt he could almost see all of Charlie’s years in him at the moment.
“You’re really old, aren’t you?”
Charlie laughed. “I suppose. I should be about six hundred and ninety two this year... Give or take. I don’t like to remember my exact age.”
“Jeez...” Lee looked at him again. He knew Charlie was old, but he realised he’d never bothered putting it into proper context before. “My parents are actually pretty young then...”
Charlie gave a short bark of laughter. “Gives you new perspective, does it not?”
“Something like that.”
“Now, what is troubling you?”
“I attacked my brother and killed some kind of animal last night.” Lee could almost feel the remains of said animal in his stomach jumping around.
“Ah... First kill?”
Lee nodded. “I... Just… How did you deal with it?”
“That is a reasonably interesting question... Well, not so much the question but the answer... To my mind.” Charlie shook his head. “What I am trying to say is I suppose I did not really deal with it at all.”
“What do you mean?”
“My first kill, like yours, was an accident. But, being a vampire is very different to being a werewolf. Whereas, I imagine, you have forgotten what you did last night,” Lee nodded, but let Charlie continue, “I did not. I remembered everything. In fact, I did not sleep for days, or eat, or drink, or even leave the room I was staying in. I sat on the floor in some kind of stupor, angrily dismissing the innkeeper’s wife who came to check on me periodically. It took some time to convince them of my sanity and the other patrons’ safety when I finally came down, I can tell you.”
“I can imagine.” Lee fiddled with his hands in an effort to stop them shaking. He hoped Charlie’s human senses were still ‘on’, or whatever he and Ellie called it, so he wouldn’t be able to hear Lee’s heart racing or smell the sweat running down his back.
“Let me put it this way.” Lee looked up at Charlie. “You only killed an animal. Sad, yes. But, not a human. I have done much, and I mean much, worse.”
Lee didn’t know what to say.
“Lee,” Charlie spoke very softly while Lee stared at him, envisioning his future victims – humans torn limb from limb, scattered in a pile around his wolf form while he gorged himself. “Lee... You are not me.”
Lee, lost in images of his potential victims, still didn’t answer. However, he was ready to scratch Charlie’s eyes out when he felt the sting of a supernaturally charged slap across his cheek. Lee growled and Charlie put his hands up, belying the smile on his face.
“Sorry...” he pointed to the smile, “I have just never used my vampire senses without Pet.”
Lee couldn’t help but smile back, of course he’d be pleased with himself.
“Thanks, I guess. My head was stuck in an awful place.”
Charlie looked thoughtful. “I, too, went there. After I killed that prostitute-”
“You killed a prostitute!” Lee wasn’t sure who he expected Charlie’s first kill was, but he wasn’t
expecting that.
“Of course, easiest prey back then. Poor, yes, but also no family. No one to miss her.”
“You killed... Okay...” Lee shook his head, not really wanting to think about Charlie and a prostitute. “How do I stop it?
“Killing?”
“Killing... Enjoying it... Being out of control...”
“Hm... Look, I am probably not the best person to ask about that. I gave into the bloodlust; I let it rule me for a long time-”
“But, not forever then?” Lee felt hopeful.
“No, I got a handle on it eventually.”
“How?”
“With difficulty. I do not know how it would be for a werewolf, but-”
“Charlie!” Ellie dashed into the room and stopped, presumably surprised to see Lee there.
He cleared his throat. Ellie would not be pleased about what he did the previous night; attacking Dwight... Well, Dwight would heal in a day – two at the most – but killing an innocent animal… His stomach heaved again as he thought about it.
“I, uh... Is it okay if we talk about this later?” he asked Charlie, as he stood up.
Charlie looked between Lee and Ellie and appeared to realise why Lee didn’t want to stay. He nodded.
“Sure, whenever you want.”
“Great. Ellie; I’ll see you later. Are we studying tomorrow after school?”
Ellie looked frazzled. “Sure, yes...let’s.”
“Okay. I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”
Lee let himself out. He heard Ellie ranting as soon as he was halfway down the stairs. Apparently, he wasn’t the only one who went to Charlie for advice.
****
Charles waited for Pet to say something, but she just hopped from one foot to the other. He motioned to the bed and she sat down, still fiddling with her hands as though she could not keep still. Her hair sparked slightly and he saw that she had been crying. Just as he was about to speak, she started.
unvamped Page 18
