by Ethan Proud
“We can bury him in the hole we just dug!” Artemisia said exasperatedly.
“Enough of the whispers,” Swain yelled before a smile broke his lips. “But you can pay my son respects, now. He was just a little late. Forgive him, someone shot him yesterday.”
Swain lifted his hand and pointed at the gate. When the moon touched his hand his hair grew thick and gnarled, while his nails blackened and stretched past his fingertips. Artemisia turned to face the new threat. Sure enough, a snarling wolf stood at the threshold, blood seeping from a hole in its flank. The hair on his hackles were raised and his eyes were fixed on the sheriff.
Ruckstead, however, wasn’t looking at Hugh. He was mortified by what was happening in front of the crypt. Swain had now stepped into the lunar-light and his skin was tinted red. He bled from his gums and hair sprouted across his face. He let out a guttural sound and his teeth fell from his mouth like lemmings at the edge of a cliff. His green eyes paled as they turned into yellow discs, a homage to the celestial body that ruled him now. He tore at his clothes and buttons flew asunder as he dropped to all fours. He convulsed violently and puked out something long and slimy, which pulsed for a moment before lying still. His snout stretched, his bones cracked, and his skin split. He collapsed for a moment, then a wolf rose from his human husk.
“Did you plan for this?” Ruckstead asked as he leveled the gun at Swain, but Artemisia roughly yanked him aside as Hugh leapt for him. Nonetheless, Ruckstead discharged the firearm, his aim going wide and the silver bullet embedded itself in the stone wall of the mausoleum. The two werewolves paced circles around their prey, snarling and barking, waiting for the opportune moment to strike. They could smell the aconite mixed with the gunpowder and were cautious, unsure if another bullet was at the ready.
“You fool,” Artemisia hissed.
“That wasn’t my fault,” the sheriff protested. He and the witch stood back to back as they watched the hungry beasts. “Please tell me you have another plan.”
Artemisia scoffed. “Of course I do. I just don’t know if it will work.”
Hugh took a wary step closer to Ruckstead, challenging him to shoot. The sheriff obliged the creature, the mundane bullet taking out one of the creature’s eyes. The werewolf howled in agony for a moment before his body shuddered and the bullet oozed from the wound, which closed up seconds after expelling the casing. The werewolves barked a short staccato of conversation before tightening their circle.
“What do you mean it might not work?” Ruckstead asked, never taking his eyes off the younger Ramek.
“It may kill us,” Artemisia explained as she withdrew two vials of a dark purple fluid. She unstoppered one of them and handed it to the sheriff. The smell it omitted was foul and the wolves whined when the fumes reached their nostrils. “It’s essence of monkshood. I have the antidote, but we need to get away from the wolves first. Bottoms up.”
She downed hers with a grimace and Ruckstead followed suit. The brew had a biting and numbing sensation. The lycanthropes sat back on their haunches and screamed in fury. Hugh took a few faltering steps towards Ruckstead before abandoning the attack and fleeing into the forest.
“How long before this kills us?” Ruckstead asked. His fingers were tingling and at the edges of his vision, he swore he saw purple.
“Minutes… maybe.”
Chapter Eighteen
The sound of leaf litter was the only thing that let them know they were still in the forest. Though the full moon shone bright, their vision was blurred, and they struck themselves on trees more than once in their mad dash from the cemetery. At least, it felt like a mad dash… their hearts beat slowly, and their breaths were shallow. Their mouths were filled with a tingling, burning sensation while numb at the same time. The same feeling was coming over their extremities as well, creeping from the tips of their fingers to their shoulders. They felt the acute emptiness within themselves.
Artemisia stopped abruptly and retched on her boots. The sound made Ruckstead gag, but he couldn’t will the contents of his stomach past his lips. With another flourish of her fingers, she bid her bile rush past her teeth one more time. She straightened feeling somewhat better. The cry of the werewolves shattered the night in the near distance.
“The antidote,” Ruckstead moaned. He was on all fours now as tremors wracked his body. His stomach was begging to be released. “What is it?”
“More poison.” Artemisia said cryptically. She pulled two more vials and pressed one into his hands. Beyond the chill cold of the air the skin to skin contact was like corpses touching. Intimate in a damned manner.
“No. I won’t take another one of your brews.” Ruckstead had little conviction left though. If this potion made his passing easier, he would drink it all happily. He took the cork out of the glass tube and poured the contents down his throat.
Artemisia did the same and Ruckstead felt his breathing deepen and fill his lungs. At the same time he felt an ache pierce his chest. “What is in this one?”
“Atropine and digitalis. Henbane and foxglove. Both are lethal in their own right-” Artemisia paused and held her throat for a moment as she fought the urge to vomit. She did not want to lose the antidote. Her heart fluttered for a minute as its pace quickened. “Both are lethal in their own right but will counteract the monkshood. We are in for a rough night. The air alone could kill us.”
Ruckstead felt warmth flood his stomach and down to his loins and wondered if he was going to soil his pants. Fortunately, the feeling subsided as quickly as it had come on. The monsters howled again, reminding the sheriff and witch of the danger they were in.
As the numbing of the aconite wore off, the growing cold settled into their limbs. Their lips chattered, and their fingers quivered. Surely hypothermia would seize them within the hour.
***
The night air was a miasmatic feast. Humans stank something ungodly, but the wolves slavered at the smell. In their bloodlust, they formed few sentiments, other than the desire for flesh. Their noses pressed to the ground, they searched out prey that would not poison them in turn. Northgate was a verifiable smorgasbord, but they kept being drawn to the two humans in the woods. It was hard to let such easy prey out of their sights, but the overwhelming scent of wolfsbane stood their hair on end.
Still they circled their slow-moving quarry. The humans had stopped now and a new scent wafted on the breeze. One that held promise. The patriarch barked at his progeny and they padded deeper into the forest.
***
Ruckstead leaned forward, hands braced on his knees, and held back a gag. Bile rose in his throat, but he forced it down. A tendril of drool ran past his lips and touched the ground.
“Don’t puke. Your body hasn’t absorbed enough of the antidote,” Artemisia warned.
“I don’t know what I’m feeling. But it’s horrid. I feel stretchy. Like there are two of me.” Ruckstead stared out into the trees. His vision had cleared momentarily, but now it swam as the trunks distorted and the fallen leaves twisted and rose several feet off the ground. He doubted if his footing was solid. “The world is dancing, I think I may fall off the earth.”
“It is the call of the other planes. Henbane is popular in flight potions. Do not worry, the monkshood will keep you on the first plane. Your soul needs a higher frequency to elevate to the second plane,” Artemisia explained as she scanned the area for threats.
“The second plane is above us?” Ruckstead asked as he stared at the moon. “How high is it?”
Artemisia laughed wearily. “No, the planes are overlapping, meshed. That is why spirits get lost and haunt the places they loved while alive. The dead travel freely between realms. If they linger too long on our plane, their energy dissipates and returns to the living. That is enough lessons for the night, the wolves are close.”
The sheriff stood up abruptly. “How do you know?” His sense of hearing and sight hadn’t revealed anything to him.
“A bird told me,” Artemisia said.
Ruckstead looked around in confusion, so she continued, “A lost little bird.”
Ruckstead had the good sense not to question that the witch was communing with the spirits of animals. He still felt sick to his stomach, and his mouth was so dry that it felt like it could split at any moment. His temples buzzed, and he took an uneasy step forward. Artemisia took off running, uncoordinated and ungainly. She rolled her ankles several times but recovered before she hit the ground. The leaves beneath her feet began to crunch more heartily than before as frost spread across their surfaces.
***
Few scents were as intoxicating as that of fear. The wolves saliva hung in tendrils past their gums and created a film that coated their entire mouths. Their ribs heaved from the mere ecstasy of the smell. The moon had reached its zenith and they had plenty of time to draw out this game of cat and mouse.
***
Artemisia and Ruckstead had been running for hours, or perhaps it was only minutes. Their lungs burnt from the icy air and their nostrils stuck together. The witch collapsed on all fours, her heart racing from the henbane and foxglove — had it not been for the monkshood it would have burst. Burst into tiny shreds. Smithereens where a beating organ had resided. Ruckstead pulled up next to her and fell like the wall of a beleaguered fortress.
Their bodies shuddered in the deep of the night and their trembling limbs reached out to clutch the other, desperate for the warmth that was flooding from their bodies in columns of steam. Oddly enough, as the temperature dropped they began to feel warmth returning to their fingertips.
Chapter Nineteen
The jangling of keys woke Mission from his fitful night of sleep. The door to the jail opened and he didn’t believe his bleary eyes at first. Gertrude stepped into the jail, wearing a riding cloak, stocking cap, and thick gloves.
“Wilder left this evening to go hunting with your cousin and hasn’t returned. I fear that they were befallen by some ill,” she said as she turned the key in the cell door and pushed it open.
With sore limbs Mission rose. The scant blanket offered little comfort on the cold floor. “What time is it?”
“Well past midnight. Some call it the Witching Hour,” Gertrude said with a sad grin. “I do not think it will be kind to Artemisia.”
The sheriff’s wife tossed her husband’s ward a thick sheepskin jacket, a hat, and gloves. “I have horses ready for us. We need to be quick.”
Mission donned the clothes, which he had no doubt belonged to the sheriff. A thought struck him hard enough that he felt it on the side of his face.
“Is this how Artemisia escapes the jail?” he burst out.
“Hardly an appropriate question given the circumstances, but yes,” Gertrude said with a conspiratorial glance before she locked the jail cell and stepped into the night air.
The horses snorted noisily, clearly upset to have been saddled at this hour. They paced nervously, but that could have been the smell of wolf in the air.
“What hunting grounds would our loved ones be found in?” Gertrude asked.
Mission thought for nary a minute. He recalled the gunfight the day before. “The cemetery trails.”
Gertrude swung up into the saddle. “We mustn’t delay then.”
She spurred her horse which took off surefooted in the lunar landscape. Mission’s steed caught up to her a moment later.
“Did you bring any weapons?” He nearly shouted to be heard above the thundering of hooves.
Gertrude nodded in answer and pointed to the musket peeking from behind one of Mission’s saddlebags. He tried to not look abashed, but realized it was pointless as the frigid air already turned his cheeks bright red. His eyes watered from the wind that whistled through the trees. The sound of hoofbeats on cobblestone soon ceased as they veered their horses off the road and into the trees. The longing cry of a wolf bleating at the moon echoed somewhere to the north.
Mission reined his horse and Gertrude spun in her saddle as she pulled her horse to a halt.
“If I know Art or your husband, which I think I do, they are that way.” Mission pointed in the direction the sound had come.
Gertrude nodded direly and hoped that Benjamin would sleep the whole night through and not wake to find both his parents gone. Or worse, if he woke in the morning and the house was emptied permanently of his parents. She swept aside her doubts like cobwebs and headed towards the werewolves.
With the moonlight guiding them, they navigated through the tree trunks with ease. A fox alighted from its hiding place as they approached, giving both them and the horses a start.
“This is a misguided quest indeed if we are frightened by a mere fox,” Mission snorted, joking to settle his nerves.
“Bravery is rarely guided by logic,” Gertrude said as she urged her horse forward. They spread out and wove between the trees, scanning the ground for the wayward witch and sheriff. Mission spied a pair of yellow eyes glowing in the dark, perched above two huddled figures.
“There!” he shouted and rushed to his cousin’s side. Between her shoulder blades, Volker purred. The cat moved aside and watched as Mission lifted Artemisia and slung her over the saddle.
“Help me with Ruckstead,” Gertrude commanded, and Mission moved to help her. Together they heaved him into the saddle, his dead weight seeming astronomically greater than Artemisia’s.
Once the unconscious bodies were loaded Volker sprang onto the rump of Mission’s horse. Gertrude eyed the feline with a look of astonishment, they were miles from Artemisia’s cottage. Mission caught her look and offered, “He’s a weird cat.”
With their senses on high alert, Mission and Gertrude led their horses back towards the town.
***
By no small stroke of fate, they made it to the Ruckstead household unmolested by the werewolves. They hurried to carry or drag the hypothermic bodies into the house, Volker mewling as he trotted after them. The horses let their displeasure at being left saddled in the cold known, but there were bigger fish to fry.
“Strip them of their clothes,” Gertrude ordered, hearing Benjamin stirring in his crib.
“What?” Mission asked incredulously. It was a survival situation, but it felt wrong to undress his cousin.
“Go start the fire and put a kettle on,” Gertrude said with a sound of exasperation. She quickly undressed her husband and moved to Artemisia. Grabbing her heaviest, scratchiest wool blankets she wrapped them both and moved them near the fire. Artemisia had a spot of frostbite on her cheek and Ruckstead’s lips were blue and two of his fingers blackened at the tips. With a kitchen knife she made small cuts to the frostbite to encourage blood flow and vigorously rubbed her hands on the afflicted skin. A moment later Mission had the fire crackling to life and the kettle was beginning to bubble.
Gertrude moved back and forth between Artemisia and Ruckstead, rubbing their arms and legs forcefully to help bring heat back into their bodies. Artemisia’s eyes fluttered as she came to, and subsequently puked. The fluid was thick and gray and smelled fouler than even Benjamin’s milk vomit when it had comprised his entire diet.
“Thank you,” she croaked, and Gertrude patted her head in the comforting way that only a mother can.
“And thank you for taking care of my husband.” Gertrude turned to Mission. “Tend to the horses please.”
“Ah, you let him out,” Artemisia said with a hoarse smile. Ruckstead began to stir and Gertrude pressed a finger to her lips.
“Second heart-attack you’ve given me in two days,” she said sternly, though it held little weight. She kissed him lightly on the thawing lips. The kettle began to whistle angrily, demanding tea be steeped in its roiling waters. “Let me get you two something to drink.”
As they warmed around the fire and tea filled their bellies, the effects of the poison came on again. Their skin went from deathly pale and blue to a sickening shade of gray. They would survive, but the night would be a long one. Volker curled in Artemisia’s lap and purred contentedly. Mission returned f
rom unsaddling and feeding the horses and took a seat near the fireplace. Gertrude brought him some tea and went to check on Benjamin who was still asleep.
“How do we defeat the wolves?” Ruckstead asked. He was warming up, his teeth still chattering occasionally.
“Swain should be easy, but it will be difficult to kill him in his human form without arousing suspicion. And without De’lune witnessing it. The vulkodlak will prove tricky. But while the planes were calling, a thought came to me,” Artemisia said as she sipped her tea. Volker stopped purring.
“You can’t ask him for help,” Mission said firmly, his eyes wide.
“Hugh will not return to his human form. He will wreak havoc upon Northgate. Nothing will stop him,” Artemisia countered.
“I am sure that we can find a more appealing alternative,” Mission said belligerently.
“Not before the body count rises and Northgate is little more than a graveyard,” the witch said direly.
Ruckstead nodded and Mission was flabbergasted. The witch and the sheriff, mortal enemies since the day they met, had been agreeing more and more of late.
“As long as it kills those creatures, I don’t care what you conjure up,” Ruckstead said. Artemisia didn’t show her appreciation for his support, instead she looked troubled.
Mission laughed aloud, though it was a mirthless sound. “Sheriff, you don’t conjure a demon, you summon it.”
Welcome to the Pantheon
Book Two
Chapter Twenty
Scree and talus covered the grassy steppe, obscuring the lichen, krummholz, and stunted flora. Above the decaying rock stood a withering peak, huge columns slowly splitting and diving to join their brethren below. The once mighty summit was reduced to rubble piles by the constant torture of the wind, rain, snow, and lightning. Not even the monoliths lived forever. Perhaps this monument once had a name, but now it had been forgotten by all but the mountain goats who bravely traversed its ruinous faces in search of rock tripe.
