High Moon

by Kati Wilde

  “Were werewolf hunters.” She puffs out a breath, lifts her hands as if to say, Who could have guessed?

  “No, I mean…” Her friend looks stricken. “The way they were killed—was that…?”

  “Oh.” Makena closes her eyes. “Yeah. Not really a bear.”

  “So it was someone like—” Carrie’s gaze darts to me and away. “And all this time, did you know?”

  Swallowing hard, Makena shakes her head. “Not until recently.”

  “Oh, sweetie.” Carrie goes to her, hugs her close. “Are you okay?”

  For a second, Makena clings to her, and her voice is thick as she says, “No. And yes.” She draws a deep breath, pulls back and holds Carrie’s hands. “We’ll have a drink in a day or two and I’ll tell you everything. Okay?”

  Carrie nods. From behind her, Kyle focuses in on me. “What organization of hunters are you talking about?”

  “Of werewolf hunters,” Makena says, but Jonas adds, “Though it seems like they aren’t much of an organization anymore.”

  All my swirling thoughts settle down and my attention sharpens again. “What do you mean?”

  The old man gives a rusty laugh, then grimaces as if it hurt him. “Well, we figured that attack on the herd was some kind of revenge. And we were wrong about that. He had no clue who me and Makena were until he saw me. But what he did to me? Yeah. He wanted to make damn sure I knew why. And that was revenge for sure.”

  Anger tightens Makena’s lips. “Revenge against you? For what?”

  “Against your parents. But they aren’t around so I was the next best thing, considering that I helped them escape him.” He coughs, and Carrie hands him a glass of water. “Thank you, mayor. Now, it seems that there was one of the úlfhéðnar that they’d been doing some testing on, and that Mikael and Halima set free when they left. So Fauconnier and the others hunted him down again—but without that poisoned silver to fight with, the wolf killed almost all of them before Fauconnier took it down. He was the only one to survive.”

  “But he got bit,” I realize.

  “He did. And it just made him even more convinced that all of your kind needed to be eradicated. Because you’re all dangerous and could spread the disease.”

  Makena shakes her head, her anger heating her scent. “Because he tortured someone, and they fought back, somehow that makes them the dangerous person?”

  “Logic and fear are never good bedfellows,” he reminds her, then continues, “So he’s got renewed faith in his crusade but he needs more silver, yeah? And he goes looking for it the same way Mikael did. He formed MDC and used it to continue his hunts for both the wolves and the silver. So when he came across a piece of tainted jewelry, he looked for where it came from. He didn’t find out exactly which mine, but he did narrow it down to a region. That’s why MDC moved in to Fortune City. So he could start looking.”

  “Silver?” Kyle asks. “That’s why you were trying to get out of here—to blow up your silver mine?”

  Jonas nods. “He thought it was real funny that for two years he’d been trying to get us to sell, not knowing who the hell we were—or that the mine on our land was the one Mikael found all those years ago. Finally he got tired of asking and went to go see for himself if the mine was even worth all the effort they were putting into trying to buy it.”

  I fucking knew it. “The night he killed so much of the herd?”

  “That’s right. And now he wants what is in there, so he can pull it out and make as much of that silver as he wants. He doesn’t know what’s down there, because I wouldn’t tell him. But he knows it’s something. And he overheard me making calls, looking for someone to get into that crawlspace.” He looks to me. “That’s why we’ve got to close it up now. He’s likely going to try to get in there as fast as he can.”

  “He can’t get in there himself,” Makena points out. “He’s too big. He’ll have to hire someone.”

  “Maybe someone like Charlie Langerman and his friends?” Kyle suggests. “He’ll get them to retrieve whatever this thing is…then maybe tie up loose ends.”

  By killing the three men. Apparently Kyle and Jonas have the same impression of Fauconnier. I don’t know whether they’re right. But Fauconnier has to be stopped.

  Yet there’s still something else I need to know. “Did he say whether he killed my family?”

  Jonas shakes his head. “I don’t know. And I was too busy trying to figure out how to stay alive to ask.”

  It doesn’t matter. I’ll ask him myself. To Kyle, I say, “Can you handle dynamite?”

  “What?” Makena looks at me wide-eyed. “You’re going out there tonight?”

  “It seems the best time. Unless everything Fauconnier believes about werewolves spreading their disease is a lie, he’ll be careful to lock himself up tonight. So it might be the one time we could do it without running the risk of him showing up with those silver bullets and that silver knife. Because if he comes at me with those…I might be in real trouble.”

  Makena’s face goes pale and tense. “But Kyle can’t get through that crawlspace. So you’ll only be able to close the mine. Not destroy the hand.”

  “We can’t be sure destroying it would take the magic out of the silver, anyway. But blowing that entrance is a sure thing. And maybe only a temporary fix, but we can shore it up after I kill him.”

  The sheriff only blinks once at that. “I’ll help you with the dynamite. Carrie and Makena, you stay here with Jonas and—”

  Makena stands. “I’m going with you. But, yeah—Carrie, if you could stay with my uncle, I’d appreciate it.” She tugs the ring off her pinky finger. “And wear this. Just in case we’re wrong and he comes after Jonas, after all.”

  Taking it all in stride, her friends accepts the ring and says, “Okay, but what do I—”

  “If he comes, you grab his bare skin with that on your finger,” Makena says. “Then you hang on while Jonas does the rest.”

  Carrie nods. “Will do.”

  Then Makena glances at me, her eyes bright, and it suddenly settles in—the organization of hunters is gone. There’s just Fauconnier. So if we kill him…I’ll never have to leave her.

  But I have to kill him first. And it sure as hell doesn’t look as if that’s going to be easy.

  23

  Makena

  On the ride home, I hold tight to Ethan’s hand all the way. I know he would rather that I stayed at the hospital, but I need to see this through. I don’t have to explain that to him, though. Because he needs to see a few things through, himself.

  Kyle’s right behind us. Our first stop is at the yard, where Ethan heads to the bunkhouse to get the dynamite he stole from the MDC site and a roll of fuse. I run into the house to let the dogs out for a few minutes. While they’re taking care of business, I head into the workshop to grab a few things, then meet Ethan and Kyle at my truck.

  Kyle isn’t in his sheriff’s uniform, but he buckled on his duty belt and holsters—maybe not quite trusting that Fauconnier will lock himself up. He eyes the case that Ethan’s carrying. “You know how to handle that shit?”

  “I do. Had some explosives training in the army, and since I knew we might be using this in the mine soon, I put myself through a refresher course online.”

  “And it’s stable?”

  “These modern dynamite sticks? Yeah. The blasting caps I’ve got in this bag are a bit more volatile, but as long as we aren’t banging on them with hammers, they’ll be all right, too.”

  “Good to know.” Kyle looks to me. “You got everything you need?”

  Nodding, I glance at Thelma and Alf, who’ve already jumped into the bed of the truck, ready to go. “Can you tell them to stay here? There’s no way that being around that blast will be good for their ears.”

  And although I snagged some noise-deadening safety earmuffs from the workshop, I don’t have anything for the dogs. With a few words, Ethan sends them back to the house, where they lie down on the porch and pout. Kyle hop
s up into the back of the truck; Ethan does the same, then taps on the window to let me know they’re ready. I start off—and no matter what Ethan says about that dynamite being stable, I drive more slowly through my pasture than I normally would, wincing with every dip and bump.

  The full moon is rising over the eastern hills as I park as near to the silver mine as the terrain allows, about fifty feet away from the entrance. And as I’m slinging the long coil of rope that I grabbed from the workshop over my shoulder, I tell them what I plan to do.

  “I’m going through the crawlspace,” I say with more solid determination than I feel. My hands are already trembling, my heart fluttering wildly in my chest. “So I can destroy Tyr’s hand and neutralize that poisonous silver.”

  Ethan immediately begins shaking his head. “No fucking way. Just talking about that crawlspace does you in, Makena. So—”

  Goddammit. “I’m not losing you!” I shout over him. “So I’ll be terrified, yeah. I’ll panic, yeah. But I will do this and there’s not a goddamn thing you can do or say to stop me, because you can’t follow me into the fucking mine!”

  His voice goes ragged. “Makena—”

  “And because I love you,” I add softly, my breath shuddering. “So I can do this.”

  His jaw clenches, and in the next second he pulls me against his chest. Voice harsh in my ear, he tells me, “I could stop you here.”

  I know he could. Swallowing hard, I wait.

  “All right,” he says thickly, and desperately kisses my mouth. “But be careful. And you”—he spears Kyle with a look—“you help her.”

  “Of course,” he says.

  “All right, then. So we’ll make sure this goes off without a single hitch.” His face hardening with resolve, Ethan steps away to reach into the back of the truck. “If we’re just blowing the hand, you don’t need more than a single stick of dynamite. Because if that doesn’t do it, there’s a good chance nothing will destroy that thing. Then we’ll just blow the entrance, instead.”

  He hands Kyle the roll of fuse, then unwinds one end and reaches into his bag for a blasting cap—which doesn’t look anything like what I imagined. Instead of a flat round cap, it’s a thin cylinder with one hollow end and one pointed end, resembling a metal pencil that’s missing its eraser.

  Ethan sticks the fuse into the hollow end of the cylinder and crimps it around the fuse cord by pinching the metal between his fingers. “This is safety fuse, which means that after it’s lit, the fire will take about thirty seconds to burn through twelve inches of fuse. How long is that crawlspace, Makena?”

  My heart’s pounding so hard that blood’s rushing dizzily through my head. “About…eight feet, maybe?”

  And feels like a million miles.

  “How far from the crawlspace to the hand?”

  “Another six or seven feet.”

  “Plus the extra distance you’ll need to string it down the wall from the crawlspace opening and along the floor. Good. That means it’ll be a long damn time from the moment you ignite the fuse to when the dynamite blows. So you’ll take this”—he holds up the blasting cap with the fuse attached to one end—“through that crawlspace with you, stringing the fuse along behind, with Kyle doling out all the length you need. Once you get to the hand, you’ll stab this blasting cap into the end of this dynamite stick, tuck it up under the bones, and head back through the crawlspace. Once you’re clear, you can light the fuse and we’ll have a good ten minutes or more to get as far away from that mine as we want to get. Yeah?”

  Be far away from exploding dynamite? Easiest thing I ever agreed to. “Yeah.”

  “Okay.” The hoarse edge to that reply tells me that he’s still not completely on board with this plan, but he doesn’t argue anymore. Instead he just makes sure I’m as safe as he can. “How are you getting out of that chamber once you’re inside?”

  I hold up the rope. “I’ll give one end to Kyle. Once I’m in the chamber, the opening to the crawlspace is in the wall, and only a little bit over my head. I should be able to hold onto this and climb up—and if I have trouble, he can help by pulling from his end.”

  “You got a light to see with?”

  I turn my big halogen flashlight on and off. Kyle does the same with the Maglite in his duty belt.

  “But speaking of light…” Kyle tucks his flashlight away. “What do we light the fuse with? Did we bring matches?”

  Ethan’s face goes blank. “Ah, shit.”

  I start to giggle.

  He looks to Kyle, who shakes his head and observes, “Who carries a cigarette lighter anymore?”

  “A lighter is a shit way to ignite a safety fuse, anyway. Goddammit. You got anything in your truck?”

  I begin shaking my head, then realize— “What about emergency road flares?”

  “That’ll do fine. They’ll work a hell of a lot better than a lighter would.”

  Road flares it is, then. I head to the cab of my truck, where the flares are stored behind the seat with my emergency kit. I slide two of those into a bag, then head back to where Kyle and Ethan are waiting. I take the yellow dynamite stick that Ethan holds out, carefully slide the explosive into the same bag. The blasting cap, I give over to Kyle, who is still holding the roll of fuse it’s attached to. Until we get into the mine and I need to go through that crawlspace, it’s probably better to keep the dynamite and blasting cap apart.

  I draw in a deep breath. “I think we’re all set, then.”

  Ethan closes his eyes, as if he wishes there was something that would convince me not to do this. Then mutters, “Fuck.”

  Then he kisses me—and kisses me again. Until his mouth stills against my lips.

  Abruptly his head comes up, his eyes glowing fiercely. “Makena…get into that mine. Right now.”

  An icy claw of terror rips up my spine. Because I’ve heard those words before. “Ethan?”

  “He’s driving up the road this way.”

  Kyle’s voice sharpens. “Fauconnier is?”

  “You’re sure it’s not the UPS guy?” I try to make it a joke but my voice is thin and wavering.

  “I’m sure. Unless someone else would be driving one of MDC’s company rigs and not bothering with their headlights,” Ethan says, peering out into the dark. Then he suddenly glances upward, as if to verify that the moon is high and full.

  The moon is high and full. “But…isn’t he cursed? How is he driving if he’s a mindless beast?”

  “Maybe he found some magical cure for the full moon, too. It doesn’t matter.” Gripping my arm, he steers me toward Kyle. “You both go and get inside the mine. You don’t come out for anything—and don’t you do a damn thing to that hand and make that mine useless to protect you—unless I tell you he’s dead.”

  Horror twists in my gut. Because maybe Tyr’s hand is why Ethan and Fauconnier can’t get near the mine. But if we don’t neutralize it, the silver isn’t neutralized, either. Ethan would be trapped outside the safety of the mine, exposed…and an easy target for those silver bullets.

  “Ethan, you can’t fight him—”

  “I won’t let him get to you.”

  “He can’t get to me. Kyle and I will be safe inside the mine. You run.”

  “Safe for how long?” He cups my face in his hands. “How long are you going to hide in there, Makena? How long will he trap you in there—until Jonas or Carrie comes out here looking for us and he gets them, too? And how long am I supposed to run?”

  Sick fear sours the back of my tongue. “I don’t know. But—”

  “We knew I would have to face him at some time. I’ll do it now. And end this.”

  With tears clogging my throat, I nod—then head back to my truck. When I return a second later carrying my shotgun, a frown of confusion furrows his forehead, until I tell him in a shaky voice, “If he uses that silver, you can’t use your warrior form. So…maybe a gun won’t help. But maybe whatever he’s doing to stop the transformation weakens him. So maybe a gun will hurt
him enough for you to gain an advantage.”

  Nodding, he bends his head. This time his kiss is long and hard, and I try to tell him everything I feel before he lifts his head. But the kiss isn’t enough, so I whisper, “I love you,” again.

  And with panic and terror ripping at my every breath, I turn toward the mine. I only make it a few steps before realizing Kyle isn’t on my heels. I glance back, my heart contracting with sheer gratitude and love as I see Kyle holding out one of his handguns for Ethan to take.

  “For backup,” Kyle says.

  Ethan’s expression says he doesn’t know if it’ll do much good, but he thanks Kyle and sticks the gun in the back of his waistband. “Take care of her,” he says hoarsely. “And you probably can’t stop her from setting up that dynamite, but you don’t let her light that fuse. Especially if he’s taken me down. Because without the magic protecting the mine, he’ll come straight in there for you both.”

  “Then you take care of her by coming through this,” Kyle replies, then turns as I yell out.

  “Kyle, hurry!”

  Because we don’t have much time. Ethan doesn’t have much time. Because he refuses to run and hide from what’s coming for him.

  So I’m not running and hiding, either. Because for a long time, the thought of going into this old mine scared me more than anything. But there’s something that’s far more frightening—and that’s Ethan dying. And I won’t lose him.

  I won’t.

  24

  Ethan

  I watch Makena run toward the mine, the scent of her fear hot in the back of my throat, with Kyle right behind her. I follow after them, getting as close as I can to the entrance—up to the point where I start feeling sick and dizzy. Close enough that I can hear them from inside.

  They must not have to go in deep—and I remember Makena said that a little light from outside got through that crawlspace and into the chamber where she was trapped. But although the moon is bright and full, there won’t be any light for her in there now except for what she brings.