Argentum (P.A.W.S. Book 2)

by Debbie Manber Kupfer

  They went down the stairs and through the kitchen and out through the back door. The place seemed deserted. Outside, though, there was a group of boys ranging from around 13 to 18 or 19 years old. They stood in a semicircle, facing a man who was talking to them. He was tall and handsome, with dark brown hair and piercing blue eyes that seemed to sparkle even from a distance.

  “Ah, Ryan,” the man said as they approached, “so lovely that you could join us, and look, everyone, Ryan has brought us a present! You have done very well, Ryan. You will be rewarded for this.”

  “Oh, thank you, Alistair,” stammered Ryan, red in the face now.

  Jenna looked away from this man’s mesmerizing eyes for a moment to glance at Ryan, who was smiling up at the man and panting a little like a puppy dog waiting for a treat from its master. He pushed Jenna toward Alistair.

  The sun was beginning to set, and all around the circle the boys were getting restless, but while they fidgeted a little, they stayed in place listening attentively to Alistair.

  “On the last moon cycle, we welcomed Ryan to our fold, and I believe he will be a valuable member of our pack. Tonight, he will join us on our hunt, but first I want to initiate a new member into our ranks. I asked Ryan to bring me a girl. It has been a long time since our packhouse has hosted a young girl, and I believe we could all do with a little civilized touch.”

  During this speech, the sun continued to set and the moon was beginning to rise; a full, round red-tinged moon that illuminated the yard so that Jenna could see the faces of the boys all around the circle. But as she watched, those faces began to change. She stared in horror as hair grew from their skin and their noses lengthened and flattened. Now their bodies were changing, too. She noticed Andrew at the very edge of the pack, and even he was turning into a light-blonde wolf.

  But Ryan was still a boy. She looked into the face of her brother and saw agony in his features, as if he was trying to fight a monster inside him. Alistair stepped forward, his slightly accented voice soothing and almost kind.

  “Go on, Ryan, you can do it. Let the moon in. It doesn’t have to hurt.”

  Ryan was screaming now, but gradually, despite his screams, his body started changing piece by piece by agonizing piece. Finally he stood in front of Jenna and Alistair—a small, reddish brown wolf.

  “There, you see, Ryan, my boy. It will get easier each month, and eventually you’ll even be able to change at will, like me! But, where are my manners? You must be starving.” He looked back around the circle of wolves. “You all must be starving! Well, soon we will go out and hunt, but first, a small pre-dinner snack. Remember, pack, we want to save young Jenna, so don’t be greedy. Just a little taste each, okay?”

  Jenna watched in horror as Alistair walked towards her. She noticed that he, too, had now begun to metamorphose; in place of his fingernails there grew long, terrible claws, and when he opened his mouth, Jenna caught sight of huge canines forming. He reached for Jenna and pushed her to the ground. He tore the light T-shirt off her chest and exposed her bare skin. The pain that coursed through Jenna’s veins at the moment of Alistair’s bite was greater than any she had ever experienced. She didn’t know it was possible to feel such pain and still be alive. But with the pain came a numbness, and the world seemed to blur and fade. Through the mist, she saw Alistair, now half-man, half-wolf, beckon to Ryan.

  The wolf that was once her brother walked over to her slowly, and Jenna watched in horror as he bent his brown furry face towards the blood that was flowing from her chest, and nipped at her flesh with his teeth. Another wave of pain flowed through Jenna’s body. Alistair commanded Ryan to stop, and for a second, as he backed away from Jenna, their eyes met and despite his canine form they were the same gray eyes he had always had; the same eyes that peered at her when she was a newborn in her cradle; eyes that were covered for peekaboo when she was an infant; mischievous eyes that danced with her when she was a toddler; eyes that had watched her as a little girl, playing dress-up, and tag, and ball. Those same eyes, so familiar, now housed in an alien form.

  How? How could he have done this? How could he have brought her here to be sacrificed to Alistair? Jenna thought she was going to die. The pain was simply too great. Maybe it would be better if she died, for now there were more wolves coming forward, each hungry to claim a taste of her flesh and blood.

  Then, suddenly, an enormous howl cut through the night. Alistair, in full wolf form now, huge and terrible, summoned his pack to him, and as one they abandoned their meal and ran towards their master. And almost instantly they disappeared into the night and Jenna was left on the ground, bleeding and confused.

  A new face appeared above hers framed with purple bangs and breath that stank of smoke.

  “Well, they’ll be gone for the night. Come on. We’d better get you cleaned up,” said Nora.

  Chapter 9

  After that night Jenna was no longer kept as a prisoner in her room, but was allowed to wander freely around the packhouse. She kept herself busy, trying to restore some order to the chaotic lives of the packhouse residents. She didn’t try to leave. Nora had made it clear what would happen if she tried. Not just to herself, but to her family and friends. She thought about her parents and Isabelle. She had to stay there. She had to protect them. She still dreamt of getting away though, that somehow she’d be able to save herself and Ryan, maybe Andrew too.

  She and Andrew were becoming friends. She liked him. He was kind to her and she realized that none of the wolves had chosen this lifestyle—none accept Alistair, that is. But some of the other wolves seemed to enjoy the hunts and looked up to Alistair in awe.

  On the first full moon after Jenna had been turned, Andrew was with her when she transformed. He helped her though the pain of the first metamorphosis and took her out away from other wolves. They hunted squirrels and rabbits . . . and stayed away from humans.

  Ryan, on the other hand, virtually ignored her. He seemed to be enjoying his new life here with Alistair and the other wolves. She wondered if he had any remorse at all about bringing her here. Yet she could not feel resentment against him. He was still her brother, whatever bad choices he had made and continued making.

  She still kept the small back bedroom, and had managed to procure a notebook and a few pencils and had started a diary of sorts where she logged the day-to-day comings and goings of the packhouse. When she was not writing, she hid the diary under her bed. She wasn’t sure whether Alistair and Nora would approve of her chronicles.

  For a short while, Jenna had a roommate during the time Mandy was detained at the packhouse. Mandy came from a rich family very different from her own, and complained constantly. It seemed that she didn’t realize how dangerous such complaints could be. She also firmly believed that somehow her parents’ wealth could buy her out of there.

  When Mandy disappeared after the first full moon, Jenna wondered if she had in fact been able to make some kind of deal with Alistair. It seemed unlikely, but it gave Jenna just a little bit of hope.

  Jenna enjoyed having her room to herself again. When Mandy had been there, she hadn’t been able to write. Now she would spend hours writing and thinking, only coming out of her room for meals or when Nora ordered her to do something.

  Nora did that more than anyone else in the house. She considered Jenna her little scullery maid. She enjoyed the power. The boys she treated like sons, but Jenna was her servant. Jenna tried to understand Nora. It appeared she was Alistair’s girlfriend, and that they had been together for a long time, yet she wasn’t a werewolf. The couple occupied an attic room directly above Jenna’s, and Jenna often overheard more than she would have liked to from that room above.

  One night was worse than any before. Alistair was angry with Nora. Jenna didn’t understand what had brought on the outburst. At dinner, the couple had been exuberant and playful. Alistair’s eyes had sparkled. Victory, he proclaimed, was near! He had brought special treats for the pack—ice cream and candy that he showered
on everyone like Santa Claus on Christmas morning.

  “My children,” he said, “my sweet children! This is just a little taste. Soon we will have everything our hearts desire.”

  Nora had left Jenna to clean up the meal, and Andrew had helped her clear the kitchen table and wash the dishes. When she was finished, she walked upstairs to her room. She sat down on her bed and took out her diary and started to write.

  Her writing was interrupted by a shriek from above.

  “Take it off! Get it off me! Alistair, please, please! It hurts!”

  What was going on up there? Jenna held her breath and crouched under the covers.

  “Worthless! Nora! Can’t you stand a little pain? This is your destiny. You want to be with me, don’t you? If you can’t do it, I’ll find another. Plenty of women would beg me for a chance to be part of this new future. Maybe I’ll take Miri! She’s not scared of a little magic. Worthless!”

  The sound of the first blow echoed down to Jenna’s ears, and Nora’s screams intensified along with the beating. Jenna wondered if she should go and get help, but how? There were no phones in this house and no neighbors for miles around.

  Finally, it seemed as if Alistair’s anger had been sated. Jenna listened for Nora. Had he killed her? No, she heard a soft sobbing along with loud snores from Alistair. Alistair had obviously fallen asleep.

  Jenna lay on her bed thinking for a long time, until finally she fell asleep. Her dreams were punctuated by visions of wolves running through a forest. Sometimes she was among them, sometime far behind, trying to catch up. By the time she awoke, she was out of breath and antsy and still terribly tired, as if she had indeed been running the whole night long.

  She walked downstairs to get some breakfast and found Andrew cooking eggs in the kitchen. There was no sign of Nora or Alistair. She imagined they were still sleeping.

  That night after supper, Alistair called a meeting. He had spent most of the day consulting with the magician Quentin Frakes, and now he wanted some volunteers for a special evening mission. The first hand up was Ryan’s. Alistair smiled at him.

  “You’ll go far, my son,” he said.

  Several more of the boys stepped forward, and Alistair selected three to join him and Ryan. They were away for several hours. In the meantime, Jenna and Andrew cleaned the kitchen and then they sat down for a game of chess. Andrew was teaching her. It was an interesting game, and each time they played she learned a little more strategy. She knew Andrew often played with Alistair, who he said was probably the most talented player he had ever met.

  Jenna couldn’t concentrate properly on the game that night, and after she had lost three games in a row, she excused herself and went up to her room. She lay down on her bed. She kept thinking about the sounds she had heard from the room above the night before. Tonight the room was silent. Alistair was out on his mission and she had not seen Nora the whole day. She wondered if maybe Alistair had taken her to the hospital. From what she heard last night, her injuries were likely to be severe.

  Finally, she drifted off into sleep.

  Two hours later, Jenna was awoken when light flooded into her room. Ryan was standing in the doorway and had flicked on the overhead light.

  “Jenna, you have to come with me, now!”

  “What . . . no, what time is it? Ryan?”

  “Now, Jenna, it’s important.”

  Ryan was nervously bouncing from foot to foot. There was a look of almost manic glee on his face. Jenna reluctantly got out of bed.

  “I need to get dressed,” she said. She was wearing only a light cotton nightshirt.

  “No, no time,” said Ryan, “and not necessary.”

  What was happening here? Were they finally going home?

  Ryan grabbed Jenna’s arm and started pulling her out of the room. It reminded Jenna of one day when Ryan had been just ten years old and had run into her room and told her to hurry; he had something to show her. The “something” that day had turned out to be a small turtle that inexplicably ended up at the bottom of the plastic wading pool in their backyard. The turtle, being a turtle, surely wasn’t going anywhere, but Ryan was so excited by it, he could not waste a second to show it to his sister.

  Jenna could see the same kind of eagerness in her brother’s features today. Maybe they were leaving. Maybe he’d found a secret way out or someone who could help them. She wondered briefly if they could take Andrew with them.

  Ryan pulled Jenna over to the winding staircase that led up to Alistair and Nora’s room. Jenna had never been up there before and she held back, remembering the horrible screams that had emanated from that room the night before.

  “No, Ryan . . . I don’t want to go there. Let me go back to my room. Let me go!”

  But Ryan kept his hand firmly attached to Jenna’s arm and pulled her up the stairs.

  At the top of the steps, Alistair was waiting for them. He looked wild and feral. Blood coated his clothing and there was a deep scratch over his left eye. Jenna shrunk back, but Ryan pushed her forward.

  “Ah, Ryan. You have done well,” said Alistair, a grotesque smile forming on his lips. “I believe she will do. She will do very nicely. Come here, young lady!”

  Jenna tried to back out of the room, but Ryan held her firmly and pushed her forward to Alistair.

  “There’s no need to be frightened, dear. I won’t hurt you. Well . . . maybe I will a little . . .but it’s all for the greater good. You want to help, don’t you? You seem most helpful. A wonderful addition to our growing community.”

  Alistair reached over to Jenna and grabbed her nightshirt, and with one tug tore it from her body, exposing her naked torso beneath. She was very pale and very slender, with tiny breasts whose nipples now stood erect from the chill that permeated the room—a strange chill that made Jenna shiver, and goose bumps crept over her skin despite the fact that Alistair himself emanated heat, a searing heat that almost left an aura of steam around his body.

  All this time, Ryan watched.

  Alistair walked around Jenna, sizing her up like a piece of meat in the butcher’s shop.

  “Yes,” he said almost to himself, “you should do nicely.”

  He reached for Jenna and pushed her down on the large king-size bed behind him. Jenna noticed his hands were still formed into the claws of a wolf. He ran his fingers over her breasts and drew a line of blood. Then he placed his mouth on the trickle and licked it, savoring its flavor like a good vintage wine.

  Terrified, Jenna wondered if he was not more vampire than wolf. She tried to struggle, to move out of his grasp, but he simply laughed and pushed her back down onto the bed with one hand, while with the other he opened his fly.

  He roughly parted her thighs and then he was inside her, pounding right into her soul. Jenna screamed over and over again. In the corner of the room, Ryan watched. She called out his name.

  “Ryan! Help me! Please!” But Ryan just stood there mesmerized, watching the rape of his sister.

  Then something strange happened. For a moment or two, Jenna slipped away from this world. She found herself in a garden surrounded by poppies. At the other end of the garden was a boy with golden hair, playing in the waters of a fountain that glowed with all the colors of the rainbow. With him was a girl with chestnut hair and warm brown eyes.

  Jenna tried to walk toward them, but as she did, the vision dispersed and she was back in the chamber with Alistair looking down at her. He stared at her with his cold blue eyes and then kissed her, his tongue protruding into her mouth, making her gag. As he did so, she heard his voice inside her head.

  “You are mine now, Jenna! And you will not leave me. You cannot leave this house, even on the night of the full moon.”

  Then he broke away and indicated to Ryan that he could take her back to her room.

  Chapter 10

  “After that night, I never left the packhouse. On the night of the first full moon after Alistair attacked, I tried desperately to get out, but his spell held and I
transformed in the kitchen with the door wide open, staring at the moon. I was terrified of the change and what it might do to the baby.”

  Jenna looked up. Mandy was staring at her. “Wait, you care about that? Alistair’s spawn? Maybe Mrs. Bumsqueak has a potion or something. You’re not that far along.”

  “No, I have to have the baby. Don’t you see? The boy I saw, the one with the golden hair. He has a future and it’s important. I know that. I can feel him inside me. I see him in my dreams. He talks to me.”

  Miri, who had been silent throughout Jenna’s story, now came forward and took her hand.

  “Let me try something, Jenna.”

  Cautiously, Miri lowered her mental shield and step by step entered Jenna’s mind, sampling Jenna’s emotions. There was a lot of fear here, but also courage, determination, and compassion. And yes, there was another soul in there, buried deep inside. But this soul was shrouded in Alistair. This was what Miri had touched when she first tried to enter Jenna’s mind—the familiar reek of her father. Alistair may be gone, but he had left traces of his soul within Jenna, within Max’s amulet, inside Miri, and Miri was beginning to realize in many other places. A person could not live so many years on this planet without leaving his mark. The remnant inside Jenna was disturbing, but Miri knew she had to pass through it, had to visit the new soul inside.

  There it was. Very faint, the promise of something new, a complex ball of possibilities. Miri sampled the boy’s emotions. They were very different from his mother’s. Even in the womb he possessed a kind of cocky, self-assured aura, that the world owed him a future, owed him an adventure. Miri shuddered. She looked for something positive in this entity, something she could share with his mother. But she found no trace of love. Maybe the other way, then? Jenna had an abundance of love for the child. Miri sampled that love and sent it to the boy. Ah, that helped. The aura of the baby glowed a little, not with love, but at least acknowledgement. That would have to do. Carefully, she took a little of this emotion and returned it to Jenna.