Moon Struck: Book 1 (When, Were, and Howl)

by Raleigh, Jeanette

  Rob and I waited.

  Meanwhile, the group scouring the forest for traps brought them into the shed, dumping them in front of the cage. As the pile grew, some of the werewolves in human form looked distressed.

  Most of the trackers left or changed into their human selves. I was the only animal left in the room, which could have been awkward, but no one made a big deal about it.

  The Moon Patrol took forever to arrive. I practiced sniffing, catching all of the cat scents and even discerning the one that didn't turn to human. Unlike the bloodhound, I couldn't smell magic. Maybe they should start calling them magichounds.

  Nothing exciting happened. The Moon Patrol took notes and asked questions. The only surprise I got out of the whole thing was that a few of the patrolmen actually dismantled the cages themselves.

  We left while the investigation was still in full swing. The disturbed look on Rob's face told me he wasn't done yet. He opened the door for me and waited for me to jump in.

  Ali popped up from the backseat, “What took you so long?”

  To his credit, Rob merely raised an eyebrow and scratched his chin, “You don't have a car of your own?”

  “I parked in the gas station down the way. This trap thing is probably connected to the amulet. So I was thinking we could all head over to the wizard's house.” Ali pushed herself up and grabbed her seatbelt, hooking it in the latch with a single swish.

  “Return to the scene of the crime? No.” Rob shut the passenger door, walking firmly around the car.

  “But Rob...”

  Rob didn't let Ali get another word in. “No.”

  “But.”

  “No.”

  I barked, mostly to tell Rob that he was in a losing battle. Sure, he said no. And in a few minutes he'd drop Ali off at her car, then she'd go alone. Ali never let a little word like 'no' stop her.

  As for me, I was getting tired of the snout and the paws. At some point, I desperately wanted to have my own face back, preferably before I turned gray.

  Ali crossed her arms. “Fine. I'll stay home tonight, but I'm taking Jen with me.”

  Which meant that we were planning another escapade.

  “Is that okay?” He asked me.

  I nodded.

  “No more water parks?” Rob lifted an eyebrow.

  Who, me? My furry face broke out into a crazy grin. He scratched me behind the ear. We were both getting too used to those little touches. Moments like this being a wolf isn't so bad.

  “No water parks.” Ali put just the right inflection for boredom, sounding exactly like a disgruntled teenager, which is probably how she felt. But I read more into it. Yes, Ali had a plan in mind, something that required a bit of subterfuge. I wondered what we would be doing in an hour. Not hanging out at home. But how to break into a wizard's house...that's the question.

  Rob's a pretty smart fellow and he frowned at Ali the way a parent might. That frown that says, I know you're up to something. I just can't prove it yet. But he let us go, driving away with a wave once he'd dropped us off at Ali's car.

  “That was way too easy.”

  I wasn't so sure about that. Rob had his expressions, too. And when he dropped us off, it was with the full and complete expectation that Ali was up to something. I wouldn't be surprised if Rob ended up at Ali's apartment. Too bad Ali didn't understand me when I said, “He knows.”

  But it didn't matter. We were two peas in a pod when it came to trouble. Either way, we were heading to Grady Road to check out the wizard's house. I felt silly even saying the words in my head.

  Chapter 25

  Last year, someone broke into my uncle's house. They smashed his television, stole a bunch of Aunt Celia's jewelry and made a general mess out of everything. Since then Ali and I curtailed our trespassing. Seeing the fury and helplessness that followed an incident like that gave me an inkling of what it felt like. That and now that I was out of high school and have a full time job, I'm more aware of the consequences of my actions or so I tell myself.

  Following Ali through the trees toward the back of the Grady haunted house, I realized that I was the only one to feel that way. Ali had continued her activities without me and felt right at home sneaking through the woods.

  Following a raccoon through trees was much easier in wolf form. As a mouse, I often struggled to keep up. Accustomed to having to wait for me, Ali moved slowly until she realized that I was keeping up just fine. Once she figured out she wouldn't lose me, she gave a huge raccoon grin and sped off through the trees without a care in the world. With a yip, I chased after her, enjoying my moment on four legs, though deep in my heart I felt a thrill of fear at the same time, the worry that I would forever be a wolf.

  Ali dashed up a tree growing beside the house, up along a branch and dropped onto the roof. She trotted along the roof to the window overlooking the back yard. The quick drive by didn't do much for my confidence. Just because the driveway was empty didn't mean the house was.

  I tried a few times to climb the tree but gave up. Ali shrugged and scampered away. The plan was for her to let me in anyway. But I couldn't help thinking that a wolf was ill-suited for this kind of activity. For the first time in a long time, I missed being a mouse. I mean, I always like the human half of me, but it never occurred to me how many times Ali and I used our animal selves to get into trouble. Had I been a wolf, our friendship would have been different. I realize that now when watching from the ground while Ali slipped into the house after finding a window cracked just that tiniest bit. As a mouse, I'd be in the house already. We'd be in it together.

  A few minutes passed before the back door opened. “Come on in. Nobody here but us weres.” Ali's human hand opened the door, but she was already shifting back. She loved to be a raccoon. Of all the weres, she's one of the few who hadn't spent at least a night cursing the full moon for rising at an inopportune time.

  The time for thinking had come to an end. I slid through the door following the raccoon tail that was even now disappearing up the stairs. Ali dashed into the master bedroom and stood in the middle of the room on her hind feet, waving her hands at the shelves. Appalling. And also fascinating. The shelves held a dark magic that gave a girl the willies. I sniffed the room. It smelled musty, like an old cellar. The walls must have been papered back in the forties because the wall paper was ancient and peeling in the spots where I could see.

  I also smelled a spicy cologne that I'd smelled back in the park when we were clearing out the traps. Whining I lifted my nose and sniffed again. Here, the smell was overpowering. Ali nodded. She'd smelled it, too. We weren't done here. Ali checked each and every shelf, poking her nose behind jars and pawing things out of the way to see.

  We found nothing of interest there. Ready to leave, I whined at the door and pointed my snout toward the exit. Ali shook her head and ran to the next room. What was she trying to prove? She found a den with a desk and desktop on the floor. With a single push of the paw, Ali turned it on. As neither mouse nor wolf would I have had the dexterity to do that.

  She flashed back to human and I turned my head, while she grabbed the mouse and logged onto the computer. No password. I guess people have an expectation of privacy in their own homes. She opened the browser and started looking at browser history and tabs, then carefully searched the processing programs. “Quite the gamer.”

  I couldn't very well answer, but if I could, I'd say something like, “That's nice, now can we get out of here?” I'm all for adventure and everything, but I had never actually spent this much time in anyone's house before. Commercial buildings, yes, but not a home.

  I whined.

  “Remember 682 Spencer Avenue.” Ali shut down the system and turned back into her furry raccoon self.

  In my head I said 682 Spencer over and over and over. My ears pricked up. I heard a car and this wasn't the kind of neighborhood where cars drive by. I yipped. Ali nodded and we both fled, running down the stairs and out the back door. Her car was parked down Haverson R
oad. But we never made it. I felt myself flying through the air and hanging upside down.

  Here's the crazy thing. Nothing was holding me up. No net. No rope. No nothing. There I was hanging in the air growling at the wind and swearing. My cuss words sounded like barks, but believe me, I know some really good words. The best ones I save for truly dire predicaments such as this one.

  “Well, well, well, well, well.” The words came from a haughty male somewhere behind us.

  I twisted my head. If only I were human. There were so many things I wanted to say right now, starting with a joke about the pointy hat. I'm not kidding. He had a pointy hat that sat back on his head the way cowboy hats do. He was young, sported acne and a robe that would make Gandalf jealous.

  “Come on down.”

  The air seemed to fall out from under me and I felt myself falling in slow motion. The pads of my feet softly touched the dirt. I scanned the forest, watching Ali crouching in the shadows, ready to spring with claws flashing. I shook my head. No sense in both of us getting caught.

  “Come inside. We'll have a coke and talk about the future.” His robe caught a bit at his knees while he walked. I had the feeling that somehow I had stumbled into a Comic-Con Convention. But he really needed to lose the hat and find a light saber.

  My legs turned and stumbled after him. Not of my own will, and that scared me. I yowled and felt the pressure on my legs release. Stumbling a bit, I followed him under my own control.

  “Sorry about that. I didn't know if you'd come willingly. You pose a bit of a problem, especially since returning the power.” He looked over his shoulder while he spoke, his nose just that little bit too long and a shock of too long hair falling over his brow.

  I whined with a question mark, hoping he'd catch on.

  Who said wizards were stupid. He knew exactly what I was trying to say. “We're in huge trouble. Me because I lost the amulet. You because you had it last. It's a shame it's not in your possession now. We could be done with this.”

  He took out a pair of cokes and a bowl and a cup out of the cupboard. Grabbing a can opener from the refrigerator, he broke open the bottles and poured them, one into the bowl, one into the cup.

  “Ice?”

  I nodded. Seems we were going to be civilized. Plus, I have a weakness for Mexican coke. It tastes better, maybe because it comes from a bottle or uses real sugar. Either way, I no longer feared the wizard. But when he turned and stared out the window with a fierce rage burning in his eyes, I gulped air trying not to shake in my paws. Okay, he really was scary.

  “The magic didn't touch your friend. I don't need her.” With a flick of his wrist, the wizard turned to the ice maker, grabbing a handful of ice to split between the cup and bowl.

  That wrist flick meant something. Before, when my legs followed his bidding, he'd made a strange little finger movement in the air. I edged toward the window, trying to look outside, hoping to see if Ali was okay.

  “Do I look like a killer?” The bowl shook slightly as he put it on the floor, his eyes wide with that crazy gleam.

  I closed my eyes and gave a quick head bob, wondering if he truly was capable or murder and hoping Ali safely escaped harm.

  “Then you know to stay put. I need to find my grimoire on were-magic.” Downing a gulp of coke, the wizard slammed his glass on the table, then ran up the stairs two at a time. I sniffed the bowl. It smelled good. It would however, be incredibly embarrassing to die by poisoning in a stranger's house.

  When he came down the stairs, he didn't actually walk, but seemed to glide on air. I'd never seen anything like it. My mouth must have been hanging open.

  “Drink up. I promise if I kill you, it'll be interesting. I'm partial to sword play myself. I won't poison you.” He murmured while he flipped pages, his brow furrowed while he tried to find what he was looking for.

  “You'd think grimoires would have tables of contents, but no. And the hand-writing is atrocious.”

  Deciding that he was several kinds of crazy, I sighed and waited.

  “I said. Drink. Up.” Suddenly my head felt as if something had grabbed me from the neck and forced my face into the bowl. I sneezed, breathing in while Coke went up my nose. That's how far he'd forced my head into the bowl, all without touching me.

  How humiliating. My nose burned from the carbonation in the pop, and the hair on my snout felt sticky. I refused to drink. Just get close enough to bite and I'll tear your arm off. That's what I said in my head. And I would. I was that angry.

  Taking away someone's freedom of choice is an act of evil, pure evil. That's how I knew that he had killed before. I didn't need to hear it. I was experiencing his lack of compassion.

  When the strange clamping on my neck eased, I jerked my head up, growling.

  “Get over yourself. Ah, here it is.” He drew a circle in the air with his fingers and said a few words in a language I'd never heard before. It didn't sound like Latin. When he finished, he said, “Now we can have a real conversation. You just say what you want in wolf speak and the spell will interpret.”

  “Is Ali safe?” I barked. A lovely voice, like a soft chime asked the question.

  “You sound like an angel.” The wizard's mouth was open and he seemed more than a little awed.

  “That's not my voice. Is Ali okay?”

  “The raccoon? Yes, I just flew her over to the car. She's locked in now and quite perturbed I can tell you.”

  I felt profound relief, trapped as I was, I now knew that Ali was safe. I could deal with anything else that came my way.

  “How do I become human again?”

  He gave me a dismissive look, “Um...you wish yourself human again? It's not rocket science.”

  “I did. It didn't work.” My yowling was once again converted into angelic voices. I wish I really sounded like that. Words can't describe the beauty of the voice that the spell created.

  “Then I guess you're stuck. Where is the amulet?” The way he hunched at the table, the way he watched me bothered me.

  I'm not as good a liar as Ali, but I've been known to throw one around here and there. I decided to make it a big one. “I'm wearing it.”

  The angelic voice must have made me sound truthful because he tipped the glass back again and wiped the corner of his mouth, “That's why it didn't work. You lost it. That explains a few things. One of the witches must have found it.”

  “Witches?” I didn't really want to give away the fact that I'd run to a lady with a hex bag for help.

  “Yeah, they've been asking for were-magic. You'd be surprised how many non-weres are looking for a quick switch to the animal kingdom.” Pushing the hair out of his eyes, the wizard frowned.

  “I don't care about the amulet. My friend stole it as a prank. Now I'm stuck as a wolf and I really really need to be human again. Please.” It felt strange pouring my heart out to a sociopathic wizard who treated me like a puppet. But I'd finally found someone who knew what was going on, and I really needed help.

  “The only way for you to be human again is to put the amulet on. Do you remember where you lost it?”

  So he didn't believe me. He tried to trip me up with that question. Lying the second time was more difficult. I felt certain deep inside that he could see through my falsehoods, “As far as I know I'm still wearing it. I don't know where it is. Can you find it with magic?”

  I took a deep breath, hoping the answer was no. I didn't want Rob anywhere near this psycho, even if the crazy wizard was playing nice now.

  “No. This isn't good. Look, I'm going to let you go, but you and your friend need to lie low. Find a place to hide and stay there. I'm serious. Don't be traipsing through the wolf park making yourself known to people.”

  “You followed us in the wolf park?” In wolf, it sounded like a yelp. Somehow the angel voice made me sound sultry. I thought it would be awesome if I could talk to Rob with that voice, but remembering the way it felt to be forced to move on my own, I decided even if I could, I would never use
magic against Rob. And that angelic voice felt like a weapon.

  “I have eyes and ears there. Look, I'm not your problem. I'm just house sitting, but you set off alarms coming into the house and I'm going to have to tell them something. You don't have the amulet. You don't know where is, and if you stay, they will kill you.”

  “So, you're letting me go?” My internal self was screaming at me. Just run, Jen. But nothing made sense here. Why would he capture me just to offer me a drink and chat for three minutes about the amulet.

  “Yes.”

  “Why can't you do your magic and turn me human again? Your magic made me like this.”

  “I'm just a kid, okay?” He completely lost it then, ripping off the wizard's hat and throwing it on the table. “All of the magic is borrowed. I don't have any of my own. I can't help you. I was planning to keep you here until they came, but...” He swallowed, “Your voice is so pretty. I think I would like you in human form. And I don't want to be the one. Just go. I'll look for the amulet. If I find it I'll let you borrow it just once to wish yourself human with all of the magic you have and go to sleep. You'll be human again.”

  “If you don't have magic, how do you know and how did you force me to do things?”

  He looked tormented. “It was my birthday present. I was the only member of my family without magic of my own. I have the most dexterity. Every single one of my spells hits exactly how I want it, but I don't have any power. My brother gave me were magic for my sixteenth birthday. Go.”

  I ran for the door, wondering if he'd lied to me as I lied to him.

  Ali waited for me at the car. She was already in human form and dressed, and when I jumped up to the car window on my paws, she was pulling a knife out of the glove box. She screeched and jumped, opening the door. “Jen, I've never been so glad to see anyone before. What happened? Are you okay?”

  “Arf.”

  The magic voice appeared, shocking both of us, “I'm fine.”