by Naomi Clark
“Chiennes de loup-garou! Allez vous faire foutre: vous assassinez les monstres, chacunes d’entre vous!” he called. A few of the people watching cheered, apparently agreeing with whatever he had said. “Vous, les monstres ne devriez pas être autorisés en ville!”
I had no idea what he was saying, but I didn’t like his tone one bit. I padded across the street towards him, hackles raised, a growl rumbling up my throat. It didn’t really matter what he’d said. He’d attacked my mate. Never throw bricks at a werewolf’s mate. You’ll live longer.
The boy eyed me without fear. Smug arrogance radiated off him. He probably thought he was safe out on the street, surrounded by people. I took another step, my growl building. I’d make him afraid.
“Ayla,” Shannon called, her voice wary. I ignored her. The boy was still poised for attack, the brick clasped firmly in hand. The people around us were shrieking and backing away, wiser than the boy.
Ears flat against my skull, body low against the pavement, I stopped a foot away from him, coiling myself to strike. Blood pounded in my head, drowning out my human self, my common sense. All I knew was the scrawny human in front of me had tried to hurt my mate and he needed to be punished for that.
I had no idea what I would do to him. He was just a cub, silly and young. Should I cuff him with a paw, snap at him to scare him and leave it at that? As angry I was, I wasn’t stupid, but in the end I didn’t need to decide, because without warning, the boy threw his last brick at me.
It hit me square in the face, knocking me back with an anguished yelp. I lost my footing as I scrambled away from him, colliding with a passing cyclist. We both went down in a mess of limbs and bike wheels. Crying, I tried to untangle myself, but only ended up scratching the poor kid beneath me. The brick-wielder yelled triumphantly and took off, vanishing into the crowd, who pulled back together to hide him like it was choreographed.
Shannon appeared at my side, crying my name as she wrapped her arms around me, helping me detach myself from the battered bike frame. The rider, swearing viciously, shoved at us both, sending Shannon sprawling to the pavement and me crashing on top of her. I was dizzy from the brick-blow, the world spinning too much for me to control my limbs. I fell.
Shannon squeaked as I landed on her. I closed my eyes with a whine, my entire face throbbing with pain. Was I bleeding? Had I chipped a fang? I couldn’t tell; it felt like my entire head had swollen up like a balloon. I didn’t dare open my eyes in case there was an angry mob circling us.
“Ayla, are you okay?” Shannon threw her arms round my neck, hugging my limp body to her. “Look at me, Ayla.”
I opened my eyes, twisted my head round so I could see her. Lying on top of her like this, I had to be crushing her, but she didn’t seem to mind. Her face was tight with anxiety, but she seemed okay. I tried to lick her nose and missed completely, my vision a little too blurry for me to judge the distance between her face and mine.
“How many fingers, Ayla?” she asked me, holding her hand up.
I whined and dropped my head to her chest. I didn’t want to count. I was too dizzy to count. Wolves weren’t supposed to count.
She levered me off her gently, sliding me to the pavement. She knelt next to me, helping me get my feet back under me. My stomach lurched and I forced back a mouthful of bile. Closing my eyes again, I breathed in deeply, trying to shake off the burning headache forming between my ears.
“That little shit,” Shannon muttered, cupping my muzzle in her hands to check me for injury. “Oh, Ayla, you’re bleeding.” She touched the side of my head gingerly and a flash of pain shot through me. I yelped and pulled away. “Don’t be a baby,” she ordered. “It’s not that bad. Let’s get back to Loup Garou and see if they’ve got a first aid kit.”
Feeling sick and sorry for myself, I followed Shannon, pressed close to her heels, telling myself it was for her protection rather than my own.
***
Clémence was seated at one of the computers when we got back to Loup Garou, fast-paced trance music pumping through its speakers. She didn’t notice us enter straight away, then I saw her inhale sharply and swing round in her chair to face us. “What happened? Who is bleeding?”
“Some idiot outside the Lupine Museum started yelling and throwing bricks at us,” Shannon explained. Clémence swore, leaping up and running to the bar.
I whined and padded over to the sofas, flopping onto one with a sigh. I’d been hurt worse—Sly had hurt me far worse, several times over—but somehow this just felt worse. An insult as well as an injury. Here we were, supposedly in the most romantic city in the world, getting bricks lobbed at us for no reason. It wasn’t fair.
Shannon sat down with me, running her fingers absently through my fur. Her touch was soothing; I closed my eyes and soaked up the attention. Clémence joined us with a big green first aid box and started rooting through it. She produced a pack of antiseptic wipes and reached for me. Shannon snatched the pack from her hand.
“I’ll do it,” she said quietly. It struck me that maybe I wasn’t the only one a little jealous of Clémence. The thought made me grin, which made my face ache. I winced, flattening my ears. “Hold still,” Shannon told me, cupping my muzzle in one hand and wiping at the gash along my cheek with the other. The antiseptic stung almost more than the original injury had and I struggled not to flinch as Shannon applied it.
“What happened?” Clémence asked again. “Tell me, please, exactly?”
Shannon told her and Clémence swore some more. “Does this sort of thing happen a lot to tourists?” Shannon asked her dryly.
She shook her head. “It is not because you are tourists, it is because Ayla is a wolf. Since the murders started, stupid people have decided all wolves must be killers.” She scowled. “I know some wolves this has happened to. That’s why we don’t go running anymore—it’s not safe.”
It occurred to me then that in the past few days, I hadn’t seen a single werewolf in wolf shape. I had assumed the werewolves of Paris had particular places to shift and run, like Moreland Park back home. Now I thought back to the newspaper vendor on our first day in Paris, telling me that wolves didn’t go out after dark anymore. Maybe it wasn’t just because of Le Monstre. Maybe it was because of the humans who thought Le Monstre was a wolf.
“Can you change back?” Shannon asked me when she was done cleaning my wound. She tugged my clothes from her bag as I slid off the sofa and slunk behind it. Shannon’s careful work with the antiseptic wipes was completely undone as I shifted back to human, my skull changing shape, skin and muscle moving around to accommodate my suddenly smaller head. The process set the wound bleeding again. Once I was fully human, I touched the gash gently, my fingertips coming away wet with blood.
“More wipes?” I asked Shannon as I pulled my clothes on. Whilst she dug in the first aid kit, I noticed Clémence give me the once over, smiling broadly as she did. I ducked my head as I tugged my top on, pretending really hard I hadn’t seen her checking me out.
I sat next to Shannon and tried to take the wipes from her, but she insisted on doing it herself, then bandaging the gash. In human form, it was a thick cut across my cheek, nearly up to my eye socket. I would have preferred not to bandage it, hating the feeling of the gauzy material on my face, but it just wouldn’t stop bleeding.
“How many fingers?” Shannon held three fingers up for me.
”I’m not brain-damaged.”
“Then tell me how many fingers I’m holding up,” she insisted.
I rolled my eyes. “Three. I’m fine. I’ve just got a bit of a headache.”
“You should report this to the police,” Clémence told me. ”I am making everyone I know who gets attacked report it, or it will just keep happening.”
Shannon and I exchanged glances. “I’d rather not,” I said. “We’re only here for a few days. I don’t want to get mixed up in anymore madness than we are already.”
“Speaking of which,” Shannon spoke up, “any word on Sun?”
> Clémence’s face turned grave, which told us everything we needed to know. She shook her head. “I was on the forums when you came in, nobody has seen her.”
“Shit,” I muttered. Shannon took my hand, squeezing it hard.
“Maybe she’s back at the flat?” she suggested.
I was about to answer when the door flew open and a mob of wolves entered, all chattering and laughing at the top of their lungs. Thérèse was with them and Clémence leapt up on seeing her, rushing over to plant a passionate kiss on the taller wolf’s lips. Thérèse laughed and returned the kiss, but she looked sad to me, eyes shining as if she might cry. The two off them split off from the main group to huddle in the corner near the doorway, voices low.
“Lover’s tiff?” I asked Shannon. She shrugged.
“Are you alright, Ayla? Really? How’s your head? Maybe we should take you to hospital. You might need stitches.” She twisted in her seat, moving her leg up so she was half-kneeling on the sofa, hands moving to stroke my hair. I kissed her.
“I’m fine, honest. It hurts, but it’ll heal up overnight. All I need is a couple of painkillers and I’ll be good as new.”
We hunted through the first aid kit for pain medication, while the wolves who’d arrived made themselves at home. Most of them headed straight for the pool table; the rest either gathered at the bar or sat down at a computer. They were all young, late teens, maybe, and happy to ignore the adults in the room, even when Clémence and Thérèse’s low-pitched conversation grew rapidly louder.
After a few heated exchanges, Clémence threw her hands up in exasperation and stomped back over to us, face flushed with anger. “I am sorry,” she said. “I think perhaps you should leave? Thérèse, her boyfriend, he is not happy with her and she thinks he might come here.”
“Is that a problem?” I asked, glancing at Thérèse, who was sidling up behind Clémence looking even closer to tears than she had before.
“I hope not,” she said, taking Clémence’s hand. “But I do not know. He can be...unkind sometimes.”
Clémence swore. “He is a bastard. He is one of these stupid humans who think wolves are the killers and he tells Thérèse she is an animal, a dog.”
Shannon’s eyes widened. “And you’re with him because?”
“She is not with him anymore,” Clémence said fervently. “She is with me and he can’t change that.”
She sounded so fierce, so proud. My heart went out to her and I realized that she reminded me a little of myself a few years ago. Full of wildness and determined to shout the world down. Her words just seemed to agitate Thérèse though, who gripped her hand even harder and shook her head.
“Clémence, please can we all just go somewhere, in case he comes? Please? If he hurt you, I would—”
Right on cue, the door slammed open again.
Eight
A man-mountain strode in. Silence fell over Loup Garou as the other wolves turned to stare at him. The trance music Clémence had playing was an odd, jarring soundtrack to the sudden tension, too upbeat and cheerful. Thérèse cringed at the sight of the newcomer, ducking behind Clémence, who bared her teeth at him in a vicious snarl. “Allez vous-en, Patric, elle ne vous veut pas ici.”
The man—Patric—spat at her. “Au pas, merde,” he ordered, voice rough with anger. Clémence didn’t even flinch and I felt a spark of admiration for her. Patric was the size of a small truck and I bet most people, most wolves even, would have thought twice about taking him on. His eyes flashed as he stared down at Clémence and Thérèse. His nostrils flared and his fists bunched at his sides, as if he was barely able to restrain himself from hitting Clémence. He leaned over her, trying to intimidate her with his bulk, a display of aggression a wolf couldn’t help but respond to. How they responded depended entirely on how dominant that wolf was.
Clémence was very dominant. She squared up to Patric without a flicker of fear. The other wolves began moving slowly towards them, stiff and alert, like they were waiting for a signal from her. My throat went dry as scenarios flashed through my head. Fists flying, blood spilling, wolf on human, teeth in flesh... It could happen. Fury shone from Patric and Clémence. Thérèse, cowering behind Clémence and clinging to her like a child, didn’t help the situation. Whether Clémence saw the other wolf as her mate or not, a threat to one of the Pack was like a spark to an oil spill.
Hell, I felt it myself. Patric was trouble and the urge to step in and help the Pack filled me. I rose slowly, the wolf rising inside me. Shannon grabbed my arm.
“Don’t,” she said. I looked down at her, saw fear in her eyes and tried to push the wolf down. I’d promised. I’d promised her and I wouldn’t break my promise.
Then Patric slapped Clémence, Thérèse screamed and I lost it.
I couldn’t help myself; Thérèse’s cry dragged the wolf out of me. I dove at Clémence, knocking her to the floor and out of Patric’s reach. He grabbed for Thérèse, who stumbled away and tripped, landing hard. The rest of the wolves rushed to surround her, all still human, but sporting fangs and wolf-eyes, ready to change if Patric pushed them. And he would push them. I saw it in his eyes, smelled it in his sweat. He was outnumbered, hopelessly outmatched, but he’d push anyway.
Clémence writhed under me, spitting and cursing. We’d landed awkwardly, me with my knees in her midriff, pinning her to the floor. She tried to buck me off with a twist of her hips, but I held her down.
Patric ignored us, his attention focused on Thérèse and the wolves ringing her. “Vous la petite salope, vousvous mettez dans l’embarras. Chien. Animal.”
I snarled at that, understanding his tone, if not his words. Thérèse growled too, shoving aside one of the wolves. “C’est terminé! Laissez-moi tranquille, Patric,” she snarled, sounding far braver than her shaking hands indicated.
He shook his head and strode towards her, muttering words I couldn’t follow. Thérèse quivered, but stood her ground whilst the other wolves stood firm behind her. He swept his eyes over them and dismissed them, focusing on Thérèse. They snapped and spat at each other, too fast and furious for me to even try to pick anything out. But the body language told the story—Patric looming over her as he had Clémence, using his size as a weapon. As tall as Thérèse was, Patric still dwarfed her and she reacted to it visibly, hunching back and avoiding his eyes. But she was trying so hard to be brave, matching him insult for insult, refusing to back down.
Clémence finally succeeded in shaking me off, rolling sharply so that I was underneath her, then springing up to place herself between Patric and Thérèse again. Shannon hurried to my side. “We should call the police,” she whispered, helping me to my feet.
I wasn’t so sure that would help. It would probably just make things worse, I thought. Clémence screamed at Patric, her hands capped with thick claws and her eyes wolf-amber. Thérèse was trying to hold her back while Patric looked ever closer to exploding and striking out.
And in a snap-second, it went from shouting to violence, just like I’d known it would. Clémence poked Patric in the chest, her claws ripping through his t-shirt. He reacted, lashing out and knocking her back. It was like dominos falling: Clémence fell into Thérèse, who slipped, her high heels sending her skidding into the knot of wolves behind her. A few tumbled over. The two that didn’t immediately rushed Patric.
In horror films, violence is always so stylized, so staged. Every spray of blood, every broken bone is lovingly framed and shot, perfectly displayed for the audience. It gives them time to react, to be sick or excited or stunned. In real life, it’s nothing like that. Everything’s too quick and confused. One minute Patric was standing there, shoulders heaving, eyes set to pop from his head. The next, two of the older wolves dived at him and he was on the floor, fists swinging, yelling in pain and rage.
In seconds Clémence was straight back on her feet, a howl ripping from her throat. She dove into the writhing mess of bodies on the floor and for a second I thought she was pulling the wolves awa
y from Patric. Then he shrieked. A sound that hurt my ears and drove the wolf crazy, the sound of a wounded animal, of prey cornered. Only Shannon’s death-grip on my arm kept me human.
Thérèse screamed at Clémence, rushing to grab the other girl by the hair and haul her away from Patric. The other two wolves kept fighting, though Patric was holding his own. The scent of blood, human and wolf, filled the air. I bit my lip to try to focus on keeping the wolf at bay. She desperately wanted to join the fight.
Clémence and Thérèse rolled away from Patric, now engaged in their own struggle as Clémence tried to escape Thérèse’s clutches. Clémence was changing, electric-blue fur sprouting on her arms and face, body elongating and popping until Thérèse was forced to let her go.
Wolf-shaped, Clémence leapt at Patric again and I had to act. She’d kill him if I didn’t. I wrenched free of Shannon’s hold and threw myself at Clémence once more. Together we hit the wall, Clémence’s head striking hard. She yelped and went limp in my arms. I dropped her, sprang to my feet and darted toward Patric and the wolves.
