by Mac Flynn
I stretched and winced when my back popped. "All I feel like is an eighty year old grandmother after a wild night of bingo." There was that chill again. I pulled the blanket closer to myself.
Mark leaned down and softly kissed me on the lips. "Do you want me to remind you what we did last night?" he teased.
"No, I want you to get off me so I can breath. It's been a couple of hours since my last gasp of air," I replied. I pushed at his chest, and he laughed and rolled off.
"I can see why I liked your scent. It smells of spunk," he commented.
"Well, all I smell is-" I sniffed the air and blinked. I smelled a lot of things, some of them pleasant and others not so much. The sheer number of smells left me feeling dizzy. It was like being placed in a room full of bright colored dots that grew brighter the longer you looked at them, but then another color intruded wanting your attention. All those demands nearly overloaded my schnoz and I pinched my nose shut.
Mark sat up and pulled my dazed self against his chest. His warmth was a nice change from that stubborn chill in my bones. "You'll get used to the smells and sounds, but don't let the world overwhelm you at first," he advised.
I glanced up at him with a teasing smile. "And I shouldn't let handsome strangers take advantage of me," I quipped.
He raised an eyebrow. "Are we strangers after last night?" he wondered.
I rolled my eyes, twisted partially around and pressed my hands against his chest. "I did just meet you a few days ago," I reminded him.
Mark leaned down and nuzzled my neck with his nose. His voice was low and sultry. "But I know your body intimately," he teased.
I only meant to push him away from me, but I forgot I was a werewolf now. My push was more like a shove by a three-hundred pound muscled man named Steve. Mark flew from the bed and landed on the rug in front of the dead fire. He also took the top sheet with him, leaving me naked and cold. I yelped and grabbed an extra sheet to cover myself while he sat up and playfully glared at me.
"You're a werewolf now. You need to mind your strength," he scolded me.
"And you need to mind your hands, or I'll tell your mom you've been playing paddy-cake in my bedroom," I warned him.
He stood and wrapped the blanket around his waist. "I doubt she entirely missed our mating session last night. You were quite exuberant in your howling," he pointed out.
I glared at him and wrapped the blanket tight around my shivering body. "Like I could help it. That was my first time doing it as a werewolf. You weren't helping," he argued.
He chuckled and picked up his torn clothes off the floor. "I was doing exactly what I intended to do," he replied.
"Well, now that the whole Night of the Furry is over, what do I do now?" I asked him.
Mark paused and his lips pursed together. "Now I am not sure. Morgan has your friend captive and evidently isn't pleased at my creating you."
"I did get the feeling there wasn't any love lost between you two. Something about glaring at each other hoping you were going to melt the other's face off," I commented.
"Morgan is jealous of my family's influence. He would do anything to weaken ours and strengthen his," Mark explained.
"And he thinks he's found his 'kill-to-birds-with-one-me'?" I guessed.
"Yes. He can accuse you, one of my pack, of endangering the Foundation by your mere existence outside our rules and have you destroyed. He wouldn't show any mercy toward your friend, and my family would be humiliated because of my hasty decision to turn you," he replied.
My face twisted with disbelief and I tilted my head to one side. "What is with this Foundation? You act as if it's some sort of a cult or government."
"To us it's both," he told me. He strode over to me and seated himself on the end of the bed. "The Foundation has been around for a very long time, nearly as long as this city. It was founded by a few new immigrant werewolves who banded together to keep ronin werewolves from the area."
"And to have a Feast of Humans every few years?" I mused.
Mark frowned. "That came later after the first leader of the Foundation stepped down. By then the Foundation had a few dozen members and more were coming. The new leader, Morgan's predecessor, feared the members would slip if they weren't allowed a moment of feral excitement every few years."
"Have they tried sex?" I suggested.
He chuckled. "The feral hunter in us," he corrected himself. "That's when the party began. Attendance was mandatory so all the werewolves could be counted including any new children or any deaths. Unless the werewolf has moved from the city, the punishment for missing the party is death."
"I thought the Census rules were tough," I muttered.
"And Morgan has only made matters worse. The Foundation used to not involve itself in the daily lives of the werewolves, but since his assumption as leader twenty years ago there is no escaping its influence. He seeks to monitor our every move, our every financial transaction. Anything that might affect our position in the Foundation and in the human world."
"So he's playing dictator and nobody's stopped him?" I guessed.
"I'm afraid so, and my family is guilty of letting him do what he pleases. We need to stop him, and your creation has given me a personal fight in the matter," he told me.
My head spun with all these intrigues and personal vendettas. It was as though I was back in Political History class, but without the bell to save me. "All right, so everything is really complicated and Johnny and I might not make it out of this alive. How do we make it so my life as a werewolf doesn't turn out to be shorter than a mini skirt?"
"We'll consult the rule book and see if we can't fight Morgan with his own tactics," Mark suggested.
"Rule book? What kind of rule book?" I asked him. I shivered and my teeth chattered. "Did somebody turn the thermostat to iceberg?" I wondered.
"You feel a chill because you don't have your fur coat over your body," he explained.
My face drooped. "You're telling me I'm going to feel cold from now on without being a wolf?"
"Yep."
"This wasn't in the contract, or any of the movies," I pointed out.
"No, but I'm afraid it's reality. We're constantly cold without our fur," he repeated.
I sighed. "I guess that explains why all the heaters are on around you guys," I commented.
"Yes, it's an annoyance, but nothing that can't be handled by a heater," he assured me. "Now let's get dressed and go to for a late-" he glanced at the clock on the nightstand and frowned. The lock read one in the afternoon. "-lunch. Then we can find the rule book in the library and see what we can use."
I shivered and shrunk into the blanket. "How about lunch in bed?" I suggested.
He chuckled. "Not a bad idea, but you must get dressed some time," he pointed out.
"When it's summer," I replied.
"Let's see if we can't find anything in the dresser here to suit you," he suggested. He walked over to said piece of furniture, opened the top drawer, and pulled out a shirt like the one I'd worn the night of the party. It was so new the tag still hung on the sleeve. "What do you think?" he asked me.
"I think you looked a little too long at me that night," I commented.
"Perhaps, but hopefully it will fit you. Mother tried her best to find the right size," he told me.
I blinked at him. "Why was your mom shopping for clothes for me?"
He coughed and draped the shirt over himself so he could tie the blanket around his waist. "I informed her of my biting you and she anticipated your coming here," he admitted.
"So this was a family affair getting me here?" I teased.
"No, it was my sole doing. My mother merely wished to make your stay here more comfortable," he explained to me.
"So she knows she has a stubborn son who wouldn't let a little kidnapping get in the way of getting his mate here?" I guessed.
He smiled and brought me a set of clothes that he tossed across the foot of the bed. "I'm afraid I'm very stubborn," he informed
me.
"I would say single-minded, conceited, difficult, and various other adjectives, but I guess stubborn will work," I returned.
"And you are the most difficult woman I have ever encountered," he shot back.
I clucked my tongue and shook my head. "That was a bad comeback. You have to hit me with something worse than that."
"Perhaps when I'm wearing more than a sheet, but right now I'm hungry, your naked body is distracting me, and we have work to do," he reminded me.
I lifted the thin shirt and my eyes flitted to him. "Is there anything thicker in that drawer?" I requested.
"No, but I will remedy that while you dress," he promised, and left me to my dressing. The last I saw of him was a trail of sheet disappearing behind the closing door.
Chapter 13
Unable to deduce whether Mark was one of those Peeping Toms at the keyhole or a guy with really bad timing, I hurriedly dressed to avoid his coming in while I was still half naked. He turned out to be neither as he returned after I was finished and seated on the end of the bed. Something long and brown was slung over one arm and he wore a new set of clothes on his own body. "This will keep you warm," he promised as he handed the item to me.
I took it and held it out. The item was a brown fur coat. I glanced over to Mark. "Your mom didn't skin another werewolf to get at this, did she?" I quipped.
He smiled. "No, but my father may have hunted the creatures who were the former owners of the skins," he told me.
"Interesting Christmas present. Your birthdays must be something to behold," I teased.
"Only because of our unique imagination," he assured me.
I slipped into the coat and rubbed my face against the fur. It was incredibly soft and, as he promised, warm. The bottom hem nearly dragged along the floor and made me feel like a queen of the woods at her coronation. Soft as it was, it was still a little troublesome having my hands disappear into the large sleeves like a rabbit into a magician's hat. "Will I have to wear this fur coat the rest of my life?" I asked him.
"You will better handle the coolness after a few weeks and won't need it in the house or anywhere werewolves reside." He half-turned toward the door and offered me his arm. "But for now let's get some food. I'm sure you're starved after our exciting night."
I took his arm and we strode out the room. "You have no idea," I replied.
Mark led me to the dining room where we were served with reheated meats from last night's feast. I wasn't one for leftovers, but my ravenous, carnivorous appetite allowed me to consume the meat as though I was eating through a tub of ice cream after a bad breakup. When I was satisfied I slid back the empty plate, licked clean as all good werewolves do, of course, and sighed.
"My compliments to the chef. Did he have to catch all this meet himself?" I mused.
"Only if supermarkets are now organized like game preserves," Mark quipped. He rose from the table and gestured to the doorway leading to the hall. "If you're ready to save your friend we should start searching for the Foundation rule book," he reminded me.
I slowly stood from my chair and followed him across the hall. Mark opened the double doors on that wall and revealed a large, two-story library complete with one of those fun ladders attached to the railing, the one you could push yourself around on. There was also a winding, vertigo-inducing metal staircase leading to the upper floor. Shelves made of old oak covered the walls to our right and in front, and the complete upper floor, more of a balcony that covered the back wall, was also covered in bookcases. On the shelves were thousands and thousands of books.
I stepped into the center of the room and turned to Mark. "Please tell me there's a map somewhere around here with an 'X' marking the spot for the treasure," I pleaded.
"I'm afraid not. We have a catalog of the titles, but not their exact locations," he told me.
"So we have to look on every shelf?" I guessed.
"Every shelf," he agreed.
It was a long hour of scanning the shelves searching for the Foundation rule book. My eyes crossed, uncrossed, criss-crossed, and I was cross by the time I covered my bookshelves on the upper floor. I plopped down on the ledge of the balcony and dangled my feet over the edge.
"I'm not finding anything," I called down to Mark.
Mark stepped back from his bookcase and rubbed his chin. "I was sure it was here," he mused.
At that moment the doors to the library opened and in stepped Mark's mom. Underneath her arm was a large book. "Good morning," she greeted us.
"Good morning, Mother," Mark replied. I trotted down the winding staircase and stood beside Mark.
"I hope your night was uneventful," she commented.
"Not too eventful a night," Mark answered.
Her eyes shone with an impish light. "I can imagine. When should I expect the grandchild?" she mused.
"As soon as we figure out how to save my friend," I spoke up. "Mark said there was a book of Foundation rules somewhere in here."
"I thought there was," he defended himself.
"There was, or rather is again," Mrs. Fuller replied as she held out her book. The cover read Foundation Rules and Scriptures. "While you two were studying one another last night I thought it a better use of my time to study how we were to keep Miss Lyman from Morgan's clutches."
Mark took the book in hand, but looked carefully at his mother. "And?" he wondered.
"And it seems there is a clause in the chapter on the 'party' where we first made Danica's acquaintance," she replied.
Mark hurriedly opened the book to the relevant chapter and scoured the pages. His face broke out in a wide grin and he slammed it shut with a triumphant clap. "Do you think Morgan knows about this exception?" he asked his mom.
"He may, but he certainly won't inform anyone else of the clause," Mrs. Fuller pointed out.
"What sort of clause are we talking? An insanity clause?" I asked them.
"It seems that if a human is invited to the 'party' and becomes a werewolf at the 'party' then Morgan cannot object to your existing," he explained.
I felt a load of bricks slide off my shoulders. Unfortunately, there was still a side load on my conscience. "Well, that's some good news, but that doesn't help Johnny," I reminded him.
"Did you find anything about her human friend being lured into helping the Foundation?" Mark asked his mom.
She grimly frowned and shook her head. "No, I'm afraid I found nothing to help her friend. There are very few rules regarding humans being used as bait to lure in a ronin werewolf, but the rule is very clear when it comes to a human who learns of the Foundation. They must be turned, or they must be killed," she informed us.
I cringed. "I don't think Johnny was looking for either of those options," I commented.
Mark furrowed his brow and walked away from us to pace the room. He bent his head in thought and tapped the book against his hip. "There must be something to prove the human had no knowledge of the Foundation prior Morgan's interference, and to allow him to go free," he murmured.
I snorted. "What do we do? Pretend he has amnesia?" I suggested.
Mark paused and lifted his head. His eyes widened and a grin slowly slipped onto his face. "That's it!" He swung around, dove at me, and wrapped me in a giant hug. "You're a genius, Danny!"
"I'm going to be a dead genius if you don't give me some air," I wheezed.
"Oh, sorry!" Mark apologized, and quickly released me. He whipped his head from me to his mom and back. "We need to have this Johnny fellow develop amnesia!"
Mrs. Fuller raised an eyebrow and looked at her son as though he was one brick shy of a load. "What are you babbling about?" she wondered.
"If the human was to forget about the Foundation then he could be freed," Mark rephrased.
My jaw dropped. "Um, amnesia really isn't something I want Johnny to go through. I'm pretty sure that involves a traumatic experience or a hell of a lump on the head," I pointed out.
Mark turned to me and shook his head. "No, there
are other ways to make a person forget."
I didn't get the reference, but his mother gasped in horror. "Mark Fuller, don't you dare go to a vampire for help!" she scolded him.
I blinked at both of them. "Come again?" I asked them.
Mark chuckled. "Do you believe we're the only legendary creatures in the world?" he wondered.
"We may not be, but you know full well there is only one vampire in this city," his mother spoke up.
"If Danny is willing to take the risk for her friend then I cannot see how it would hurt us to ask him for help," Mark countered.
I raised my hand. "Um, could I get a bit more information on this other legendary creature guy?" I pleaded.
Mrs. Fuller turned away in disgust, and Mark sighed but turned to me. "Vampires also exist, but in fewer numbers than werewolves. If there were too many of the undead their nightly prowls would be noticed by humans," he explained.
"So there's a vampire in the city and he's going to help us how?" I wondered.
"Vampires have the ability to erase peoples' minds. That is how their victims don't remember being attacked," he told me. "If we find this vampire in a decent mood we may be able to convince him to help us."
"Or he could be really cranky and drain us dry," I pointed out.
Mark smiled and shook his head. "No, vampires dislike the taste of werewolf blood. They say it has a gamy flavor," he replied.
"So we politely ask this vampire to what? Go with us to the Foundation and erase Johnny's mind so he can go home?" I asked him.
"It won't be that simple," Mrs. Fuller spoke up. She turned to us with a deep frown on her face. "The Foundation dislikes competing creatures, and they are not aware this vampire is in the city. If they were to find out he resides her then he would either be destroyed or banished from the city," she explained.
I threw my arms up. "Great, so he probably won't help us because we need him to go to Johnny and do the amnesia, right?"
"He owes us a great favor for keeping his secret for so long," Mark pointed out to his mother.
Mrs. Fuller shook her head. "He may not see revealing his presence as a fitting trade," she pointed out.
