Code of the Wolf

by Susan Krinard

  Had she been listening to their conversation? Ordinarily, no human could approach so close to Jacob, or any werewolf, without giving herself away. But both he and Zora had been distracted and focused on each other. There was no telling what Serenity might have overheard.

  Zora moved quickly to the door. Jacob joined her. Serenity had already disappeared.

  “Maybe she didn’t hear anything,” he said without much hope.

  Zora’s strong hand gripped the doorjamb, setting the wood to creaking in protest. “If she knows what I told you,” she said, “it will hurt her. But if she realizes what we are…”

  She turned and walked back into the stable. Jacob was torn between staying to ask more questions about the gang that had killed Serenity’s family or going after Serenity…to what purpose he didn’t know. If she’d heard everything, she wasn’t likely to want him anywhere near her.

  And right now he had to spend a little time alone, figure out just what he was going to do—not only in trying to defend a man he despised, but after the trial was over.

  He walked away from the barn, past the outbuildings and well out of sight of the house, before he Changed. The vastness of the desert lay open before him, and he let the wolf take him.

  SERENITY’S HEART was beating with such force that she was afraid Jacob would hear it from across the yard.

  He could do it. He could exact the retribution she herself could not. She knew from painful experience just how keen those animals’ senses were, and how difficult it was to deceive them. She was still amazed that he hadn’t heard her enter.

  And Zora… Serenity darted inside the bunkhouse and struggled to catch her breath. Zora was one of them. Serenity had never suspected, never questioned Zora’s extraordinary tracking skills, her keen senses or her ability to heal so quickly.

  Was it because she was a woman? Serenity had known only male werewolves. She hadn’t even been able to imagine how any woman could…

  Voices—Changying’s and Frances’s—sounded from the sickroom, and Serenity pressed herself to the wall. None of the others knew. Not about what had happened to her, let alone that creatures such as Zora and Jacob existed. Zora, who never seemed afraid of anything, had obviously never wanted anyone to know what she was, least of all Serenity.

  She had every reason to hide it. Zora had been rejected by both Indians and whites, belonging to neither world. It was bad enough for any person to live as she had, with no place and no people. But if anyone had ever seen her Change, it would have been far worse.

  Had Zora’s parents been like her? How many others had she herself known without realizing it? And Jacob…

  A chill of horror gripped Serenity. She had ridden beside Jacob Constantine, spoken intimately with him, fought beside him, and he had never once looked at her with cruel lust in his eyes. He had never become an animal in her presence. He had kept his word about Leroy.

  And he had held her in his arms and told her Bonnie’s death wasn’t her fault. She could still feel the strength of his body, the solid beat of his heart, the warmth of his breath in her hair. She had wanted him to hold her forever.

  Until she had remembered.

  Serenity’s legs crumpled. She crouched, half leaning against the wall, pressing her hand to her chest as if she could soothe the wild thing leaping madly inside her ribs. Her emotions were so raw that she knew the only way she could master them was by keeping them locked within. Above all else, she had to make sure Jacob never knew what she had learned. After the trial, she would see that he left Avalon immediately. She would find some excuse to send him on his way.

  Yet once she was calm again, she was able to recall the other things Zora and Jacob had discussed. Zora was the only woman at Avalon who knew the whole truth of Serenity’s past, but she had told Jacob only part of it. Had she confided in him because they were the same kind? Because she really thought Jacob would be willing to find the Renier gang?

  “You are a hunter of evil men,” Zora had said. He’d been shocked when she had told him that the killers of Serenity’s family were werewolves, but then he had asked for their names. He had spent many years tracking outlaws. Could he know something about the Reniers?

  Serenity sucked in a deep breath, got to her feet and walked into the sickroom where Changying was hovering over her patients. Frances was sitting up, while Judith lay on her bunk, breathing through her mouth.

  “How are they?” Serenity asked.

  “I’m fine!” Frances said before Changying could answer. “When can I ride again?”

  “In a few days, if you continue to rest,” Changying said.

  Frances cast her a rebellious glance. “I should have been with Bonnie and Zora.” Her eyes filled with tears. “If I had, maybe—”

  “You couldn’t have done anything,” Serenity said, as gently as she could manage.

  “I know what I’ll vote for when we have the trial!”

  “You’re too young to be involved in something like this,” Serenity said. She turned to Changying. “We’ll bury Bonnie tonight, as soon as Caridad and the others have returned. Then we’ll hold the trial. Is Judith well enough to attend?”

  “I’ll come,” Judith said, poking her head up from underneath her blankets. “I want to…help put Bonnie to rest. And make sure that man…” She shivered and sank back down.

  Changying hurried to her side, laid her palm on Judith’s forehead and tucked the blanket higher around Judith’s neck. Then she turned back to Serenity.

  “Would you condemn this man so soon after Bonnie is laid in the earth?” she asked.

  Changying’s distaste was evident in her soft voice, but she had seen Bonnie’s body. Serenity couldn’t believe she wasn’t just as eager to see Leroy punished as the rest of them were.

  “We can’t afford to hold him prisoner,” Serenity said sharply. “There is too much work to be done, and Bonnie would want—”

  “She would not wish this,” Changying said. “Constantine could take him away.”

  “That’s not good enough.”

  “You have already decided this man’s fate.”

  “He’ll have a chance to speak for himself.”

  Except Jacob would be speaking for him. And she would have to listen.

  She walked away before her discussion with Changying could turn into a quarrel. Nothing the Chinese woman could say would make a difference, not to her or anyone else who had loved Bonnie.

  Unable to eat and afraid to think, Serenity went to the bedroom where Bonnie lay and sat beside the bed, letting anger and hate fill up all the empty spaces in her heart. The hours passed, and sometime late that afternoon she heard Caridad, Nettie and Michaela ride in. She went to meet them, and soon most of the other women were gathered in the yard. Zora hung back, but Serenity felt her glances and was certain that the Indian woman knew that her true nature was no longer a secret.

  But now there were other, more urgent concerns. Telling Caridad and her partners about Bonnie was horribly difficult, and by the end everyone but Caridad and Zora was weeping. Caridad gripped her guns and stared at the shed.

  “Cari,” Serenity said, “shooting is too good for him.”

  With a brief nod, Caridad took her horse toward the barn. Nettie and Michaela followed, heads bowed and steps heavy.

  Serenity knew she had to be strong for all of them. Strong enough to face her greatest fear without flinching. She went to join Zora.

  “It’s all right,” she said.

  Zora needed no other reassurance. The tension in her face relaxed. For a moment Serenity thought she would speak of Jacob, but she only touched Serenity’s arm lightly and slipped away.

  ALL THE WOMEN assembled by the house an hour later. Victoria had spent the time making a proper coffin out of spare wood. Now she, Helene and Serenity dressed Bonnie in her best dress, laid her gently in the coffin, and then covered her sleeping face with a beautiful lace shawl that Helene had brought with her when she’d come to Avalon.

&nb
sp; The place they had chosen to bury Bonnie was just at the base of the foothills that rose steeply out of the valley, climbing around narrow arroyos and rocky outcrops toward the abrupt wall of the mountains. All of the women took turns digging, and well before dark they had made a space big and deep enough for the coffin. Nettie offered a quiet prayer, and then they slowly covered the coffin with earth. Michaela planted a cross she had made at the foot of the grave. There was no sound but quiet weeping; even the coyotes were silent.

  When Serenity finally turned away, she found Jacob watching from a low rise above the grave. He had come so silently that not one of them had noticed him. His head was bowed, but as she walked toward him, he lifted his head and met her gaze. He didn’t look any different than he had when they’d ridden back with Bonnie that morning. There was nothing to show him for what he was, but she saw in his eyes, as she had in Zora’s, that he knew what she had overheard.

  Yet she couldn’t speak to him, though she knew herself for the very coward she had sworn not to be. She walked past him without a word.

  IT WAS FULL DARK when the women gathered again in the dining hall. Changying, Judith and Frances sat in the back of the room, Judith still wrapped in her blankets.

  Jacob was nowhere to be found, and Serenity hoped with all her heart that he had decided to leave Avalon. She was about to send Caridad and Zora to fetch Leroy from the shed when Jacob walked into the room, pushing the outlaw ahead of him by the collar of his shirt. Serenity felt an almost painful surge of relief, followed quickly by amazement that she hadn’t noticed how like a predator he moved, how casually, powerfully inhuman he was in every act and motion.

  “We’ve been waiting for you,” she said.

  He looked at her silently for a long moment, the gold flecks in his eyes burning like flames suspended in a stormy sea.

  “Where do you want him?” he asked.

  Serenity gestured toward the chair facing the benches and tables on the other side of the room. Jacob forced Leroy onto the seat and knelt to bind his hands behind the chair’s back.

  Leroy stared at the cold faces of the women who were to sit in judgment. His lower lip trembled. Jacob spoke to him in an undertone, and the outlaw shook his head violently.

  Serenity began to speak, relating the story in all its ugly detail. She never raised her voice or revealed her anger and grief. Leroy stuttered in protest several times, but Jacob quickly silenced him each time with a cold stare and a quiet word.

  Then it was Jacob’s turn. He didn’t offer any real defense. He briefly mentioned that it had been Leroy who shot Bonnie, but it was merely a dry statement of fact. He admitted that Leroy was a bad man who deserved to hang. But he went on to repeat what he’d said before to Serenity: that every man deserved a fair trial with a judge and jury of his peers, no matter what he had done. He made plain that all the women involved would be able to testify against Leroy in a court of law, and that there was no possibility he could avoid the lethal punishment he had earned.

  He was eloquent, though he, like Serenity, never raised his voice. Even Serenity was drawn in by his reserved but earnest passion for the law. Every word he spoke served to remind her that he was utterly unlike her tormentors.

  But when he was done and a tense silence had fallen over the room, there was not a face that had softened. Even Helene, the gentlest of them all, wasn’t moved.

  “You’ve heard Mr. Constantine give his testimony,” Serenity said. “I know he intends to take Leroy back and see him put in jail. But beyond that, he has no control over what happens. Even he cannot guarantee this man’s punishment.”

  “He won’t get away,” Jacob said. “I won’t leave until he’s tried and hanged.”

  Serenity didn’t look at him, knowing she couldn’t bear what she would see in his eyes. “We will put it to a vote,” she said. Victoria rose and handed out small scraps of paper and pencil stubs to the other women.

  “Write ‘go’ if you think we should let Mr. Constantine take Leroy,” Serenity said when everyone was ready. “Leave the paper blank if you disagree.”

  Not a pencil moved. Victoria collected the scraps of paper. She brought them to Serenity.

  Every one was blank.

  Hands shaking, Serenity turned to Jacob.

  “It’s decided,” she said.

  Leroy spat a stream of curses. “You ugly bitches ain’t gonna hang me!” he shouted. “If you try and touch me, I’ll kill every last damned—”

  Jacob seized Leroy by the back of his neck, tore the ropes free with his other hand and lifted the outlaw out of the chair. “You should be grateful, Leroy,” he said. “At least you won’t have to rot in your own piss waiting to die.”

  “No!” Leroy shrieked, struggling in Jacob’s grip. “I have a right to a fair trial!” But it was clear that the stuffing had gone out of him.

  “You should have thought of that before you came back looking for blood and an innocent woman ended up murdered,” Jacob said. He held Leroy firmly as Caridad produced a long rope with a neatly tied noose at one end. Changying rose, took Frances’s arm, and led the protesting girl from the room.

  “You don’t have to take any part in this, Mr. Constantine,” Serenity said, staring after them. “You can leave whenever you want.”

  “I’m already a part of this,” he said.

  “Then bring him outside,” Caridad said, gently swinging the rope. “We have just the right place.”

  She strode out of the bunkhouse, and the other women filed out after her. Serenity hung back until she was certain that Jacob had followed with Leroy.

  He wouldn’t break his word. She believed that, even though that belief went against everything she had accepted as truth about his kind.

  She went on to the barn, where several lanterns had been lit and Caridad was tossing the rope over one of the sturdy roof beams. Zora had brought a stool, and as Leroy cursed and fought in Jacob’s grip, she placed it under the dangling noose.

  Jacob hoisted Leroy onto the stool as easily as he would an infant. The outlaw collapsed, his legs sprawling on either side of the stool, and started weeping uncontrollably.

  Jacob looked at Serenity. “You sure you want to do this, Miss Campbell?” he asked.

  A bubble of shame formed in Serenity’s stomach and climbed into her throat. She swallowed it down.

  “Please step back, Mr. Constantine. Zora?”

  With Zora’s help, Serenity lifted Leroy to his feet. He didn’t even struggle as she dropped the noose over his neck. Caridad stepped forward, ready to kick the stool out from under Leroy’s feet, but Serenity shook her head. It was her responsibility, and hers alone.

  She closed her eyes and swung her leg back. She never completed the motion. The deafening blast of a gun went off beside her, making her stagger and setting her ears to ringing. Leroy’s head sagged in the noose, and his body went limp.

  Jacob holstered his gun. Serenity had never even seen him draw it. She felt an almost tangible wave of shock as the others realized what he had done.

  “Through the heart,” Caridad said with unwilling admiration. She glared at Jacob. “Cabrón! You have robbed us!”

  Spinning on his boot heel, Jacob headed for the barn door.

  Serenity caught up with him.

  “Why?” she asked. “Did you think you were being merciful?”

  He met her gaze. His eyes were cold.

  “I couldn’t let you do it,” he said.

  “You didn’t have the right!”

  “Did you want it that badly, Serenity?” he asked. “Is blood the only thing that will satisfy you?”

  The growl in his voice left her bereft of an answer. Without another word, Jacob strode out of the barn and stalked across the yard toward the outer corral.

  Victoria came up beside Serenity, laying her rough hand on Serenity’s shoulder.

  “He’s dead,” she said. “That’s all that matters, isn’t it?”

  Her voice was as flat as the Texas prair
ie, but Serenity knew the blacksmith was troubled. She glanced at the other women. They were avoiding each others’ eyes, and none of them would look at Leroy’s body.

  Was it guilt? Did they feel what Serenity felt now, forced by Jacob’s blunt accusations to recognize something ugly in themselves?

  No. The ugliness had all been in Leroy and the men who had killed Bonnie.

  Serenity returned to the stool, pushed it out from under Leroy’s feet and climbed up onto it. She drew her knife and slashed the rope. The body fell.

  “He’ll have to be buried,” she said. “Who will help me?”

  The others began to stir as if they’d just wakened from a terrible dream. Victoria, Caridad and Michaela offered to assist her. Victoria led one of the horses to the barn door, while Michaela brought two shovels from the shed. Caridad took a lantern, and then they heaved Leroy’s body over the horse’s back and set out across the range, leading the horse in the opposite direction from Bonnie’s resting place.

  The work was hard and worse than unpleasant. Each of them took turns with the shovel, and they finished in an hour. No one suggested putting a cross at the head of the grave. When they were done and had returned to the house, Victoria went directly to her smithy, while Michaela headed for the bathhouse. Caridad muttered something unintelligible and walked toward the bunkhouse.

  Serenity felt filthy in body and soul, but she had another task to complete before she could indulge her personal needs. She went looking for Jacob and found him in the dark tack room, sitting on the bench and briskly rubbing wax into his borrowed saddle. She braced herself and walked through the door, pausing just inside where there was enough moonlight to see by. Jacob didn’t look up.

  “Why did you shoot him?” she asked.

  He set down the rag and ran his hand over the polished leather. “I told you,” he said.

  “You said you couldn’t let me do it. Why?”

  Jacob raised his head. “He was never yours to judge,” he said.

  “But you killed him. Was it all a lie, your talk about justice? Did you plan to shoot him all along?”