Bad Wolf Chronicles, Books 1-3

by McGregor, Tim

  Lara’s tone was aloof. “Good luck with it.”

  “Lara—” Amy jerked but catching the harsh look in the woman's eye shut down her protest and she said no more.

  Jay slammed his glass onto the table, turning to Griffin. “Tell her what you found.”

  “This isn't the first time this area's seen wolf trouble,” Griffin said. His fingers drummed the table, eager to spill what he knew. “There's a bizarre history of wolf attacks and deaths in this part of the country going back over a hundred years. All kinds of people have died from so-called random attacks from wolves. The earliest settlers of this area, then the gold-panners, the miners, the railroad teams. All of them were subject to brutal and unprecedented attacks by wolves.”

  Amy's eyes widened. She couldn’t help it. “Is that true? How come it isn't news? Or more known about.”

  “The locals cover it up. Every incident has been dismissed as accidental or, if you go back far enough, an act of God. Swept under the rug. No one wanted to cause a stink and keep people away. Whether it was the settlers or prospectors or Chinese laborers on the railroads, the incidents were hushed up to keep industries or settlements expanding.”

  The look of disdain was potent in Lara’s posture. “And where did you learn this?”

  “Local historian,” replied Griffin.

  “And he backed this up with documentation, did he?”

  “No. Nothing tangible, anyway.”

  “Hmm. Well that fits right into your formula, doesn't it? Wild speculation with no verifiable proof.”

  “It raises a lot of questions.” Griffin took up the pitcher and refilled his glass. “This seems to be a hotspot for wolf activity. Translate those reports of wolf attacks to werewolf incidents and you got something much bigger and weirder going on.

  “And this isn't all ancient, unverifiable proof either. There was another incident last winter. Couple head of cattle were eaten up by something. Three local guys went out hunting whatever it was that was killing the livestock. One of them ended up torn to pieces by something that the other two described as a giant wolf.”

  “Again, great stuff for your show.” Lara turned to Amy. “You ready to go?”

  Lara clearly wanted to scram but Amy didn't see the point in denial. What was to be gained? “Maybe there's something here to talk about.”

  Lara glared at the girl.

  Tasha slid forward, sprawling her arms across the table. “Why don't you just come clean. Both of you know way more than you're letting on. Cut the mystery and be straight with us.”

  Lara slid out of the booth. When she spoke, it was to Amy and Amy alone. “I'm going to the bar to settle our tab. Then we're leaving.” She walked away, leaving Amy alone at the table under the scrutiny of the paranormal trackers.

  Tasha watched the woman walk away. “There's something different about your friend.”

  “She can be a little curt sometimes,” apologized Amy.

  “No, not that.” Tasha squinted her eyes as if to see better. “There's something downright spooky about her.”

  19

  LARA LAID OUT A FEW bills on the bar to cover their tab. The bartender who'd been friendly earlier could only offer a smile to her as the bar filled up. Annoyed with Amy for fraternizing with the ridiculous ghost chasers, she reminded herself that Amy was still a kid herself and was simply drawn to people her own age. Given what the girl had gone through, Lara sometimes forgot that she was still in her teens.

  Then, apropos of nothing, the hair on the back of her neck tingled and straightened. Lara turned and scanned the now crowded barroom. The lobo was here.

  She could smell him in the room and the shock hit so hard she felt the change rumble deep in her bones. She had to bite it down for fear of morphing right here in front of everyone in the bar.

  But which one was he? The smell of the crowd and the stink of the bar prevented her from pinpointing the lobo's location. She scanned the faces of everyone around her but nothing stood out, no fevered set of eyes stared back at her. If she could smell him (and it was without a doubt a man, of that she was sure) then he could detect her.

  Her hand dropped to her jacket pocket but the gun wasn't there, left behind in the Cherokee. She glanced over at Amy. The girl remained at the booth, fraternizing with the UFO chasers and oblivious to the danger in the room.

  Pushing off the bar she walked slowly through the crush of patrons, eyes scanning left and right over the faces in the room. Laughing, drinking and hollering, nothing rang any alarm bells. And then the tangle of bodies parted before her and there he was. Sitting alone at a table near the wall, shoulders hunched over an empty glass. His eyes, although shaded in the dim light, were on her and her alone. Waiting.

  Lara didn't even have her knife on her and there was nothing within reach that could be improvised into a weapon. There was glassware. She could smash the lip from a pint glass and dig the sharp end into his eye. She moved forward through the carousers and stood before his table, as if waiting for an invitation to sit.

  The man hunched over the empty shot glass was ragged and disheveled, as if he'd been dragged through the mud and planted at this little table. His hands were dirty, the fingernails crusted with grime. More grime was caked into the creases of his face and his eyes looked haunted and crazed. Bloodshot, as if drunk but she could tell by his scent that he hadn’t been drinking. Blasted and insane, maybe even rabid, yes. But drunk? No.

  “What did I do to you?”

  The stranger's voice was hoarse, as if unused to speaking and there was a drawl to it that Lara couldn't place.

  Lara studied his features but found nothing familiar in them. “Where did you come from?”

  The man's mouth opened as if to speak but no reply came. His canine teeth, she noted, were still elongated and sharp, as if he was unable to shift back to human all the way.

  She took a half-step closer. “Were you one of Grissom's pack?”

  “Grissom's dead,” he uttered.

  “I know. I killed him.” Lara steeled herself for some kind of reaction but the stranger didn't stir. A string of drool threaded between his gaped lips. She ventured another question. “What about the rest of the pack? Is there anyone else besides you?”

  “All dead.” He scratched his cheek and his fingers left a sooty stain on his face. “Gone. Left me all alone.”

  Amy’s assumption was right. This ragged fugitive was the last of Grissom's pack and, judging from his eyes, had been driven mad from being alone. Despite cultural myths, there was no such thing as a lone wolf. Lone wolves do not survive.

  She weighed her options. Attacking the stranger here in this crowded bar was dangerous. He would morph into the wolf and kill anyone in his way. He had to have counted on that when he tracked her down. She needed to keep him talking until she decided how to play this. “What's your name?”

  “Name?” He jerked out of a reverie.

  “Your name. What is it?”

  His eyes swam up to meet hers. “Why do you want to kill your own kind?”

  “I'm not like you.”

  He leered with a perverted grin, as if privvy to some joke they shared. “No. Not yet.”

  “What do you want? Grissom's gone. Why stay around?”

  “I don't remember. I want to run north, where the true wolves are. Be like them.” His head bowed and he gazed at his filthy hands as if they offended him. “I can't stand this mongrel state anymore.”

  Any twitch of empathy she may have held out for this fugitive was quashed by his facade of contrition and remorse. A bad liar. “But you're still here. Running rabid and killing people.”

  “We wolves...”His voice died off before finishing his thought. Then his eyes lit up, as if waking from some trance. “Something keeps pulling me back here. Not me but the wolf. It wants something and keeps sniffing around for a way in.”

  Lara's eyes narrowed. Was the man simply driven insane from his predicament or was there something more to what he was gibbe
ring on about? “What does the wolf want?”

  “There's a place not far from here. It's there but I can't get near it.”

  “What do you mean you can't get near it?”

  “There's a fence. Not big. The wolf could span it easily, or run it down. It's just wood. But something stops me. Something burns inside when the wolf tries to cross it.”

  He wasn't making any sense but Lara was only half-listening, her eyes distracted on a table nearby. The two men seated there had ordered steak and among the cutlery was an oversized steak knife, its serrated edge ending in a sharp point. Lethal enough to slit the stranger's throat if she was fast enough.

  Too slow. The stranger followed her gaze, clocked the knife and swung his gaze back to her. “You still want to kill me. But are you fast enough?”

  She lunged for the knife. He lunged for her. Her fingers grazed the knife's handle as something rocketed into her midsection and slammed her into the bar. Sparks popped in her eyes from the impact to her skull. The strange man was on top of her, the change already happening. She heard the cartilage pop and facial bones crack as his features twisted into some obscene mutation of man and wolf. He was uttering something in a hot breath on her face but his jaw had morphed too far to enunciate any kind of language. Not that it mattered, his glowing eyes flashed hot murder.

  A tumult rang through the bar as patrons reacted to what they thought was a bar brawl. Her fist pistoned fast in a series of lightning jabs at his twisted face and her legs kicked and bucked to get the bastard off of her. Gaining the upper hand, she felt him withdraw and scrambled to her feet only to feel two clawed hands rip into her and pull with ungodly force. Then she was crashing through tables before sprawling to the wet floor.

  The tavern exploded into a bedlam of screams and feet stomping for the exits. Cursing herself for being slow, Lara scrambled to get up when a mob of men dropped atop her in a mad scrum. They pinned her down, breaking up the fight and trying to contain the perceived antagonist to the floor. They barked at her to give up, to be still. Hadn't they seen the stranger? Were they blind to the grotesque half man, half-wolf in their midst?

  Their intentions were good, she thought. Too bad.

  The lobo locked up in her heart stretched its limbs and she drew on its strength to shake off the men dog-piling onto her. Thrown off like water shaken from a dog’s back, the men tumbled off and fell away. Lara leapt over the tangle of bodies, her eyes pinballing around for the stranger while she bellowed for Amy to come running.

  The stranger was gone. Amy appeared in a flash, confusion stitched over her face. “What the hell is going on?”

  “He was here,” Lara spat. She could see the path the fugitive had taken. Patrons and tables were bowled over in a direct line towards the door. “We have to go after him.”

  “Oh shit…”

  Two big men, bouncers Lara guessed, grabbed hold of her arms to keep her still while others crowded in to see who had caused the ruckus. The bouncers were barking questions and Amy withered at the men's aggression. Lara warned the bruisers to get their hands off of her. When they didn't comply, she sent them them tumbling through the tables. Snatching Amy's hand, she bolted for the door. Other patrons yelled at them to stop but no one tried to stop them.

  The air was damp as the two women burst out of the tavern and sprinted for the curb where the Cherokee was parked. Amy flung open the back and dug around for the guns. Lara stood in the street, turning her nose to all points of the compass.

  “Which way did he go?”

  “North,” said Lara, wagging her chin at the road leading out of town.

  Amy checked the magazine on the Desert Eagle. “Can we follow him in the truck?”

  They didn't have a choice. The crowd inside the bar spilled onto the street, hollering and agitated. To Amy they looked like the mob of angry villagers in every Frankenstein movie she had seen. The only thing missing were the pitchforks and torches in their hands. The mob surged forward, hollering obscenities. Amy wondered if there was a police station in this town.

  “Get in,” Lara snapped.

  Amy clambered into the passenger bucket and glanced into the sideview mirror. The mob rushed the truck. A figure slammed into the passenger door, slapping a hand to the glass.

  It was Griffin. “That was him, wasn't it! He was here!”

  “Stay out of it!” Lara barked, putting the Cherokee in gear.

  The young man looked desperate and pleading. “Where are you going? Wait for us!”

  “We can’t!” Amy saw him stumble back as the Cherokee surged forward and sped away from the crowd.

  The old V8 roared as Lara pushed the engine hard. Amy clocked the skyline where the sun was slanting over the trees. Dusk settling in over them. “Sun's going down,” she said. “We won't have much daylight left.”

  “Then we better make this quick,” Lara said and gunned the truck harder.

  20

  LARA STOPPED ONCE to get her bearings, climbing out of the truck to stand in the middle of the road and test the air. Climbing back under the wheel, she said “I know where he's headed.”

  “Where?”

  “The village we got chased out of.”

  Amy gripped the door as the truck bounced over rough pavement. “Why would he go there?”

  “He said he was drawn to it. That there was something there.”

  “You talked to him?” Amy blurted up in disbelief. “What did he say? Who is he?”

  “He wasn't making any sense. His mind is lost. But he was one of Grissom's, like you said.”

  Amy paled. “He tracked us down? Right to the bar? How could he do that?”

  “Same way I can find him.”

  Amy flung into the door as the truck swung a hard left off the main road onto the rough logging trail. Lara steered through the winding path too fast, jostling the old truck hard through the potholes in the packed dirt until the fallen tree that blocked the road flared up in the headlights.

  The forest floor was plunged in darkness from the lengthening shadows, broken here and there by the odd patch of sunlight dappling the needle carpeted earth. Opening the back, Lara dug out flashlights and handed one up to Amy. Hooking a small backpack onto her shoulders, she pulled out the shotgun. “Where's the fifty cal?”

  Amy took the gun from her pocket. “Here.”

  “Are the silver rounds in it?”

  “Yeah,” Amy said. Her eyes went from the fifty caliber to the shotgun in Lara's. “Maybe you should carry this. I'll take the shotgun.”

  “Keep the Eagle in your pocket. We can't afford to waste a round.” Lara held out the Sig Sauer for Amy to take. “Take this, keep it in your hands and use it if the wolf charges. But wait for the right shot before you use the fifty.”

  Amy didn't like that idea, not trusting herself to make the shot with the silver if the opportunity came but she kept mum and closed the back of the truck. Without another word Lara vaulted over the fallen tree and was off running, tracking the wolf. Amy ran to catch up, looking up at the sky and wondering how much light they had left. She didn't want to be out here after dark.

  Twenty yards in, Lara cut west off the logging road and straight into the dense brush. Amy cursed and followed, tiny branches swapping at her face. Running blind through the dark trees she lost sight of her friend completely. She could hear Lara's feet trampling the loam up ahead but beyond that, she was lost. She stopped and called out.

  There was no response. Even the trampling crash of pounding feet had disappeared. Amy gripped the gun tight and thumbed on the flashlight. Tree trunks flared up in its beam but beyond that was nothing, dark and more dark. She hissed Lara's name, needing to be heard but not wanting to attract the wolf running loose in these woods. Why did Lara have to sprint on ahead like that? She knows no one can keep up with her when she's in that spooky state.

  A tiny dot of light bounced through the trees, growing larger as it approached. Lara's Maglite, weaving through the brush. The woman moved fas
t, making almost no sound as she passed over the loamy ground.

  “Goddamnit it, Lara. Don't take off on me like that. I can't keep up.”

  “I'm sorry,” Lara said. She hadn't even broken a sweat. “I got caught up in the chase.”

  “Is he close?”

  “Yeah. But I don't know where. His scent doubles back here and then circles around. Trying to lose me.”

  “That or he meant to lure us out here.”

  Lara bristled. “What does that mean?”

  “Maybe it's no accident he found you at dusk. He gets us to chase him out here right when the sun goes down. Easy pickings.”

  “He isn't that clever. Come on, let's keep moving.” Lara pushed on, threading her way through the brambles, following a trail only she could detect.

  Amy stomped clumsily through the ferns, her clothes hooked by every clawing branch. She cursed the terrain, feeling like a graceless oaf behind a woman who slipped silently through the brush with nary a snap of a twig to sound her presence. When Lara stopped cold and held up a hand, Amy followed suit and strained her ears. There was nothing to hear beyond her own panting breath. “Where is it?” she hissed.

  Lara listened for a moment before nodding to their portside. Amy had to hold her breath to catch it but it was there. Noise filtering through the darkness of the trees. It was close.

  Lara spat onto the ground. “Damn it.”

  “What's wrong?”

  “It's those idiots,” Lara snapped. “They followed us out here.”

  When Amy strained her ears she picked out the low rumble of voices and footsteps scuffing gravel up ahead. The paranormal trackers.

  Lara's jaw clenched. “How stupid are these people? They're going to get themselves killed.”

  “What do we do?”

  “Leave them,” Lara said and turned away. “We have work to do.”