Blood Moon

by French, Jackie

  ‘No, don’t be. I suppose the full moon…’

  Dusty smiled. ‘You suppose the full moon is irresistible to a wolf? Not quite. I was out there anyway, and…’

  Eleanor frowned. ‘I said no one was to leave the house at night…’

  ‘I smelt something,’ said Dusty shortly. ‘Something wrong. And with Rusty not here…’

  ‘What sort of thing?’ I asked, alarmed. ‘The Matriach’s people again?’

  Again the not-quite-human shrug. ‘No. Not this time. I don’t know. Strange. Maybe animal. Maybe human.’

  ‘Are you sure it wasn’t Gloucester?’ asked Emerald.

  ‘I know Gloucester’s smell perfectly well,’ began Dusty.

  ‘Gloucester!’ I exclaimed.

  ‘He’s been patrolling the Valley every night since the Patriarch was killed,’ said Emerald.‘Didn’t you know?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said slowly. ‘I suppose these murders bring it all back…Perdita’s death I mean.’

  ‘I suppose they do,’ said Eleanor quietly. ‘Now, what do you intend to do this morning? You have our full cooperation of course.’

  ‘Well,’ I said. ‘I’d like to question each one of you if you don’t mind. By yourselves,’ I added hastily, in case Eleanor decided to orchestrate each interview. ‘Just to see where everyone was. If you all have alibis then that proves you must be innocent.’

  ‘I’d have thought that finding the guilty person would do that even better,’ said Emerald quietly from the fireplace.

  ‘Darling, we know none of us are murderers. Danielle doesn’t. Isn’t that right, Danielle?

  I nodded, took a bite of chop. It was tender, but I was already sick of so much meat.

  Eleanor sipped her orange juice, and smiled at us around the table.

  Chapter 14

  ‘Don’t see why they need NetSchool,’ growled Dusty, sitting on his haunches and staring up at me. ‘Load of nonsense if you ask me.’

  I had intended to question the cubs first, to get them out of the way before school. But they’d tumbled out of the kitchen before I had finished my chop (Connie still with her bone in her hand) and I’d had to ask Dusty to round them up.

  ‘An education’s useful,’ I said mildly.

  ‘What Eleanor says.’ I’d noticed that Dusty’s speech grew more abrupt when he was preoccupied. He stood up—four legged this time, not two—shook himself, and trotted out the front door. I heard a long drawn out…yelp, is the closest word to it, then a more human ‘Bonnie! Connie! Johnnie! Get your tails down here now!’

  I sat back on the puppy-smelling cushions in the living room, and looked at my watch. Not yet seven. Plenty of time yet.

  NetSchool begins at 8 a.m. It’s mostly Realtime, even though it’s in Virtual. Back in the City kids are selected into nets according to their temperament and ability. I supposed in the Outlands people just formed their own nets with the kids around, but probably used the same programs too.

  I wondered if I were wasting my time with the cubs. Although it was just feasible that one of the cubs could kill a man—especially if they all worked together—it was impossible to imagine them doing it and anyway they were too strictly supervised by the rest of the clan. But it was just possible they’d noticed something, without realising its significance.

  ‘Inside!’ barked Dusty, and suddenly they were scrambling onto the sofa in front of me, while Dusty trotted out to his lookout rock again, his shepherding duties over.

  The cubs sat in a line before me: three sets of dark eyes and three blunt noses. How on earth did you cross-examine children about murders? They stared at me, waiting for me to begin.

  ‘Er, right then,’ I said. ‘Did you ever meet Brother Perry or the Patriarch?’

  Three nods. ‘At the Christmas party last year down at Soggy Crossing,’ said Bonnie.

  ‘And the one before that too,’ said Connie.

  ‘What were they like?’

  Three shrugs. They were grown up. What else was there to say?

  ‘Did you ever speak to them?’

  The cubs glanced at each other. Three more head shakes.

  ‘Brother Perry said I was cute as a button,’ said Connie. ‘But Auntie Emerald came over and told me to go see Santa Claus.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘She didn’t like Brother Perry.’

  ‘How do you know?’ I asked.

  Another nose wrinkle. ‘Just the way she smelt. Angry. But not the sort of angry when Bonnie pushed Johnnie down the waterfall. A sort of…’ Connie frowned, ‘a sort of rich anger. But she didn’t say anything to Brother Perry, she just came with me to see Santa too.’

  ‘It was just Gloucester dressed up,’ said Johnnie. ‘Not a real Santa Claus.’

  ‘But he was nice,’ said Bonnie decidedly.

  ‘I think Uncle Dusty was a better Santa Claus,’ said Connie. ‘That was the Christmas before. But he’d been Easter Bunny this year, so it was Black Stump’s turn to be Santa Claus.’

  ‘Uncle Dusty is the best Santa of all,’ said Bonnie firmly.

  ‘Then Uncle Dusty played pirate ships with all us kids,’ said Connie. ‘He was the pirate ship and we had to attack him. That was Portia’s idea, and then she said…’

  ‘No, we didn’t, we had dinner first, then we played pirate ships,’ corrected Bonnie. ‘It was roast chicken but it wasn’t as good as Aunt Emerald’s chicken. And then…’

  I interrupted the memories of the party. ‘What about the Patriarch?’

  ‘Oh, him,’ said Bonnie dismissively. ‘Did you know he wanted Jen to come down and be his wife?’ She wrinkled her brow. ‘Well, sort of his wife, that’s what it smelt like but sort of different.’

  ‘What did Jen say?’

  ‘Jen just laughed. It was at the gathering too. We were hiding in case the pirates attacked and the Patriarch said to Jen, better a real man than being silly bait.’

  ‘Silly bait?’ I wondered. Then I realised: celibate.

  I asked Auntie Emerald what silly bait meant,’ Bonnie continued, ‘and she said it meant being lonely, but Jen wouldn’t be lonely, she had too much gumption for that. Auntie Emerald was angry then too.’

  ‘I see,’ I said slowly. ‘Look, have you any idea who might want to…to…hurt Bother Perry or the Patriarch?’

  Bonnie nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said.

  ‘Really?’ Was it going to be as easy as this, I thought.

  ‘The pirates!’ Bonnie informed me. ‘They snuck into the Valley and eeerrrwwwkkk!’ The small face suddenly scrunched up into a surprising snarl. ‘They slit their throats with their cutlasses and then they sailed away. Portia says they buried their treasure too, and we should go hunt for it but Mummy says we can’t go treasure hunting till the murderer is caught, even during the day. It’s not fair! If I caught a pirate I’d tie him up, bite his balls off and make him tell us where the treasure is and…’

  I let her finish the story. None of the others interrupted. It was evident that Bonnie was the leader of the threesome. Johnnie watched her happily, his mouth slightly open, his tongue protruding in a happy puppy grin. Connie sat more quietly, watching a butterfly investigate the dusty shrubs outside.

  ‘…and then we’d cut off their heads too,’ said Bonnie, her story finally winding to an end. ‘Portia says that’s what you have to do to pirates.’

  ‘So,’ I said. ‘Apart from the pirates, you don’t know who might have wanted to hurt Brother Perry or the Patriarch?’

  The cubs looked at each other then turned back to me.

  ‘No,’ said Bonnie simply. ‘Can we go out to play with Uncle Dusty now?’

  I nodded and they bounced off the sofa, paused briefly while the front door opened for them. (It didn’t squeak, I noticed; but then a sliding door had no hinges, did it? Maybe we should install some sliding doors.) I heard Bonnie yelp for Dusty and Dusty’s answering bark.

  There was no point questioning them further. Why should the cubs be interested in the adult world?

  And
the one question I really wanted to ask them—have any of your family ever come in late and bloodstained?—was impossible.

  Great Uncle Rex sat curled into the largest of the sofas in the living room. The dog smell seemed fainter now, or perhaps I was getting used to it.

  ‘Er…hope I didn’t…er…offend you,’ he said. ‘Last night…’

  ‘No, of course not,’ I said sincerely. There was a thin layer of hair on my cushion. I hunted for words then decided to take a leaf out of Eleanor’s book. Probably Chapter 8 of Neo-authoritarianism was titled ‘How to Win Friends and Influence Elderly Werewolves’. ‘I was flattered,’ I said finally.

  ‘You really were?’ Great Uncle Rex brightened.

  ‘Look, I’d really value your experience on this. I mean, you know the people in this valley better than anyone.’

  Great Uncle Rex brightened even further. ‘Well, yes. The old dog’s day isn’t done yet, eh?’

  ‘Who do you think is responsible for the murders?’

  Suddenly the facade of harmless old gentleman was gone. Great Uncle Rex looked serious, and now I could see the protective uncle he had once been. ‘Been thinking about that a lot,’ he said. ‘Two murders, blood on the doorstep both times. Obvious solution, one murderer.’

  ‘Well, yes,’ I said.

  ‘Not necessarily,’ said Great Uncle Rex crisply. ‘First murder, the Patriarch—well, lots who’d like to get rid of him. See what I mean?’

  ‘I think so,’ I said.

  ‘So, someone thinks, werewolf pack up on the hill. Tear the old man’s throat out, everyone will think it’s them.’

  ‘But surely they wouldn’t want you to get the blame!’

  Great Uncle Rex wrinkled his too-broad nose. ‘Hate anyone different, werewolves even more different. See what I mean?’

  I nodded.

  ‘Besides, Patriarch a bastard. Public service really.’

  ‘What about Brother Perry?’

  ‘All right, Brother Perry. Who hates Brother Perry? Too many to count. Someone thinks: right, there’s a werewolf murderer about. Let’s bump off Brother Perry, people will think it’s the same wolf who killed the first one. Don’t feel guilty about wolf getting the blame, as they think wolf has already killed once.’

  ‘But it wasn’t one of you?’

  Great Uncle Rex met my eyes. ‘Not one of us,’ he said, and suddenly his speech was slower and more distinct. ‘I never ruled this clan, but have been part of it all my life. Eleanor, she tries to make us human. We look human, most of us, most of the time, but underneath we are wolf. And wolves do not kill,’ he said, even more slowly, ‘except for food or to protect our own.’

  ‘Uncle Rex, what happened to your brother and sister?’ I asked frankly, ‘the ones that Eleanor and Rusty defeated to become the leaders of the family?’

  Great Uncle Rex was silent for a moment. ‘Dead,’ he said at last. ‘Not what you are thinking. Own choice. A wolf thing. When you are leader, you lead. When defeated, you lose heart.’

  ‘I see,’ I said. ‘Thank you, Uncle Rex.’ Great Aunt Lexie was tiny and furry in her great soft bed, in her room without a door, in the first branch. The face was human—almost—but the limbs beneath the sheets looked awkward. I was reminded of the wolf in Red Riding Hood, dressed in the grandmother’s clothes in her bed. His shape would have looked a bit like this…

  ‘She was such a pretty girl,’ said Great Aunt Lexie. She was talking about Eleanor as a child. ‘I could see she’d be a good leader even then. But it takes more than leadership you know. Oh, much more.’

  ‘Does it?’ The room smelt of fur and talcum powder.

  ‘Oh, yes. It’s the fight, you know. That’s how you get to be leader. You have to be strong. She was such a pretty little thing. I thought, she’ll never make it. She’ll challenge and she’ll lose, and being Eleanor she wouldn’t have coped with losing. I thought, Emerald will be the one to make it. Emerald was a such sturdy child.’

  ‘But Eleanor won,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, yes, Eleanor won. It was Virtual that did it. She has always been so good with the Net.’

  ‘Pardon?’ For a moment I thought she’d meant that Eleanor had used Virtual in some way to win her challenge. But the shaky old voice was still speaking.

  ‘Martial arts course, Virtual gym. Every day she’d be practising for hours. Still does, I bet you; her challenges aren’t over yet. By the time she was twelve she was stronger than any of them. You wouldn’t think it to look at her.’

  ‘Yes, I would.’

  Great Aunt Lexie ignored me or perhaps she didn’t hear. ‘She comes to see me every day. So good when they don’t ignore the old ones. Best chops too, she sees that I get those. “I’ve made sure you’ll get the really fat ones, Auntie,” that’s what she says to me every day. And a chocolate biscuit every day with my afternoon tea. She tells Emerald to make them. Emerald wouldn’t think of chocolate biscuits, you know. She was such a pretty little thing. I’ve got some holos somewhere here…’

  ‘I’d love to see them,’ I said. ‘But I have so much still to do…’

  ‘Of course I could have done it,’ said Uncle Dusty, grinning at me, so that his flat wide tongue lapped slightly over his teeth.

  The cubs were hooked into NetSchool. Dusty sat so close to me on the sofa I could smell his breath—a mix of stale meat and decay. Natural dogsbreath? I wondered, or did he just need a dental check up with a Meditech? I moved slightly back on the sofa.

  ‘How could you have done it?’

  ‘Easy. Run over the paddocks, down the creek and up to the Patriarch’s while everyone else was asleep. Twenty minute run at most. Slash, tear, do the deed, another twenty minutes back again.

  ‘Then Brother Perry—down the same way, across to Nearer to Heaven while Emerald was cleaning up dinner and putting cubs to bed. Rex’s always asleep after dinner and Eleanor’s on Virtual or exercise regime.’

  ‘Exercise regime? She still exercises?’

  Dusty’s pale gold eyes twinkled at me under the furry brows. ‘How do you think she keeps so fit? Does an hour’s workout once a day.’

  ‘Why? Surely—well, she’s head of the clan now.’

  ‘Wouldn’t stop Emerald challenging her again,’ said Dusty frankly. ‘Emerald, she expected to be leader when we were cubs. Rusty expected it too. Sure, we did what Eleanor said, but Emerald was stronger. Besides, one day Jen will challenge Eleanor. Stronger she is, the longer she’ll last as leader.’

  I sat back against the too-soft sofa cushions. ‘You know,’ I said. ‘I didn’t realise that you would be as, well, as critical or, I don’t know, clear-sighted about Eleanor.’

  ‘Because she’s head of the clan? I’d give my life for Eleanor,’ said Dusty and I knew he was speaking absolutely literally. ‘Doesn’t make me blind. She’s ambitious. Always has been. Part of what makes her a leader.’

  ‘And the other part?’

  ‘Ambition too. But not ambition for herself alone—ambition for the clan. She cares for us; we care for her. It’s a wolf thing,’ explained Dusty, scratching what I hoped wasn’t a flea.

  ‘What about you?’ I asked curiously. ‘Don’t you mind? Aren’t you ever jealous of Rusty?’

  ‘Why?’ the wide mouth grinned at me again. ‘You mean sex, don’t you? Truenorms are so…so constant about sex. Can smell it on you all the time. Doesn’t mean as much to us wolves. The smell needs to be right. It’s a…’

  ‘It’s a wolf thing,’ I said. ‘But you’re not entirely wolf.’

  The grin stretched in a way a human grin never could. ‘All right, won’t say it’s never occurred to me. You Truenorms smell on heat half the time, give even a poor old uncle ideas…’

  ‘I’m not Truenorm,’ I pointed out.

  Dusty grinned, his tongue lolling from his mouth. ‘Truenorm enough in that way,’ he said, ‘But with Eleanor. All right, when she’s on heat, I’d be in there like a shot if Eleanor said yes. But she wouldn’t. Eleanor goes for the
best, and around here best is Rusty. Fine with me. Best mates with best and that means the cubs are the best of the best. Cubs are our future. But sex? If I can’t smell it, I don’t feel it. Simple. It’s a wolf thing,’ he said again.

  I hoped my Truenorm ready-to-have-sex-any-time-of-the-month scent wasn’t confusing him now. ‘But you’re more human than wolf.’

  ‘Because I talk? Feelings matter, not talk. Feel wolf, talk human,’ said Dusty, panting up at me with his wet red tongue.

  ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Back to the murders. You could have slipped off while everyone was asleep or when Emerald was up with the cubs and Eleanor in her study. Surely any of you could have if it came to that.’

  ‘Could have,’ said Uncle Dusty. ‘We didn’t. Couldn’t hide it from the clan if we did. Could smell a murder out.’ Again he gave that strange animal-shouldered shrug. ‘But how to prove that to a Truenorm? Don’t know.’

  Aunt Emerald was making scones. The kitchen smelt of hot flour and dog hair and Emerald’s hands were floury too, the flour sticking to her fur like chunky talcum powder. Outside the cubs laughed and tumbled with Uncle Dusty.

  ‘It’s the best sound in the world, isn’t it?’ said Emerald, her ears pricked in their direction.

  ‘What is?’

  ‘Children’s laughter.’ She rolled the scone dough neatly on the floured bench. ‘I hear that lots of people in the City don’t have children at all.’ She spoke as if the City were a foreign country.

  ‘Well, the world has enough people, don’t you think? It was unbearably crowded before the Decline. Besides, you can’t have children and do, well, lots of other things.’

  ‘Really? Wouldn’t know. Not the point anyway. You don’t have children to populate the world.’

  ‘What do you have them for?’

  ‘To keep you sane,’ said Emerald

  ‘What…?’

  ‘Maybe sane isn’t the right word.’ The dough was swiftly cut into rounds with a floured glass. ‘Keep you…balanced, is a better word. Stop you seeing the world in relation to yourself. You see the world differently when you have children.’