TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
About the Author
Newcastle, UK
http://clockworkpress.co.uk
Wolf Moon (Lia Stone: Demon Hunter, Episode Two) first published in the UK by Clockwork Press 2017
Copyright ©Austin Hackney 2017
Austin Hackney asserts the moral and legal right to
be identified as the author of this work.
eBook (Kindle only) ISBN: 978-0-9935367-7-9
Cover design: Streetlight Graphics
http://streetlightgraphics.com
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
This novella is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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CHAPTER ONE
I WATCHED MY GRANDMOTHER’S FACE. “Any good?” I said, biting my bottom lip.
Grandma sighed, leaning forward on her walking stick. She lifted a gnarled hand to her face and removed her half-moon spectacles. Smiling, she looked me in the eye.
“Amelia,” she said. “You are… improving. And that’s what matters.”
My shoulders slumped. “Walking through walls, Gran, is not any easy trick. Try again?”
“You need to be ready as soon as possible. Since your initiation my powers continue to wane. We are most vulnerable to attack at this time. Between one generation and… well, between two generations in this case.”
I flinched at the allusion to my parents. According to the tradition, they should have been teaching me now. I shouldn’t even be taking on the responsibility of demon-hunting and guarding the Gates. But since demonic forces kidnapped my parents and imprisoned them in another time zone, I’d known I would have to make an early start.
“I know this is a lot for you to take on,” said Grandma, snapping me back from my thoughts. “But since your initiation at the Dragon Moon, the demons will gather their forces. They sense the empowerment of a new Guardian, and they fear you.”
“Especially after I made barbecued mincemeat out of Azazel,” I grinned.
“You did well. But more powerful demons than Azazel still exist. They also know you’re still untrained. They’ll want to take advantage of that. And with Moratu still on the loose…”
Moratu: The Dragon-born occultist-gone-bad who was trying to open the freaking Gates.
The prospect of initiation had always freaked me out. But that changed after I’d shifted the first time. Since I’d felt the Dragon power surging through me, and wielded Excalibur, the ancient sword of the Pendragon, against the enemy… well, let’s say there was no going back from that.
Grandma sat down, the sash window behind her. She belonged in her old Victorian mansion house as much as the mahogany bookcases which lined her study, the gilt-framed oil paintings on the walls, and the old range that warmed the kitchen. To be honest, I’d found the place creepy at first. It was definitely high on the spooky scale.
But recently I’d felt more at home there. And I liked that before he’d moved to America, Dad was born in a room upstairs and Mom had lived here with him for the first year after their bonding.
It was dark outside and a chill breeze sneaked in through the drafty old window frames, causing the thin, lace curtains to flutter and flow like wisps of smoke. The moon was close to full. Silvered light sugared the treetops at the edge of the garden.
“Right,” said Grandma, thumping her walking stick on the floorboards to attract my attention back from my thoughts. “Let’s try again. The key is to combine the magical influence with the…”
The doorbell rang. Grandma raised an eyebrow.
“Oh!” I said. “It’ll be Dan. I forgot. We’ve got a presentation in class tomorrow. I said he could come round, and we’d work on it together.”
“Well,” Grandma said, getting up and turning to check the window was secure. “You’re off the hook.” She turned back. I hadn’t moved. There was a sound from beyond the window. I didn’t like it. My spine tingled.
The doorbell rang again, seeming distant along the hallway.
“Well?” said Grandma. “Off you go. Don't keep your young man waiting! I’ll make tea.”
“But what’s that noise?”
Grandma cocked her head, listening. Howling echoed through the trees.
Grandma laughed.
“Oh, that!” she said. “Those are the hounds. For the Hunt, you know. Well, this is your first autumn here, isn’t it? What would you call it? Fall. Yes. Fall, that’s right. Well there’s a long tradition of hunting foxes with hounds in the British countryside. And it’s the time of year for it. The Master of the Hunt will starve the dogs for several days beforehand so they’re eager for the quarry. They put up a terrible racket when they’re hungry. Now let that poor boy in, won’t you?”
I ran out the study and along the hallway to the front door, flinging the bolts back, and turned the handle. I’d totally forgotten he was coming, and I’d done nothing to prepare.
There was Dan, hunched in a fur lined Parker, a lumberjack shirt and skinny jeans, a single silver earing in his right ear and his long hair scraped back in a ponytail. His breath steamed in the freezing air. His eyes fixed on the moon.
When I’d come to live with Grandma Stone in London, after my folks had gone missing in New York, I’d been desperately lonely. But since I’d started at University, I’d met Dan and we’d hit it off straight away. Through Dan, I made friends with the bunch of misfits we hang out with. I fit in pretty well with the freaks and the misfits.
But since my initiation, it had been getting more difficult to handle my relationship with Dan. He knows nothing about the real me. I guess he has me down as another loveable oddball. It’s not like I wanted to live a double life. I hated lying to him. But what could I do? The truth would’ve totally freaked him out. And the alternative was too bleak to contemplate.
If you’ve never been lonely, don’t bother. Loneliness is just about the worst disease. I should be grateful he still thinks me worth the trouble, I thought. Chrissakes girl, I upbraided myself, where’s your self-esteem?
“Hi Dan,” I said. He turned and looked at me, his dark brown eyes reflecting the sky. He smiled his lop-sided grin.
“Hey,” he said.
“Sorry I took so long. Grandma and I we were busy… er…” Trying to teach me to walk through walls. I caught sight of the blackberries hanging from the brambles in the rough patch beneath the trees. “… er… making jelly.” Then I remembered that’s not what it’s called in England. “We were making jam.”
I hugged him. He kissed me. His lips were like ice. Pulling back, he nodded toward the Hunt’s kennels. “Mean business, isn’t it? Fox hunting. It’s not like they eat them
or anything.”
“It’s icky,” I said, wrinkling my nose. “All that wiping blood on their cheeks and stuff. Kinda primitive. Gruesome.”
The baying of the hounds carried over the garden; haunting, spectral, ghostly. Ice crystals were forming on the long grass. I shivered, nestling a little deeper into Dan’s embrace. “Let’s get in,” I said. “It's freezing out here.”
We were about to turn back into the house, when the flash of car headlights arced through the darkness, beneath the trees lining the long driveway from the main road.
“Expecting someone else?” Dan said.
“No,” I said, honestly. Then, less honestly, “Only you.” But something twisted my gut as a shiver zipped down my spine. This time it wasn’t the cold. “You say hi to Grandma. She’s just put the kettle on. I’ll find out who this is.”
Dan hesitated, but I disentangled myself and gave him a friendly shove toward the door. “Go on,” I said, flashing him a smile. “Go be an English gentleman!”
Dan shrugged and went inside. I closed the door behind him.
I walked down the steps and watched the car approaching, pulling my leather jacket tighter around my shoulders and folding my arms across my breasts.
It was a long, black vehicle: an X-type Jaguar. The car swung round and parked behind Dan's Mini. The Jag’s door opened. A man stepped out. Slamming the door behind him and rising to his full height, he crunched across the gravel. I recognized him then.
Joe Summers, PID.
I still found it hard to believe there was a secret Paranormal Investigations Department, but my heart fluttered, and I felt a warm glow despite the cold.
“You like to play the part, don’t you, Detective?” I said, smiling.
He stopped. “What do you mean by that?”
“The suit. The greatcoat. The fedora. You look like you’re on the set of a 1940s film noir.”
“This, Ms. Stone, is what is known as classic style, thank you very much.”
He pushed his hat back on his head, brushing the flaps of his coat aside, and thrusting his hands into his pockets. He rolled back on his heels, scanning the façade of the house. “I’d forgotten what a creepy old place this is.” Then he looked at me. “Anyway, didn’t I tell you to call me Joe?”
“Don’t tell me to do anything,” I countered. “You can ask and I might consider. Just because you helped save my life, doesn’t give you special rights.”
“Whoa! Sorry I spoke,” he smiled. “In any case, my part in that was small, and you saved the entire world, if I remember? Aren’t you going to invite me in?”
I wanted to run into his arms and kiss him. But that was crazy. No, I told myself. Don’t even go there. Things are difficult enough. “Actually,” I said, “I have a guest. What do you want?”
“Could we talk inside?” Joe said. He seemed crestfallen. “It’s cold out.”
I nodded. “In the hall,” I said. “And make it quick. It can only be trouble, I guess.”
I pushed the door open again, and we both stepped into the hall.
The air wasn’t much warmer in the house. I shut the door behind us.
“Listen,” Joe said, suddenly serious. “There’s something mighty weird going on and I need…”
Dan appeared in the hallway. He stopped in his tracks, narrowing his eyes at Joe.
Oh, no.
“Dan, this is Detective Summers.”
“I remember.”
“He won’t be here long.”
Dan kicked his heels and his frown deepened. “Nice jam,” he said, and disappeared back the way he’d come.
“Jam?” Joe said.
“Forget about it. Just tell me what you want.”
“I need to speak to your grandmother, too. This could be urgent. Something bad is happening and I don’t know what to do.”
“What makes you think I will?”
“It’s in your line. Spooky stuff. I’m sure of it. That’s why they put me on the case.”
“The Paranormal Investigations Department? Look,” I said, lowering my voice so Dan wouldn’t hear, “I’m a Guardian, Joe. I’m here to protect the world from demons. Period. All the other stuff - the ghosts and the ghouls and things-that-go-bump-in-the-night, that’s all for you.”
“Right.” Joe’s anxiety darkened his eyes. “Lia, it may not be demonic, but it’s something I can’t handle alone. I've got a dozen other cases open and the Department breathing down my neck. You know I ended up in this job because things went wrong before. I need this to work. And this affects you, too.”
Before I could answer, I heard Grandma’s voice from the kitchen. “I’m sure she won’t be much longer. If you’d like another cup of...”
“No thanks, Mrs. Stone.” It was Dan. “I think it’s clear she’d forgotten I was coming. She’s obviously more involved with that guy in the hallway.”
Dan appeared, shrugging on his jacket and heading straight for the door. He shouldered passed Joe, who stood back with his arms raised. “Excuse me!” he said, lifting his eyebrows.
“Dan, wait!” I said. “Where’re you going? We’re doing the presentation, right?”
Dan pulled the door open and looked back over his shoulder. “Like you remembered,” he said, glaring at Joe.
“I remembered, I just… forgot.”
So totally lame, Lia.
“And lied about the jam,” Dan said. “And your Gran won’t tell me what you were doing. Now you leave me out cold so you can talk with this dude. Forget it, Lia. If you haven’t got the guts to tell me we’re through, then let me do it for you. We’re through.”
And the door slammed behind him.
I looked daggers at Joe, pushed passed him, yanked the door open, and rushed out after Dan. But it was too late. All I saw were the red rear lights of his motor as he roared away along the drive, wheels spitting up gravel behind him.
Turning back into the house, I let the door fall closed behind me. I leaned my back against it and shut my eyes.
“I’m so sorry, dear,” Grandma said, appearing in the hall beside Joe. “Such a nice young man.”
“It’s my fault,” I said. Then turning to Joe, “I should have told you to leave while you were still on the doorstep.”
He shrugged. “I need your help.”
“I should call Dan.”
“Perhaps it would be better to let him cool off a little first, Amelia,” Grandma said. “He won’t be ready to talk until he's let off steam.”
“I guess.”
“I’ve just made a fresh pot of tea,” she said, brightening. “Shall we all go to the kitchen and the Detective can tell us what this unhappy intrusion is all about?”
A minute later we were sitting around the scrubbed pine farmhouse table, the heat from the range warming the room. I held my mug of steaming Darjeeling in cupped hands and blew vapor from the surface before taking a sip of the scalding liquid.
“Okay,” I said. “As this may have just cost me my boyfriend, you'd better make it good.”
Joe put his cup down on the table. “Girls have been disappearing,” he said.
I sat up straight. “What girls? Disappearing how?”
“Girls, young women I should say, from your university. All young women. All loners. I guess you’d say they were all geek girls. Is that the right term?”
“Maybe correct, but not right,” I said. “But go on.”
“Well, they vanish.”
“A murderer, you think? Kidnap?”
“Worse.”
“What could be worse?”
“They come back.”
“Sorry?”
“They disappear. Nobody knows how or where. Nobody sees anything. They’re gone for a couple weeks, and then - hey-presto! – they’re back again.”
“And they have been… where?”
“I don’t know. They won't say.”
“Okay,” I said, sipping my tea again and glancing over at Grandma’s impassive face. “So they come home
and they don’t want to say where they’ve been. At least they’re safe, right? Do they know each other?”
“That’s just it. They’re all loners. Or were. When they get back, they know the others. They’re meeting together now. Like a gang.”
I leaned back in my chair and knotted my brow. “Okay, so a bunch of loner geek girls have a smart idea and form a gang, or club, or whatever, and they keep it secret because it makes them feel special, and now they’ve got friends. Doesn’t sound so bad.”
“But where are they for two weeks?”
“It’s a bit weird, Joe, but hardly paranormal.” I shrugged. “I mean, they come back and they’re okay, right?”
The detective sighed, pulled his tie loose and unhitched the top button of his shirt. He shook his head.
“I’m afraid not,” he said. “It’s not as simple as that.”
“Spill the beans.”
“When they come back, they’re…”
“They’re…?”
“Different.” He sighed. “And they’re all scarred. Like this.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his ‘phone. Swiping the screen, he laid the device on the table.
I scrolled through the images. And a deep dread twisted my insides.
CHAPTER TWO
I SLID THE 'PHONE ACROSS THE TABLE to Grandma. She looked through the photos. She wore the same inscrutable expression as always.
“These are deep scratches,” she said. “Not quite wounds, perhaps, but deep.”
The photos were of the girls. They were fuzzy, so I guessed he took them in secret from a distance. How Joe got them, I didn’t know. But if I hadn’t known him well enough, I’d have had him down as some kind of pervert.
He’d zoomed in on the girls’ thighs. One through a window while she was undressing; another at a public swimming pool; in another she was wearing a mini dress. The photos showed three deep, parallel scars, each as long as a finger, scratched into the inside of each girl’s left thigh.
But the sudden feeling of dread which had shuddered through me had passed and my thoughts were clearer. “Okay,” I said. “That’s not nice, but all kinds of sororities and sisterhoods do this kind of thing: a tattoo, or some kind of branding. It’s icky, but it happens.”
Wolf Moon: Lia Stone: Demon Hunter - Episode Two (Dragon-born Guardians Series Book 2) Page 1
