He squints down his long nose at me. “No. It just stopped.”
“But what stopped it?”
“I don’t know,” he says and shrugs. “One day wolves were out in broad daylight and attacking folk. Next day, the town was back to normal and everyone returned to their old selves. I’m surprised Jefferson hasn’t mentioned it to you.”
“Wait, he was around when all that happened?”
Deputy Graham reaches his squad car and opens the door to climb in. “Of course. He’s been here since the beginning.”
Chapter 13
I find it incredibly difficult to not say anything on the ride back to the field office. I let Hawk and Jefferson talk uninterrupted about the scene of the crime and Hawk assures us both that if he catches the scent again he’ll probably be able to recognize it, but I know his sense of smell can be wonky. It’s always easier for werewolves when they’re in their wolfish form. I keep my mouth shut but my fingers tug at the bottom of my sweatshirt and play anxious drums on my kneecaps. I know Hawk notices but he doesn’t say anything about it.
When we reach the cabin I assume Jefferson will give us free time but the second we put down our backpacks he hustles us outside to work on our firearm skills. We go through fifty rounds each using the rifle, then the handgun, and even get a feel for a shotgun that kicks hard into my shoulder. Then he runs us through tactical drills on a little obstacle course he set up inside the edge of the forest. Jefferson shouts at us if we do anything wrong or even slightly off. We did a good deal of this during our training in Underground but there’s a completely different vibe out here where we know there’s something lurking in the woods that could be watching us even now.
Once the light fails Jefferson brings us inside only to give us blank report forms. “I want you to account for everything that happened today at school. I want to know every little thing about the werewolves in that building—what they looked like, what they were doing, what they ate, who they sat with, everything. Each detail is important.”
Hawk and I sit at the table to start. Jefferson hovers in the background to make sure we actually do the paperwork before he disappears outside. A quick check out the window lets me know he’s holed himself up in the barn again. I race through my report of the day, obviously leaving out the bit about the lunch fight, and set my pen down. Hawk is still working on his by the time I finish.
I nudge him anyway to make him stop. “Jefferson knows a heck of a lot more than he’s telling us.”
“Didn’t you already say that before?” he grumbles, focused on what he’s writing.
“Yeah, but there’s more,” I lean in closer and put a hand on his report so he’s forced to stop. “Deputy Graham told me all of this strange behavior has happened before. Fourteen years ago.” Hawk’s eyes widen and a muscle in his jaw twitches. “Jefferson was there. He knows all about it and he’s never mentioned it before.”
“Fourteen years,” Hawk mutters. He starts to massage his jaw and looks distant. “That’s an eerie coincidence, don’t you think?”
I know exactly what he’s thinking because I’ve been thinking the same thing. Fourteen years ago exactly in five days’ time on Halloween—and incidentally our birthday of all days—Hawk was bitten and changed into a werewolf. The same day our parents died. The same day I became one of the Blessed. I never knew the full story. I was four at the time and only remember a great black shape and Hawk screaming. I remember the blood and the terrifying snarl of a wolf. Then I remember punching that werewolf on the nose to save my brother. After that is only bright light and suddenly I was in Underground.
I know a dragon was involved somehow, that he saved us and gave me his magic, but beyond that there’s only black ink. My parents’ file is classified. I’ve tried to get Witty to crack the files but there were measures put in place that stopped him. I don’t even know where I used to live before I went to Underground. I was too young to remember. For all I know, I could have grown up right here in Moose Lake.
“Should we ask Jefferson about it?” Hawk says quietly. His fingers have curled around the pencil in his hand and the wood has started to splinter under his grip.
“If he hasn’t told us already, he’s not going to if we ask him point blank. He’ll deny it or side step it like everything else we’ve asked him. No, I say we comb through these files ourselves.”
He frowns. “And what? Find a report about our parents in all this? Phoenix, we’ve gone through everything and neither one of us has found anything about our parents or me.”
“Hawk, this is too big of a coincidence to ignore! And Jefferson could just be hiding the files on our parents—”
“Phoenix . . .”
“Don’t Phoenix me,” I snap. “He’s taken and hidden a report before.”
“What are you talking about?”
I gesture angrily to the mountain of boxes in front of us. “I had been sitting right here going through stuff and found a police report about some little girl being bitten. I think the mother was killed but the rest was a mess of coffee and I couldn’t read it.” I’m talking fast and one of Hawk’s eyebrows is slowly rising. “The point is, I left it right here, I went to sleep, and when I woke up the next morning it was gone. Jefferson took it.”
“But it was a little girl bitten,” he argues. “That doesn’t have anything to do with us.”
“No, but it does prove Jefferson has hidden stuff before and is hiding things now.”
Hawk exhales sharply and runs his hands through his hair. “What are we supposed to do about it? He’s an agent. Maybe it’s classified. Maybe he took that report and stuck it in the right file when you weren’t looking. All we have are conspiracy theories.”
“Then we have to keep looking.”
He puts his hand on top of mine and gets real quiet. “Phoenix, I know you want answers. So do I. But let’s do this the right way, okay? If you get yourself too worked up about something—”
“This is our mom and dad we’re talking about.” My voice escalates in volume along with my temper. “Of course I’m going to get worked up about it!”
“I know and you have every right to. Just keep a level head, okay? We’ll be smart. We’ll go through the files and see if there are any werewolves that were bitten back in 1996. Then we keep up the mission at the high school and see if there are any more similarities. Don’t rush into this blindly.”
I glare at him. “And do what? What do you honestly think I would do?”
“For our family?” He scoffs and shakes his head. “Anything and everything, even if it ends up hurting you or someone else.”
I don’t know if it’s meant as a compliment or an insult but it sort of feels like a punch to the gut. So, I ignore him and pull the closest file box towards me. Hawk finishes his report then grabs a notebook and brings it to the table.
“Okay, but we do need to do homework in turns so you don’t get in trouble again.” He prods me with the eraser of his pencil and offers a smile.
“I can live with that,” I say and keep digging through the files.
The last time I went through all this paper I was mostly skimming. I put names together and what not but I didn’t really analyze anything. Now I know exactly what I’m looking for. There are a number of werewolves that have relocated out of the area but quite a few stuck around Moose Lake or Carlton County. The bite incidents are scattered through time, across months and years. I make a ledger in the notebook Hawk brought me with names and dates. If there were any associated cattle mutilations or territorial displays I note those as well.
Three hours and two boxes later, a pattern has started to emerge. Hawk nudges me out of my chair and passes over a plate of eggs so I can take a breather. He starts in and adds his own neat handwriting to my list. I try to work on my Shakespeare quiz and math assignment but it’s difficult to concentrate. I plug in my mp3 player and crank up some old hip-hop songs Hawk and I used for dance competitions. I soak up the music for a solid twenty
minutes before I’m able to focus enough to write about Romeo and Juliet, then abstract equations.
My mythology assignment is a piece of cake. I know the Greek lore because a good deal of it refers to actual monsters that roam the earth and have been classified by the IMS. I’ll discuss the story of Lycaon, one of the many origin stories of the werewolf. It’s always interesting, and informative, to see how other people react to such legends because to them they’re just stories.
The second I’m finished I push Hawk out of the chair and pick up where he left off. He disappears into the bedroom for awhile and I’m lost in dates and police reports. Scanning through the notes he’s left on the ledger, I see “black wolf?” circled next to the date of infection for several people. I go back to those particular files and page through them until I find Jefferson’s handwritten notes. There’s a lengthy report of his discussion with a girl freshly infected. She said it was too dark to see the creature exactly but knew it had great yellow eyes. Jefferson has “black wolf?” circled in the margins of the page.
Then I notice something else odd. He says “we followed the trail into the woods.” Plural. I keep reading and it definitely indicates Jefferson had been working with others before. He doesn’t say any names but then I see other handwritten notes that don’t match his hasty script. Someone else made notes in this file. I have to squint at the initials on the bottom of the page for a good two minutes before I decide that they are R.M. My fingers brush the letters as if I could feel them.
R.M. My father was Robin Mason. Both he and my mother had been agents. Was it possible? Did my parents work with Jefferson here in Moose Lake? Did they die here in 1996 during the last uprising of the werewolves?
I realize I’m breathing hard. I press the heels of my hands against my temples and fight something ugly in my chest.
“Hawk,” I wheeze out. “Hawk!”
He races out of the bedroom. “What? Did you find . . .” He puts a hand on my shoulder and kneels down so he’s looking up at me. “Are you okay?”
I push the paper towards him. “Did you see this? Look at the bottom.”
He slides it off the table and his eyes scan back and forth. When he reaches the very bottom his eyes slowly narrow and his eyebrows knit together. “I just skimmed over it before,” he mutters. “I guess I wasn’t paying close enough attention. Two people wrote this.”
“The initials, Hawk. R.M.”
His green eyes jump to mine. “You don’t think . . . Dad?”
“There’ve been too many coincidences. It’s got to be him.”
He frowns and reads the paper over again. He rolls his lips and sticks his tongue out a little. “We need to talk to Jefferson.”
“Okay.” I start to rise but he pushes me back down.
“Let’s go through some more files first,” he says. “See if we find R.M. anywhere else or more bites in 1996. I want to be able to prove something to him. That way he can’t deny the facts. He’s clever and I’m sure he’ll try to avoid answering otherwise.”
“But why?” I say louder than I mean to. “Why hide the truth about our parents if they were here? If they worked with him?”
“Well, let’s figure it out. Hand me a box, will you?”
We bend our heads over the files together. My brain is fevered and I can’t stop. I don’t care that it’s getting late. Each time I see another reference to 1996 or a black wolf or see R.M. anywhere, it drives me on. We also spot a third set of handwriting with the initials M.M.—Mary Mason, our mother. It has to be. Our list grows and a greater pattern emerges. There were at least thirty people bitten within a three-week period in the beginning of October of 1996. Then people started going missing like Deputy Graham said. In fact, I see his name mentioned in a report on his sister. After that there were attacks during daylight and livestock was being slaughtered all over the place. Then after Halloween everything just stopped. The werewolves calmed down, a task force from the IMS stuck around for awhile to make sure the situation had settled, then life moved on. There have been only sporadic biting incidents since then from random people going off the serum injections.
Our list is made and it’s 1:30 a.m. but I don’t care. Hawk and I take our information and march out in the darkness to the barn where light spills out from under the door even at this hour. I knock three times and wait. Hawk cocks his head and I’m sure he can hear movement inside that I can’t. He nods to me and I knock again, harder this time so the whole door shakes. Seconds tick by and I’m ready to wrench the door off its hinges when it swings open.
“I told you not to come in—”
I cut him off. “It’s about what happened in 1996.”
The color bleeds out of his face. I put my hand on the door to make sure he can’t close it again. I’m ready to push Jefferson aside and storm his secret base.
Hawk must sense my impatience because he inserts himself between me and Jefferson. He snatches the list out of my hands and holds it up for Jefferson to see. “We know about the previous attacks. Deputy Graham said you were there so we looked into it. We’ve got questions and I think we’ve got a right to have them answered if we’re going to work as a team here. The more we know, the better we’ll be able to handle the current situation. Don’t you agree? Or are we going to keep hiding secrets until people start to disappear like last time?”
Smooth talker. Jefferson squints at the list and a muscle in his jaw twitches. I can almost smell victory. He doesn’t look at us but holds the door open wider and gestures us inside. I walk in first to survey what I never got the chance to the last time I came in uninvited.
The dirt floor has a thin scattering of hay across it and the place smells like mildew and alcohol. Directly in front of me is a tan tarp covering what is obviously a car with four tires peeking out underneath. There are some file boxes stacked on wooden pallets beside it and a workstation covered with hammers, crowbars, screwdrivers, glue, and cans of oil. I go up an open flight of stairs next to the draped car to the loft. The first thing that catches my eye is an enormous map of Moose Lake taped to the wall and marked by a hundred little colored pins. There’s a bookshelf on the right stuffed with more files and boxes, and a little hook on the wall holds car keys. A plain table in the center holds a few open files, photographs paper-clipped to the covers. A picture of Hawk sits on top.
“What is all this?” I ask. I walk over and point to my brother’s picture. “And this?”
“What does it look like?” Jefferson says gruffly. “I was given files on you two when you first got here, remember? I was re-familiarizing myself with your case.” He glances over his shoulder at Hawk who emerges at the top of the stairs and soaks it all in. “Bitten in 1996. Son of Robin and Mary Mason. Both parents killed during the incident. Sister marked by a dragon. Both siblings rescued by said dragon. The werewolf was never caught.” His eyes lose focus as he gazes at the open file. “It was a bloody nightmare.”
My heart thunders in my chest. He says it like he was there and witnessed it firsthand.
“Where?” I breathe.
His beady eyes are pained when they meet mine. “You don’t know, do you?” He massages the side of his face and pulls a hand over his beard. “They classified the files since that dragon got involved.”
“Where?” I demand, my voice steady this time.
“Here,” he sighs. “Or more accurately, right here.” He walks to the massive map and points to a blood-red pin near the edge of town. “Right here in Moose Lake fourteen years ago.”
Chapter 14
I had already convinced myself of the facts. I was the one pushing Jefferson to confirm all my theories. Yet the moment he tells the truth, a gaping hole rips open in my chest. So it’s true. Hawk and I used to live here when we were kids. Neither of us can even remember it. I walk to the map and put my finger on the pin that marks where our lives changed. Where our parents died. I can’t speak. I just stand glued to that map as Jefferson continues to talk.
“R
obin and Mary were my co-workers.” He clears his throat. “And they were my friends. Back in 1996 something began happening to the werewolves in the area and we investigated it together.”
“A population explosion,” Hawk says quietly.
“Exactly. But not just that. Their behavior changed. They got aggressive. They stopped taking the serum. It got to the point they started biting people in the streets. We called in the IMS because something was seriously wrong.”
I don’t turn around. There’s a prick behind my eyes as I stare at that horrible red pin.
“Things got bad. Real bad. Then we started piecing the puzzle together. There were sightings of a huge black wolf all over town. The other werewolves were drawn to it and protected it. And—” He clears his throat again, louder this time. “It was directly involved in several incidents.”
“You don’t know who it was?” Hawk asks even though the answer is obvious.
“No, but your folks called me Halloween night. Said they might have a lead before the line went dead. I went to your house but by the time I got there . . .” He trails off. He doesn’t need to fill in the blanks for us to understand but that twisted part of me needs to know. Answers have eluded me for so long and I want the truth no matter how gruesome at this point.
“But what?” I say roughly, still facing the map.
There’s a long moment of silence before he answers. “By the time I got there a dragon was already cradling you and Hawk. He said the black wolf had been there, then he took you two and vanished. Robin and Mary didn’t make it. The wolf had killed them and from what I could make of the wreckage in the house, they died trying to protect you two.”
I worry my lower lip and stare at the little red pin. I never knew my parents. I just have that old picture of them in their IMS jackets, happy and smiling. I never knew what kind of people they were. I always imagined them to be brave and selfless and heroic and I was proud. Now hearing how they died, trying to protect Hawk and me, all I feel is guilt. There’s a bubble swelling in my chest but it’s cold and dark. That black wolf killed them. Had it been after Hawk and me the whole time? Had our parents simply gotten in the way? Or were they killed because they had figured out the identity of the wolf?
The Curse of Moose Lake (International Monster Slayers Book 1) Page 16
