The Wereing

by Rodman Philbrick

  “GRUFF!” shouted the werewolves, making my blood turn to ice and my knees to jelly.

  But Ripper wasn’t finished. “Remember, all the people of Fox Hollow must be made werewolves. Then WE control the town. After that, we’ll march on—to the next town! And the next! And the next! Now, get to work!”

  The other werewolves began howling a chant, leaping onto their chairs, cackling and snarling. “We want the world and we want it NOW!” they shrieked.

  They hurled themselves onto the table and huddled together. Then all at once they raised their hideous snouts into the air and began to howl at the top of their lungs.

  “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

  The heart-stopping noise echoed off the walls and the ceiling. It built and built and still the werewolves howled for blood, louder, shriller, higher.

  Suddenly the huge panes of glass in the picture window exploded, sending jagged shards flying all over the room.

  Chapter 34

  Shrieking with glee, the werewolves bounded through the shattered windows and raced off into the night, calling to other werewolves still inside the building. Answering howls erupted from all around the Wolfe Industries complex.

  I slumped to the floor, ears ringing, my whole body quivering with horror and disgust. I stayed there, unable to move, as the sound of howling drowned out even my thoughts.

  I had to get out of there. I had to follow the werewolves. I had learned that, thanks to Mr. Parker’s new formula, there were even more of them than there should be on a night when the moon wasn’t full. But I hadn’t learned the most important thing: What was the “surprise” Ripper talked about? What were they planning for tomorrow night?

  Fresh air ruffled my hair. The broken windows! A way out!

  I ran into the deserted conference room. I leaped through the picture window into the parking lot and landed running.

  Werewolves were streaming out of the building, howling and leaping. It looked like they were going to trample the electric fence in their monstrous frenzy. But slowly the gate began to swing open.

  I ran harder, sprinting after the werewolves. The guard at the gate jumped to get out of their way before he was trampled.

  The gate started to swing shut. I couldn’t make it before it closed again. I was much too far away. I dropped down, hiding behind a car to catch my breath.

  Then the guard at the gate dropped to all fours. His body began to bulge. His clothes split and flew in all directions. He was too excited to stay in human form. He was becoming a werewolf. When the wereing was complete he howled and took off after the others, leaving the gate open.

  In a flash I was up, dashing for the gate. Ahead of me werewolves disappeared in the trees, howling with evil glee.

  I ran through the gate after them. But they were too fast for my weak human legs. They bounded into the trees and were lost from sight. Some of them leaped the fence into the construction area around the new recreation center. And suddenly all of them were gone.

  Gasping with fear and exhaustion, I stumbled blindly through the woods, trying to pick up their trail. But the werewolves had disappeared. I had failed. And tomorrow night was the full moon.

  Chapter 35

  When I got to school the next morning I went straight to the library without going to class. I had the werewolf book with me, the one that spelled out the “Rules of The Wereing.”

  There was something about that library—I felt sure the answers I needed were there.

  Mrs. Bookbinder got up from her desk as I came in. She smiled as if she’d been expecting me. “Hello, Gruff,” she said, her dark eyes gleaming. “I’ll be with you in a moment.”

  The librarian poked her head out the door and looked up and down the hall. Then, nodding to herself, she locked the door and slipped the key into her pocket.

  I gasped in fright. Was she one of them? Was she going to keep me here until it was night and it was too late to help anyone?

  “No one must disturb us,” whispered Mrs. Bookbinder, gesturing me toward the back of the room. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

  She’s got to be one of them, I thought. My hands got clammy. I rubbed them on my pants as I looked for a way out. But the library only had one door and the windows were too high to climb out of. A cold shiver traveled down my back to my toes.

  “Here we are,” said a grim, muffled voice behind me.

  I spun around, determined to die fighting. But it was just Mrs. Bookbinder, her voice distorted by the effort of carrying a large, heavy book. “Wait,” she said as I took it from her. “I’m not finished yet.”

  She turned around. Next thing I knew she was hunched over and her shoulders were wriggling. My breath caught in my throat. I looked around for a weapon, gripped the chair I was standing next to. I braced myself for the sight of the werewolf as she turned back.

  I let the chair fall with a bang. Mrs. Bookbinder looked surprised. She was still just a small, mild librarian. “You seem awfully jumpy, Gruff,” she said. “I know you must be tense but we have a lot of work to do.”

  She closed the drawer she had been rummaging in and put the stack of papers on the table by the book. “These night creatures are very powerful,” she said. “Very strong. There’s only one way to beat them.”

  My heart leaped. I knew I’d been right to come here. “How?”

  “You have to out think them.”

  Chapter 36

  I slumped back in my chair. I didn’t think I was up to outsmarting a whole pack of super-naturally powerful adult werewolves.

  But Mrs. Bookbinder went ahead and laid out some old yellowed newspaper clippings on the table. Then she opened the big book to show me more. As she helped me read the clippings, a story began to come together that filled me with horror.

  “This has happened before,” Mrs. Bookbinder whispered.

  It was true. Years before there had been another town built on the same spot. A town called Pleasantville. Mrs. Bookbinder showed me old newspaper articles saying what a perfect place Pleasantville was going to be when Wereing Incorporated was finished with it. More articles told about the wonderful school and the firehouse and the park and recreation center the Wereing company was building.

  “Something happened,” Mrs. Bookbinder said. “Something evil.”

  Before Pleasantville was finished, another kind of article starting showing up in the newspapers. The stories were all short and sounded hysterical and crazy. Reports of babies stolen right out of their cribs in the night. People complaining about strange howling keeping them awake and giving them nightmares.

  One article described a strange animal running through the streets of the town under the full moon. Another described people behaving strangely and snarling savagely at each other.

  “You should read this article,” Mrs. Bookbinder suggested. She handed me a yellowed clipping so old and brittle it almost fell apart in my hands.

  In the article a young woman claimed her husband was a werewolf. No one had paid any attention but the very next day the woman vanished into the woods, taking her tiny baby with her.

  There was something about the article that really caught my attention. I kept coming back to it, feeling a sad heart-tug every time I read it.

  “A few days after the woman and her baby disappeared, police from another town came to Pleasantville,” Mrs. Bookbinder told me. “They found the whole town deserted. All the residents of the town had disappeared. Just vanished. No one ever saw them again.”

  “Never?” I asked.

  She shook her head sadly. “Pleasantville became a ghost town and eventually all the new houses fell apart. The remains were bulldozed when they started building Fox Hollow.”

  “I can’t believe it!” I cried. “They’ve tried this before. Taking over a whole town. I wonder what happened to the people?”

  Mrs. Bookbinder bit her lip and looked sadly at the clippings strewn over the table. “I don’t know for sure. But I suspect some of them got
away and never spoke of the place to a living soul. Others were never heard from again. And some, no doubt, became werewolves.”

  I sat back in my chair, stunned. It all seemed so hopeless.

  Mrs. Bookbinder cleared her throat. “There’s more,” she said, eyeing me worriedly. “Remember that woman who claimed her husband was a werewolf?

  “Yes,” I said, feeling an odd tickle of excitement. “She disappeared with her baby.”

  Mrs. Bookbinder nodded. “That’s right. Into the swamp.” She paused and gave me a sad smile. “That little baby’s name was Gruff.”

  Chapter 37

  When I emerged from the library it was late afternoon. My mind was spinning with all I’d learned. But mostly I was just totally stunned by the news of who I was.

  My real mother was a human! I tried to picture her in my mind but couldn’t. I had one thing from her, though—my name. I’d always thought Gruff was a name I gave myself, made up from the sound Wolfmother made when she called me. But it wasn’t. It really was my name.

  Walking along, I stopped short. A name wasn’t the only thing my mother gave me, I realized. She had given me something much more important. My father was a werewolf but my mother was human. That must be why I had resisted killing and becoming a full-blooded werewolf.

  Being a werewolf was thrilling and exciting. When I was a werewolf I knew how weak and puny my human self was. But even when the wereing gripped me, the evil of the other werewolves filled me with fear and horror. It was my human side that showed me the hideous werewolves for what they really were. The half of me that was human wouldn’t let me fall under their spell.

  As I wandered along, my mind filled with wonder, something tugged at my attention. I tried to shake it off but couldn’t. I sighed, looking around to see what it was that was bothering me. It couldn’t be werewolves—the day still had several hours to go before the moon would come up.

  Suddenly I opened my eyes wide. I stopped. I spun around. The streets were deserted! There wasn’t a soul around. Not a car, not another person strolling along, or a kid running to a friend’s house—not anyone.

  Where had everyone gone? Had they disappeared like the people of Pleasantville? Had the werewolves completed their plan while I was locked in the library?

  I tried to remember how long it had been since I’d seen anyone. Had I seen another person since I came out of the library? A hollow panic spread in my chest.

  Maybe it was too late.

  Suddenly I jerked my head up. What was that strange music? The sound was distant and I knew I’d never heard it before. What could it mean?

  Chapter 38

  I ran toward the music through the empty streets. “Hello!” I yelled. “Anyone around?” The windows of the houses stared back at me blankly. No curtains twitched, no one curiously stuck a head out a door.

  The air was warm but I felt cold.

  The music pounded a beat in my head. It was loud and cheerful but it only chilled me more as I got closer. Something big was happening.

  Then I rounded a corner and skidded to a stop, staring in amazement. I’d found the townspeople! All of them, it looked like.

  A lot of people were in the middle of the street, banging drums and blowing horns, making the odd music I’d been hearing. Other people in the street were dressed in funny clothes and arranged in lines and columns. They were marching in time to the music, lifting their knees up high and grinning at the rest of the townspeople, who were lining the street on both sides, watching them and clapping.

  A girl marched in front, wearing a shiny costume and white boots, throwing a metal stick in the air.

  “Hi, Gruff!”

  It was Kim, wearing her cheerleader outfit, marching with the other cheerleaders, waving pom-poms. She laughed at the expression on my face. “It’s a parade,” she shouted over the music. “Wolfe Industries is holding a cookout for the whole town to celebrate the opening of the new recreation center. It was a surprise. Didn’t you hear the announcement this morning at school?”

  I hadn’t, of course, because I’d been in the library. All day I’d been studying old clippings while the werewolves were putting the finishing touches on their big “surprise.” My heart sank.

  Kim waved again as the cheerleaders passed me by. “See you at the rec center,” she called back.

  My brain felt numb as I watched the columns of Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts go by. Next the town’s two policemen glided by in their cruiser. Then a fire truck all decked out in crepe paper streamers.

  A murmur went up from the crowd. “Oooooh.”

  I followed their eyes and saw the strangest thing yet. I had no idea what it could be. It looked like a platform decorated with flowers that spelled out WOLFE INDUSTRIES.

  “What a lovely float,” said a woman beside me. “Isn’t it marvelous?”

  I nodded and tried to smile. Everything certainly looked like harmless fun. But I knew it couldn’t be.

  The first float-thing went by. Little girls stood under make-believe trees. The girls wore ruffled dresses and threw paper flowers at the crowd. People shouted with glee and leaped in the air to catch the red, white, and yellow flowers.

  Behind that float came another, even bigger. On this one were two large plastic statues. One was a smiling cow, the other a smiling pig. Standing between them was Mr. Parker!

  As I watched, he lifted a megaphone to his lips and shouted, “Come one, come all to Wolfe Industries’ cookout. It’s a barbecue; it’s a carnival; it’s fireworks! Come to the party!”

  Looking at the grinning plastic animals, I gagged. They were grinning all right. It wasn’t beef and pork that would be on the menu at this barbecue—it was Fox Hollow!

  Chapter 39

  As the last float went by, the people on the sidelines rushed into the street, following the parade to the recreation center grounds on the hill below the Wolfe Industries complex. They streamed by me like a flood.

  “Don’t go!” I shouted. “You’re in danger! They only want to get you all in the same place so they can turn you into monsters like them!”

  Some people laughed. Others made a wide circle around me, not wanting to come too close. I heard people whispering about the “strange wolf-boy” who would never learn human ways.

  I felt helpless. But somehow I had to stop this. I darted into the crowd and grabbed a woman by the sleeve. She pulled away, gathering her three small children close.

  “Listen,” I begged. “Please listen. There used to be a town here before Fox Hollow. Strange things started happening just like here and then suddenly all the people disappeared. Wolfe Industries is trying to get everybody together so they can make us all disappear. It’s happening again!”

  The woman stared at me in disbelief. “It’s a cookout,” she said. “Just a simple cookout.” The children looked at each other uncertainly but the woman pulled them away and they hurried off, disappearing into the crowd.

  I tried again, stopping people and explaining to them what I’d learned that day in the library. They just looked at me as if I were crazy and then ignored me.

  I realized I’d never convince the adults. I had to get the kids to help me. I stopped a boy I knew from school. “Marshall, listen to me. You’ve got to help!”

  “Sure, man,” he said, snapping his gum. “What’s up?”

  Everything spilled out, all of it. But halfway through I noticed his eyes straying impatiently to the crowd running into the rec area.

  “Look at the size of that Ferris wheel,” he interrupted me excitedly. “I hear they have an awesome roller coaster, too. Chill out, Gruff. These guys are just businessmen, trying to show the town a good time.” And off he ran.

  Nobody would listen! The kids were running to be first on line for rides and the adults were congratulating each other on having moved to such a great little town.

  I started looking for Paul. He’d believe me!

  The recreation area was spread out below the big complex of Wolfe Industries
, as if the company was watching over it. The rec area—a ball field, playground, rec building, and pool—had a shiny new fence around it. As people waited to get inside the gate I ran along the outside, hunting for a sight of Paul.

  Beyond the recreation center was the pond where Paul and I had first escaped the werewolves. But when I came to the pond, I stared in shock. There was nothing left of the pretty little pond but a big mud hole with a little scummy water puddled in the middle.

  “Hey, Gruff.” I spun around. It was Big Rick, grinning at me.

  “Neat, huh,” he said, cocking his thumb at the pond. “The guys at Wolfe Industries said it would breed mosquitoes so they drained it. Who cares, anyway? The company built an Olympic-size swimming pool in the rec building. That’s better than some muddy old pond. The fire department is filling the pool right now.”

  I realized that all of this was the “project” the werewolves had been working on. They’d completed it in time and I had never guessed. Did this mean they had won for good?

  Rick had taken the bandage off his arm and the scabby marks of werewolf teeth were clearly visible. “You ought to come inside,” he said. “You’re missing the party. We wouldn’t want you to miss the party, would we?”

  I raced away from his evil grinning face, ran through the gate, and threaded my way through the crowd.

  Where was Paul?

  People were chomping on cotton candy and popcorn. A band had set up on a stage and men were firing up huge barbecue grills. There were fire trucks parked by the big rec building.

  My brain was working feverishly as I took in every detail of the rec area. There must be something here I could use to convince people. Some mistake the werewolves had made that would show people what they really were.

  I passed a woman talking to her daughter. “Sorry, honey, but the man said there won’t be any hamburgers ready until after the fireworks,” she explained to the girl.

  That was it! I’d throw off the lids of those giant coolers and show the people there wasn’t any beef waiting to go on the big grills. I’d tell them they were going to be on the menu—unless they wanted to be werewolves instead. That should convince them!