The Mountain's Shadow tlf-1

by Cecilia Dominic

  “Ron, this is Doctor Joanna Fisher, formerly of Cabal Laboratories and one of the world’s leading researchers of CLS.”

  “Nice to meet you.” I held out my hand and Ron shook it. His hand was warm, but also rough.

  “Ah, that’s who I was hoping you’d be. I’ve read your work and told Leo he needed to try to meet you. I’m Doctor Ronald Bowman, formerly a surgical resident at UAMS.”

  “And now waiting tables?” I asked, then bit my tongue. “Sorry, that was rude.”

  Ron’s mouth twisted into a bitter smile. “That’s all right. The CLS was interfering. Wouldn’t do to lose it in the operating room.”

  I put my fork down. “Why don’t you both come up to my place? I have a lot more to ask you.”

  Ron smiled. “Sure, when?”

  “When do you get off work?”

  “I’ve just been cut, so half an hour. Just enough time to fetch you some dessert and coffee. What would you like?”

  “Chocolate. But I had that dessert last night.”

  “The chef does an awesome chocolate cream pie the regulars know to ask for. It’s not on the menu.”

  “That sounds perfect. And a latté, please.”

  “Leo?”

  “Apple pie. Plain coffee.”

  “Coming up.”

  When Ron left, the room seemed to get a little darker.

  “Do you know how to get to Wolfsbane Manor?” I asked, then remembered, “Oh, yes, you do.”

  Leonard smiled, but with bitterness. “Will your butler be there?”

  “Oh, Gabriel, I forgot.” I thought for a moment. “Why should it matter?”

  “Well, there was last night.”

  I remembered the two men locked in their wrestling match, their faces intent. “I think he’ll be okay with it. We’re all trying to solve the same puzzle.”

  “Fair enough. I knew you’d need more than a salad.”

  “Leonard, are you teasing me?”

  He smiled without bitterness this time. “I can’t let my charming cousin have all the fun. And call me Leo.”

  I smiled back. This could end up being a fun afternoon.

  Chapter Six

  The caffeine and sugar from the chocolate pie and latté buzzed happily through my bloodstream as I rode up the mountain in the back of Ron’s compact car. Lonna still had the car keys with her, so I left a note on her Jeep, and the guys brought me home. Leo had originally offered me the front seat, but I was the shortest, so it made sense for me to take the back. After about ten minutes, the guys seemed to forget I was there.

  For a moment it felt like I was back in graduate school. Most of my friends had been men, and I’d learned to fade into the background and listen to them tease. The differences between the thought processes and communication styles of men and women had always fascinated me. Now I had to learn a whole new vocabulary—that of the werewolves.

  Leo and Ron bantered about women of their past, but when they slipped into a debate about a certain reconstructive surgical procedure in the most recent issue of JAMA, I became bored and watched the world out the window.

  “It’s been a long time since I’ve used the road to get up here,” Ron commented as we pulled up to the gate, which was closed. Lonna had the remote, too, so I hopped out and pushed the buzzer.

  “Wolfsbane Manor.” Gabriel’s clipped accent came through with some static. “State your business.”

  “It’s me, Gabriel, and I have guests.”

  “Very good, Madam.”

  I hopped back in the car as the gate swung open. Ron maneuvered the car up the long drive to the circle in front of the house. Gabriel had cleaned out and turned on the fountain, and the water droplets sparkled in the sunlight. For a moment, all felt right with the world, but then Ron’s comment about not having used the road to approach the manor jolted me back to the present sticky situation.

  “How long have you been coming up here?” I asked.

  “Months.” Gabriel appeared in the door, which opened without a creak. He’d been busy.

  “Gabriel,” Ron said with no trace of his former joviality.

  “Ronald. Good to see you again.”

  But it obviously wasn’t.

  Leo frowned. “Gabriel? When did you get back in town?”

  “Yesterday. Apparently you don’t remember our conversation last night.”

  “What conversation is that?”

  “The one during which I taught you a lesson about threatening ladies.”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “You were fresh off the hunt.”

  Now I was the one rubbing my temples. It seemed impossible the violent, angry Leo of the night before could be the same affable chap who had just bought me lunch. The conflict had slipped my mind even though my wrist throbbed when I moved it in the wrong direction, and most directions were wrong. It seemed like everywhere I turned today there would be some sort of surprise waiting. I just didn’t want to end up with a fight on my hands, but Leo didn’t look like he wanted one. His frown was of concentration and frustration.

  “Would you care for a drink?” Gabriel asked.

  “I’d love one,” Ron replied and bounded up the stairs.

  “I need one,” Leo added and followed. Gabriel held the door open for them but moved to block me.

  “A moment, Madam,” he said.

  “Okay.”

  “The drinks are on the bar in the den,” he called over his shoulder, then shut the door.

  “What is it?”

  “As you can tell, there is some, ah, tension between us.”

  “No shit.” I crossed my arms and tried to look as stern as I could even though I barely reached his shoulder. “Tell me why?”

  “We were part of the same pack. There was a falling out. I became a solitary hunter.”

  Gabriel’s revelation jolted me.

  “You’re one of them, too?” I whispered.

  He looked at his feet. “I thought you might have guessed after last night. My case was from childhood. Your grandfather had hired me for research, and the domestic help thing was just to be a cover-up.

  “So why are you still here?”

  He inclined his head toward the inside of the house. “The same reason they are, I suspect. I know of your research. And you need the help around here. It’s a big house.”

  “Fine, you can stay.” I put a finger on his chest and tried to look intimidating. “But no more funny stuff, and especially no more drugs. At the first sign of something suspicious, you’re out of here. Got it?”

  Gabriel nodded solemnly. “Yes, Madam.”

  “Why was my grandfather interested in werewolves?” I asked. “Don’t tell me he was one, too.”

  “He had the lycanthropic energy about him, and he understood the condition, but I never saw him change. He told me he was working on a cure, and I became a willing subject. It was soon after that he disappeared.”

  “What do you know about that?”

  “The same facts you do: he went on an ill-fated canoe trip. I was out of town working out immigration issues, so I wasn’t here.”

  “Do you think they had something to do with it?” I glanced toward the windows to the den.

  “Perhaps we should question these two and see what we can learn.”

  “Sure, why not? Although… You haven’t put anything in the drinks, have you?”

  He smiled, and wrinkles appeared around his eyes. I realized he had seen and done a lot more than he’d let on, and I mentally added about five years to his estimated age. “No, Madam. I am counting on the truth being in the bottle, as they say.”

  We entered the den. Ron and Leo sat on the sofa and sipped beers.

  “Done with your conference?” Leo asked.

  “Yes, he was just filling me in.”

  “Must’ve been quite a fill-in. Ron’s already on his second beer.”

  Gabriel took the first bottle—which Ron had put on the sea chest without a coaster—into the kitche
n. I poured a glass of white wine from the bottle that chilled in the ice bucket along with the beers.

  “So you guys are doctors?”

  “Were doctors.” Ron waved his beer in a dismissive gesture. “We could be saving lives, but we’re stuck here, in the middle of the backside of nowhere.”

  “Doctor Fisher doesn’t need to hear a reprise of this old conversation,” Gabriel came in with a plate of assorted cheeses and crackers. “She has some questions for you.”

  As much as I appreciated his interrupting the rant, I resented him taking the lead just as Lonna had earlier. Did I really seem so timid?

  I took a deep breath. “Ron, when were you diagnosed with CLS?”

  The lycanthrope in question sat back and sipped his beer. “I don’t remember exactly when I was diagnosed, but I knew when I had it.”

  Leo sat forward and laced his fingers over his bottle, his head down. Dark brown curls obscured his face. “The night of Temmerson’s dinner.”

  Ron looked sick to his stomach. “The chief surgeon Alfred Temmerson had us residents over to his house. I didn’t have a date, so I brought Leo.”

  I listened, fascinated. I had never heard the story told from the first-person adult’s perspective.

  Leo had been out sick that day, as he mistook the early signs of CLS infection for the flu, which he assumed he acquired from the flu shot he’d gotten earlier that week. Ron also wasn’t feeling great, so the cousins decided to go to Fred Temmerson’s dinner together in case Ron needed Leo as moral support and chauffeur. When the cousins arrived, they were greeted by the very attractive Lisa Temmerson, who was home from college and helping her father host the dinner. Her mother had died from breast cancer the year before. The moon was waxing, only a day away from full, and as it rose, Ron and Leo felt its charm—and those of the young Lisa.

  Lisa took their coats and told the young men to loosen their ties.

  “We’re being casual here tonight,” she told them with a wink of her green eyes. Ron felt a pang of jealousy, and for an irrational moment, wanted to punch Leo. He shook the feeling off and accepted the glass of red wine another resident offered him.

  By this point, both Ron and Leo felt as though they were floating in a dream with events happening in illogical sequences. Dinner—catered barbecue—was served from the kitchen, and the residents ate on paper plates on their laps and pretended not to wonder who would screw up first. Lisa struck up a conversation with Leo, who was quite glad to entertain the pretty girl, particularly as he was the only non-surgeon physician there. The other surgery residents had brought girlfriends, boyfriends or spouses—none of whom had doctorates in anything with the exception of a psychologist who dated one of the female surgery residents.

  “Nice place,” Leo commented to Lisa. He remembered a few more details than Ron but wasn’t sure how their conversation went, only that she made a comment about her mother and left in tears. The rest of the memory spun out in slow motion as he watched his cousin’s career crash and burn.

  “What did you say to her?” Ron glared at Leo.

  “Nothing.” Leo, hurt and surprised, became defensive. “She’s still upset about her mother.”

  “I’m going to find her. No reason for you to make her cry.”

  “I didn’t make her cry.” Leo grabbed Ron’s arm. “What has gotten into you?”

  “Nothing. I wouldn’t have brought you along if I’d known you’d be hitting on Fred’s daughter.”

  “I’m not hitting on her.”

  “You’re going to take advantage of her, and I’m not going to let you.”

  By this time, their voices were raised so the other residents could hear them, and the hum of conversation halted.

  “Ron, calm down.”

  But Ron, drunk on the combination of the CLS virus coursing through his veins, alcohol, and the innocent beauty of a young woman, didn’t heed him. He balled his hands into fists.

  Somehow they ended up in the kitchen with the psychologist, who had been trying to get Leo’s attention.

  Ron’s pupils dilated and contracted, and his breaths came in ragged gasps. “I think he needs to go to the hospital,” murmured the psychologist. “And I think you need to go, too.”

  “Why?” Leo’s head spun and spots swam in front of his eyes. He certainly felt like crap. “I’ve only got the flu.”

  “I think he’s got something more.” The young man’s intense gaze anchored Leo’s. “I think he has CLS.”

  “What?” Leo vaguely remembered something in his pediatrics class, but he couldn’t pull it into conscious thought. He leaned on the kitchen table for support, and the painful spot where the edge bit into his palm became his center of focus.

  “Chronic Lycanthropy Syndrome. He’s displaying the classic symptoms. The adult version.”

  “CLS?”

  “Too fast, too fast,” Ron moaned. At that moment, Lisa walked in. Leo realized he was hyper-aware of her, and he shot a nervous glance at Ron.

  “My father wants to know if everything’s okay.”

  “I think you’d better go, Lisa.” There was steel in the psychologist’s voice, and she took a step back, her eyes wide.

  “Is he okay?” She pointed to Ron, then looked at Leo. “You’re a doctor, too. Can’t you do something for him?”

  “Not right now,” Leo said with a sigh. “The best I can do is get him home. Please thank your father for a lovely evening.”

  Lisa smiled, and her left cheek dimpled. “I will. Would you like my number?”

  “No!” Ron lunged at Leo, who jumped out of the way. Ron missed and tumbled into Lisa, and they ended up on the floor. Ron pressed his lips on hers and mumbled through the kiss, “No, won’t let him take you, won’t let him have you! Mine.”

  Lisa screamed.

  Before the psychologist and Leo could pull Ron off the girl, her father and the other residents ran into the kitchen. The male residents managed to get Ron into Leo’s car, but it took all four of them plus Leo and two male significant others. By that time, Ron was delirious, ranting about women and the moon and the sweet, hot blood in her kiss. Leo took him to the hospital, where he stayed under observation in the psych ward. The ER doctor took one look at Leo and confined him too, just in case it was something catching. Both cousins were put under respiratory contagion restriction, and all Leo could remember about that week was people in “space suits” coming to check on him.

  All Ron could remember was a sense of burning shame as he recalled making a fool of himself in front of his residency director and his beautiful daughter.

  I sat there, the wineglass forgotten in my hand, after the cousins told their story and tried to make sense of what it could mean. One of the frustrating things about research is finding data contradictory to your hypotheses.

  People weren’t supposed to be diagnosed with CLS as adults.

  CLS sufferers weren’t supposed to actually turn into werewolves and go hunting on one’s lawn at night, and they certainly weren’t supposed to sit in one’s den and tell you about horribly embarrassing dinner parties while sipping their beers.

  “So you lost your residency position?” I asked.

  “Resigned. For medical reasons.”

  “And you, Leo?”

  “I stuck around for another month, but it was too hard.” His black eyes flashed under heavy brows. “The impulses got to the point where I had a hard time controlling them around patients, especially female patients.”

  “So we came up here,” Ron added. “Peter took us in. I got a job in town as a waiter. Leo helps around the house.”

  “It’s big enough, and Marguerite’s no housekeeper.”

  “No, she’s a French princess.”

  “With a cad for a husband,” I added.

  Instead of jumping to the defense of their benefactor or agreeing with me, Ron and Leo sat in awkward silence.

  “They may agree, but they won’t bite the hand that feeds them,” Gabriel pointed out.

/>   “Better that than living as a servant for pay,” Leo snarled. “Lab rat.”

  “Charles wished it.”

  Again, my grandfather’s name.

  “Do you guys know what happened to him?” I asked.

  Ron shook his head, but it was Leo who spoke. “We know as much as the sheriff. I can show you where they found his canoe.”

  “Really?” The thought of being out in the woods with no telling what was watching me sent a shiver down my spine, but I didn’t want to show them I was frightened.

  “Maybe you’ll see something we missed.”

  “You looked?” I pictured the animals circling the canoe, sniffing the blood, and this time, I shuddered.

  “He was good to us,” Ron said. “He let us hunt here, and he would have us over for dinner when we were bored with Peter’s domestic drama.”

  “But if you’d rather not go, we understand,” Leo broke in. “I can see you’re a city girl.”

  “I was running through these woods before Crystal Pines was even dreamt of.” I met his eyes in a challenge. “Take me to the crime scene.”

  “Aye, there was a crime,” Gabriel murmured. “There’s just no clue as to what, exactly, it was.”

  Leo and Ron led the way down the steep path to the river. Wolfsbane Manor stood at the crest of the hill. On one side, the estate sloped gently toward the subdivision. On the other, the much steeper grade prevented development without major blasting. My grandfather had built a boathouse on the river when I was little, and in it he kept his kayaks and canoe. It kept him from having to haul them down the path, although he was in good-enough shape to do so.

  We could have driven the long way around back through town, but Ron and Leo assured me this way would be quicker. As we walked along, I remembered skipping down this path with my grandfather, who never admonished me to hurry up, slow down, or do all those other things the adults in my life lived to fuss at me for doing or not doing. He let me go at my own pace, slower with my little legs, and we would explore the woods together. He had infinite patience with my questions about bugs or leaves or clouds. From what Galbraith had told me, he later enjoyed reading my own answers to the puzzles of what CLS is and where it comes from. At that moment, I felt past and present merge, and it was almost as though I could turn around and see him, his craggy face bent in a smile he only showed to me.