Breeds 2 (6 page)

That chest-hitching, barely lessened by clamping both hands across his mouth, summoned a monster.

From the gloom a huge dog emerged, as if materializing within an unseen pentagram.
A dog
, part of Dale’s mind shrieked in terror.
That’s no goddamn dog!

The beast’s sizeable maw leered. Its teeth looked capable enough of shredding the world in half.

Dale scurried in retreat and slammed the bathroom door.

Bailey stood in glossy pools, breathing deeply of blood and smoke and fire as a pang of delight nearly burst his heart. He’d missed one. In the heady aroma of bodily juices both foul and pure, even his heightened sense of smell could be skewed at times. He crept toward the door where the man hid, catching an underlying yet tangy scent of fear. Each step left a paw print in the blood. Bailey had ripped apart the four men with all the savage gusto of a child on Christmas morning, and blood spray-painted the floor and walls as if shot through an overcharged lawn sprinkler. In the short melee, he’d slammed the table into the small woodstove, toppling it and spilling fire from its lid. A single flaming chunk of wood landed on a nearby sofa, quickly lighting the fabric.

Bailey stopped with his nose a foot away from his target, catching a familiar scent. He glanced over his shoulder.

There, lurking beyond the open doorway, was a second wolf, growling in warning.

Bailey’s answering rumble issued from a throat slick with blood. He faced the beast while flames waved merrily from the sofa, marching upon other nearby combustibles.

Morris growled again but he wouldn’t enter the burning cabin, wouldn’t dare enter the cage.

That was fine with Bailey.

He’d killed plenty of little shits like the Pictou warden. Little shits who’d rather sniff holes and lick balls than establish dominance. Bailey strode forward and Morris backed away, allowing the ancient creature to step outside into the night.

The two werewolves expressed their intentions with racks of teeth.

Morris projected an aura of outrage over the savage killings within the cabin.

A crazed cold front of anticipation oozed from Bailey.

And on some subconscious signal they leaped for each other’s throats at the same time. Gravelly snarls cut the air as the two opposing masses crashed together. Heads spiraled around snapping jaws, defending throats. Morris backed the larger werewolf against a wall, but Bailey’s greater mass eventually pushed back, twisting the smaller
were
to the side. They rolled, swatting each other with fully extended claws.

Morris slashed open the killer’s left side to the bone.

Bailey ripped an ear from his prey’s head in a puff.

Morris sank teeth into the
were’s
shoulder and shredded muscle.

Bailey jerked away in a dark arc of clumpy matter. He rolled onto his back, raking Morris’s legs and causing the smaller werewolf to jump. They clashed again, wrestled with teeth and talons, rolling into the front of the cabin as the flames grew bolder, urging them on, illuminating the struggle and casting long shadows upon the front lawn.

Morris attempted to duck under Bailey’s toothy maw, but the larger beast slapped him down, splitting the warden’s fur and flesh to the skull. Morris lunged again and got a horrific bar code down the side of his face, claws nearly slashing his other ear free.

The warden withdrew without so much as a yelp.

A part of Bailey respected that. Another part feared it. The warden circled and Bailey matched him, both supernatural foes keeping their throats low to the ground. Slits gleamed bone by firelight. Black eyes glittered with malefic intent. Ink dripped from wounds and wrote jagged lines through grass.

Bailey decided to give the younger warden an opening. He faltered, pretending to stumble because of his damaged leg.

Morris lunged.

In a blink, Bailey twisted onto his back while bringing up his powerful hind legs. Claws hooked into the meat of Morris’s lower chest and Bailey
pulled
, launching the werewolf into the space behind him.

Through the front window of the burning cabin.

Bailey regained his stance and panted evil delight as an agonized howl pierced the night. He quickly blocked the doorway and waited for the frenzied werewolf to bolt outside––upon which Bailey would take advantage of his burning adversary and rip out his throat.

Or, if the fire had already enveloped the
were
, simply corral Morris until the flames finally killed him.

Another cry of pain and misery and a blazing Morris exploded from the front window, his pelt trailing streamers of smoke and flame. Bailey quickly backed away from the four-legged fireball, not expecting such spectacular results. A frenzied Morris shot past the
were
killer and rammed a shoulder into a tree trunk with a heavy thud. The impact altered the trajectory of his panicked rush and Morris scampered off in a new direction, wailing as he disappeared into the night.

Bailey intended to follow, keen on seeing the
were
cook until only ash remained.

A loud
schlacking
stopped him cold, a distinct priming of metal on metal.

The werewolf turned to the cabin, the violent fire scorching his face and wounds. A man stood at the corner of the burning structure. The monster barely had time to comprehend the shape of the shotgun as Dale Hutchinson blew apart the wolf’s head in one blast, dropping the monster in a twitching heap.

Gasping and shivering, Dale cautiously approached the convulsing creature. He didn’t waste any time, remembering how pieces of his friends lay scattered about the cabin floor.

He fired again. And again.

What Dale didn’t shoot off in that first twelve-gauge salvo, he targeted and removed with vengeful righteousness. Skull fragments jumped as he emptied the shotgun’s magazine into the beast. When he finished, the Pictou man dropped to his knees and witnessed what he’d done. What he’d killed. A second later he broke down and wept before the bloody monstrosity on his property.

All the while, the flames from the cabin grew.

The cabin’s smoldering husk could be seen on the other side of Claymore Lake, an eerie, after-midnight beacon that drew the curious and the nosy and the death seekers. The sky above the fiery structure flashed, indicating a crew of firefighters were on scene. Corporal Roy Richter glanced at his cruiser’s dashboard and noted the time. Just after twelve. The cruiser’s headlights whitened the road ahead, illuminating trees and bushes hedging the gravel shoulders. A few potholes appeared in the rain-washed surface, and Richter avoided these with an afterthought.

Buttfuck nowhere,
he mulled. An amazing thought in itself since his detachment was posted in the
middle
of buttfuck nowhere. Not that he minded being situated in the sticks, as he certainly didn’t want the headaches that came with peacekeeping Halifax. The worst he saw out here were mostly domestic abuse cases, which were bad enough, but at least no one was shooting at each other. Or him. At least not up to this point.

Cars, pickups and ubiquitous SUVs lined both sides of the road leading up to the destroyed cabin. Richter had been called out of bed an hour earlier by Constable Bob Hines. Bob wasn’t one to call him after hours unless some pretty thick shit had gone through the fan. Matter of fact, Richter couldn’t remember ever being called to a scene while off duty, not in his last nine years of living in the nearby community of Antigonish. Not even when the students of the local university were at their tribal rowdiest. Some might consider that history a grim portent of things to come––that they were due for a shit storm. Richter supposed they were, to some degree. The question was when… and how big.

Spinning firetruck lights flashed through the trees and Richter suspected the chief probably wasn’t none too happy about having to rush out to the lake either. The pump truck could barely manage the old country roads. A rescue truck came into view and with it, the gathered crowds of late-night busybodies. One officer held the lot of them at bay and as Richter approached, the civilians pulled back in a retreating tide of white faces. Richter didn’t understand why they gathered like crows. Didn’t see the fascination. If they saw the things he tried to forget…

A hand rose and Richter stopped the car beside his junior officer. He lowered his window and smelled the last few puffs of smoke along with a heavy lathering of foam.

“Bob’s up ahead,” one Officer Ryan reported.

Nodding, Richter eased his window up and drove toward the bright collection of firetrucks, police cruisers, and cars parked haphazardly over a driveway and the front lawn. He parked his cruiser and cracked the door, taking a breath before pulling himself out into the night. He inhaled spent moisture along with the reek of smoke. The unsavory blend flooded the back of his throat and sinus cavity. The smell tugged free his own experience with fire, when his father’s old station wagon had gone up in an electrical fire one night. As the vehicle was parked close to the house, he and his father heaved buckets of water onto the flames in an attempt to slow the blaze until the fire department arrived. By the time the firefighters got there, Richter and his father were sputtering from smoke inhalation.

Three cars filled the cabin’s driveway but appeared untouched. Firefighters clad in heavy Nomex gear went through the motions of hunting for hot spots around the gutted wooden structure. Richter nodded at the faces he recognized before his attention centered on the charred ruins. Spotlights revealed a drowned porch and interior. Thermal exposure had scorched the one intact window while another had completely shattered. Firefighters splashed through puddles as they ventured in and out of the cabin. A Mountie was on one knee, placing numbered cards upon the front lawn.

“Corporal Richter.”

He turned to Constable Hines. His junior’s normally ruddy face was absent of color.

“Bob. What happened?”

“Homicide,” Bob reported. “At first glance, anyway. We have the shooter. A Dale Hutchinson. This was supposed to be a weekend with the boys.”

‘Party got out of hand?”

“Something like that.”

“How many?”

“Five in all. Four now deceased.”

“Where’s Mr. Hutchinson now?”

“In my cruiser.”

“And?”

Bob took a breath and glanced around at the firefighters. “I think we’ll have to do some digging on this one. Get blood samples just to be sure. But this is what he told me. All five of them were sitting around a table playing cards. Enjoying themselves. They were kicking off a weekend of deer hunting. At one point Mr. Hutchinson got up to use the facilities. He didn’t see what happened outside the bathroom, because he was too scared to open the door. He did hear a commotion outside followed by the growling of a large wolf.”

Hines continued with his report, and Richter shook his head at the more graphic parts.

When the officer finished, Richter sighed. “So the wolf killed them all?”

“Tore them to pieces. There are cooked remains inside and out.”

“There’s no conclusive evidence of wolves being in the province.”

“But there are wolf and coyote hybrids,” Bob countered.

Richter chewed on that. “All right.”

“The burning wolf,” Bob continued, “disappeared into the bush, but the other wolf was right on Mr. Hutchinson’s front lawn here. Mr. Hutchinson turned the corner and shot the wolf repeatedly, effectively taking the head off the animal.”

Lips tightened, Richter turned to the blanket-covered lump decorating the front lawn.

“Now for the weird part,” Bob quietly announced.

“It gets weirder?”

“Unfortunately, yes. And gruesome.”

“Wonderful. Lead on.”

Bob led his superior officer to a blanket. He crouched at the edge and pinched a corner.

Richter nodded that he was ready.

Officer Hines lifted the blanket off a headless torso of a naked, well-muscled man, the flesh tone eerily pale under the artificial lighting. Boots splashed and water hissed in the background.

“This is the wolf?” Richter asked without a trace of emotion.

“This is it.”

“Jesus H.…”

“Mr. Hutchinson has stated for the record that he and the others had been consuming a large amount of marijuana and beer.”

“They were high?”

“Yes sir,” Bob confirmed, covering up the corpse. “That is correct.”

“High enough to mistake a man for a wolf?”

Bob didn’t answer that.

“Anything extra in those joints?”

“Mr. Hutchinson says ‘no.’”

“Yeah. Right. That’s one for the labs to decide. Who knows what’s in these loads these days. Might’ve been Shatter.” Richter rubbed the side of his face. “First question, Bob. Why is that corpse naked?”

“Good one, sir. I have no idea. Maybe the lab reports will show something.”

Richter looked to the points marked on the lawn, each one denoting a little tent of white plastic. “And what are these?”

Bob met his superior’s eyes. “Body parts.”

Richter’s stony façade trembled and dropped. There were about a dozen of the little tents all over the lawn. “Jesus H.”

“It gets weirder,” Bob said and approached the nearest pile of human remains. Once more he squatted and gestured for his commanding officer to join him. Richter did so, ignoring the cracking of his knees.

Bob pulled the plastic cover back to reveal a pale shin still connected to a black-socked foot. Meat and bone gleamed.

Richter made a face. “Oh my.”

“Right here,” Bob said and got in close with a finger, tracing the jagged edges of the detached limb.

Richter saw and a cold rush of unease fluttered through his frame.

The limb hadn’t been shot or cut off. With the ragged indentations around the skin, Richter recognized the bite pattern as easily as seeing his own in a hamburger.

Except this pattern didn’t belong to a person.

With a case of beer underneath his left arm and a pair of grocery bags at the end of his right, Douglas Kirk approached the parking lot of his apartment complex and huffed from the light exertion. It was October and, after months of guiding Ross Kelly through his initial transformation and then educating him on the finer points of life as a
were
and a warden, Kirk believed he’d earned a little R&R. A little
me
time. The case of beer was actually the second dozen he’d carried to his apartment from the nearby liquor store, and he was debating purchasing a third. Or maybe something a little harder, to really take the edge off.