Wolves Abound: A Short Story

honest with me when I ask you this.” He held her face as he stared into her eyes. He could see the glimmer in them that told him, she wanted to run away. But he held her tightly, she had to know and understand what was happening to her. “You’ve been bitten by a dog or a wolf within the last month haven’t you? And that is when the dreams started and the craving for meat, for blood. And that’s why you’ve come here, to find out what is going on, or if you are just going crazy.”

  She began crying. “Yes.” Jamie pulled her tight, knowing that she needed him to make it everything right again. They sat where they stood, and she cried until she could cry no more. Rachel told him about a guy she had met a few months ago at one of the theater after parties. He had been great, sweet, kind, just wonderful. Then he became possessive, he changed. She broke up with him and the following week, while she was playing in the park with her son William, this rabid dog had sauntered right up to them. It terrified her, but she remained calm as she picked up her son, the animal reached out and bit her, nonchalantly, and walked off. Ever since then, the dreams and cravings had started.

  Jamie was right, but couldn’t believe what he was piecing together. “Was his name Bryan?” Rachel could hear the fear in Jamie’s voice.

  “Yea, how’d you know that? Did he send you here to spy on me?” Rachel began to get angry.

  “No, no, nothing like that. And don’t worry, I doubt Bryan will ever bother you again.” Jamie hung his head. He could see why Bryan would become possessive of the woman, she was beautiful. He himself was feeling possessive of her as well. “Bryan was my cousin.” Jamie spoke softly as he stood up.

  “You see, the men in our family, for centuries, have been cursed. I know it sounds insane, but its true. We are werewolves. Some of us can control it better than others. With the change, sometimes, the entire human person is absorbed by the wolf mentality. Its what happened to Bryan, its why his personality changed. That dog that bit you was no dog. It was Bryan in his wolf form. But I’m guessing you already knew that. He had chosen you as his mate, and when you rejected him, I guess he thought the best way to keep you was to make you one of us.” Jamie’s voice trailed off.

  “How do you know he wont bother me again?” Her voice quivered in fear.

  “Because my dad, and his went to New York to find him. They never came back, but all those dog attacks you heard about stopped to. I think they managed to kill Bryan, and then whatever werewolves had formed a pack with Bryan killed them, and without a leader, they disbanded.” It hurt Jamie to think that he would never see his dad and uncle again.

  “So your saying, I’m a werewolf?” She knew it was true, after all wasn’t that why she was here. To find out? To find a cure? A prevention?

  “Yup.” He said nothing more and they walked through the woods, and finally found her clothes by the stream.

  Feel like running?” Jamie asked as she slipped her own clothes on over his borrowed shirt and shorts.

  Sure, I think I could use a good run.” They both sprinted towards the boarding house in the village. With each step she felt free as if the cares and worries of this world had never existed. In no time they were in town.

  Jamie looked at her and grinned, “That is another bonus of the change, or curse, whatever you wanna call it. The freedom you get from running, it’s in our blood now. I don’t know about you but I could use a bath. Meet downstairs in 20? We can go over and get some breakfast, erm a late lunch.” he looked down at his watch, it was nearly 2:00.

  “That’d be great, I am really starved.”

  “I bet the first few changes are always exhausting and hunger inducing.”

  Twenty minutes later he sat on the porch enjoying the afternoon waiting on Rachel. They walked over to the pub. “So I”m guessing your here to find a cure for what we’ve got?” Rachel asked him as they walked inside.

  “You got it. I want a family some day, but not if it means that my son would be like this, especially after seeing what Bryan did. I could never live knowing that I was the cause of something like that.”

  “I suppose this is why I’m here too,” Rachel began as the waitress seated them and took their orders. “I had to make sure it was real, that I wasn’t going crazy, and to find out what could be done, so that I don’t hurt my son.”

  “Well, I can share what I’ve found so far, and soon as we finish eating, we can hit the library for a few hours before they close.” They didn’t want to spoil a delicious supper with talk of werewolves, so they began to get to know each others, as if they were merely on a date.

  “I am so stuffed!” Rachel leaned back in her chair and dropped her napkin on the plate. “Can we take a nap, instead of research?” She grinned.

  “That would be great, but tomorrow is Sunday, Library will be closed, we can nap tomorrow.” Jamie laughed as he and Rachel made their way out.

  In the library they began digging again. “There’s so much here. How can a library in the middle of nowhere have all these nearly ancient books?” Rachel was blown away at the collection of books.

  Jamie reached into his bag. “Oh, I almost forgot, this is for you.” He handed her a leather necklace with a charm identical to his own. “It will help control the change, to control the urges, hopefully.” Rachel tied it around her throat immediately. “It should work fairly well, unless you ever taste human blood while in your wolf form.”

  “Well, lets hope we find a cure or something before that happens!” She exclaimed.

  “I have to find a cause first, well for me and my families curse that is. If we are lucky though, the same cure will apply to anyone bitten.” Jamie flipped through a German text, while Rachel read some pages about Britain folklore written in Latin.

  “Good thing I went to Catholic school, they required Latin classes. Otherwise this would be pointless.” Rachel laughed.

  “I’m glad your here, I didn’t take Latin. I’m only fluent in English and German, my mom’s parents where from Germany. Guess it was destiny that we met here. Now maybe we can figure this out together. Otherwise, I’d be sitting there with a dictionary, trying to translate Latin.” Jamie chuckled.

  “Hey, I think I found something here on origins...” Rachel jotted down some notes, “ Saint Patrick while preaching Christianity to pagans of Britain was met upon by a vulgar race of men, who while he attempted to convert them, was mocked and howled at by the men. Saint Patrick prayed to God, to avenge this, and place a judgment on these men. These people and their descendants were cursed into taking the form of a wolf...”

  “Yea I’ve seen that one to, except it was related as a curse from Natalis, here in Ireland. Maybe that’s why the occult library is in Ireland?” Jamie chuckled.

  “I guess.” Rachel replaced that book, and reached for another one. “Good this one is in English, My head hurts from the Latin.”

  “Yea I’m about done for with German too.” Jamie looked at his watch. “I tell ya what lets stop for the night. The librarian will be up in about 10 minute to shoo us out anyways.”

  “Sounds wonderful to me.” Rachel bounced up, glad to be done reading. “Hey when do we have to worry about the um, next full moon? Is that the only time we change? Is it involuntary? If I wanted to change could I without the moon?” Rachel began chattering nervously, realizing that sun set was in about 40 minutes.

  “I was wondering when you would get to those questions.” Jamie laughed as he grabbed his laptop case and they walked down the stairs.

  “The next full moon is tonight. If you’d feel safer, I have enough chains for both of us. Well that would sound really weird if we weren’t talking about transforming.” Jamie was doing all he could not to blush.

  “Indeed it would!” Rachel slapped him on the chest as they went out the door.

  “Full moon is the only time we will involuntarily change. The change is tied closely to emotions, but the charm will help with that.” He explained everything he knew about changing. “You wait here, I’ll run up and get the back pack.??
? They went running together, back towards the tree they had stayed at last night.

  Rachel could feel the change this time, she was aware of every scent on the air. Was the charm slowing it down? Or was she just noticing because now she knew that she wasn’t crazy after all?

  “This is strange...” She began, as Jamie fastened the chains around her waist, and hands.

  “Yea I know, but this way we know we won’t hurt anyone. Some of the research I’ve come across says that once we eat human flesh we are truly damned. I personally don’t care to take that chance.”

  “Ew that sounds disgusting.” Rachel wriggled her nose.

  “You say that now, wait until you’ve had to go through a change and be near people.” He fastened the last manacle on himself.

  “Well here’s hoping we can find a cure before that ever happens.” Jamie leaned in and kissed Rachel before she knew what was happening.

  “See you in the morning...” Jamie held his breath as he transformed before her eyes. Then he licked her on the cheek.

  Rachel looked down, and realized she was now looking at wolf paws where her hands should be. They curled up together and just slept the night away.

  The sun rose and this time, Rachel woke up with it, she snuggled up closer to Jamie. They watched the sun ascending into the sky in each others arms.

  “Well, so far, this wolf thing isn’t to bad.” She said as