Wolfsbane and Mistletoe

"Well . . . yeah."

She frowned. "You’re young and you’re being greedy and you’re forgetting the First Lesson."

I scowled. "’The work is the reward.’ You sound like Grandpa."

"There’s a good reason for that. He was right." She hunkered down against the wall next to me. "Look, everyone reaches a crisis of faith at some point in his life. For me, it was trying to figure out if we had the right to live outside human law, learning the difference between law and justice. It’s part of the life. It makes us understand what it is to be human, why that’s precious and to be protected. Normals never get half of what we have, and go through life in doubt."

"We’re not human, Claud. Never will be. And now we get the doubt, too."

She shook her head. "We’re closer to them than anything else. Biologically and spiritually. We need that connection. And you know that killing Smith was right, even if he was one of us."

But no Fangborn had ever killed Fangborn before. No Fangborn had ever manifested pure evil before . . . I couldn’t turn off the voice in my head.

Claudia talked for a long time about the community of the Fangborn, duty, honor, and all that crap. I listened. A lot of it made sense.

I nodded. "You’re right. I need time, that’s all. Thanks."

"No problem. I’m just glad I got here before you got into the Nine Inch Nails." Relief flooded her features, which told me exactly how rocky she thought I looked. "So. You packed?"

"No. It won’t take me long." This year, our Christmas present to each other was tickets to Aruba. Expensive, but we both needed the sunshine right now.

She nodded, then eyed me sternly. "But you’re gonna go to midnight Mass, right?"

"Probably. I gotta go for a walk, first. Clear my head." I hauled myself up, muscles stiff not from the fight, but from lying around. Any harm I take while wolfself heals rapidly, as long as I remain wolfy, but any hurt I get while in human form reappears when I revert back to human form.

"Good. I’ll see you there. And Gerry?"

"Yeah, Claud?"

She wrinkled her nose. "Take a shower, would you?"

I flipped her the bird again, and got my jacket. She smiled as she left, and I knew I had her convinced. That’s the good thing about having a shrink for a sister: you learn what they look for and you can give it to them.

Yes, her words made sense. They just did nothing to take away my pain.

I pulled on my duck boots, hat, scarf, and gloves. I probably didn’t need so much – it was over thirty degrees – but ever since the fight, I just couldn’t get warm.

I walked a long time and found myself at the foot of Derby Wharf. I went out far enough to let the holiday lights of the street fall behind me, until I was alone in the frigid dark. Bloodstains blurred the snow, which had been trampled by the locals looking for the serial killer’s savage dog. A fierce hellhound roaming Salem, one more myth in the making.

I watched the lighthouse beam skim the surface of the dark water. Listened to the soft slap of waves against the stone wharf. Anyone with a lick of insight could feel the remnants of the power that had been expended here.

In our family’s annals, there was nothing like this, but now I had to wonder: Who else had we missed? Or if this was a really new development, what did it mean? The only thing I knew was that my certainty about my place in the world – my armor and my sword – was shattered.

I felt the silence all around me, city noises muffled by the snow, and tried to find the bottom of the sea of pain I felt. The uncertainty was crushing, the loss of faith like the loss of a limb. I felt broken and made a fool of, mocked by the universe for my belief.

I took a deep breath, the kind you take at the crossroads when the dark man shows up and offers you the world in exchange for your grubby soul. As I watched the obsidian water, I took another breath and realized that if I couldn’t manage the leap of faith that Claudia described, then I had to make a leap of another kind.

Down the street from Derby Wharf is a little bar called In a Pig’s Eye. It’s a local joint; there’s no television and they pull the best pints in town.

Annie works there nights.

It was about half full, the folks who were getting one more drink in before Mass and the ones whose family were the other strangers on bar stools.

"Jeez, Gerry, you been sick or something? You look kinda peaky." She set down a coaster in front of me. "Winter Warmer?"

"Thanks. Just . . . out of it, I guess." I suddenly remembered my rank-smelling sweats and two days’ growth of beard, and kept my jacket zipped. Hell.

"I bet. I read about Claudia in the paper. You must have freaked."

One of the things I’ve learned to live with is the fact that I’ll never get credit for being on the scene, for doing the job. "I worry about her, but she’s good at taking care of herself." Then I couldn’t resist, sweats or no. "And besides. Chewie wouldn’t let anything happen to her."

She put the dark beer down in front of me, a perfect half inch of froth at the top. "No. He’s a sweetie."

I felt myself flush, remembering the perfume of Annie’s ankles, her hand on the back of my neck as she talked to Claudia one summer night. We’d been coming home from work and I’d still been intoxicated by the kill when we ran into Annie. It’s one of my fondest memories. "You like dogs?"

She shrugged. "Depends. Like people, really. You gotta take them one at a time, you know?"

Ask her out, I told myself, ask her out right now, coffee, a drink, anything, or so help me, I’ll – "How do you feel about Aruba?" I felt myself go red again: that was not what I meant to say. It was too much, too soon, too pimp, oh shit –

Annie stopped wiping down the bar.

Suddenly, the bottomless water seemed a better choice.

"I’d prefer to start with a drink, maybe dinner," she said slowly. "That is, if you’re really, actually, finally getting the guts to ask me out?"

"Uh . . . yeah." I swallowed. "That okay?"

"Yeah. But it took you long enough." She glanced at me. "You tough guys, you’re all just pu**ycats. You aren’t always a big pu**ycat, are you, Gerry?"

Mostly I’m a big wolf, I thought giddily. "Never again," I vowed. "How’s tomorrow night?"

"Can’t." She looked at me funny. "It’s Christmas tomorrow, remember? I’m going snowshoeing at Bradley Palmer State Park in the morning."

I wrinkled my brow. An odd tradition, but nice, I s’pose . . .

She blew out her cheeks. "You know I’m Wiccan, right? I like Christmas, but I observe the Solstice."