High Moor (17 page)

“Do you really think that’ll happen? You’re both going to turn into werewolves in three weeks’ time?”

“Yes, I do. You didn’t see the thing, Marie. It was worse than anything in the movies. Every time I close my eyes, I can see it. I wake up screaming every night to the same dream. When the moon comes up, Michael and me are going to change, and we’ll hurt anyone that’s near to us when we do. I don’t want that to happen to you.”

“What about you?”

“I’m going to take care of it. I won’t hurt my mam and dad, or anyone else.”

Marie sat down next to John and took his hand. It was warm. Sticky. She looked at her hand and saw that it was slick with blood.

“John, what did you do?”

“I was trying to end it. Kill myself before the full moon. I couldn’t cut deep enough because I was scared. Then you turned up. I’m a coward. A fucking coward.” John’s eyes brimmed with tears and he sagged.

“John?”

He looked up at Marie. Her eyes blazed in fury and she punched him in the face as hard as she could.”

“What the fuck?”

“How could you think of doing that? Kill yourself? You survive all that, and then just cut your wrists? You are a selfish fucking bastard, John Simpson. How do you think your mam will feel?”

“She’ll be upset, but at least she’ll be alive.”

“OK, so what about me?”

“You?”

“Yes, me. One of my brothers is dead; the other is in hospital and might never wake up. Me mam wanders around the place in a daze all day, and Dad’s done nothing but drink himself unconscious since Dave died. You are all I have left. Why would you leave me too?” She threw her arms around John’s neck and sobbed.

“Marie. It’s important. You have to promise to stay away from Michael on the 22nd. Promise me, Marie.”

“You have to promise too. Promise you’ll stay with me and don’t do anything stupid. Then I’ll do what you say.”

John hugged the girl tight, tears streaming across his cheeks.

“OK, Marie. I’ll find another way to keep everyone safe. I promise.”

***

31st May 1986. Hamsterley Forest. 14:45.

Carl sat in his rented Ford Escort and lit another cigarette, disgusted at himself.
I keep off the fucking things for years, and suddenly I’m back to two packs a day.

The bank holiday traffic had been as bad as expected. The roads were packed with vehicles, and the car park at the forest visitor’s centre was completely full. Couples walked hand in hand through the shaded paths and tracks. Families talked and laughed as they made their way through the well-tended woodland. The forest was full of life and happiness as people took advantage of the sunny May afternoon.

The tourists and dog walkers had not, however, roamed too far along this track. The presence of the traveller camp in a clearing a quarter of a mile beyond where Carl was parked had made sure of that. Cars turned around in haste when they sighted the circle of caravans. People on foot decided that it was probably best that they take another route. Carl didn’t know if it was merely their natural suspicion of travellers, or whether it was something subconscious that screamed in the deepest, oldest parts of their mind. Beware. Predators are near.

He picked up his binoculars from the passenger seat and trained them on the camp. The gypsies seemed not to realise that he was there and went about their business. Pots of food bubbled over an open fire. Children played with an elderly Jack Russell terrier. Men returned from the forest with arms full of wood or the occasional rabbit. Women washed baskets of clothes in the stream that ran along the edge of the clearing.

Several of the men appeared to be injured. A large dark-haired man had white linen stretched over the left side of his face. Others wore slings. A young man, probably no older than seventeen or eighteen, hobbled to the fire on crutches. His right leg was missing below the knee, and fresh blood stained the dressing.

Carl stubbed the cigarette out in the overflowing ashtray and exhaled the last lung full against the windscreen.

“What the fuck are you doing here, Carl? What the hell do you hope to accomplish?” he said to himself.

“I was going to ask you that exact same question, Mr Schneider.”

Carl jumped in his seat, startled at the unexpected voice. Joseph stood by the driver’s door. He pointed a shotgun through the window at Carl’s head.

“I wouldn’t do anything stupid if I were you. Take your gun and put it on the passenger seat, then get out of the car.”

Carl weighed up his options and didn’t like any of them. With a sigh, he reached into his coat pocket and took out his pistol.

“And the other one. I don’t recommend you do anything to make me nervous. This shotgun has a hair trigger, and I would hate to ruin the upholstery of your car.”

Carl’s shoulders sagged, and he withdrew his other pistol, putting it alongside its twin on the passenger seat, then he opened the door and stepped out onto the road. Joseph took a couple of steps back and motioned towards the gypsy camp with the barrel of his gun.

“After you, Mr Schneider.”

The two men walked down the road to the parked caravans. Carl could see movement in the trees on either side of them.

“Why not just kill me now and have done with it? That is what you said you would do if I came looking for you, isn’t it?”

“I say a lot of things. Some of them are even true. At the moment, let’s just say that your fate is in your own hands and leave it at that.”

Heads turned to regard Carl as he entered the camp. Up close, he could see that many of the people were carrying injuries, not only the men, but some of the women and children as well. Over twenty pairs of eyes followed Carl with suspicion and barely contained anger.

“What the hell happened here?”

“Mirela happened. She changed in the middle of the camp and attacked the first thing that she saw. Her family. Her friends.”

“Why the hell did you keep her in the camp on a full moon? You must have known what would happen.”

“Mr Schneider, you know almost nothing about us. Under normal circumstances, when we are poisoned with silver, we cannot change for more than a month. Not until the poison is out of our system. My best guess is that, as Mirela survived being shot with silver twice, she may have built up a degree of resistance. It was my error in judgement, and I shall bear the consequences of that for the rest of my days.”

“How many people did you lose?”

“Seven, including my wife Yolanda. Some of us managed to change and drive her away before she could kill any more. Once we had tended to our wounded, we pursued her and, well, you know what happened then.”

“I’m sorry, for what it’s worth.”

“It’s worth very little, but thank you anyway.” Joseph opened the door to a large mobile home and motioned for Carl to go inside.

“Take a seat, Mr Schneider. I’d like to talk about why you're here.”

Carl moved a folded blanket from a chair and sat down. “I’m here because I couldn’t understand why you hadn’t left. I needed to know what you were up to and whether you were going to be a problem.”

“You’ve seen those outside. They are the lucky ones. Most of the other injured are recuperating in their caravans. They are too badly hurt to move far.”

“Then why not get them proper medical help?”

Joseph laughed. “You think it’s that simple? Leaving aside the questions that would be asked with so many wounded, what do you think would happen if someone were to look at our blood through a microscope? The risk of exposing ourselves would be too great. If humans had definitive proof of our existence, then they'd hunt us down and exterminate us. This brings me to my second reason for staying.”

“The boys?”

“Yes. Those children are infected. They will change on the next full moon. Whether they are like us when they change, or like Mirela, remains to be seen, but if I had to make a guess, I would say the latter is more likely.”

Carl nodded. “That’s what I was afraid of. So you're hanging around for what? To see what happens? Or are you intending to do something about it?”

“We haven’t decided yet. There are other factors to take into consideration.”

“What other factors?”

“The involvement of the Pack for one. When Mirela became afflicted, I fled the Pack to protect her. They order all Moonstruck to be killed. No exceptions.”

“Why?”

“In part, it’s to maintain secrecy. A moonstruck werewolf is a savage beast, incapable of rational thought. It is inevitable that, sooner or later, one would provide irrefutable evidence of our existence. The other reason is fear. We heal from most injuries very quickly unless the damage is severe. Not even silver is guaranteed to kill us, although it inhibits the healing process. The claws and teeth of another werewolf though? Well, you can see the results of that outside.”

“You don’t heal from injuries inflicted by another werewolf?”

“We do, but it takes time. It won’t be until another lunar cycle has passed that our bodies will repair the damage.”

“So, let me get this straight. You think the Pack are here? Now?”

Joseph shrugged. “I don’t know, Mr Schneider. I would say that it’s possible. Even likely. If they are here, they will stop at nothing to protect our secret. That puts everyone around those children in grave danger.”

“Jesus. If I am honest, Joseph, I have no fucking clue what I’m supposed to do here.”

“The solution is obvious, Mr Schneider. You need to kill both of those boys before the next full moon.”

21st June 1986. Neville’s Cross. 13.00.

The sound of the telephone reverberated through the house, waking Steven, who was asleep on the sofa. The noise hurt his head as if the sound had solid spikes that caught against the inside of his skull and tugged on brain matter. His head span and he stumbled to his feet, kicking a plate across the floor. It broke as it collided with the coffee table. Steven swore and staggered to the hallway.

If this is some bastard trying to sell me something, there’ll be hell to pay.

He snatched the handset from its cradle. “What?”

A child’s voice answered. Small and uncertain. “Hello? Is that Sergeant Wilkinson?”

Steven rubbed his eyes with his free hand and tried to force his mind into focus. “Yes, this is Steven Wilkinson. Who is this?”

“It’s John Simpson. You told me to call you if I needed to.”

Steven felt like someone had just dropped him into a bath of ice. His mind cleared in an instant, and his hand tightened around the receiver until his knuckles turned white. “John. Of course. What’s the matter?”

“I don’t know what to do. The full moon’s tomorrow night and I’m scared.”

“John, calm down. We don’t know for sure that anything’s going to happen.”

“I do. I know.”

Steven pulled a stool out and sat down. “How do you know, John?”

The line was silent for a moment. “I…I tried to kill myself. I cut my wrists.”

Steven was appalled. “You did what? Do your parents know?”

“It healed up. It healed up nearly straight away. I know you said that I had to take care of it, but I can’t.”

“I didn’t…I mean, oh fucking hell. John, I didn’t mean for you to try and hurt yourself. You’re not going to try anything like that again, are you?”

John sniffled down the phone. “No, it’s no use. It just hurts and then it’s like I never did anything. I wanted to know if you could lock me up? Put me in prison so I don’t hurt anyone.”

“I wish I could, John, but I’m not a police officer anymore. Not really. I can’t get access to any cells, and even if I could, the other policemen would never let me lock up a ten-year-old boy.”

“But the healing. That means I’m going to change, doesn’t it?”

Steven sighed. “Yes, it probably does.”

“Can you take me away somewhere, then? Somewhere far away from anyone, so that I won’t hurt anybody when it happens?”

Steven thought about this for a moment. “John, are your parents home today?”

“Yes, Dad’s out in the garden and Mam’s cooking.”

“Alright, I’m going to come round and see you all. I’ll be there in a couple of hours, OK?”

“OK. Thank you, Sergeant Wilkinson.”

Steven put the phone down and ran a hand over three days of beard.

“Steven, you’re a fucking idiot. You just couldn’t stay away, could you?” he said to himself. He put the kettle on and made a cup of strong black coffee while he tried to think about what he'd say to John’s parents.

***

21st June 1986. Outside John's House, High Moor. 13.15.

Carl sat in the rear of the Ford Transit van and waited. He'd wound down the driver's side window not only to allow some air to circulate in the stifling heat of the June afternoon, but to allow him a clear line of sight on his target. He eased aside the blanket that hung behind the front seats with the silenced barrel of his rifle and focused the sights on the red telephone box down the street.

Can I do this? Can I really blow the head off a ten-year-old boy in cold blood?

Joseph’s warnings ran through his mind, and he wiped the sweat from his brow. The door to the telephone box opened, and John Simpson stepped out into his crosshairs.