High Moor (24 page)

A branch snapped outside. Claws clacked against the concrete of the footpath that circled the house. Then silence.

A shadow passed across the front door, gone before Steven could bring the gun to bear. A barely suppressed tide of panic rose in his chest. He caught movement out of the corner of his eye and swung the pistol round, but it was only the dancing shadow of a tree silhouetted against fire and moonlight.

He heard breathing. Heavy, regular, with the faintest hint of a growl held in check.

Then the lights went out.

Steven dropped into a crouch and backed against the living room wall. The only illumination was a flickering orange glow from the fires outside. His heart raced, and his sweating hands struggled to keep hold of the pistol. His limbs felt numb. He realised he was hyper-ventilating. He took a deep breath and tried to bring his terror under control.

Something collided with the living room window. A dark shape loomed outside. The wooden boards splintered as something chewed its way through them. Steven raised the pistol and fired.

The bullet blew a hole in one of the boards. The shape outside vanished.

Silence hung like a shroud, broken only by the pounding beat of his own heart and his ragged breathing. The back door shuddered in its frame when something slammed against it. The sounds of splintering wood from the sitting room and the kitchen followed.

Steven realised his mistake. All of the rooms led into one another. He couldn't defend all sides of the property by himself, especially with only five silver bullets. He moved across the living room towards the cellar, gun held out in a rigid double-handed grip. Each step felt like he was walking underwater.

He stepped into the hallway and searched the dark corners for any sign of life. Satisfied the way was clear, he sprinted to the basement door and grabbed the handle. Then one of the werewolves threw itself at the boarded-up window in the sitting room.

The boards shattered under the impact, showering the room in shards of glass and wood. A huge hulking figure, outlined in firelight, looked at him with glowing green eyes and snarled.

Steven sensed the impending attack. He raised his gun and fired at the malicious iridescent disks. The bullet tore a hole in the doorframe. He backed away until he hit the wall. Then the werewolf leaped.

Time seemed to slow. The creature’s eyes dipped for a fraction of a second before the attack. Steven tried to steady his aim as the darkness of the room gave birth to a nightmare. The creature was massive. Coarse, black fur covered its muscular body. It regarded the man with intelligence and absolute loathing. Steven heard himself scream, and he pulled the trigger twice in rapid succession, more a reflex of his terror than an intentional act. The first round caught the airborne werewolf in the stomach and blew a fist-sized hole out of the creature's back. The second struck the monster in the head, splattering bone and brain across a picture of John’s grandparents. The werewolf smashed into the wall beside Steven and lay still. Bones snapped and contorted. Hair receded into pores. Within moments, all traces of the wolf had vanished, leaving the ruined corpse of a naked man behind.

Steven stood frozen for a moment, too shocked to move. Then he regained his senses.

“Oh fuck this.” He leaped to his feet and hammered on the basement door. “George, open the fucking door. For Christ’s sake, open the door.”

Steven heard John roar and renew his assault on the cell door below. Stairs creaked. The wind howled around the house, and the sporadic patter of rain turned into a steady hiss. He hammered on the door again. “George, get a bloody move on.”

A flash of lightning illuminated the darkness of the sitting room. Another werewolf crouched on the carpet, ears flat against its head and teeth bared. A blur of movement came from the window, and a second creature landed beside the first. The monsters curled their lips and snarled. The bass growl merged into the low rumble of thunder from outside.

The door swung open. Steven threw himself inside, colliding with George. Both men rolled down the wooden stairs and landed in a heap on the concrete floor. The gun slipped from Steven’s hand, skittered across the room, and came to rest in the far corner.

Steven looked up. The cellar door was still open. He untangled himself from George and started back up the stairs. Too late. The enormous form of a werewolf filled the door frame.

Where John and Mirela were bipedal, this creature moved on all fours. Long, pointed ears lay flat against the monster’s head. The long, tapered snout was wrinkled into a snarl, lips pulled back to reveal two rows of razor-sharp fangs. Muscles moved like liquid beneath the layers of coarse, black fur. Terrible clawed feet, each toe ending with a black, curved talon that wrapped around the stairs, splintering the wood. It tensed its muscles, ready to pounce. Steven held his breath and prepared to die.

The thunderclap retort of the pistol and the smell of gunpowder filled the cellar. The werewolf’s head exploded in a cloud of hair, blood, and brains. Another shot rang out, shattering the foreleg of the already dead monster. The creature slumped to the floor.

Click. Click. Click.

Caroline stood against the back wall, the gun held in front of her. Tears of terror and rage streamed down her cheeks. She walked towards the foot of the stairs, with the gun trained on the dead werewolf, and continued to pull the trigger of the empty weapon until Steven took it from her.

George got to his feet and put his arm around his trembling wife. ”Is that all of them?”

A dark shadow filled the doorframe. Steven felt his heart sink. He had no more silver bullets. They were all as good as dead.

Unless.

The final werewolf looked at the terrified people with triumph in its eyes. It descended the stairs at a slow, measured pace. The clack of claws on wood counted down the last few seconds of Steven, George, and Caroline’s lives. After what seemed like an eternity, it reached the bottom. It snarled and tensed its muscles to pounce.

Then Steven unlocked the door to John’s cell.

The door burst open as John hurled himself against it. No trace of the ten-year-old boy remained in the creature standing in before them. It stood on two legs, well over six and a half feet tall. Coarse, brown hair covered sheets of rippling muscle. It sniffed the air, snarled at the three cowering humans, and then leaped at the other werewolf.

Claws flashed out as he swung at the silver-grey monster. It jumped back, only just avoiding the blow. It bared its fangs and snarled, then circled around to his left. John crouched and matched his opponent’s movement. Then the silver werewolf pounced. Fangs flashed at John's throat, but he jerked his head back at the last instant and the teeth sank into the flesh of his shoulder.

Caroline took a step forward, reaching out her hand. “Oh God, John.”

Steven grabbed her wrist and pushed her towards the cell. “Both of you, get inside while they’re distracted. Move.”

George couldn't tear his gaze away from the two werewolves. “But the door only locks from the outside.”

Steven nodded. “I know, George. Now move your bloody arses before they remember us.”

“Steven, you don’t have to.”

“I do, unless you have a better idea.”

George shook his head and looked at the floor, unable to meet Steven's gaze. “No, I don’t.”

Steven ushered them both into the cell, closed the door, and slid the bolt home. “Don’t be sorry, George. Take care of your family.”

The fight intensified. The beasts crashed against the walls and smashed a wooden chair in the corner of the room into pieces. John lashed out with his claws and tore four ragged wounds in the side of the silver werewolf. The creature yelped and ducked under a follow up blow, then dove forward and bit a chunk of flesh from John’s thigh. John roared in agony, slammed into the other werewolf, and they careened across the basement, towards Steven.

Both creatures were wounded. Whereas the silver werewolf was showing visible signs of weakness, the pain only seemed to fuel John’s rage. His attacks became more brutal and frenzied. Claws sliced through fur and muscle, fangs tore pieces of flesh from the silver werewolf’s body until its fur was soaked with blood. The silver werewolf feinted forward, as if to return the attack, and then retreated from the enraged moonstruck. John pounced on it when it tried to flee up the stairs, and clamped his huge jaws around its neck.

The werewolf thrashed and snarled, but failed to break John’s hold. The jaws tightened. Bones popped. Veins and arteries sprayed blood. Clouds of red mist filled the air and covered the walls. Then John’s jaws closed. The severed head of the silver werewolf hit the floor with a wet thud before rolling down the stairs and coming to rest at Steven’s feet.

Steven backed away until he came up against the stone wall. He watched as John tore the now human corpse into shreds of blood-soaked meat. John sniffed the air and turned around to face Steven. Scraps of torn skin hung from the side of the snarling beast’s mouth. It began to descend the stairs, cautious at first, but growing in confidence. The wounds on its body were horrific. Ragged slashes across its abdomen oozed thick, crimson blood. Chunks of flesh had been torn from its shoulders and thigh, deep enough to show the bone. None of this seemed to bother it, as it stalked the former police officer.

Steven had nowhere left to go. He closed his eyes and waited for John to start eating him.

Ten seconds passed. Steven opened his eyes in time to see the werewolf slump to the floor with four darts sticking out of its right side. George peered through the small barred window with Steven’s tranquiliser pistol in his hand.

Relief flowed through him; he fell to his knees. He looked up at George and managed a weak smile. “Oh fucking hell, George. You did it. You saved me.”

George grinned back. “Well, it was the least I could do. It would be rude if I let our son eat you alive after everything you’ve done for us. Now get off your arse and let us out of this bloody cell before he wakes up.”

***

22nd July 1986. Treworgan Farm, High Moor. 06.17.

The storm had passed. The rain first eased, then stopped altogether. The black clouds moved away, and the first glimpses of the early morning sun glimmered through the trees to the east. Steven stood on the porch and lit a cigarette. After he took a long drag, he coughed until he was almost sick. He looked at the cigarette, dropped it onto the muddy ground, and crushed it under his heel.

Picking up the shovel, he walked out into the yard. The rain had washed the blood into the earth and put out the fires during the course of the night, but the front of the house was still like an abattoir. Burned lumps of unrecognisable meat were strewn over the entire area, but it was worse when Steven saw something that he did recognise. A hand, or a scrap of tattooed skin, or part of Carl’s head. He steeled himself and shovelled the remains of Carl Schneider into black plastic bags.

He worked in silence for more than half an hour, filling one bag, then another, then another, until he was satisfied that he'd gathered all of Carl Schneider’s earthly remains. Then he leaned against the shovel and wept in silence.

George walked out of the house and across the yard. Steven didn’t look up until he put his hand on his shoulder and said, “I’ve taken the ones from the house to the back yard. Dug a pit like you said.”

Steven choked back his tears and turned to look at George. “How’s John?”

“He’s hurt pretty badly, but I don’t think there’s anything fatal. Caroline cleaned him up and bandaged him as well as she could. He’s in a lot of pain, but I think he’s going to be alright. The wounds were already clotted over when he changed back.”

Steven nodded. “That’s good. I’m glad.”

George motioned to the black sacks. “Are they going with the rest?”

“No. The others we burn, but Carl gets a proper burial, or at least as close to it as we can manage. We owe him that.”

***

22nd July 1986. Treworgan Farm, High Moor. 09.30.

The bonfire had died down over the last couple of hours until all that remained in the fire pit were smouldering embers and charred bones. The stench of burned meat hung in the air like an oppressive cloud.

Steven, George, and Caroline stood next to a hole in the ground at the far edge of the property, near the woods. John sat on a wooden chair, his face pale. Three plastic sacks lay at the bottom of the hole.

George looked at Steven. “Do you want to say anything?”

Steven nodded. “Carl Schneider was a lot of things. He was a brave man, a complete pain in the arse, and he was my friend. He came over here to save us from the monsters that we didn’t even know were among us, and gave up his life so that we might survive. There’s a passage in the Bible about that kind of sacrifice, but for the life of me, I can’t remember it. Hell, I don’t even know if Carl was religious. What I do know is that, if there is a God, then Carl will be up there with him now, drinking his whiskey and laughing at me for being such a sentimental idiot.” Steven took out a silver hip flask, undid the top, and poured the amber liquid into the grave. “Here’s to you, Carl. I saved you some of the good stuff. Goodbye, my friend, and thank you. You will be missed.”

Caroline and John wept while Steven and George shovelled earth back into the hole. When the task was complete, Steven stuck his spade into the earth as a makeshift headstone.

John looked up at his father and the ex police officer. “It’s over then?”

Steven nodded. “For now, yes. There might be more of them out there, but for the time being, I think we’re safe.”

“What if more come?”

“Then we’ll be ready for them, but I hope it won’t come to that. If you’re careful and stay hidden, then with any luck, this is the last we’ll see of them.”

"So what do we do now?”

End of Part 2