PancaKe
17th March 2004, 12:07 AM
I know I've been gone for ages. School sort of drowned me and I didnt have any time left. But now I am more organized (and getting less sleep). Ive found room for school, work, social life AND tpm. And as Im now back, I may as well repost from the beginning. From Chapter Twelve, i think, there's new chapters, okay? But for now, let us enjoy...
~Mist
Chapter One
“Honey, I have to leave for an emergency at work.” A woman, tall, with a slim figure, turned at hearing this news. Her eyes soon lost that sapphire sparkle, and showed evident signs that she was experiencing a mixture of feelings.
“Is everything all right?” she asked. She stood up fully, picking up a small child in her arms and brushing loose bits of carrot colored hair out of her eyes. “Why are you being called into work so late at night? It’s-”
“Almost nine, I know,” her husband answered. “But Emily, Sandra Hellensberg called and by the sounds of it, it sounded urgent.”
“What could be so urgent working in the Anti-Werewolf League?” Emily McGregor questioned. She sighed, walking over to the kitchen and picking up a small bottle of juice and handing it to the child down by her legs. “Can’t somebody else fill in for you Kyle?”
“I don’t know, but Sandra did mention something about a sighting,” Kyle answered, trying to sort through his briefcase and talk at the same time. He hurriedly picked up items from his desk and shoved them in, before looking at them quizzically and taking them out again.
Emily walked over to the desk and opened one of its many draws and reached right in to the bottom, and pulled out what looked to be a sniper rifle. Handing it to Kyle she kissed him on the cheek. “Its not loaded with bullets, but with tranquilizer darts,” she told him. “But please be careful Kyle, if something happens to you then there’s only me and Sally-Anne left.” She looked up into his dark green eyes pleadingly. “I worry about you,” she told him.
Kyle put the sniper into his suitcase and locked it. “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine. And if you do happen to be called in, bring Sally-Anne with you. If you are called, everything will probably be fine anyway.” Kyle grinned a cheeky grin at her and kissed her, before picking up the suitcase. “I’ll see you later. Bye-bye little Sal, Daddy will be home later tonight.” He ruffled the thick reddish hair on top of Sally-Anne’s head.
“Don’t call her Sal, her name is Sally-Anne,” Emily told him, shaking her head as he turned and exited out the door. Emily walked over and watched him out the window walking down the dark street before blending into the dark shadows. “Right missy,” Emily smiled, picking up Sally-Anne while she suckled on her bottle still, the juice slowly disappearing into her tiny mouth. She carried her across the narrow hallway and into her bedroom, decorated in a style, which you could call cute for a four year old.
The room was loosely based on the color scheme pink and white. The only visible non pink and white thing in the room happened to be the clothes that Emily was wearing, baggy tan pants and a grass green hooded sweatshirt with words in yellow block letters across the chest reading “Warroga National Running Club”, Warroga being the country in which they resided.
Warroga had only become settled in the last fifty to a hundred years, but was still a very empty country despite the six million people living and immigrating into the country. It had very little land, and what land that wasn’t settled and civilized with cities and towns was covered in a mass stretch of forests and meadows. In the area that the McGregor’s lived, most of the forest had been cleared away for the installation of a city where people lived almost on top of each other. The houses weren’t in one big row and all together like the English style terraced houses, but were apart and each had a small backyard. But Quentside wasn’t the nicest of areas to live in, it was a big area for those who were immigrating out of either third world countries, or with little money to live, and despite the fact that both Emily and Kyle McGregor had high positions in the Anti-Werewolf League, they still couldn’t afford to raise Sally-Anne and move to a better area.
At least they didn’t have to live in the Mount District. Emily always put it like that when houses in neighboring streets were robbed, or gangs had attacked somebody and left them to bleed for hours until morning, or syringes were left pointing upwards in bus station seats. Somehow, the Mount District seemed to top this bad reputation with a worse one, involving muggings in broad daylight, drug addicts running around and shooting other innocent people with syringes, nobody bothering to work or pay any attention to the law, and people living on the streets once they were kicked out of their rental properties with three months of overdue notices.
Emily had always dreamed of one day getting a transfer at the Anti-Werewolf League to a nice place, maybe in the Northern Residence. This was the area in the North and Northeast, which contained the suburbs packed with mansions each with a swimming pool, two tennis courts and a butler or maid. It was in this area that contained the capital of Warroga, a clean street city by the name of Norton, named after the last son of Jamison Warroga, the discoverer of Warroga.
That was many years ago, and now Warroga had a different threat to its nation. Twenty years ago, a group of young business majors at a university were camping out in the woods when they awoke and discovered that a wolf had decided to join them in their tent. The group had screamed, but quickly realized that this wasn’t an ordinary wolf, the teeth seemed smaller yet more pointed, the tail was longer and much more bushier, and the general build was more delicate than a regular wolf, and to top it all off the eyes were bright blue.
That group had feared being attacked and sat cowering at the back of the tent until sunrise, when the wolf turned and bounded. Carefully, they peeked out the tent flaps after the wolf and watched as the wolf ran and watched the wolf slowly changing with every bounding leap it took. The body became slimmer, the fur disappearing in a quick motion, as if it were shrinking back into the skin, and clothes reappearing. The tail shriveled up, the paws changed from paws to hands and shoes, and before changing the course of its mad dash into a thick clump of trees, the group watching timidly from the tent saw in the place of a running wolf was a running boy, of about nineteen.
They had realized that werewolves were not just myths but real creatures, and real threats. The Anti-Werewolf League started a year later. Its aim; to remove the werewolf population in the hope for a safer country. Emily and Kyle McGregor held very high positions in the Board of Directors for the Quentside Division, under the ruling of the current President of the AWL for all of Warroga, Sandra Hellensberg.
Emily sunk into these thoughts as she put Sally-Anne to bed, thinking about how her life was now devoted to more than just the AWL, but to her daughter as well. And for the safety of her daughter, she would have to work harder at the AWL.
She jumped as the phone gave a shrill ring, and got up from Sally-Anne’s bed to go into the next room to answer it. “Hello?” she said into the receiver, looking around the room and out the windows. She felt uneasy answering the phone late at night all alone, especially after seeing a few horror movies.
“It’s me Emily,” Kyle replied, his voice shaking with uncontrollable excitement. “Look, there was a sighting, and between me, Michael Kent, Christopher Laskey, Wendy Esteen and Sandra Hellensberg, we managed to capture a werewolf.”
“Really? That’s great!” Emily cheered, her spirits soaring. “So are you going to test it and do research?”
“Not us personally, but they’re sending it to the Kilbourne AWL. There’s much more advanced facilities at that division. But I’m just so excited!”
“Me too! Can you imagine what this means?”
“Yes of course I can. Oh, and also, there’s a celebratory dinner tomorrow night at the nicest place in town, the Quentside Quay. It’s supposed to have a really high reputation, considering the area its in.”
“Where is it?”
“Dragoness High Street.”
“I don’t think that’s safe, going into the main street of town at night.”
“We’ll be perfectly safe, don’t worry about a thing. I’m coming home soon so don’t wait up okay?”
“Okay, bye.”
Emily sighed as she put down the phone. As much as she wanted to have a celebratory dinner she knew it would be dangerous just thinking of going to Dragoness High Street at dusk, let alone night going in at night. She shuddered at the thoughts of recent headlines. Night attack on Dragoness, Guy found guilty of mutilation, All twenty shops empty next morning. She didn’t want to think about what went unreported.
A howl outside, floating into the silent room, caused Emily’s thoughts to shift from unsolvable murders to the joy that she had shared only moments before. For the first time in history the AWL had a captured werewolf, which would help them in finding other werewolves and finally ridding Warroga from all werewolves. She stirred the cup of cocoa she had been absentmindedly been making and sat down on the lounge, taking a sip.
A world without werewolves, she liked the thought of that.
*
“Are you ready honey?” Kyle called from the living room, holding a dressed up Sally-Anne on his knee, trying to desperately do up her little pink denim jacket. He smoothed back his wild hair with his hand, in a hopeless attempt to keep it lying flat. His wife walked out the room, not dressed up as you would if you were going to be attending a business dinner, but to give the impression that she was just an ordinary person going to an ordinary night out in Quentside, an ordinary person who shouldn’t need to give the impression that she was wealthy, or had a reasonable amount of money. An ordinary person trying to give off the impression that she wasn’t to be targeted.
“I’m ready,” she replied, taking Sally-Anne off his knee and grabbing her bottle of juice from the kitchen bench. She stopped in the front mirror to fix up her hair. Kyle rolled his eyes as he pushed her out the front door and onto the porch.
“You’re not supposed to be dressing up, and it still takes you at least half an hour to get ready,” he commented jokingly. Emily rolled her eyes and buckled Sally-Anne into her booster seat.
“Mummy!” Sally-Anne cried, pulling on Emily’s hair. She squealed with excitement and waved her arms around. Emily laughed at how cute her daughter was and uncurled the small fingers that gripped tightly around her hair before shutting the door and getting in herself.
Kyle had already started up the car and was drumming his fingers in beat with the song on the radio while waiting for Emily to get buckled up. The heavy riffs blasted out from the speakers as he nodded his head to every smash of the drum. “Turn that music down,” Emily told him, before sighing and doing it herself. “Honestly, with all this noise I’m not sure that Sally-Anne will grow up knowing what real music is.”
“You mean that stuff that sounds like a hundred cats yowling at once?” Kyle grinned as he backed the car out of the drive and began to head down their street for the main town.
“It’s called Mozart,” Emily snapped, annoyed at the rude accusation placed on her favorite music. “And it’s not yowling either. It’s classical orchestra.”
“Yeah its classic all right,” Kyle scoffed. He cast a sideways glance while driving at his wife, whose quick temper had flared up and lead her to keeping her mouth shut but sitting quietly with the look of somebody biting into a sour lemon upon her face. “Look, I’m sorry that I offended your music, but you offended mine first.”
“You are so immature sometimes, do you realize that?” Emily scorned, before turning and looking out the window. The car was quiet for about a moment, the tension so thick you could cut it with a knife and serve it in between two slices of bread.
“Mummy and Daddy don’t fight.” The car halted to a stop at red lights and both Kyle and Emily turned around to look at Sally-Anne. “Don’t be mean. Be friends.”
“Wow,” Emily said quietly as the car started once again. “I didn’t realize we were having that effect on her.”
“So do you accept my apology?” Kyle asked her.
“Yes,” Emily grinned. “But it doesn’t sound like cats yowling.” She stayed quiet for the rest of the car journey, angry and sulking at Kyle’s accusation. She had no idea that her daughter had a mind as clever as hers; she had no idea that what she said and did had an effect on her at all. “Sally-Anne? I’m sorry Daddy and I were fighting.”
“Fighting is bad,” Sally-Anne nodded from the back.
“She talks a lot for a three year old,” Kyle commented, grinning. He drove around the block once more, trying to find a parking spot near to Quentside Quay.
“Like you!” Sally-Anne squealed to Kyle. Emily laughed, and Kyle, who tried not to find that funny, couldn’t suppress the wide grin it put on his face.
“She’s really smart you know,” Emily told him.
“Oh, shut up,” Kyle snapped, but the grin on his face clearly told everybody who looked that he wasn’t mad at all, he was just pretending.
“Can you find a parking spot?” Emily asked as they circled the block for a third time. “It’s getting close to dinner time.”
“Sal hungry!” Sally-Anne cried from the back.
This time neither of her parents paid attention to that cry of protest from the backseat. “There’s one!” Kyle quickly swerved the car into the freshly made spot as another car, this time a rust bucket road unworthy car, drove out, most probably stolen.
They stepped out the car and holding Sally-Anne’s hand, they made their way around the block. “It’s almost seven,” Emily panicked, looking at her watch. “We can’t be late, especially since one of the executives from Kilbourne division is supposed to be there!” She began to fasten her pace, but Kyle merely grinned at her frantic attempt to be there quickly. “What are you doing Kyle?!” she yelled at him furiously, stamping her foot and glaring at him. “We’re going to be late!”
“No we’re not,” Kyle grinned, thoroughly irritating Emily. “I know a shortcut,” and he took her hand and led both her and Sally-Anne down an alleyway and emerged at the other side. Down the street from where they stood was a brightly lit formal eatery, with thick black security bars surrounding the windows and glass door. They opened the glass door and stepped inside, feeling the warmth of hot food, candles and heating snuggle them and defrost their frozen faces and hands.
“Name please,” a waiter in a suit questioned, looking over the reservation book, searching for a name, which he did not yet know.
“McGregor, Kyle, Emily and Sally-Anne,” Kyle answered him. “We’re here for the AWL party.”
“Party!” Sally-Anne cried, and began to jump up and down. Emily bent down to calm her hyped up daughter.
“This way sir.” They followed the waiter, Sally-Anne still bouncing, to another room where a long table with about fifteen or so chairs was set for them. Sandra Hellensberg was at one end, seated with Michael Kent and his wife Angelica Kent, and down from them sat Christopher Laskey with his son Jamie, and on the opposite side of the table sat Wendy Esteen and Randal Esteen. Emily and Kyle took their places across from Wendy and Randal and began chatting away about such subjects, which did not interest Sally-Anne to hear about.
She got down from her seat and crawled under the table to join Jamie Laskey who had already made himself comfortable down there with a handful of bread sticks. “Want one?” he offered handing them out. Jamie Laskey was two years older than Sal; he was five whereas she was only three. Even so, Sal would still be the bossier out of the two.
“Mine,” she grinned, taking one and eating it.
“Sally-Anne you look beautiful,” Jamie told her as she ate her breadstick. The smile on Sal’s face looked as if it was wiped off with a cloth and replaced by a menacing frown.
“Don’t call me Sally-Anne!” she yelled, and going for him with his fist. “Sal!”
The table shook from above and in an instant reaction, both Emily and Christopher Laskey dived down and picked up their children. “Sally-Anne what are you doing?” Emily demanded.
“Jamie Laskey what did you do to Sally-Anne?” Christopher Laskey questioned.
“He called me Sally-Anne!” Sal cried, tears of frustration appearing in her eyes.
“She got angry and yelled at me when I said Sally-Anne you look beautiful,” Jamie told his father, his large eyes showing signs of confusion and fear.
“He called me Sally-Anne!” she cried, louder this time.
“Excuse me for a minute,” Emily apologized, before picking up Sal and carrying her to the bathroom. She sat her down on the vanity next to the sink and looked at her hard in the face. Sal stopped her crying, realizing that her mother wasn’t the usual cheery person she was. “Sally-Anne McGregor I am ashamed! You cannot yell like that especially when we’re at a dinner party! Do you understand? I don’t want to hear another word from you all evening! Don’t yell at all again okay? Your name is Sally-Anne and you cannot go changing it and yelling at other people for calling you your real name! You are Sally-Anne McGregor, and a dignified McGregor doesn’t go around embarrassing people at dinner parties!”
Sal sat there, taking all this in. Her mother, the one who she thought would always love her, seemed to be yelling at her, just for being herself. Sal didn’t want to be called by her full name, she didn’t want her room pink and white, she didn’t want to have her hair in pigtails and her clothes all pink and white and looking cute. She just wanted to be who she was, drop the name Sally-Anne and be known as Sal by everybody.
Sal made no response to this outburst of her mothers temper, and allowed her mother to carry her back, as much as she didn’t want to go. Her mother sat her down, and with a last sharp look at her, turned back to the conversation.
More and more people came to be seated, many whom Sal did not know, but her parents knew very well. Emily and Kyle spent the rest of the evening greeting people such as Pauline Notting and her boyfriend Todd Hanson, career focused Olivia Bell and others. The waiter reappeared and orders were taken from everyone.
“And for Sally-Anne I’ll order-” Emily began.
Familiar rage rose up in Sal. She was still furious about what her mother had said to her in the bathroom and decided that nobody was going to stand over her anymore, even if it meant she was going to be rude. “A hotdog and chips,” Sal finished.
Emily glared at Sal while others around her laughed. “I can bring a hot dog for your daughter if that is what you want,” the waiter offered.
“Thank you very much but she will be having the kids size beef and vegetables please,” Emily forced herself to grin and gave the order to the waiter who shrugged and walked off, muttering something that sounded like, “That’s what leads them to rebellion.”
Sal frowned and sulked quietly, not daring to open her mouth again. Silence swept the table as Sandra Hellensberg stood up. Emily and Kyle looked over in awe also. “Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to introduce to you the Head of the Kilbourne Division, Lucidia Balloise,” Sandra spoke.
Lucidia smiled, her dark red lips moving upwards at the corners. Little Sal looked up and instantly a wave of bad feeling washed over her about Lucidia. She didn’t know whether it was the orange color of her hair that was darker and a more business like shade of Sal’s hair, or the icy blue eyes that seemed to be able to shoot shards of ice across at people. Perhaps it was the way she stood there, tall and in a navy pinstripe business suit, jacket and skirt with a white blouse and dark brown stockings. Whatever it was about her, Sal had an odd feeling.
“Hello, I’m sorry I’m so late,” Lucidia began, beaming a toothy smile at everyone before taking a seat. All eyes were still upon her when she continued talking. “There was some important business at the Kilbourne Division that I had to attend to. I’m not sure if they can handle it on their own so if I have to leave tonight then I’m very sorry in advance. Waiter!” She raised her hand and flagged down a waiter and gave him her order before turning back to the table. “So shall we discuss this business now?”
“Well we’ve sent the werewolf across,” Sandra told Lucidia. “But I won’t be coming down to Kilbourne Division for quite a while yet, I’ve decided to stay up here for a while until the next full moon at least. Kyle has volunteered to do a watch for more werewolf activity and I would like to be around for that.”
Lucidia scowled but then quickly smiled once more. “Well that’s okay then, I’m sure we can handle the progress of a werewolf for a month at least, I’m sure that’s very well. Do you mind if I make my way back up here in the next full moon or the day after depending on the progress at the Kilbourne Division to see what findings you have made?”
“Certainly,” Sandra nodded. “Oh good, food.” The waiter set down the meals in front of everybody and wishing them a ‘Bon Appetite’ left them to eat. Sal poked her tongue out at the food in front of her, refusing to eat. Conversation carried on around her, even though she took no notice of what the adults were saying. Sal was very mature for her age in some ways, and in other ways you wouldn’t suspect she had the slightest bit of maturity in her. She could understand what the adults were planning to do, she knew that her father and mother would be the only two members of the AWL to go out on the werewolf stakeout, and she knew that Lucidia wanted to come and view a capture.
She really didn’t care about any of this. She was too young to understand, so thought her mother. Sal knew that the werewolves were ordinary people with a disease and they shouldn’t be killed as if they were going to hurt others. She didn’t dare share this point of view with either her mother or father, just thinking about the response gave her nightmares that sent chills down her spine and woke her up in a cold sweat.
“Ah.” Lucidia suddenly gasped as she glanced down at her watch. She looked up at the table, where everybody had stopped at her sudden cry to watch her. Emily’s fork was half way to her mouth when she stopped. “I’m dreadfully sorry but I’m going to have to go, I have to be back at the Kilbourne Division by eleven thirty at the latest and it’s already getting to be late. Please do excuse me. I will be seeing you all shortly though, when I return to keep on standby with Sandra for the next werewolf stakeout. Thank you for this lovely dinner.” She stood up and picking up the small leather handbag which Sal had not seen her carry in, she pulled out a hundred dollar bill and placed it on the table. “This should cover more than my share of the bill,” she smiled. “Good night to you all,” and on these departing words, she exited the building.
*
The tranquilizer gun that captured the first werewolf for the AWL lay on the desk, waiting to be picked up and used tonight. Or so Kyle hoped anyway, as he headed out the kitchen and into the room in which the desk resided, picking up the tranquilizer gun and a packet of tranquilizer darts and shoving them into his backpack. Emily handed him a hot thermos flask with coffee and a thermal mug, before kissing him on the cheek. He snatched the walkie talkie, and his mobile phone from a draw in the desk and placed them into his bag also, before returning the kiss.
“You’ll be all right won’t you?” Emily asked.
“I’ll be fine, you should worry more about Sally-Anne,” Kyle smiled back. “Are you going to bring Sally-Anne to see me and say goodbye at shift change?” Emily nodded. “Well rug her up then, it looks as if it’s going to be a chilly night.”
Sal wandered into the room, now a month older and wiser. She knew the hunt was on tonight; her mother and father would always discuss it in front of her, unaware that she could hear and understand them. “Bye Daddy,” she said to Kyle, hugging his leg.
“Bye Sal,” Kyle grinned, ruffling her hair. She beamed up at him; her father was always her favorite, especially seeing that he called her Sal instead of her given name.
Emily glared at him. “Her name is Sally-Anne,” she growled through clenched teeth, trying to suppress her anger. Sal had learnt about her mothers temper as quickly as Kyle had, and had learnt that it was no use crying in front of her, crying in her mothers eyes was a sign of a sissy.
“Bye Sally-Anne,” Kyle corrected himself, kneeling down to hug her. “Sal,” he whispered playfully in her ear. She giggled.
Hours uneventfully passed, but Sal held a glowing inside of her, one that whenever her mother lost her temper (which was often) she would be able to let it slide off her back like water off a ducks back. It felt good to know that her father disagreed with her mother as much as she did about certain topics.
“Mummy, can I go to bed now?” Sal asked, yawning. Her mother had wanted her to stay up late so that she could take her down on the shift swap, but aside from being tired, Sal wanted to annoy her.
“No you have to stay up,” Emily answered. She glanced at the clock and got off the lounge. “Come on, put your jacket on, we’re going to go see your father.”
“Yay!” Sal cried, leaping off the lounge, then cast a look at her mother, who was fuming. “Sorry Mummy, inside voice.”
Still a firm scowl on her face, Emily nodded. “Put your jacket on now,” she managed to say calmly, fighting her urge to explode with anger. Sal followed this instruction, and they headed out the front door, with a fresh flask of hot coffee in Emily’s other hand. Walking down through the streets of Quentside Heights spooked Emily, and her tight grip on her daughter’s hand was beginning to affect the blood circulation.
They had taken a detour, instead of taking the main road, which lead around the whole city. Emily lead Sal through the side streets and the alleyways for the quickest way to get across to the other side of the city where her husband was. The moonlight their only light through some parts, scattering shadows wildly.
Suddenly Sal felt herself being yanked back, and she realized that her mother had stopped short. She looked up to Emily’s face, and saw the expression upon it. Emily was stricken with horror, her mouth open slightly, eyes wide and pupils dilated. She looked like a ghost, bathed in the moonlight, with her skin so pale. Sal turned to look at what made her mother so scared.
It lay in the middle of the pathway in a shallow pool of blood. Bite marks were all over it, but not human ones. Human bite marks didn’t rip chunks of skin out of the arms and legs and chest. By the looks of it, it had come as a surprise; the eyes were wide open, but moved not at all. Sal felt her insides tearing apart as she stared at her father.
Kyle lay dead on the sidewalk. On top of him sat a bloodstained werewolf, its lips up, teeth bared, growling. Emily took a step back, dropping the flask of coffee she had been holding. Sal fought the urge to cry and scream and run towards the werewolf at once. Emily pulled her daughter harshly back and behind her. Sal had no objections in following her mothers orders this time.
“What have you done? You FILTH! This is why we do what we do,” Emily announced, trying to be brave yet her voice quivered as she spoke. “You’re nothing but a useless freak. A freak of nature, a danger to society. You’re the reason, this” (clearly indicating her dead husband) “is the reason that the Anti-Werewolf League of Warroga was set up!”
The werewolf got up and stepped off Kyle, towards Emily and Sal. Emily quickly moved backwards. “You’re not brave are you,” the werewolf uttered, in a sleek voice that seemed to go totally against the harsh impression. The voice tingled the hairs on the back of Sal’s neck as she watched from behind Emily’s shaking knees. “I can see you knees shaking.” The werewolf shook her head. “Maybe next time you want to go locking up people you should lock those up with hearts of coal, just like yours.” Her voice had dropped to a hiss now, and a low snarling was coming from the pits of the werewolf’s throat.
“Get… Get away from me,” Emily stammered her order as the werewolf advanced. She stepped back before turning and bolting, picking up Sal and running as fast as she could. The werewolf jumped on her back, tackling both her and Sal, and horrified, Sal got up and tried to pull her mother out of the werewolf’s jaws. “Sal, leave me, go and run!” Emily shouted. Sal turned and ran as fast as her short legs would carry her. Tired, she stopped and glanced around the corner she had just run around. The werewolf had finished with her mother and was advancing after Sal.
If Sal hadn’t been overcome by her instinct, she would have wet her pants. Instead she turned and ran as fast as she could the other way. With a bounding leap the werewolf appeared in front of her. Sal turned to run the other way, and came face to face with the werewolf again. “Are you…” she trailed off in a timid voice.
“No I’m not going to kill you,” the werewolf simply answered her question. With a smile the werewolf continued. “You don’t deserve to die. You weren’t the one who put Nade in a cage and sent him off for testing. You had nothing to do with it. But, I do think that it would be a danger to the werewolves of Warroga if I let you just wander free.”
Sal stared at her, her face blank. The werewolf in front of her grinned, and snapped its teeth together. Sal closed her eyes and held out her arm.
~Mist
Chapter One
“Honey, I have to leave for an emergency at work.” A woman, tall, with a slim figure, turned at hearing this news. Her eyes soon lost that sapphire sparkle, and showed evident signs that she was experiencing a mixture of feelings.
“Is everything all right?” she asked. She stood up fully, picking up a small child in her arms and brushing loose bits of carrot colored hair out of her eyes. “Why are you being called into work so late at night? It’s-”
“Almost nine, I know,” her husband answered. “But Emily, Sandra Hellensberg called and by the sounds of it, it sounded urgent.”
“What could be so urgent working in the Anti-Werewolf League?” Emily McGregor questioned. She sighed, walking over to the kitchen and picking up a small bottle of juice and handing it to the child down by her legs. “Can’t somebody else fill in for you Kyle?”
“I don’t know, but Sandra did mention something about a sighting,” Kyle answered, trying to sort through his briefcase and talk at the same time. He hurriedly picked up items from his desk and shoved them in, before looking at them quizzically and taking them out again.
Emily walked over to the desk and opened one of its many draws and reached right in to the bottom, and pulled out what looked to be a sniper rifle. Handing it to Kyle she kissed him on the cheek. “Its not loaded with bullets, but with tranquilizer darts,” she told him. “But please be careful Kyle, if something happens to you then there’s only me and Sally-Anne left.” She looked up into his dark green eyes pleadingly. “I worry about you,” she told him.
Kyle put the sniper into his suitcase and locked it. “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine. And if you do happen to be called in, bring Sally-Anne with you. If you are called, everything will probably be fine anyway.” Kyle grinned a cheeky grin at her and kissed her, before picking up the suitcase. “I’ll see you later. Bye-bye little Sal, Daddy will be home later tonight.” He ruffled the thick reddish hair on top of Sally-Anne’s head.
“Don’t call her Sal, her name is Sally-Anne,” Emily told him, shaking her head as he turned and exited out the door. Emily walked over and watched him out the window walking down the dark street before blending into the dark shadows. “Right missy,” Emily smiled, picking up Sally-Anne while she suckled on her bottle still, the juice slowly disappearing into her tiny mouth. She carried her across the narrow hallway and into her bedroom, decorated in a style, which you could call cute for a four year old.
The room was loosely based on the color scheme pink and white. The only visible non pink and white thing in the room happened to be the clothes that Emily was wearing, baggy tan pants and a grass green hooded sweatshirt with words in yellow block letters across the chest reading “Warroga National Running Club”, Warroga being the country in which they resided.
Warroga had only become settled in the last fifty to a hundred years, but was still a very empty country despite the six million people living and immigrating into the country. It had very little land, and what land that wasn’t settled and civilized with cities and towns was covered in a mass stretch of forests and meadows. In the area that the McGregor’s lived, most of the forest had been cleared away for the installation of a city where people lived almost on top of each other. The houses weren’t in one big row and all together like the English style terraced houses, but were apart and each had a small backyard. But Quentside wasn’t the nicest of areas to live in, it was a big area for those who were immigrating out of either third world countries, or with little money to live, and despite the fact that both Emily and Kyle McGregor had high positions in the Anti-Werewolf League, they still couldn’t afford to raise Sally-Anne and move to a better area.
At least they didn’t have to live in the Mount District. Emily always put it like that when houses in neighboring streets were robbed, or gangs had attacked somebody and left them to bleed for hours until morning, or syringes were left pointing upwards in bus station seats. Somehow, the Mount District seemed to top this bad reputation with a worse one, involving muggings in broad daylight, drug addicts running around and shooting other innocent people with syringes, nobody bothering to work or pay any attention to the law, and people living on the streets once they were kicked out of their rental properties with three months of overdue notices.
Emily had always dreamed of one day getting a transfer at the Anti-Werewolf League to a nice place, maybe in the Northern Residence. This was the area in the North and Northeast, which contained the suburbs packed with mansions each with a swimming pool, two tennis courts and a butler or maid. It was in this area that contained the capital of Warroga, a clean street city by the name of Norton, named after the last son of Jamison Warroga, the discoverer of Warroga.
That was many years ago, and now Warroga had a different threat to its nation. Twenty years ago, a group of young business majors at a university were camping out in the woods when they awoke and discovered that a wolf had decided to join them in their tent. The group had screamed, but quickly realized that this wasn’t an ordinary wolf, the teeth seemed smaller yet more pointed, the tail was longer and much more bushier, and the general build was more delicate than a regular wolf, and to top it all off the eyes were bright blue.
That group had feared being attacked and sat cowering at the back of the tent until sunrise, when the wolf turned and bounded. Carefully, they peeked out the tent flaps after the wolf and watched as the wolf ran and watched the wolf slowly changing with every bounding leap it took. The body became slimmer, the fur disappearing in a quick motion, as if it were shrinking back into the skin, and clothes reappearing. The tail shriveled up, the paws changed from paws to hands and shoes, and before changing the course of its mad dash into a thick clump of trees, the group watching timidly from the tent saw in the place of a running wolf was a running boy, of about nineteen.
They had realized that werewolves were not just myths but real creatures, and real threats. The Anti-Werewolf League started a year later. Its aim; to remove the werewolf population in the hope for a safer country. Emily and Kyle McGregor held very high positions in the Board of Directors for the Quentside Division, under the ruling of the current President of the AWL for all of Warroga, Sandra Hellensberg.
Emily sunk into these thoughts as she put Sally-Anne to bed, thinking about how her life was now devoted to more than just the AWL, but to her daughter as well. And for the safety of her daughter, she would have to work harder at the AWL.
She jumped as the phone gave a shrill ring, and got up from Sally-Anne’s bed to go into the next room to answer it. “Hello?” she said into the receiver, looking around the room and out the windows. She felt uneasy answering the phone late at night all alone, especially after seeing a few horror movies.
“It’s me Emily,” Kyle replied, his voice shaking with uncontrollable excitement. “Look, there was a sighting, and between me, Michael Kent, Christopher Laskey, Wendy Esteen and Sandra Hellensberg, we managed to capture a werewolf.”
“Really? That’s great!” Emily cheered, her spirits soaring. “So are you going to test it and do research?”
“Not us personally, but they’re sending it to the Kilbourne AWL. There’s much more advanced facilities at that division. But I’m just so excited!”
“Me too! Can you imagine what this means?”
“Yes of course I can. Oh, and also, there’s a celebratory dinner tomorrow night at the nicest place in town, the Quentside Quay. It’s supposed to have a really high reputation, considering the area its in.”
“Where is it?”
“Dragoness High Street.”
“I don’t think that’s safe, going into the main street of town at night.”
“We’ll be perfectly safe, don’t worry about a thing. I’m coming home soon so don’t wait up okay?”
“Okay, bye.”
Emily sighed as she put down the phone. As much as she wanted to have a celebratory dinner she knew it would be dangerous just thinking of going to Dragoness High Street at dusk, let alone night going in at night. She shuddered at the thoughts of recent headlines. Night attack on Dragoness, Guy found guilty of mutilation, All twenty shops empty next morning. She didn’t want to think about what went unreported.
A howl outside, floating into the silent room, caused Emily’s thoughts to shift from unsolvable murders to the joy that she had shared only moments before. For the first time in history the AWL had a captured werewolf, which would help them in finding other werewolves and finally ridding Warroga from all werewolves. She stirred the cup of cocoa she had been absentmindedly been making and sat down on the lounge, taking a sip.
A world without werewolves, she liked the thought of that.
*
“Are you ready honey?” Kyle called from the living room, holding a dressed up Sally-Anne on his knee, trying to desperately do up her little pink denim jacket. He smoothed back his wild hair with his hand, in a hopeless attempt to keep it lying flat. His wife walked out the room, not dressed up as you would if you were going to be attending a business dinner, but to give the impression that she was just an ordinary person going to an ordinary night out in Quentside, an ordinary person who shouldn’t need to give the impression that she was wealthy, or had a reasonable amount of money. An ordinary person trying to give off the impression that she wasn’t to be targeted.
“I’m ready,” she replied, taking Sally-Anne off his knee and grabbing her bottle of juice from the kitchen bench. She stopped in the front mirror to fix up her hair. Kyle rolled his eyes as he pushed her out the front door and onto the porch.
“You’re not supposed to be dressing up, and it still takes you at least half an hour to get ready,” he commented jokingly. Emily rolled her eyes and buckled Sally-Anne into her booster seat.
“Mummy!” Sally-Anne cried, pulling on Emily’s hair. She squealed with excitement and waved her arms around. Emily laughed at how cute her daughter was and uncurled the small fingers that gripped tightly around her hair before shutting the door and getting in herself.
Kyle had already started up the car and was drumming his fingers in beat with the song on the radio while waiting for Emily to get buckled up. The heavy riffs blasted out from the speakers as he nodded his head to every smash of the drum. “Turn that music down,” Emily told him, before sighing and doing it herself. “Honestly, with all this noise I’m not sure that Sally-Anne will grow up knowing what real music is.”
“You mean that stuff that sounds like a hundred cats yowling at once?” Kyle grinned as he backed the car out of the drive and began to head down their street for the main town.
“It’s called Mozart,” Emily snapped, annoyed at the rude accusation placed on her favorite music. “And it’s not yowling either. It’s classical orchestra.”
“Yeah its classic all right,” Kyle scoffed. He cast a sideways glance while driving at his wife, whose quick temper had flared up and lead her to keeping her mouth shut but sitting quietly with the look of somebody biting into a sour lemon upon her face. “Look, I’m sorry that I offended your music, but you offended mine first.”
“You are so immature sometimes, do you realize that?” Emily scorned, before turning and looking out the window. The car was quiet for about a moment, the tension so thick you could cut it with a knife and serve it in between two slices of bread.
“Mummy and Daddy don’t fight.” The car halted to a stop at red lights and both Kyle and Emily turned around to look at Sally-Anne. “Don’t be mean. Be friends.”
“Wow,” Emily said quietly as the car started once again. “I didn’t realize we were having that effect on her.”
“So do you accept my apology?” Kyle asked her.
“Yes,” Emily grinned. “But it doesn’t sound like cats yowling.” She stayed quiet for the rest of the car journey, angry and sulking at Kyle’s accusation. She had no idea that her daughter had a mind as clever as hers; she had no idea that what she said and did had an effect on her at all. “Sally-Anne? I’m sorry Daddy and I were fighting.”
“Fighting is bad,” Sally-Anne nodded from the back.
“She talks a lot for a three year old,” Kyle commented, grinning. He drove around the block once more, trying to find a parking spot near to Quentside Quay.
“Like you!” Sally-Anne squealed to Kyle. Emily laughed, and Kyle, who tried not to find that funny, couldn’t suppress the wide grin it put on his face.
“She’s really smart you know,” Emily told him.
“Oh, shut up,” Kyle snapped, but the grin on his face clearly told everybody who looked that he wasn’t mad at all, he was just pretending.
“Can you find a parking spot?” Emily asked as they circled the block for a third time. “It’s getting close to dinner time.”
“Sal hungry!” Sally-Anne cried from the back.
This time neither of her parents paid attention to that cry of protest from the backseat. “There’s one!” Kyle quickly swerved the car into the freshly made spot as another car, this time a rust bucket road unworthy car, drove out, most probably stolen.
They stepped out the car and holding Sally-Anne’s hand, they made their way around the block. “It’s almost seven,” Emily panicked, looking at her watch. “We can’t be late, especially since one of the executives from Kilbourne division is supposed to be there!” She began to fasten her pace, but Kyle merely grinned at her frantic attempt to be there quickly. “What are you doing Kyle?!” she yelled at him furiously, stamping her foot and glaring at him. “We’re going to be late!”
“No we’re not,” Kyle grinned, thoroughly irritating Emily. “I know a shortcut,” and he took her hand and led both her and Sally-Anne down an alleyway and emerged at the other side. Down the street from where they stood was a brightly lit formal eatery, with thick black security bars surrounding the windows and glass door. They opened the glass door and stepped inside, feeling the warmth of hot food, candles and heating snuggle them and defrost their frozen faces and hands.
“Name please,” a waiter in a suit questioned, looking over the reservation book, searching for a name, which he did not yet know.
“McGregor, Kyle, Emily and Sally-Anne,” Kyle answered him. “We’re here for the AWL party.”
“Party!” Sally-Anne cried, and began to jump up and down. Emily bent down to calm her hyped up daughter.
“This way sir.” They followed the waiter, Sally-Anne still bouncing, to another room where a long table with about fifteen or so chairs was set for them. Sandra Hellensberg was at one end, seated with Michael Kent and his wife Angelica Kent, and down from them sat Christopher Laskey with his son Jamie, and on the opposite side of the table sat Wendy Esteen and Randal Esteen. Emily and Kyle took their places across from Wendy and Randal and began chatting away about such subjects, which did not interest Sally-Anne to hear about.
She got down from her seat and crawled under the table to join Jamie Laskey who had already made himself comfortable down there with a handful of bread sticks. “Want one?” he offered handing them out. Jamie Laskey was two years older than Sal; he was five whereas she was only three. Even so, Sal would still be the bossier out of the two.
“Mine,” she grinned, taking one and eating it.
“Sally-Anne you look beautiful,” Jamie told her as she ate her breadstick. The smile on Sal’s face looked as if it was wiped off with a cloth and replaced by a menacing frown.
“Don’t call me Sally-Anne!” she yelled, and going for him with his fist. “Sal!”
The table shook from above and in an instant reaction, both Emily and Christopher Laskey dived down and picked up their children. “Sally-Anne what are you doing?” Emily demanded.
“Jamie Laskey what did you do to Sally-Anne?” Christopher Laskey questioned.
“He called me Sally-Anne!” Sal cried, tears of frustration appearing in her eyes.
“She got angry and yelled at me when I said Sally-Anne you look beautiful,” Jamie told his father, his large eyes showing signs of confusion and fear.
“He called me Sally-Anne!” she cried, louder this time.
“Excuse me for a minute,” Emily apologized, before picking up Sal and carrying her to the bathroom. She sat her down on the vanity next to the sink and looked at her hard in the face. Sal stopped her crying, realizing that her mother wasn’t the usual cheery person she was. “Sally-Anne McGregor I am ashamed! You cannot yell like that especially when we’re at a dinner party! Do you understand? I don’t want to hear another word from you all evening! Don’t yell at all again okay? Your name is Sally-Anne and you cannot go changing it and yelling at other people for calling you your real name! You are Sally-Anne McGregor, and a dignified McGregor doesn’t go around embarrassing people at dinner parties!”
Sal sat there, taking all this in. Her mother, the one who she thought would always love her, seemed to be yelling at her, just for being herself. Sal didn’t want to be called by her full name, she didn’t want her room pink and white, she didn’t want to have her hair in pigtails and her clothes all pink and white and looking cute. She just wanted to be who she was, drop the name Sally-Anne and be known as Sal by everybody.
Sal made no response to this outburst of her mothers temper, and allowed her mother to carry her back, as much as she didn’t want to go. Her mother sat her down, and with a last sharp look at her, turned back to the conversation.
More and more people came to be seated, many whom Sal did not know, but her parents knew very well. Emily and Kyle spent the rest of the evening greeting people such as Pauline Notting and her boyfriend Todd Hanson, career focused Olivia Bell and others. The waiter reappeared and orders were taken from everyone.
“And for Sally-Anne I’ll order-” Emily began.
Familiar rage rose up in Sal. She was still furious about what her mother had said to her in the bathroom and decided that nobody was going to stand over her anymore, even if it meant she was going to be rude. “A hotdog and chips,” Sal finished.
Emily glared at Sal while others around her laughed. “I can bring a hot dog for your daughter if that is what you want,” the waiter offered.
“Thank you very much but she will be having the kids size beef and vegetables please,” Emily forced herself to grin and gave the order to the waiter who shrugged and walked off, muttering something that sounded like, “That’s what leads them to rebellion.”
Sal frowned and sulked quietly, not daring to open her mouth again. Silence swept the table as Sandra Hellensberg stood up. Emily and Kyle looked over in awe also. “Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to introduce to you the Head of the Kilbourne Division, Lucidia Balloise,” Sandra spoke.
Lucidia smiled, her dark red lips moving upwards at the corners. Little Sal looked up and instantly a wave of bad feeling washed over her about Lucidia. She didn’t know whether it was the orange color of her hair that was darker and a more business like shade of Sal’s hair, or the icy blue eyes that seemed to be able to shoot shards of ice across at people. Perhaps it was the way she stood there, tall and in a navy pinstripe business suit, jacket and skirt with a white blouse and dark brown stockings. Whatever it was about her, Sal had an odd feeling.
“Hello, I’m sorry I’m so late,” Lucidia began, beaming a toothy smile at everyone before taking a seat. All eyes were still upon her when she continued talking. “There was some important business at the Kilbourne Division that I had to attend to. I’m not sure if they can handle it on their own so if I have to leave tonight then I’m very sorry in advance. Waiter!” She raised her hand and flagged down a waiter and gave him her order before turning back to the table. “So shall we discuss this business now?”
“Well we’ve sent the werewolf across,” Sandra told Lucidia. “But I won’t be coming down to Kilbourne Division for quite a while yet, I’ve decided to stay up here for a while until the next full moon at least. Kyle has volunteered to do a watch for more werewolf activity and I would like to be around for that.”
Lucidia scowled but then quickly smiled once more. “Well that’s okay then, I’m sure we can handle the progress of a werewolf for a month at least, I’m sure that’s very well. Do you mind if I make my way back up here in the next full moon or the day after depending on the progress at the Kilbourne Division to see what findings you have made?”
“Certainly,” Sandra nodded. “Oh good, food.” The waiter set down the meals in front of everybody and wishing them a ‘Bon Appetite’ left them to eat. Sal poked her tongue out at the food in front of her, refusing to eat. Conversation carried on around her, even though she took no notice of what the adults were saying. Sal was very mature for her age in some ways, and in other ways you wouldn’t suspect she had the slightest bit of maturity in her. She could understand what the adults were planning to do, she knew that her father and mother would be the only two members of the AWL to go out on the werewolf stakeout, and she knew that Lucidia wanted to come and view a capture.
She really didn’t care about any of this. She was too young to understand, so thought her mother. Sal knew that the werewolves were ordinary people with a disease and they shouldn’t be killed as if they were going to hurt others. She didn’t dare share this point of view with either her mother or father, just thinking about the response gave her nightmares that sent chills down her spine and woke her up in a cold sweat.
“Ah.” Lucidia suddenly gasped as she glanced down at her watch. She looked up at the table, where everybody had stopped at her sudden cry to watch her. Emily’s fork was half way to her mouth when she stopped. “I’m dreadfully sorry but I’m going to have to go, I have to be back at the Kilbourne Division by eleven thirty at the latest and it’s already getting to be late. Please do excuse me. I will be seeing you all shortly though, when I return to keep on standby with Sandra for the next werewolf stakeout. Thank you for this lovely dinner.” She stood up and picking up the small leather handbag which Sal had not seen her carry in, she pulled out a hundred dollar bill and placed it on the table. “This should cover more than my share of the bill,” she smiled. “Good night to you all,” and on these departing words, she exited the building.
*
The tranquilizer gun that captured the first werewolf for the AWL lay on the desk, waiting to be picked up and used tonight. Or so Kyle hoped anyway, as he headed out the kitchen and into the room in which the desk resided, picking up the tranquilizer gun and a packet of tranquilizer darts and shoving them into his backpack. Emily handed him a hot thermos flask with coffee and a thermal mug, before kissing him on the cheek. He snatched the walkie talkie, and his mobile phone from a draw in the desk and placed them into his bag also, before returning the kiss.
“You’ll be all right won’t you?” Emily asked.
“I’ll be fine, you should worry more about Sally-Anne,” Kyle smiled back. “Are you going to bring Sally-Anne to see me and say goodbye at shift change?” Emily nodded. “Well rug her up then, it looks as if it’s going to be a chilly night.”
Sal wandered into the room, now a month older and wiser. She knew the hunt was on tonight; her mother and father would always discuss it in front of her, unaware that she could hear and understand them. “Bye Daddy,” she said to Kyle, hugging his leg.
“Bye Sal,” Kyle grinned, ruffling her hair. She beamed up at him; her father was always her favorite, especially seeing that he called her Sal instead of her given name.
Emily glared at him. “Her name is Sally-Anne,” she growled through clenched teeth, trying to suppress her anger. Sal had learnt about her mothers temper as quickly as Kyle had, and had learnt that it was no use crying in front of her, crying in her mothers eyes was a sign of a sissy.
“Bye Sally-Anne,” Kyle corrected himself, kneeling down to hug her. “Sal,” he whispered playfully in her ear. She giggled.
Hours uneventfully passed, but Sal held a glowing inside of her, one that whenever her mother lost her temper (which was often) she would be able to let it slide off her back like water off a ducks back. It felt good to know that her father disagreed with her mother as much as she did about certain topics.
“Mummy, can I go to bed now?” Sal asked, yawning. Her mother had wanted her to stay up late so that she could take her down on the shift swap, but aside from being tired, Sal wanted to annoy her.
“No you have to stay up,” Emily answered. She glanced at the clock and got off the lounge. “Come on, put your jacket on, we’re going to go see your father.”
“Yay!” Sal cried, leaping off the lounge, then cast a look at her mother, who was fuming. “Sorry Mummy, inside voice.”
Still a firm scowl on her face, Emily nodded. “Put your jacket on now,” she managed to say calmly, fighting her urge to explode with anger. Sal followed this instruction, and they headed out the front door, with a fresh flask of hot coffee in Emily’s other hand. Walking down through the streets of Quentside Heights spooked Emily, and her tight grip on her daughter’s hand was beginning to affect the blood circulation.
They had taken a detour, instead of taking the main road, which lead around the whole city. Emily lead Sal through the side streets and the alleyways for the quickest way to get across to the other side of the city where her husband was. The moonlight their only light through some parts, scattering shadows wildly.
Suddenly Sal felt herself being yanked back, and she realized that her mother had stopped short. She looked up to Emily’s face, and saw the expression upon it. Emily was stricken with horror, her mouth open slightly, eyes wide and pupils dilated. She looked like a ghost, bathed in the moonlight, with her skin so pale. Sal turned to look at what made her mother so scared.
It lay in the middle of the pathway in a shallow pool of blood. Bite marks were all over it, but not human ones. Human bite marks didn’t rip chunks of skin out of the arms and legs and chest. By the looks of it, it had come as a surprise; the eyes were wide open, but moved not at all. Sal felt her insides tearing apart as she stared at her father.
Kyle lay dead on the sidewalk. On top of him sat a bloodstained werewolf, its lips up, teeth bared, growling. Emily took a step back, dropping the flask of coffee she had been holding. Sal fought the urge to cry and scream and run towards the werewolf at once. Emily pulled her daughter harshly back and behind her. Sal had no objections in following her mothers orders this time.
“What have you done? You FILTH! This is why we do what we do,” Emily announced, trying to be brave yet her voice quivered as she spoke. “You’re nothing but a useless freak. A freak of nature, a danger to society. You’re the reason, this” (clearly indicating her dead husband) “is the reason that the Anti-Werewolf League of Warroga was set up!”
The werewolf got up and stepped off Kyle, towards Emily and Sal. Emily quickly moved backwards. “You’re not brave are you,” the werewolf uttered, in a sleek voice that seemed to go totally against the harsh impression. The voice tingled the hairs on the back of Sal’s neck as she watched from behind Emily’s shaking knees. “I can see you knees shaking.” The werewolf shook her head. “Maybe next time you want to go locking up people you should lock those up with hearts of coal, just like yours.” Her voice had dropped to a hiss now, and a low snarling was coming from the pits of the werewolf’s throat.
“Get… Get away from me,” Emily stammered her order as the werewolf advanced. She stepped back before turning and bolting, picking up Sal and running as fast as she could. The werewolf jumped on her back, tackling both her and Sal, and horrified, Sal got up and tried to pull her mother out of the werewolf’s jaws. “Sal, leave me, go and run!” Emily shouted. Sal turned and ran as fast as her short legs would carry her. Tired, she stopped and glanced around the corner she had just run around. The werewolf had finished with her mother and was advancing after Sal.
If Sal hadn’t been overcome by her instinct, she would have wet her pants. Instead she turned and ran as fast as she could the other way. With a bounding leap the werewolf appeared in front of her. Sal turned to run the other way, and came face to face with the werewolf again. “Are you…” she trailed off in a timid voice.
“No I’m not going to kill you,” the werewolf simply answered her question. With a smile the werewolf continued. “You don’t deserve to die. You weren’t the one who put Nade in a cage and sent him off for testing. You had nothing to do with it. But, I do think that it would be a danger to the werewolves of Warroga if I let you just wander free.”
Sal stared at her, her face blank. The werewolf in front of her grinned, and snapped its teeth together. Sal closed her eyes and held out her arm.