“Sam!” Kingsley gasped, pressing his face into the square opening. “What...what are you doing here?”
Now that I saw him like this—desperate, wild, angry, shocked, and in mid-transformation—I wanted to unsee it. I also wanted to unsmell what I was smelling. Maybe this was a bad idea.
But it wasn’t. I needed him. I needed help.
“I...I have to speak to you—”
“Leave, Sam!” he growled, and turned away from the square, I could see him pacing through the opening, passing back and forth behind it. God, he looked massive, the few glimpses I saw.
“I’m sorry, Kingsley, but I can’t.”
“I’m warning you, Sam...”
He wasn’t himself. I could see that. Or, rather, he was tapping into a very, very angry and primal and hate-filled part of him.
The demon, I thought. It’s the demon coming through.
I powered on, “How do I stop a werewolf?”
I knew all the stories. I’d heard all the rumors. The truth was, I really didn’t know. It wasn’t a question I’d ever needed to ask Kingsley. I suspected Fang would know the answer. But I didn’t feed into rumors or legends. I needed to know facts, and I needed to stop Gunther tonight.
“Why, Sam?” he growled, pacing behind the small opening, each footfall shaking the ground beneath me. If I had to guess, I would guess that he was easily a foot taller, and maybe another hundred pounds heavier.
And he would only get bigger.
And stronger.
“Gunther has another hiker. A woman this time. A woman I know, well, kind of, long story—”
“Enough!” he roared, and I shrank back. And it took a godawful lot to get me to shrink back. But never, never had I heard such force and powerful volume from a human.
Because he isn’t human, I thought. At least, not now.
I knew Kingsley could transform into a wolf—as in an actual wolf—at will. Few werewolves had this ability to shapeshift. But on the night of the full moon, he didn’t turn into a wolf. No, he turned into a hulking, hybrid monster. A true wolfman.
We were still hours from dusk and already he’d changed so much. I knew his transformation was a slow, painful process for him. Unlike the wolf that he could conjure quickly—which, I suspected, was closer to what I did with the winged Talos—his monthly transformation into a hulking beast was nearly unbearable for him. After all, this was when the entity within made a full appearance and, while doing so, apparently delighted in torturing Kingsley along the way.
“I don’t care about the hiker, Sam...” His voice rattled, rumbled, like an idling Harley.
“You do, Kingsley,” I said. I almost said ‘Wolfie,’ which was my term of endearment for him, although he didn’t much like it...unless, of course, we were in his bedroom.
He yanked his head away from the square opening and stretched his neck to and fro, and I saw what was happening. His neck was getting bigger. Muscle mass was appearing before my eyes. Muscle mass and fur. He grunted and might have whimpered.
“Leave, Sam. Leave, goddammit.”
This wasn’t the Kingsley I knew. The man I knew was attentive and playful, even if a little stubborn. This creature, stalking behind the door, was only a semblance of the man I now loved. The immortal I loved.
“Kingsley, please—”
He growled as he paced behind the door. I could only see flashes of him behind the small window. The flashes that I saw were horrific at best. With each passing minute, I would lose more and more of him. I doggedly asked my question.
“How do I stop a werewolf, Kingsley?”
I saw him shaking his head as he paced. “Too strong,” he was saying, mumbling. “Too strong, even for you.”
I wasn’t so sure about that, but I wasn’t going to argue the point.
Kingsley went on: “Kill and destroy and feed, and will fight to the death once engaged.”
“Then tell me how to defeat him, Kingsley.”
“Don’t do it, Sam. Wait...for me.”
“He has to be stopped. Tonight.”
He didn’t like my answer and pulled away angrily. His heavy footfalls seemed heavier than just a few minutes earlier. His great head and beefy shoulders appeared and disappeared through the square opening.
Now, I pressed my face into the square opening. “Tell me, Kingsley. Tell me what you know.”
I sensed his hesitation. After all, once I knew how to defeat a werewolf, I would know how to defeat him, too. A small, protective side of him was keeping that information from me. Or not. But that was my guess.
Suddenly, Kingsley’s thick, sweating, panting face appeared just inches from mine. I saw the fangs pushing through his gums, which bled profusely. It was only noon and he was suffering so much. I had no idea he went through such a prolonged, hellish transformation. And he still had many hours to go. How many hours, exactly, I didn’t know. When did a werewolf turn into a full-blown werewolf? At sunset? At dusk? At midnight? At the first sign of the full moon? I didn’t know exactly. But looking at Kingsley now, it looked like the transformation wasn’t very far away.
And I still had to find Gunther.
Shit...
“We are not so different, Sam,” he said, gasping. Blood bubbled between his lips. “The same silver that kills you, kills me.”
“A silver dagger—”
“No, Sam. You’ll never get close enough with a dagger. He’ll be too fast, too powerful. You’ve never seen anything like this, Sam.”
“Then what?”
“A silver bullet.”
“But where...”
“Franklin...” he gasped. “Franklin has them. Just in case...”
He held my gaze, although his bloodshot eyes wavered. I got his meaning: just in case he ever got out and needed to be put down. Of course, he had gotten out a few years ago. Where was Franklin then? A question for another time.
“Go, Sam! Leave me be!”
With that, he slammed his huge hands against the door, and kept slamming them until I gulped and skittered off down the hallway, back to where Franklin was still waiting in the shadows. The thick, metal wall vibrated. More dust and dirt sifted down.
* * *
Upstairs in the oversized kitchen, as Franklin locked the door that led down into the cellar, I said, “That smell...”
“A deer carcass,” said Franklin, turning to look down at me as he pocketed the key. “I hunted it last week.”
I nodded, sickened and relieved...relieved that it wasn’t a human corpse. Sickened that I kiss that mouth of his. “And it’s been rotting down here ever since, I presume.”