Beneath a Winter Moon (42 page)

“You are wrong.”

“Go to hell,
nutford
.”

“Oh, I have no doubt where I am going when my time comes, Delmar…but you can rest assured that
you
will already be there.”

For a moment, Delmar thought of his cancer. The man was probably right…he
would
be in hell long before Alastair.

Thomas, who had been studying the intricate water system at the kitchen sink, heard Alastair’s comment and turned around to face him. “Remember what I said.”

“Fuck you,
ya
stupid fucking child!” Thomas involuntarily took a step back at Alastair’s outburst, and he bumped into the counter. Delmar also leaned back, his expression frozen in place by the surprising display. Alastair’s eyes were huge, and his teeth were gritted. He looked absolutely mad. “You fucking man-child! I told you to let me go, but you act like you are on a damned crusade! A crusade of good! Hometown soldier makes good!” He laughed, and the laugh was guttural. Thomas glanced at Delmar, who sat silent, his mouth hanging open. “You fucking asked for it, boys. Aye! You asked for it. I told you to fucking let me go, but now it’s too late. He’s coming, idiot fools! He…is…coming.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Jack went completely nuts, growling and snarling from behind Delmar. His teeth were bared and saliva shot from his jaws as he snapped them. Thomas ran around the table and subdued him, dragging him back toward the foyer. He attached the leash to his harness and snapped the D-ring around the neck of the doorknob. He quickly finished and came back to the table where Alastair seemed to have calmed a bit. Just then, they heard Jenny cry out and saw her scramble toward the couch, only stopping for a second to look directly at Alastair. He stared back, and smiled. Thomas saw the smile, and his nerves snapped.

He opened his hands as if looking for something to strike Alastair with, and then removed the knife from his pocket. He slammed it so that it stuck in the center of the table just in front of Alastair’s face. “I’ll skin you alive, so help me God.” he leaned forward, about to say something else, when he saw beads of sweat pop out of Alastair’s forehead and face. Had Thomas’s threat worked so easily on the defiant Scot? Thomas pulled the knife out of the table and began to move the tip of it toward Alastair’s face. The man jumped back and away from it and shook his head.

Thomas frowned. “Is it the knife, Alastair, or is it
this
knife that scares you? You really are a crazy bastard, aren’t you? A damned loon. Is this knife some special thing? A religious thing, maybe? Well, that is great…all the better for when I cut out your damned eyes.” He didn’t mean it, he knew. He had already calmed down, his heart slowing as he regained control of his breathing. Oh, he did want to hurt the man for scaring Jenny…but he doubted he really would have done it. Thomas looked over at Delmar, who raised his eyebrows and looked back.

“Holy shit, Hero,” was all Delmar said.

Alastair wanted to spit at Thomas, to somehow wrestle the knife away and slice out the man’s heart…but the knife was now more of a danger to himself. Just a touch from the blade would burn him like fire. A thrust into the chest and Alastair would be dead…at least until the knife were removed.

Alastair’s outburst was caused by a failed attempt to transform. He couldn’t see how dark it was outside, and had thought that maybe it was close enough. Not only had the attempt failed, but it had also drained all of his energy in the process. Now, Thomas and Delmar once again held the upper hand, if only for a time.
The damned knife!
If only he had hidden it…but then how would he have known to do it?

He had tried to use silver on himself just after the stock market crashed during the beginning of the great depression. He’d lost almost everything, and the authorities in
New York
had taken an interest in him with regard to several gruesome murders and missing persons. They had questioned him three times, and they were not giving up.

Just as it was when he awoke to find that he had murdered his wife and son, Alastair had again reached his limit. He stole the alter bowl from a nearby church and ordered that a knife be crafted from the almost pure silver. He waited patiently, and when it was finished, he took it to a bewildered priest, who reluctantly blessed the knife. Alastair went home and lay on his bed, grasped the silver knife with hands that were wrapped in cloth so as to protect them from the silver…and plunged it into his heart.

Two days later a coroner’s assistant was reprimanded for the disappearance of a corpse…Alastair’s corpse. The young man had lifted the silver bladed knife, astonished that the cops had not stolen the beautiful weapon for themselves. Their loss was his gain, he had figured. Quitting time came during the middle of Alastair’s autopsy, so the young man had covered the body and slid it back in its drawer. The morning shift found the cadaver doors mangled and Alastair’s body missing.

Strangely, a few days later the knife, which the young man had stolen (claiming it was not with the body when it was delivered), turned up missing from his small apartment. Someone had broken in and taken the knife, leaving everything else intact. An eerie message had been carved into the plaster walls near the door. “Beware the Moon.”

Thomas slipped the knife into his pocket and smiled. Delmar merely watched as Thomas vaulted across the room to the gun cabinet. For a moment, Delmar thought that his friend was going to shoot the man. Thomas told Jenny that everything was okay, then slowly walked back to the table. Alastair and Delmar both stared. He set the small, black box onto the table and reached for the duct tape once more. Alastair protested, cursing him, but Thomas slammed the tape home.

 “You know, I think it’s time to free ourselves of this burden,” Thomas said, looking into Alastair’s eyes. The man cocked his head sideways at the comment. Thomas nodded. “It will be dark in a half hour, which is when Alastair here says that the thing…will come to the cabin.” He paused, looking over to Delmar. “I don’t want Alastair interfering when that happens.” He opened the small box of tranquilizers. “He says these won’t work on the…monster, but he said nothing about how they would work on…him.”

Alastair tried to speak through the tape, shaking his head furiously.

“Are you sure, Thom…”

“I’m doing it,” Thomas said.

Delmar nodded and grasped Alastair’s hands, stretching them out over the table. Thomas tapped the tranquilizer dart hard onto the table so that it would begin to release its payload. He jammed it into Alastair’s arm. The Scot tried to cry out, but at the moment the wail escaped his mouth, his head fell limply to the table with a soft thud.

Delmar stared. Thomas leaned close to Alastair’s face. “He’s breathing just fine,” he said.

“Pity,” Delmar replied.

“Better remove the tape, though, and we need to get him on his side, in case he vomits,” Thomas said. Delmar stepped around to help Thomas just as he removed the tape from Alastair’s face. Alastair’s head fell back and he began snoring loudly. Together, Delmar and Thomas half dragged, half carried Alastair to his bedroom. They lowered him to his bed and Thomas carefully checked the zip ties.

Delmar chuckled as they looked down at the sleeping form. “And you thought there was something wrong with me? I haven’t seen you that worked up in a very long time.”

“Well,” Thomas replied. “It’s like you said earlier. The man has something to do with the deaths of our friends…and I wasn’t prepared to cut him any more slack.” He paused and poked Delmar in the arm. “I did warn him, you know. I told him to behave and not to do anything that would scare Jenny. That was the second time he ignored me.”

They left him locked in the bedroom. Thomas showed Delmar the strange documents and photos, and explained everything that he could, reciting everything that Alastair had said. Back in the living room, the two friends went about loading all of the weapons inside the gun rack.

Delmar loaded two of Alastair’s rifles and propped one by the door and one by the kitchen window. He saw Jenny watching him. “Jenny, you use these if you need to.”

Jenny sat on the couch, having just finished looking through the personal papers and pictures that Thomas had brought out. She didn’t reply to Delmar’s suggestion, and instead said, “If I did not know it was impossible, I’d swear that the man in these WWII photos, and the photos from after the war…were all of Alastair.”

Thomas set the 10-gauge down and nodded. “Those are my sentiments exactly.”

Delmar shrugged. “I’m not sure that I care. Once we are out of here, we are going to make sure that Steven’s remains are recovered and that Daniel’s body is found. Nothing about that bastard in there…” he motioned to the bedroom. “…is worth worrying about. He will get what’s coming to him. You can count on it.”

“I hope so,” she replied. “To everything you just said.”

Delmar took a long look at her. She looked tired and frazzled, but she was being strong right now and that is exactly how they all needed to be.

“It’s dark out there,” Thomas said.

“So, are we thinking the beastie will come up and knock on the door?” Delmar asked.

Thomas didn’t laugh. “I don’t know…maybe. Or maybe it just comes close and somehow lets Alastair know it’s out there.”

“It probably howls,” Delmar said.

Thomas shuddered. “I swear that the devil himself couldn’t make a more freaky sound.”

Delmar nodded. He was sitting on a bench at the kitchen table, rifle in hand, staring toward the door. “We need to dim these lanterns.”

Thomas, already up and near two of them, put them out. One remained lit, over the couch near Jenny. She shook her head when he went to snuff it out. Thomas didn’t comment, he just left it alone. He called out to Jack and the Husky immediately jumped down from the couch where he had been sitting with Jenny, and came over to him. “Stay here with me, boy. Sit.” Jack nuzzled Thomas’s knee as he sat down next to the bench.

“Down,” Thomas said, gently. “Don’t be mad at me for hooking you to the door, earlier.”

Jack made a wooing noise as if to protest, but then lay down at Thomas’s feet.

“Good boy. That’s my boy.”

Delmar was vigilant about watching through the windows…but the two dimly lit lanterns, one in the hall and one above Jenny, made good night vision difficult.

“I hope it doesn’t show…much as I would enjoy killing the bastard,” Thomas said. “The damned thing scares the hell out of me.”

Delmar didn’t reply. He had walked to the door, where he stood staring through the small porthole.

Thomas thought that he heard something. Jack suddenly sat up and growled, staring…but in the wrong direction, toward the hallway.

“What was…” Delmar began.

A wail from the bedroom cut him off. “Is that bastard up to something?” he asked.

“No doubt,” Thomas said. “But I don’t like the sound of it.”

Jack growled again, this time trying to take a step toward the hallway. Thomas stopped him and grabbed his leash and attached the D-ring to his belt. “Stay with me, boy.”

There was a scuffling sound from the room….then a scratching sound followed by thumps, as if Alastair might have fallen to the floor.

Delmar thought the same thing. “Yep. He is trying to break loose. Probably on the floor by now, trying to untie himself,” he said.

Then the short wail came again, followed by a loud grunt.

Jenny stood up, her face full of fear and anticipation.

When the growl came from the room, they all knew that there was nothing human about it. Delmar looked at Thomas; the look on his face was a question. Thomas didn’t like what he saw in the big man’s own expression. It was something seldom seen by anyone. Thomas tried not to let his own fear show as he took a step toward the hallway. He had the 10-gauge in his hands. Jack growled and followed,

“You sure there wasn’t a trapdoor or something in there?” Delmar asked, his voice a harsh whisper. “Maybe a way for him to let his monster pet inside?”

Thomas shook his head, “I don’t believe it…but I will check it out. You stay ready.” He took another step toward the bedroom. Jack followed, still tethered to Thomas’s belt.

“I am going to open the door…so be ready, Delmar.”

Delmar nodded and positioned himself a few feet in front of the cabin door, facing the hallway with a clear view of the bedroom door. Jenny stood motionless; the look on her face was that of pure terror. She had seen the beast before…