Gonji: A Hungering of Wolves (12 page)

And there was a second, equally pressing concern: He was sure the creature would seek out its father straightaway once it was in power. Simon’s soul would then only watch helplessly as he was delivered into the Farouche Clan’s infernal hands.

On the day before the full of the moon, he retired to the eastern border of France—the Alpine frontier whose rugged peaks stood between the French and the Holy Roman Empire. Casting about in futility for much of the day, he at last happened upon a deep, long-abandoned well that seemed his only hope of sanctuary.

At first the notion he entertained seemed absurd. But the well was deep and narrow, and its steep sides were coated with moss and slime and ice.

At length he threw up his hands, at a loss for any other reasonable plan, and, as evening shadows settled over the snowy, pine-scented land, he cast a prayer up to heaven and dropped feet-first into the well’s murky depths.

The energumen mocked him in his pathetic effort at isolating its unleashed ravings, but as he settled into the muck at the bottom of the well, its waxing despair perked his own spirit. Simon’s human shoulders were nearly wedged into the tight confines, and he knew what this boded for the near doubling in size his form would soon undergo.

Night gradually descended, the moon rising in rounded fullness. Simon suffered the agonizing birthing of the Beast—an hour-long ordeal of erupting lycanthropy. He was never certain whether it was the heady taste of freedom or a
second
possessing demon-spirit that caused the madness of the cohabiting soul during those violent full-moon episodes. He always preferred to interpret it as the latter, lest anyone call
him
the possessed. But on that well-bound night, the monstrous golden creature spewed its wrath with a frustration Simon had seldom seen before, though he had subjected it to a wide assortment of daunting ploys during full moons past.

The werewolf howled maniacally in its dashed hopes at venting its bloodlust. It called its father’s name repeatedly up the tunneled shaft to the distant surface. When it had worked its arms over its head at last, shoulders rubbed raw and fur matted with blood and slime, it began to claw desperately toward the circle of freedom high above. Frosted earth, masonry and stone exploded amidst its thrashings. Its talons were broken and caked with mud. But despite its prodigious strength, it could gain no hand- or foothold. In the end it slumped back into the muck to whimper and curse and rage its promises of vengeance.

The morning reversion presently returning his human form, Simon succumbed to exhaustion and relief. He slept for a time, then was awakened by sounds unmistakably, alarmingly—human. He strained to make out the forms in the far-off disk of light, his red-veined eyes watering and befouled with dirt. He could see heads peering down, knowing they would not be able to see
him
in the darkened well.

Deliberating a moment as they called down to him in the patois of the region, realizing that these might be his enemies, he finally surrendered to the reality of the situation: He had to get out somehow, and if they were foes, then better to face them—whatever their nature or number—than be destroyed like a sewer rat.

A rope was sent down. Simon allowed himself to be drawn up. He was weaponless. He scanned their number and armament first—six surly and suspicious brigands sporting muskets and pistols, longbows and blades. Their dress was rugged; their gear, a motley array adopted for its suitability to mountain living. Mountain men. Hunters. And Andre…

Uncle Andre.

He remembered the face, the voice that had come to cheer him with its smiling promises of reunion during those bewildering youthful years Simon spent imprisoned at the monastery. The liquid blue eyes whose sadness had always left him with the distinct impression that the voice had lied. The tall, wiry frame, much like Simon’s own. The large, strong, weathered hands that examined his wounds, the tatters of his garb.

Simon found himself smiling. It was, all things considered, a major victory over the confounding powers of darkness. He was reunited with Uncle Andre, brother of his murdered father.

His sole living blood relation.

* * * *

“Things happened to those who made trouble for the Farouche,” Uncle Andre was saying as he stirred a thick, pungent ragout.

Simon studied the appointments of the mountain cave. Lambent firelight flickered over the walls, the burnished faces of the hardy mountain dwellers. The stuffed wall niches and crowded corners of the cave, mounded high with supplies and bundled equipment and outfitted with an assortment of scarred weaponry, bespoke its longtime use as both a lair and a base of surreptitious operations.

He felt, for the first time in years, at home among these denizens of his homeland. They were his countrymen, his kin. They shared his faith and his earnest desire to rid France of the evil growth that had begun to devour it. It was a strange, welcome feeling, this intoxication of belonging, enhanced by the work of the wine, as he sat on a rough-hewn
tabouret
and sipped from a bejeweled goblet—souvenir of some foray against a corrupt noble.

“Farouche,” his uncle repeated with disdain, spitting as if to scour his mouth from the taste of the name. “Even their very name speaks to their savagery. They bring us foul sorcery from their demonic world, you know. Things prowl the forests that ought not to live among men. When we saw that—we hunting folk, we did something about it. The king forgot about Burgundy—or feared it. And the
Grand Seigneur
threw in his lot with ‘em. So we little people fought back. Pretty soon hunting was outlawed. That god-cursed shire-reeve,
Lyle
Farouche—he made poaching a crime punishable by death, he did.
Poaching.
Since when is it poaching to shoot the innards out of a
werewolf
? Eh…begging your pardon, nephew. I mean, of course,
evil
werewolves,
non?”

Simon smiled, unoffended at such an intimation, feeling no discomfort at the open mention of his curse, for the first time ever among men. It was a rare and wonderful experience that actually caused him to feel something of the reveling in his potential power that Gonji had always urged him to consider.

“They do everything they can to keep the people down,” the old trapper Pierre was saying now. “You know—break their spirits. Seems they change the official regional religion every fortnight or so. First we’re Catholic, then the Huguenots have it right, then we’re Catholic again for a spell—the
cures
of every parish are like weathercocks anymore. Them that are still alive…”

“Oui,”
Andre added, “but most of them are too scared to do anything about it. They send word…to the king, to the bishop, God knows where else. No one knows whether news of the territory ever leaves. We’re not bothered much up here, though. I don’t think the Farouche are too eager to tangle with the Empire. Not till they’ve consolidated their power, or whatever they’re planning.”

“Of course not,” Simon advanced. “The Empire represents power backed by righteous faith.”

“Maybe,” Andre allowed. He sipped from the stew ladle, then cast in another pinch of seasoning. “Even the goddamn soldiery supports the Farouche Clan. It’s like—like Burgundy is another country. An antagonist to France…”

“People cower in their homes. Afraid of the night,” Pierre observed glumly. “Women and children disappear. For what reason they’re taken, only Satan himself knows…
God
knows,” he appended, crossing himself and nodding somberly, “and He’ll visit His wrath on ‘em.”

“He already has—we’re it,” Uncle Andre said, evoking a hearty laugh full of staunch brotherhood.

Wine cups and skins and bottles were tipped in toast, and Simon’s goblet was refilled. His eyes brimmed and his head spun with the rapidly spreading warmth. He was unused to drinking, fearful of the lost control that accompanied it; yet he was loath to commit any act that might disaffect him with these spirited companions. And soon, as he had noted when Gonji had once cajoled him into a tilt with a rum cup during their crossing of the sea, the demon spirit inside him was lulled to sleep.

He was mercifully freed of its presence and its antagonizing thoughts.

Andre served the stew. Two men pulled out a board and playing pieces and pursued a game of
tric-trac
while they ate. There was contented banter for a time, Simon’s uncle plying him gently for news of his legendary meanderings, steering the conversation to more pleasant subjects when it seemed he grew uneasy.

Then, in the placid post-meal silence, a rotund, one-armed hunter named Hugh Thibedeau began to ramble sullenly.

“Evil everywhere in Burgundy. Monsters. Wolves and satyrs and the walking undead. Bats the size of cattle. But that ain’t the worst of it. You just know it could be a whole lot worse. And they don’t even show their muscle until they’re opposed.
Non…
They hit you with their foul magic only after you show you won’t join ‘em. They’re smart. They don’t waste any power they don’t have to…

“Every season knows its own special evil. New shapes, new patterns. We’ve seen ‘em. We’ve sat up here and watched for a long time. The spring? That’s their
courting
season. Satyrs with their filthy seductions. The one that married the duke’s young daughter is worst of all, they say.
Oui…
busted lives and busted loves. That’s how they win acolytes. Life loses its meaning. There ain’t nowhere else to go, so…The Courting of Evil.

“The summertime, that’s when they get tough. The time of the rams and jackals. Now they bust up
people.”
He pushed forward the stump of his arm for emphasis. “You give us trouble, we know how to fix you, eh? Join us or fight. Friend or foe. Violence. Evil charms in the skies. No one walks the roads at night…

“Now the autumn—I think that’s their favorite, eh, Andre?
Here
is our power! Join us—Hell’s immortals! That’s when they hold their—their saturnalia. Black rites. Sacrifices no one cares to think about, much less try to stop. Like they were building up a storehouse of evil sorcery for the winter. Flying horrors, haunters in the night. Wait till you see the moon in
those
days, young wolf cub! That’s when they win over new followers for the Dark Angel. People can stand no more fear. They see no deliverance. They start to wear that goddamn wolf crest. And then they’re lost to humanity. They’ve got their immortality, eh?

“But now
winter,”
the hunter rasped, eyes alight with fervent emotion,
“that’s
the worst. That’s their season of
hunger
—the season when our world is lost to us and another takes its place…but you’ve seen that, I gather.”

“Oui,”
Simon replied as Hugh’s eyes now fixed on him alone for the first time. “I’ve seen your winter, and I’ve survived it thus far.”

Uncle Andre bellowed a laugh that echoed in the upper reaches of the cave.
“Oui,
my nephew has survived, and now he’s here among us. And together we break the power of these evil usurpers, whatever shapes they see fit to clothe themselves in,
n’est-ce pas,
Simon?”

Normal conversation broke out here and there once again, and Andre sat on the damp floor beside Simon. “We may be few in number, but we’re tough,” he said to his nephew in a more intimate voice. “They’ve known the sting of our opposition. And anyway, we’re not alone. There is this Wunderknechten underground—you’ve heard of them, I see. I thought as much. Many tales connect you with them and this…Far Eastern wanderer who they say leads them.”

“They’re your allies here?”

“Mmm. They’ve been officially condemned, you know. Anyone who can say
that
is our ally. I believe their secret activities are all that hold the people together in the towns.”

“I never thought much of them before,” Simon admitted. “I ignored them the last time I was here. Refused to believe them worthwhile. This business of compromising the true faith—do you accept them as brothers in Christ, uncle?”

“Why not? Aren’t they? And they’re good fighters. Right now, that’s all that counts, given the nature of our enemy. They have this warrior code they swear by…
bushido.
Do you know about that?”

Simon smiled thinly. “My little samurai friend would be smugly delighted. Uncle—in Lamorisse, there’s a woman. Claire Dejordy. Do you or any of your friends have knowledge of her condition? Do you know whether she’s safe?”

Andre grunted thoughtfully. “Haven’t been to Lamorisse in some time. Pierre, here, is from Lamorisse, but he moved his family from there some time ago. This girl, her father is—what, a tanner?”

“A fellmonger,” Pierre corrected.

“Was,”
Simon said morosely.

“Ah,
oui,
but I don’t know about the girl,” Andre told him sympathetically. “If you need to know, we’ll find out, only…”

“Oui?”
Simon encouraged anxiously.

“Simon…do not be too sure of a woman in these times. I mean…ofttimes they can let you down…when you need it least. Or just plain
die
on you. That’s what your aunt did to me…Listen, don’t look at me like that. Forget I said it. We need each other. There’s much to do, and we must remain strong. When Simon—your father—died…well, you know how I swore I’d avenge him. I was just a boy. I thought I’d have to face that devil cult alone someday. Now you’ve come, and we’ll do it together, eh? Only we’ve got to stay alive. And strong.
Nothing
must weaken our resolve. No matter of the heart. No personal scar.
Strong.
With an eye to the destruction of this cult from the netherworld. Now drink. Then we rest and plan. We’ve got to fatten you up, eh?”

Simon became one of them. One of the mountain folk who struggled for freedom from the terrorism wrought by invaders from another world. Like the mountain men, he became one of the hunted who turned on their hunters. They wreaked havoc among the predators and rogues who ran roughshod over the forests and plains under the direction of the Farouche Clan, who played a sinister game of control and power perversion in Burgundy, their ultimate purpose disguised by their machinations.