Men of the Otherworld (7 page)

However, there was one problem to be overcome. Wherever Jeremy wanted to take me wasn't accessible by foot and as long as I refused to be shut into a room, much less a car, we couldn't go. So, Jeremy continued working with me, building up trust.

To pass the time, he also coached me on other things that I
deemed a complete waste of brain space—useless skills like table manners and rules of public behavior. Stand up straight. Speak clearly. Don't eat with your hands. Don't growl at people. Don't piss on the furniture. And above all, don't sniff
anything.

Jeremy didn't work miracles with me. In the end, I think he decided that if he waited until I was fit to be seen in public, we might celebrate the coming of the next millennium in that motel room. So one day he decided I was good enough for my first foray into the human world.

Before we left the motel, Jeremy had spent a lot of time making phone calls. Not that I understood what he was doing. For whatever reason, I had holes in my memory such that I'd know perfectly well what a car or money was for, but objects like telephones and toilets were unfathomable mysteries.

At the time, it seemed to me that Jeremy was spending a lot of time with a piece of plastic pressed against his ear, talking to himself. Which was fine by me. We all have our eccentricities. Jeremy liked talking to plastic; I liked hunting and eating the rats that ventured into the motel room. Or, at least I
did
like hunting and eating the rats, until Jeremy caught me and promptly kiboshed that hobby. Some of us are less tolerant of eccentricities than others.

After much plastic-talking one morning, Jeremy announced our first mutual voyage into the human world. The only part I understood was “car” and “out,” but I got the idea. I was okay with the going-out part. It was the complex preritual that I objected to—the new clothes, the dressing, the hand washing, the face scrubbing and the hair combing. As I endured this torture, I decided there wouldn't be many more of these “goings-out” in the future if I had any say in the matter.

The car ride itself was uneventful. I clung to the door handle, closed my eyes, screamed now and then, but only sent Jeremy swerving into opposing traffic once.

Past the busy downtown district, Jeremy turned onto a side road, then slowed. After consulting a piece of paper, he turned down a wide alley, navigated trash bins and parked outside a battered metal door.

Before we could walk to the door, a thickset man opened it. The man said something. Jeremy replied. The man laughed and motioned us through the door. As we passed him, I edged closer to Jeremy so I wouldn't risk brushing against the stranger.

We walked into a windowless room. Across the room, under a blinking lightbulb, was a massive desk. Along the far wall, a row of machinery whirred and chirped and emitted waves of some noxious stink. Behind us, the metal door clanged shut. I jumped, grabbed a fistful of Jeremy's trousers, sticking so close he nearly tripped over me. He steered us toward the desk.

The machinery gave a
thunk
and went silent. A second man stepped out from the bowels of the beast and shouted something at Jeremy. Despite his raised voice, he was smiling. He walked toward us, smiling and shouting.

This was my first real lesson in human interaction. Although Jeremy had tried to teach me how to act in public, I'd absorbed the rules without understanding the logic behind them, like a child learning complex algebraic formulae. Now, watching him, I began to pick up tips, though not necessarily the ones he meant to impart.

He smiled when the other men smiled and laughed when they laughed, but no hint of humor warmed his eyes. He shook their hands and accepted a backslap from the first man, but initiated no physical contact and, whenever possible, kept his distance.

He clearly didn't want to be here. So why was he? Because
these men had something Jeremy wanted. Papers. A small stack of papers, different sizes, different shades of white and cream, each covered with squiggles that smelled faintly of the black liquid that coated the machinery.

As Jeremy examined the papers, I clung to his leg. At a sound from behind us, I turned to see three boys in the corner, hidden in the shadows, their smell swallowed by the stink of the machines.

All three were laughing at me, not with the good-humored chuckles of the two men, but with the acid laughter of derision, the kind that seeps under your skin and burns holes in your dignity. The largest caught my eye and stuck his thumb in his mouth, making a show of crying. The other two howled with silent laughter. I turned away.

Jeremy reached into his back pocket and pulled out a wad of money. He counted off most of the wad and handed it to the machinery man. I glanced at the boys. The leader stared at Jeremy's back with narrowed eyes. I followed his gaze and saw half a bill sticking out of Jeremy's rear pocket.

The boy sauntered out into the open. He walked past and retrieved a soda bottle from the desk. On the return trip, he ambled to the right, bringing him closer to us. I tensed. As the boy passed, his hand darted toward Jeremy. My reaction was purely instinctive, devoid of forethought or reasoning. I saw what I perceived as an attack on my master and reacted.

I launched myself at the boy, hitting him full in the chest and sending us both soaring across the room. We crashed through a stack of boxes. I closed my eyes, but kept my hold on him, fists clenching his shirtfront.

We slammed onto the floor. I landed on his chest and righted myself, pinning him down. The boy started to scream—not a yell of pain, but a high-pitched shriek of panic that reminded me of a rabbit's death throes, which reminded me that I was hungry.

Jeremy grabbed me by the shoulders and ripped me off my prey. The door-opener man scooped up the boy by the scruff of his neck, shouting at him. The boy's screams died to whimpers. The man let him go and the boy slunk back into the shadows.

Jeremy said something. The door-opener man laughed and shook his head. Keeping a tight grip on me, Jeremy went back to the desk and picked up his papers. A few more words were exchanged, but Jeremy's pleasantries had turned brittle. He put a quick end to the conversation and escorted me out, not releasing his grip until I was safely locked in the car.

As the car navigated the city streets, the only sound was the rumble of the engine. Jeremy kept his eyes on the road. His face was impassive. He started heading down the road toward the motel. Suddenly the car skidded to a halt.

Without a word, Jeremy swung around in a tight U-turn, ignoring a cacophony of horn blasts. At the next light, he veered north, heading out of the city. I gripped the sides of my seat, scarcely daring to breathe. I knew what was coming. Not a beating—Jeremy had never so much as raised a threatening hand to me. Worse than a beating. He was taking me back to the bayou.

The meeting with the men had been a test. I'd failed. No more regular meals. No more warm place to sleep. He was sending me back.

I sank into my seat and slowed my breathing, as if by being small and silent I might convince Jeremy that I'd be no trouble if he kept me. The car continued to zoom away from the city. I closed my eyes. I felt the car turn again. Then again. Any second now it would screech to a stop, the door would open and I'd be flung out to fend for myself.

The car turned again and slowed. I clenched my teeth and scrunched my eyelids shut even tighter. Something roared above the car. I crammed my hands against my ears. The car stopped. The door opened. Smells wafted in. Strange smells, mechanical smells. Not the bayou? Then where? Someplace worse? At least I knew the bayou.

“Clayton?”

I took my hands from my ears, but kept my eyes squeezed shut. The vinyl seat squeaked as Jeremy moved closer. His hand went to my shoulder, his touch tentative.

“Clayton?”

I didn't budge. He sighed. I opened one eye. He was twisted around in the driver's seat, facing me, fingers still resting on my shoulder.

He didn't look angry. It was hard to tell with Jeremy. Anger was the slightest tightening of the lips. Happiness was the faintest ghost of a crooked smile. Worry was the barest gathering of the eyebrows. That's what it looked like now. Worry, not anger.

I opened the other eye and looked around. Airplanes. That was the first thing I saw. Three airplanes behind a fence about a quarter-mile away. Following my gaze, Jeremy smiled.

“Yes?” he said. “Go?” He pointed to an airplane taking off. “Home?”

It was a spur-of-the-moment, now-or-never, bite-the-bullet decision. Rather than return to the motel, even to get his things, he'd decided to take me straight home. It could have been an act of incredible bravery and determination. Or it could have been sheer desperation, fear that if he didn't act now, things might never get any better. The truth probably lies between the two.

*   *   *

Once we were inside, we had to wait in a line of people. I clung to Jeremy's pant leg, shuddering each time some stranger brushed past me.

Finally, we approached the counter. Jeremy talked to a young woman, bestowing a generous portion of smiles on her. She bent down and said something to me. I only stared at her. Jeremy said something and she tsk-tsked sympathetically.

Jeremy handed her some papers from his pocket, then the papers he'd bought from the man. The woman leafed through the papers, smiling and nodding. Then she handed them back to Jeremy along with some more papers and we left the line.

Jeremy bought some candy bars, drinks and other unidentifiable things at a small shop in the airport. Then he took me to a phone booth. While he talked to the plastic thing, I downed two candy bars and a carton of milk. When he finished his phone call, he led me into another area and we sat down.

I finished a third candy bar, then noticed the papers still in Jeremy's hand. I pointed at them. He lifted an eyebrow. I reached for the papers and grunted. Another raised brow. I grumbled, but gave in.

“See,” I said. “Want see.”

He nodded, cleaned the chocolate off my fingers, then handed me the top paper. I saw only several lines of typed text. I couldn't understand the squiggles, but if I could, I would have read in them my future. My name: Clayton Danvers. My date of birth: January 15, 1962, making the day Jeremy found me my seventh birthday. And, if I'd been able to read the other papers he had bought for me, I would have learned that I was orphaned and under the guardianship of my cousin, Jeremy Malcolm Edward Danvers. And my home? A house in the state of New York, near the town of Bear Valley—13876 Wilton Grove Lane or, as Jeremy's great-great-grandfather had named it, Stonehaven.

I don't remember much of the airplane ride. I slept through it, which probably had something to do with the chalky taste in the second milk carton Jeremy gave me on the plane.

We arrived in Syracuse later that day. Outside the airport, a string of cars idled by the sidewalk. Jeremy led me to one, opened the back door and nudged me inside. Then he crawled in beside me. Just as I was wondering how he planned to drive from the rear seat, I noticed a man sitting up front. Jeremy said something to him. The man nodded, and the car broke ranks with its brethren.

As we drove, Jeremy pointed out sites of interest, which didn't really interest me. I pretended to be paying attention, partly because it seemed to be what he wanted and partly because it helped me forget we were sitting very close to a stranger, but mostly because I just liked listening to Jeremy talk. When we pulled away from the city, Jeremy's travelogue slowed, until finally he turned to stare out the window and seemed to forget I was there at all.

I leaned over to see what held his attention beyond the window. When I didn't notice anything, I looked up at Jeremy and
followed his gaze. But he wasn't really staring at anything. His eyes were unfocused, black mirrors that reflected nothing.

Tension vibrated from his body. More than tension. Unease. Worry. Fear. The last startled me. Fear? What did Jeremy have to fear? He was an adult, a werewolf, my protector. He took away fear; he wasn't supposed to feel it.

Jeremy's anxiety fed my own subconscious worries, and I reacted with the only defense mechanism I had. I started to Change. I felt the tingling in my fingers, then the throbbing in my skull, and finally the first licks of white-hot pain. Yet I didn't make a sound. I accepted it. If you grow up with pain, it becomes a fact of your existence.

As my heart rate accelerated, my breathing kept pace. Jeremy turned. His eyes were still blank. Then they focused, looked at my hands. He let out an oath and grabbed the driver's shoulder. The car veered. The driver snapped something. Jeremy's reply was apologetic. He said something else, forced calm.

The driver pulled the car to the side of the road. Jeremy swung open my door, grabbed me around the chest and bent my head down toward the gravel, as if I were vomiting. I barely noticed. The Change had spread to my arms and legs. My clothing began to rip. Jeremy coughed, barely fast enough to cover the sound, then hoisted me from the car, jogged down the ditch and laid me at the bottom.

“Stay,” he said. “Yes?”

I could barely understand him, much less reply. Jeremy bent over me. He stroked my head, whispered something, then scrambled up the embankment to the car.

Seconds later, Jeremy returned. The Change was almost done. I lay on my side, panting. He crouched beside me and gently removed the clothing tangled around my arms and legs. Once I'd
caught my breath, I clambered to my feet and started investigating my surroundings.

A trickle of icy water ran along the bottom of the ditch. I lapped a mouthful, then looked back at Jeremy. He was still in human form. I ran over to him and whimpered. He patted my head, brushed his bangs back with a sigh, then got to his feet.

Lifting me in both arms, he carried me to the other side of the ditch, then set me down away from the road. The car and driver were long gone. Jeremy stood there a moment, then started walking in the direction the car had been traveling.

I sat on my haunches and watched. He went a few steps, then turned and waved me forward. I didn't understand. He called my name. I yipped back. He whistled. I howled. Apparently, still not the right response, as he threw up his hands and walked away. I watched him until he was nearly out of sight, then ran to catch up.