Red Moon Rising (7 page)

He goes back to the computer and switches the image again. It's an X-ray, a front view of my skull. “See these dark areas? Those are your sinuses. They're enlarged to make room for the lycan-metamorphosis. That's the cause of your headaches. These are all very clear symptoms. The only part that is atypical is that wulves don't normally have heightened senses and increased strength
between
periods of the Change. It's odd, but it might have something to do with your incomplete genetic treatments. Nevertheless, it doesn't change my diagnosis.”

He lets it sink in, not that I want it to. I look at Dad, and he looks as miserable as I feel.

The doctor clears his throat. “The other symptoms you're having, the ones that feel like flu. That's LMPI. Lycan-Metamorphosis Prodromal Illness. Prodromal means ‘first symptoms.' You may also have fever, nausea, rapid heartbeat, and very severe headaches. About half the wulf population gets LMPI every month before the Change. You've seen the TV ads for Lupinox?”

Who hasn't?
Lupinox: to help you feel good when that animal acts up.
I nod.

“It's over-the-counter. It should help with the symptoms.”

I'm sure I'll feel just great. Without the crushing headaches and joint pains I'll be able to concentrate on all the fun parts of becoming a werewulf.

“I'll give it to you,” Dad says. “You bump into someone you know, how are you going to explain why you're buying Lupinox?” Dad says. His skin looks almost gray.

The image of my skull is still on the screen, and I stare at the dark shapes in my head.

The average IQ for a human is 90 to 110. In spite of con
troversy about alleged bias in testing materials, the aver
age wulf IQ is generally believed to be lower than that of humans. However, the average IQ for a vampyre is 165 to
180.
If that is not an indication of our superiority, I don't know what is.

—Lord Reginald Bulwyr-Fulton,

Parliamentary Address, London, 1946

Since ancient Rome—earlier, actually—humans hated vampyres, just like they hated us wulves. But in the last fifty years, vampyres have become a partner species with humans, and vampyres have become some of the richest and most powerful people in the world. But what about us wulves? When will it be
our
turn?

—Huey Seele, Wulf Rights Activist, Interview,

“Big Bad Wulf?” segment,
60 Minutes,
March 16, 2005

See here, mate. I don't write me songs just for wulves. They're for humans and vamps, too. Music is supposed to bring us all together. True, we ain't together yet, but that don't mean I'll quit trying.

—McJahn Le Nin, guitar, the B-Tells,

Billboard
interview, May 24, 1968

W
e're parked a couple of blocks from the house, and we haven't said a word for maybe ten minutes. I feel sick. Dad looks wrung out.

I can't take the silence anymore. “I guess it's better that we know,” I say.

“We would have found out soon enough, but yeah. It's better that we know. I have to leave for the compound tomorrow, but I'll be back in a few days. We have some time to figure out what to do.”

“To do about
what
? We can't stop this. The doctor said it's happening next month.”

“There are things to decide. Like whether or not you should register.”

I look at him. He's not joking. “What do you mean, ‘whether or not I should register'? How can I
not
register?”

“Not everyone does.”

“Yeah. Mom will love the idea of me being a moonrunner.”

“Easy now,” he says. “There are other choices. I'm not ready to talk about any of it, not until I've had some time to think it through.”

Looking through the windshield, I can see the lights from our house down the street, glowing in the darkness.

Dad reaches over me and pops the glove box. It's jammed with papers. He digs through them, finds a white plastic bottle of Lupinox, and unscrews the cap. “Hold out your hand,” he says. I do and he dumps the pills in my palm. “You don't want the bottle lying around. And keep those hidden.”

I let out a breath. I have to say, I'm scared as all hell.

“You should start letting your hair grow a little longer, too. After your first Change, you'll probably want your ears covered.”

“Right.” I would never have thought of that.

He looks at me. “Okay, better get going.”

I pick up my book bag and open the door. He grabs my arm. “We'll get through this,” he says. “Don't worry.”

I just nod. I'm pretty sure if I say anything out loud, I'll cry.

I close the front door behind me and stand in the foyer. It's almost dawn, and the Sol-Blok shades are sealing themselves. Loretta is getting dinner ready. Mom and the girls are doing whatever upstairs. To them, everything is normal. To me, nothing is.

I'm going to Change. I'm going to turn into a werewulf. It's beyond my worst fear.

Brushing my teeth, I look up into the mirror. Weird. My shoulders and arms look thicker than before. My chest, too.

So, maybe my face won't win me the Sexiest Man Alive Contest, but that's all right. I can hardly believe that it's going to change every month. My nose will break during the first Change, which they say is the worst one. It breaks every time after that, too, but you don't get the black eyes. I hope I don't get the facial ridges. I can't believe I even have to think about this.

I look at my hand as I rinse the toothbrush. After the first Change, my knuckles will swell permanently.

But it's okay. I can deal with this. Lots of people do it every month, and they get through it. It'll be okay.

But it's not just about the Change every month. It's about being someone else now. Being someone, or something, else in the world. It's every day. Wherever you go. Being a wulf is something people won't let you forget.

I
have no interest in the discussion about Hemingway and the question some jerk asks every year about whether he was a human or a wulf. Hemingway's family wouldn't allow DNA tests on his corpse, so it'll be a mystery forever. And what difference does it make? It was all so long ago.

“What about Beethoven?” someone calls out.

“No,” Thaddeus Sterling-Willet says. “My father's a conductor at the philharmonic, and he knows. He says the rumor started because Beethoven wore his clothes until they rotted off him. He was nuts and smelly, but he was no wulf.”

“What about Van Gogh? He was definitely a wulf,” a kid in the back calls out.

“First of all, this is English class, so we're not going to be talking about painters,” Ms. O'Conner says. “As far as authors go, there's no clear evidence that Hemingway was a wulf. Same with Walt Whitman, for that matter.”

“How about characters, then?” Bernard Laurence asks.

“Like ones who are supposed to really be wulves. Falstaff?”

“Yeah, and Magwitch in
Great Expectations
?” Babette Byer says.

“And Pap in
Huck Finn
,” Thaddeus says.

I can't believe this conversation is still going on. It's almost as idiotic as the ones between Paige and Jess about which movie stars are dating, or who's going around the world collecting babies like they're toys.

“Isn't that all just speculation?” Juliet asks. “I mean, we might be reading stuff in that wasn't meant to be there.”

“Exactly right,” Ms. O'Conner says. “It's fine to have theories. But it's a matter of opinion. And anyway, now is not the time for this.” Ms. O'Conner goes to her desk and picks up a stack of papers. “I know this conversation is just a stall to keep us from discussing
Mrs. Dalloway
. In the spirit of helping you remember to do your reading, I'd like to offer you an exciting little pop quiz. Let's clear those desks.”

Lots of groans as everyone puts their books under their seats. Juliet looks over at me and I shrug. Yeah, like I was going to start reading Virginia Woolf's book right after finding out that I'm going to Change into a werewulf during the next full moon.

Another thought has been nagging at me: whether Juliet knows that the non-vamp half of me is wulf. I know it's only fair to tell her, but I can't help worrying she'll change her mind about me if I do.

Antony Delacroix is holding a pack of tests over his shoulder, shaking the papers to get my attention. I take them, keep one, then pass the rest back.

Obviously, I can't tell Juliet the whole thing. So, really, what's the point of telling her any of it?

Nice rationalization. Coward.

I look down at my desk. Someone wrote
You suck!
in purple ink.

No kidding.

I catch up with Juliet just outside the English room. “Hey,” I say. The hall is filling up with students.

“Hey. Good thing I read four chapters last night,” she says. It seems like every single time I find her, she smiles at me. “Did you do okay?”

“Well, a steady stream of nonsense was flowing out of my pen, but it was pretty well-written nonsense. If she falls for my elaborate doublespeak that says nothing concrete, then maybe I did okay.”

When she laughs, her long earrings swing back and forth. “I guess that's one way to do it,” she says.

“Yeah, well, it's my fallback. I rely on it when the alternative is doom. But listen. There's something I wanted to check with you.”

“Sure. Can you walk with me to my locker?”

“Absolutely. No problem.” I don't know if it's the heat from the semiwarm vamp bodies filling the hall, or something else, but sweat breaks out on my forehead and upper lip. There's a nice big drop rolling down my back. I want to back out, but I know it's better to just get it over with.

“So, what's up?” she asks.

“It's not a big deal. I mean, I don't think it is. But I just thought I should make sure, you know, get it out of the way.”

She gets her locker open and smiles at me. “Okay, you have my attention.”

In the throng, I see Bertrand walking toward us.
Please don't stop to talk
. I try to beam my thought to him. Bertrand puts his hand up high and I slap it when he passes. What a relief.

Juliet bumps her shoulder against mine, shoving me off balance for a second. “So what's this important thing?” she asks.

Just go ahead. Play it casual. “It's just, what do you think I am?”

“What you are? You mean, that you're a freshman?”

“I'm saying…what do you think I am in terms of…species?”

“Oh. Well, you're in the Carpathia program, smart, and have blue eyes, so that says ‘vamp' to me. But then you have dark hair and all that, so I figured maybe you're half-vamp and half-human.”

“You're half right.”

“Okaaay…” she says. She waits for me to get to the point. I just need to go through with it.

“I'm actually half-vamp and half…half-wulf.”

“Wulf.”

“
Half
-wulf.”

“Oh.” She looks inside her locker and I can't see her expression. “I guess you had the genetic treatments.”

“Yeah.” Which is true. I did have them. Just not the full series.

She glances at my right hand, looking for the wulftag.

“Yeah, my vampyre immune system rejected most of the ink.” I raise my hand to show her. “You can still see it, just a little, when the light hits it a certain way.”

She looks at my hand, squinting, then looks back at my face. “I don't see anything.”

“Here,” I say. I don't know where I find the nerve, but I take a gentle hold of her elbow and shuffle us through the traffic of kids to the window. I spread my thumb out and move my hand back and forth until the moonlight hits just right and the thumbnail-size werewulf-head symbol is clear. I move my head next to hers to make sure she has the same angle. Her hair smells like vanilla and cinnamon.

“I see it,” she says. “It looks like it's floating under your skin.”

“Yeah. So anyway, I thought I should tell you about my, um, background before…well, I thought I should tell you.”

“Thanks.”

“So, I mean, is it a problem?”

“That you're a wulf?”

“Half,” I say, holding a finger up and trying to laugh, though it probably sounds more like I'm choking.

“Not a problem for
me
.” And now she grabs my arm to pull me along. She's touching me. She's holding my arm. We stop at her locker.

“Seriously? It doesn't bother you?”

She raises an eyebrow. “Did you think it would?”

“No. I'm not saying that at all, but it's the kind of thing you're supposed to tell someone who you're…getting to know. Full disclosure.” Okay, maybe not full, but enough. For now, at least.

“It's fine,” she says. “So what happened to that idea about us going out somewhere?”

“Well, you still want to, right?

She smiles. “What do
you
think?”

What do I think? I think I love life. I love this world and everything about it. I'm ecstatic.

And suddenly I'm on my knees. The sound of my head hitting the locker reverberates inside my skull.

“Sorry, guy,” Gunther Hoering says. “I tripped. You okay?”

He reaches out his hand to help me. Before I can think better of it, I reach up. He grabs my forearm and pulls me to my feet. I hate myself for accepting. Like I'm saying it's okay that he deliberately smashed into me, banged my head into the locker, and completely humiliated me in front of Juliet.

Gunther is staring at my mouth. My upper lip feels warm and I touch it. My hand comes away with a thick smear of crimson blood.

I look back at him. His pupils dilate big as saucers and his nostrils flare. He swallows, and his Adam's apple bobs in his throat.

His buddies turn away. They can smell the blood, too. Every vamp in the hall can smell it.

“Come on, bro,” one of the guys says. “We're late for History.” They start to pull him away. He stops and takes notice of Juliet.

“I've seen you around,” he says. He gives her the smile that all the girls love. “You're pretty cute—for a human. Why you want to hang out with a loser half-breed is beyond me.”

He winks at her and leaves. Her upper lip curls in disgust as she watches him walk away.

I told her just in time.

She turns to me. “What was that? Are you okay?”

“Totally fine,” I say. My nose is still bleeding and I'm embarrassed as hell.

She reopens her locker, which got slammed shut courtesy of my head, digs inside, then produces a dark blue T-shirt that she moves toward my face. I put up my hand to stop her.

“I'll stain it,” I say.

“Don't worry. It's just my gym shirt. If you can stand the smell, you should probably use it.”

She pushes my hand away and presses the shirt to my nose. I hold the shirt, too, and our hands touch for a second.

“This is really bleeding,” she says.

“Yeah, it's heavy at first, until the regen kicks in, and then it stops and heals really fast. But I'd better get to the nurse before every vamp in the school goes nuts from the smell.”

The nurse is at the other end of the building, so the halls are empty and everyone is in class before I'm even halfway there. I'm pinching the bridge of my nose and holding the T-shirt hard against my nostrils, trying not to let any blood drip on the floor.

The boys' room door opens and Craig Lewczyk comes out. He's pushing up the sleeves of the thermal shirt he's wearing under a Rubber Crutches concert T-shirt.

He nods at my face. “What happened to you?”

“Just got bumped into a locker. I'm going to the nurse.”

“Yeah, me too.”

I notice now that he looks pale, and there's a sheen of sweat on his forehead. “What's wrong?” I ask.

“Nothing. Just a bad stomach and a wicked headache. No big deal.”

He looks sick. And he's limping a little. “Is that LMPI?”

“Yeah. I'll live. I just need some Lupinox.”

I go through the door first so I can hold it open for him, then I walk next to him.

We haven't talked in so long, I don't know what to say. Maybe a little nostalgia would work. Old times. “So, how's your mom? Still making those great oatmeal cookies?” Brilliant. Very natural topic to bring up.

“Sometimes.” It looks like he feels a little awkward, too.

“They were good. I still remember them.”

“I guess you do.”

He's not working much to keep the conversation alive. But I try again. “You still playing baseball?”

“Lacrosse.”

“Very cool.” I wish I could play lacrosse. But there's the whole vamp bleeding thing that kind of gets in the way. “You like it?”

“It's okay.”

We get to the nurse's office. There are at least eight wulf kids standing in line, and a strong smell of vomit coming from the bathroom. If this is what it's like here at night with the few wulves we have at Carpathia, it must be a total zoo during the day.

The nurse's aide takes a look at me and pulls me out of line toward a treatment room. I don't know whether I'm getting this privilege because I'm bleeding or because I'm part-vamp.

I hold the gauze against my nose, pressing hard.

“Here, I'll get rid of that T-shirt for you,” the nurse says. She reaches for Juliet's shirt.

“No,” I say. “It's not mine. I'm going to wash it and give it back.”

Which I may not do. Even though Juliet said I wouldn't be able to stand the smell of her shirt, she was wrong. It doesn't smell bad at all. It smells like…I don't know, like Juliet. If she doesn't ask for it back, I'm going to keep it.

The nurse takes the bloody gauze from me and stuffs a cotton Hemo-Sealer plug so far up my nose I'm pretty sure she's trying to get it inside my skull.

“Can't have kids smelling this blood. You'll cause a riot.” She holds my neck, trying to steady me as she makes the last push. “That's up there,” she says.

“I'll say.”

“Hmmm. That's strange.”

“What?”

“Your pulse,” she says. Her fingers happen to be right on my carotid artery. “It's going like a locomotive.” She looks at the clock and counts silently.

Think fast. If she gets too worried about my heart rate, she may decide I need to see a doctor, and down that road lies disaster.

“I'm still worked up about getting bumped into the locker,” I say.

“No, no. It's about seventy beats per minute. That's as fast as a human heart.”

“Right, but I also ran really fast all the way down here. That's why.”

“Oh. Well, you shouldn't run when you're bleeding; it only makes you bleed faster. Next thing you know, you'll have the whole school in a frenzy.”