The Children of the Night
Crooked teeth, sharp nails, the smell of dirt, and a shave-proof layer of thick, coarse hair. Raggedy boots, frayed flannel shirt, scars old and new criss-crossed my discarded canvas of a body. I had a huge family back home, but they weren’t my pack. I didn’t need people like that. This place suited me much better, anyway.
The library lacked its usual shuffling and whispering, and for that I was glad; I was alone with the woody smell of books and the pungent chemical scent of their glossy covers. Well, except for Allistair, the student librarian. He never bothered me though. Behind his black wire-frame glasses and dark eyebags, his pale complexion often stood out to me amongst the aisles.
Usually I’d hear someone coming, or smell them. It let me slip away when I wanted to be alone. Allistair’s steps mustn’t have even been felt by the carpet beneath him, and if he smelled of anything, it wasn’t strong.
Vaguely, I became aware of someone speaking near me, and quickly popped out one of my earbuds.
‘Hi, Reece.’ Allistair was sitting on a plush ottoman that had been empty a moment before. ‘A collection of new film journals arrived earlier today, and before I put them up on the shelves, I wanted to see if you would like to borrow any of them.’ He smiled politely, gesturing to a package at his feet.
‘Oh! Y-yeah, sick, thanks.’ I shuffled my feet and shied away behind the collar of my flannel shirt. Even up close, I still couldn’t smell him. To perceive him I had to look at him. Those haunting yet warm eyes, red-brown and precise.
‘It is past six, which is unusual for you. I do not mean to be obtrusive, but the library closes for the night shortly,’ his verbosity reminded me of a kindly English butler, but it made me smile.
‘Yeah, ‘course, uhm- I already have to be home by…’ I checked my phone. Shit, ‘I’m sorry, I gotta go- like now.’ Panic surged through me, the full moon was almost high enough in the sky to change me. Fuck. I practically live here, I have to stop losing track of time while reading. I can’t get caught. I think the city already suspects me. If I make a break for it, I could cross the street, reach the tree line-
‘Reece, it’s okay,’ he said.
‘It’s not, you don’t get it,’ I scrambled to get my bag, ‘sorry, I mean- it’s- it’s complicated.’ I made a break for the door, bounding across the room in two inhuman strides.
‘After 6pm you must use your library card in order to take leave, Reece.’ Allistair said, somehow already leaning against the doorway. His voice was steady, calm, and it made me froth, how can you be calm? I can’t let this happen, especially not to you.
With already violent and wild fingernails, I ripped the zip from my bag as I tried desperately to retrieve my card. As my overgrown digits thrashed in vain, Allistar tapped his own card against the entrance, and I leapt for the door so quickly I ripped it from its track, bursting through in a hail of glass. In the lacerating storm, my clothes tore in places, patches of pelt peeking through, inky muscled fur drenched in the ichor of transformation.
My hands collided with shards of glass that failed to shred my now calloused palms, and I sprinted wildly down the narrow hall. I collapsed onto all fours, but my speed only increased as all of my claws ripped away at the carpet.
My knuckles snapped, cracked, and groaned as they lengthened into paws, the seams on my clothes ripped and the fabric shredded under the strain of expanding flesh and fur. I screamed in anguish, but it came out as a gargled howl, blood and spit roared into the air.
When my reflection manifested in the exit door ahead of me, it was a blur of teeth and stygian hair, magnitudes larger than I was moments ago. With a vicious swat, I struck it from its hinges and leapt into the night, in one great motion across the car park and the road beyond.
In the air, I was as a bolt of lightning- thunderous, and unyielding. Castoff scraps of fabric shed from me, my hominal concerns with them. This was my element: howling zephyr, claws of the earth, wild kin.
My body rolled as it landed, a dark mass heaving with ragged breath. Metal monsters roared on the long, ashen line that bordered the forest, so I retreated further in. Birdsong, whistling wind, and the rushing blood of prey. I inhaled deeply, the fresh air a resuscitating force.
Instincts urged me to hunt, and my ravenous stomach groaned with supernatural hunger. I lowered myself into a snakelike belly-crawl, and snagged the heartbeat of a deer in my mind’s eye.
Staying downwind, I followed the trail. Every noise echoed in my pointed ears, drawing me like a beacon. Warm flesh, dripping rare carcass, shearing sinews from bone, cracking them open to suck out the marrow… Saliva drooled from my maw as I envisioned my bounty.
I emerged carefully from the cover of the pine trees, into the clearing where my prey awaited. My cold yellow eyes narrowed, sensing something was awry, and fixated on the buck. It laid in a heap, struck down so recently that I could still smell the life leaving its body. From behind it, a shadow grew. It lengthened its back, rising to stand tall.
The form had no heartbeat, and smelled not of fear or life. Red ran from its pale lips, the essence of my quarry. My black lips pulled back in a snarl that flashed my white teeth, and I grew to my full stature, tail swaying menacingly.
The creature lifted its chin, and the moonlight that escaped the canopies illuminated its face; a black, insectile shape containing two clear shiny lenses adorned its visage. It lifted an arm with an imperious, sweeping gesture, and brushed an impalpable fog from my mind. My hunger vanished in an instant, all as a heavy cloud passed across the face of the moon.
“You are beast, but you are no monster,” it spoke, from its fanged mouth. It glided across the grass, not a single blade compressed under foot. A cold, but tender hand brushed the fur between my ears. I fixed my charmed gaze on him, and my tail wagged softly.
Allistair. Pack.
