Midnight Howl (4 page)

“Werewolves?” I looked uncertainly back and forth between Lily and Anderson. This was obviously some kind of joke, but I didn’t get it.

Lily rolled her eyes. “There’s no such thing as a werewolf, Anderson,” she said flatly.

“That’s what you say,” Anderson said, grinning. “Everyone knows that Wolf Valley is stalked by werewolves. How do you think it got its name?”

Lily frowned. “Um, from wolves?”

“Yeah, unusually large and intelligent wolves,” Anderson replied. He turned to me. “Hunters are allowed to kill wolves here, but only during wolf hunting season. And they can only kill, like, seventy-five in the whole state, and then the season closes.”

“Yuck,” I said. “I hate hunting.”

“Anyway,” he went on, “all year long, people see huge wolves in this area. Especially at night. And especially around the full moon. So hunters come here during wolf hunting season, and some people around here get wolf licenses, but
no one ever kills a single wolf.
They always just disappear. And then, once hunting season is over, they’re back. Does that sound normal to you? Do normal
wolf
wolves know how to read a calendar?”

I looked at Lily skeptically. Was this guy kidding?

She shrugged. “Coincidence. Anderson’s overstating how often people see wolves around here. People hear them, but they hardly ever see them. Students from the university camp out around here to see wolves in what should be peak wolf season, and I don’t think they’ve ever seen one. And with only seventy-five wolves allowed to be killed anywhere in the state before they close the season, it would be statistically more surprising for a hunter to actually shoot one than not.”

“Oh yeah?” Anderson said. “Where did all the werewolf stories about Wolf Valley come from, then? My grandfather told me his own grandmother saw a
huge wolf get shot in the leg, a long time ago, and the next day,
her neighbor was limping.
”

Lily and I stared at him, then glanced at each other and burst out laughing.

“Anderson,” she said between giggles, “that is the weakest story I’ve ever heard.”

We were still laughing when we got on the bus. Lily and I sat together, and Anderson flopped into the seat behind us. Jack was in the back, sitting with some other guys, and he tipped me a little wave.

“Stop laughing at me,” Anderson groused. “There are lots of other stories, too, from people who’ve actually seen werewolves. If we found somebody with the werewolf signs, we could watch them around the full moon.”

“Like what?” I asked him. “What are werewolf signs?”

He straightened up, looking pleased that I was interested. “A long ring finger,” he said. “Pointed ears. Heavy eyebrows.”

Lily made a
pfft
noise and waved him away. “Please,” she said. “Anyone could have any of those things.
I
have pointed ears.” She pulled her hair back to show us, and her ears were kind of pointy on top.
“And I’m not a werewolf, am I? And my ring fingers are pretty long, too.”

I looked at her hands. The ring fingers didn’t look superlong to me.

“Well …” Anderson frowned at her. “The eyebrows are the most commonly accepted sign.”

“Maybe I pluck them. You’d never know, would you?” Lily smirked at him. Then she turned back to me, and her face got serious. “Marisol, even though there’s no such thing as a werewolf, there
are
wolf packs in the area, and people around here stay indoors at night. So don’t go wandering around unless you’re with a big group of people, okay?”

I nodded. I shivered when I remembered how I had felt when I had been outside alone my first evening in town.

The bus dropped Jack and me off at the end of the long driveway up to the house, and I walked quickly and nervously. It was past four o’clock. Later in the year, it would be dark by this time, and now that I knew that the forest all around was crawling with wolves, I really wasn’t looking forward to making this walk in the dark. I was glad I wasn’t alone, but I doubted Jack would be much protection from a pack of wolves.

“What’s up?” asked Jack. He jogged to catch up. “How was the meeting?”

“Great,” I said, speeding up even more. “Let’s get inside.” I felt a tingling at the back of my neck, like someone was watching me, and I turned to peer into the shadows in the trees by the driveway. Were the eyes of something (a wolf? a werewolf?) glinting in there? I shivered, grabbed Jack’s arm, and pulled him along the last few yards to the door.

Hailey was doing her homework at the kitchen table when we came in.

“What’s
up?”
Jack asked, pulling his arm out of my hand, half-laughing, half-annoyed. “Are you okay?”

“Sorry, I’m just a little nervous,” I said. “Have you heard that there are wolves around here?”

Jack grinned and cocked his head toward Hailey. “You should ask her about them. She’s the wildlife expert.” Hailey crossed her arms in front of her and stared at me. I thought about how the walls of her room were covered with animal pictures. She didn’t look like she was planning on giving me any information, though.

“Hailey,” I said, super-politely, “please tell me about the wolves.”

Hailey shrugged. “I don’t know what you want to know,” she said reluctantly. “There’s definitely at least one wolf pack around here — people have spotted them and seen their tracks. They estimate there might be as many as fifteen wolves, which is a pretty large pack. But they must roam a big area, because nobody knows where their den is, and it can be months between sightings.”

“Have they ever attacked anyone?” I asked, morbidly fascinated. “Lily told me not to go out alone with my telescope.”

Hailey frowned. “Wolves don’t attack people,” she said sharply. “That is, unless they’re cornered or starving.”

Jack rummaged through the kitchen cupboard and pulled out a bag of chips. “They’ve killed animals, though,” he said. “Sheep and cows. The ranchers hate them.”

“Nobody knows for sure that was the wolf pack,” Hailey objected. “It could have been stray dogs.” Jack shrugged but didn’t answer.

“And, um …” I felt like an idiot. “One of the kids said something about werewolves?”

Jack laughed. “Was it Anderson?” he asked, and laughed again when I nodded. “He’s always got a
wacky theory about something,” he said. “There have been stories about werewolves around here for years, but no one takes them seriously.”

“There’s no such thing as werewolves,” Hailey said. I started to agree, but she kept talking. “It’s too bad, though. Wolves are amazing. They’re graceful and courageous and loyal — they’re a lot of things that humans ought to be. Maybe it would do the human race good if some people
were
werewolves.”

Hailey was frowning defiantly, but her eyes were shining, and I had a sudden flash of warmth toward her.
Graceful, courageous, loyal
— someone who was so passionate about these qualities was worth trying to be friends with.

I took a deep breath and plunged in. “Hailey?” I said. “I feel like we got off to a bad start. I know I made you mad, but I don’t know what I did. Can we try again? I’d like to be friends.”

For a minute, Hailey was very still. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. I stared at her, and she stared back, blue eyes wide.

Jack smacked the table, making us both jump. “Hailey!” he said sternly. “Marisol is trying. Give her a chance.” I gave him a little smile, but he was busy glaring at his sister.

Hailey sighed, and when she looked at me, her eyes softened. “Listen, Marisol,” she said. “You said some things that were kind of snotty, like you were looking down on us for living in the country.” She fiddled with the edge of her notebook. “Anyway, I was nervous about having you come and stay here, and it hurt my feelings.”

I was totally dumbfounded. “Like what? What did I say?” I could hear my voice getting louder and squeakier.

“Like that it didn’t matter what people here thought of you. Or like when you acted surprised that you couldn’t get
sushi
in town. Or when you were surprised we had a pickup instead of a
hybrid
.”

“Oh,” I said. Honestly, I thought Hailey was being way too sensitive. But I was glad to find out why she’d been acting so cold toward me, and that it was nothing horrible, just a misunderstanding.

“I’m sorry, Hailey,” I said. “I didn’t mean to sound that way. I really like it here. When I said it didn’t matter what people thought of me, I only said that because I’m leaving soon. I meant that if no one likes me, it’s okay because at least I don’t have to stay. And I didn’t mean it, anyway — I do want people to like me.” I thought of Hailey sitting alone in the
classroom and felt myself blush a little bit. I didn’t think she had a lot of friends. “And anything else was just me being kind of a dork. Which I am, sometimes.”

Hailey frowned down at her notebook and then looked up at me and smiled. “Okay,” she said. “I’m sorry, too. I should have been nicer to you.”

It was like a huge weight had lifted off my shoulders. I hadn’t realized just how much living with somebody who disliked me had been bothering me.

Jack rolled his eyes at both of us. “Well, I’m glad that’s over,” he said simply. “Did you get the social studies assignment?”

My warm and fuzzy feelings toward Hailey continued for the rest of the evening. After dinner, we all hung out with our parents for a while, playing board games. Hailey turned out to be a star at Cranium.

As the evening got later, though, Hailey became jumpy and distracted. Her knee was vibrating, she was bouncing in her seat, and she kept missing her turn.

“What’s going on with you?” Jack asked her when she forgot to roll the dice for the third time in a row.

“Hmmm?” Hailey asked, tapping her fingers on
the table and glancing quickly out the window. I turned to look: nothing but darkness.

“Sheesh,” said Jack as he pushed back his chair and stood. “If no one’s paying attention to the game, I’m going to get ready for bed.”

“I will, too,” Hailey said, jumping to her feet.

As they went upstairs, our mothers exchanged an amused look.

“I’m glad the girls are getting along better,” my mom said cheerfully.

“Still right here,” I reminded them. They just laughed.

I checked my e-mail on the family computer in the living room. Tasha had e-mailed me back:

Then I said good night to my mom, Molly, and Mike, and headed for bed.

I was halfway down the hall, passing Hailey’s room, when I heard it.

Aaaawwww-oooooo.

My heart pounded. Was that a wolf howl? It came again, and the little hairs on my neck stood on end.

Aaaaawwww-ooooooo.

Just as well I’m not out there with a telescope,
I thought.

It was amazing, though. The call sounded so wild and lonely. Based on what she’d said earlier, I knew one person who would be blown away by it, and I wondered whether she had heard it, too.

I knocked on Hailey’s door.

After a moment, I knocked again. It hadn’t been
long enough since she went upstairs for her to be asleep.

I remembered waiting in the dark outside her room the night I had arrived, and how she’d said fiercely that her room was private, but we were friendly now, right? I turned the knob.

The lights were out and Hailey’s window was wide open, a cold breeze rustling the pictures on the wall. The full moon shone in, illuminating enough that I could see the shapes of the furniture.

“Hailey?” I asked, taking a tentative step inside. Maybe she had gone to sleep already after all.

But Hailey’s bed was empty. She hadn’t been in the hall or on the stairs. I would have passed her if she had gone anywhere, except maybe my room. I ran down the hall quickly and checked. Hailey wasn’t there.

I remembered Hailey staring out the window at the darkness, and I remembered the cold chill at the back of my neck that afternoon as I’d walked up the drive.

The wolf’s howl rang out again, clear in the cold night air.

Aaaaah-wwwwooooo.

I didn’t know what to do. Part of me wanted to go grab my mom and Hailey’s parents, shriek that Hailey was missing and that there were wolves outside, and let them handle it. But I had just started being friends with Hailey, and if she was secretly raiding the kitchen and I had missed her on the stairs, I didn’t want to get her in trouble. Besides, I would look like a panicky idiot.

She was probably just talking to Jack before she went to bed. I held on to that idea like it was a life preserver. It was reasonable, it was nonscary, and it was totally believable.
Yes, she’s talking to her brother.

Still, I left the door to my room open so that I would hear her when she came back. I sat in the
flowery armchair in my room where I could get a view of the hall in case she passed by. We were reading
The Giver
for English class, and I tried to fill up my time by reading ahead, but I couldn’t concentrate. After a few minutes, I hopped up and wandered restlessly around my room.

Among the brochures about the area on my desk was a thin book called
The Wolves of Wolf Valley.
I hadn’t looked at it before. I had assumed it was a wildlife guide, but now that I looked at it more closely, it didn’t look like a wildlife guide. Don’t those usually have pictures?

“Weird,” I muttered. I flipped it open and began to read:

The book went on to tell how eight hunters went out one night to hunt down the wolves endangering their town, and only three returned. Soon, the rest of the townspeople noticed weird changes in those three men and their families. From the time of the hunt, they seemed hostile and wary of their neighbors. They got hairier, their ears became more pointed, and they were said to eat their meat raw.
(Ew!)

Eventually, rumors spread that these families were changing into wolves when the moon was full. There were stories like the one Anderson’s grandfather told him, about a wolf being shot and a human showing up wounded the next day. Some people even claimed they had witnessed humans changing into wolves, in the woods or outside houses in the dark.

Legend said that the hunters had been cursed by the mystical wolves of the valley. They had ventured into the wild, and the wild had changed them. The town lived in fear.

One night, someone burned down the houses of
the families suspected of being werewolves. The book said that no one knew for sure who had done it, but it seemed like the whole town must have been behind it. The three families disappeared and were rumored to have moved farther into the wilderness. The book went on:

“Weird,” I muttered again, and shivered. I glanced outside, where the full moon hung in the sky. It suddenly seemed menacing. I got up and pulled down the shade.

It was getting late when I finally climbed into bed, sure I wouldn’t be able to sleep. I lay awake for a long time listening, but I didn’t hear a sound from Hailey’s room. The wolf seemed to have moved on, because I didn’t hear it howl again. It felt like I waited
for hours, but when I finally fell asleep, Hailey still hadn’t come back.

When my alarm went off, I just lay there for a minute, blinking in the bright sunlight pouring in my window.

Had Hailey ever come back to her room last night? I climbed out of bed and took a peek down the hall. Hailey’s door was closed, and I couldn’t remember if I had left it open or not.

I tiptoed down the hall and listened at Hailey’s door. Nothing. I tapped gently.

The door opened suddenly, and I stumbled backward a step.

“Hi,” said Hailey, looking sleepy and confused. “What’s up?”

“Where were you last night?” I asked.

“Um … here?” she replied, raising one eyebrow quizzically. I’d always wanted to be able to raise one eyebrow.

“I was looking for you, and you weren’t here. I listened, but I never heard you come back.”

Hailey shrugged. “I was probably in the bathroom,
or downstairs getting a snack. Sometimes I wander around a little at night. I wasn’t gone long, though. You must have fallen asleep.”

She sounded almost bored, and totally believable. But I noticed a streak of mud on her cheek. And her hair was wild and tangled.
How could she have gotten so dirty in her bedroom?

“Was there something you wanted?” Hailey asked, self-consciously touching her cheek. I must have been staring at that streak of mud. She looked tired, too, and she had dark circles under her eyes. “Last night, when you were looking for me?”

I forced myself to stop looking at it. “Oh yeah. I wanted to know if you heard the wolf.”

“Oh, yes.” Hailey sighed, and smiled. “Wasn’t it wonderful?”

She turned away from me and gently shut her door in my face. I stood and stared at the door blankly for a moment. When she’d turned, I’d seen a dried leaf tangled in her hair; it certainly hadn’t been there when she’d said good night. Whatever Hailey said, I was sure she’d spent part of the night outside.

The scary dream I’d had about Hailey was still bothering me, and I kept remembering everything Anderson had said at school about werewolves. With Hailey’s odd behavior the previous night on top of all that, I didn’t know what to think. But there was definitely something weird going on.

I found myself watching Hailey carefully over breakfast. She had washed off the mud and combed the leaf out of her hair, but she seemed awfully tired. Molly was making vegan pancakes at the stove, and Hailey sat across from me at the table waiting for them. She leaned forward, elbows on the table, her chin propped on one hand, and gradually her eyes closed and she slumped to one side.

Something touched me on the shoulder.

“Gaaaah!” I screamed, jumping out of my chair and flailing my arms. My hand hit something hard, and there was a crashing noise.

“Marisol!” my mom scolded. When my heart stopped pounding like crazy, I saw her frowning behind me. On the floor was the smashed orangejuice pitcher she must have been holding.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I said. “I’ll clean it up. You startled me.”

“I guess I
did,”
she said, frowning. “That was quite a reaction.”

“Sorry,” I muttered again. Hailey had opened her eyes and was watching me sleepily but intently, like a cat. Or maybe like a wolf. And I had just seen something I hadn’t noticed before: Hailey’s ears were pointed.

I got a cloth and helped my mom and Molly clean up the broken pitcher and juice.

“Molly?” I asked, trying my best to sound casual. “I was reading in my room yesterday, um, the werewolf book?”

Molly laughed. “Isn’t that a hoot?” she said. “Our guests get a real kick out of it.”

“Yeah …” I said hesitantly. “This town has an interesting history.”

“It certainly does,” she said proudly.

My mom smiled. “Anything you want to know about Wolf Valley, Molly can tell you, Marisol,” she said. “Her family’s been here since the very beginning. Right, Molly?”

“We have,” Molly said brightly. “In fact, my family’s all mixed up in the werewolf story, if you can believe it.”

It felt like my heart stopped for a moment.

“Really?”
my mom exclaimed. “You never told me that!”

“Well, it was a long time ago,” Molly said. She shook her head a little. “The way this town turned on innocent families was terrible, but it’s all in the past.”

I slowly turned my eyes toward Hailey. She was ignoring us, twisting a ring on her finger as she stared out the window.

Her ring finger looked awfully long.

The ring was gold, with a turquoise stone set flat into it. A stone in the shape of a howling wolf.

Hailey must have felt me watching her, because she turned away from the window and her eyes met mine. She gave me a long look. Her eyes seemed cool and distant — just like a wolf’s eyes in every picture I’d seen. A shiver went up my spine.