The Howling (21 page)

Karyn's next sensation was one of floating. She was riding along on a gently flowing river. But there was danger. She had to swim to shore. She tried to move, but something held her fast. Suddenly awake, she thrashed wildly to free her arms and legs.

"It's all right." The voice of Dr. Volkmann was deep and commanding. "You're home now."

She was being carried, Karyn now saw, in Volkmann's arms. He was walking toward the little house, where the lights still blazed as she had left them.

"No!" she cried. "They're here too. The wolves."

Volkmann stopped and swung her feet down to the ground. He steadied her as she tried to stand. Her head hurt and she staggered against him.

"You say they're here?" Volkmann said.

"Yes. One came at me, but I got away in the car. I went into a ditch, then ran into town looking for some place to be safe. I found Oriole, and she ..." Karyn could not complete the sentence. "We've got to get away."

The two of them turned back and started toward the Buick. Before they could get close, a lean black wolf slipped out of the forest and moved between them and the car. The wolf was joined by a second. Then a third.

"We'll never make it," Volkmann said. He spun Karyn back toward the house and they ran across the clearing to the door. Volkmann pushed it open and they stumbled inside. He slammed the door behind them and Karyn shot the bolt into place.

They stood for a moment watching the door as though expecting it to burst open.

"What about the back door and the windows?" Volkmann said.

"I locked everything before."

"Where is your husband?"

There it was, the thing Karyn had refused to think about. Part of her must have known when she found Roy's shoe near the place where Inez had died, but she would not let herself admit it. When he called her out of the house, she had gone, and
they
were waiting for her. She had lost him.

She said, "I think Roy is one of them."

Volkmann frowned and shook his head.

"I don't know how it could have happened," Karyn said.

"It must have been the night he did not come home," said Volkmann. "If he was attacked by a werewolf and lived ..."

"But he had no wounds."

"None that showed, but remember the blood on his shirt."

Karyn turned away. She was not ready to talk about Roy. She went into the kitchen and ran a glass of cold water. Through the small window over the sink she saw more wolves coming out of the shadows.

"They're all around us," she said.

"We'll be safe inside the house."

"They broke the window of the car. They can get in."

Volkmann looked over to where the shotgun was propped against the wall.

Following his eyes, Karyn said, "That can't stop them."

"Perhaps it will slow them down."

"Can we make a run for the car?"

Volkmann peered out the front window, then turned back, his face grim. "Take a look."

Karyn moved closer to the window. What she saw froze her blood. The grassy clearing in front of the house was alive with wolves. Different shapes and shades, but all of them large and deadly-looking. Occasionally one of them or another would make a menacing move toward the house, but mostly they just shifted restlessly about, watching the house. Waiting.

Karyn backed away from the window, hugging herself for warmth. She spoke in a toneless voice, barely above a whisper. "Oh, the time we wasted wondering who in Drago was the werewolf. It isn't just one of them, it's the whole town. Inez must have realized that somehow. She was coming to warn me when they got her."

Volkmann continued to stare at the animals outside.

"It's the legend of Dradja," Karen said. "The people would not give up their werewolf even under torture because the werewolf was all of them. When the village was destroyed some of them escaped. These things outside are their children."

"Incredible," Dr. Volkmann muttered.

"You've lived in Drago for years," Karyn said. "Did you never suspect?"

The doctor spoke without turning from the window. "I'm afraid I kept apart from the people of the town. Who could imagine a thing like this?"

Outside, the night sounds changed. Under the sighing of the wind there was a growing rustle of movement. A series of heavy blows thudded against the door, rattling dishes in the kitchen cupboards. A wolf crashed against one of the window screens and rebounded. Another hit a window on the opposite side.

Karyn and Dr. Volkmann looked at each other.

She said quietly, "They're coming for us."

The red Camaro hit the crest of the hill to the west of Drago and plunged down the winding road into the dark valley. At the wheel a grim Chris Halloran fought to keep the car on the road without slackening his speed. The gun loaded with silver bullets hung heavy but reassuring in his jacket pocket.

At last he reached the valley floor and the road straightened for the short drive to the village. As he entered Drago, Chris wondered why there were no lights. He slowed the car passing the dark buildings, looking for signs of life. He saw no one. Then what appeared to be a large dog showed up in the headlights. Chris hit the brake pedal and the car slewed to a stop. The animal never flinched, just stood there looking at him.

Now he saw it was not a dog. It was too big, and the eyes were not right. A wolf.

He started to ease the car around the animal, and a movement at the side of the street caught his eye. Another wolf was coming toward him. No, there were two of them. With a growing sense of alarm Chris looked along the street and saw half a dozen more of the shadowy forms. These were no common wolves.

He gunned the engine and wheeled the Camaro straight at the wolf that stood ahead of him. He tensed for the coming impact, but at the last instant the wolf sprang aside and the car roared past.

When he reached the turnoff to Karyn's house, Chris saw the rear end of a car jutting up from a drainage ditch across the road. He steered in that direction to let his headlights fall on the ditched car. A Ford, Roy Beatty's Ford.

Chris pulled the Camaro off on the shoulder and started to get out. He had one foot on the ground when a snarling beast charged him from the ditch. He pushed himself back inside and slammed the door just as the wolf hit the car.

His first thought was the gun. He drew the pistol from his pocket, then hesitated. He still had to reach Karyn. He could see there was no one in the Ford, so she must be at the house. He had only the twelve bullets, and from what he had seen so far he might need all of them.

Inside the house Karyn stood with her back to the inner wall next to the fireplace. She held the shotgun leveled at the door, in which two vertical cracks had opened under the constant battering from outside. She knew the gun was no defense, but it was better than waiting passively for ... whatever.

On the other side of the fireplace, Dr. Volkmann stood watching intently as the cracks in the door widened with each blow. He had not spoken for several minutes. Nor had Karyn. There was nothing to be said.

Then, over the banging at the door and the rush of the wind, Karyn heard a new sound. The high-pitched whine of a straining engine. A car was coming. Coming fast. With a cry she dropped the gun and ran to the window. Bright white headlights washed across the clearing and the wolves.

"It's Chris!" she cried. "Dr. Volkmann, it's my friend. He'll help us."

Outside the Camaro plowed into the wolves, scattering them for a moment, and jolted to a stop behind the Buick.

"Dr. Volkmann, did you hear me? We're going to be all right."

Karyn turned to where the doctor was standing, but he was no longer there. His clothes lay on the floor. She started for the fallen shotgun, but a lean gray wolf sprang from the side of the room and stood between her and the weapon.

"Oh my God," Karyn gasped. "You too."

The wolf came at her.

The pack of ravening wolves around Karyn's house was like a preview of hell. Chris Halloran aimed the Camaro at two of the animals nearest the roadway and drove into them. He felt the sick-soft thump as the wolves went down under the wheels. They should have been crushed. Looking back, Chris saw the two animals lie still for a moment, then get back to their feet in jerky movements. Their eyes blazed with wild hatred.

Now he knew for certain what they were. His rational twentieth-century mind had rejected the word, but it had been on the edge of his consciousness from the time he had played the tape and heard Karyn ask for silver bullets. Werewolves.

He pulled up behind an old Buick that blocked his path to the house. Someone appeared for a moment at one of the windows. It might have been Karyn. Chris calculated his chances of reaching the house on foot. Between him and the door were more wolves than he could count. Right now they seemed indecisive, their attention divided between him and the house.

Chris took the gun from his pocket and stepped out of the car. The wolves watched him intently, but made no move. He started walking carefully toward the house. At the same time from inside came a loud growl. As though it were some kind of signal, the wolves came for him.

Chris took quick aim with the pistol and fired at the nearest animal. The sound was a disappointing little pop, and Chris longed for a heavier-caliber weapon. A puff of dust kicked up a foot in front of the wolf. He had missed. At pointblank range. One precious bullet gone.

For his second shot Chris steadied his right hand with his left, the way pistol shooting was taught. He aimed carefully at a point between the eyes and fired. A round black hole appeared magically in the short fur of the wolf's head. The animal's legs stiffened for a moment, then buckled, and it fell, the eyes open and empty.

The other wolves drew back for a moment, then came together in a mass between Chris and the door. Holding the gun straight out in front of him, he advanced cautiously. Off to the side, a lone pale wolf bounded from the forest and charged the house. Oblivious to both the man and the other animals, it crossed the clearing in powerful leaps and sprang for the window, forepaws outstretched to take the impact. The screen collapsed inward, the window glass shattered, and the pale wolf disappeared into the house. A woman screamed.

When she realized what had happened to Dr. Volkmann, Karyn edged away from the window, keeping her eyes on the lean gray wolf that now stood in her living room. She wanted to believe that Chris would reach her in time, but she had seen how many wolves blocked his approach to the house.

The muscles of the gray wolf bunched as he crouched to spring. With nowhere to go, Karyn backed into a corner, holding her arms crossed in front of her in a feeble attempt to ward off the attack.

But before the blow came there was a splintering crash and fragments of glass peppered the room. A pale-yellow wolf, broad through the chest, landed on all four feet between Karyn and the attacker. She screamed.

To Karyn's astonishment, the pale wolf turned not toward her, but the other way to face the lean Volkmann wolf. The two squared off, growling deep in their throats. The pale wolf made the first move, springing at the other. The gray wolf stepped nimbly aside, and the newcomer overshot and slammed into the sofa before he could turn. The gray wolf moved in fast, his jaws open wide, teeth bared for battle. They collided with a thump and rolled across the floor, the fury of their combat shaking the house. From outside Karyn heard the popping of a small-caliber gun.

She watched the fight with a strange detached fascination. The lean gray wolf was the quicker of the two, but the pale newcomer was the stronger. The gray wolf would back away, inviting an attack, then leap aside like a matador and slash at the other as he went by. Each time the sharp teeth ripped through the yellow fur, leaving a streak of blood, and each charge by the pale wolf was a fraction slower than the last.

The end came with startling suddenness. The gray wolf moved half a second too late, and the other was upon him. Using his superior weight, the pale wolf forced his foe slowly to the floor. Then he struck, powerful teeth clamping on the other's throat. A terrible, bubbling cry came from the downed animal just before his windpipe collapsed.

Still pressed back into the corner, Karyn looked directly into the eyes of the pale wolf as it raised its head, muzzle dripping with the other's blood. A shock of recognition went through her.

"Roy," she said softly.

At that moment the weakened door splintered and Chris Halloran burst into the room. He looked down at the mutilated wolf, then at the other. He pointed the Stoeger pistol at the survivior.

"No!" Karyn cried.

With his finger tight on the trigger, Chris looked over at Karyn.

"Don't kill him," she said. "Not this one."

Chris let his gun arm fall, and the pale wolf leaped out through the smashed window.

Karyn staggered for a moment, and Chris moved swiftly to catch her.

"Hang on," he said. "We've still got to get out of here."

She nodded and drew a shuddering breath. "How many bullets do you have left?"

"Only four, if I counted right."

Through the open doorway they could see the dark shapes moving cautiously nearer.

"We can't stay here," Karyn said. "We've got to get to the car."

Chris nodded toward the shotgun that lay across the room. "Can we use that?"

"It's no good. Only silver can stop them."

Outside the wolves grew bolder.

"Is there nothing else?" Chris asked.

"One thing," she remembered. "Fire."

Chris looked over at the dwindling flame in the fireplace. "See if you can find something to use for a torch. I'll watch the doorway."

Karyn ran to the bathroom and took Roy's long-handled shower brush from its hook over the tub. She wrapped two heavy towels around the bristle end, fastening them with adhesive tape. From the cupboard under the sink she took a can of lighter fluid and poured it over the towels. From out in the living room came the sound of shots. She ran back and saw two more wolves down on the floor.