Werewolfing. 9

Chapter Nine

Elliot fell quiet, picking at the shrubs’ leaves and tearing them apart.

“You… you never told us?!” Tanvi looked like she was about to implode. Her face had flushed from pale to red, and her voice grew decidedly less calm with every word she spoke.

“I’m sorry, I didn't think...” Elliot stopped talking with a frown, watching her lips.

“Do you know how many people are in danger now?” she begun, fiddling violently with the zip on her backpack. “You -”

Seb cut her off with a deep, rippling growl. The zip broke with a feeble crunch. If they made it through unscathed, Seb would listen to her rant a hundred times over. But now wasn’t the time.

“Yeah. You’re right,” she sighed, composing herself. Seb could’ve sworn her hands were still shaking. She scrabbled at the broken zip, dragging a scarf out of her bag. She put her hood up and wrapped her scarf around her face. “… I need go. I need to warn my family.”

He cringed as he thought about her family and what could become of them - seven dusty brown pelts piled on top of each other. Seb made a questioning, whining noise.

“This is enough disguise, if that’s what you’re complaining about.” Tanvi’s voice was muffled, and she didn’t sound as authoritative as usual.

Good luck.

-

The journey back was worse than the trek to the motorway haven. So, so much worse. Both of them stayed quiet as Seb led Elliot, who was stumbling and still-groggy from the dart. Their breath coiled up like smoke, ready to give away their position. They crept down backstreets avoided by all but the stupid and the illegal, slinking around streetlamps and sticking to the shadows like patch of creeping damp. The clouds were stained dreary Prussian blue as they finally pushed open the front door, sending peeling flakes of red pain fluttering onto the carpet.

Their house was terraced, just like the others in the street, and three storeys high. It was so skinny and tall that it bordered on comical. Its roof off-kilter, slipping away like the hat of a drunken tramp. The house stood infront winking lamplight a road that had been full of potholes for as long as Seb could remember.

Riley’s enthusiastic greeting died on her face as soon as she looked from Seb to Elliot. She ushered them inside with croons of worry. Tiffany set Juana down in her playcrate and joined Riley in the kitchen.

“Seb, go and change,” she said, holding out a pile of clothes for him. They kept clothes like that all over the house, folded up and grouped by outfit, ready for a surprise-shift at any time.

Seb padded out, the uneasy silence broken only by his claws on the floor and by Elliot shuffling and accidentally hooking his leg around the chair leg, falling forwards into it. Seb took the bathroom on the ground floor and pulled on his clothes as quickly as he could - it had gotten very cold very quickly.

“What happened?” Tiffany asked as soon as Seb got back, beating Riley to the question. Her eyebrows arced up with worry, and her voice was low and serious.

Seb told her who whole wretched story, competed with snippets of speech from Elliot. Any shock from Elliot’s speaking was well-hidden. Seb finished and waited, looking from Riley to Tiffany, waiting for one of them to speak. The silence tore at his mind so much that he had to glance at Elliot for some kind of reassurance. It isn’t our fault, is it?

“Poor kids,” Riley finally choked out, pulling them into a hug over the table that made the wood dig into Seb’s stomach-scar. She let them go, becoming brisk and businesslike again, and reached for the keys hanging behind the kettle. Seb watched her jog to the front door and heard the click of the lock.

“Don’t worry,” Tiffany tried to reassure them, “it’ll be fine. We’ll talk with Tanvi’s father about this. I’m sure he’s seen things like this happen before. He’ll know what to do. We’ll all just have to be careful from now on. No more weekends werewolfing for a while, and he’ll never know where we are.”

The sick terror hadn’t left Seb’s churning stomach yet - nightmarish visions of being shot, microchipped, and sold ran riot in his head, bolting and kicking at his psyche like demonic horses. He could tell from the cloudy fear in his thoughts that the calculating, cold rage in the hunter’s beetle-eyes would haunt him for a very long time.

-

Supper was quiet, only punctuated by Juana squealing or howling or calling Seb’s name, craving attention from anyone who’d look her way.

“’Bastian!” She squealed, her hand-paws morphing claws into fingers to hold her spoon. She flicked gravy over the table until Riley took her plate and spoon fro her, trading it for dry chunks of lamb and potato. Not long afterwards, Elliot left early, wordlessly, twenty minutes before Seb started to consider getting up. He did so with a groan, making for the washing up bowl in the sink.

“You’re off-duty,” Riley said, turning the tap on, “go up and make sure he’s alright. Make sure you’re alright. Get some sleep, kiddo.”

Seb nodded and poked Juana’s nose-muzzle for luck. Once he’d managed his way up the stairs and avoided the sharp little toys scattered around Juana’s bedroom like landmines around a warzone, Seb checked in their room. He poked his head around the door to Elliot’s corner, to find nothing but the mattress they’d put there since the first night, the pillow, and the duvet. Perhaps the bathroom? God, maybe he’s finally having a shower…

He checked in Riley and Tiffany’s room on the way to the bathroom, before he knocked on the door. It took a while without an answer for Seb to realise knocking was futile. He pushed the door open and peeked around the corner, ready to cover his eyes and make a hasty retreat.

Blood. So much blood.

Elliot stood haunched over the sink, clutching a razor - my razor! - and staring at Seb like a startled cat. Livid red spewed over the porcelain. A few morbid spots had lodged themselves on the mirror, while others lay dangerously close to the toothbrushes. Blood continued to pour from the huge gash in Elliot’s left forearm that made Seb recoil while his stomach threatened to turn.

“Jesus Christ!”

Seb lunged forwards and ripped the razor out of Elliot’s hand, throwing it into the bathtub and sending flecks of blood flying. Elliot twisted his wrist out of Seb’s grip, frustratingly nonchalant, and continued to pick at the wound.

Panic rose in Seb’s throat as he watched - he knew they’d all been shaken by earlier but surely not this badly? His mind raced and drew a blank, unable to come with something - anything - to get him to stop making the cut worse. No matter how annoying, idiotic, and just downright bloody stupid Elliot was, Seb didn't want him to die.

Seb cuffed Elliot around the face as suddenly as the idea had come to him, catching his cheek and probably jarring his nose, too. A sharp slap echoed around the bathroom. Elliot let his arm go and held his face instead, clutching his head as if it was the only thing stopping it from crumbling to pieces. Blood smudged into his hair and over his skin.

“You can’t kill yourself, twat!”

Nothing. Elliot wasn’t looking.

“Hey!” Seb pushed Elliot’s shoulder, “what the bloody hell were you doing?”

“My tag,” Elliot growled, voice wavering, “was trying to get my tag out.”

“Your…” As Seb stared at the mangled mess, strange, warm relief cooled his anger down to something very small - insignificant, almost. “Your tag… that’s, uh, not how you should get it out.”

“I know, but -”

“Don’t listen to Tanvi. I mean, yeah, you should’ve told us, but one night isn’t going to make much of a difference. I know someone who can get it out properly, okay? Just wait until tomorrow.”

“Okay.”