Blood Moon Rising 5

Food threatened to slip by Harper's grinning lips. The flavor of the food was rich, ripe, alive on his tongue. Did food ever tantalize his senses so completely before. Was the experience of eating more intense at the present moment than it had ever been? Harper felt no desire to brood or even wonder at his state. The wolf remain, but it was quiescent. It rested in a dark shadow of his mind but hardly troubled him. He felt an odd affinity with the creature that had always haunted him. Why? The thought slipped away from his attention without bother. The flavor of eggs and vegetables, the tang and savor. Harper felt as human as he had in as long as his practical memory imposed upon him. The rest was to fantastic to consider, at least in the moment. The moment. Harper swallowed and let the satisfaction of flavor and communion with the rest of humanity's pleasures satisfy him.

After a long time, Harper paused, his gut so full that he couldn't force down another morsel, although he wanted to continue, if not to lose his grip on the moment.

"I don't think I've ever been so happy to feel so empty as I did this morning," Harper said, to no one in particular.

He looked up to see Cagan smiling with eyes so wide and livid, he almost started. The abbot maintained a different expression, guarded and introspective in its complexion.

"I felt the same," Cagan said, and laughed. He smiled and the turn of his lips and eyes transformed a countenance from stoic to joyous. The abbot glanced at Cagan and sighed, his head slumping as if exhaustion seized him.

The abbot sighed and gathered himself.

"I'm glad to see you both so well," he said quietly, then added, in a warner tone, "The night was long, but we survived intact."

"We did better than that!" Cagan exclaimed, and rushed on Harper, to clap him on the shoulder. "It was a hell of a night, but you did better than survive..."

Harper smiled and stood, fought an impulse to embrace Cagan, and instead slapped his shoulder. Why the rush did he feel such a rush of camaraderie?

"I...I just feel better about things," Harper said.

"You should," Cagan said. "Not everything is lost, you know, even when you are under the curse, some little part of you remains as a memory within what you become, and when you emerge again, something remains of your other life. What is left isn't always awful. Part of my job is to tell you about that, but we had better sit down. The threat that hangs over us remains, but...I think we have some breathing room now. We've knocked our enemies back again, and you were part of that."

"Please," the abbot said. "Excuse me. I think we ought to consider that life was lost here. Whatever victory might have been one was at a cost."

"What?" Harper blurted.

"None of ours," Cagan reassured.

"How many of those creates who assaulted us perished."

"Frankly," said Cagan as he stood, "I don't know. But we didn't provoke this fight. If they perished, they did so as a consequence of their actions."

"Never to be redeemed," the abbot said. "Never to be redeemed."

"They abandoned any hope or even desire for redemption a long time ago."

"Have you?" the abbot asked.

Cagan scowled.

"Whatever judgement you want to press upon me," he said, "remember that I am paying for my sins. Whatever else, the curse that holds me bound will surely take my actions into consideration, and I hope it regards the extingencies to which it has subjected me."

"God will judge," the abbot said.

"Well, he's taking his time with the verdict," Cagan said. "Until he has rendered it, I believe I have a right to self defense. As have we all."

The abbot shook his head, but not in negation, rather in in a gesture of confusion.

"If I were as certain as you about what we are doing here, perhaps I would share your joy in what you regard as victory."

"Victory?" Cagan asked. "If I was after victory, I would be beyond these walls destroying the last enemy of ours I could find. So we never had to fight them again. Pursuit is the responsibility that comes with victory. Destruction is the cost. What elation I feel is in our survival. More than that. Our lives. The ability to do what we do in good conscious..."

Cagan paused and sighed.

"You weren't meant to celebrate a fight, even a good fight, a fight that's won," he said. "I supposed you were meant to forgive it."

"I wish it was that simple," the abbot said.

"Hey, I don't get this," Harper said. "Could someone tell me what's going on?"

"I can tell you what went on, with the abbot's help, if he's so inclined."

The abbot nodded and said, "We had a fight here last night. Some of it, I can explain, some I can't. To discuss events is one thing. To understand them is a more difficult proposition."

"Here, we are in agreement," Cagan said. "What occurred is beyond even my experience."

With a wave of his hand, Cagan indicated one of the chairs in front of the abbot's desk. He resumed his seat at the end of the couch across from the desk as the abbot retreated to his own chair.

Harper took his chair with a grin stretching his face. He forced himself to sit still.

"So, what went on?"

"Some of this may seem fanciful," the abbot began. "Even fantastic. I hope you can set aside any skepticism and accept what we have to say."

"If that's the preamble, fine," Harper said. "I'm ready to listen. I, um, I'll try to keep my mind open, even if it's inclined to reject certain contentions."

"Good enough," Cagan said. "First, I want to know if you remember anything?"

"From last night? Of course not. Not after...Not after that change started on me."

"You can try to remember. Sometimes we retain, not so much coherent memories, but images."

"I'm not sure how much I want to remember."

"See, that's it. After a night like last not, when, well, when you don't have to dread what you remember, that's the time to start trying to recall whatever you can. It's important."

"Why?"

"Let's just say it's a way of coping with the situation. We don't have to get into that now. Just, try and remember something."

Harper paused and said, "Not a thing."

"Alright," Cagan said after a little sight, but he smiled again quickly. "I can remember a few things, but I'll let the abbot start..."

"Wait," Harper interjected, "you remember..."

Cagan nodded, "A little. I hve been going through this for a long time. It is possible for most of us, but don't concern yourself about it now. More important to bring you up to date."

Cagan turned to the abbot. After a moment, he nodded.

"After we confined you and Cagan, we took...precautions. Our brothers took their positions in the compound. We didn't know exactly what to expect...Our weapons, or primary weapons are designed for containment and to repulse an incursion...not one we would wish..."

"They wish to avoid bloodshed," Cagan interjected.

"Yes. We are in a position...our weapons may seem foolish given certain circumstances..."

"Don't apologize, my friend," Cagan said. "Your humanity preserves us."

"Still, when the assault came, we were not altogether prepared."

"I don't understand," Harper said.

"Their primary weapons are modified paintball guns. But they fire ammunition containing wolfsbane and garlic. Harmful to us..."

"Okay, I'll bite on the wolfsbane...so to speak...but garlic."

"Painful to our usual allies," Cagan said. "But certain rouges among them make trouble for us. For the purposes of our story, we must say, the brother's were ill armed."

"We couldn't have known the effect would be so poor," the abbot said.

"What? Wait, what went on?" Harper said

"The brothers prepared for a fight they understood. What they encountered was something different," Cagan said.

"What!?!"

"Our brethren are cursed, but there are those who have taken on effect we live with voluntarily."

"Isn't that a little dangerous..."

"It is done as part of a cultic ceremony we don't fully understand. Somehow, the ceremony invokes Rakshasas, Hindu demons that have no fixed form but can shape shift. The human soul is sacrificed to the Rakshasas and their overlord Vitra, and, afterwards, the body can take on the shape of animals. For some reason internal or external to India, the cult fixed itself on wolves, at least in the modern manifestation. Or that's as much as we know. The Rakshasa cult keeps a very low profile and remains closely tied to its main center of worship, which is somewhere in northwestern India. Occasionally, a few emerge on some mission, but we know very little about their priorities or intentions. We've tried to contact them, even to capture one when it went on a rampage in California. It killed half a dozen recent immigrants from India twelve years ago. Wolf sitings in the vicinity of the murders made our brethren very uncomfortable. I was part of the pursuit, but we remained far behind our quarry, which finally disappeared."

"So, they change with the moon?"

"Yes and no. Their ability to change is associated with the new moon, not the full. That was likely fortunate for us."

"But they could change anyway?"

"I'm only making an educated guess, but with discipline and time, some might manage to change outside of the period of the moon's influence."

"Man! Wait, can we..."

"They already have the ability to change when they wish, or not, in the period of the new moon. We have more than 200 years of scattered reports on these beings, mostly rumor, but we have accounts of instances when the writer or someone who he interviewed witnessed an individual turn into a beast. Even identified, those beings made good their escapes. Sometimes, they lived undetected for years, despite local disturbances and even murders, because they could control their transformations."

"So why attack when they're weak?"

"Maybe the circumstances dictated the timing. Perhaps they wanted us to be in our transformed condition. I'm not sure."

"And what about our potatoes looking friend. Is he one of them."

"Decidedly not," the abbot interjected.

"The abbot has a theory about our nemesis."

"An avatar, possibly of an Asura, a class of demons different from the Rakshasa," the abbot said.

"This is all getting a little too mystical for me," Harper declared, shaking his head.

"And our speculations could be partially or largely off base," Cagan said. "But those creatures last night jumped the gates in the guise of wolves and they were something very different from you and me."

Harper shrugged, and said, "You and me."

Cagan laughed, surprising Harper.

"Harper, it's a little late for denial."

Harper shrugged.

"Part of my mind keeps telling me I'm going to wake up, and this all will be a bad dream."

"I'm afraid that is a luxury you can no longer afford," the abbot said.

"We each have to work out our feelings about our particular dilemmas," Cagan said.

"Yes," the abbot said.

"You want to give me a break?" Harper said.

"I, too, disbelieved when I was confronted with the plight of your kind..."

"It's not the same," Harper insisted.

"It really isn't the same," Cagan said quietly.

"My brother's have been injured, some badly injured!" the abbot snapped.

"They are your brothers in religion, and we are your brothers in strife," Cagan said, "as is anyone living in this monastery. But as close as we are, you cannot know. I...I do not believe you are unsympathetic to the unusual circumstances that confront us."

"You, us, is that how you want to address our particular dilemma?" the abbot asked.

Cagan frowned, regarding the abbot.

"Is this all to much for you?" he asked.

The abbot rose and turned himself toward the high window.

"Almost," he muttered. The he returned to his seat.

"Stress," the abbott said, now smiling slightly but drawing on his lips on the same time. "I have not slept. I know my duty to you and to Mr. Harper. But, I walk down a quiet street, and the knowledge that I retain haunts me. Sometimes I wonder if It only is madness, and that I've lost myself in some phantasmagoria."

"You and me both," Harper said.

"I should keep that in mind," the abbot said. "I'm sorry. And, believe me, my sympathy is with you. I'm a bit overwhelmed. I apologize."

"Alright," Harper said. "Let's not make things worse."

"Agreed," the abbot said. "I...I would prefer to put the events of last night behind me. But, of course, we much revisit them."

The abbott paused and took a breath.

"The assault began not long after you changed. The event is sufficiently difficult. We placed fewer monks in the corridor with you than I would have liked."

"I thought we were, I guess you could say, secured," Harper said.

"In the circumstances, no security is certain. The non lethal weapons we count on are designed to keep the cells secure. My monks are also equipped with steel bars to seal the cells. To secure the compound, we could only spare half a dozen of our youngest and least experienced monks, a concern of itself..."

"But not a consideration in our story," Cagan said.

"Yes," the abbot replied. "Still, a worry. But then, what happened next was much more worrisome."

"Yes?" Harper inquired.

"Our outpost spotted the creatures prowling the walls of the monastery. They were quite taken aback. The creatures they saw resembled your transformed condition, but they were working to a purpose, not randomly assaulting the grounds. The found a weakness, a tree near the wall. They crashed through a window into the pavillion above. Our brothers fired their non-lethal weapons. To little effect. The brothers said it was as if they were striking them with fly swatters. They hardly flinched. The brother commander ordered a resort to lethal weapons. The brothers opened fire."

"Jesus," Harper said. "Real guns. Where are the cops?"

"Silencers," Cagan said.

"I thought silencers were illegal."

"We have been allowed a certain leniency..." the abbot said.

"How deeps does this whole thing go?" Harper asked.

"Deep," Cagan said. "But we can discuss that another time."

"Yeah," Haper said. "But they didn't they kill those creatures."

"They didn't," the abbot said. "But the weapons had a greater effect. Not unlike the effect we hoped for by our non-lethal weapons, a bit more effective, in fact. The creatures were halted for a moment. Well placed shots broke bones, penetrated skulls. The creatures fell. But unlike the effect we might expect if we..."

"If the brother's fired silver crested ammunition at us," Cagan said.

"Yes. The effect wasn't fatal. They rose again. No blood. If we...I'm sorry...if we had fired at you and Mr. Cagan, we would expect an effusion of blood. But the floors and wall of the monastary are as clean as if scrubbed."

"I'm sorry..." Harper muttered. "The whole thing must have been terrifying."

"Yes," the abbot said. "But the brother's acquitted themselves well. The fell back in order. The had no choice. The fell on our main defense in the courtyard."

"Defense?" Harper said.

"You don't have military experience," Cagan said. "The lower pavilion is designed to provide defensive positions. The garden offers thick growth on the side the brother's defend, nearest their quarters, low, thing arrangements on the side opposite side, near the offices."

"I didn't notice," Harper said.

"We fell back," the abbot said. "I took command of the defense."

The abbot paused, lost in thought for a moment. He continued.

"The creatures continued their assault. Our brothers stationed in the defensed opened fire with what we regarded as out lethal weapons. They were hardly lethal, but the held the enemy at bay, snarling, spraying spittle in their rage, but they accumulated injury. Even at the outset, I was told, their movement was odd, as if they existed oddly in their bodies awkwardly, even painfully, despite their evident power and determination. But they began to fail. The pain of their wounds, perhaps the pain of their regeneration, was more than they could bear. They hesitated. They seemed prepared to flee. But our enemy came."

"That slug of a thing," Harper growled.

"Yes," Cagan said.

"He appeared above the gate. How he gained that place, I do not know. But he came, and he uttered a chant, an incantation of awful purpose. The sound was like glass grinding. The scrapped up our very bones. But it reenergized the creatures assaulting us. We was an awful burden to even move under its influence. Our fire slacked, it was without purpose. The creatures surge forward. I thought we would be slaughtered. But our ally appeared."

"Simeon?" Haper asked.

"Simeon." Cagan said.

"Simeon appeared upon the ramparts and assaulted the creature. He tore at it with fist and fang. But Simeon was thrown down. The chant, though, the awful song was silenced. The creatures were almost upon us, but our fire resumed. They were so close, they reached brother with claw and fang, but we drove them back..."

"Will they..."

"No," Cagan said. "They assumed the curse that consumed them. The brothers are not accursed."

"We believe..." the abbot moaned. "I hope."

"They will not be," Cagan said. "I know the scent."

"Simeon assaulted the beast, again and again, and was thrown down again and again, so that I feared he would be destroyed. But he did not falter, even as he weakened. The creature reiterated his song, interrupted by Simeon, but not silenced. We drove the creatures back, but they resumed the assault with the same ferocity as the song resumed. We had little choice but to fall back behind out sturdy doors, one wounded brother after another. We had no choice..."

"What?" Harper asked.

"Your guardian," the abbot said. "Whatever the risk. As they drove us back they began to assault the door to your refuge."

"Our dungeon," Harper said.

The abbot shrugged.

"We had agreed. We didn't have enough men to defend the lower level to the assault that gathered. We would not suffered you to be torn apart in your cells."

"They released us," Cagan said.

A gasp seized Harper.

"Do you remember?" Cagan said, half rising.

"No," Harper said, grasping the arms of his chair tightly. "Of course not."

"Do you remember a dream?" Cagan insisted.

"I...know, a feeling," Harper said. "Something...a feeling.."

"Cagan surged into the yard like a storm. He tore the creature who assailed him in two. Still, we saw no blood."

The abbot paused again. Whatever Harper meant to say caught in his throat.

"We withdrew," the abbot said. "Our weapons were more dangerous to you than the creatures who opposed you. We watched. It was a simple thing to do. You, powerful and tall, our enemies haunched and scrambling against you. Cagan tore one and then another apart. I felt, and I admit it, an awful elation."

"And what did I do?" Harper groaned, rising in tension, "Nothing?"

"You," the abbot chucked, without any trace of mirth in the cast of his face, but with his eyes livid with his recollection. "You were anarchy itself. Striking, Biting. Tearing at one creature at another. Tearing them away from their purpose as Cagan leapt at our enemy. Whatever the power of the creature, it could not withstand the assault. It was thrown down. Then...the moment was odd, like the eye of a storm. Silence. Peace. Then the creature arose."

The abbot gathered himself and even Cagan's fell into a mask of introspection.

"The howl the creature raised," the abbot said. "Oh...so awful. We fell, with our hands over our ears, trying to drown out the sound. Even the minions, those stilt faning life fell on their faces."

"But not I," Simeon said.

Simeon, wrapped in a black cloak that only his all dull eyes and sharp nose exposed, stepped slowly into the chamber.

"Oh, rest my friend," Cagan said.

"I wish to witness the account. I could sense the telling even in my sleep. I am a witness to what occurred, but the actions were so swift in their occurrence. I wish to hear."

Simeon moved stiffly to a chair and his breath rattled as if in a sigh. He sounded what what might be a chuckle if not so ancient and labored.

"I thought nothing would be worse than to feel nothing," he said. "I believe I have been mistaken."

"Can I get you...anything?" the abbot said.

"I will refresh myself among my own kind," Simeon said.

"As must be," the abbot said, gathering himself. "Simeon assaulted our enemy again..."

"Music and song is lost to me," Simeon said. "We all must bare the burdens that accumulate upon us."

"Simeon assaulted the creature again," the abbot continued. "He tore at its throat, and Cagan recovered to strike it, silence it...Then its minions fled. Rage filed our enemy. Such a power that I had never encountered. It cast Cagan aside and flung Simeon up over its head to tear him apart. I could see the purpose in its black eyes..."

"And then?" Haper asked.

"And then you gathered, prepared your assault against it," Simeon said.

"Me?," Harper blurted. "I couldn't have prepared anything."

"Your attention locked on the creature," Cagan said. "It had struck me down."

"Cagan was prostrate, seeking to right himself," the abbot said, "Simeon tore at the grip that held him but could not gain release. And you raged in the courtyard as your kind in the moon. But, something happened. You turned suddenly and saw the enemy. You leapt. A mighty leap, from the garden to the palisade of the gate. You struck our enemy with tooth and claw, and I saw something I never expected to see. Blood. Black blood pouring from its chest where you ripped flesh from bone...The scream that uttered from it was not an expression of power but of pain and despair and, in that instant, it disappeared."

"What?" Harper interject. "Why? What?"

"We don't understand," the abbot said.

"Somehow, you wounded it in a way it had to flee our existence," Simeon said.

"So, I killed it?"

"That sort of being can't be killed," Simeon said. "It isn't alive. But, finally, your assault drove it from our world to the horrors from which it emerged."

"Guess I hit it at the right time," Harper said, trying to smile.

"I wonder," Simeon whispered.

"What happened" Haper implored.

"We're not sure," Cagan said. "What we think is happening, much of it, is speculation based on more or less evidence."

"The being we confronted was a manifestation of something much more powerful in its own realm," Simeon said. "Cagan is more focused on the traditional aspects of reality. It is well that he is. However, the curse that lingers pun you and him, the curse that consumers me, the being of that creature arise from another element of reality, one tenuously associated with what the larger populous would describe as the everyday."

Simeon snorted on of the dry laughs that disturb Harper, but less so on the occasion.

"So, I guess when you get thrown out on the surreal end of what's real, you better keep an open mind."

Simeon smiler slightly and said, "That's one way to put it."

"Speculation aside," Cagan said. "Clearly, our enemy has suffered a defeat."

"But. wait, what happened to...his evil minions or whatever."

"As their master abandoned them, the lost heart," Simeon said.

"They ran for it."

"No," the abbot said. "I...perhaps you might explain, Mr. Cagan."

Cagan took a breath, and said, "Well, have you heard the term jour de guerre?"

"I've read the term. I'm not sure how it applies..."

"You and I, we weren't done."

Harper felt some of his elation deflate.

"So...we weren't done."

"We were engaged in a battle," Cagan said. "War was upon us. And we responded in that means."

"I'm not to sure about how I feel about that, if you're saying what I think."

"The battle wasn't over," Simeon said. "The creatures who remained screamed. Tore at their own flesh, but the fire returned to their hearts. Before they could regain themselves, you and Cagan went among them. You finished the battle as it must be finished."

"I don't to imagine," Harper said, growing pale.

"Not that terrible," Cagan said. "Although, it is terrible to assume anything we have done when the rage is upon us. We did destroy the beings that remained."

"Assured, your hunger remains as evidence of your restraint," the abbot said.

"You fought as warriors," Simeon said.

"And you?" Harper asked.

"I could play not hand in your assault, no was it by no means necessary. You and Cangan...these creatures sacrificed their humanity to their bestial ambitions. You and wolves and men besides. They could not withstand you."

"Would you like to see then?"

"No!" Cagan insisted.

"He has a right to see!" the abbot interjected.

"I would see," Harper said.

"What point would it serve?" Cagan asked, his tone disturbed but winsome.

Harper felt a chill in his body, and for a reason he could not explain, the asked Simeon, "Should I?"

"I cannot advise you," Simeon said. "My heart is dust. If you weigh what you can bear, then you will do so. But I do remember. When a man tests what horror he can stand, he may break, even if he hopes to grow stronger."

Harper grunted, the laugh he intended stifled by chill that remained.

"I guest you're not a Nietzschean," Harper said.

"Nietzsche!" Simon grunted. "A syphillitic fool."

"He should what the result is," the abbot said.

"Now is not the time!" Cagan insisted. "We have to survive what assaults us."

"If not now, when?" the abbot asked, signing. "What salvation do you offer without witness?"

"I don't offer salvation," Cagan said, in a voice that fought to dampen a growl. "I offer sanity and a chance to establish a pause so Harper can come to terms with his circumstances."

"What pause....!" Harper snapped. "This is just another moment in a nightmare!"

"What pause?" the abbot repeated.

"Don't," Harper said. "Don't repeat what I say. You don't think I know you have your own agenda. The people who locked me up had an agenda. You want to get your grips on my? Don't think it will be that easy. And you either."

Harper turned to Cagan.

"Alright, then," Cagan said.

"I'll decide for myself," Harper said.

"Decide for yourself," Cagan said.

"Alright," Harper murmured. "Let's go see."

"I believe I'll return to my rest," Simeon said.

Simeon left and, as the others followed, proceeding in the opposite direction. Harper looked over his shoulder and watched Simeon continue away from them.

"Special guest quarters," Cagan said. "I want to warn you...Under normal circumstances, I would oppose what we are doing here. I will tell you frankly that what you will see is awful. I...I would not regard you as prepared under other circumstances. However, the threat hanging over our heads requires haste."

"What do you mean, under other circumstances?"

"I have, previously, worked with others new to our circumstances."

"You mean others who got themselves turned into werewolves."

"I am glad you are taking the frank approach to the situation. If you think you are prepared for what we are about to do, though, you are mistaken. The confrontation with what we had to do last night...you are not prepared for it. Not fully."

"I've woken up with flesh in my teeth wondering if it was human."

"And your mind found ways to deny it. Perhaps not definitive. But it created the possibility of escape. The possibility ends now. Werewolf is a term born of ignorance. Our people simply use the term wolf. The context is sufficient to render the particular meaning..."

"Sensitivities aside..."

"I do not dabble in sensitivities, only fact. What we become is wholly animal, no part man, part animal. Something of the human remains and even effects the wolf in its actions, but the action is mixed with the mindset of the wolf and the affect of the curse. We rarely attach children, but it is hard to say why, if it the human aversion, the effect of the curse, or the instinct of the wolf to preserve the young of another pack animal. Perhaps a mix of the three. On those rare occasions when it has occurred the attacker has been depraved in the human state. Some of our kind draw an odd comfort from that, but I do not think any case has been proved."

"You make it sound so very medical."

"Even unreasonable situations can be illuminated by reason."

"So, are we getting all philosophical now."

"Philosophy also applies. It can buffer a blow and allow us to accept a difficult truth as our psyche allows."

"Don't get all zen on me," Harper said.

Cagan snorted a laugh.

"I haven't always live a contemplative life."

"Good, I'm not sure I can take any more philosophy."

"Alright," Cagan said, his tone becoming sharp and precise, "then grab your fuckin' balls because they're going to try and run the fuck up your throat in a minute."

The group had paused at the doorway to the lower level and the cells where Harper and Cagan had been caged. As the door opened, Harper saw that the outside was marked by the tearing of claws and that the metal shutter on the window that opened on the wooden face before him had been torn violently from its hinges. Inside, the door was marked with bullet strikes that had not penetrated the dense wood.

"It gets worse from here," Cagan snapped.

"Alright," Harper growled, and followed Cagan, who had begun descending the stairs.

Yellow emergency lights illuminated the the proceeding corridor . A cool wind wrought with a metallic aroma set Harper's skin to prickling. As they reached the foot of the stairs Cagan through open a heavy door and pressed through it. Harper followed, pausing behind Cagan as he halted. Harper's gaze remained upon Cagan as he halted and raised an arm indicating what was before him. Harper hesitated look, but gathered himself with as little hesitation as he could managed and turned.

Before him, under the pustulant lamp-glow several sheets lay on the floor. The white periphery of each defined a crimson stain and something poorly defined to Harper's adapting eyes. Limbs. Torsos. Heads. Brown-skinned body parts disarticulated, laid together in the pattens of men.

"What kind of sick shit is this?" Harper said, trembling throughout a body urging him to flee.

"Last night's remains," he abbot said quietly.

"What the fuck is wrong with you people?" Harper muttered. "Did you do this..did you do this to do this to me..."

"You did this," the abbot said. "These are your enemies. You destroyed them. I cannot fault your actions. The result...the fault must lie somewhere. Does the fault lie with God? Too painful a question to ask..."

"Are your kidding?" Harper railed, turning to Cagan. "Are you kidding, you sick fuck!?!"

Harper returned his gaze to the bodies as his eyes adjusted tot he dim light. Torn flush. The jagged pieces of broken bones merging from them. Heads tiled half one way, half the other, eye, too many eyes, wide and vacant.

Harper buckled led with disgust, nausea, a desire to deny what he feared had occurred, a suspicion that he had been deceived and that the fate of the corpses arrayed before him would be his in a moment, a knife in the back, fangs at his throat, claws tearing into his chest to rip away his heart.

A fury tore through Harper. Raising him up. The smell of blood infused his consciousness, but not as horror, but as a triumph. A cry grasped at his throat, but he gathered it. He breathed out. The horror adhered to his mind, but another sensation seeded through his mind. A memory burst through his conscience, of tooth and claw, of awful countenances snapping red jaws upon his being, and, him, ripping them away, tooth and claw, blow and thrust, a madness of destruction, but courage and purpose driving the carnage...

"Enough!" Harper roared.

The room grew quite around him.

"Do you remember?" Cagan murmured.

"They weren't men then," Harper said, "They were something else. They had a purple. to destroy me. I..."

"You remember."

"I never remembered anything," Harper said. "I thanked God for it."

"You have taken a step you should not have taken so soon," Cagan said. "I'm sorry that you have. What faces you won't be easier because of it. But you will be better prepared for the troubles that are coming. The struggle within becomes the struggle without..."

"The struggle without becomes the struggle within," the abbot muttered. "The struggle within becomes the struggle without."

"That is a merciful way to describe the struggle, but it isn't that simple," Cagan said to the abbot.

"And what result can we expect?" the abbot asked.

Cagan turned to Harper and asked, "Do you know who these men are?"

"Our enemies," Harper said, "defeated."

"And what of their remains?" Cagan asked.

Harper hesitated. He wanted to formulate an answer that what shock Cagan. But how primitive would that be? Something urgent overcame Harper's need to deflect Cagan's question. A calm swept Harper's mind. Harper recognized that the abbot offered him a comfort in philosophy. Harper felt sweat prickle his back and flow. Philosophy? Sweat and blood infused Harper's mind. The abbot, the brothers had had saved his life. Their duty completed, what were they but witnesses, acolytes, fulfilling what was required of them?

"These are our enemies?" Harper asked. "My memory...I remember them as nightmares launching themselves at me. How am I certain...? No. I should face my enemies."

"Human they began," the abbot said. "Human they return to God's eye. May he be merciful."

"These creatures, dark and willing as they are, have some kinship with us," Cagan said, " in the final measure."'

"What of it?" Harper said, laughing at he did. "They after us, didn't they? Save them for dinner, next full moon and spare some innocent asshole. Throw them with us in the cage. Save a life that's worth something. My enemies? My victims. Not innocent. No. Feed them to me. I will chomp their stinking fleshI"

The room fell silent. Harper breathed deeply the scent of blood and all it promised. What were they but the fodder for his...

What has had happened? Harper asked himself.

The question imposed itself in his mind as a murmur, but overtook him in a moment that sent him shaking uncontrollably.

"Did I kill them!?!," he screamed, "Did I murder them!?!"

Harper spit on the remains laid out before him.

"Come to murder me!" he roared "Fuckin' chicken parts, now, huh? Fuckin' killed them! Fuckin' kill them again. Kill fuckin' everything! That's what I'll do. That's what I'll fuckin do! Fuckin' kill everything! Oh, I'll fuckin' kill everything, okay. Fuckin' kill me! Just fuckin' kill me already. Let it just be fuckin' over....

The room swam in around Harper, until darkness imposed.



Simeon. Harper awoke the Simeon's pale, narrow face leaning over him. This must be the end, Harper thought.

Simeon's mouth extended in its narrow smile. The eyes remained dark and expressionless. The end...

"I'm not here to satisfy any mortal wish," Simeon said. His voice had changed in its quality, dusty, rattly, but with a deeper note that Harper interpreted as, barely, soothing. "Besides, a quality in you lot...even in your everyday guise, the wolf would arise in the last measure. To content with me."

Simeon grunted, a hollow sound, but not so terribly empty as Harper expected.

"What a battle we might have in this little room, floor to wall and ceiling, and I might not win, although, and I will say this temperately, I likely would. But I am not threat to you, no matter your present disposition."

"I would change?" Harper asked.

"No. Perhaps if I was crude. The wolf always remains, as death shrouds my being. But the wolf does not die without asserting itself. Lie quiet. We have a quiet time now. I would not harm you. I was a soldier once, like Cagan. I respect those who have fought with me. Respect is as close to an emotion as a being such as I, as old and damned as I am, experiences. I think that is all that separates my kind from some species of furious, pointless demon. But, no philosophy. You don't have to worry about me imposing conundrums upon you. We have fought together, and you fought well. And we should leave it at that. Rest is better for you now than mysteries. All is well. We have no urgent threat to concern us."

"I feel...better," Harper said.

"Better, how so?" Simeon asked.

"Numb," Harper said.

"A feeling with which I am familiar. Rest in is the moment's unimposing embrace."

Harper felt himself smiling. Was that Simeon's idea of a joke?

"Where is...?" Harper stopped himself, not wanting to call for Cagan.

"Arguing," Simeon said. "Cagan and the abbot are friend and rivals. They view your your condition differently. The conflict is nothing new or confined to you. Allies bicker, viewing different paths to the same end. The dilemma certainly is not confined to your circumstance."

"So they went out to the hallway to bitch and moan, and left you as my babysitter?"

Simeon half turned way, and his slight grin broadened into something that approached human. He drew back his accustomed emotionless facade and nodded.

"An approximation," he said. "I should alert Cagan and his entourage. Concern for you animates them more than I can endure for much longer. Do you mind?"

Harper nodded, and Simeon stood and drew open the door.

"My charge has awakened," he said.

Cagan hurried into the room. The abbot followed past Harper's guardian, who paused at the doorway smiling slightly under the mass of hair that obscured his face.

"How do you feel?" Cagan asked.

"I don't want to think about it," Harper said.

"Yes," Cagan said. "Yes. Too much. You have been introduced to much more than we could expect..."

"Don't say it," Harper muttered. "Let me just lay here."

Cagan muttered. However, the abbot wavered physically, his shoulder bobbing slightly.

"I'm...yes. I..." the abbot grumbled.

Harper wasn't certain how to address the abbot's concern and chose to ignore it, wishing only to sink deeper into the mattress and sleep.

"I just wish to apologize," the abbot continued, anyway. "I have treated you like a burden, not a guest. The action violates...within our rule...not, that is not to say..I have been inhospitable, and I have been wrong as such."

"It's okay," Harper said, "you had a lot to worry about."

"Kind of you to say," the abbot replied. "But that isn't an excuse."

"So anyone want to update me?" Harper asked, nodding his head slightly but throwing an arm across his eyes.

"Do not worry," Cagan said. "We're safe for now. Rest. I think we must move on shortly. But for now, rest."

Harper felt clutched the arm tighter across his eyes, wising it were a more effective barrier. No use. He drew it back slightly to look for Cagan.

"You are well, as are we," Cagan began. "The night could have been a tragedy, but it was not. Harm was done, but what harm occurred was not fatal, at least to our friends. Something must be said for that."

"Yes," Harper said.

"I think we have beaten back our enemies sufficiently to move on our own initiative."

"Dangerous as that might be," the abbot said.

"Yes, of course," Cagan continued. "But remaining my be a burden on our minds and a consequence that is not in our power to affect."

"We offer as much safety as any fortress," the abbot said.

"And fortresses fall!" Cagan snapped.

"Yes," the abbot responded in a soothing tone. "But any departure might be subject to observation, pursuit..."

"One of the wonderful things about New York is the abundance of escape routes. We can escape."

"And who do you propose, of your pursuers, would you avoid?"

"What?" Harper said, throwing his arm aside and rising from the bed.

"The abbot and I do agree that the enemy that seized you and the one that attacked us last night are not the same."

"That's great," Harper said. "How many enemies have I got?"

To his surprise, Simeon answered, saying, "We do not know. We do not even know if you are exactly the focus of these actions. We are, as it were, in the dark. But I side with Cagan. Taking you from the crux of our dilemma could at least suggest what contingency we must address."

"Well," Harper said, "my contingency, call it my inclination, is to get the hell out of here. I'm sorry, abbot, but I think I'm bait here, and don't think I like that feeling..."

"Egotism aside, I am not convinced this trial has you at its source," Simeon said. "I apologize if that argument is deflating. Independent of your situation, lately the characteristic circumstances that we except, our normal condition, if it might be accepted as such, has been interrupted From which, we must conclude, that some power is trying to impose itself upon us."

Harper turned to Cagan and said, "Can you translate that"'

"We're fucked," Cagan said.

"Right, I'm getting the hang of this," Harper said.

"Jibes aside," Simeon said, "separating Harper from the immediate circumstances might give us some insight additional insight as to the intent of our enemy."

"That's put very precisely," Harper said.

"I was a soldier once," Simeon said.

[The abbot make his case for remaining.}