Lonely Werewolf Girl Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Chapter 91

  Chapter 92

  Chapter 93

  Chapter 94

  Chapter 95

  Chapter 96

  Chapter 97

  Chapter 98

  Chapter 99

  Chapter 100

  Chapter 101

  Chapter 102

  Chapter 103

  Chapter 104

  Chapter 105

  Chapter 106

  Chapter 107

  Chapter 108

  Chapter 109

  Chapter 110

  Chapter 111

  Chapter 112

  Chapter 113

  Chapter 114

  Chapter 115

  Chapter 116

  Chapter 117

  Chapter 118

  Chapter 119

  Chapter 120

  Chapter 121

  Chapter 122

  Chapter 123

  Chapter 124

  Chapter 125

  Chapter 126

  Chapter 127

  Chapter 128

  Chapter 129

  Chapter 130

  Chapter 131

  Chapter 132

  Chapter 133

  Chapter 134

  Chapter 135

  Chapter 136

  Chapter 137

  Chapter 138

  Chapter 139

  Chapter 140

  Chapter 141

  Chapter 142

  Chapter 143

  Chapter 144

  Chapter 145

  Chapter 146

  Chapter 147

  Chapter 148

  Chapter 149

  Chapter 150

  Chapter 151

  Chapter 152

  Chapter 153

  Chapter 154

  Chapter 155

  Chapter 156

  Chapter 157

  Chapter 158

  Chapter 159

  Chapter 160

  Chapter 161

  Chapter 162

  Chapter 163

  Chapter 164

  Chapter 165

  Chapter 166

  Chapter 167

  Chapter 168

  Chapter 169

  Chapter 170

  Chapter 171

  Chapter 172

  Chapter 173

  Chapter 174

  Chapter 175

  Chapter 176

  Chapter 177

  Chapter 178

  Chapter 179

  Chapter 180

  Chapter 181

  Chapter 182

  Chapter 183

  Chapter 184

  Chapter 185

  Chapter 186

  Chapter 187

  Chapter 188

  Chapter 189

  Chapter 190

  Chapter 191

  Chapter 192

  Chapter 193

  Chapter 194

  Chapter 195

  Chapter 196

  Chapter 197

  Chapter 198

  Chapter 199

  Chapter 200

  Chapter 201

  Chapter 202

  Chapter 203

  Chapter 204

  Chapter 205

  Chapter 206

  Chapter 207

  Chapter 208

  Chapter 209

  Chapter 210

  Chapter 211

  Chapter 212

  Chapter 213

  Chapter 214

  Chapter 215

  Chapter 216

  Chapter 217

  Chapter 218

  Chapter 219

  Chapter 220

  Chapter 221

  Chapter 222

  Chapter 223

  Chapter 224

  Chapter 225

  Chapter 226

  Chapter 227

  Chapter 228

  Chapter 229

  Chapter 230

  Chapter 231

  Chapter 232

  Chapter 233

  Chapter 234

  Chapter 235

  Chapter 236

  Copyright Page

  Thanks to: Les Carter, Martina Dervis, Alexandra Dymock, Simon Fraser, Robin Gibson, Lorraine Garland, Melanie Garside, Kirsty Gordon, Malcolm Imrie, Andrea Kerr, Andreas MacElligott, Jonathan Main, Gordon Millar, Peter Pavement, Penn Stevens, Geoff Travis.

  1

  Kalix was lost. Tired, nervous, unable to focus, and lost. And now it was raining. She had padded her way down street after cold street, looking for the empty warehouse that was her temporary home but the streets all looked the same and she was beginning to despair.

  The cold rain quickly soaked through her hair which trailed, thick, long and dank, round her bony hips. Kalix was skinny, thin like a reed, not an ounce of fat to show for her seventeen years of existence: a werewolf without an appetite. How her family had hated that. Her mother used to plead with her, beg her to eat. Until last year when Kalix attacked her father, lord of the werewolves. Now her mother had more to worry about than her daughter’s poor appetite, or her violent temper, or her addictions, or her madness.

  Kalix’s hair, never cut, hung down to her hips. As the rain flattened it around her head her ears showed through. Her ears were never entirely normal even when, as now, she was in human form. There was something wolf-like abou
t them, naturally.

  Kalix stopped, and sniffed. Were the hunters close? She couldn’t tell. Her senses were dulled. She hurried on. If the hunters caught up with her now, when she was weak, they might kill her. Kalix wondered what it would be like to be dead. Good, she thought. Better than living in an abandoned warehouse, begging for money to feed her addiction. But she wished she’d managed to kill her father. Then, she thought, she might have died satisfied.

  Were she to die, she would die alone. Kalix MacRinnalch had always been alone. She’d never had a friend. She had two brothers, a sister, and many cousins; all werewolves, but none of them friends. She hated her brothers. She hated them almost as much as she hated her father. As for her sister, the Werewolf Enchantress, Kalix didn’t hate her. She almost looked up to her. Had the Enchantress ever given her encouragement, Kalix might even have liked her. But the Enchantress had long ago distanced herself from the family and had no time for a sister born so many years after her, a sister who was famed from a young age as a source of trouble.

  In fairness to the Enchantress, she had given Kalix the pendant which protected her. While wearing the pendant Kalix remained undetectable. She was free to scavenge on the streets of London, untroubled by the members of her family who wanted to drag her home to Scotland to face the vengeance that the attack on her father demanded. Free from the attentions of the hunters who wanted to kill her with silver bullets. Free from all harassment. It had been good while it lasted but Kalix, inevitably, had sold the pendant to raise money. Now her enemies were closing in.

  Kalix pulled her ragged coat tightly round her thin frame. She shivered. When Kalix was five years old she could run naked in the snow and not feel the cold. Now she had lost her resistance. She longed to be back in the warehouse. It was empty, with nothing to make it comfortable, but it was some sort of shelter. When she reached it she could fill herself with laudanum and sink into dreams. Not many people remembered laudanum these days. It was almost gone from the world. For a few werewolves, sunk in degeneracy like Kalix, it was still obtainable. It was a further disgrace that Kalix brought on her family.

  Footsteps sounded from round the corner. Kalix tensed though she knew it was not the hunters. Just two young men walking home at midnight. As soon as they caught sight of her they headed her way, intent on not letting her pass. Kalix attempted to step round them but they moved quickly to intercept her.

  “Hey skinny girl,” said one of the men, and they both laughed.

  Kalix regarded them with loathing. It infuriated her the way drunken human males would always try and talk to her.

  “Going home on your own?”

  Kalix had no time to waste. She needed to find her warehouse before she collapsed from exhaustion. She growled. Even in human form, Kalix’s growl was a terrifying sound, a lupine howl so chilling it seemed impossible it could come from her slender frame. The young men, startled by its ferocity, leapt to one side and regarded her uncomfortably as she hurried past.

  “Freak,” they muttered, but quietly, and went on their way.

  2

  After sixty years in England, mainly in the fashion industry, Thrix, the Werewolf Enchantress, had mostly discarded her Scottish accent. It was only really noticeable when her voice was raised in anger. Thrix was unconcerned at the loss. It further distanced her from her family and this was to her liking. The thought of her father the Thane, roaming the grounds of his castle in the remote wilds of Scotland, still made her purse her lips with distaste.

  Whilst not displeased to be a werewolf, and a member of the MacRinnalch ruling family at that, Thrix did not like to associate with others of her kind. Others of her kind always meant problems. The malevolence of her uncles, the plotting of her mother, the machinations of her brothers, all these Thrix avoided. The MacRinnalch Werewolf Clan could tear itself to pieces so long as they all left her alone.

  Thrix was unique among the Scottish werewolves. She was blonde, beautiful, the owner of a fashion house, and a powerful user of sorcery. No other werewolf could claim as much. The dazzling blonde hair alone had always been enough to set her apart from the rest of her clan. She was vain about this, which she knew.

  A huge mirror covered the wall by Thrix’s desk. She studied her reflection while talking on the phone.

  “Cassandra, what are you doing in Portugal? You know I need you here for the shoot.”

  Thrix listened while the model related some tortuous story of missed planes and unreliable photographers.

  “Fine, Cassandra,” she interrupted. “It all sounds terrible. Now get back to London. Your ticket will be waiting for you at the airport.”

  Thrix put down the phone. Models. Not the most organised group of people, she found, though generally she liked them. Not as much as she liked the clothes, of course. The Werewolf Enchantress truly loved clothes in a way that had always mystified her family.

  Thrix looked at the message on her desk. Her mother had called. Why? Surely Verasa was not expecting her to visit? Thrix had been at Castle MacRinnalch only six months ago and her mother knew that she would never visit more than once a year.

  The Werewolf Enchantress studied herself in the mirror. She looked around thirty, perhaps a year or two younger. She was in fact almost eighty years old. Her youthful appearance was not the result of sorcery. The MacRinnalchs were very long lived, and eighty was still young for a werewolf. Thrix was enjoying her life. Her fashion house’s reputation was growing steadily. If everything went to plan she would one day be one of the major players on the European fashion scene.

  What did her mother want? Thrix sighed. No matter how she tried to distance herself from the clan, Verasa, the Mistress of the Werewolves, would never admit that she was gone. A troubling thought floated across her mind. Could her mother be calling about Kalix? There was a time when Verasa had never been off the phone about Kalix. Even before her savage attack on the Thane, life hadn’t been easy for the youngest member of the family. Thrix affected not to care - she had left Castle MacRinnalch long before Kalix was born - and why the Thane and the Mistress of the Werewolves had chosen to have another child almost one hundred and fifty years after the birth of their first was a mystery - but she had some sympathy for Kalix. Life in the Scottish castle hadn’t been easy. Not for a young girl anyway. No wonder it drove Kalix mad.

  Kalix shouldn’t be in trouble with the family. Not when Thrix had discreetly provided her with the pendant which hid her from the world. Even when she transformed into her werewolf shape, and her scent was most distinctive, she would remain hidden. She was safe to do whatever she wished which, as far as Thrix could see, was destroy herself at the earliest opportunity.

  Her assistant buzzed through to let her know that the call she had been waiting for was here. A very fashionable photographer who Thrix was keen to enlist for an upcoming shoot. She clicked on the speaker phone and prepared to be at her persuasive best. Before she could launch into her speech, the door burst open. This was unexpected. Ann, her personal assistant, was much too efficient to let her be disturbed unannounced.

  “Prepare to die, cursed Enchantress.”

  It was the Fire Queen. Flames were flickering around her eyes.

  “You have angered the Fire Queen once too often, you perfidious werewolf! I am going to roast you over a fire then send you off to the deepest pits of hell where you will suffer a millennium of torment!”

  Thrix sighed.

  “I’ll call you back,” she said, and hung up the phone.

  3

  Kalix was trembling. It was a long time since she had tasted laudanum and Kalix’s shameful addiction was very strong. Dizziness overwhelmed her and she halted to catch her breath. The rain intensified. She shook her head to clear it and hurried on. Finally she recognised the street she was in. Not far now to the warehouse. As she turned the last corner she halted. Someone was close. Hunters. Seconds after registering their presence Kalix found herself confronted by two large figures dressed in black. Without the streng
th to flee, Kalix could only stand motionless as they advanced towards her. The light from the street lamp glinted on the ring that pierced her nose, a gold ring through her left nostril that was rather prominent, a size larger than would commonly be worn.

  The hunters towered over her and their immense bulk cut off most of the light.

  “If your father is Thane of the werewolves and you’re just a little werewolf girl - ”

  “ - a puny little junky werewolf girl - ”

  “ - it doesn’t pay to aggravate him, and get yourself banished.”

  The larger of the two men drew a gun from the depths of his coat.

  “It’s stupid of you to walk around here.”

  “I am stupid,” muttered Kalix.

  “Really, wolf whelp, you deserve to die.”

  “I know,” said Kalix.

  “And when you’re dead, no one will miss you.”

  “It’s true,” said Kalix, quietly. And it was. It was all true. She deserved to die and no one would miss her.

  The hunters gazed with dislike at the skinny, ragged, trembling figure, seventeen years in the world, without a friend to her name, not a single soul who would be sad to learn that she was gone. Kalix gazed down at her feet, at the cracked and broken boots she wore, now letting in water as the rain poured down from the black sky.

  “I like it better when they fight,” muttered the second hunter, drawing his gun. “Let’s do it.”

  Kalix dragged her gaze up from her boots to the face of the larger man. She spoke, quite softly.

  “I’ll kill you.”

  The hunters laughed.

  “You’ll kill us? What with? Your werewolf strength?”

  “You can’t transform. No full moon, dummy,” said the second hunter, pointing at the sky where the crescent of an old moon showed through a break on the clouds. Both hunters raised their weapons, preparing to fire silver bullets through the young werewolf’s heart. Kalix thought, as she often did, how pleasant it would be to die, and end it all on this bleak London street. But somehow, she just couldn’t do it. As the hunters raised their guns she transformed in a split second from helpless adolescent runaway into the savage, bestial, werewolf who’d killed hunters from one end of Britain to the other, who’d torn the very gates from the prison the clan had held her in after she almost killed the Thane. Before the hunters had time to squeeze their triggers they were torn apart, shredded by the unparalleled savagery that had been both a gift and a curse to the lonely werewolf girl.

  It was over in seconds. Kalix let out a frightful howl then shuddered as she reverted back into human form. She looked down bleakly at the carnage beneath her. Already the rain was washing the blood away.