The Night Has Claws (Book Two) EXCERPTS ONLY

2. RIVER STYX

At the first opportunity, I shower and switch into my own clothes to try to regain the feeling of being in my own skin again. What I want is to get back to my life, whatever that means now that I’m a werewolf. I would love to sleep but if I stop moving I’ll have to think about last night, last week and everything that’s gone down since this school semester started in Paris. And I just can’t face that yet. Just the idea of heading to school and sitting in class is absurd so I decide to bag up my dirty clothes and grab a bite to eat at a neighborhood laundromat café. The place is empty except for the lone employee who leans behind a shiny Formica bar, engrossed in a book. A massive column of washers and dryers divides the room, four machines wide on each side, and beyond that is a lounge of sorts. The walls are painted bright red and blue while all the furnishings are bright white. After putting in a load of laundry, I buy a coffee and sandwich then take a seat on an uncomfortable plastic chair at one of several café tables. As plush as they look, I don’t trust myself on one of the couches because I’d pass out from exhaustion for sure. Even still, the white noise of the machine is enough to put me in a trance so I put in my EarPods and stream a local metal station.

While I do feel bad for Arden, living with him is going to be the worst. I can’t even begin to imagine it. Maybe if his arm wasn’t in a cast, things could return to something that resembles the status quo. In the state that he’s in, though, he’s probably going to need my help and I doubt his ego will allow asking for it. He normally spends most of his time either working downstairs in his butcher shop or out who-knows-where with who-knows-who. But how’s he going to operate his business now that everyone has abandoned him? Not to mention the danger Arden’s in, keeping me around while I’m on the most-wanted list of the four-hundred-year-old human he bit. My guess is that Boguet isn’t done with me and that before Boadicea died she was trying to warn me of his plans. Madison took off with the answers before I even had a second to formulate the questions.

After I’m done folding and sorting clothes I bring them back to the flat and keep myself busy by washing a sink full of dirty dishes and general tidying up. I’m completely exhausted. I crash on my own bed enveloped in the downy soft-and-perfumed scent of clean sheets, and sleep is welcomed instantly. I sleep straight through until morning and when I get up my mind instantly goes to a plan of attack for the day. There are things I need to find out, people I need to track down, and I have no idea where to begin. Arden is still in his bedroom. I gently knock on his door and when there’s no answer I decide to check in on him. Quietly pushing the door open, I poke my head in through the crack of the doorway and see that he’s still fast asleep. Even at rest he looks uncomfortable as a human. It’s dispiriting to see him this way, looking so vulnerable. Is this how he saw me at one point? Weak, unable to defend myself ... prey? I suddenly feel uncomfortable watching him.

I head out on my bike and leave Arden to sleep off being human. The first logical place to start my search is at school, where I assume Madison and Josh will be. When I get there, everything is so unnervingly normal that it makes me feel out of place and I consider turning back. My life has become anything but average and this environment makes it more achingly obvious to me. I have questions, though, and some of the few people who can answer them may be here. The kids who mill around the front of the building begin to stare at me as I lock up my bike, like somehow they know what I’ve become. For a second it panics me but then I remember that the last time I saw any of them was at the mash-up party on Friday night. That’s when Josh clocked me for trying to kiss Madison in full view of an entire auditorium of students. It seems like a lifetime ago. The rumor mill must have been working overtime this weekend filling in the blanks. Under their watchful gazes, I make my way inside while trying to keep a lookout for the only two friends I’ve made here.

I peek into our psych classroom where the lesson is already underway, but all three of our seats are empty. It occurs to me that they may not return to school at all. Maybe now that they’ve captured Henri Boguet they’ll be shipped off to some other city to fake friendships, all in the name of maintaining some semblance of justice in the werewolf world. It’s almost lunchtime and I want to get out of here before the other kids have a chance to ask me any questions. I’ll next have to try Madison’s boarding house all the way across town. First I walk by our usual haunt J’m Sushi just for good measure, peering through the glass facing of the brightly colored building in the hopes of seeing Madison’s cherry-red hair. There’s no sign of her, or Josh for that matter, but memories of a simpler life from just days ago begin to stir. I grab a bite to eat at Starbucks instead and sit alone with a latté and sandwich. It brings to mind the first day of this semester when I headed back to the school courtyard with my lunch instead of hanging out here. I’d wanted to stretch my comfort zone, make new friends, reinvent myself. Well, mission accomplished.