Camille

Tess Oliver

Copyright © 2009 by Tess Oliver

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This book is a work of fiction. Names,
places, characters and incidents are products of the author’s
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events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely
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The shadows of the grave markers stretched
thin across the mossy ground. I scooted nearer to Dr. Bennett. A
layer of death rested eternally beneath me, yet the white heat of
the moon infused the night air with energy.

“Another graveyard,” I said, “why always a
cemetery?”

Dr. Bennett grabbed my hand and pulled me
along the fence. We stooped low behind a dense row of shrubs. He
lowered Dutch’s cage to the ground. “Perhaps, for the next hunt, we
should send a short missive suggesting our prey show up in a more
preferable location such as Hyde Park or the Adelphi.”

“I don’t see why not.” In a futile attempt to
warm my feet, I reached down to tighten the laces on my boots.
“We’ve been following the man for two hours. What if the paper was
correct and the man was actually bitten by a dog?” I rubbed my
hands together. The friction heated them but only for a moment. “If
I find that I could have been at home, tucked on the settee with
hot tea and a book instead of…”

Dutch’s hairless tail flicked through the
bars of his cage and lightly brushed my cheek. I jumped, imagining
a cold finger had reached up from one of the graves. A low growl
rolled out from beneath the cat’s whiskers shattering my dog bite
theory.

Dr. Bennett shifted onto his left knee, and
the light conversation froze into rigid silence.

The cat’s gray stripes bristled, and it
shrank back into a crouch. We’d saved the animal from two boys
who’d been torturing it with a lit candle, hence the hairless tail.
But it was not until we’d nursed the cat back to health that we’d
discovered Dutch’s talent for sensing a lycanthrope. Drunken
laughter pulled my attention away from the cage.

The lantern glow inside the caretaker’s shack
cast a liquid stream of light across the yard and onto the
unearthed coffin. A shiver vibrated my tired body, and I clutched
my cloak tightly around my neck. Sometimes I wondered what it would
be like if my life had not taken such a fierce turn. Not that I
didn’t appreciate what Dr. Bennett had done for me. Without him, I
surely would have ended up starving and homeless. Or worse.
Besides, I’d tried to stop feeling sorry for myself long ago
because it only made my life more pathetic.

My toes tingled with numbness as I rolled
forward onto them and wrapped my gloved fingers around the black
iron bars, the only barrier between me and the hallowed home of the
dead. “You did remember the bullets this time,” I said as a
statement, but it was more a question. Academically, Dr. Bennett
was the smartest man in Britain. He’d read every science book
written and even wrote a few himself. He was a distinguished member
of several of the Scientific Societies, all with names too long to
remember. But I had to remind him to do simple things like stir
honey into his tea, put on shoes, and bring his silver bullets.

He patted the pistol in his pocket and
nodded.

I glanced across the yard. Two silhouettes
wavered in the small window of the shack. “I believe we’ve found
tonight’s dinner special, fresh gravedigger with a side of
caretaker.”

“Don’t be so crude, Camille. They have no
idea the danger they’re in.” There was a stern edge to his voice
but he knew that my ill-timed humor was a defense system. It kept
us both from going mad. Dr. Bennett glanced across the deserted
grounds to the coffin. “That funeral must have been hours ago. I
don’t understand the delay.”

The two men laughed again not realizing that
the next grave may very well be their own. “It’d serve them right,
lazy louts. Spending the evening celebrating, while she sits out in
the cold, waiting for eternal peace.”

“I hardly think the corpse is experiencing
any discomfort from the cold.”

I hugged myself. “She may not be, but I’m
frozen down to my drawers.”

“Spoken like a finely raised young lady. How
do you know the corpse is a woman?”

“The casket is small and feminine. Anyone can
see that.” Other girls my age were floating across polished dance
floors, and I was standing in the cold assessing the size of a
coffin. I stood and shook out my feet. A flicker of movement in a
nearby tangle of ivy made me drop back to a crouch. We both relaxed
simultaneously as a rat scurried past our feet. An unnatural
silence surrounded us now. My heart raced as if I’d run a steep
hill.

Dutch released a series of yowls. Dr. Bennett
hastily removed his coat and threw it over the cage to silence the
cat. His gaze shot across to the copse of trees at the far end of
the cemetery, the last place we’d seen our prey still in the shape
of a man. “No doubt the transformation is taking place as we
speak.” A visible shudder ran through him, and he fished for the
pistol in his pocket. None of this was new to us, yet even with
experience, the terror of it never lessened.

A crackling of leaves snapped our attention
to the south end of the cemetery. Three figures, one tall and two
short, floated out from behind the vine covered mausoleum. Their
nervous whispers swirled around the maze of crooked headstones. The
smallest one tripped, and the tall one grabbed his coat collar and
wrenched him back to his feet.

Dr. Bennett pressed his face closer to the
gate. “Now, who’s this?”

“Splendid.” I leaned forward. “Who would have
thought a cemetery could draw such a crowd.” A bitter taste filled
my mouth. While I’d seen the horrific remnants of a werewolf
attack, I’d never actually witnessed a victim being ravaged by one,
and I intended to keep it that way. But five possible targets in
one location seemed like unavoidable carnage. My stomach tightened
somewhere between nerves and nausea.

We watched as the three sprinted across the
path to the caretakers shack. The tall one knocked lightly as he
took a peek back over his shoulder. He handed the gravedigger a
bottle, and the stout man shut the door on the three boys.

“They look rather young.” I stood. “I’ll
scare them off.”

Dr. Bennett took hold of my wrist. “Wait.
Those lads are planning to rob that corpse. That explains the delay
on the burial. They must have bribed the gravediggers with
gin.”

“I don’t see how stolen jewelry will help
them if the flesh has been shredded from their bones,” I whispered
loudly.

Dr. Bennett’s eyes widened as something
caught his attention across the way. His hold on my arm tightened
as he yanked me down to my bottom. “It’s too late, Camille.”

I wrapped my arms around my knees and pulled
them against my chest both for warmth and to keep my heart from
slamming against my ribs. For an instant, my gaze floated up to the
night sky. It looked as if someone had cut a perfect circle out of
black broadcloth and patched it with a gold sovereign.

The tall lad pulled a metal pipe from his
coat. The moonlight illuminated his face beneath the wild, black
hair that framed it. It was a symmetrical face with a straight nose
and a strong jaw. The thief bit his lip in concentration as he
pried open the casket. His younger companions backed up at the site
of the dead woman, but he reached directly in to grab his
treasures. He seized the woman’s arm. Her pale hand hung limply as
he attempted to slide a ring off her finger. It didn’t budge.

I squeezed my legs tighter and shut my eyes
for a moment attempting to transport myself into a bad dream that I
could wake from at any moment. The ground beneath my frozen feet
trembled. My eyes shot open and I looked at Dr. Bennett. The pallor
of his skin assured me that he had felt the tremor too.

The boys were still huddled around the dead
woman. One of the younger boys grabbed the tall boy’s arm. “Let’s
go, Strider. Leave the bloody ring.”

The boy they’d called Strider reached into
his coat and pulled out something shiny. With one swipe, he removed
the corpse’s finger. Both the finger and ring dropped to the dirt.
As he stooped to retrieve the gold circle, a ripple started in the
boxwood lining the back fence of the cemetery. The wave of movement
grew in speed and intensity.

A breath caught in my dry throat. Panic
pushed me to my feet. I was in no mood to witness the murder of
three pickpockets. “Give me my bloody finger!” I yelled into the
night air.

“Christ, Strider, what’ve you done?” one of
the smaller boys asked and grabbed the arm of the other, dragging
him back the way they’d come. The lad with the knife stared in our
direction, slipped the ring on his pinky, and ran off, leaving the
disfigured hand draped in a macabre display over the side of the
casket. At the back fence, he easily tossed the two smaller boys
over. He grabbed the bars to hoist himself up but lost his grip and
fell hard on his bottom.

“Get up, you fool.” My teeth ground against
each other as I clenched my jaw. Then the sound came. It started as
a guttural snarl and quickly exploded into a squall loud enough to
shatter the stone angels that stood watch over the yard. My hands
flew to my ears. It was an unbearable noise that sounded as if the
wretched creature was caught somewhere between ecstasy and
torture.

The thief shot to his feet.

Dr. Bennett raised the pistol in his shaky
hand. “Godspeed,” he whispered as the boy grabbed the fence again.
With preternatural speed, the beast bolted across the yard. Its
putrid odor lingered in the cool night air. My gaze darted to the
back fence. The tall boy had one leg still on the cemetery side as
the beast’s jaws snapped at him. He yelled out before falling to
the ground on the other side.

Blood pounded in my ears and gooseflesh
covered my skin. I grabbed Dr. Bennett’s arm. “Shoot it.” The words
barely broke free from tight lips.

It heard me. Like the dense orange center of
a flame, its eyes flickered in the blackness. My head throbbed with
each of its thunderous breaths. I grabbed the fence for support. At
times like this, when my defenses were concentrated elsewhere, the
disastrous memory of my father’s death surfaced. I could not pull
my gaze from the beast’s eyes. Transfixed, I hoped to catch a
glimpse of something, a glimpse of the human soul still within.

Dr. Bennett’s voice jolted me from my trance.
“Run, Camille!”

I hesitated, not in fear but in worry for Dr.
Bennett. My only true friend.

“Now!”

I pushed to my feet but my legs wobbled. The
roar rolled closer. With rubbery legs, I flew across the path
toward the road. A gunshot blasted behind me, and I stumbled but
caught myself. I dared not look back. Up ahead I spotted three
shadows darting down the gravel path that led out of the cemetery
grounds. I followed.

My thin soled boots were no match for the
myriad of rocks and holes in the road. One deep crevice wrenched my
ankle into an unnatural position, and I fell to the ground. I
jumped to my feet and wiped the gravel from my palms. A branch
snapped behind me. Clumsily, I reached under my cloak to the pocket
in my trousers. My fingers curled around the smooth ivory handle of
the knife. I turned sharply on my heels, waving the gleaming silver
blade in the air.

“Tis only me, Cami.”

A whimper of relief bubbled from my lips at
the sound of Dr. Bennett’s voice. His chest heaved with deep
breaths as he clutched Dutch’s cage in his hand. He lowered the cat
to the ground as I ran to hug him. His embrace always felt logical,
scientific, but it comforted me.

“The bullet landed in its leg. It limped off
into the dark. I think it will be enough silver to finish him, poor
wretch.” There was a heavy sadness in his words. “The gravediggers
stayed hidden inside. More interested in their gin than in the
outside events, I suppose.” He grabbed my shoulders, and I pulled
my face from his chest and stared up at him. The color was inching
back into his skin. “Let’s find that lad. I want to get a closer
look at his leg.” Dr. Bennett picked up Dutch, grabbed my hand, and
pulled me along.