I've mentioned already the events that led to the origin of OUR SAVAGE ANATOMIES, so now it's time for a treat. Those events led to me writing a short story for an antho call. I've mentioned how after writing the story, I realized if I wrote one more sentence after the ending, which in the short story is a true ending, I could run with these characters. I didn't know there would be a Jack Pandemonium or anything, but the seed was planted. Your treat...is the story itself, "Home Is Where the Howl Is," where we meet Rufus and Sasha and Mister E. in the mysterious town in Italy.
I'll even add the line that I knew would trigger my brain to See Where It Goes (and the wild path it decided to take while getting there, haha) after the short story.
An edited version of this story takes up the second and third chapters of the novel.
Enjoy!
***
Home Is Where the Howl Is
The crisp scent of burnt sunflowers
threaded the light breeze, less an odor, more a signifier that another long,
hot summer was reaching its end. Autumn, still circling the periphery, had yet
to slip through the seams. It was an in-between time; a time when anything was
possible. Rufus Skye sniffed the air and registered the acrid bite of olives,
the potent aromas of rosemary, oregano, peppermint. West of Senigallia, where
the Adriatic Sea lapped at white sand shores while beachcombers sat beneath
rows of beige and blue umbrellas, a trace of salt still lingered in his
nostrils.
He’d wound his way through the labyrinthine
roads that crisscrossed through the Marche region, many barely fitting the
expected description. The roads dipped and sloped upward at precarious angles.
He wondered how cars made it from one tiny village to another tiny village
under such perilous conditions yet had seen a few driving faster than he
imagined safe along his trek. He also wondered why the old crone who had
pointed him in this direction had chosen such a wayward one, then realized,
when one is heading for a destination that lacked a name, the path shouldn’t be
easy, and, for all he knew, there would be nothing when he reached it; nothing
but nothing in the middle of nowhere, Italy.
Walking the dodgy roads was work, but he
was used to the feel of the earth beneath his feet.
The previous evening he’d slept beneath
the stars, stretched out amidst dirt and weeds down an aisle of a vineyard,
immersed within the burgeoning fragrance of young grapes reaching maturation.
He’d taken a few into his mouth, suckled then squished them on his eager
tongue, savoring the promise of sweetness, before spitting out the dregs.
Almost ready to be plucked from the vines, mashed into wine, but not quite.
He’d fallen asleep beneath a sheet of stars that shined deeper than what he was
used to. He’d been mesmerized by the Milky Way, an imposing white brushstroke
across the vast heavens, while insects cavorted across his naked arms and face,
beetles and untroubled stink bugs and ants, so many ants; he minded not the
least. As he succumbed to slumber, the dreamworld opened to him, the curtains
of the unconscious pulled aside to permit wild, primal visions to frolic, as
often happened the few days before a full moon filled the night and he was made
to run, to rage.
Today would lead to such a night. He only
hoped to make it to his destination, the one not on any map, though villages
masked in mirage made something that might seem already sketchy even more so,
before the full moon turned him into something he detested.
As he passed by Loretello, a village that
corresponded to the crone’s directions as “near, but not quite there,”
something glimmered to the north. Not far, but not close…but not far; distance
was inconclusive, really. Within the
glimmer that drew the corner of his eye in its direction, another village
smaller than even Loretello’s meager margins, took shape. As if the mirage were
taking a deep breath, coming to life.
As if he was meant to see it. The thought
made his heartbeat quicken. He didn’t dare look away.
The flow of time ticked sporadically,
humidity drawing sweat from gasping pores. As with his dysfunctional cell
phone—the crone had told him it would be useless once he neared his
destination—the considerations of time as he knew it seemed out of sorts. The
unnamed village grew larger as he approached yet seemed almost claustrophobic
once he stepped through a sizeable, archaic entranceway. The doors towered
twice as tall as a man, yet the wood seemed sturdy as if it had been
constructed recently. The village was walled, great bricks surrounding the
borders. The only path lead around a handful of old houses and boarded-up
businesses and a steepled church that looked weary, yet as with the doors out
front, there was a strength imbued in the structure. He walked toward a table
at the edge of the spacious terrace that overlooked vast brown, ocher, and
green fields. That’s when he noticed a copse of trees distinguished by a
vibrant reddish hue like nothing he’d ever seen before. What made them stand
out even more was that they were set dead center of a barren field, a perfect
triangle.
“Beautiful, eh?”
Rufus turned toward the commentator. The
man’s eyes were buried beneath the shadow of a leathery, well-worn hat the
color of midnight. Darkness blended with darkness until the man tilted his head
back and smiled, only to reveal sunglasses, another layer cloaking his
features. Perhaps his intentions as well. Rufus was often made wary in
situations such as these, conversations with strangers or just strangers taking
notice of him. A conglomeration of deep folds dissected the lower half of the
man’s face, black lightning holding up the upper half being eaten by an abyss.
“The red trees or everything?” Rufus
pulled back on the reins of paranoia which, in his case, was more like
heightened awareness. There was a difference. It was the way he had to live.
“Everything…and those red trees.”
The man sat at the table across from
Rufus, pulled out rolling papers and a bag of tobacco from inside a leather
jacket that matched the hat in color, tone, mystery. Seemed Italians liked to
roll their own, at least as far as he’d witnessed in the so far at the few
caffe’s he’d frequented since he’d landed in Rome. As the man rolled the
cigarette between his knobby fingers, he pulled his concentration from the
process and back to Rufus.
“Do you know what we call those trees?” He
licked the tip of the cigarette, purely unfiltered, and struck a match against
the metal grid of the table. Rufus was surprised to see the head erupt in
flame, in fire.
“I just got here. Still getting my
bearings.” He smiled wanly, still on edge.
“We call them the blood trees. The blood
orchard.”
“Blood trees? A blood orchard?” Sure, the
red could be considered blood-like, but it seemed a bit much to Rufus. “Sounds
rather grim to me.”
A waitress scooted over to their table.
Her hair was shorn to the scalp, black stubble caressing her otherwise smooth
skull. Black on black slacks and blouse. Everything about her was panther
sleek. Dark blue eyeliner circled eyes the color of a frozen sea. Her lips were
thin, though the mouth was large and also trimmed in dark blue. The sun danced
on those lips as she moved them and spoke to the man across from Rufus. He
couldn’t make out what she said, his Italian meager at best, yet was quite sure
it wasn’t Italian. With this observation, he thought it surprising the man
spoke to him in English. Perhaps Rufus looked like a tourist. Perhaps he looked
like a foreigner, like he didn’t belong here.
Perhaps, despite perceptions otherwise and
the underlying promise of something positive, he didn’t belong here.
Perhaps it was all fantasy speculation for
such a creature as him.
The sun was moving swifter toward setting.
He’d need answers sooner than later if he wanted to avoid a scene.
Music started to play, filling the air
with chords cast as moods, dark moods before twilight took over and dark skies
would follow. Rufus nodded his head to the song, something thick and gothic
with vocals that scraped deep into places one rarely explored. Type-O Negative
in all their delightfully gloomy glory. What brought a rare smile was realizing
the music was not coming from the caffe the waitress now entered, it emanated
from the church adjacent to it.
He turned to the man, to ask a question,
but the man was a step ahead of him.
“The rumors are true. What flows in your
veins is what brought you here. To us.”
Rufus internally questioned how the man
could have any idea what flowed in his veins. If he did, he might scatter
before moonrise. Of course, the sense in this thinking was instantly swatted
away as one would any pest or aberrant train of thought. A man living in such an
enigmatic place would know so much more than Rufus could imagine.
Still, caution scooted around within the
confines of his thoughts, even as he tried to embrace the possibilities.
“Who is us? You and” --he thought it
quirky, but he had to choose somebody, and since the waitress was heading
toward them with two goblets of who-knows-what, she fit the bill—“her?”
Rumbling laughter rose from deep within
the man, exited his mouth past teeth too perfect for a person of his age. An indefinable
age, sure, but all evidence suggested ancient wasn’t a bad guess.
“Me. Her. Everybody who ends up here.”
The waitress smiled, the piercing tips of
her glistening canines longer than the norm, polished by the slowly setting
sun. The light played on her features as well, something malleable, subtly
twitching beneath her pleasing countenance.
Rufus’s head grew light as the
possibilities began to bloom all around him. The hush hush secrets hinted at in
dark net grapevines and whispered down transient alleyways in metropolises made
of steel and pain opened their arms to him.
The man took a sip from his silver goblet.
Rufus peered over the top of the one near him, noting a rich, red liquid. It
was too cliché to think it blood, even under these less than cliché-ridden
circumstances, so he leaned toward a no-frills Bloody Mary, though didn’t make
any effort to taste it.
“The blood orchard was born hundreds of
years ago.”
The man paused, removed his sunglasses to
reveal eyes that made butterflies awaken within Rufus’s belly. Oil-stains
filled the orbs, no white to trim the pupils, only swirling rainbows, before
the man blinked once, twice, and an even more stunning quality appeared. The
pupils were white and trimmed in black, a reversal of the familiar. Dimples
somehow cut through the layer of lines at each corner of his mouth. His tongue
flicked lightly along his chapped lips, the forked tips smoothing out the dry,
dead pink skin.
The man continued.
“Those trees were nurtured with tears of
blood.”
Tears of blood? Was he implying the
blood trees, those in the blood orchard, were born of actual blood?
“Lacrime di sangue,” the waitress said, as
she stared out toward the trees. Rufus was so taken by the man’s eyes, he
hadn’t noticed the waitress had loitered back toward them. She steered her
focus in Rufus’s direction, her features slightly different than he remembered
thirty seconds prior. “You’re going to love what’s next.”
Rufus thought that a curious statement
until the man continued his tale.
“Yes, those trees were nurtured by tears
of blood. Vampire blood.”
Vampire blood? Could Rufus be
hearing this correctly?
“To what purpose?” Uncertainty flitted
around the tattered edges of rumor becoming fact.
The man glanced up at the waitress. Rufus
took both in, along with movement at the periphery, a sprinkling of small
groups or couples in conversation, smiling and laughing. A vibe of unmitigated
joy filtered through him, quashing the butterflies while enlightening
everything he’d heard of this place. If it was true. If it was all true…
But first, what of those trees?
“Survival for our kind. Survival without
having to murder—”
“The humans,” the waitress interrupted,
her ears taking in the story, but her eyes watching the sun set. Rufus did a
quick glance behind to note the golden glow, as if the horizon were on fire. He
swiftly turned back toward the man.
“I’m not exactly sure what you are
saying,” Rufus said, understanding how he felt when it came to murdering for
survival—blood was needed; blood and flesh—having felt so alone for so long. He
thought he was the only one cursed to exist as he did to feel anything
approaching empathy, thought himself more a freak than he already was. A
werewolf whose human conscience was the overriding force within him; well,
almost overriding, a notch below survival instincts and the need to kill.
“You understand, my friend. We feel as you
do. We want as much to avoid the primal side of our instinct, at least when it
comes to dealing with the humans. We get no pleasure out of killing, but we
have to. Choice is banished when the ache becomes too much.”
“At least, that’s how it used to be.” The
waitress nodded as she said this. The man telling the tale looked up at her
again. Rufus noted a smile rise out of the aged, fleshy cartography of his face,
as if he were pleased about something Rufus could not make heads or tails out
of. The waitress’s occasional interjections, or something more, something else.
Rufus had to admit he felt himself as Sisyphus,
shifting the weight to a reasonable place, one he felt might be lessening the
more the odd tale revealed. He noticed the nametag pinned above the waitress’s
left breast, red marker scribble designating her as Sasha. He liked the way the
word rolled around on his mind’s tongue. He liked much of what was being
revealed to him so far, yet his always-present suspicion disallowed him fully
giving into what he was learning quite yet.
“Throughout history, there have always been
vampires, as well as other creatures who live in the shadows.” The man took
another sip. Sasha folded her palms across her abdomen, attentive. “But before
the fifteenth century, we had been a vile, sinister presence. Our role in
history was lethal, our engagement with the humans wrought in blood and death.”
“For the sake of survival,” Rufus said.
“Yes,” Sasha said.
“Change was needed, or at least desired by
a few. Those who found our condition ne’er unbearable, preaching resistance to
the call of our savage anatomies.” The old man reached for his goblet, fingers
caressing the stem, but did not pick it up. “But they were met with opposition
from those who relished what those savage anatomies demanded.”
Rufus knew how hard it was for him, not
even a vampire but one driven by the call of the full moon to completely bury
his human aspect. He wondered, if what he was being told had foundation in the
reality he lived in, how personal restraint was attained when, no matter his futile
efforts, the full moon’s pull was irresistible.
“Years of battle ensued, neither side
gaining ground.” The old man leaned forward and shook his head. Rufus could
read in his strange eyes and the way he held his hand up to cradle his
forehead, the man was not just telling a tale, but sifting through memories.
“Shall I?” Sasha asked, calming hand to
the old man’s shoulder.
“Please.”
“Eventually, those like us dwindled to a
precious few and most of them were slaughtered out there by the others, in that
field.”
The old man put his hand on Sasha’s and
sat up, sunglasses propped back atop the bridge of his nose, though Rufus found
it unnecessary as darkness descended. He had a passing thought about vampires
and sunlight, was set to ask how the old man and perhaps Sasha—perhaps everyone
strolling on the terrace—seemed somehow untouched by the rays, casting shadows
when there should be none. A rumor dispelled, while another took shape? What Rufus
really wished was that they would hurry up with their odd tale, wondering how
much was meant for him, since he was not a vampire.
He felt it begin to itch beneath his skin.
Everywhere beneath his skin. Bones, muscles, the corpuscles beginning to
quicken their pace. He consciously slowed his breathing, tamped down what he
could.
“There is no way to explain what happened
next beyond the details. Magic cannot be defined. It simply is. Perhaps the
gods played a hand.” The old man had picked up the tale again as Sasha began to
shuffle in place. The few other people meandering around the terrace seemed
aware of something; Rufus realized it was the night they were all responding to
as the old man continued: “As they died, those like us, their tears drenched
the soil. Tears of blood. The long night fell into caterwauling revelry. Those
determined to leave the status quo alone celebrated as if victory for all time
had been attained, and initially that might have seemed a correct assumption.”
The old man paused, drew in a breath, and said, “I can still remember the din.
It rings in my ears even now.”
Rufus was not surprised by the old man’s
claim. He took his own deep breath, almost released a low growl. He could feel
the moon’s persuasion deep within him.
“The vampires in that field perished
overnight, perhaps fertilizer for what followed. Trees sprouted immediately,
noticeable to the few like us who remained. We set fort within those trees, not
knowing what would come next, until the call of what we were became too substantial
to resist. At that moment, seemingly without provocation or a blade to puncture
the woody flesh, one of the trees began to bleed. And I went to taste the red
nectar.” His hesitant fingers gripped the stem of the goblet and raised it
toward Rufus. “Blood. Sweeter and stronger than any other blood. Blood with a
purpose. The blood orchard supplied us with an answer to what we had been
searching for. Now, all vampires can live with the humans without the bloodlust
corrupting the peace we seek.”
“But what of—”
But what of werewolves? The rumor had
been simple: come to this place and you will be amongst those like you. All
talk so far had been about vampires. What if he had been led to this place of
vampires to be slaughtered for his differences; because he was a werewolf?
Rufus stood as his body trembled, fighting
what he was.
“Relax,” Sasha said, as she began to unbutton
her blouse. A group of people to Rufus’s right shifted within their clothing
and transformed into bats, the discarded material shushing to the cobblestoned
surface of the terrace.
“But I am not a vampire. I require more
than simply blood.” Rufus felt hope, rarely considered in his life, slipping…
“We know,” said the old man. “All men are
hybrids. Only a sparse few are as we are, vampires, and as you are. Werewolf.”
“How can you know what I am?”
No introductions had been made. The old
man knew his name. Perhaps vampirism included mind-reading abilities. He would
have to find out later.
“But what am I supposed to do about—”
His body started to shift, the change
emanating from within. Hairs pricked his skin from beneath layers of epidermis
and poked through. His nocturnal vision grew sharp, crystal clarity amidst the oncoming
tide of night.
“Relax,” Sasha said again, slipping out of
her slacks. Her body was coated in dark brown fur that covered her whole human
form.
Relaxation had never been his way, though.
Rufus fought against transformation. Yet, here he was, for the first time
face-to-face with another who was a werewolf.
“The blood from the trees is not just for
vampires. Its power is for all the creatures who live as whispers upon wind and
in shadows that rarely see light.” The man nudged the goblet in front of Rufus
toward him. “Have a sip—”
“Not yet,” Sasha said, as she stood
upright on sturdy paws and sprinted toward the edge of the stone wall
surrounding the terrace. “You won’t need to kill tonight. Follow me and we can
join the rest of our brothers and sisters in the forest.”
She held out her paw, an invitation Rufus
was still hesitant to take.
“Well, don’t take too long,” she said, as bones
and cartilage crackled as her snout elongated, and she raised it to the moon.
She howled, sprung onto the ledge, and leaped.
Rufus was overwhelmed by the sensations,
the conflict inside, as he ran to the ledge and leaned over, spotting Sasha a
good five meters down as she dashed toward more familiar trees constituting a
forest. Exuberant howls met his ears.
“Go,” the old man said. “Go now, you’ll be
fine for the night. Drink with me tomorrow. Remember, you are no longer alone.”
A firm hand brought warmth to the fur shrouding his shoulder. “You are one of us and we welcome you with
open arms.”
With that, his clothes shredded as he’d
not removed them as Sasha had—fighting what he was, what he’d always fought
against—his snout did as he’d witnessed Sasha’s had done, the final stage, yet
this time he welcomed it and the howl that would follow as he moved toward the
ledge…and swung himself over it.
He landed firmly with a spring in his
step, ready to run free of dread or trepidation for the first time ever.
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