Blood Moon Read online

  And there were cubs everywhere, wriggling and wrestling on the cushions, tumbling over the backs of the sofas. Then they stopped and looked at me and as my eyes grew accustomed to the light, I saw there were only three of them and they weren’t cubs at all, but children, a few years younger, perhaps, than Portia.

  They stood up as I approached.

  Uncle Dusty put my bag down on the floor and absently scratched behind his ear—with his hand, I was relieved to see, instead of dropping to all fours and aiming with his hind paw. ‘Connie, Bonnie, Johnnie,’ he said. ‘Kids, Danielle Forest.’

  I never know what to say to children. Hello kids, would you like a new Realbeach, with genuine surf, Virtual seagulls and up-to-date software? I settled for ‘Hi’.

  ‘Hello,’ said the boy. There was no trace of growl about his voice. It was hard not to stare, to try to trace the wolf in his features. Narrow brown eyes, too-coarse hair, receding jaw, but the face was bare of hair and so were his arms. Too bare, I realised suddenly. Even children have down on their arms. The boy’s arms and possibly his face had been shaved, or permanently lasered, to make them human-like.

  ‘Are you here to solve the murders?’ asked one of the girls. Her ears stood up like a wolf’s and were pricked towards me and her wide nose sniffed in my direction. I hoped my scent was confident enough now to impress her.

  ‘Well, maybe,’ I said.

  She snorted, a true child’s snort. ‘I bet my Mummy solves them before you do,’ she said, the furry ears flattening slightly. ‘My Mummy is best at everything.’

  ‘Er, well, yes, I’m sure she is,’ I said soothingly.

  Someone laughed across the room. ‘You shouldn’t say that unless you mean it. Not in this house. We can sniff out insincerity at twenty paces.’

  A woman limped forward, into the light where I could see her. She was short but looked powerful, despite the narrow shoulders. Her body was lightly furred, her nose and mouth pure wolf, her neck almost nonexistent, but the eyes wide and surprisingly human. Surely, I thought, this couldn’t be Michael’s ‘brilliant’ and ‘extremely attractive’ Eleanor?

  ‘I’m Emerald. Auntie Emerald,’ she added wryly as though like her brother she could smell what I was thinking. ‘Eleanor’s my sister. And these gorgeous little beasts are my nieces and nephew! It’ll take a while for you to sort us out.’ Her voice was clearer and more human-like than her brother’s, despite what looked like an excess of teeth in the too-wide mouth. She held out a calloused, furry hand.

  I shook it. Now she was closer I could see her nostrils, flexible and slightly moist.

  She laughed. She and her brother seemed very keen on laughter. It must be a happy household, I decided. ‘I’m not as wolf-like as you first thought.’ Her voice was amused.

  ‘Well, no.’

  ‘We’re turning humaner and humaner each generation. Is there such a word as humaner? There ought to be. Human beats wolf in the long run it seems. A pity in a way, wolves are a nicer species. But not nearly as successful. Sit down. I’ll fetch some tea…or coffee?’

  ‘Tea would be fine.’

  ‘Eleanor is trying to turn me into a tea drinker. Can’t say I like it. Why heat stuff up just to let it cool down so you can drink it? She’ll be out in a few minutes. She’s in her study, in that Virtual hook-up of hers. Extraordinary thing, isn’t it? You can even smell the people she’s been conferencing with…’

  I frowned. ‘It doesn’t work that way. The Terminal picks up the other person’s scent, but it’s only transmitted as signals to the receiver’s brain. You can’t send a real smell over a Terminal.’

  Emerald frowned, and the hair on her face creased. ‘Are you sure? It’s a shock sometimes, like her room is inhabited by ghosts.’

  ‘Maybe what you’re smelling is Eleanor’s reaction to whatever she’s received. Yes, that’d be it.’

  ‘Really?’ Emerald seemed more interested in the smells than the explanation. ‘Well, I’ll get the tea. Rusty isn’t here I’m afraid. He and the older kids have taken a load of venison down to one of the river Utopias. They won’t be back for a couple of days. Ah, here’s Eleanor now.’

  A woman emerged from the shadows. But a woman like Eleanor can never really be in shadow. How can I describe her? She was small, but she gave the impression of height. She was slim, without the chunkiness of her sister, but I could see the muscles taut under her skin.

  My first thought was that she didn’t look wolf-like at all. She moved like a Truenorm. It was only when you looked a second time that you realised how much she must have trained herself to do so.

  Narrow shoulders. Awkward elbows. A long skirt that probably hid awkward wolf-style knees as well. Narrow brown eyes, but the brows that arched delicately over them, making them appear wider, appeared to have been plucked. Coarse black hair, and when she smiled I saw the skin inside her mouth was darker than Truenorm too.

  But the nose and mouth were small, her face and arms bare of fur, her neck was human-like. If I hadn’t been told she was a wolf I’d have taken her for a slightly odd Truenorm.

  Michael had called her beautiful—she wasn’t. She was compelling and assured and so she gave the impression of beauty. This was a woman who succeeded; who made a career of convincing others that they might succeed as well.

  She was also—I saw to my surprise—extremely pregnant.

  ‘It’s lovely of you to help us!’ The voice was husky. She held out her hand—no, not paw-like at all—and when I began to shake her hand she covered mine with her other hand and pressed it warmly. ‘I’m Eleanor. And you’ve met my little cubs, and darling Uncle Dusty and Auntie Emerald too? Emerald, do get us some tea—Danielle here must be parched—and some biscuits; those lovely ones you made this morning.’

  Despite the flattery she didn’t bother looking at Emerald as she spoke. Nor did Emerald seem to expect it. The confident aunt who had met me a few minutes before seemed to evaporate with her sister in the room. Emerald simply nodded, turned and limped off in what I presumed was the direction of the kitchen.

  I wondered what accident had caused the limp.

  ‘Come into the study Danielle. Connie, sweetheart, do get that bone off the sofa. We eat at the table, remember?’ Then to me. ‘Chaos, isn’t it? We’re always like this. Now what shall we do? Pretend this is just a social visit or would you like to ask questions straight away? Dusty…’ She turned the full warmth of her smile onto him as she spoke. ‘Take Danielle’s bag up. The first room in the second branch, don’t you think?’ She smiled at me. ‘It has a door!’ Then to Dusty ‘Thank you, darling. Bonnie, no, not the ball indoors. Take it outside, that’s my darlings.’

  Ah, I thought. A manipulator. No wonder Michael likes her…

  Another smile and she turned back to me.

  I met her eyes. The too-narrow eyes, amused and thoughtful.

  ‘Questions first,’ I said.

  Chapter 10

  ‘Didn’t you find it—difficult—convincing the City to employ you?’

  Eleanor smiled at me over her teacup. It was a charming smile, but I wasn’t charmed at all. ‘Not once Michael had read my book. Besides, a good management consultant is always a bit of a werewolf. Or a vampire, if you prefer—we suck the information out of our clients. Then we have to think how to put the pieces back together so that they work more efficiently.’

  We were in her study, sipping our tea from one of the thin china teacups that Emerald had brought in on a tray before limping back to her kitchen. Not just Realtea, either, but City hydroponic Altitude tea from that special factory that duplicates Darjeeling’s climate. The sound of children’s yells and the occasional growl from Uncle Dusty floated in from the garden.

  At least there were proper chairs in here. Low to the ground, wide-seated, cushion-soft, but still chairs. I looked around. It was strange to think that Michael had been here only a few minutes ago—in Virtual, naturally but, as Emerald said, it was as though his scent still hung in the air.
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  The living wood here had been smoothed and painted a soft yellow. Carpet, desk, the same sort of comfortable office chair as Theo had back at home, Terminal and Virtual receiver side by side. A wide, irregularly shaped window looked out over the valley. A bone lay under the desk.

  She saw me looking and smiled. ‘Not mine. I hardly ever chew bones while I’m working.’ The voice held a pleasant mockery. ‘It’s Connie’s. She loves her bones. Just like her father.’

  ‘Nice room,’ I said noncommittally.

  ‘My halfway house. In Virtual I’m human, out there I’m werewolf—human and wolf combined. In here…’

  ‘You’re what?’

  ‘Myself.’ She sank into one of the armchairs and lifted her feet up onto a footstool. ‘Ah, that’s good. You have no idea how sore your feet get when you’re pregnant. At least I’m nowhere near as big this time. Have you ever been pregnant?’

  ‘Me? No. No kids.’

  ‘Planning to?’

  Neil and I hadn’t discussed it. Michael and I had, but in a vague ‘someday our kids will laugh at this’ way. Our children would have inherited the modification from both their parents. Our children would have been…what? Our own genius squared? The same but with our experience to guide them? Or something totally different, in the way I suspect children often are.

  Not that it mattered. Our modification was recessive. If either of us had children with someone else they’d be Truenorms.

  ‘Who knows?’ I said.

  ‘It’s a good thing having children.’ The hint of the instructress now, the management consultant taking over from the hostess. ‘Motherhood makes you more efficient. You learn to prioritise. Multitask.’ She smiled. ‘My heavens, do you multitask. More than that…’ she hesitated, watching me out of those strangely placed eyes.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Having children makes you determined to succeed. Especially if you’re a woman.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘It’s simple. Why does anyone want to succeed?’

  ‘I don’t know. For the pleasure of doing whatever it is, I suppose.’

  She shook her head. ‘No. Doing things well—that’s a pleasure in itself. But succeeding, being better than others, forcing yourself to be the best—that’s something else. Males do it naturally. Aggression is a male’s hormonal heritage. Be bigger, be stronger and you’ll catch your mate and beat off the opposition while you do it.

  ‘But for us? For women? No, we want to succeed for our children. To keep them safe, to win them the best possible world as they grow up…’

  She smiled. The thin dark lips pulled back over her teeth. Long teeth, by human standards, and just a little too wide. ‘The old wars were mostly fought by men. But when women had to fight we were more ruthless. Men kill anyone who is temporarily their enemy. Women kill only in desperation, but when we do…’ the narrow eyes were still watching me closely,’…we are efficient.’

  ‘So,’ I said slowly. ‘You’d expect this murderer to be male?’

  ‘Of course. The murders were too bloody. Messy. Male.’ She had been leaning forward. Now she leant back again, seemingly relaxed. I wasn’t taken in. Even relaxed Eleanor was still in charge. All it needed was someone to threaten her domain then…

  ‘Bam wham powee!’ she said.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘That’s the way men kill. In anger. Messily. The person who murdered those men did it messily. Ergo, the murderer is almost certainly a man.’

  Eleanor rubbed her feet for a moment. ‘Women kill in two ways. Either in self-defence, in which case it’s unpremeditated, or secretly, carefully. They used to call poison the woman’s weapon. Now…well, I’d imagine a women could be even more discreet.’

  ‘How would you kill someone?’

  ‘Me? You know, I’ve never thought about it—apart from occasionally wanting to strangle my husband. No, don’t get me wrong. I love Rusty dearly and I’m certainly not confessing to homicidal leanings. But men—well, they can be exasperating.’ She smiled at me, as though expecting me to cosily agree. I said nothing.

  Eleanor shut her eyes momentarily. ‘How would I kill someone then? Virtual feedback,’ she decided, opening her eyes and meeting my gaze full on. ‘Give someone a basic Virtual scenario—werewolves feeding by moonlight perhaps.’ The thin dark lips grinned at me. ‘Then give it unlimited feedback so they feed on their own terror. Result: heart attack. No sign of violence. No proof of murder. Tidy. A woman’s weapon.’

  ‘Someone tried to kill a friend of mine that way once,’ I said, thinking of Neil at the vampire castle and trying not to be impressed by her insight. ‘But it wasn’t a woman.’

  ‘Really? That surprises me.’

  ‘Well…’ I thought about it. ‘He called himself Uncle Bertie,’ I said slowly. ‘But he said he had no sex.’

  ‘He was a woman,’ said Eleanor casually. ‘Bet on it. Women are subtle. Men go for blood and gore.’

  She was right, I thought. The more I thought about it, the more her analysis seemed correct. Very impressive indeed…I tore myself back to the present and tried to regain a little of the upper hand. ‘So…you believe these murders were done by a male?’

  ‘By a man,’ she corrected. ‘A human man. Wolves don’t murder. Neither do other animals, so that rules out a wild dog. Wolves and dogs kill for food. Humans are the murderers. So, yes, this was done by a man. Messily.’

  ‘Not by a woman in self-defence? You can’t always kill neatly if you’re taken by surprise.’

  Again the charming smile. Her teeth were so nearly Truenorm. ‘Two cases of self-defence in two weeks? That’s a very careless woman. Besides, how could a woman inflict so much damage—so much messy damage—in self-defence?’

  ‘All right then. Say the murderer is a man. A human-type man, not a werewolf. Why did he do it?’

  ‘That I can’t tell you. They weren’t nice people. I imagine quite a few people are delighted to see them gone.’

  ‘Down at Black Stump they think the murderer is a Wanderer, who’s left the district. Well, Gloucester doesn’t, but the others do.’

  ‘Black Stump thinks well of everyone,’ said Eleanor. ‘I’d like to think they were right.’

  ‘But you don’t?’

  Eleanor shrugged. Like Dusty’s, her shrug was slightly wrong. ‘Call it animal instinct. I just have the feeling that something…smells bad. There’s still danger in the air.’ She smiled. ‘Probably just a pregnant woman’s nerves. But a wandering murderer seems too convenient to be true.’

  ‘So you think we are still looking for someone in the valley,’ I said. ‘Let’s look at the first murder then.’

  ‘Ah, the Patriarch. I have no idea what his real name was. One man, eight wives, and every one of them is a clone of the Patriarch.’

  ‘What! How can women be a clone of a man?’ My mind scrolled back to long-stored data, absorbed when my mind meshed with any network storage system that I chose. ‘Yes,’ I said slowly, ‘it would be possible. Select a single cell for cloning, then replace the Y chromosone with an X from another cell. Same person, different sex…’

  ‘Well done.’ It was impossible to tell if she meant it or was just flattering me. ‘Every child is a clone too. That’s the way it’s been for, what, four generations now.’

  ‘That’s incredible. Surely someone should stop them?’

  ‘Who? You’re in the Outlands now.’

  ‘But why would you want to live with yourself? Mate with yourself…’ I halted. I was sitting opposite a woman who had married her brother, who’s parents had been brothers and sisters. I hoped she couldn’t smell my embarrassment.

  She could. She looked amused. ‘Some people don’t like outsiders. They just take it to the extremes. The Patriach was bad enough. He wouldn’t even let his young be part of the school Net with the cubs. The Matriach—the next clone in line was female—is worse.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Two o
f the junior members came up here last night. Tried to burn us out.’

  ‘What! It’s hard to burn living wood. Are they stupid too?’

  ‘Not stupid. I imagine it was symbolic. A warning. Spread enough oil around, light it, see the wolves run. They didn’t get that far of course. Dusty and Emerald smelt them out before they got past the fence. They left the oil and torches behind when they ran.’

  Which explains the lookout now, I thought. ‘Well, at least none of his wives murdered him as he was really them too—if you know what I mean.’

  ‘I know what you mean.’ Another too-charming smile. ‘But of course they could have killed him. They’re the most likely suspects. Imagine having a tyrant who was really yourself. You hate them but can’t bring yourself to leave, because you can’t cope with strangers. So rather than change yourself, so they can no longer tyrannise you, you kill the tyrant.’

  ‘What about Brother Perry?’ I asked.

  ‘Ah, Brother Perry. How can I explain Brother Perry?’

  ‘You don’t have to. I met Brother Perry earlier this year.’

  ‘Then you’ll know that he is no loss, won’t you? A disgusting little man. And I don’t say that just because he hated werewolves. Besides, he didn’t hate all of us. Last time he was here I thought Rusty would go for his jugular, the way he was sniffing after young Jen.’

  I must have started at her words.

  ‘I used “go for his jugular” in a metaphorical sense,’ added Eleanor dryly. ‘Rusty would never do anything of the kind. Just a little dogsbreath and teeth in his face, and a suggestion that if he valued his testicles he’d stay at home next time a gathering was held up here.’

  I nodded. Given that the last time I had seen Brother Perry, he was trying to rape an unconscious girl, Rusty’s reaction seemed quite restrained. ‘So, who are we looking for then? Someone public-spirited?’

  ‘A vigilante with a taste for blood? Perhaps. You know,’ Eleanor’s dark eyes met mine again, ‘we have something in common, you and I.’

  ‘You mean Michael?’ I spoke without thinking.