Blood Moon (8 page)

‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Back to the murders. You could have slipped off while everyone was asleep or when Emerald was up with the cubs and Eleanor in her study. Surely any of you could have if it came to that.’

‘Could have,’ said Uncle Dusty. ‘We didn’t. Couldn’t hide it from the clan if we did. Could smell a murder out.’ Again he gave that strange animal-shouldered shrug. ‘But how to prove that to a Truenorm? Don’t know.’

Aunt Emerald was making scones. The kitchen smelt of hot flour and dog hair and Emerald’s hands were floury too, the flour sticking to her fur like chunky talcum powder. Outside the cubs laughed and tumbled with Uncle Dusty.

‘It’s the best sound in the world, isn’t it?’ said Emerald, her ears pricked in their direction.

‘What is?’

‘Children’s laughter.’ She rolled the scone dough neatly on the floured bench. ‘I hear that lots of people in the City don’t have children at all.’ She spoke as if the City were a foreign country.

‘Well, the world has enough people, don’t you think? It was unbearably crowded before the Decline. Besides, you can’t have children and do, well, lots of other things.’

‘Really? Wouldn’t know. Not the point anyway. You don’t have children to populate the world.’

‘What do you have them for?’

‘To keep you sane,’ said Emerald

‘What…?’

‘Maybe sane isn’t the right word.’ The dough was swiftly cut into rounds with a floured glass. ‘Keep you…balanced, is a better word. Stop you seeing the world in relation to yourself. You see the world differently when you have children.’

‘But…’ I had been going to say, but none of the children are yours. But then I realised that to Emerald—and Dusty and Rex and Lexie—the cubs were as much theirs as Eleanor’s and Rusty’s.

‘I’ve met some selfish people who have children.’

‘I don’t mean it’s a miracle cure. It’s just…something people should do. Have kids in their lives.’ She slid the tray into the oven. ‘Tea?’

‘Please.’ I knelt down at the table.

‘You really like that stuff? Water does me. The scones won’t be long.’ Emerald knelt opposite me. ‘Now I do like scones. Thought I wouldn’t when Eleanor found the recipe. Cubs like them too. All right, what do you need to know?’

‘I wish I knew,’ I said. Somehow it was easier to be honest with Emerald. With Eleanor there was always the faint feeling we were competing. ‘I don’t suppose you can tell me who the murderer is?’

‘Or murderers. That’s Rex’s theory. You’ve spoken to him, haven’t you? No, I don’t know who the killer is.’ I
waited for her to assure me it wasn’t one of them, but she didn’t.

‘Dusty said he could have done it.’

Emerald smiled. ‘Dear Dusty. There’s no way he could have managed to do those murders.’

‘Why not?’

‘Arthritis. That’s why he hasn’t gone with Rusty and the older kids in the floater. He can’t do any really heavy work any more, he can’t run far or fast either. Can’t even hunt nowadays. A rabbit can outrun Dusty.’

‘Why can’t he be regenerated?’ I wasn’t used to untreated debilitating conditions. Surely arthritis belonged to the past.

‘Wolf genes, remember? Need a City pass for that sort of treatment.’

‘Some sort of medicine then?”

‘We don’t always respond to drugs as Truenorms do. All the family gets arthritis as we get older. Rex has it, Lexie’s crippled by it…Dusty’s young for it. Good thing he isn’t breeding, he’d pass the tendency on.’

‘So,’ I said slowly. ‘It can’t have been Dusty.’

‘Not if he didn’t want to be crippled the next day,’ said Emerald. She stood, and peered into the oven, then closed it again. The fragrance of baking had already covered up the scent of dog. ‘And one of us would have noticed that.’

She turned to me and wiped the flour from her hands onto her apron. It was strange, I thought. Emerald’s features weren’t much more dog-like than Eleanor’s, but somehow Emerald’s clothes—especially her flowered apron—looked wrong, like a child dressing up a kitten.

‘I’ll tell you something though,’ said Emerald.

‘What?’

‘I’m scared. No, not about the murderer.’ She smiled, but it was a bitter smile. ‘One thing about living with a clan of werewolves—we’re unlikely to be attacked by psychopaths. But our neighbours—that’s another thing.’

‘You think they’d really hurt you? Eleanor thought the fire thing was just a warning.’

Two long canine teeth protruded as she bit her lip. ‘Maybe we should listen to the warning. One of the chief wives down at Soggy Crossing called Eleanor, said she had a stun gun and she’d use it if she saw any wolf about her place.’

‘Eleanor didn’t mention it,’ I said slowly.

‘Maybe she doesn’t want to admit that her whole human thing is crumbling,’ said Emerald

‘Human thing?

‘Making us be like humans. Accepted by humans.’ Emerald’s ears flattened. ‘Back in Mum and Dad’s day we kept to ourselves. Didn’t need outsiders. Better that way. Humans will always hate us deep down.’

‘Why? Black Stump doesn’t.’

‘No, they don’t, do they?’ Emerald smiled, showing her long canines. ‘So maybe Eleanor is right. She usually is.’

Usually, I noticed, not ‘always’. Here at least was someone who didn’t think Eleanor was infallible.

Emerald reached into the oven and drew out the tray of scones. They smelt wonderful. My only attempt to make scones had produced rocks. She put the tray down on the table, spread a cloth over them, and sat down on the cushions beside me once more, her body flowing more into wolf shape now she was no longer upright. She grinned at me again, and while her grin wasn’t human, it wasn’t pure dog like Dusty’s. ‘You haven’t
asked yet where I was when the murders were committed.’

‘All right, where were you?’

‘Here. In the kitchen. Or up with the cubs. Or in my bed. Asleep probably. I sleep soundly, for a wolf. The least noise wakes Dusty, but not me. No way to prove I was here, or that I wasn’t. But I’ll tell you this—I couldn’t have done those murders without the family knowing.’

‘Why not?’

‘I don’t run well enough nowadays.’ She patted her lame leg. Her feet, I noticed, were bare, clawed and furry. ‘Nearer to Heaven isn’t far as the crow flies. Nor is the Patriarch’s.’ She grinned wryly. Her teeth were longer than Eleanor’s, and looked sharp. ‘I suppose I should say “the Matriarch’s” now. But they’re too far for me to limp there and back and still have breakfast ready.’

‘Could you have taken the floater?’

‘Nope. Rusty had taken it for deliveries both times.’

Which ruled out Rusty and the others too, I thought, if they were delivering the venison—unless one of them snuck away from the others and took the floater. But surely that would have been noticed. ‘How about a dikdik? You do have one?’

‘There’s one in the shed. Doesn’t get used much. Why putter on a dikdik when you can leap across a fence? Unless you’re crippled like me. Yes, I could have used a dikdik. But they’re noisy. Someone would have heard me go. Don’t forget, we have better hearing than you.’

‘Emerald,’ I said slowly. ‘If…if you knew—or suspected—that one of your family had done the killings, would you tell me?’

For the first time there might have been admiration in her gaze. ‘No,’ she admitted.

‘What would you do?’

‘Make sure they never did such a thing again. Or Eleanor would. Her job, really.’ She didn’t say how they could make sure.

We sat in silence for a while.

‘You know,’ said Emerald finally. ‘It’s funny. Our neighhbours talk about the wolf below the surface. But they don’t think what lies below their surface too.’

‘What?’ I asked.

‘The savage ape. The xenophobe who kills the stranger. It’s in you all,’ said Emerald, looking at me. ‘And it’s not far below the surface either.’

N
ight again. I could hardly smell the faint dog scent now. Perhaps I was even coming to smell a bit wolf-like too.

‘Bathroom?’ asked Emerald, surprised, when I asked her where I could take a shower after dinner. ‘Ask Dusty to take you up to the waterfall tomorrow, he usually takes the cubs after lunch. Or Eleanor has a BreezeClean next to her study. She uses it before she goes into Virtual for the City. They’re a bit sensitive to honest smells there.’

Emerald shook her head at the eccentricity. ‘Rusty hates it,’ she added, ‘takes hours for Eleanor to smell like Eleanor again.’

I had been at the Tree for thirty-six hours, I thought, as I undressed for bed and washed as well as I could in the basin by my bed. And I had achieved nothing.

Or perhaps I had. Perhaps Ophelia’s theory was accurate. If the murderer was long gone, all I needed to do was show scared Utopians that there was nothing to fear from their werewolf neighbours.

Or maybe it was Uncle Rex who was right. Two murderers had murdered two unpleasant people, relying on the werewolves being blamed.

Either way, I thought, there would be no more murders. The Valley would slowly come back to normal, and I could go home.

Meanwhile I’d better visit Nearer to Heaven and the Matriarch’s tomorrow, just to show I was genuinely
investigating. Perhaps I might even ferret out who one of the murderers might be. Even if I couldn’t prove it, at least it would take some of the suspicion off the werewolves.

I looked out of the window. The moon was just past full now. I wondered if Dusty would be inspired to howl again.

Footsteps pounded up the stairs; someone scampered past my room. A door opened down the corridor; then voices, urgent, with just the suggestion of a growl; then knocking on my door.

I opened it. Eleanor stood there and, yes, I thought, she does wear a dressing gown—red and green velvet, a much more elaborate one than mine.

‘I apologise for disturbing you,’ she said crisply, ‘but it’s urgent. A call came through a moment ago from Black Stump. Luckily I’d just come out of my exercise program, so I managed to catch it straight away.’

‘What’s happened? What did they want?’ For some reason my thoughts went to Neil, to Faith Hope and Charity, to Theo.

‘They think there may have been another murder. Florrie Anderson called them, she’s from a farm down the Valley. She was in shock they said, but they think…they think someone should go there straight away. They’d have gone, but they don’t have a floater or a dikdik and it’s a good hour on foot from Black Stump to the Andersons’.’

‘We could take my floater,’ I said stupidly, then realised that was why Eleanor had come to me in the first place.

Eleanor nodded. ‘Emerald will go with you,’ she said. ‘If anything has happened to Andy—that’s her husband
—it may be good to have another woman there. And Dusty too.’ She frowned. ‘I wish Rusty were here, or Len. Dusty won’t be much protection…’

‘I don’t need…’ I began, and stopped. What on earth was I saying? There was a murderer out there, of course I needed protection.

I thrust off my dressing gown, pulled my slipon back over my head and padded down and round the staircase and out to the floater pad. Emerald stood by the floater waiting for me, with Dusty sitting on his haunches beside her.

I had expected Dusty to automatically take the floater controls, as most males do when confronted with machinery, but he took it for granted that I’d drive and sat in the passenger seat, his nose out the window, his ears flying in the wind, while Emerald gave me the Andersons’ coordinates.

I punched them in, annoyed for the millionth time that I could no longer think instructions to the computer. I’d accepted the larger losses in my life—the instantaneous communication between members of the Forest, the almost limitless scope to create new worlds my talents had given me; but little things could still infuriate me.

The floater rose from the pad and swooped noiselessly over the dark paddocks. I wondered if I should turn on the outside lights, so we could see where we were going. See a fleeing murderer too, perhaps. I flicked the switch and light flooded around us.

‘How far do we have to go?’

‘Three or four minutes,’ said Emerald. ‘Not far.’

‘Do you know the Andersons well?’

‘Well enough.’ She seemed preoccupied. Her gaze raked the darkness beyond the floater lights.

‘Eleanor said something might have happened to Mrs Anderson’s husband. What was he like?’

‘A good bloke,’ said Dusty.

‘Not like the Patriarch then, or Brother Perry?’

‘Definitely not. They’re kind people, the Andersons,’ Emerald hesitated. ‘I suspect Black Stump jumped to conclusions. There probably hasn’t been a murder at all.’

‘Why would Mrs Anderson be in shock then, if her husband is all right?’

‘I didn’t say he was all right. Andy Anderson was dying,’ said Emerald bluntly. ‘Rejuvenation rejection. There’s nothing that can be done, except to try and control the pain, and it had got to the stage where his body couldn’t tolerate most chemical painkillers.’

‘What about Net control?’

‘That still worked. But Andy was, is, well, stubborn. Said he’s lived in RealLife for eighty years and wasn’t going to live what was left of his life in Virtual.’

‘But it’s not like that. The pulses just control the pain. You don’t have to go into Virtual.’

‘Eleanor explained it to him,’ said Emerald flatly, ‘but he was stubborn.’

‘So you think he’s just…died. Naturally, I mean.’

‘I think so,’ said Emerald. ‘She’ll still need help though.’

‘They live alone?’

‘Yes. Two kids: the boy’s off Wandering, the girl’s studying. Got a scholarship down in NewNew Zealand.’

I was impressed. ‘She must be good.’

‘Bright little thing,’ said Dusty, panting happily. He looked like he was enjoying the ride, despite the emergency.

The floater was slowing now. We must be nearly there. ‘Do the Andersons have a floater pad?’

‘Yes. Out the front of the house,’ said Emerald. As she spoke the floater gave an almost silent hum as it keyed up the pad signal. Dusty pulled his head in to avoid the tree branches as it landed itself neatly next to another floater, older and shabbier than mine. I opened the door.

Emerald shook herself, as though preparing each portion of her body for some trial. ‘I’ll go first,’ she said quietly. ‘It might upset Florrie to see a stranger at a time like this.’

I nodded. We climbed the steps in the light from the floater—three of them, of shabby wood and crossed an even shabbier verandah. Emerald knocked on the door.

There was no answer.

‘Maybe we should try round the back…’ I began

Emerald held up a hand. ‘Shh,’ she ordered. She seemed to be listening.

Suddenly I could hear it too. An animal scream almost at the edge of my hearing. It came from the back of the house, I thought.

Dusty tried the door. ‘Locked,’ he said. He glanced at Emerald. Wordlessly she moved next to him. Before I’d realised what they intended they had kicked in unison. The door jamb shattered and the door swung open. The hall was dark.

Dusty sniffed the air. But even I could smell it—a thick, sweet smell, horribly familiar.

‘Blood,’ whispered Emerald.

She sniffed again. ‘What else can you smell?’ I whispered.

‘Fear. Anguish.’

‘Something else,’ said Dusty ‘Can’t you smell it? Animal…Animal? Maybe human. Can’t tell. Strange. Not in here…outside.’

‘What sort of animal?’

‘I don’t know. Smelt it before.’

The cry came again. I looked for a light switch and turned it on.

Light flooded the hallway. Wallpaper, framed photos, all ancient—pre-Decline at least. Who bothered with photos now, when a holo showed so much more?

‘Down here,’ said Emerald.

Dusty and I followed her down the hallway. Even scared as I was, I noted it was Emerald who led, and Dusty who followed.

Another door. Emerald opened it. We stepped into the kitchen.

A Truenorm kitchen, with all the details right, so unlike the kitchen at the Tree. Kitchen table. A pot on an old wood stove, tomato soup by the look of it. Crumbs on a plate. Toast? A pair of holos on the Ultrawave. A boy waved from a dikdik; a girl looked up from the book she was reading, smiled, then looked back down.

There was another sound now. A choking, bubbling wail. It was a second or two before I realised it was crying.

The back door was open. Someone crouched on the steps.

Emerald stepped across the kitchen. ‘Florrie?’

The crying stopped. The woman looked towards us. And then she screamed.