Chapter Forty – Faith

 

I’d never seen a wolf in the wild, and I’d never imagined they could grow so large. It was easily three times as large as I’d thought one could get.

Quickly, though, I realized that this was no ordinary wolf as it came rushing right at Tanchovsky, its white fangs bared as the vampire raised Sam’s pistol and took aim.

Dr. Lawrence even slackened his grip, he was so fascinated, and we both watched as the giant wolf leaped into the air and went sailing in an arc for the vampire’s throat. The gun jumped and barked in Tanchovsky’s hand as he fired twice, but not before the wolf could come down on him like a ton of furry bricks launched from a catapult. Either the vampire had missed his shots entirely, or the wolf was much stronger than it appeared.

The two hit the ground, and Tanchovsky actually screamed as he tried to throw the biting, feral beast off. “No!” he shouted, rolling over on top, trying to grab hold of the wriggling, snapping beast. “Get off of me!”

I was so dumbfounded and fascinated by the whole thing, by the absurdity of everything that was going on, I forgot I was supposed to be struggling. Even my tears began to dry in my eyes. Beside me, Dr. Lawrence did the same, his jaw slack, his one good eye blinking in surprise.

First the wolf was on top, its jaws bloody and snapping as it tore at the vampire’s face, as it ripped at his body. Tanchovsky managed to throw it off with one arm, to get to his feet so quickly that he was nothing more than blur. But the wolf was right back at him, and just as fast, toppling the monster with its weight.

They tumbled into the dust and grass, and began to roll again. Tanchovsky got up and scrambled away on his hands and knees, his eyes bright like burning embers as he tried to bat the leaping wolf away one more time.

The wolf, though, latched its jaws tightly onto the vampire’s forearm, growling and frothing around its prey. Its beastly growl almost drowned out by the screams of the vampire as he tried to shake the predator off.

My heart seemed to lighten as I realized that, my God, this creature could actually handle the vampire! It could actually beat him, where Sam and I had failed. Honestly, I didn’t even care where the hell it had first come from, or whether or not it would turn on me when it was done. All I knew was that the strain was beginning to show on the vampire’s face as he struggled, and failed, to control the creature.

And then, all of a sudden, it was like Tanchovsky remembered that he had the pistol in his hand. That he’d just used it moments before. And that, now, the wolf on his arm was so close he could never miss.

He raised the pistol with his free arm, brought the muzzle right up to the wolf’s side, and pulled the trigger. The gun popped again, this time the sound muffled by the animal’s side.

The wolf yelped in pain and anguish, releasing its grip on the vampire’s forearm as it fell into the grass and onto its side.

Right before my eyes, I saw it. I witnessed the change. The hair receding, the legs shortening, the tail disappearing. I watched in fascinated horror as the creature changed. Changed from a wolf into a man. As it shifted from a four-legged beast and into a handsome, naked, toned man with tattoos up and down his right arm.

All that was left was the man I’d only just met, but whom I already loved.

Sam Fitzgerald.

“What…why…how…Sam?” I asked, my words distant, as if they were being beamed into my mind from another world. Mars, maybe. Whatever they were, they didn’t feel like they were mine despite the fact that they were coming from my lips.

Sam rolled over, locked eyes with me. “I’m sorry, Faith,” he breathed. “I should have told you.”

“Sam?” I asked again as I stood there, just blinking and wondering how this could all be real. The vampire. The morgue. That poor pig. The house burning just a little way away from the four of us. The house Sam and I had set fire to. Sam being…a wolf?

Sam dropped to the grass, his body shaking as, I could see even from where I was standing, a cold sweat broke out over his body. He didn’t move, didn’t get back up. All he did was lie there and breathe, his body wracked in torment.

The vampire turned his eyes towards mine, a cruel-looking smile slowly growing on his lips like a flower blooming for the midday sun.

I didn’t know which was worse. That Sam wasn’t human, that he had lied to me, or that the vampire had found some new way to torment me? And, this time, one that didn’t even involve physically harming me.

“Do you see what your lover is?” he asked in a mocking tone as he gestured to Sam’s bloody, naked, broken form on the dirt in front of him. “Nothing more than a beast that believes it’s a man.”

And that was when my psyche realized all of this was just too much. My eyes rolled back, and I was plunged into darkness as my whole body went slack and collapsed to the dirt.

The last words I heard were Sam’s. “Faith!” he said, his voice raw. “I love you! I’ll come for you!”