Chapter 55: Fifty Five. We All Turn Into Lunatics
It happened out of nowhere, just one day before the full moon.
We were all sitting around the table like normal at six in the evening. Felix was starting to raise his voice to Liam, because he said Grace looked “Real nice this evening,” while staring at her chest.
Mom doesn’t take the time to break up that squabble, because she’s too busy hogging all the time with baby Jack that she can steal, bouncing him on her lap and trying to get him to eat some mushy peas. Jack decided that was too offensive of a food or something and started wailing his head off, as he does. Mike never offers to calm him down, and it’s usually dad who makes the silly face to distract him and get him back to giggling again.
But not tonight. He’s been weirdly quiet this evening, sitting right at the head of the table beside mom and Jack, but just focusing on ravaging his steak, never even looking at his grandson. Now, out of nowhere, he drive his freaking steak knife right toward Jack’s face.
Kathy reacts just in time with lightning fast reflexes, jerking him out of the way and bounding to her feet, staring at her husband in wide-eyed dismay.
Jack has gone silent too, apparently transfixed by the stare of the predator glowering up at him. Victor’s eyes have gone bright yellow, his voice a guttural growl. “Now he shuts up?”
“Victor!”
His eyes raise to lock with Kathy’s, and he blinks, coming back to himself. “What just…?”
Mike’s taking all of this way too calmly, still just chewing on his steak, until he catches sight of my suspicious glare and remembers to paint on an expression of alarm and concern. He acts like he was frozen with shock and he’s just now computing what’s happened, shoving back his seat, stalking over to Kathy, and taking Jack. “Guess I shouldn’t have brought him over this close to a full moon,” he reflects with what I can’t help but feel is feigned worry.
“But you said he was cured,” Kathy grates. “That witch of a woman said--”
“Ravenna’s power wanes as the moon waxes,” Mike rebuffs. “It’s a servant of Hecate thing. No spell she casts can keep its power this close to a full moon.”
“We really should have wrapped up dinner before sunset,” Felix mutters. “My head freaking…” Grace goes to put a hand on his back, and he shoves her away. “Get out of here. Now.”
She draws away from him and backs flat against the wall without need of further prompt.
Victor is staring out the window at that the glowing, yellow orb of what looks to be a full moon cresting the horizon as twilight dips to night. “Get the silver, Kat. Right…” He cries out, fingers twisting into full on claws, as he slumps forward over the table with bones snapping and thick, black hair bursting through the tears in his rapidly disintegrating shirt.
Mike walks right out the door with the obvious excuse of protecting his son from the three – nope, four – shifting monsters transforming from man into full-blown beast right in front of our eyes. It doesn’t usually happen this early in the evening. It’s an overcast night, and the moon was only visible for seconds as it rose. This should not be happening, but as the only one of my brothers not turning into a yellow eyed canine, I know I have to get Grace and get out of here. Now.
I grab her hand and kick aside Aiden, already fully in wolf form and lunging to rip out my hamstring. I shove Grace out the dining room door and slam it shut behind us, glad for once that my mother is so freaking paranoid. This isn’t the first time we’ve had a loss of control during dinnertime, which is why the window in that room is crossed with silver and the door to the dining room is solid oak equipped with a heavy crossbeam that I pick up now and drop into place.
“It’s never happened all at once like that,” Kathy murmurs, stood tense before Mike and her grandson with silver Bowie knife in hand.
“I know,” I mutter. I can feel something pulling at me too, this insufferable pressure rattling around my skull -- It's a woman's voice, too muddled to make out the words. But that call is growing louder, especially as the wolf pack barred up in the room right behind me starts howling, a unified chorus led by dad. I squeeze my eyes shut, breathing in deep to keep a level head and keep from changing.
Grace backs away from me and scurries off behind Kathy for protection. “It’s okay. I’m fine,” I assure her.
“You most certainly are not,” Kathy counters, “none of you are. Now go to your bedroom, Jason, and put on your collar.”
My eyes snap open. “I said I can control it--”
“I already have four full-on wolves to deal with battering against these doors!” she snaps. “I do not have energy to waste chasing after you while you’re running loose outside!”
I frown, but her eyes have already shifted on to Mike. “And that goes for you too. Just hand Jackie back over here to me, and we’ll get you locked down safe.”
“I’m not staying here tonight,” Mike rebuffs, still looking fully in control and fully human, despite what he just said about Ravenna having no power whatsoever to combat our curse this close to the full moon. “I have to be home.”
“Like hell are you heading back to the city right now,” Kathy counters. “You are a danger to the entire populace, and you are a danger to your son. I’m surprised you haven’t already lost it, what with your wife having lied about that promised cure--”
“Ravenna did not lie,” Mike tells her. “But this ritual of hers, stopping Cassandra, can’t take place until 3 AM the night of the actual full moon. I guess I should have mentioned. Now you’re going to have two difficult nights of dealing with dad going ape-shit.”
“Language,” she murmurs, covering Jack’s ears.
“Sorry. But by dawn two days from now, we will all of us be cured.”
“But if none of us are cured yet, then why aren’t you turning?” I demand. “Why the hell do you think you can just go out driving with your infant son and keep fully in control the whole night?”
Mike shrugs. “I didn’t look at the moon. Dad did. And hey, I’ve got those breathing techniques down pat, same as you do, kid,” he lies. “I keep a level head, so I am not going to turn. And even if I do, I have me very own basement cell to keep me contained, enchanted chains a whole lot more secure than mom’s meager security measures.” I get the feeling that’s a lie as well, but I have no way to prove it. He’s never let us over to his place, the house he shares with Ravenna. The house where Cassi is probably laid out in a coma. And are they even caring for her properly? Any person trapped unconscious for this long needs a proper IV set up and--
Stop. I can’t afford to be thinking of her now. I have four other much more pressing issues to deal with tonight. Six, if you count suspicious as hell psycho Mike and his son.
“If you insist on leaving, I will drive you back to your place,” mom demands, “and inspect this supposedly much more secure prison of yours.”
“Kathy, you know you can’t afford to do that. You can’t leave this farm, what with dad and the others all--”
The wolf whose scent I recognize as Felix hurls himself into the door so hard I feel it start to splinter, in perfect emphasis of Mike’s point.
“Get the tranq gun,” I tell mom. “I’ll help you chain them up after they’re out.”
“No, you will go immediately to your bedroom and clamp on your own cuffs,” she orders me. “That goes for you too Grace.”
“She is not going to turn!” I snap. “The vaccine worked, and there was no sign of infection in her blood these past few--”
“Get to your room, right this instant, or I will shove you into the dining room with the others,” Kathy threatens. I catch sight of my reflection in her upraised blade then and realize I’ve gone all yellow eyed. My family really is just the worst thing for my temper, I gotta say. It was way easier to keep the beast in control back in my apartment, even with evil Dr. Carson slipping me constant ‘inhibitors’ to jack up said temper.
It was way easier to keep calm when Cassi was there, sitting by my side, laying on my chest...
Shit, even the memory of those nights turns irritation straight to melancholy, and fully blue eyed again, I manage to talk mom into letting me hold shut this door until she can go to the garage and load up the heavy-duty tranquilizer.
Mike heads out the second she leaves with wailing baby Jack in hand, defying Kathy’s orders and returning home to his witch.
I want to follow him, to find out his address, and see where he’s been keeping Cassi. I need to see how they’ve been preparing for tomorrow night’s ritual, and just what chants Ravenna was speaking this very evening while we were all sitting calmly down to dinner, because I swear that voice in my head… Guttural as it is, it sounds way too familiar.
There’s no chance I can go after Mike tonight though, because I’m just barely keeping in control of myself, trying to tamp down the fear and anxiety, as I feel my fingers shifting subtly back and forth between claws and regular nails.
Now mom’s come back with rifle in hand, so it’s time to pull open this door and let her shoot my rampaging dad and all my brothers, busting up our ceramics and chewing up the curtains.
They lunge to attack me the second I undo that crossbar. I catch Felix on my freaking forearm and can’t help but cry out. Mom shoots him the same second those jaws clamp down, kicks back Liam in the very same motion and squeezes off three more rapid-fire darts into each wolf’s side.
Then she turns the gun on me, arm bleeding, slumped against the doorframe. “You serious…?” I guess the angry growl of my tone seemed like too much of an imminent threat to her, because sure enough the gun goes off faster than I can dodge, right into my stomach.
Mom catches me as I topple forward, whispering apologetically, “I gotta track down your brother before he eats my grandson, sweetheart, and I need to be sure you’ll stay put.”
I wake up well after dawn, chained up in my childhood bedroom in full collar, cuffs, and ankle fetters.
I can still hear someone growling and thrashing right next door, even though it’s after sunrise. That’s dad. I can smell him. He’s right back to the beast we kept chained in the basement of Carson’s clinic, and mom probably isn’t going to let either of us out of our silver-doored prison cells today.
Did she even come home last night? I don’t know. I can’t sense any whiff of her nearby.
What if that confrontation with Mike went south? What is she’s injured out in the city somewhere? And what if all my brothers are still just as crazy as dad right now, despite how young they are, and despite it being fully daylight out.
That witch did something to us last night, something to amplify this curse. That may be just an unfounded theory, but with how weird Mike was acting, and how elusive Ravenna has been… I’m convinced I’m right. It’s only going to get worse on the real full moon tonight, and I damn well sure need to get out of these chains and do something about it.