Sisters Red Read online

  I shuffle my feet with pretend nervousness. "I'm lost," I lie. I meander across the street, swaying my hips. "I was supposed to meet a friend here..." Just a little farther, and the row of pawnshops on the cross street will hide us. He laughs, a deep, growl-like sound.

  "Lost, huh?" he says, walking toward me. "Why don't you let me show you the way back?" He extends a hand. I look down. There's a black tattoo-like mark on his wrist, a flawless image of a coin. A member of the Coin pack, out this far? Odd. I take another step away from him. I'm hidden from the civilians' view now, and if he comes just a tad closer, he'll be as well.

  "I... I'll be okay," I mutter. He grins. He thinks he's scaring me, and he's relishing it. It's not enough to just slaughter and devour girls. They need to frighten them first. I turn my back to him and start to walk quickly, letting my cloak billow

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  out in the wind, taunting him. Come along, follow me. Time to die.

  "Hey, wait," he calls out. His voice is dark now, almost guttural. He's fighting the transformation, but his hunger is winning--I can feel it somehow. His bloodlust hangs in the air like a fog. He wants to tear me apart, to dig his teeth into my throat. I stop, allowing the hood to slip down and my curls to wave in the breeze. I hear him groan with disgusting delight as I grip the familiar grooves of the hatchet's handle. Don't turn around, not yet. He hasn't changed, and if he sees the scars on my face, my cover will be blown. Can't risk him running and getting away--he has to die. He deserves to die.

  "All I'm saying is"--he chokes on the words as the mutation begins to overpower his vocal cords--"people might get the wrong idea, a pretty girl like you out alone on a corner like this."

  My lips curve into a grin as I draw the hatchet from my belt. There's a swish as his clothes hit the ground, then the clicking sound of claws on pavement. "I'm not worried," I answer, unable to suppress a sly grin. "I'm not that kind of girl."

  When I spin around, there's no man behind me, only a monster. Some call them werewolves, but they're so much more than wolves. This Fenris's fur is dark and oily looking, fading to gray-mottled skin by his enormous feet. He growls and brings his long snout to the ground, tensing his jaw and clacking his yellowed teeth. The streetlight illuminates

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  his enormous frame and casts a shadow that overtakes the ground at my feet. I raise an unimpressed eyebrow at him, and his eyes find the gleaming hatchet in my hand.

  He leaps.

  I'm ready.

  His powerful shoulders launch him through the air at me; he snarls, the sound like rocks being shredded. I whip around toward him, low to the pavement. He begins to sail over my head but twists back in midair. I snap the hatchet up at the last possible moment. The blade makes contact and skims his front leg, and then I spin the hatchet to the left and manage to slice into the top of his back leg before the Fenris even hits the ground. Blood showers me.

  The Fenris howls and collapses onto the pavement behind me. Try again, wolf. Don't run away yet. You can't let them run, once you've started a fight. They'll be starving from the expended energy, slaughter twice as many in half the time. It can end only one way: with the wolf's death. This one isn't a runner, though. He still wants to devour me.

  Saliva drips from his lips, and his eyes narrow. The Fenris paces in front of me, shoulders rolling with every step. He curls his black lips back and bares his fangs.

  The Fenris darts at me again. I sidestep and swipe at him--miss. He doubles around. No time to draw the hatchet back. I lift it like a shield in front of me and let my body relax. When the Fenris slams into me, I hit the pavement--hard--but he's run his chest into the hatchet, the weight of his body driving it in. I brace my legs against his abdomen

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  and kick up, sending the monster flailing away behind me. Back to my feet. I grimace as a wave of dizziness rushes over me, as blood runs down the back of my shoulders, scrapes from hitting the asphalt. Get it together, come on.

  I blink. The wolf is gone. No, not gone--I can still smell him in the air. I hold my breath, ears straining.

  Wait for it. He's here. Wait for it--

  The Fenris crashes into me with all the force of a bus. My right side, my blind side. His claws pop through the skin on my waist, sharp, stinging pain that makes my eye water and my vision blur. I hit the ground again and lose my grip on the hatchet. The wolf's weight bears into me, his breathing heavy and labored. I don't struggle--it makes them happy. Blood from his chest wound pools on my stomach, and as he presses his face closer to mine, I can see only one raging eye.

  Wait for it. He'll relax. He'll make a mistake. You get only one shot to get them off you--make sure you take the right one. Flecks of his fur catch in my nose and mouth, and grime from his body sticks to my sweat. I could try to reach the hunting knife on my waist, but both of my hands are locked in place by his front feet. I choke as he lowers himself even farther against me, heavy on my lungs, gagging as he exhales almost directly into my throat.

  Then a thick, dull sound echoes through the night, surprising enough to distract both me and the wolf. Footsteps? Before either the Fenris or I can react, a solid hit to its side throws the Fenris off my body, and I gasp for air as though I'm surfacing from water. Get up, get up, quick. I roll to my

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  stomach. Out of the corner of my good eye, I see a man, shadowed by the night but with a familiar lanky gait. He turns his head from me to the Fenris, who prowls a few yards away.

  "You'd think after all these years, you'd know to keep a Fenris from getting to your blind side," the intruder says. I grin, standing up. The Fenris growls at us; I lean to one side as it leaps forward and swing my hunting knife into his front leg. The wolf manages to shred part of my cloak as he stumbles away.

  "I could have gotten him. I was waiting for my moment," I answer. The boy laughs, eyes sparkling gray-blue even in the darkness.

  "Would that moment have come just after we carved 'Scarlett March' on your tombstone?" the boy snickers.

  The Fenris rears back and snarls. It knows it's too late to run. It's kill us or be killed. I join the boy, grabbing my hatchet off the ground. He licks his lips nervously. He's rusty at hunting, obviously. I wonder how long it's been.

  "You know," I say, smirking, "if you aren't up to all this, I can handle it for you. You know, if you aren't man enough."

  He narrows his eyes, but a smile tugs at the corners of his thin lips. We turn toward the Fenris as the wolf lowers its shoulders to the ground, eyes focused and furious. The boy draws two knives from his belt. I flip my hatchet in my hand.

  "He's gonna come at you first," the boy says.

  "I know," I answer. "You go to his--"

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  "I will," he replies, grinning. I shake my head. Nothing's changed. We don't need words, not when we're hunting together.

  The wolf charges us just as we take the first few running steps toward him. The boy reaches it first. He leaps high over the Fenris's arched back and sinks both knives into his sides. That should do the trick, but I won't let him take the credit. I skid to a stop and release the hatchet toward the Fenris. It lassos through the air before sinking into his chest with a squelching thud.

  The Fenris collapses to the ground, its eyes glimmering in a mix of hunger and hatred as I step toward it. It snaps at my legs once or twice uselessly. There's nothing human about it now, nothing canine, only a dying creature both bestial and disgusting. Its rotting-garbage-meets-sour-milk scent makes me gag. I've lost track of how many Fenris I've hunted, but the smell gets to me every time.

  "When did you get back? And where's your ax?" I ask the boy without taking my eye off the Fenris. Best to wait until you know they're dead.

  "About an hour ago, and I didn't exactly expect to be hunting straight off--hence, no ax. Figures I'd find you out here before I even get back to my house. You need some hobbies, you know?"

  I shake my head as the Fenris takes a few final raspy breaths. Its tongue lolls out of its mo
uth, and with a final growl, it dies. The dead Fenris bursts into darkness, an explosion of nighttime. Shadows flit over walls, into the cars,

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  between blades of grass like coal-colored fireworks scattering across the world. I look toward the boy.

  "Good to see you, Silas."

  Silas grins and shakes the Fenris blood off his knives before sheathing them. "You too, Lett."

  "Good to see a real hunter in action again, you mean," I quip.

  He steps forward and hugs me. I tense--I like being hugged, but it doesn't happen too often. Something about a girl that's missing an eye turns people off to touching her, I guess. Silas has known me since before the scars, though. I give in and put my arms around him.

  Silas releases me and frowns at the bloodstains on his jeans. "There are some parts of hunting that I really didn't miss," he grumbles. "Are you okay, by the way?" he asks, motioning to the wound on my waist.

  "It's nothing," I say, waving it off. "Are you saying you didn't hunt the entire time you were in San Francisco?" I run my hatchet along the hem of my cloak. The Fenris's blood barely shows up on the crimson fabric.

  "Forgive me for trying to spend some time with my uncle!"

  "Yeah, yeah," I sigh. It's hard to understand how he can just not hunt for such long periods of time, but the subject has always been a losing battle for me. "So how is Uncle Jacob these days?"

  Silas shrugs. "Okay. I mean, for a forty-year-old man who's practically a hermit."

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  "That's not his fault, though," I say as we meander back through the alley. "Your brothers and sisters still riled up about your father giving Jacob all the inheritance money?"

  "Yep. Even angrier about him giving me the house here," Silas mutters. Silas finished high school instead of taking a woodsman apprenticeship, something his brothers found fairly dishonorable and his triplet sisters found emasculating. Combine that with the fact that Pa Reynolds gave him and Jacob his worldly possessions before going senile... they can really hold a grudge, it seems.

  "I'm sorry," I offer. I try to imagine my life without my sister, but it's impossible; if she were gone, my life would stop. I give Silas what I hope is a sympathetic smile. He nods in response.

  At the end of the alley there's a car without hubcaps or a front bumper, the driver's-side door flung open. The back is piled high with duffel bags and fast-food cups.

  "That thing made it to California?" I say, frowning.

  "Not only that, but I managed to make it run off vegetable oil while I was there," he answers.

  "All the way to California and not a single Fenris..." I sigh.

  Silas grins and wraps an arm around my shoulders. "Lett, really, you've got to get a hobby. Come on, I'll give you a ride home."

  I climb into the passenger seat, knocking a few empty soda bottles to the floorboard. I have the window rolled down before Silas can even get to the driver's side--maybe

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  it's because I don't ride in them often, but cars make me claustrophobic. Silas slides in beside me and fiddles around with a few wires that stick out by the ignition, and the car grumbles to a start.

  "What about here, though? I didn't realize packs were starting to prowl around Ellison again," Silas says.

  I shrug. "It's been kind of recent. That one had been here awhile, I think. He was Coin. No sign from Arrow or Bell," I answer. What are packs like on the West Coast? As large as the ones in the South, as fierce? Is there anyone there to destroy them like I do here? How much more could I accomplish if I were in California instead of small-town Georgia? I can't believe he didn't hunt even once...

  "Also, thanks for saying happy birthday," Silas interrupts my thoughts.

  "Oh, wow, Silas, I forgot. I'm sorry. So you're old enough to drink finally?" I ask.

  "It's not as exciting as you'd think." He grins. We sail past the edge of town and into the night. A few scattered farmhouses glow like stars on hills, but other than that, there's nothing but the dim glow of Silas's single working headlight. I double-check that there's no blood on my hatchet or hunting knife, then wrap both up in my cloak. I flip down the sun visor and grimace. I lick my fingers and try to smooth my hair, which is shooting out as if I've been electrocuted.

  "Well, looks like Ellison hasn't changed much--hey, since when do you care about your hair?" Silas asks.

  "Since now," I answer quickly. I adjust my shirt and tuck

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  the cloak and weapons under my seat as we turn down an unpaved road. Tall grasses line either side, and the shrieks of crickets and locusts become deafening through the open window. I wipe away the moisture on my forehead.

  "Wait, are you... you're trying to hide the fact that you were hunting!"

  I sigh. "Look, I told Rosie that she could go hunting on her own for the first time, but that Fenris--"

  "You stole a solo hunt from your sister?"

  "No! I mean, yeah, but it's a good thing I did. That wolf was harder than I predicted. I don't know. She's not ready and I had to go hunting or lose my mind..."

  "Scarlett..." Silas begins in a serious tone. He started using "the tone" when we were kids to remind me that he's older than I am. It annoys me just as much now as it did then, only now it's less acceptable for me to push him into the mud for it. "She's supposed to be your partner."

  "No, she's supposed to be my sister. You were my partner, before you up and abandoned us--"

  "Hey, I still am, I've just been away--actually, no, I'm not getting into this argument again. Why can't Rosie be in on this partnership too?"

  "Look, I'm not going to wait for my sister to finish grocery shopping while the Fenris slaughter people left and right," I snap as we take the right fork in the road, toward Oma March's house. It doesn't matter how long she's been dead; I'll always consider it her cottage. The left fork goes to Silas's house. The only other thing close to us is the back

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  side of a massive cow pasture. "It's our responsibility," I add. "We know how to kill them. We know how to save people's lives. We don't take nights off or vacations to California for a year."

  "Ouch," Silas says, but I can tell my words roll off him. It's hard to get Silas riled up, unfortunately. "All I'm saying," he continues, "is that you can't keep Rosie locked up forever."

  I sigh in annoyance as the cottage appears in the distance like a lit oasis in the dark. "She's just not ready," I mutter. "And I don't want her to end up like me." Silas nods knowingly and traces his thumb over the scars on my arm as the smell of jasmine flowers wafts in through the air. We ride along in silence for a few moments.

  Finally, Silas's car growls up to the edge of the gravel drive. The cottage's front door swings open, sending a long stripe of light through the yard.

  "Wow," Silas says softly as he kills the ignition. I follow his stare out the windshield--Rosie is standing in the kitchen doorway, arms folded and eyes sparkling in anger. "Rosie looks... different."

  "Yeah. 'Different' as in mad. " I sigh, throwing the car door open. "Stay here for a second."

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  CHAPTER TWO

  Rosie March

  She's back. I pace in front of the door, trying to build up strength. You have every right to be upset, I convince myself. Don't let her out of this one. I blink furiously, trying to keep myself from choking up. I can put up with a lot. But it's hard to just shrug when your sister thinks you're incapable.

  I inhale deeply, throw the old wooden door open, and step outside.

  It slams shut behind me, destroying the tiny ray of kitchen light that had spilled into the darkness. My face is hot and probably bright pink, and my hands are balled into fists. If Scarlett wants to think I'm a child, I'll act like a child. I storm forward, pretending the crunchy gravel isn't slicing into my bare feet. Silas Reynolds's car looms in the driveway--he

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  was probably hunting with her. I'll deal with him next. Scarlett sighs, holding out her hands as if she's calming a wild an
imal.

  "You promised! " I snarl. I throw a bundle of red-violet fabric to the ground at her feet--my cloak, almost the exact same color as Scarlett's.

  "Rosie, look--" Scarlett begins. I grab at my waist and yank two daggers off the belt. Their bone handles clunk together as they tumble onto the rocky drive. I cringe and try to hide it; Scarlett's always nagging me about dirtying the blades, and it's a measure of how angry I am that she doesn't call me on it now. It's silent for a moment, other than the occasional hoot from a nearby owl. I fold my arms and glare.

  Scarlett groans. "Oh, stop pouting." She bends over and grabs the daggers and my cloak. The moon reflects off the shiny scars on her shoulders, evenly spaced lines that disappear under her tank top. She shoves my things toward me, but I don't budge.

  "I'm not pouting!" I snap back, realizing how pouty that sounds. "I can hunt too, Scarlett. You don't have to go running out into the dark every time."

  "It was just one Fenris, and he was on the prowl. Someone might have died tonight if I'd waited for you. You want that on your head?"

  "All you had to do was tell me you were going! How am I ever supposed to hunt on my own if you keep going after every wolf that sets foot in Ellison?"

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  "Look, Rosie, I'm sorry. Really."

  "Just because you're older doesn't mean you get to treat me like I'm some kind of lame sidekick!" I shout, emotion betraying me on the last word. I mean for it to be furious, but instead the hurt creeps in, tiny squeaks of impending tears slipping through my lips. I hate that--it's as though I have an anger threshold, when suddenly the rage turns into hurt. It never happens to my sister--her body is always hard, firm, perfectly trained and controlled. Her body could never allow tears--it isn't trained for it.