He saw Cullie’s hands holding that flesh shirt, saw his friend keep pulling, separating the skin garment from the body it belonged to, and saw the way his friend trembled. He looked into the girl’s eyes, and all but felt the pain coming from her in waves.
Worst of all, he knew that Cullie meant to keep cutting and skinning until the girl died. He knew the kid he’d all but grown up with meant to make her suffer for as long as he could.
He moved forward and knocked Cullie aside even as he was reaching for his own hunting knife. He drove the blade in with all of his weight behind the strike and felt muscles part, hot blood wash his hands and finally, the sickening crunch of bones breaking from the force of the attack. Mark held his breath as he kept sawing at the open wound he’d made, using more strength than he actually knew he had to stop the scream still echoing through his mind. She kept screaming long after he’d removed her head. The sound slowly faded, but still seemed deafening even after they’d buried her body.
As for the burial itself, he barely remembered a damned thing except panicking. All he clearly recalled was digging and then George trying to get the rental car back on the road and running into a tree and finally, Cullie calling the other guys back to haul them out of the ditch.
Mark pushed the rest of it away. He was close to where he needed to be, and he wanted to concentrate.
He was pretty sure the landmark he was looking for was almost his. All he knew for sure was that it had a cross as a symbol. Maybe it was a church or maybe it was a tree, he had no idea for sure.
As he finished scrabbling up a steep slope of jagged stone he saw what he’d been questing for. It was a church; or rather it had been a church once. Now there was little to see save the burnt remains that sat under a sheath of ice from the growing storm. The wood was old and water-soaked, but even in the darkness he could make out the shape of fallen pews through the holes in the front of the building and the slightly bent cross that still perched on the roof. A narrow dirt trail stood in front of the place but it was overgrown now and obviously no longer in use.
He almost sobbed as he staggered forward, his body shaking with cold and exhaustion.
He did sob when he saw the golden mane of the werewolf. It stepped around the side of the building, looking directly at him and grinning. The thing towered over him, close to eight feet in height on its back legs, and moved closer with slow, predatory steps.
He almost pissed himself when it spoke. “She’d have lived if you hadn’t cut off her head.” The words were clear enough to understand, but only barely.
He looked at it for several seconds and it, in turn, waited for a response. “I have no excuse for you. I was wrong.”
Instead of speaking, it merely nodded.
“Will… Are my kids going to be okay?”
It nodded again.
“Then I guess let’s get this over with.”
The werewolf didn’t tear him apart. Instead it moved forward and struck him with a backhand that sent him sailing five feet backward.
“You’ve got a knife, Loman. Use it.”
Mark crawled back to his hands and knees and looked at it for a moment, surprised.
The thing came closer, dropping to all fours. “I said use it.”
He nodded and reached for the sheathed weapon. It waited patiently until he was up and standing, ready to defend himself, and then it charged, roaring a challenge.
Mark stepped to the side and swung the blade in a low, fast arc, hacking through fur and muscle across the creature’s back. It let out an almost human yelp and spun around, glaring hatred in his direction.
Before he could even think about how lucky he’d just gotten, the creature lashed with one forepaw and cut four trenches down his face. Mark fell to his knees from the pain and the force of the blow, the knife forgotten and all the fight taken from him.
“Pick up your knife and try again.” The voice was infuriating. “I wouldn’t want you thinking you didn’t get a fair shake out of this.”
He spoke as carefully as he could through the heavy lacerations on his mouth. “You’re going to kill me either way, right?”
“Oh, yes.” The monstrous face nodded, the blue eyes burned with the desire to rip him apart.
Mark reached down and grabbed the knife. He didn’t want to die; it was as simple as that. If he could at least incapacitate the thing, he might have a chance.
His face felt like it was on fire and the rain and snow that struck it only made matters worse, but his adrenaline levels were climbing now and the cold seemed to have left him. Mark shook the blood that threatened to spill into his eyes away and lowered himself closer to the ground, covering his most vulnerable areas as best he could.
He was a hunter, too, and he knew what the werewolf would try for. The same places he knew he would be trying for.
The werewolf moved, stalking closer. Mark faced it, his hands and knees shaking with adrenaline and exhaustion.
It was time now.
Man and wolf-man both charged, both growled as they met, and Mark ducked under the monster’s body and slammed the knife he carried into the heavily muscled stomach of the creature, not trying to hack in and pull out, but instead sinking the blade in deeply and then forcing the edge to run up from just above the creature’s navel all the way to the hard sternum. Thick hot fluids ran from the gaping wound and the werewolf let out a shriek of pain. The claws of the beast raked across his back, tearing through waterlogged clothes and grazing his ribs on both sides.
Mark let out a scream of his own and pulled the weapon free, stabbing again, this time into the heaving tender spot under the thing’s arm, slamming the blade through muscles and blood vessels and once again dragging the weapon as far as the bones would permit to open another long gash. The werewolf clubbed him with its elbow, trying to break free, but Mark knew better than to let it. He pulled the knife away and lowered his aim, cutting into the meat and organs just above the werewolf’s pelvis, trying to saw through as many vital organs as possible, to inflict as much pain as possible, anything he could do to stop the animal in its tracks.
The hind claw of the thing left the ground and caught his leg just below the knee, ripping flesh and clothing away in a downward stroke that took most of the meat from Mark’s shin in the process.
Mark screamed and kept stabbing, hoping he could stop this insanity, praying he would live through it.
The werewolf pushed away from him, thick trails of blood falling from every open wound he’d made.
Mark groaned, feeling the hot run of blood coursing over his face and over his leg. Aside from that unexpected heat, he felt almost nothing. Shock was surely setting in.
The beast stood still, panting heavily and looked at him. Its unsettlingly human eyes stared a little glassily. There was a part of Mark Loman that had always been a hunter and always would be. That primal aspect of his soul wanted to roar in victory. He kept staring back, and that predatory piece of him suddenly shivered.
The werewolf was standing back, not attacking, because it wanted him to understand what he faced. Its fingers parted the fur around the worst of the wounds he’d given it, displaying the massive gash that ran from chest down nearly to the groin. Mark stared, stunned as the flesh there began to heal.
He watched, too shocked to consider running or fighting, as the flesh and organs exposed by the deep cut pulled back together. Blood stopped flowing, and then the heart he’d nicked mended itself, the muscles bunched and twisted until they were once again whole and the skin practically zipped itself shut.
The other wounds mended as well, and the beast stared at him, the glazed look gone from the cold blue eyes.
“That was to let you know, to make you understand.” The voice seemed more human now, or maybe he was just adjusting. “She would have healed even from the skinning your friend gave her, Loman. She would have recovered given time.”