All Hallows' Moon Read online

  There was Kathleen, next to a freckled girl who might have been a cheerleader, and then there was a boy with slicked-back brown hair. Only eight in all. Small class.

  And they all stared at her.

  Ms. Reedy’s lips twitched in what was either a smile or a grimace. “Tell us about yourself.”

  I’m a werewolf. I would kill all of you and eat your organs.

  “My name is Rylie.” She focused on a world map on the back wall. “I’m not from around here.”

  “What do you like to do?”

  Kill.

  Her nerves had stirred the werewolf within. It was interested in these young, vulnerable faces. It was thinking about the one exit to the room and how easy it would be to trap everyone inside.

  “I like movies and art,” Rylie said. Let me sit down, let me get out of here, I don’t want to be up here anymore…

  “And?”

  Annoyance clenched in her stomach. Rylie opened her mouth to—to what? Growl? Snap at the teacher? Now that would be a great way to start the school year.

  She shut her mouth, bit her lip, and sat down at her desk. Her face burned.

  Ms. Reedy stared at her. They all did. Kathleen was whispering to someone, and Rylie could feel every word like a nail in the back of her neck. Now that the wolf had awakened, it wasn’t happy with such an anticlimax. She tried to ignore it.

  After a long, awkward silence, the teacher went to her lectern. “We’re going to review chapter four today. Please open your books…”

  Rylie.

  Her name. Someone was whispering her name.

  She dug the fingernails of one hand into her knee while she took the school book from the tray under her desk with the other.

  “She snapped at me on the way into class… just trying to be nice…”

  Kathleen. It was that girl talking about her, and Rylie remembered how the other girls at camp read her diary. At the time, she had responded by leaving the cabin, but retreating only made her more of a target. She wouldn’t be a target anymore. She wasn’t prey.

  Chapter four. Her eyes blurred. She couldn’t make out the page.

  “…so weird…”

  “…wonder why she would…”

  “…what’s with her?”

  A growl rumbled in her chest. She couldn’t stop it.

  Kathleen’s head was bent over her book, but she was whispering out of the corner of her mouth to someone.

  “Stop it!” Rylie hissed.

  “What? I wasn’t—”

  “Just shut up. Shut up.”

  Kathleen’s eyes went round. Her lips sealed tight. Her gaze flicked over Rylie’s shoulder, and she turned to see Ms. Reedy hovering again.

  “Is there a problem?” the teacher asked. The whole class was silent.

  “No,” she said, her heart pounding. “No problem at all.”

  They went through the chapter review question by question. Each person had to answer at least one, although Ms. Reedy skipped over Rylie, since she hadn’t had the chance to read the book.

  Slowly, so slowly, the voices started again.

  Rylie… Rylie…

  It was that Kathleen girl.

  “We’re going to get in groups of three to work on the test quiz,” Ms. Reedy announced halfway through the class. “You can look up the answers in the book, but no cell phones.” She gave a pointed look at Rylie even though her phone didn’t get very good reception out in the country.

  The teacher separated them into groups, and Rylie ended up with Kathleen and the cheerleader, who turned out to be named Maxine.

  “So… do you want to look up different questions, or should we…?” Kathleen ventured. So it was like that, then. She didn’t want to work with Rylie. She just wanted to get rid of her. She was just like Amber.

  “Fine. I’ll do it myself,” Rylie snapped.

  “That’s not—”

  “Don’t pick on me!” She shoved her chair back and flung the book off her desk. Rylie was stronger than ever before. It flipped over and smacked into Kathleen’s arm.

  “Hey!”

  “Miss Gresham!” snapped Ms. Reedy, hurrying over. “What’s the problem?”

  Rylie spun, baring her teeth. She couldn’t even think of what to say. She didn’t know how to defend herself. All she could think was hungry and—

  “She freaked out at me!” complained Kathleen.

  Maxine nodded. “It’s true. I saw it.”

  Rylie floundered for human language. “They just—I don’t—”

  Ms. Reedy pointed at her. “Dean’s office. Now.”

  She didn’t wait to be escorted, since she had seen the sign for the dean at the front office that morning. Rylie stormed out of the room as the teacher picked up her phone to alert the office she was on her way.

  As soon as she hit the sunshine and fresh air, her head cleared, and she felt a little ridiculous.

  What had she been thinking?

  The anger vanished before she’d taken three steps away from the building, and she was cold with nerves by the time she reached the dean. The secretary was expecting her. He directed Rylie to a chair in the hallway behind him, and Rylie sat with her face buried in her hands.

  “Who are you?”

  She took a sniff of the air before checking the source of the drawling voice. She was surprised to pair the sticky-sweet scent of marijuana with the guy sitting on the other end of the hallway. He wore a polo shirt and loafers, and he looked like he fit into the farming community about as well as Rylie did. His hair was even spiked in the front.

  “Who are you?” Rylie countered.

  “I’m Tate. You must have done something good to visit the dean on your first day of school.”

  “How did you know?”

  “I’ve lived here for longer than a week. I know everyone.” He kicked his feet up on the opposite chair, cupping his hands behind his head. “So you’re Rylie. I saw you on TV.”

  Of course. Rylie’s face had been splashed all over the city back home after she went missing at summer camp. There had been a small media storm when they found her. Just another reason for her to avoid the city.

  “I didn’t think I made the news this far west,” she said.

  “You didn’t. I spend a lot of time online. So was it really bears?”

  “No,” she said. On a whim, she added, “It was werewolves.”

  Tate seemed to find this hilarious. His laugh sounded too feminine coming out of his large frame. “Nice. So, I don’t suppose you like four-twenty, do you?”

  “What’s that?”

  “You know. Ganja. Mary Jane.”

  Rylie snorted. “No. I don’t smoke pot.”

  “Have you tried it? You might like it> I’m the only guy in town who sells it,” Tate said.

  “No thanks. You’ll be the first person to hear about it if I change my mind, though.” Which Rylie didn’t see happening anytime soon. But Tate reminded her a lot of some of her stoner friends back home, so she couldn’t help smiling.

  He took her rejection with a shrug. “So what did you do to earn a visit to the dean? Piss off Ms. Reedy?”

  “Kathleen, actually.”

  “Nice,” he said again. “Nice. I was caught smoking behind the bleachers again. I don’t know why it surprises them anymore. What else am I supposed to do in this dump of a town?”

  “Vandalism?” she suggested.

  Dean Block found them laughing in the hall, and she gave her face a tired rub. “Great,” she muttered. “Miss Gresham, please wait in my office. Tate…”

  He held up his hands. “I know. Don’t do it again.”

  “Just… wait out here.”

  Tate gave Rylie a little ironic wave goodbye. She smiled sheepishly.

  Everything in the dean’s office was brown. The only light came through a tiny window with frosted glass. It was probably supposed to feel warm and cozy, but Rylie felt claustrophobic.

  She sat in the chair across from the desk to wait, and the
dean came back in after talking to Tate. The circles under her eyes looked even darker after their conversation. “Your aunt is on her way,” she said. “She should be here in about a half an hour. Do you want to tell me what happened?”

  “No,” Rylie said, focusing on the cup of pens on the corner of the desk.

  “Ms. Reedy said you picked a fight with Kathleen.”

  The wolf swelled inside of her, and she clenched her hand into a fist. Her fingernails dug into her palm. “She’s the one who started it!”

  “I’m sure.” Dean Block didn’t look impressed. “What happened?”

  Rylie opened her mouth to spill—then shut it again. “Nothing.”

  “If you don’t give me your side, then all I can do is take the teacher’s story as fact. We may not be some big city school like you’re used to, but we do have rules about how we handle this kind of thing, if it’s true. You could get a suspension.”

  “I’m not talking until my aunt gets here.”

  The dean rubbed her face again. “All right, all right.”

  Rylie passed the time by stealing a pen out of the cup and doodling curling lines from one corner of a sticky-note to the other. Dean Block worked on the computer, ignoring her completely. She wondered if the silent treatment was supposed to make her nervous. It was working. She had never been in any dean’s office before.

  A half hour inched past on the clock. Finally, the door opened, and Aunt Gwyn came in. She set her hat on the edge of the desk, then dusted her hands off on her jeans. “Sorry. I’ve been working all day. I’m a downright mess.”

  “Thanks for coming. Please take a seat.”

  Gwyn stayed standing. “Tell me what Rylie did.”

  “She provoked a fight and threw a book,” the dean said. “We understand transitions to new schools are difficult, but—”

  Her aunt cut Dean Block off with a hand. “Yeah, I get that. Can we talk in private?”

  Uh oh.

  “Okay. Miss Gresham, would you wait in the hall?”

  Tate was gone, leaving her no distraction from the nerves gnawing in her belly. Rylie bounced her knee as she waited, chewing on her thumbnail until the edge bled. She could imagine the conversation going on inside the office.

  You think she’s been acting weird? the dean would ask.

  Yeah. All the animals are afraid of her. I think something happened at camp. Something really bad, Gwyn would reply.

  We’re going to expel her.

  And Aunt Gwyneth would smile that unsympathetic smile. Good. I wanted to send her back to her mom anyway.

  The thought of it made her want to scream.

  What would happen if someone did realize what happened to Rylie? There was no way anybody would believe it if she told them she was a werewolf, and there was no cure now that she had changed.

  No cure… except a silver bullet.

  This scene was too familiar to one Rylie had experienced at camp over the summer. She had been caught sneaking over to the boys’ camp with a car she stole from the faculty. She only escaped arrest because a counselor stood up for her—and Jericho only did it to keep Rylie under his thumb. He turned out to be a werewolf and hoped she would help him attack the camp.

  Gwyn had no ulterior motives. After Rylie’s refusal to work that morning, she didn’t have much of a reason to keep her niece at all. Even if she didn’t get expelled, it seemed like there was a pretty slim chance of getting to stay at the ranch.

  She wouldn’t live with her mom. She couldn’t.

  When her aunt emerged, Rylie stood up.

  “I’m not going back to the city,” she said.

  Gwyn’s expression didn’t change. “Of course you’re not. Come on, I’m parked out front.”

  She strode off, leaving Rylie staring after her.

  That was it? Wasn’t she supposed to get yelled at or something?

  Rylie hurried to catch up with her. She got in the passenger’s side and buckled her belt silently. Her aunt tuned the radio to a country station and hummed along with it as she drove.

  Instead of turning left toward the road that would take them to the ranch, they headed downtown. Rylie couldn’t stand the quiet.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Hardware store,” she said. “I told you we would get paint for your room after school, didn’t I?”

  “You’re not going to get rid of me? I thought I was expelled for sure.”

  “Not this time. The dean’s willing to work with your issues.” Rylie didn’t realize how afraid she’d been until it drained out and left her weak. Gwyn stopped at a traffic light and gave her a hard look. “You’re not going to throw anything again. Not books, not temper tantrums. Nothing. You’re going to control yourself.”

  “But—”

  “Tomorrow, you’re going to wake up and do your chores without complaining. You’re going to go to school. You’re going to blend in. And you’re not going to get in trouble.”

  “It’s just—”

  “I’m running a ranch, girl. It’s a big job. I can’t go running into town every day because you’re making trouble. I’ll start losing money, which is not an option, so I will send you back to your mother. Understand me?”

  Rylie nodded. “I understand.”

  “Good. Now, what color do you want to paint your room?”

  Four

  Strangers

  By the time Rylie and Gwyn were finished with retail therapy, they had a lot more than paint. A shopping spree in a town with one half-empty strip mall was virtually impossible, but they picked up furniture from an antique store and Rylie scrounged together a few designer outfits from the consignment shop. It wasn’t much, but it beat her aunt’s hand-me-downs.

  They emptied Rylie’s bedroom and did the primer coat that night. It was awful to her sensitive nose. She slept on the deck chair with a checkered blanket pulled to her chin, and awoke in the morning damp and chilly.

  The days quickly began to take on a strange sort of rhythm: Rylie woke up at four in the morning to eat breakfast (whether she liked it or not), struggled to find chores that kept her away from the animals, and then took the long ride to high school. She didn’t dare argue with her aunt anymore. She weeded the garden, repaired fences, and hauled bales of hay. The cows panicked and tried to stampede whenever she passed. Gwyn didn’t remark on it, but she never stopped watching.

  It got easier after the first day, in the sense that she was no longer a novelty and became part of the scenery. New students weren’t interesting gossip for long.

  On the other hand, classes with Ms. Reedy didn’t get much easier. She hovered over Rylie and watched her every move.

  Fortunately, it turned out Tate was supposed to be in Ms. Reedy’s class instead of smoking under the bleachers. He strolled in reeking of weed to claim the seat next to Rylie after a few days. He immediately pulled out his phone and started texting.

  “Care to share your discussions with the class?” the teacher asked.

  “Just planning a drive-by with my gang,” he said.

  This seemed to be a normal response for him, because Ms. Reedy only looked pained. “Put your phone away, Mr. Peterson.”

  It was nice having Tate to distract the teacher. She made it through the week without another disruption, and by the second week, Rylie was sitting with Tate and his degenerate friends at lunch. The three of them were repulsive, like every other teenage boy she had ever met, but they were also wonderfully simple creatures. All they cared about were video games and marijuana.

  Rylie could almost forget the full moon was coming.

  Almost.

  “I hear you’re hanging out with a bad crowd at school,” Gwyn said over a dinner of steaks from her own herd. Considering how much meat her aunt ate, she might as well have been a werewolf too—and she managed to top it off with several steins of beer.

  Rylie shrugged. “They’re all right.”

  “Are you doing drugs with them?”

  “No.”
>
  Her mom would have never accepted that answer without an hour of interrogation, but it was enough for Gwyneth. “Good. You don’t work on my ranch if you’re not clean.”

  “Trust me, that’s not a problem.” Rylie could barely control herself anymore. The idea of throwing substance abuse into the mix was stupid.

  The clinking of silverware against plates filled the room for a couple moments. Gwyn set down her fork. The line between her eyebrows said she was thinking hard again.

  “I’m going to give it to you straight, babe: You’re a great worker. You’re almost as strong as both my men combined, so I’m happy to have you. But this refusal to ride my horses is a serious problem. You want to explain it to me?”

  “I had a bad experience at camp,” she said. “Actually, I had a lot of bad experiences at camp.”

  Sympathy flashed across Gwyn’s hard face. “Yeah. I know.”

  Rylie ate her last bite of steak and pushed the plate back. She could have probably had two more of them without feeling full. “I’m surprised you haven’t tried to play twenty questions about it yet. It was all Jessica wanted to talk about.”

  “You went missing for two weeks. She was scared for you.”

  “You weren’t?”

  “I was, but you’re tough. I knew you would be fine. Since you’ve come back, though, you’ve been… different. You’re darker now. Guess that’s no surprise considering what you’ve been through.”

  She didn’t meet her aunt’s eyes. “Yeah.”

  “If you want to talk about it, I’m here. Until then, there’s work to be done.” Aunt Gwyn grabbed another beer out of the fridge and sat down, using the side of the table to pop the cap off. She poured it into her glass. “Your sixteenth birthday is coming up soon.”

  Was it? Rylie had completely forgotten. Time for her was no longer marked by days and weeks and months. It was measured out in phases of the moon. “We don’t have to do anything.”

  “Do you want to learn to drive?”

  She smiled. “Really?”

  “I don’t have time to drive an hour into town twice a day. It would be mighty convenient if you could do it yourself. So I’ll tell you what, Rylie—if you can get past this summer’s bad experience and go for a ride on Butch, I’ll teach you to drive. You can even have the old truck.”