Story: "Werewolf" (Part 3)

This is Part 3 of the story.
If you haven't read Part 1 or Part 2  yet, please start there. 

“So, why do we stay here, then?” Aureliano is a broad shouldered man who resembles a monkey, a great ape, both in his features — the small narrow-set eyes, the small up-turned nose, the wide mouth, the large teeth, gums showing, the jug-ears, the long arms, short legs — and in his mentality and physicality. He’s a jokester, a prankster, his laughter a wild screech that can be heard from one end of the camp to the other. But now he is dead serious.

“What do you mean,” you say.

“Let’s Attack! Let’s go! Let’s take the damn City. Let’s get out of this forest, where the wolf is picking us off, one by one, like a herd of deer.”

“We are not ready for the city, not yet.”

“Who says.”

You sigh. “Rollo says.”

“Rollo says, Rollo says,” Aureliano japes. “That is the answer to everything. Can no-one think for themselves?”

“Well, do you think we are ready? To take the City, I mean.”

He shrugs his broad shoulders. “How should I know?”

You don’t even bother to point out the inconsistency in his attitude, his instinctive pushing away the responsibility for the decision, yet griping about it. So much easier to be the critic.

“Well,” you say, “we’re not ready. It is as simple as that.”

“Why?”

"Because … " What flashes through your mind is the complicated dance, the courtship of the inhabitants in the City, how the majority of the City must be willing or at least not resisting, and how at least one out of every eight must be active supporters, informers, potential recruits to join the guerrilla, and it would be better if this number was closer to one in four. This is a process that involves a great deal of patience, a great deal of talk over domino tiles and strong, black coffee, and beer and tequila, over months and months, so that little by little the City is already lying on its back with its belly in the air, waiting to be scratched, before a single fighter sets a single boot inside its wall. You open your mouth to explain all of this, then stop yourself, shake your head. Grin. “… because … Rollo says.”

Aureliano grins back, lifts one long, hairy arm, raises his middle finger, a long middle finger with a long, tapered nail. “Here’s what I think about what Rollo says. But I suppose we are stuck here, with the wolf. What are we doing about it? How many more, eh?”

“We have doubled the snares.”

“And much good this will do.”

“Do you have a better idea?”

“How should I know?”

***

The next morning, Jose is found dead by his tent.

“In his tent?” Bice’s emerald eyes are wide, pupils contracted in the bright sunlight, her bright, green irises like verdigrised coins. “Inside his tent?”

“What kind of wolf is this?” Rollo is thoughtful. “Perhaps not a wolf after all, eh? Something else. Or someone.”

“Inside his tent?” It is Bice again.

“No,” you say. “Not inside his tent. He was dragged out.”

You were the one that discovered Jose. You were up this morning, earlier than usual, drinking your black coffee. It was still dark, the sun just beginning to color the sky a faint purple at the horizon and over the mountain. You walked between the tents, thinking idly about the fact that not much more than a hundred men — and some women — were gathered here, and this, this was the start. You knew it. In that moment, you felt certain, felt the momentum of history, concentrated right here.

Something to write about, this feeling, this certainty. After the fact, of course, after the victories, but perhaps something you should record now, write in a journal so that you could later report that on this day, this early morning, with the sun coloring the horizon and the top of the mountain, at this time, in this place, you knew. Yes you should record this. You felt your shirt pocket and there was your small notebook. But no pen, no pencil.

So, you went back towards your own tent, to get that pen or pencil so you could write down your impressions and feelings of this moment.

And then you saw it.

The tent-flap gaping open — ripped.

The trail of blood, like black oil in the dark twilight.

You followed the trail.

You found the corpse right outside the camp, Jose’s long, thin body, twisted, his hungry, hollow-cheeked face up-turned, eyes wide open, staring, his teeth bared, his throat, his chest, his belly torn, flesh shredded.

“A wolf that goes inside the camp?” Rollo shakes his head. “A wolf that walks among all this human scent? A wolf that selects a human and rips him from his sleep, from his tent? No. This is not a wolf.”

“Then what?” Bice asks.

“And why Jose?” Rollo asks, in that way of his, when he does not seek for the answer, when he knows the answer, when he wants you to see the answer, on your own. “That is the question, no? Why Jose?”

“Because,” you say, “it was Jose who saw the wolf. Well, not the wolf, because it is not a wolf. He saw the outline of a creature standing on two legs. Something with very long arms, reaching almost to the ground, something with claws.”

“A … werewolf?” Bice laughs, but there is a shake to the laugh.

“A man who changes into a wolf?”

“Or a woman,” you say.

“The female of the species is more dangerous than the male.” Rollo laughs. “Really? A werewolf? What does Occam say?”

“Who?” Bice knits her brow. It makes her even more beautiful.

“William of Occam,” you say. “Medieval Philosopher. Occam’s Razor. When confronted by many possible solutions to a problem, always pick the simplest solution.”

“And what is the simplest solution?” Rollo looks at you.

“Not a wolf, not a werewolf, a human.”

“With very long arms and with claws?” Bice asks.

“Aureliano has long arms,” you say.

Rollo scoffs. “Maybe a little longer than normal, but not the way Jose described it, not reaching all the way to the ground, or nearly so. And Aureliano does not have claws.”

“He does have some long nails,” Bice says, half serious.

“No, no,” Rollo shakes his head. “Not Aureliano, or at least not necessarily him. What did Jose actually see?”

“A shadow,” you say.

“A shadow on two legs. A man, a human. And in outline, just a dark outline. Tell me. Use Occam’s Razor. What is the easiest explanation for the long arm?”

You see it. “He carries something, some tool.”

“Yes,” Bice adds, excited now. “Like a pitchfork maybe, that would look — wouldn’t it? — like a long arm with long claw-shaped fingers. In outline, I mean. Like an extension of his arm.”

“That’s it,” Rollo says. “That’s what Occam would say, were he here, in camp, with us. That is the simplest solution.”

“Who?” you ask.

“One of us?” Bice adds.

“Who was killed first?”

“The woman.”

“Yes, the unknown woman. What was she doing here?”

“A spy?” You laugh, thinking about Raphael and his paranoia about spies infiltrating the camp.

“So,” Rollo says, “let us think through this. Let us say that there was a woman and a man, two strangers, who approached the camp. Occam’s Razor. The simplest solution. Would it be likely that this would be a coincidence, that two strangers would independently approach the camp, for some purpose, not knowing each other, and then one of them kills the other?”

You shake your head. “No, that is not the simplest solution. A simpler solution is that these two strangers were together.”

“Then,” Rollo says. “These two, who have made it through the forest, they have a falling out, and he kills her, making it appear to be the work of a wild animal, with the tool, let’s say it’s a pitchfork, that he has been carrying through the forest. Is this likely?”

“No,” Bice says. “It could be, of course, but it is not likely. It is too complicated. We would have to assume that they had some joint purpose, perhaps they were both spies, or perhaps they wanted to join our company. And then, while intent on this joint purpose, they argue, even though we do not hear them arguing, and then one kills the other.”

“Well, I can see one simple option,” you say. “The woman is running away from the man. He is pursuing her. She runs through the forest, perhaps towards the camp, perhaps not even knowing that the camp is there, perhaps simply running away from the homicidal man. He catches her, he kills her.”

“Ah,” Rollo leans back against the tree, knits his hands behind his head. "This is a clean and simple solution, and so human, no? A woman running away, a man pursuing, strong emotions, passions, violence, murder. Yes, this is a human solution. Except — "

“Except,” Bice finishes Rollo’s sentence, “then why does he stay? Why does he not run away from the scene of his crime of passion? Why does he kill Segundo, then Jose?”

“Exactly,” Rollo says, “and so?”

“The woman was coming to meet someone in the camp,” you say.

“She comes to meet a man,” Bice adds, “and that man kills her. One of our company.”

“Why Segundo,” Rollo asks, " why Jose?"

“Because Jose saw him?”

“That’s Jose, but why Segundo?”

You give this some thought. “Perhaps Segundo also saw him?”

“This is possible.” Rollo nods. “And let us say that is the solution. Then why did Segundo not mention to anyone that he had seen the killer?”

“He must have,” Bice says. “He must have mentioned it to one person. The killer.”

“And that is why Segundo was killed,” Rollo says. “That is why Jose was killed. They could have recognized the killer. Because they knew the killer.”

“The killer,” you say, “is one of us.”

***

“Who is she,” Rollo says. He is looking at the corpse of the woman who was killed. We had buried her, now you and Rollo have unearthed her. It is just the three of us here, two living, one dead: Rollo, yourself, and the dead woman.

“Let us see if there is anything that can help us,” you say. “First we need to get her out of this hole.”

Together you pull the corpse out of the grave.

Lying on her back, she looks sad, a discarded toy.

This is the way she looks: her hair is long, dark, unruly, but it is only unruly because of the violence done to her, the dirt she was buried in. You brush the dirt off her hair, comb it with your fingers, feeling that it is silky, in good condition, and as you arrange it, you see that it is a good style, expertly cut to enhance her oval face. Her eyebrows are finely shaped, plucked, her lashes long, thick. She wears small pearl earrings. The pearls appear to be real, expensive. Her blouse and skirt are in the peasant style, but the material is not rough peasant cloth, rather it is a fine, delicate material, expensive. She wears boots, laced up high, acceptable for a walk in the woods, but not a working woman’s boots, they are leisure boots, fashionable, expensive.

“Expensive,” you say. This is the overall impression. “She is a woman of means.”

“Yes,” Rollo says. “And not from here, not from the City.”

“Why do you say this? Could she not be some City merchant’s wife or daughter?”

“No,” Rollo says. “She is not from the North Country. She is from the South, from the Capital, or close to the Capital. These boots, these pearls, this style of clothing, the hair, it is what we would see in the Capital, not here.”

“So, what was she doing here?”

“That,” Rollo says, “is the question.”

Her right hand is clenched tight. You work her grip open, which necessitates cracking her fingers with some brutality. You do not know whether you broke a bone, but suppose it does not matter to her now. Still, it does not feel right to treat her this way.

In the palm, you find a piece of paper. Thick parchment.

“It looks like something legal,” Rollo says. “Can we make out any of the words?”

You flatten out the piece of paper. The only thing you can make out is a large, capital ‘P’ in gothic font.

“P?”

Rollo shakes his head. “I do not know,” he says.

“So, she comes here, with this paper, to meet someone, and is killed for her trouble.”

“We have many here that carry past sins,” Rollo says. “This is the nature of the cause, and who it attracts.”

“This is true, and surely many of them have a violent past,” you agree.

“Perhaps,” Rollo says, “we have seen the last of it. I would dearly love to see justice for Segundo and Jose, good men both. But we may never know. And if we do not, then let us instead make them a monument of the City.”

But it would not be the last of it.

***

“How many?” Rollo is pale.

“Thirteen.” Raphael looks like he is about to burst into tears.

“Killed. Ripped apart. Ten men, three women.”

“My God!”

“In all different parts of the camp,” Raphael says. “And thirty men have left, moved out.”

“My God!” Rollo exclaims again. “Down forty-five fighters because of this one, this one … wolf-man, this man in wolf’s clothing.”

“Perhaps Aureliano was right.” You say this out loud. You were thinking it. You realize the words came out.

Rollo looks at you. “What?”

“Something Aureliano said. We need to move now, take the City.”

Rollo shakes his head. “You know we are not ready.”

“Yes, I know. But perhaps we have no choice. The werewolf is breaking us up, decimating us.”

“Don’t call him a werewolf. Not you too.”

“You know what I mean. I only call him that because that is what everyone calls him, how everyone speaks about him, in hushed voices at the campfire, in their tents, at night when the sky is black and the moon is big. That is why thirty fighters have left. That is why thirty more will leave, and then more until the whole cause is doomed.”

“We cannot take the City now, not yet. We need more converts. It will be many more weeks. Months.”

“I know. But we also cannot stay here, not with the wolf picking us off.”

“It is not possible to attack yet.”

“Then,” you say. “There is one other solution.”

“I know,” Rollo says. “We need to kill the wolf.”

“We need to kill a wolf, yes. We need to be able to display a wolf carcass. Or a wolfman carcass.”

“And how do we do this? The snares have not worked.”

You explain your idea.

***

That night you dream of the wolf, and the wolf looms large in your dream.

He stands at the edge of the plateau looking outwards, and you realize that he is looking down towards the City.

The wolf-man raises his right arm and the arm is outlined against the large, white circle of the full moon, and you see that the arm is long, ending in sharp claws.

Between you and the werewolf is the campfire, flames flickering, and around the campfire there are five men, shadows, their backs to you. They are all staring at the wolf, necks stretched long, longer than normal, like giraffe-men. They start swaying back and forth as if to a tune that you can’t hear. Now they each lift their right arms, as in response to the wolf-man, as if involved in some mystical ritual, as if worshipping the wolf-man.

In the dream the wolf whispers your name, and its as if he is right next to you, whispering in your ear, even though he is far away on the other side of the campfire with its five worshipping giraffe-men.

‘What do you want from me?’ The wolf-man’s voice is intimate in your ear.

You answer with a question.

‘Who are you?’

‘I am,’ the wolf whispers, like a soft growl, and you think you can feel whiskers tickling your ear, ‘what you most desire. I am what you most fear. I am the one you run towards, even when you know I will eat you.’

Your breath catches in your throat.

‘Let me see you.’

The wolf begins to turn, long hair flowing in the moonlight.

And the features are like Bice and Rollo all merged together, as one creature. It’s hideous. Hideous and beautiful all at the same time.

You wake up with a gasp.

***

Stepping outside the tent, it is still dark.

There is a shadow, standing still at the edge of the plateau.

Then it moves, and in that movement, the heave of heavy shoulders, the toss of long hair, there is something that seems like a wild animal.

It’s exactly like in your dream.

It is the werewolf!

You stand still, holding your breath.

The creature begins to turn.

No, no, not this way.

And the creature comes towards you, features still lost in the shadows.

And, just like in the dream, he calls your name.

And he steps into the light.

And it’s Gratia.

Gratia dressed in his all-black outfit, with his black bandana, the black beard and the bandana blending together at his neck, and his black hair is long and flowing.

And he is smiling.

And he is not the werewolf.

And you’re safe.

You realize that you have been holding your breath, let it out in a long exhalation.

“Hah hah,” Gratia lets out a barking laugh. “You look like you saw … heh heh … a werewolf.”

You laugh as well. It feels good to laugh. You used to laugh, often, and well. You should laugh more.

Gratia is someone who laughs often.

Gratia is honest, in a blunt, direct way that you normally take offense at, take personally, but you realize now that he is just as he seems. There is nothing manipulative or dishonest about him, and this is very refreshing. Also, he is an artist, someone you really should relate to more than you do, since you do, secretly, view yourself as an artist, a poet, even though you wear the cynicism of the journalist as a chain-mail cloak. So, you tell him about your dream. It’s as if you’re testing yourself, testing him too. How does it feel to say this out loud? It feels like standing naked at the edge of a cliff with wind whipping your bare skin. Dangerous. Frightening. Refreshing. Invigorating. Liberating.

“So,” Gratia says, after you have spilled out the whole dream. “Was the wolf right? Is that how you feel? Is that what you most desire, what you most fear, at the same time: Bice and Rollo, together?”

There is no judgment in his voice. In this way Gratia is very similar to Rollo. Both of them have this open, curious way of asking. It’s hypnotic. As if you can, finally, be fully understood, can fully let down your guard, and there will be no consequences, only understanding.

“Yes,” you say. There is no need to extract a promise, it is understood, this is just between the two of you and what is spoken here will never be spoken about again, unless you choose to bring it up. How do you know? It is in the air, the solemnity of the tone in Gratia’s voice. So you continue: “I love Bice. I love Rollo. I love them both. I hate seeing them together. Instead of her with me. I know she can never be with me, not the way I am. Sometimes I wish I was … well, someone like Rollo, someone she could be with, that she would want to be with, someone she would look at in the same way she looks at Rollo. And, yes, I fear this too. I suppose what I fear is this uncontrollable thing in me, the passion, and I fear what I might do. I know that passion can eat me up, can ruin everything, can destroy what I love most. Because even though I hate seeing them together, I love it too. Because I love them both. If I can’t have Bice, and I know I can’t, then I love the fact that Rollo can have her, that she can have Rollo. Seeing them together is beautiful. And it’s hideous.”

You stop talking. Your mouth closes, as if on its own accord your mouth has decided that you have said enough.

Gratia is quiet for what feels like a very long time, then he says: “This is how art is made, like a pearl in an oyster, from a grain of sand, weaving a translucent shell, layer by layer, to protect your soul. Take this passion, take the love and the fear, the beautiful and the hideous, take it all and burn it up in a magnificent blaze, and you will create great art.”

***

Bice is marvelous in her fury.

“He is impossible!”

“Who, Rollo?”

“Impossible!” She spits the word out, an angry red flush coloring her pale skin.

It is mid-day, and Bice has just come storming towards you, eyes burning. You are outside the camp, near the big tree where you saw Bice and Raphael the other day.

“What has he done now?”

“He does not trust me. Why does he not trust me?”

“About what?”

“About … about, oh, anything!” She stomps her foot on the ground. “I am strong. I am clever. I can be a help. I can help him. I can help the cause. I can be a true partner. But he won’t let me.”

I know this about Rollo already. I’m surprised she does not.

“He is like that with everyone,” you say. “It’s not you, Bice.”

“Ah,” she shakes her head, furious. “He is like that with everyone. Everyone! I’m not ‘everyone’. I’m his. We are one. And yet he separates himself. He is secretive. He never tells me what he is thinking, not really, just about the unimportant things. He speaks more to you about the important things than he does to me.”

Now she turns to me and lets me have the fury of her glare head on. It’s magnificent, scary, even just a little bit funny.

“What are you smiling about!”

You shake your head, compose your features, wipe away the small smile that suddenly crept out.

"You’re like him. You’re like him! You think I’m ridiculous. You think I’m a child, you … "

“No, no,” you protest. You move closer.

She turns away, her hair flying in the air, a glorious cloud, red like a morning sky warning of storms and rain.

You grab her arm, spin her back around.

She stares into your eyes.

And you want to —

But then it’s her who —

— puts her arms around you, who pulls you to her, who finds your lips, who parts your lips, it’s her warm tongue who invades your mouth, and you’re lost in her, and all you can feel is your pulse racing as you pull her close and your bodies press together so close like you want to break the surface tension, two drops of water becoming one in the waves of the warmest ocean, the lava of a volcano shot up hot from under the sea.

And it’s she who breaks away. Pushes you away, while still holding on to you.

“I knew it,” she says, and her face is flushed, her breath fast, rough. “I knew it wasn’t just me. I knew you felt it too.”

“Bice, I —” You feel tears sting, try to hold them back, but they come. “I can’t … we can’t … Rollo …”

She lets go of her grip on me.

“I know,” she says, and the flush recedes from her flawless, pale skin, and her eyes refocus, and her breathing slows. “I know. I just had to know.”

“Now you know.”

“Yes, now I know.”

She reaches out as if to touch my arm again, then halts, pulls the hand back.

She turns without at word.

You see her form recede, blend into the trees, disappear into the camp. Maybe to go find Rollo, to make up, to be with him.

For a moment, you felt it. The warmth.

Now what is left is cold.

Hideous.

***

Raphael is furtive. There is something about his movements that seem calculating. What exactly this is, you can’t tell. Nor what it means. The man is otherwise an open book, his heart on his sleeves. On several occasions you have seen him attempt to tell a lie, and in each case it was humorous, the way he stuttered, stammered, the way his florid face flushed a deeper shade of red, the way his hands would not stay still by his side, but fluttered like fat, pink birds, like flying pigs, and when he attempted to control them by clasping them together, they were soon wringing one on the other, as if the two pink pigs were now wrestling.

It takes you just a few moments to reason it out. Of course, the only reason for Raphael’s behavior must be that he is covering for someone. And you think you know who.

“Have you seen Bice?” you ask.

He flushes the deep shade of red, the hands begin to tremble.

“Wh-why d-do you ask?”

Ah, not quite a lie, this, just an evasion. You give him an open smile as you tell the lie:

“Oh, nothing. It was just that Rollo asked for her.”

“Ro-rollo?”

“Yes. So you haven’t seen her?”

“N-n-o.” Raphael straightens up. It’s as if he knows that he is transparent and has decided that he will brace it, tell the lie barefaced, knowing that we both know it’s a lie. “I haven’t seen Bice at all today.” His face beet red, his hands jammed into his pockets, but his chin held high, so that he towers over you and is looking down at you over his long nose, and no trace of stutter in his defiant voice.

“Oh, never mind,” you say, and he lets out some of the held air, shoulders relaxing, and the face returns to near-normal ruddiness. You change the subject. “What do you think Rollo is doing? Are we going to attack the City soon?”

“But surely you know?”

“I do not,” I lie. “Everyone thinks that Rollo confides in me about these things.”

“And he does, no?” Raphael is interested. Incredulous.

“He keeps his own counsel,” you say. “Certainly, he listens to me, and God knows I give him my thoughts on the matter.”

“Which is.”

“We need to move. We need to get out of this position here on the mountain, in this forest, among these pine trees, where the werewolf is hunting us, and where people are leaving.”

“We are down to less than fifty fighters now,” Raphael agrees.

“Cowards,” you say. “Those who left. Superstitious cowards.”

Raphael crosses himself. “You do not believe in the werewolf?”

“Do you?”

“You know,” he says, and he lowers his voice to a half whisper, although there are no-one anywhere near. “My grandmother saw one once, a loup-garou, back in our village in Franche-Comte, near Montbeliard, close to the border with Switzerland. Have you ever been there?”

You admit that you have not.

“Oh, it is a beautiful country,” Raphael waxes into one of his digressions. “And the Chateau de Montbeliard, ah, what romantic splendor. She stands upon a rocky promontory overlooking the valleys of Liaine and Allan. It was the home to the Dukes of Wurttemberg, and of course you have heard of the curse, no?”

You admit that you have not.

He claps his hands together. The glee of a child telling ghost stories comes over him as he screws up his face into a scowling grin.

“Ah, well this goes back to the founder, ‘Der Stifter’ of the family that became the Dukes of Wurttemberg. Ulrich was his name, he lived in the 13th century, and he was Count Ulrich, as it would take several generations for the family to earn the Duchy. Ulrich was know as ‘Ulrich mit dem Daumen’, which means ‘Ulrich with the Thumbs’.”

“He had some big thumbs, is that it?”

“He had a lot of them, twice as many as normal. On each hand he had two thumbs, one on each side.”

“Six fingers on each hand?”

“No, five on each hand. But instead of the little finger, there was another thumb.”

“Unusual.”

“Like an animal, some said. Like a wolf.”

“A wolf has no thumbs.”

“But his hands, they said, Ulrich’s hands looked like wolves paws, with those thumbs, one on each side.”

"And, so, the Dukes of Wurttemberg were — "

“Loup-garou.” Raphael nods. “Werewolves.”

“And your grandmother saw one?”

“She did, yes she did. And she was, some said, bit by the loup-garou.”

“Bit by it?”

“She never said so.”

“But that’s what people said?”

Raphael grins. “People say many things. She never admitted as much. All she said was that on a night of the full moon, she saw the loup-garou, up on the rock by the castle, and she ran away.”

“So how did she know it was not just a wolf? Or even just a shadow of a man that somehow looked like a wolf.”

“Because,” Raphael says. “She was right outside the castle, on the rock, looking down at the valleys below. And she heard a sound, heavy breathing, thick with saliva, and she smelled wet fur, the scent of an animal, like a dog who has just come in from the rain, she said, but much stronger, stinging the nostrils, and then … then, she turned and she saw the creature, the loup-garou, as near to her as I am to you now.”

Raphael suddenly bends down, his face close to yours, baring his teeth, and you notice, for the first time, the length of his canines, the unusual size of his teeth in general, his yellow teeth. And, is it just in your mind? He seems to smell of animal. His eyes, is it just a trick of light? They seem yellow.

You pull away. “And then she ran?”

He straightens ups, and his eyes are dark brown. “And then she ran,” he says. “Although some said the loup-garou did sink its teeth into her neck before she was able to make her escape.”

“Which would mean that …”

Raphael grins. “Which would mean that there may be loup-garou blood in my veins, yes.”

You laugh. But there is something about the way he looks down at you, the way his eyes shine.

***

Aureliano laughs, a high pitched screech.

There is something maniacal about that laugh.

You see him standing there, hunched over, his back to you, his long arms hanging down limp at his side.

As you approach, you see Rollo coming from the other side.

“Bice!” Rollo cries out as he’s running towards Aureliano.

No, no, no. Not Bice!

You run towards Aureliano, and without even really know why, you lower your shoulder, you run the shoulder in under Aureliano’s arm, up the armpit, hear him grunting, then the two of you fall down in a huddle on the ground.

You see the blood.

Blood everywhere.

The figure on the ground. A woman. Her hair covered in blood. Rollo is on the ground with the woman, the corpse of the woman, and he turns her around.

Her face is ripped off.

“Bice!” Rollo throws his head back, his blond mane flowing, and what comes out of his mouth is a howl, a long howl. And you wonder, even if you don’t want to, even if you want to suppress this thought, whether the blood running down Rollo’s face, down his shirt front, whether this blood was there before.

Bice is dead.

— END PART 3 - TO BE CONTINUED —

Click here to go to Part 4 (the FINAL part) of the story.