The beast within

"I think she'd like this one better."

A soft, unfamiliar voice pulled Elias out of his thoughts as he considered yet another book.

He closed the one in his hands with a brief exhale and turned toward the man, only to find him holding out a book with a pale cover. Magnificent marble columns stretched across it, and right in the center, pictured in the same ancient style, was the profile of a woman with dark curls.

"Really?" Elias asked, returning the book he had been holding to the shelf. He then tried to make out the title of the one being offered to him, upside down as it was.

"Based on what she's chosen before-yes," the man replied with quiet confidence, his voice no less warm as he made no attempt to turn the book around for Elias's convenience.

The wolf's yellow eyes fixed on the cover like a predator sighting its prey, yet the shapes of the letters suddenly lost all meaning. He stared at them for several seconds without blinking, saying nothing, until at last he lifted his gaze to the man standing before him. Thin lips curved into a polite smile. The man tilted his head ever so slightly, his gray eyes fixed on Elias as though they were taking in all of him at once.

He knows. The thought flashed through the wolf's mind in the brief moment it took him to accept the offered book. This librarian had realized that Elias did not come here for books for himself. He had realized who they were for. He had realized that Elias had come this time without any clear instructions. And worst of all, this complete stranger had figured out what kind of books Elias' wife liked before Elias himself had.

Nonsense. He immediately tried to calm himself down. It was easy enough to notice, he decided. Elias had never lingered over his choices before. Even a fool could tell the difference between someone looking for something specific and someone simply browsing. And everyone knew who Elias was. Everyone knew he had a wife. It wasn't difficult to guess that the books were for her, especially when Elias himself barely had a moment of free time. And could some stranger really have figured out Nancy's taste in books that quickly? Most likely, he had simply made an educated guess and was now pretending to be certain of himself in front of Elias. In the end, everyone wanted to please the wolf-guardian.

Even so, Elias gave the librarian a good-natured smile and let his tired shoulders sink. He would never blame the people around him for trying to win his favor. That had long since become something ordinary, almost expected, and he would never dream of pushing them away for it.

"You noticed..." the wolf said after a brief pause, almost sheepishly.

"You're difficult not to notice," the man's voice seemed to drop a little lower. Even his vowels seemed to lengthen, shaped by that peculiar way of speaking-slower, almost more deliberate.

Elias wanted to shake the words off himself like sand caught in his fur. The hairs at the back of his neck stood on end, and he slowly rubbed at it with one hand. For some reason, those simple words-words he had heard, and been told, dozens of times before-stirred an unfamiliar embarrassment in him when spoken by this particular man.

"How long have you worked here?" Elias asked, unable to understand why he suddenly felt the urge to snap.

The librarian seemed not to notice the barb. Without even looking back, he walked toward the table where a large ledger lay open. The administration had only recently begun connecting the city's institutions to the local network, so even some of the city services still lacked computers. The local library was hardly an exception. Though, strictly speaking, this was more of a private collection that Mr. Vale had been kind enough to open to the city.

"As long as I can remember. This is my home, after all," there was still a smile in his voice.

That made Elias feel guilty all over again for being so overly reactive whenever the conversation touched on Nancy. Of course Adrian had been here all his life. The walls and furniture must have been saturated with his scent by now. You couldn't leave that kind of presence behind after living somewhere for only a short while.

"Of course... Sorry. I'm less attentive in the evenings," he admitted, surrendering once more and trying to get his impulsiveness back under control.

"Not without reason. I understand," Adrian agreed.

Then, noticing the puzzled look on his customer's face, he shifted his gaze toward the newspaper lying at the edge of the table.

The body of missing Alicia Green was found in the park. Police are withholding details.

Elias exhaled quietly and lowered his eyes to the ledger, where the man was slowly writing down his name and today's date.

Adrian held the pen so lightly that the veins raised along the back of his hand barely seemed to move beneath the skin. When his knuckles bent slightly, the tip of the pen touched the paper with a quiet click. Then Adrian drew an elegant, effortless line, and Elias, standing as though hypnotized by the simple movement, could hear the faint scratch of the tiny ball gliding over the paper.

"Until next week?" Adrian's question made Elias suddenly realize that he had no idea what he was being asked.

"Yes," he answered, swallowing audibly and, just to be safe, turning his gaze all the way toward the door.

Adrian gave a soft, amused chuckle. He took the book from Elias' hands without meeting any resistance. From a drawer in the desk, he produced a sheet of thick beige paper and carefully wrapped the book in it. One edge, then the other. With his index and middle fingers pressed together, he smoothed down the seam. Again, deliberately slow, the pads of his neat fingers glided over the wrapping. Elias stopped watching. His brow furrowed, and he almost turned away entirely from yet another trap laid by his own mind.

There was something in the air. Something that had most certainly not been there during any of the previous times he had walked into this damned library.

†††

Nancy threw her arms around Elias the moment she unwrapped the package. "How did you know?" she asked, before going on to explain that she had only mentioned the book to Mrs. Moro during their last visit. The sheriff's wife had told her that she'd found notes about it in her mother's journals and that it would be exactly the sort of thing Nancy might enjoy. More importantly, it would be useful for her studies. And yet, no matter how many times the sheriff's wife had checked the library, the book had never been there.

Elias listened attentively, marveling at the incredible coincidence, and sheepishly rubbed the bridge of his nose whenever Nancy once again excitedly explained how she was going to surprise Mrs. Moro by telling her about his find. Then she left the living room, leaving Elias alone with the logs crackling in the fireplace. He slowly ran his tongue over his lips. Almost baring his teeth, like an animal that had caught the scent of a stranger on its territory.

He hadn't had the courage to tell her that he had nothing to do with the choice at all. Nancy had been so happy to realize that her kind, attentive husband knew her so well. And Elias was afraid of disappointing her in that, too.

He spent the rest of the evening at the table, where Nancy had carefully spread out the newspaper clippings and police reports he had asked to have sent over. Seven people were missing. Only six bodies had been found. It wasn't that the missing had gone without being searched for. Quite the opposite. There had been very little need to search for the bodies themselves. The killer-or killers, since that was the theory the police were leaning toward-had made no attempt to hide them. They were displayed like exhibits in a depraved art gallery meant for people who were truly sick in the head. The aesthetics of death. Elias couldn't remember which report he had read the phrase in, but the words had lodged themselves in his mind. The bodies were posed with the help of wire. They were dressed in fresh clothes, or sometimes left naked, with new elements added to complete the composition.

An unexpected search for a missing victim had not been part of Elias's plans for tonight. But he needed to clear his head, and for once in the past month, he needed to let the wolf out. He never did it around the sheriff. He still remembered the look of distrust on the man's face the last time he'd seen Elias in his true form. So, after telling Nancy that he would be back by morning, Elias slipped out through the back door, which opened directly onto a patch of land slightly more overgrown with bushes and trees. He took off his clothes and folded them carefully on the porch. Then he exhaled, as though preparing himself for a fight rather than a walk through the night. And then his bones began to break. A horrible crack tore through the quiet, and Elias choked on a groan of pain. His claws lengthened. The skin of his fingers darkened and hardened. Then fur began to spread across it. The transformation worked its way through his entire body until, beside the porch, there stood nothing but a large black wolf. He shook the tension from his body, his claws digging into the earth with the motion. The beast wasn't merely large. An ordinary person would have been able to meet its muzzle at chest height, and one of its paws was certainly larger than a human hand. Its blue-black coat was long and thick, falling in a straight cascade over the powerful animal body. Around the neck and chest it grew even fuller, framing the wolf's head and shoulders like a soft ruff.

Elias drew in a deep breath through his nose, separating the scents he caught one by one in his mind. Then he gave a short growl. Wolves weren't particularly good at pretending to have human expressions, but there was no mistaking the sound for displeasure. His sense of smell was keen, his eyesight sharp, and the beast possessed an endurance anyone would have envied. And yet what Elias could sense now was profoundly different from what he had been capable of eight years ago.

The worst part was that Elias knew exactly why he had become weaker. And he knew exactly how to fix it. He simply wasn't willing to sacrifice his soul for it again.

The beast left the barely fenced grounds of his home at an unhurried pace. Once he reached the paved road, he headed straight toward the last place the missing woman had lived. The streets were empty. The sheriff had insisted on a curfew since last week. Though no one would have paid much attention to a black beast moving through unlit streets anyway.

When he reached the missing woman's house, the wolf circled around to the side where the windows of her room faced and followed the strongest scent onward. It led him to the local grocery store. Then to the hospital, but Elias didn't approach it. The building was brightly lit, and there were still people inside. He had no desire to be seen by them now. After that, the trail became uncertain. She had definitely left the hospital on foot. She had definitely headed somewhere into the city. And then the scent simply ended. Elias stopped in the road again, stretching his neck as he surveyed his surroundings.

A car could have taken her anywhere, and he couldn't even tell what kind of car it had been. Worse, he kept circling the entire city and still couldn't find a single clear trace. Only one possibility remained in his mind now. Elias turned his head toward the bridge, moonlight caught in his yellow eyes and the wolf snorted.

The old bridge crossed the river into the old city. High-rises towered there, buildings it was dangerous even to approach. They had been picked clean long ago, stripped of anything useful, anything that could be salvaged or put to work. No one had any intention of restoring them. It would take too much time and too many people. Elias understood that this was why the Keepers had never even considered returning to the old city, generation after generation. But tonight, he decided to trust something other than his nose and stepped toward the bridge.

The black wolf was almost at the abandoned checkpoint when the fur along his neck rose. Elias stopped, lowering his head almost to the ground and sniffing more carefully. Something nearby smelled of formaldehyde, decay, and something else so horribly familiar that his body went still. The beast broke into a quick trot, leaving the road to the bridge behind. The closer he came to the source, the more clearly a small abandoned structure emerged among the moss-covered trees. Only when he reached it did Elias realize what it was: an old shipping container. Its original color was impossible to make out beneath the rust and the bushes that had grown around it. It's door stood slightly ajar and the wolf hesitated for several seconds before carefully pushing his muzzle into the gap and forcing the door wider.

A wave of foul smells crashed over him, Elias recoiled sharply, throwing his whole body sideways and nearly tangling himself in his own legs. He jerked his head from side to side, desperately trying to shake the smell from his senses, as though it had lodged itself directly inside his receptors. Elias didn't even notice himself turning in a full circle before finding himself facing the open container again.

Inside, his wolf's eyes picked out a pair of arms stretched toward the entrance. The beast froze, gave one last sharp snort, lowered himself slightly, and slowly stepped inside. One step at a time, so quiet and careful that it was almost as if he were afraid of startling his prey. Flies buzzed inside the container. Some, disturbed by his arrival, began to swarm chaotically around his ears. And the closer Elias came to those outstretched hands, the more surreal the scene became. A nearly invisible wire hung from the ceiling, supporting the body in a kneeling position. The girl's head was bowed as though in prayer and her arms, held in place by the same kind of wire, were stretched forward-directly toward whoever entered the container. And resting in her cupped hands was the source of that sickly-sweet smell of decay: a heart.

The wolf stood directly before the sacrifice left for the first person who entered. He straightened his neck to get a better look at the body and froze. He knew that scent, he would have recognized it even twenty years from now, even in the final stages of decomposition.

The smell of human flesh. And it wasn't coming only from the victim's body.