Under the Blue Moon

Two

He wakes up in a cold sweat, jumping up right in his bed, the covers pooling around his waist. He reaches up to rub his head, mussing his hair roughly. The dreams have started again, this one is not the one that scares his, the dream of the late February day in the market when he was given his Wolfie-bear, it’s the ones that come after that leave his blood running cold.

Years of therapy have brought him to the point where the dreams just mean that his sleep and his peace of mind are broken, when they began, he would wake families in the houses around his own with his screams and protestations.

Taking the deep cleansing breathes to ground him in this reality, repeating his mantra of “What is done is done, the past is not mine to change” he slowly peels himself from his cold wet bed and pulls a t-shirt on over his shorts before heading to the kitchen.

Once in the well-lit kitchen the last tendrils of the dream clear his mind, sighing heavily he reaches into the fridge for the milk. Turning to grab a glass he jumps a little at the frame of his father in the kitchen doorway. “Hey Dad” he says calming himself quickly.

“Couldn’t sleep again” the older man asks with deep concern etched into his brow. He reaches into the cupboard for a second glass before pushing it towards his son to pour a second glass.

The two sit facing each other over the kitchen island. “It’s been a while but they’ve started again?” the younger man says, his shoulders slumped in resignation.

“Which dream?” His father asks.

“The marketplace” he sighs “The nice one tonight, so the bad ones will start when I sleep again.” Fifteen years, he shakes his head, Fifteen long years of dreams and terrors, therapy and sometimes medication to allow him to sleep. The last six months have been like a dream, calmness overtook him and the dreams stopped, for the first time since he was seven years old he had been in full control.

“I know you’ve talked this to death with your therapists, but if it will help, I’m here son” the older man takes a swig of the cold milk, settling in further into position for comfort. This isn’t their first mid-night chat over milk and cookies.

“mm” The younger man muses, pushing his unruly black hair from his eyes, “Do you honestly not know what happened to them Dad?” he asks, his eyes pleading for some undisclosed snippet of information to be forthcoming this time.

“No son, I really don’t” he looks pained to be giving this response again, as a thought pops into his head “But you have fresher eyes than me, why don’t we go through the pack reports for that day together, you may see something that I have missed.”

The youngster brightens immediately, “Really?” he exclaims “I didn’t know there was any paperwork!”

“Of course there is paperwork son, an entire family doesn’t just disappear like that in my pack” he shakes his head, old ghosts raising themselves in his subconscious “Not like that, not ever like that.”

The two finish their drinks, before heading along the corridor to a large home office, his mother’s taste screamed out from the décor, clean crisp walls hung with family and pack photographs, greenery scattered throughout the room, from the large monkey puzzle tree in the corner, to the tiny air plants hanging in their teardrop containers at the window. The only proof that his father had, had any say in the decoration of the room was in the soft leather chairs and sofas arranged in a semi-circle around the dark wood desk.

Popping open a cupboard door and pulling out a deep draw of files, the older man zeroed in on the day of the disappearance quickly, pulling out a thick manilla file held together by two or three thick elastic bands.

The file and papers within were well thumbed, his father had obviously spent many hours doing this. Reading and re-reading the reports, looking over the at-scene photographs, trying to make sense out of the worst day in their entire pack history.

The pair sat down to read.

Time passed both slowly and in the blink of an eye, as they read and the younger man takes copious notes. He is stopped in his tracks by the photographs when he gets to them. He remembers the blood, so much blood but seeing it again stops him dead in his tracks. As he scans the images in front of him he is swept back to that day.

He let go of his mother hand and skipped up the short path to Gwyny’s front door, the winter dry lavender was overhanging from the borders, tickling his ankles as he ran through it. Small buds of green were starting to show on the plants and he could almost see the honeysuckle flowers that would burst around the little green door ahead of him in the next couple of months.

Gwyny’s house looked like it belonged in the fairy tales that his mum and dad would tell him before bed. He loved the way this little cottage snuggled into the hills and sat as though it had always been there. So much more homely that the stone edifice that was his family home. That’s not to say that he didn’t love his home, he did, it’s just this looked like a house should!

He grinned widely as he reached the green door, it was held ajar by a glass filled with the first spring flowers, James bent down to sniff at them before bounding into the hall shouting “Gwyny I’m here”. He got no reply. Unperturbed as only a child could be he bounced on further into the house, stopping dead as he entered the kitchen. His brain frozen unable to process the scene in front of him.

The usually neat as a pin kitchen was in disarray, cups and bowls upended on the worksurface, sugar spilled and still spilling from a tipped over pot into the floor. The floor, oh the floor, it was wet, it was red, it was everywhere. It was blood.

A scream burst from his throat as his mother caught up to him, she scooped him into her arms rushing him from the house as she fought with the mobile in her hand to call her husband, his father to get to the house with his beta and gamma now!

Taking a deep breath he looks deeper, paying attention to every element in the pictures. He grows still his eyes focused and his breathing deep. His father stops to watch his son, concern growing in his face after ten minutes passed in this still state the older man reaches across the desk, touching his sons arm he softly calls “James”.

James jumps at his name, before looking his father in the eyes, “Something is wrong in this picture Dad.”

The older man looks at the picture in his son’s hands, not seeing anything wrong he returns it and asks for an explanation.

James grins, his father relaxes at the sight of genuine pleasure on his sons face and prompts him to tell all.

“Gwyny had a new baby brother,” he begins “Where are the baby’s things?” He spreads out the pictures on his father’s desk and sure enough not one image from the entire house has a single item that you would normally equate with a baby. James points at another picture, this one from the once pristine master bedroom, a single suitcase from a matching set lies open on the floor, Gwyny’s fathers’ clothes spilled all around it. “Where are the other cases Dad?” he taps firmly on the image “Where are everyone else’s clothes?” He flips back to the kitchen pictures, blood is pooled on the floor with a set of drag marks running through the puddles to the back door. There are footprints and handprints on the floor and walls, “None of these marks are smaller than those of an average size man.” He pulls up some sizing images that were taken against rulers “where are the prints for Gwyny’s mum, for Gwyny?” Everything here indicates that only one person was in the house when they were attacked, the rest had already packed and were long gone.”

James’s father looks stunned as he scouts through the images, looking for any indication that his son was wrong. He can’t find one. Picking up his phone he hits a button, waiting a moment he barks “James, it’s Gio” he rolls his eyes at the stream of no doubt imaginative expletives coming back at him “yes I know it’s early, it’s important.” He rolls his eyes at the stream of consciousness flowing from his Beta on the other end. “I know, terrible alpha, the absolute worst, now get your arse here in ten, I need you for this.”

James is sitting back on the comfy sofa, his eyes lolling closed as the door opens. “f***s sake Gio” his Uncle Matty groans as he walks in “This had better be f*****g good, it’s not even 3am” He’s rubbing his bleary eyes sipping from a tall travel mug of black coffee. Uncle Jamie follows closely after him, sinking his teeth into a jam filled doughnut, “Too f*****g early G.”

James smiles up at his two uncles, well his Dad’s Beta and Gamma, Uncle Jamie and Uncle Matty have been around for his entire life, making sure that everyone is safe and that everything in the pack runs smoothly. James reaches down and ruffle his hair, “Hey Kiddo, not sleeping again?” he asks.

“I’m not a kid anymore, you know that right?” James grumbles back. Matt replies “Ah but you’ll always be that tiny little pup with grazed knees to us baby boy.” Before yelping and hiding behind James as James growls at the nickname. “G tell him, he’s not playing nice!” Jamie complains.

“James, Matt, James, enough!” Gio growls “This is serious.” All thoughts of teasing and banter slip immediately from the pairs mind as their alpha and friend’s seriousness washes over them. “Yes Alpha” they both respond, moving to the desk quickly they stand at attention waiting for the next order to come.

“James’s dreams restarted tonight” Gio begins. “So I thought maybe it’s time to put this whole thing to bed finally and we came up to look through the pack reports for the day it all happened.” The pair nod in agreement, their expressions saying that they perhaps thought it had been left later than they had thought healthy. “Well, James has found something that we all missed.”

James and Matt look at James in shock, “Tell us everything James” they say in unison.