Dean pulled the Impala up to Happyland’s front gate and opened the trunk, lifting the false bottom to reveal their mobile armory. Right now, what they were most interested in was the selection of edged weapons. There were silver blades, of course, but also steel, iron, copper, titanium, and gold. There were only two of the latter—the brothers didn’t have much call for them—and after handing one to Sam, Dean admired the remaining blade. To be honest, it didn’t look much different than a regular knife in the dark. Shame they didn’t have any gold bullets. The knives would have to do.
Dean turned to Garth. “Sorry we only have two,” he said.
“No biggie. I got my gun, and I got these.” He held up his right hand and the fingers lengthened into claws for a moment.
“Don’t do that,” Dean said. “It gives me the creeps.”
Garth grinned.
Dean and Sam tucked silver blades into their belts and made sure their guns were loaded with silver bullets. Dean liked this part of a hunt. Choosing weapons and preparing yourself mentally for the battle to come. It was when he felt most at peace. He sometimes wondered if these kinds of moments would form the basis for his personal Heaven— assuming he ended up there after he died, of course. Naw. His version of Heaven would be sitting behind the wheel of his Baby, cruising down an endless stretch of deserted highway, window down, classic rock blasting on the radio. That, or sitting at a table in a stripper bar, a never empty and always cold bottle of beer in his hand. Either or.
He closed the trunk as quietly as he could, and then the three of them walked up to the gate. It was chained and padlocked shut. Dean got their lockpick tools from the car, and a moment later, the lock was open. He slid the chain free—carefully and quietly—and then opened the gate just wide enough for them to slip into the park.
High overhead, the moon gave enough light to see by, but did little to illuminate the dark shadows around the abandoned attractions. As monster lairs went, Dean thought this was one of the coolest. A closed-down, long-forgotten amusement park? This place couldn’t have been more sinister if it tried. The only thing missing was a psychotic clown or two. Wouldn’t Sam just love that? he thought.
Garth led the way in werewolf form, his superior senses functioning as perfect scouts. He’d smell, see, or hear danger long before either Dean or Sam could. Who knew having a werewolf for a buddy would come in so handy? Even though Dean knew Garth’s senses were far stronger than his or Sam’s, he still kept his weapons ready and his eyes and ears open. He liked hunts that were clear-cut, with easy-to-identify good guys and bad guys. That way, you knew who to kill and who to protect. But this case was anything but simple. There was Morgan and her baby brother, both werewolves, sure, but both of whom they wanted to save so they could go live happily ever after with Garth’s pack. Then there were the jakkals—which he’d never heard of before coming to Bridge Valley. Hell, he hadn’t even seen one yet. Supposedly, they were non-threatening monsters, a kind of cross between werewolves and well-behaved ghouls. The Crowders intended to kill the jakkals for no other reason than the werewolves were douches. So he, Sam, and Garth had three main objectives: rescue Morgan and her little brother, help the jakkals—who might think the human hunters were coming to kill them— and kill the rest of the Crowders. That was too many moving parts as far as Dean was concerned, which meant there was a lot that could go wrong.
Then we’ll just have to make sure it doesn’t, he thought.
He gripped his weapons tighter as they continued moving deeper into Happyland.
* * *
When she’d first climbed the park fence with Joshua, Morgan had been surprised that so much of the park remained intact, especially the rides. Later, as she and Greg were leading the neteru to this spot, he told her Happyland’s owner had specified that everything in the park remain exactly as it was on the day it closed. The man had a crazy dream that someday the park would return to life, which of course it never had.
“The place is perfect for my family,” Greg had told her. “It’s kind of like a pyramid in a way—an ancient monument to a long-dead man.”
Now Morgan crouched alongside Greg off to the side of a rust-eaten ride called Verti-Go-Go! (exclamation mark included), behind an old ice-cream cart. It was large enough to provide cover for both of them, but only if they remained close together. Their arms, hips, and legs were touching, and the contact was at once exhilarating and terrifying. Here she was, helping a group of people she’d just met fight against her own family, and all she could think about was how natural it felt—how right—to be near Greg.
Well, that wasn’t quite all she was thinking about. There was the terrible guilt at betraying her family, even though she knew she didn’t have any other choice, and the fear they’d get Joshua back and raise him to be just like them. And she felt guilty for allowing her brother to become a hostage. Kayla was watching Joshua back at the offices the jakkals used as their home. She didn’t know if she could trust Kayla to take good care of Joshua—although Greg insisted Kayla would. She hoped Joshua wasn’t frightened. Greg’s family hadn’t let her go inside the office building to say goodbye and reassure Joshua one last time that everything was all right. She had the sense that they had something stored there—something important—that they didn’t want her anywhere near. This was fine with her, but she wished they’d let her say goodbye to Joshua. She wouldn’t have remained behind even if they’d insisted. It was her family coming, and this fight was just as much hers as it was the jakkals’. Maybe more.
Greg had ordered the two neteru he commanded to stand on opposite sides of the path. She was still getting used to the idea that jakkals could make their own zombies. One, a woman in her thirties with long blond hair, stood concealed in the shadow of the ride. The other, a pot-bellied man in his forties with a shaved head and a salt-and-pepper beard, hid among a group of nearby bumper cars. In the dark, the dead man was so still that he looked as if he might be another piece of equipment. Greg had commanded both of them to shut their eyes so the crimson light emanating from them wouldn’t give the undead servants away. Morgan couldn’t get over how eerily silent and motionless the neteru were. They didn’t breathe, and she couldn’t detect the sound of their hearts beating since, of course, they weren’t. But there was no hiding their scent. They reeked of embalming chemicals. When she’d asked Greg if he was worried her family would be able to smell the neteru before the undead creatures could attack, he’d said, “Sure they’ll smell them. But they’ll have no idea what they’re smelling. Who’d ever guess it was a bunch of animated corpses? Plus, the neteru’s scent will mask our own.”
She hoped he was right. If her family was overwhelmed with rage and bloodlust, they would disregard the smell as not-prey. But if their human sides weren’t completely dominated by the wolf in them, they might recognize the neteru’s scent as something to be wary of.
They were waiting for an attack, and she was nervous, yes, but her mind wasn’t on the battle to come. She had planned to leave town with Garth, taking Joshua with her to join Garth’s peaceful pack. But doing so would mean leaving Greg, and now that she was here, she wasn’t sure she wanted to do that.
The air was split by the sound of an explosion then, not far from their position. She jumped—the animal part of her hated loud noises—but she remained by Greg’s side.
It had begun.
* * *
Alan landed soundlessly on his feet. As he straightened, he scanned the immediate area and detected no one in the vicinity. He’d chosen to climb Happyland’s fence nearly three quarters of the way from the main entrance, on the southeast side of the park where there had been no jakkal scent in the small stretch of woods. He wasn’t surprised the jakkals stayed out of the trees. They didn’t feel the same connection to the natural world that Alan’s people did. As far as he knew, they didn’t feel the pull of the moon, either. If they hadn’t been so disgusting, he might’ve felt sorry for them.
Certain that no one was near, Alan motioned for Sylvia and Spencer to join him. They scaled the fence and dropped down beside him. It rankled to be sneaking into the jakkals’ territory instead of making a frontal assault, but the wounds to his left shoulder and right hand hadn’t fully healed. The cut Spencer had received across his ribs from the silver blade still bled. The pack wasn’t at full strength. The jakkals outnumbered them, and while the carrion-eaters weren’t as strong and fast as werewolves, they did have that deadly bite of theirs. And thanks to Morgan, they likely knew they were coming. They would be prepared.
So as much as it galled him, he knew a head-on attack would most likely result in the pack’s defeat. They had no choice but to use guile and stealth as well as fang and claw. And while it wasn’t what the wolf half of him wanted, the human part knew it was the best chance they had of victory.
Alan began jogging northeast toward the center of the park, where the jakkals’ den was located, and Sylvia and Spencer automatically fell in behind him. The wolf in him chafed at this slow pace. It wanted to run, but he restrained the urge. He and his boys had activated a trap the last time they’d been here, and he expected there would be more scattered throughout the park. The wolf part of him might hate being cautious, but Alan knew it was necessary. He’d warned Sylvia and Spencer to be on the lookout for traps, and with any luck, between the three of them they would—
Alan had no idea how they activated the trap or which of them had done it. One moment they were jogging through the park, and the next a plastic trashcan exploded in a burst of light and noise. He caught the harsh tang of chemicals in the air an instant before he felt multiple impacts on his right side. It felt like small fires blazing in his arm, side, and leg. He cried out in pain and collapsed. He heard both Sylvia and Spencer fall as well, and he wanted to make sure they were all right, but he hurt too much to move.
At first, he wasn’t certain what had happened. They must have set off a bomb—maybe one connected to a motion detector. What he didn’t understand was the pain. Werewolves hurt when they were injured, of course, but the sensation faded almost at once as their healing ability kicked into gear. But this pain wasn’t ebbing. If anything, it was increasing. And then he saw why. Scattered across the ground all around them were pieces of silver. Most of the metal had been deformed by the blast, but a few items were still more or less intact. The jakkals had packed silver jewelry and utensils into a sealed plastic container hidden inside the trashcan. Terrorists might have used nails or ball bearings to make a crude but effective bomb. It seemed the jakkals had put their own spin on the idea. Smart, he thought.
“Sylvia? Spencer?” he called. “Are either of you badly hurt?”
It took an effort for him to grit out the words through the pain, but he managed. For a moment, neither of them answered. The sound of the explosion had affected his hearing, and he couldn’t detect their heartbeats or breathing. He feared they were mortally wounded, but then Sylvia said, “Minor wounds here. Irritating, but not fatal.”
“Same,” Spencer said. “My right leg got chewed up pretty good, though. I’m not going to be running marathons any time soon.”
Now that they were easy targets, he expected the jakkals to come racing out of the shadows, claws and fangs bared, ready to finish off their enemies. But no one came.
They had to have heard the explosion, he thought. They know where we’re at and that we’re hurt. So why—
Because they weren’t predators, he realized. They knew how to protect themselves, but when it came to killing, they were woefully inexperienced. A lucky break for Alan and his pack.
“Do your best to get the silver out,” he said.
Using his claws, he dug into his wounds until he could feel the pieces of silver embedded in his flesh. He yanked them out one by one, making the wounds worse. But leaving the silver in wasn’t an option. It wouldn’t kill them—only a direct hit to the heart could do that—but the pain it caused was excruciating. If they didn’t remove it, all they would be able to do was lie here writhing in agony. Eventually, the jakkals would realize they could kill the wounded werewolves while they were helpless, and that would be the end of Alan’s pack, one that could trace its ancestry back to the Alpha himself. He would not allow such a hallowed line to end here. Not like this.
So they clawed, pried, pulled, and dislodged the silver shrapnel, burning their hands as they did so. They succeeded in removing most of the silver, but each of them was left with a few pieces that had buried themselves too deeply in the flesh to be taken out. At least not without the proper equipment to prevent blood loss.
Alan took a quick inventory of their injuries. Most were relatively minor. But as Spencer had indicated, his right leg was a mess. He could stand on it and likely walk as well, but he would do no running until it healed, and since the wounds had been caused by silver, they would repair slowly. Unless Spencer could feast on a fresh human heart to jump-start his healing powers, as his brother had done.
Sylvia’s right arm had sustained the most damage, but she assured him it remained useable. As for Alan himself, his right knee had taken the worst hit from the barrage of silver. He was still fairly certain he could walk and even jump if he had to, but he didn’t want to run on it until it was necessary. He wanted to avoid straining it too much in case it gave out on him in the battle to come.
The three werewolves looked at each other. It seemed the jakkals weren’t going to be the easy prey that they’d imagined.
They started moving again, much more cautiously.