To Wear a Wolf
The tavern had settled into its usual quiet rhythm. Fae murmured in the back corner. A werewolf slouched over the bar, staring into his beer as though it would tell him the future. The vampires occupied the center of the room, their ghouls waiting nearby.
Then—the heavy oak door slammed open.
Aldéric Rousseau sauntered inside, chin high, each step a performance.
A few vampires sighed. Their disappointment condensed into one collective exhale.
Ghouls turned away to avoid locking eyes with the crazy one.
Fae whispered and giggled behind their hands, delighted to see the undead embarrass themselves.
The wolf didn’t move.
Aldéric sashayed to the center of the room, passing every vampire-occupied table. Most ignored him, but all covered their nose with a hand or handkerchief. Some gagged.
Unbothered, he paused to straighten a crooked portrait, tapped a few dissonant notes on the tavern’s piano, and pushed in an uneven chair. Then he swung his thick fur coat behind him like a cape and disappeared through an open doorway.
He entered the back room, aglow with the light from a grand wooden chandelier and a fire dancing in a stone cooking pit, the scent of clove hanging heavy in the air. A massive copper cauldron hung above the flames, its contents gurgling thickly.
Lachlan Sullivan lounged with his chair tipped back on two legs against the stone wall, hands behind his head, eyes closed. Loose blond curls brushed the collar of his linen shirt in soft contrast to the dark stubble shadowing his jaw.
Julien Sinclair stood nearby at a small table, straight-backed and immaculate in a tailored coat and trousers. His dark hair was slicked back and precise, every inch controlled as he studied a parchment with quiet focus.
Lachlan sniffed the air. His chair dropped to the floor. He gawked at Aldéric, who stood with one arm draped dramatically on the stone wall.
“What in Shiva’s name are you wearing?” He pinched his nose closed. “And what is that revolting smell?”
Julien turned, the corners of his mouth tipping down. With practiced control, he refrained from the indignity of covering his nose.
“Please tell me that is not what I think it is.”
“Oh, but it is,” Aldéric cooed. He stepped forward, one hand flowing in front of him. “Isn’t it magnificent?”
Julien blinked slowly. “A werewolf pelt is not magnificent. It is obscene. Take it off.”
“Werewolf?” Lachlan shot out of his chair, bumping the cauldron, sloshing its contents across the cobblestone.
Julien glared at the puddle. “Marvelous. You have baptized the floor.” He pointed to Aldéric. “Take that thing off and put it outside.”
“No!” Aldéric stroked the coat protectively. “I like it.”
“It is putrid,” Lachlan muttered. “You smell like a carcass that rolled around in dog piss.”
“I don’t smell anything,” Aldéric said smugly.
“Then your nose is broken,” Lachlan huffed.
“It is not.”
“It will be,” Julien said through clenched teeth, “if you don’t take that off and put it outside.”
Aldéric waved him off, stepped closer to the cauldron, and inhaled deeply. “What’s in there?”
“You know very well what is in there. My annual batch of bloodwine.”
A short, regal woman came into the room, grey hair coiled into a tight bun at the nape of her neck, her crimson gown whispering across the stone floor as she moved. With an understated flourish, she pushed back her flared sleeves and dropped a handful of cloves into the cauldron.
She froze. Her head turned so slowly it almost creaked.
“Good evening, Margot.” Aldéric bowed his head. “You are looking lovely as ever.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You are going to contaminate the bloodwine with that stench.”
Julien’s voice was too calm to be anything but dangerous. “Contaminate my bloodwine, Aldéric, and I will wear you as a pelt.”
Aldéric pouted. “How can my beautiful coat possibly contaminate the bloodwine?”
“The Lussier family recipes are finicky, and we despise wolves,” she said. “While the Hundred Years’ War was raging, a pack of those brutish creatures bedded down near our cellars and destroyed an entire vintage.”
“That was over seven centuries ago,” Lachlan said.
She bared her fangs. “And?”
He lowered his head. “Just a long time to hold a grudge, is all.”
She huffed and handed Julien a long wooden spoon. “Stir. Do not stop. When the wood turns red, it’s ready to bottle.” She turned to Aldéric. “If you’re still wearing that thing when I return, I will stake you.”
Without looking up from the cauldron, Julien ordered Lachlan, “Burn that coat. Even if he refuses to take it off.”
Aldéric puffed up. “How dare you! After centuries of loyalty—”
“In that coat, you are my enemy. Take. It. Off.”
Aldéric fumed. “Fine!” He yanked at a sleeve. It caught on his cuff. Another pull. Nothing. He pulled harder.
Julien exhaled through his nose. “It appears you are having trouble.”
Lachlan casually pulled a lighter from his pocket and flicked it open.
Aldéric took a step back. “Since when do you carry a lighter?”
Lachlan shrugged. “I’m a prepared vampire.”
“Prepared for what? Bonfires?”
“Mayhem.”
“You stay away from me!” Aldéric backed into the wall, yanking at his sleeve. “It won’t come off!”
“Of course it won’t.” An olive-skinned man ducked under the joist, shoulders broad enough to fill the doorway.
Julien’s head snapped up. The muscle in his jaw ticked; his silver eyes darkened. “Kendrick,” he said coolly. “It is always a delight to see you on two legs. Why have you left your perch at the bar?”
“Oh, I think you know.” He glanced at Aldéric, still battling the coat. And losing.
The room fell silent.
Aldéric realized all eyes were on him. He stomped his foot. “It won’t come off!”
Lachlan rolled his eyes and snapped the lighter shut. Without bothering to look at Kendrick, he asked, “Did you come for the coat or the one wearing it?”
Kendrick laughed, the baritone sound filling the room. “I have no need for a peacock. Just the coat.”
Aldéric opened his mouth. Julien silenced him with a single raised finger.
“You are. Do not argue.” He turned his attention back to the cauldron. “Take the wretched thing. We have no use for it.”
“Or the peacock,” Lachlan said under his breath.
Aldéric shot him a look—then growled, deep and menacing.
Lachlan stumbled back, bumping the cauldron again.
“Gods damn it, Lachlan!”
“But… his eyes.” Lachlan pointed. Aldéric’s eyes glowed, the brown irises now amber.
“Let me guess,” Julien said flatly. “The coat is cursed and will turn the wearer into a werewolf.”
“Close enough,” Kendrick smiled.
Lachlan’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean, ‘close enough’?”
“There are many kinds of wolves.” Kendrick explained. “My kind would not consider him a werewolf, but he would be wolf. So, close enough.”
Aldéric held his hands out in front of him and whimpered. The bones in his fingers cracked and shortened, bending grotesquely until his hands began to resemble paws. His nails thickened and turned black. He looked up at Julien, fear filling his glowing eyes.
Julien sighed. “Kendrick, would you be so kind as to remove the coat before my consociate completes his metamorphosis?”
“Happily.” He waited for Julien to meet his gaze. “But you must give me something first.”
The air around Julien grew still. “This was premeditated.”
Kendrick smirked. “Better keep stirring.”
Without breaking eye contact, Julien began moving his arm in slow circles again.
Kendrick clasped his hands behind his back and began to pace. “You are a very predictable man, Julien. Tradition rules you. The world knows what the great Julien Sinclair will be doing every August nineteenth.” He turned to face him. “Crafting your bloodwine on Vinalia Rustica is quite poetic.” He tilted his head. “A bit obsessive-compulsive, perhaps, but endearingly so.”
Aldéric fell to the floor, groaning. The bones in his legs began to splinter and protrude in unnatural angles.
Julien’s lips drew back around his elongating fangs. “What do you want, loup-garou?”
Kendrick shivered. “Ooh, it’s so sexy when you speak your native tongue. Say it again—please.”
Lachlan smirked.
“Do not comment,” Julien admonished.
“Well, it was pretty sexy.” Lachlan adjusted his pants. “Got a little turned on myself.”
Julien frowned. “Why are you the way you are?”
Aldéric howled, not in anger, but in agony. A sickly wet tear broke the skin open on his thigh as his femur splintered and pushed through.
Julien broke eye contact with Kendrick and looked down at his friend, now curled on the floor in a fetal position.
“I loathe repeating myself.” Julien’s grip on the spoon tightened, his knuckles turning white. “What do you want?”
Kendrick reached into his back pocket and withdrew a folded set of pages. “I want your winery in Savoie. All thirty hectares.”
Julien’s eyes closed. His brows drew together, his hand did not stop stirring. Yielding to a werewolf was distasteful and he detested doing it.
Aldéric moaned, the sound echoing against the stone walls.
“Soit,” Julien said quietly. “So be it.”
Kendrick’s grin spread slowly. “Perfect.” He offered Julien a pen. “Sign here.”
Julien met his gaze. “When you remove the coat, will he return to what he was? No lingering effects?”
Kendrick glanced toward Aldéric. “Yes. It may take an hour or two, but he will once again be a tick.”
Lachlan leapt forward, fangs bared.
Julien did not raise his voice. “Mind yourself, Lachlan.”
Lachlan’s fists tightened at his side, but he silently backed down.
Julien turned back to Kendrick and signed the contract in his elegant script. “I will reclaim what is mine.”
Kendrick tucked the papers back into his pocket. “I look forward to seeing you try, Sinclair.”
“Lift the curse,” Julien commanded. “Now.”
Kendrick crouched down next to Aldéric and pressed a hand on the coat. His fingers disappeared into the thick grey fur.
“Nirath liris tande.”
He gripped the end of a sleeve and pulled.
“Nirath liris tande.”
The coat loosened and slid off Aldéric’s arm.
He seized the other sleeve.
“Nirath liris tande.”
With a final tug, Kendrick swept the coat off him like a magician revealing his trick.
Lachlan’s jaw dropped at the sight of Aldéric. “He looks like a bowl of noodles.”
Kendrick tucked the coat under his arm, gave a small bow, then turned on his heel and disappeared back into the tavern.
Julien dragged one hand down his face, the other kept stirring.
An hour later, Aldéric sat on the floor with his back against the stone wall, his head in his hand. He hadn’t spoken since the ordeal and refused to look Julien in the eye.
Julien sat with his elbows on his knees, fingers laced together, staring at the floor. An untouched glass of bloodwine waited on the table beside him.
Margot swept into the room, lifted the glass and sniffed. “It smells like wet dog.” She set it down in disgust. “I told you the Lussier family recipes are finicky around werewolves.”
“Actually,” Lachlan said, legs stretched out in front of him, “you said your family recipes were finicky and that you hated werewolves. You did not put the two together.”
She blinked. “You should have connected the dots.”
“Bottle it.” Julien said.
Margot spun to face him. “It will taste as bad as it smells.”
“Never did like the taste of dog,” Lachlan muttered.
Julien rose from his chair. “Bottle it and send it to my winery in Savoie, a well-deserved benefaction to Kendrick.”
She nodded once then disappeared around a corner.
“Je suis désolé,” Aldéric whispered from the floor.
Julien crossed the room and slid down the stone wall to sit next to Aldéric. “I will recover what was lost.” He plucked a tuft of grey fur off the floor and held it to the light. “But you, Aldéric, are not so easily replaced.”
Story 3 drops March 1st at kayshahanock.com/stories
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