By Pamela Love

My brother and I have labored since dawn under the Colorado sky, hacking away at a rock face in a luckless search for silver. Growing numbers of werewolves back East have made that metal more precious than gold. Frustrated, we eat a meager supper after sundown. Minutes later, we’re asleep.

A howl pierces the silence. Claws slash through our tent. A werewolf lunges through the shreds. “Walt! Look out!” Simon yells, trying to wrestle the beast away from me. Then he screams.

I grab my pickaxe. Steel won’t kill a werewolf, but it can discourage one. I drive the point into its back with all my strength. It staggers off on two legs, the pickaxe falling on the ground.

“Hang on, Simon.” Trying to ignore my brother’s moans, I stir up the embers of the campfire we’d banked before nightfall. When I have a good-sized blaze going, I rip what’s left of his sleeve off to get a good look at his arm. There’s no question. Simon’s been bitten.

“Walt, please.” He’s trembling. “I don’t want to be one of those… things. One more month, and then—” He starts to wail.

 “Stop talking foolishness.” I wrap my arms around him, rock him like a baby.

Simon’s panicked sobs begin to slow. “Too bad folks never talk of looking for a cure. Just silver.”

I sit up straight. “Wait. Remember Doc Abbott at the general store last week? He said you can save someone bit by a rattlesnake by sucking the poison out.”

Simon shakes his head. “Don’t you dare. Bad enough I’m a werewolf. I won’t have that on my conscience.”

“I won’t swallow the blood. Would the doctor have said how to do it if it would hurt me? Now hush up. I’ve got to make one of those, what did he call them, tourniquets.” With my bandana and a tent peg, I twist a hard knot. Then, with my jackknife, I cut an x right above the bite. “Here goes.” I bend my mouth to his arm. We’ve always been brothers by blood. Now we’ll be another kind of blood brothers.

I’m not sure how much to take, but after spitting his blood on the ground seven times, I decide to quit. Seven’s a magic number. “That should do it.”

“If anything can.” My brother grits his teeth. “I’m not bleeding much.”

“That’s just because of the tourniquet.” I know he’s fretting because werewolves heal fast. That’s why normal weapons won’t kill them. By tomorrow morning, what attacked Simon won’t even have a bruise from my pickaxe. I cut off the bandana. “Besides, the bite wasn’t that deep.”

“Whatever happens, Walt, thanks for trying. How are you feeling?”

“Okay.” I sure don’t feel poisoned, or even sick to my stomach. If my idea does work, it might be a cure.

Sleep is impossible. Simon chokes back a whimper. To distract him, I point out the Big Dipper, the North Star, and the Milky Way. Not the full moon, though.

Time passes. Every now and then, I squint at his arm. It’s not getting any better, and it must be past midnight.

Hopeful, I begin whistling. Partway through “Oh! Susanna,” Simon interrupts, his voice harsh. “Walt, look at me.” By the light of the full moon above and fire beside us, I see that fur is quickly sprouting all over him.

“That’s impossible.” I sit frozen with shock. “You can’t be turning yet. You’ve got a whole month to go until the next full moon. That’s how it works!”

He squeezes his eyes shut as his mouth stretches out into a muzzle. “Walt, run.”

I’m a dozen strides away before realizing I should’ve grabbed my pickaxe. I don’t even have my jackknife on me.

My heart pounds as I race across the mostly barren ground. Terror spurs me on, but the monster is faster. With every second, he closes the gap between us. Dawn will change him back, but I can’t outrun him that long.

But I can keep him from tearing me to pieces. Or, worse, turning me into another werewolf. With the wind flicking teardrops off my face, I head for the edge of the nearby canyon. I reach it, whirling around to face Simon as he springs. I grab my brother in a bear hug and push myself backward. That, plus his own leap, carries us both over the rim. The last thing I remember as we fall is my brother howling and my silent prayer that somehow he’ll die quickly, and before he hurts anybody else.

I don’t remember landing. But when the sun rises, to my amazement, so do I. Beside me lies Simon’s crumpled body, human again. My prayer has been answered.

I kneel over my dead brother, sobbing. What kind of twisted miracle could have saved me and not him? That fall shouldn’t have killed a werewolf. Unless… I have a sudden, horrible thought. My curiosity makes me want to vomit, but I have to know.

Whispering an apology, I roll Simon over as gently as I can and dig at the dirt with my nails. Silver glints through the scratches where his head struck. It was your idea to join the Silver Rush, and you found it at last.

So, why am I alive? I check myself all over. Simon never bit me. It doesn’t make sense. Guess maybe I didn’t spit out every drop, or I did and it wasn’t enough. I claw at the place where my own head struck. There’s no silver there.

I’m part werewolf now—the part that mends fast. My guts twist. Must be why he turned so soon. Instead of saving my brother, I’d robbed him of his healing power, taking the little time he had left.

“See you again someday, little brother.” I clasp his hand and swallow hard. “Maybe someday soon.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Pamela Love was born in New Jersey and worked as a teacher and in marketing before becoming a writer. Her work has appeared in Havok, Page & Spine, and Luna Station Quarterly. She is the 2020 winner of the Magazine Merit Fiction Award for her story “The Fog Test,” which appeared in Cricket. She and her family live in Maryland.

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