Academia dels Maleits: Short Stories

Luna Merassa drew her blanket tightly around her chest, shivering. It was not a cold night, being, as it was, the beginning of June, but she had spent the day with some of the other kids from the local village and they had been telling stories again. Stories of werewolves. Luna had always been a sensible child and so didn't really believe that werewolves existed, but the other children were such good storytellers that their tall tales had her rattled all the same. Plus, there had always been a certain level of doubt left in her mind by the fact that the distant howls were always plentiful during the full moon. She still didn't believe the stories, but enough of the pieces fit together to make it scary to an eight-year-old. Especially when the light of the full moon was streaming in through the small gap in the curtains, throwing scary shadows up against the wall.

Eventually, in spite of her imagination running wild, she managed to slip off into an uneasy sleep, full of nightmares about gigantic wolves creeping up on unsuspecting civilians. When she awoke, she glanced at her watch, an old analogue Tissot that had once belonged to her grandmother and her great-grandmother before that. Although the watch had once been an elegant design, the leather strap was starting to fall apart a little, and the clockface was scratched but Luna loved it all the same. It was a piece of her heritage and probably the most valuable thing she would ever own, considering that her family was not wealthy.

In the limited light, she could just make out that the clockface read one o'clock and she briefly wondered what could have woken her. Her quiet pondering was disturbed when she heard a howl from outside, however, and a shiver ran down her spine. The howling was the closest it had ever been and, in fact, seemed to be coming from right outside her house.

She held her breath as her trembling hands pushed back the blankets, and she tiptoed across the cold, wooden floor to her bedroom window. When she first reached the window, she closed her eyes, barely able to bring herself to look out into the street, too scared of what she might see. When she finally managed to open them, she almost screamed. There, standing under the light of the streetlamp was a wolf. This was no ordinary wolf though. Naturally, Luna had never seen a wolf in real life before, but she had always loved watching nature documentaries and she could tell just from looking at this wolf, that it was much larger than average, and its eyes seemed somewhat intelligent.

Her mind wandered to the wolves that the village children had spoken of and she began to back away from the window and edged over to her bedroom door. She then hurried down the hall to the adjacent room, which belonged to her parents. She knocked, hoping that one of them would still be awake but she was out of luck and so she twisted the handle and tiptoed over to the bed.

"Dad?" she whispered, shaking the sleeping figure until he stirred.

"What's up, Luna?" he mumbled sleepily, swatting her hand away from his shoulder.

"The wolves are howling real loud tonight."

"You've been listening to those stories from the village children again, haven't you?" he asked, sighing as she nodded. "There's nothing to worry about, sweetheart. They're just stories designed to stop children sneaking about after dark. They're not actually true."

"Then why is there a wolf outside my window?"

"A wolf outside your window? That's quite impossible, Lu."

"It was there, I swear it, right under the street lamp." Her dad groaned and pushed the covers back, getting unsteadily to his feet. Next to him, Luna's mother had also started to stir.

"What's going on?"

"Nothing, dear, you can go back to sleep. Luna's just been listening to a few too many scary stories…thinks there's a wolf outside the window. I'll prove to her there's nothing there, and put her back to bed, no point in both of us getting up." In spite of his suggestion, her mother sat up in the bed, leaning against the headboard.

"I don't want you hanging out with those children anymore if this is the result, Lu," her mother said, sighing. "You know there's no such thing as werewolves."

"It was there, mum," Luna insisted simply. "It was taller than our car, with bright yellow eyes." Her dad looked over at her, his mouth turned down into a frown and his brow furrowed.

"Lu, there's nothing here," he said. "Just an empty street, save for a couple of cars."

"That can't be right." Luna shook her head vehemently and marched over to the window. Her dad was right though. Even if the wolf hadn’t been a figment of her imagination, there was nothing there now. "I promise you, it was standing right there under the street lamp."

"Even if it was, it must have run away."

"What if it's just hiding? What if the second you put me to bed, it jumps through my window and gobbles me up?"

"Your window's locked up tight, Lu. There really isn't much chance of that happening, is there?"

"But-"

"Luna, if it will make you feel better, I will go outside to check for you, but when I come back inside, no wolf in sight, I expect that to be the end of it. Is that clear?"

"What if the wolf attacks you?"

"I guess I'll just have to take that chance." Luna gave a frightened yelp at this statement but looking at her dad's wide, albeit tired, grin, she nodded and followed him down the stairs.

As they walked down the hallway, Luna could hear nothing but the sound of their footsteps clacking on the wooden panelled floor and the beating of her heart. She knew her dad didn't believe the wolf existed, but she also knew what she had seen. Its fur had been a light grey colour, almost white, and its eyes had stared straight at her, she could have sworn. Her father quickly pulled his shoes onto his feet and got up, sliding the bolt across and unlocking the door. Luna cringed as the rusty metals scraped against each other, the dissonant sound making the hairs on her arm stand up on end. Just as her dad laid his hand on the handle, she suddenly started having second thoughts about letting him go outside. He opened it ajar but she threw herself against the wood, slamming the door shut again.

"Luna, what are you playing at?" her dad asked her, a hint of frustration entering his tone now.

"You can't go out there, Dad."

"Lu, you're the one who wanted me to go outside and check in the first place."

"I've changed my mind. I'm scared the wolf will get you."

"Now, you're just being ridiculous. I'm going to go out this door, I'll have a look around, and once I've proven to you that there is absolutely nothing out there, you are going to go back to bed and we’ll have no more of this nonsense about wolves, is that clear?" Luna stood back meekly from the door, fighting back tears as she nodded. Neither of her parents had ever spoken to her quite so sharply and she knew that they thought she was being ridiculous. She wished she had never let the village children put the idea of werewolves in her head because now, even though she knew that werewolves didn't exist, she couldn't escape the fear that was invading her mind.

Her dad threw the door open and marched out onto the front lawn. Luna just stood in the doorway cowering, still afraid that the wolf was lurking somewhere nearby. Her dad walked over to the bushes on the left-hand side of the garden and pushed the branches aside, looking around very thoroughly. He then made his way over to the car and made a point of looking under it, behind it, even opening up the doors. After the car, he got his phone out of his pocket, turned on the torch function and started pointing the light up at the roof of the house. After pointing the torch in various different directions for about thirty seconds, he turned back to Luna, a weary look on his face.

"See, Lu, there are no wolves out here. You must have imagined it. Now can we just go back to bed?" Luna had stopped listening to him though, because from an alley behind her father, on the opposite side of the road, the wolf she had seen earlier appeared, its teeth pulled back into a vicious snarl. Luna opened her mouth to try and warn her dad but no sound came out and so instead, she raised a shaky hand and pointed at the beast.

Her dad heard the wolf snarling before he fully registered the look of terror on his daughter's face and she watched as the realisation dawned, his eyes widening as he spun around. By the time he had turned around fully to face the wolf, it was right behind him, crouched down and ready to pounce. Luna looked around, searching for anything she could use to try and save her dad but there was nothing obvious. She was still scared of course, but where there had previously been fear for herself, she now felt only fear for her dad. She knew she had to save him somehow.  After all, it was her fault he was out there.

Her eyes came to rest on a ceramic fragment on the ground that had broken off of a nearby flowerpot and she bent down, picking it up and turning it over in her hands. Then, she threw it as hard as she could in the direction of the wolf. It sailed through the air and hit the wolf just above its right shoulder. Its head snapped around to look at Luna and a little yelp escaped her lips as it started to snarl and prowl towards her. Her dad was just staring, dumbstruck, at the beast as it approached his daughter. Luna knew that she should go back into the house and close the door, but with her dad still outside, she was scared that the wolf would return to its original target and so she stayed rooted to the spot.

When it was just half a metre away, the wolf stopped, crouching down. From this distance, she could smell the beast's horrible breath. It cocked its head, its eyes full of what could only be described as curiosity and for a few seconds, Luna honestly believed that the beast wasn't going to attack her. Then she heard footsteps coming down the stairs and her mum's voice called out.

"What's going on down there?" Instinctively, Luna started to turn around and it was like the spell was broken. The wolf lunged at her, its teeth grazing her chin and its enormous paws pinning her shoulders to the ground. She heard her mum scream and the wolf's head snapped up again. She wanted to call out to her, to warn her not to come any closer, but she was too weak to move even a finger. She could feel the blood trickling down from her face onto the floor beneath her and for a split second, she wondered if this was what it felt like to be dying. Then, the wolf turned around and bounded away with one final snarl.

Her dad hurried over to her the second that the wolf was out of sight. When he reached her, he fell to his knees and cradled her in his arms. Her mother wasn't far behind him, grabbing her mobile phone off the kitchen counter and calling for an ambulance. The rest of the night passed in a flash. The ambulance came to take her to the hospital but after an initial examination, it was determined that the damage had been mostly superficial and in the morning they were already sending her home.  

While it was true that the wounds were not as bad as they had initially appeared, Luna couldn't help but feel like there was something different about her, something not quite right.  For one thing, despite losing what had felt like a lot of blood, she had never felt stronger.  For another, she felt as though all her senses were in sharper focus somehow.  Her eyes were picking out the small, individual fibres in her clothes and she could now hear the next door neighbours' TV as clearly as if it were in the room with her.  There were other things too, smaller things, but for now, Luna pushed them from her mind, choosing instead to be thankful that she had survived the ordeal.