Anne Bishop - Written in Red

Not a dog puppy, Monty thought when the animal snarled at him. A Wolf pup.

Meg jerked at the sound. After staring at the Wolf, she looked at Monty and said, “This is Sam. He’s helping me for a few days.” Then she looked at the youngster. “Sam, this is Lieutenant Montgomery. He’s a police officer.” Back to him. “He’s young. I’m not sure he knows what a police officer is.”

When did the Others start shifting into human form? Was that pup also a boy? Whose boy?

He didn’t need three guesses to figure that out, but it made him wonder what other duties Simon Wolfgard might require from his Liaison.

“Maybe the bookstore has one of those ‘this is’ books,” Monty said. “I don’t recall the actual name, but the gist of the books is to help children identify things. Like, ‘This is a cat. This is a car. This is a mouse. This is a moose.’”

There was a queer look in her eyes, and her fair skin paled. “I remember those kinds of books,” she whispered. “I didn’t know other children were taught that way.”

He’d been thinking of all the evenings he sat with Lizzy, reading those books to her, and how excited she had been when they went to the children’s zoo and she could identify the goat, chicken, and bunny. But looking at Meg, he doubted she had the same kind of warm memories about those books.

“Thank you. That’s a good suggestion,” she said. “If HGR doesn’t carry children’s books, maybe the Courtyard library does.”

Time to leave. He glanced at the catalog, which was open to a selection of dog beds, and noticed she had circled one. He took a moment to gauge the pup, then tipped his head to look at her choice.

“I’d go with the medium-sized bed, not the small,” he said.

“But he is small,” Meg protested. She paused. “At least, I think he’s small. I haven’t seen a full-grown Wolf yet.”

He smiled, but he wondered why she hadn’t seen a Wolf yet. “Take my word for it. Sam is already bigger than what people consider a small dog.”

“Oh. Well, that’s good to know.”

“You have a good day, Ms. Corbyn.”

“You too.”

When he stepped out of the office, he caught sight of Kowalski’s expression. Looking to the right, he saw the Grizzly who was standing on the other side of the wall, watching him. In those first moments, his lungs refused to breathe and his bowels turned to water.

“Good day, Mr. Beargard,” he said quietly. Then he walked over to the patrol car and got in.

“We okay to leave?” Kowalski asked, still keeping an eye on the Grizzly.

“Yes. Let’s go,” Monty replied.

Henry Beargard watched them until they pulled into traffic.

“A guy from the consulate came out as soon as you went into the Liaison’s Office,” Kowalski said. “Mainly wanted to know what we were doing there. Told him it was a courtesy call.”

“Which it was.”

“The guy was in my line of sight, so when I first saw the Grizzly, I thought it was one of those carvings, until the bear turned his head and watched you talking to the Liaison.” Kowalski braked carefully as they came up to a red traffic light. “Never saw one of the Bears before. Can’t say I’m anxious to see another one.” A pause when the light changed and they started moving again. “Do you think he could have gotten over that wall?”

Could have gotten over it or gone through it. Not finding any comfort in that certainty, Monty didn’t answer the question.

Meg called the Pet Palace and placed her order with the shop’s manager since the salesperson who answered the phone didn’t want the responsibility of charging anything to the Courtyard. Receiving a promise that the bowls and bed would be delivered the following morning, she considered her next call.

Something was wrong with Sam—or had been wrong. She’d understood that from the cage in Simon’s living room and the kibble, which she doubted was a typical food for any of the Wolves .

Something had changed in the past few days. Sam seemed more responsive, more like a curious puppy now. If he was behaving more like a typical Wolf pup, maybe that explained his increasing lack of interest in the kibble.

Although it didn’t explain his interest in the cookies she had bought for him.

Since she couldn’t ask Simon for advice—and she sure didn’t want to ask Blair—she called the Market Square butcher shop to see if she could get an answer.

And as she listened to the phone ring, a thought niggled at her. She’d been in the Courtyard almost two weeks now and heard them every night, so why hadn’t she seen any of the Wolves in Wolf form? Were they under orders to avoid her when in that form? Were they really that scary?

“We got meat and fish today,” a male voice said. “Whaddaya looking for?”

“This is Meg, the Liaison. Do you have any special meat?”

Silence, followed by sputtering. “Special meat? You want some of the special meat ?”

Obviously there was a special meat. Just as obviously, not everyone was allowed to have it.

“It’s for Sam,” Meg said. “He’s not enthusiastic about the kibble, so I wondered if there was a special meat for puppies. Well, maybe something like rabbit or deer isn’t really special, since Wolves eat it all the time. Don’t they?” When he didn’t say anything, she plowed on. “Little Wolves Sam’s age do eat meat, don’t they?”

A gusty sigh. Then that voice, sounding relieved, said, “Sure they eat meat. Sure they do. Got some nice bits of beef in today. That would be more of a treat than deer or rabbit—unless you want a whole haunch of rabbit. Got a haunch left from the one I caught this morning.”

Suddenly feeling queasy, Meg said, “A small piece of beef would be fine. I don’t want to give him too much if he hasn’t had it for a while.”

“I’ll bring it over.” He hung up.

Meg stared at the phone. “Why was he so upset about me asking for special meat?”

Not everyone was allowed to have it. Or was it just the humans who weren’t supposed to want it because . . .

Before she lost her nerve, she called A Little Bite and silently thanked all the gods when Merri Lee answered.

“Are humans considered special meat?” Meg asked.

“This isn’t a good thing to talk about over the phone,” Merri Lee finally said.

For a moment, Meg couldn’t think, could barely breathe as a drawing of a cow with arrows pointing to the various cuts of meat popped into her head. Then she imagined a drawing of a human with the same kinds of arrows. Could there be a sign like that in the butcher shop?

“Merri? Does the butcher shop in the Courtyard sell people parts?”

Silence.

“Oh, gods.”

After another silence, Merri Lee said, “I’m pretty sure the special meat isn’t sold in the butcher shop anymore, if it ever was,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “And I’m pretty sure when the Others kill a human, that person is usually consumed on the spot and there aren’t any leftovers.” She swallowed hard enough that Meg could hear it over the phone. “But when special meat is available, you’ll see a sign on the shop door. It’s not obvious what it’s for, but we’ve all been able to guess why it goes up. Like I said, I’m pretty sure they don’t sell the meat there, but the sign tells all the Others that it’s available.”