Chapter 20 - Bianca

The dim glow of streetlights guides me down the empty road I've been wandering since arriving by cargo plane. My wallet is already half empty from bribing my way through the various airport channels till I made it out into this sleepy Bhutanese town. Even though I was able to make a fake passport in Silver Bow and gather all the necessary counterfeit documents, I still wanted to make sure that I would be untraceable. The only person who has a hint of my whereabouts is Valentina out of the sheer desperate attempt I made to ask her to run away with me.

How pathetic was that?

I shiver in my heavy windproof jacket with fur trim as a gust of cold and dry air blows hard behind my back, the crunch of fresh snow under my shoes breaking through the silence of the night air. I bought everything that I needed for my journey at the sports shop back home: a hiking bag, hiking boots, warm clothes and a few ropes and things so it looked like I was going for a trek.

I search for a hotel, an inn or a restaurant but everything seems to be closed right now. I could really use the warmth when another gust of wind hits me in a short burst.

I reach an empty square, all white from snow, with a lone clocktower. I notice a group of youngsters gathered around a small bonfire at the far end of it as the clock strikes 12 and gongs, reverberating through the town. For the most part, the group minds their own business, smoking cigarettes and drinking what one drinks at midnight with friends, till I hear someone shout "hotel?" and I turn to look. One of them is waving me down.

I pause in my steps and sniff the air. Humans. Well, if anyone of them tries something with me, it will be their loss. Hopefully, they would have sense enough to run away rather than record a white wolf snapping at them and post it on the internet like everybody seems to do these days.

I walk over to the group, some of whom greet me with hellos and nice-to-meet-yous and drunkenly laugh among themselves. The one who waved me down seems about the only person who can speak sensible English.

"You looking for hotel?" he asks, maybe a boy of 17, with a bright red woolly cap, holding a lit cigarette that doesn't smell like tobacco behind his back.

I nod.

"Okay. 75 dollars, one night," he says.

"I'll give you 50 dollars," I haggle, keeping in mind what funds I have left.

"70 dollars."

"60."

"65."

The price is a little steep, but I am growing desperate for some shelter right about now.

This better be a great hotel, kid.

"Show me," I tell him.

He takes one last puff of his 'cigarette' and hands it to a friend as he gestures for me to follow. The boy takes me down an alleyway that's barely lit up, though my sharp senses can make out the sound of a cheering audience and the distinct intonations of a sports commentator echoing in the distance. He takes several complicated turns until we reach a small building with a half-closed garage door. The boy opens up the garage door for me to go through it.

The walls are colored a weird pale green. In one corner of the room are stacked stools and tables huddled together next to a set of dark stairs leading upstairs. I begin to wonder if this is, at all, a hotel. A middle-aged man, who slightly resembles the boy, turns away from the football match he's watching on the TV to size me up and pointedly asks him some questions in their language. He shouts out "Ma!" and in comes a short elderly woman dressed in heavy layers. She, too, questions the boy, whose name, I find, is Sangay. He explains himself further then, all at once, everybody's countenance changes. He probably mentioned the 65 dollars.

The older man quickly sets up a table and stool for me as the woman orders him around. He then disappears upstairs. The woman asks, "Chai?" For a second, I pause to decipher what she means then I remember all the 'chai lattes' I had in college and nod.

I set my hiking bag down, take off my beanie and undo my scarf. Sangay steps up beside me and holds a hand out. He wants to be paid upfront.

I discreetly reach into my fanny pack and take out two 20 dollar bills and hand it to the boy.

"I'll pay the rest tomorrow," I tell him, with an emphasis on 'tomorrow'.

He nods in satisfaction, pockets the money then shouts out to let his family know he's going back out. The older man comes downstairs and begins talking furiously at the boy, who backs out of the door casually. Their argument echoes through the streets. The old lady then reappears with a cup and a teapot. The older man soon stops at her request and steps back in.

She pours me a cup of milk tea, when suddenly a blood curdling scream causes her to spill the hot liquid everywhere on the table. The older man ducks a head out to see the commotion. A beat passes. He calls out, "Sangay!"

Then, my ears prick up to a throaty growl I've heard many times before and a rotten scent I've known all my life.

"Hey," I whisper to the man, "TV." I point at the TV that's about the only sound that's on at the moment.

The look on his face is of pure terror as he follows my order. I turn back to the old woman, fear plastered on her face, and put a finger up to my lip.

As I step out, I pull the garage door as slow and quiet as I possibly can, while focusing my hearing on the disgusting crunch and slush some 40 feet away from me. It takes only one sniff at the cold air to recognize the smell of fresh blood.

I stalk towards the target, minding my footsteps not to slip on the frosted street, and there on the ground next to some open waste, is a vampire huddled over the boy, sucking loudly on his neck. Sangay's mouth is wide open as if to scream, with nothing but gurgles and choking sounds coming out. As long as there aren't others around, I can handle one vampire without having to shift.

I pounce on the unsuspecting vampire, kneeling on his back while trying to decapitate him with my bare hands. He screeches deafeningly. I bare with it until I feel a disconnection in his spine then put all my weight into separating his head from his body, which, once severed, I stomp on several times for good measure.

The boy, Sangay, moves to the side ever so weakly. I scoop him up and take him back to his family, who are relieved at the sight of him. But he's lost a lot of blood. I pray to the Moon Goddess that he pulls through.

I ask the older man for a match or a lighter and some oil, so I can go burn the body down. He hands them to me quickly, grateful for the safe return of the boy.

When I reach the bloody site, I push the body and head towards the open waste, douse everything in oil, then set it on fire. To humans, this will smell somewhat like burnt barbecue, but to wolves, this is worse than the stench of death.

I walk back through the dark alleyways to the hotel, looking through every smaller alley I pass on my way. And I slow down, because a shadow moves in my periphery to the left. Then another to my right. A breeze passes by, but I know it not to be the mountain air, for it is laced with death.

I am surrounded.

I take my jacket off, leaving myself something to wear after this takedown. I get down on my knees, looking up above at the sliver of starry sky I can see from down here then urge my body to shift. Bones move and grow painlessly inside me as tufts of white fur emerge through my skin and a set of big white paws land on the cold white ground.

One moment I blink, and the next my vision changes. I can make out at least 7 vampires in the dark vicinity.

My ear perks up to my left and I instantly side step to grab a vampire by its shoulder as it lunges for me and I rip its arm clean off. Another takes a jab at me quite uncoordinatedly, which opens him up for an easy decapitation. Then two at once, both of whom I swiftly outmanoeuvre, while snapping one's head off.

I presume they've been caught by surprise by a strange werewolf in their town, but judging by the poor condition of their bloodstained clothes and the look of desperate hunger in their eyes, these are probably new born vampires.

A female vampire comes head on, screeching in anger. I jump on her, growl loudly then rip her head off, disconnecting the hinges of her jaws. The remaining vampires taunt and snarl back at me. It's time for round two.

I easily behead two of them, only feeling slightly winded, when one distant screech turns into two, and I hear sounds of panicked screaming emanating from the complex alleyways I came from. More vampires have reached Sangay's friends.

I double down to shred another to pieces when the last vampire escapes me towards the town square. I follow him, engaging every muscle in my body, then launch myself forward to tumble with the vampire out into the open square. Out of the corner of my eye, I see maybe 20 vampires ganging up on the group of youngsters, some of whom have already met their demise.

Unexpectedly, a third creature joins, one that smells as familiar as the vampires do to me. Its heavy body lands with a thud onto an unsuspecting vampire that was freshly feeding, when it opens its mouth to a deep bellowing roar. For a second, my heart skips a beat at the possibility that my beloved Astrid followed my trail to this Bhutanese town, but when the tiger bites down on the vampire's stomach, ripping through its spine and revealing a nasty scar running down its face, I know that this is not her.

The one I have pinned down below me squirms and whimpers softly. I quickly take its life and join the tiger in driving away the rest of the horde.

After a coordinative rally with my new acquaintance, all but one vampire remains. The tiger and I stand our ground, huffing and panting from the fight.

The lone vampire hunches closer to us, his head low and lips pulled back to a grimace. He doesn't look like anything special to be so brave as to face us alone, but still, he walks forward in stuttering steps. I growl at him to back off, when his face softens and he stands up straight. His expression changes into something less wild. His eyes turn fully black.

"White wolf," he says to me, in an eerie mixture of voices not of this earth.

I bark back, while the tiger beside me hisses.

"You have finally come," he grins menacingly. "Thank you for this...omen."

Then, he turns to my partner.

"Tiger," he sneers. "You are too late."

The tiger pounces forward and tears the vampire apart, violently shaking its head with chunks of the undead in its jaws. I slowly step closer.

The tiger snaps his head back to me and huffs. He de-shifts before my eyes in a crouched position, emerging stark naked under the moonlight. He stands up, revealing a hundred different scars across his body. He also reveals every single part of him, not minding that I am, in fact, a woman under all this white fur. The scar I saw in his tiger form is more prominent now, running diagonally from forehead to jaw and stretching across his long face. His black hair is chin-length and swooped to the side.

"I am Ganzorig," he says. "Please."

He waves a hand at me, wordlessly asking me to do the same thing he has and de-shift. And no matter, he may be attractive, but not my type.

I emerge out of my fur and stand up almost as tall as Ganzorig, my long hair giving me a bit of coverage.

For the most part, his face remains stern, although I catch the subtle dilation of his pupils.

"I am Bianca," I tell him. "I didn't mean to cause all this trouble."

"I know that," he answers. "I've been waiting for you."