The storm continued to rage as Andrew dragged Victoria onto the beach. He heaved her as far away from the swelling waves as he could, then collapsed by her side.
Rain pounded against the both of them, buffeting their exhausted bodies.
Andrew reached over and shook Victoria’s shoulder.
She slapped him away, yelling, “Just let me die!”
“No way,” Andrew said. “I didn’t kill half the seabed just so you can be so ungrateful!” Wind stole the rest of what he wanted to say, but he had a feeling Victoria got his point.
The girl curled up away from him, but Andrew could hear the sound of her cries even through the howling rain.
“I don’t want to be here anymore,” she sobbed. “I just want to go home. I want my sister.”
Andrew sat up. “You can’t,” he said. “Because Constantia is dead.”
Victoria cried harder. “You’re a monster.”
“I’m not!” Andrew said. His heart was slamming against his ribcage, making it hard to focus. Remnants of the alchemical reaction still flowed in his veins, numbing his fingertips. It was exhilarating, as if he’d dipped his whole body inside a tank of electric eels and had come within a hair’s breadth with oblivion. “I’m not the monster,” was what he wanted to say, but when he cast his eyes out at the rolling sea, and saw the massive pillars of rock and sand jutting out between the waves, he wasn’t so sure.
“Let’s get out of this rain,” he said to Victoria. “You can decide on what to do when we’re both dry and covered.”
He prepared for her retort, and was surprised when she got up without another word.
They headed into the forest.
Whatever gods that let Andrew live through the ordeal in the ocean were good enough to let him find shelter. After stumbling deep into the overgrown vegetation, they stumbled upon a tiny cave half-hidden among vines and low-bearing willows. Andrew led Victoria inside, instructing her to wait there while he gathered fire wood.
When he returned, he had half a mind to expect her gone again, but she didn’t. Curled up in the dirt, she looked like a drowned kitten, and it sent fresh waves of guilt down Andrew’s gullet.
He threw his armload of timber against one side of the cave. Victoria tensed, but didn’t move.
“I’m going to light a fire,” Andrew said.
Still with her back to him, Victoria chattered through her teeth, “Then do it.”
Andrew looked around. He tore out a few clumps of moss out from their crevices and went back to the wood pile with these tucked under his arm. Then, he picked out a stick from among the pile and started to draw.
“Does it have to take so bloody long?” Victoria asked.
“It’ll take longer if you complain,” Andrew replied. He finished the last few characters, tossed the stick back into the pile, and took the moss from under his arm and placed them in a clump right onto the alchemy circle.
With a spark and the right words, the woodpile started to burn.
Andrew stepped back, satisfied, and glanced over to see Victoria staring at him and the fire.
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“How did you do that?” Her voice came out as a gasp. She got up, crawled over to the fire and stuck her hands out in front of it. “You didn’t have any matches.”
“I transmutated the water out of the wood,” Andrew explained, setting himself down on the other side of the flames. “And directed the lightning from the reaction into it, causing it to combust.”
After hours in the freezing storm, the fire in front of them was a godsend. Andrew didn’t want to leave, but he knew he had to soon, or else the sun will set and whatever warmth they’d built up in the cave will be drawn right out by the deadly cold of night. He got up.
“Where are you going?”
“We need food,” Andrew said, already shrugging off his coat. It came away a wet bundle. Then he started pulling his shirt over his head.
“What are you doing?”
“Do you always have this many questions, all the time?” Andrew asked. He went to the fire, pulled out a stick that hasn’t burned yet, and stuck it through the sleeves of his clothing. “I’m going out to pick some berries,” he said after seeing the hurt on Victoria’s face. “I want my clothes to be dry when I come back so I don’t freeze.”
Victoria looked at him then, her eyes wide. “You’re going back out there, half naked?”
Andrew shrugged. “Believe it or not, it works.” He stuck the sticks with his clothes attached into the ground, then stepped around the fire towards the mouth of the cave. Rain was still reaching in, making it look like they were blocked off from the outside world by a veil of static.
Without another look behind him, Andrew stepped through the veil and back out into the cold.
After two more hours of fumbling around in the wet woods, Andrew found his way back just before sunset.
Victoria gave a little shriek when he burst in carrying an armful of mushrooms, roots, and the coveted berries.
“I was beginning to think you weren’t coming back,” she said. Then looking at the food he brought, added, “I’m glad you did.”
“I sure hope so,” Andrew said, dumping his finds aside and falling to his knees by the fire. It was bigger than when he made it, and it didn’t take him long to see that Victoria had been busy too. While he was gone, she had gathered many more things to burn. Over by the wall, there was a whole stack of branches and twigs. And by the looks of it, she even pulled a few long stems from the nearby willows.
“Good work,” Andrew said, nodding towards all the material. “With that much, we can stay here tomorrow if we need to.”
Victoria was silent. She was mostly dried now, but didn’t look any less miserable. Her hair was an angry shade of red, and hung in a limp ponytail over her shoulder, just brushing the top of her collarbone. Her clothes were crumpled and faded, with parts of it stretched so much it’d torn.
Andrew realized then that she was wearing his coat around her shoulders.
“That’s mine,” he said, pointing.
Victoria clicked her tongue. “Come and take it,” she said.
More than getting his warm coat back, what Andrew wanted to do more than anything was to take off his pants. He was drenched to the bone, and was shivering even when he was pressed close enough to the fire for the hairs on his arms to be burned. But for some reason he didn’t want to do that with Victoria right there, looking. So he stayed where he was and kept quiet.
They ate what little Andrew found, and fell asleep shortly after. They were both exhausted, and their bodies needed rest even if their minds still reeled from the day’s events.
When day broke, Andrew woke to a bad smell. He opened his eyes, thinking the worse had happened, only to get a face full of wolf paw.
Andrew’s scream died in his lungs. He stared into the yellow eyes of Ignar, his brain somersaulting with an explanation as to why the wolfman was here.
Victoria stirred.
Andrew’s eyes widened. Ignar grinned. The claw on Andrew’s face tightened. His heart began hammering, pumping fear into his senses. He could see everything, from the lines of white hairs along Ignar’s snout to the speckles of saliva clinging to the wolfman’s fangs, every detail imprinted in Andrew the inevitability of bloodshed.
Ignar lifted his head to look at Victoria, and as he did his drool dripped down onto Andrew’s face.
In that second, Andrew knew why Ignar was here. The wolf had known Victoria was on the island, knew it probably since she came here. And now, with the Doctor no longer well enough to control him, his primal nature was likely getting stronger, overcoming what little reason he even had to begin with.
He was here to hunt.
His mouth still covered by the wolfman’s massive paw, Andrew tried to convey what he could with his eyes. But then he heard sounds of rustling coming in Victoria’s direction, followed shortly by her sigh of, “Morning already?”
Andrew was out of time. He had to do something, or else Victoria was dead. But what chance did he have against a monster who was neither man nor wolf?
He felt the weight shifting as Ignar unfolded himself off from him, claws and teeth glinting in the daybreak.
It was too late.
Andrew heard a sharp intake of breath, then just before Ignar sprung and Victoria screamed, he reached out, grabbed a fistful of Ignar’s fur, and began the transmutation process straight into the wolfman’s body.