“Which direction do you want to start?” Lane asked, as soon as they were out of the camp.

“Let’s go towards the river,” David said. “Greg says he and some other werewolves escorted a trail of workers on their way back from the building site when they were attacked. Three came at the flank of the truss he was guarding, the last one attacked from another direction. Nathan went after that last one.”

The area where Greg and Nathan had fought against the three now dead werewolves was easy enough to find, and afterwards, it was just a matter of crossing the path the workers had trodden on their way to the bridge and look for tracks there.

“Is Greg all right?” Lane asked while they were looking out for traces of either Nathan or the werewolf he was after.

“He’ll be, in a few days, I reckon,” David said. “Did Morgulon ever talk about what that werewolf healing does to werewolf bites?”

“You mean when she talked at all?” Lane shook her head. “No. She did seem kind of wary about fighting another werewolf, when we ran into a mad one, though. Or maybe that was just cause I was sitting on her back, who knows?”

David grimaced. “She’s hard to read, for sure,” he agreed.

“There,” Lane said. When she pointed, David spotted the hoof marks, too. Iron shoed. As far as they knew, they and Nathan were the only people on horseback for miles, so they followed the trail. It soon met with a single werewolf trail, slightly older.

“Either truly mad or really, really stupid,” Lane stated after about an hour. They had circled the camp about halfway. If there weren’t still trees on this side of the settlement, they would have been easily visible from up the walls.

“Truly dead, too.”

Nathan’s voice made them both jump a little in the saddle.

“I thought I’d heard hooves,” Nathan went on.

He was on foot, waving to them. “Come on, it’s right behind those bushes there.”

Behind the thicket he had pointed out, Nathan’s horse was tied to a tree, and the dead werewolf lay on the ground. Nathan had obviously been in the process of taking off the pelt when he had heard them.

“I’d hug you,” Nathan said, “but I don’t think you’re too keen on that right now.”

David rolled his eyes. “I’m happy and surprised about your consideration.”

Nathan was covered in blood, and dirt, and other grime. He grinned and went back to work on getting the pelt off. “What are you doing here, anyway? I mean, besides babysitting me.”

“Babysitting scientists,” David said and explained what had brought them out to the camp, while Nathan finished skinning the werewolf.

“This one give you any trouble?” David asked, once he was finished, pointing at the carcass.

“Na,” Nathan said. “I reckon he was a spreader in the making – must have circled the settlement all night. He could have been fifty miles away by now, somewhere deep into Rot territory. Wasn’t hard to take him out, either. Anyway, let’s get back to camp. I wanna see how the last two of the young ones move into their cages, just to be sure.”

David nodded. He wanted to watch, too, though mostly because he was worried about how Greg would be treated. Between Lane, Nathan, and him, he wasn’t too worried about any more of the others going mad.

He was a little surprised to see Nathan take his job as the only resident hunter around here so serious.

Or maybe Nathan just wanted to see how Greg got on, too.

They reached the gate of the settlement about half an hour later when the sun was already vanishing behind the trees. The guards waved them through, but interesting enough, nobody seemed particularly happy to see the werewolf pelt rolled up and tied to Nathan’s saddle.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Why had Nathan taken that? As a form of proof, sure. But for that, the head would have sufficed. Could he even sell it? What noble, or merchant, would fork out the kind of cash that a werewolf pelt used to fetch now that living werewolves were so high in demand?

Somebody siding with the Valoise, maybe. Or a devout Mithran.

Had Nathan even considered these questions? Or had it just been habit to take the furs?

Would it bother Greg to see them?

David shook his head, annoyed with himself. He’d just have to ask him.

The captain sent his attendant for one of his corporals as soon as they entered his office. The man must have been close by because he entered and saluted just a minute later.

“Is this the right one, Corporal Myers?” the captain asked.

Myers carefully unrolled the whole pelt, clearly looking for some kind of mark. Close to the belly, there were three nearly round black spots edging into the lighter fur. The corporal patted them lightly and straightened again.

“It’s the right one, Captain,” he said.

This was all a lot more thorough than David had expected, especially considering what Greg had told them about all the earlier blunders. Maybe they had learned from that? Or maybe everyone was on best behaviour because of the duke’s visit?

David looked around the office again. There were maps of the surrounding lands, with the trail the railway was supposed to take marked in, and a huge picture of a bridge, with a complicated and technical drawing underneath that David figured was probably the building plan, or whatever it was called. Also a huge roster with “werewolf on duty” written on top. Three of the names there had already been crossed out.

Greg was sitting at exactly the same spot as when they had left, alone by now, even though the drizzle had mostly stopped.

“That was fast,” Greg said. “Will you join us for dinner?” he added. “Thoko and Mr. Higgins are inside to see what they want. Not that there’s much on offer.”

He looked calmer than before, which surprised David, considering the moon was already rising.

“When will they make you leave the camp?” he asked.

“Sundown,” Greg said. “About – oh, another hour. Ito, he’s on guard tonight, promised he’ll let me back out of the cage if I can stay human until it gets fully dark, though. I guess that’s something. I’ll only have to spend one full night actually inside that way.”

That explained the new calm a little, David guessed.

“Are you two really courting?” Greg asked, looking back and forth between him and Lane. Nathan sniggered, but Greg went on: “Only, I thought I remember you...”

Greg broke off. “Oh,” he said. “I see.”

“I didn’t realize you did remember me kissing George Louis,” David said when Greg didn’t say anything more.

Greg blinked and glanced at Lane. “Wait, what? That was him – I mean – the duke?” he asked, still looking at Lane.

“She knows,” David said. “What do you remember?”

“Mostly, I remember Andrew yelling at Nathan and me to never ever say anything to anyone about you kissing guys,” Greg said, grimacing. “I guess I didn’t recognize who you were with. But seriously. Him? I’d have thought you had better taste than that.”

Lane and Nathan both laughed at that, and David smiled, too.

“Yeah, well, I was fifteen,” he said. “Don’t tell me all your choices at that age were great.”

“You were together for more than two years?” Lane asked promptly.

David looked away. “Not really. We weren’t – that steady, I guess.”

He couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder at the turn the discussion had taken, but he needn’t have worried. There were more people about, now that the rain had let up, but they were keeping their distance.

Except for Thoko and Mr. Higgins, who were coming over with plates. Thoko had one in each hand.

“I see your hunt was successful,” Mr. Higgins said.

“I am not eating with that thing on the table,” Thoko complained and tried to push the still bloody pelt away with her elbow, without losing hold of her plates. “What did you even bring that for?”

“I thought it might shock Bernadette and pack,” Nathan said.

“Oh,” Thoko said. She looked a little uncertain as if she wasn’t sure if she approved. Then her gaze wandered from the skin to Greg, before she raised one eyebrow at Nathan.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he complained. “Greg knows better than to get weirded out by something like that, right, Greg?”

“It’s fine,” Greg said and reached for the plate Thoko was offering him. “But it does stink of blood.”

Nathan rolled his eyes and pulled the packet of fur down onto the ground.

“Where is the rest of the pack, anyway?” Nathan asked.

Greg shrugged. “Not far. They mostly entered the camp because I did, I think. They’ll be there for the lock-up, I’m sure.”

The rest of the pack, Nathan had said. Like Greg was a part of it, David noted.

“I’m surprised you’re still hungry,” Mr. Higgins noted when Greg dug in.

“Only cause it’s your first full moon with him,” Nathan said. “He’ll eat more than Andrew during those three days, and that’s saying something.”

Greg finished his plate quickly, pushing it away before getting up from his seat. The wild look was back on his face, a little like barely controlled fury, with an edge of fear to his restlessly shifting gaze. He walked a few steps away from their table, then returned, looking back and forth between them.

“I guess I’ll be outside,” he said slowly.

“I’ll go with you, if you’d like,” David offered. Greg was nodding before he’d finished speaking.