Page 41 of The Hunting Moon
As Emma hops the final few steps toward the cubbyhole, Bretta asks, “Have you gotten started yet?”
“No. And thanks for helping me.” Winnie smiles at her friends, and they—of course—smile back. “Should we do your lab work first? I already finished in class, if you want to see.”
“Dang.” Fatima gives a low whistle. “I didn’t thinkanyonefinished in class. Impressive.”
“Nah.” Winnie flushes and withdraws her notebook. “I already know most of it.”
“Compendium smarts,” Emma says with a nod. “I told you guys she had ’em.”
Winnie’s flush deepens—but it’s a happy one. “Here. Take a look if you want.”
“Ooooh. We do want.” Bretta takes the notebook, her fingers grabbing like little crab claws. “This is excellent, Winnie. Thank you.”
Emma, meanwhile, says, “I’ll help you, Winnie. I wrote a paper about the Wednesday Masquerade right after we moved here, so I know exactly where to start.”
Where they start is at the Sunday Encyclopedia. It’s divided into twenty-six volumes, with one book for each letter of the alphabet spaced out across three tables in the basement. Each tome has nice thick paper that students can’t easily damage, and the separation into multiple volumes means multiple people can use it at the same time.
Winnie goes for the letterM(forMasquerade), Emma goes toW(forWednesday Clan). Then they settle at a table nearby, so Emma won’t have to keep hobbling all the way back and forth to the cubbyhole.
“Sometimes the entries reference other books to check out,” Emma says, flipping through theW’s. “I remember finding a whole bunch of stuff on the first Wednesday party…” She trails off.
Winnie, who is thumbing through her own volume, glances up—and finds that Emma’s face has turned sickly. Alarmed, Winnie shifts toward her… only to catch sight of what Emma is staring at.
It’s the entry forWerewolf.
Below the name is a drawing of a werewolf that’s horribly inaccurate. The canines are too small, the fur too thin, the shoulders too narrow. It’s like the opposite of Red Riding Hood:My, what small eyes you have.There’s even a full moon sketched above it, even though real werewolves have no connection to cycles of the moon. They rise when the forest wants them to; they kill when the forest commands.
For half a moment, Winnie is struck by how these illustrations never live up to reality. The werewolf’s real size and power. The kelpie’s watery glisten. The vampira’s vicious claws…
And the fantasy of being a Luminary again.
That hasn’t lived up at all—not merely because a pen can’t capture reality, but because Winnie herself can’t. She is too small, too boring, too one-dimensional to be a proper lantern shining against the night.
She forces her thoughts back to Emma, who looks to be spiraling just as hard as Winnie is. “You okay?” she asks her friend.
Emma swallows. “Yeah, I’m fine. I just…” She scratches absently at her injured leg, eyes almost vacant, almost hazy. Like she is existing in a very different time, a very different place.
And Winnie knows exactly where Emma is—and she in turn rubs at her scarred forearm. “How much do you remember from the night of our trial, Emma?”
“Some.” Emma’s eyes twitch. Her pupils shrink. “The harpy… I think it had me, and then the wolf showed up howling. I…” She shakes her head. Her eyes shift back into focus. “It’s all so fuzzy after that, but then I remember you getting it off me and screaming at it. It didn’t bite at me, did it?”
Winnie shakes her head. “No.”
“It just bit at you, then.” Emma’s eyes drop to Winnie’s covered arm. She has seen the scars only once before, when Winnie was in the hospital. Her frown deepens. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?” Winnie blinks. “For what?”
“For Saturday night. At the party.” She leans over the table, over the Encyclopedia and the wolf’s snarling face, to lay a hand on Winnie’s. “We shouldn’t have said what we said to you. About the scars and getting bitten and… and the howling. It was really insensitive. Especially since that monster is still out there.”
“Oh,” Winnie breathes. She hadn’t been expecting a conversation like this—not ever and not from anyone. Instead of making her feel better about everything, though, it only makes her feel worse. There’s still a piece of her that’s missing. A werewolf-shaped hole that she can’t seem to fill, no matter how hard she tries to remember.
A few days after Winnie got home from the hospital, she towed out her Xeroxed Compendium, and stared at the entry on were-creatures. She hoped it would jog something loose. Unlock this unintentional compartment in which she has stuffed all her memories.
The wolf bit her. When? Where?Why?
But the copied pages of the were-creature entry had no more answersfor her than this encyclopedia does. No more answers for her than Emma does. There is no gas or dust here to form a star; there is only dark matter.
“Thanks,” Winnie murmurs to Emma—and she means it. Shedoesappreciate the apology.
