Chapter Text
Kate crouched lower in the shadows, every muscle tensed and ready to spring. Her quarry moved in closer, and she unsheathed her silver dagger. Almost there. One step... two steps... she flung herself out from behind the dumpster. A brief scuffle, and she was straddling the target, blade held to his throat.
"Dude, what the hell?"
Kate blinked down at him, taken aback. Most of the monsters she'd taken out had last words more in the vein of snarled death threats and hissing. This was sort of new.
He kept speaking. "Like seriously, what's your problem? Did I run out without leaving a note, because I hate to break it to you, but I'm not really a relationship kind of guy."
She pressed her dagger closer against his pale neck. "Look, it's nothing personal. Think of me as an enforcer of public safety."
His eyes widened. "Hey, I don't know what you think I did, but whatever it was, I didn't. I'm not one of those Pack guys, or anything."
Kate rolled her eyes. "Please. You think I care about your political affiliations? How many people did you eat last full moon? Two? Three? Five? It ends now." She let the tip of her dagger pierce skin, and a singular drop of blood rolled down the blade.
"Woah! Okay, first of all, ow. Secondly, I never ate anyone! I mean, okay, there was that one time, but I'm totally straight now. Full moons I mostly curl up with a nice juicy leg of lamb, or something." He was squirming under her blade, trying to get away from the cold burn of the silver. A tiny nick couldn't kill him, but it was definitely uncomfortable.
"Please," Kate scoffed. "You think I don't hear that from every wolf I've ever met? 'Ooh, let me go, I'm a vegetarian, I've gone straight, I never ate anybody.' Yeah, right."
The man (if he could be called that, he looked about nineteen) leaned further away from the silver pressed to his throat. "No, I'm serious. Look, you can ask my brother. He keeps an eye on me, or whatever, he has a shop off of Morgan Avenue, the one with the lightning on the sign. You can ask him, he'll tell you I'm not like that."
His desperation was obvious. Kate had always considered herself pretty good at picking out lies, and he wasn't tripping any alarm bells. Still, you could never trust werewolves.
"Okay." She eased up on the knife a little, and he breathed an audible sigh of relief. "But if I go to this shop and it's not there, or the owner has no idea what I'm talking about, you're dead. I tracked you down tonight, I can find you again. Capisce?" He nodded vigorously.
In one fluid motion, Kate pulled away and stood up, dagger still in hand. The werewolf tripped over himself trying to crawl away and stand up at the same time. Kate sheathed her dagger. "Scram." He wasted no time disappearing into the light pollution orange night.
---
The shop was where the young werewolf had said it was, tucked between a second hand bookstore the size of your average closet and a building with boarded up windows and crime scene tape over the door.
An old wooden sign hung over the shop's door. The letters were faded, but Kate could make out the word "apotheckary" and the faint image of lightning striking a cauldron. Bells tinkled as she pushed open the door, which only opened three quarters of the way before hitting a bookshelf stocked with titles like Runes Guidebook and To Stir a Magick Cauldron. Kate squeezed through.
The shop was so tiny Kate couldn't have laid down across the floor, with every inch of wall space covered in shelves of crystals and candles of every possible color, tarot decks with cats, dragons, fairies, comic book superheroes, or aliens, rows of almanacs, ointments and jars of bulk herbs. There were at least two different sticks of incense burning, and everything was coated in a healthy layer of dust. A plump middle aged woman was poring over Tarot Made Easy, but Kate gave her a look and she hurriedly put the book back on the shelf and left.
The man behind the counter was thin and dark haired, his face hidden by shadow. He was perched precariously on a stool reading a comic book, and didn't seem to care if there were customers in his shop or not. Kate cleared her throat. He didn't look up. She cleared her throat again, louder. He turned a page.
Kate crossed her arms. She didn't have time for this. "Excuse me, do you own this shop?" The man looked up, and Kate's eyes widened in surprise. He was the spitting image of the werewolf from last night, identical except for the color of his hair.
"Uh, yeah. Did you want to order something?" He flipped the comic shut, but kept his finger marking his place.
"Actually, I'm here about your brother."
He sighed, and ran a hand through his disheveled hair, which only served to make it messier. "Look, I'm sorry about whatever Tommy did, but he's not here."
Tommy. That was his name, then.
"We had a little... dust up, last night." Kate glanced around the shop to make sure they were really alone. It was about as redundant as double checking to make sure you're the only person in a phone booth. "Your brother told me he's on the straight and narrow, and said I should ask you if I didn't believe him."
Tommy's brother frowned. "Uh, okay. What... context did he say this in? Like, you know, were you guys hanging out or--" "I know your brother's a werewolf." Kate cut him off. He grimaced.
"Right. Okay. In that case, yeah. He's totally, you know. Not... about eating people. For like two years now. You don't have to worry about him." He sighed, and pinched the bridge of his nose. "You shouldn't be doing this, you know. They're people."
Kate frowned, her eyebrows knit together. "Monsters. Monsters who hurt people."
The shopkeeper shook his head. "Can you honestly tell me you think it's that simple?"
Kate hesitated. She'd be lying if she said she never thought about whether all the monsters she'd tracked down had really deserved it, but usually she tried to push those thoughts to the back of her mind.
He sighed deeply. "You should leave." She nodded, and turned for the door. The man looked back down at his comic, as if she was never there. Kate reached for the door handle, but something stopped her.
"What's your name?"
He looked up from his comic, a little taken aback. "Billy. Billy Kaplan."
"Nice to meet you, Billy Kaplan. I'll be in touch. You know, to make sure your brother doesn't eat any small children."
"I'll look forward to it," said Billy in a tone that made perfectly clear just how little he ever wanted to see her again. He went back to his comic book and Kate turned to leave for the second time. As she opened the door, Billy spoke again.
"Oh, and Kate?" She turned her head. He was still seemingly absorbed in his comic. "If you touch him, I'll kill you." He flipped the page casually.
It wasn't until Kate was half a block away that she realized she'd never given him her name.
--
Billy waited five minutes and then got up, flipped the open sign to closed, and locked the door. He slipped through the door marked 'EMPLOYEES ONLY' and into the back room. Where the front of the shop was full of crystals and smudge sticks and Wicca for Beginners, the back room's shelves were stocked with powdered mandrake, dusty leatherbound books with suspicious bloodstains on the covers, and things in jars. There was a very detailed alchemical circle painted on the floor, bundles of herbs (monkshood, digitalis, nettle, and yarrow) hung drying from the ceiling, and the room was lit by candles that hurriedly flared to life as Billy stepped in.
He pulled out his phone and fired off a quick "where are you" text to Tommy, and flopped down at his small desk, which looked more like a small parchment recycling pile than a work surface. He ran both hands through his hair. Sure, stuff like this happened. There was a new cocky hunter in town every six months, but this was the first time anyone had ever gone after anyone Billy actually knew. He took a shaky breath and looked at his phone again, but Tommy hadn't replied yet.
He needed a drink. Something strong.