Five: Out of the Dark by Holli Anderson

angry finger at Johnathan.
    I went and stood in front of her. She gingerly touched my arm, and relaxed slightly. “Good,” she said. “
You
are untainted … for now.”
    “What do you mean,
untainted
?” I asked. I wanted to add,
why are you being so weird?
But decided against it, since it was kind of a dumb question … she was always weird.
    “He has been
turned
. I can feel the evil. He must leave my house. He cannot be here!” Her voice rose in pitch.
    Johnathan held his hands up in a placating gesture and said, “Okay, Madame. I’ll wait for Paige outside. Just, please, let her stay, we need some information.”
    “Fine. Leave.”
    It was up to me.
    She turned to me when she was sure Johnathan was out of her house and said, “What happened to him? Tell me!”
    I explained what happened with the changeling. Madame LaForte stood quietly and listened. As I described what had happened the night before, her eyes grew wide.
    “Girl, I’m afraid your friend has been turned. Have ya heard of a
lycanthrope
?”
    “No …”
    “Very much like a Hollywood werewolf. His blood is tainted with evil.”
    “Okay. Then how do we fix it?” I asked. That was all I cared about.
    She laughed a bitter laugh. “Fix it? You don’t
fix it
,” she said. “I know of no cure for this evil. If he’s an honorable man, your friend will end his own life in order to spare the lives of his hundreds of potential victims. Including yourself.”
    I gasped at her harsh words. “He will do no such thing! I
will
find a cure if it’s the last thing I do! There has to be a way!”
    “Poor girl. If there is a way, no human knows it. Maybe the Fae people know of a way, but I doubt it. They would exact a harsh payment from you for any information anyway, harsher than most humans would be willing to pay. Death is his only cure, Paige. Death will bring peace for his tormented soul.” She reached a comforting hand toward my arm. I jerked away, frustrated tears stinging my eyes.
    “You’re wrong.” I said, and stormed from her house.
    I didn’t tell Johnathan about her suggestion for a
cure
. I did tell him the old woman didn’t know of a cure but that she’d given me an idea of how to find one. When he pressed me for details, I said, “Just let me do this for you, John. You can’t do it for yourself. Don’t worry, I
will
find a way to help you.”
    The sky darkened as black clouds swept across it. The gloominess of the atmosphere matched that of my soul. We walked home in silence as rain poured down on us.

ohnathan went right to sleep as soon as we reached our new home. The night’s activities had really worn him out. I, however, had a hard time falling asleep, even though I was exhausted. In my haste to find a cure and my subsequent anger at Madame LaForte’s suggestion, I’d neglected to ask some important questions—like, how often will he change? And, when will he change again? Little things like that.
    So, I tossed and turned for about an hour, then I gave up on sleeping for the day. I grabbed the white book and sat down at a table. I thumbed through the chapters on non-human beings, trying to remember the word Madame LaForte had used.
Likeand-
something. As I flipped quickly through the pages, a picture caught my eye. I backtracked, searching slower for the picture. I found it about five pages back—a drawing of a creature that looked very similar to how Johnathan had looked the night before.
Lycanthrope
, the caption read.
    There was very little information. It basically said there were two ways to become a
lycanthrope
. One, it could be genetically handed down from father to son. Or two, a warlock is bitten by some form of
lycanthrope
—a warlock in the guise of a human, an Elf, or a Goblin. Even Giants weren’t immune to the evil poison of a bite. The
change
took place only during a full moon. That was good; it meant I had a full month to find a cure. Oh, and there was no known cure. I latched onto the