The day before Marc’s execution, I got up early and made breakfast, which I sat and ate alone in the tiny flat I had rented above ground.

Since Pen’s death, I had thrown myself back into my career and decided to study for my sergeant’s exam. I thought it might be a welcome distraction from everything that had happened. I showered, and looking in the cracked mirror above the sink, I could see my hair had grown greyer in colour, and I now had streaks of silver through it. I was only twenty-three. I stood, wrapped in my bathrobe, and trembled in the cold. Christmas was only a few weeks away again, and the first flurries of snow had started to fall. I headed to the kitchen to make a hot coffee. It was then I saw the envelope sticking out of the letterbox like a white tongue, and I pulled it free. My name had been scribbled across the front of it. I ripped it open and pulled out the folded piece of paper that had been tucked inside. It read:

I think it’s safe for us to meet again.

Pen once told me about the lake. Come tonight.

I hadn’t thought of Annie in a while and was shocked to have suddenly heard from her again. Why does she want to meet up again? I wondered to myself. Maybe she wanted to meet one last time before Marc was executed? After all, with Marc only hours from his own death, and with Steve serving a life sentence, Annie probably felt it safe enough to meet up with me again.

Receiving the letter had set me off-course somehow, and instead of hitting the study books, I anxiously spent the next hour or two pacing back and forth around the house, my mind once more full of memories of Pen. I felt as if that letter had bewitched me, filling my head again of my friend’s murder. Part of me was brimming with excited curiosity at meeting Annie again and finding out what it was that she wanted, but the other part of me resented her for coming back into my life and cutting open the stitching that I had used to seal up those wounds. But maybe that was the problem – perhaps I had never really tended to those wounds and had just fixed them up with Band-Aids. I wondered if Annie hadn’t done the same. Maybe by meeting with her tonight, hours from our nemesis’s demise, we would both find permanent healing.

I left for the forest, which surrounded the lake, in late afternoon. I parked my car some way off, as there was nothing other than a dirt track. I made my way down to the lake on foot, and as I pulled the collar of my jacket up against the cold, it started to snow. I made my way over the familiar ground and it dawned on me that I hadn’t been back to the lake since Pen was sent away all those years ago. The forest and the lake with its thick, red waters had always been there but I had kept away. As I neared the lake again, I felt a certain amount of anxiety, and an overpowering sense of regret. Maybe I should have come back from time to time, sat on my own and enjoyed the memories of Pen and me. Perhaps I should have visited on her birthday and laid some flowers on the lake, perhaps…perhaps…perhaps. I hadn’t done any of these things, and in my heart, I knew why I had avoided this place. I had found it too painful to return without my friend. This had been our place, our secret hideaway, where we had both fallen in love. It had been our playground, our utopia, our sanctuary – and without Pen, I believed it would feel lifeless, dead, just like her. We had enjoyed this place together, not alone.

I pulled out the torch I had brought with me and peered curiously around. To my surprise, it hadn’t really changed at all. I passed the light over the area where we had once sat on the shore and skimmed pebbles across the red water. I stood and watched as thick flakes of snow seesawed lazily to and fro in the glow of my torch. I recalled how it had often snowed during the many hours that Pen and I had spent together down here. I remembered the last time that we had been here together. That had been the night she had fled at the sound of her father seeking her out. I could see us sharing that kiss. I could hear myself telling Pen I loved her.

As I stood and recalled all of those wonderful, yet painful memories, my eyes began to sting and then fill with tears. My shoulders shook uncontrollably as I began to sob, releasing months of pent-up anguish.

“I miss you, Pen,” I whispered.

It was then I heard the sound of movement from the trees behind me. I wiped my eyes and peered into the darkness.

“Annie?” I called into the night. “Annie is that you?”

I then saw movement. A figure stepped out from between the snow-laden spruces and pines. I went to shine my torch in that direction but it slipped from between my fingers and dropped to the ground.

The figure came closer and I fumbled around for the torch. The tips of my fingers brushed over it. I snatched it up and shone it directly into the face of the approaching figure. On seeing their face, my legs gave out from beneath me and I fell backwards into the snow.

“Hello again, Jim,” she said, holding out her hand towards me.

Shaking uncontrollably, and wondering if I was dreaming, I reached out and took hold of Pen’s hand.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Murphy

Pen looked at me, her eyes bright and keen. Her long, blond-white hair trailed about her shoulders in thick waves. She wore a thick, white fur coat which trailed about her feet. The collar was up, nestling against the sides of her face.

“Pen?” I breathed, unable to believe it was really her. “Pen, is it really you?”

As if to prove to me that it was truly her and that she was very real, Pen threw her arms around me. “It’s me, Jim, it’s really me,” she whispered in my ear. Her breath felt warm against the side of my face. I pulled away from her.

“But how? You’re meant to be dead.”

Then without saying another word, she took me by the hand and led me into the forest.

Silently, we made our way through the trees until we came to a thick brush of undergrowth. Some snow had managed to work its way through the leafy canopy above us, and had covered the bushes. Gently, Pen pushed them aside, revealing a small circular area which offered shelter from the cold and the snow. Pen faced me and looked deep into my eyes. There was so much I wanted to say. So much I wanted to ask. Before I’d the chance to say anything, Pen leant forward and kissed me on the mouth. Her lips were soft. I closed my eyes and kissed her back. Gently at first, then more deeply. Her tongue felt like velvet inside my mouth. Pen pulled me close as I lost my hands in her hair. Her coat fell open and I could feel her naked body against me, which only heightened my desire for her. As we kissed, Pen pulled my jacket and shirt free. Then, fumbling with a growing passion, Pen unfastened my belt, pulling my jeans and shorts down over my hips. I kicked off my boots, then stepped out of my clothes. I placed my hands inside her coat, and cupped one of her soft breasts in my hand. Pen let her coat slip from her shoulders where it fell to the leaf-covered ground. As we continued to cover each other in kisses, we lowered ourselves onto the leafy ground, using her coat like a blanket. Pen rolled me onto my back and climbed on top of me.

Slowly, we began to make love and it felt like I had waited a lifetime for this moment. I placed my hands around her back, pulling her down onto me.

She worked her hips gently in a rocking motion, and I kissed her neck, face, breasts, anywhere I could.

“I love you,” she murmured in my ear.

“I love you more, Pen,” I breathed, moving my hips in time with hers. And even though I knew what we were doing was wrong – forbidden – it only increased my desire. I pushed the sound of the Elders’ warning from my mind and gave myself completely to Pen. How could something which felt so beautiful be a crime?

Then, as I ran my fingertips down the length of her spine as she continued to move faster and faster on top of me, I no longer felt smooth, cold skin, but soft, warm fur. I opened my eyes a fraction and could see that Pen’s body was covered in a fine coat of pure white fur. She threw her head back and the softest of howls escaped from between her red lips. She looked more beautiful than any woman I had ever seen and she excited me. My heart raced in my chest and my head spun as my own claws shot from my fingertips, my fangs protruded from my gums, and my wings tried to free themselves from under me.

She looked down into my face, both us now as we were meant to be – in our true form – Vampyrus and Lycanthrope.

“You truly are beautiful,” I whispered.

“How beautiful?” she murmured.

“I’ll show you,” I said, easing her off me.

Gently, I lowered myself over her, as she wrapped her legs around my back, and I wrapped my arms round her. Locked together as if we were just one being, I made love to her. My wings sprung from my back, and they draped over us, hiding us from the rest of the world. The world which forbid our love for each other, made it feel dirty and wrong – unnatural. We cried out as one, then collapsed in each other’s arms. With her coat beneath us, and my wings wrapped over us, we held each other tight. How I had longed for this moment. For the first time in my life, I felt a kind of peace wash over me.

With her head nestled against my chest, and my face lost in her hair, I said, “I don’t understand what’s going on here. I saw you die with my own eyes, Pen.”

“I thought I was dead, too, until I woke up suddenly to find myself wrapped up tightly in a blanket, in the dark and on my own,” she whispered.

“So Marc didn’t murder you?” I asked.

“This is not some dream that I’m going to wake up from?”

“It’s not a dream,” she said, easing herself around in my arms so she could look into my face.

“Marc thought he had murdered me, and still does, but I got away.”

“But how…? Where have you been…?

Who else knows you’re still alive?” My head started to hurt as I tried to play catch-up.

“Okay, I’ll tell you everything…you might not like what you hear…but I had to do it, Jim…I had to do it,” she said, staring at me.

“Do what?” I asked.

“Pretend I’ve been dead all this time.”

“What are you saying? That the whole thing has been some elaborate con?” I shook my head disbelievingly.

Pen broke my gaze and said, “Yes…but, Jim, I had to do it.”