“What spoilsports you guys are,” said Kim, tossing her head and making her hair swing over her shoulders. “I’m not going to listen to this anymore.” And with that she started singing at the top of her lungs:
“A hundred bottles of puke on the wall, a hundred bottles of puke. One of the bottles of puke fell off, ninety-nine bottles of puke on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of puke …”
It was a funny song and educational, too, with all the counting. I wanted to join in but I felt like something furry with teeth was gnawing on the inside of my stomach.
It was two o’clock in the afternoon. In five hours the full moon would rise. The wereing would begin.
Mr. Clawson would become Ripper, leader of the werewolves. He would have the children of Fox Hollow right where he wanted them—trapped far from the safety of Fox Hollow and their parents.
We drove for a long time. Big Rick amused himself by singing loudly in my ear and leaning heavily against me every time we went around a curve. I gritted my teeth and ignored him. I had bigger things to worry about.
Finally the kids on the bus got tired of the puke song and began to guess at our destination. “The state park!” “The wax museum!” “The beach!”
Suddenly the bus lurched. Kids were thrown against the sides. The bus jolted and wobbled. Something scraped the roof.
I jumped up to see what was happening. The principal’s black car had turned onto a narrow dirt road enclosed on both sides by thick trees and brambles. The road looked like it hadn’t been used in a long time.
The bus was turning into the woods, following the black car.
“Don’t!” I shouted. “Don’t follow. We’ll never leave! Don’t follow, he’ll get us!”
Chapter 32
Mr. Grunter looked at me in his rearview mirror and laughed. “Of course we’ll follow Mr. Clawson,” he said. “He’s the principal. We have to do what he wants. Now sit down and be quiet, Gruff. Everything’s going to be fine. Don’t worry.”
Don’t worry!? The trees closed in around us, so thick and dense they turned day into night. Branches scraped the windows and snapped under the wheels of the bus. Leaves hid the rest of the woods from view. This wasn’t a place I had ever been before.
“Well we’re not going to the beach,” muttered Rick, slumped in his seat. “Or the state park or the wax museum.”
“Or the prison,” snapped Kim, turning around to scowl at Rick. But her eyes widened as she looked at me. “Gruff! What’s the matter? You look so gloomy.”
I could only shake my head. I felt so totally helpless and lost. We were heading into a nightmare and nobody would believe me.
“It’s only a field trip, Gruff,” said Kim reassuringly. “We’ll go for a walk in the woods and identify some trees and some birds maybe. You’ll be right at home here. You’ll know twice as much as the rest of us,” she said, trying to cheer me up.
She looked so friendly and honest and worried for me. But I had a terrible secret I couldn’t share. If Kim knew about me, the monster inside me, she’d run screaming in terror.
Already, with the shadows closing in and the smell of the swamp growing stronger, I could feel the power of the moon pulling at me. Would I be strong enough to resist?
I remembered the power of the wereing. When the beast had hold of me, would I be strong enough not to harm my new friends?
“What’s with you, wolf-boy?” Rick challenged me, jumping as a tree branch knocked against his window. “All this gloom and doom stuff is giving me a pain. You afraid of the rabbits, maybe? Afraid of the squirrels? Or are you just squirrelly?”
I didn’t answer. The smell of the swamp was filling the bus now. It was the boggy smell of mold and things that lived a long time ago in places where the sun never penetrated.
No, it wasn’t birds and rabbits that scared me. It was red eyes that glowed in the night. And two of those eyes were mine.
Chapter 33
Branches whipped by the windows of the bus and I just watched, paralyzed. I couldn’t come up with a plan to defeat the werewolves and there was no way I could convince any of these jumping, yelling, happy kids of the danger they were heading into.
But finally the joking and laughter died down. Maybe it was the jolting of the bus, which creaked and groaned every time it hit a rut or rolled over a stone. Or maybe it was the darkness of woods so thick they shut out the sun. Or maybe it was the strange and ancient swamp smell, so alien from the air of the town. Whatever it was, everybody seemed pretty subdued.
Even Rick stopped bumping against me every time we bounced over a rut in the dirt track.
Finally the bus slowed and slowed and shuddered to a stop. Sunlight! All the kids leaped up from their seats to see where we were. But there wasn’t much to see.
We were in a small clearing, surrounded on every side by trees and thick brush. Kids looked at each other and shrugged and sat down again. “Why are we here?” someone asked. But no one had an answer.
The bus door opened. Mr. Clawson climbed inside, looking pleased with himself.
“All right, students,” he said. “This field trip is about learning to appreciate your environment. Mr. Grunter and myself will point out many species of plants and animals along the trail. The trail itself winds through woods and swamp. Some places are boggy and dangerous, so stick to the trail and follow me at all times.”
He glared. “Got that?”
Everyone swallowed nervously and nodded. “Yes, Mr. Clawson.”
“There’s a wonderful variety of wild creatures living right here just a few miles from Fox Hollow,”
