Free Guardian of Werewolf Keep (Werewolf Keep Trilogy) by Nhys Glover Page A

directly.
    ‘Mary, you don’t know anything about me, so it is easy to think that I would be like any other upper-class lady you have known. I am not. I lived in genteel poverty for most of my life. My mother crocheted lace collars to make enough money for us to live. When she died, I became a governess – a servant just like you. I don’t want us to have class barriers between us. I would like to be your friend, if I may.’
    The mouse- like woman suddenly looked up at her, and met her gaze. Her pale blue eyes were anything but mousey. They burned with a hellish fire that took Phil’s breath away.
    ‘It ain’t class that separates us , Miss, ‘tis the beast. You can’t know what it is to be one of us, even if you live here for the rest of your life. And monsters like us don’t have friends. Ever.’
    Phil didn’t know what to say to that. She felt rejected , as surely as if the woman had snubbed her in public. But it didn’t feel like the rejection was personal. It felt more like she was unable to imagine someone like herself having something as ordinary as friendship. As if she didn’t deserve it. That was so sad. She wondered what had happened to the girl to make her feel cut off from the rest of humanity this way. Other than the obvious.
    Later in the afternoon, Byron stopped in to see how the settling in was progressing. Mary had gone back to her normal activities by then, and Phil was busy sorting her books onto her father’s book case next to his desk.
    ‘Can you tell me a little about Mary ? She is so hard to get to know,’ she asked him as he hovered just inside the open doorway.
    Byron frowned , and closed the bedroom door behind him. Then he sat on her father’s chair, so he could look thoughtfully out the window at the world that was still wet and overcast.
    Phil put down her books, tried to forget that Byron had sealed them into this room together, alone, and went to sit on her new chair by the low burning fire.
    ‘Mary came to us about three years ago. She was injured trying to save the child in her care from attack. It was winter, and Mary had stayed too long at the park with her charge. The beast toppled the child, mauling her to death, before Mary had a chance to do anything. When she did, the beast turned on her, and bit her hand. A constable shot the beast dead before it could do more harm.’
    ‘Do all of Her Majesty’s Constabulary know of the existence of werewolves?’
    ‘No. There is a special task force spread thinly around the country – a secret task force, made up of those who have had personal contact with werewolves. Their role is to follow up on any sightings, track down the beasts, and kill them, if they are an immediate threat to the populace.
    ‘They inform us of what has transpired. We step in where the person has returned to himself, and survived. And we take in those who have been turned. The Captain had tried to create a protocol where the beasts could be trapped , rather than killed, during the full moon. But it was too dangerous. The slightest injury condemned a person to this living hell. The risk was too great.
    ‘We brought Mary to us a few days later, after she had recovered a little from the shock of what she had witnessed. She blames herself for the death of her charge. She hates the beast that killed that child, the beast that she now is . Her self-loathing and guilt are common amongst the residents.’
    Phil sat quietly , turning over what she had learned. It seemed so unfair that someone as brave as Mary obviously was, should be condemned to life as one of these loathed beasts.
    ‘One thing you need to know about the werewolf. It attacks only those that are wounded or are, in some other way, defenceless. Like children. That is why a battlefield is sure place to find them.’
    ‘I have seen no children living here. Except Jamey , of course.’
    ‘Children never survive an attack.’
    Phil fell silent again, as she tried to digest this horrifying piece