Blood of the Wolf “Within all of us is the spirit, true. But it lies within the meat. It pulses in the blood. It caresses the bone and coils around the heart. They tell you the spirit is what we were, that it defines what we can be. But listen to your own breath and your own heartbeat, feel the heat that rises in you and you know that everything you are now is the flesh and the blood. You are a beast of mortal flesh and natural hunger. Live.” —Mgelika Tusiev, Hunter in Darkness This book includes: • A look into the physiology of werewolves, from the ramifications of their regenerative powers and shapeshifting to explorations of health, mating and old age • An extensive look at how werewolves survive in the world around them, from the urban jungles of human civilization to the far reaches of the wilderness • An in-depth treatment of wolf-blooded humans, both as supporting cast and as playable characters WW30301 PRINTED IN CANADA www.worldofdarkness.com 1-58846-329-X WW30301 $26.99 US 1 By Matthew McFarland, Wayne Peacock and Peter Schaefer World of Darkness created by Mark Rein• Hagen Chapter Number: Chapter Title Like God The diner wasn’t a place that you’d stop into randomly, enter it. They snuck up on it, as though they were afraid it just passing by and feeling peckish. It wasn’t the sort of place would bite like a rabid dog if it saw them before they got in you’d pick out of a phone book, either. If the diner had ever the door. They sat and ordered their food, ate, grimaced at had a real name, that name had been buried under cigarette the dirty grease covering everything, paid (sometimes) and ash, tied up in varicose veins and erased along with Tuesday’s left. Anyone who ate there more than once was a regular, but, lunch specials. It was just “the diner.” It didn’t warrant capi- even by that generous standard, there weren’t many. talization. It didn’t attract business so much as accept it, the • • • way a drain accepts garbage and dirty water. Joel was standing in the dry stockroom trying to reach The diner squatted between a porno theater and a the last roll of paper towels for the bathroom. He was looking burned-out tenement like a bum taking a shit in an alley. The at the spot where Naomi had been standing while she stroked employees, those who drove to work, parked their cars in the him, her face twisted into a look halfway between lust and theater’s lot. Arliss, the theater manager, took his payment bitterness. Joel wondered if it had really happened or if he for this privilege in free coffee and sandwiches, stumbling had thought it up. It didn’t seem like his kind of fantasy. He into the diner late at night reeking of mildew and beer. didn’t really like white girls. Joel bussed tables at the diner. He was just out of col- The diner was busy, but, of course, that was relative. lege, but he had pulled out too soon. He was barely 19 and Four customers had slunk into the diner within a few minutes had received enough schooling to know how to write an essay of each other. Naomi had actually come out from behind the but not enough to know why he should. He worked at the diner counter to wait on them, popping her gum and glancing back because, on night shifts, the owner paid the staff minimum at the cash register every few seconds. Once she had taken wage instead of making them work for tips. the orders, though, she planted herself behind the counter The day crew wasn’t extensive, but the night crew was and half-heartedly began to clean. That left Joel to bring the truly skeletal. Joel — tall, thin and sallow, his hair tied into customers’ food out. cornrows that were now growing wild — bussed the tables and The first order to come up belonged to a heavyset man in washed the dishes. Naomi worked the counter — she was a torn blue jeans and a greasy white shirt. He ordered a ham- “waitress,” but she rarely went over to people’s tables. She’d burger and when Joel brought it to him, he picked it up and call to them across the diner, and make Joel bring people’s ate it so languidly that bits of the bread stuck to his lips like food out to them. Naomi was nearly 10 years older than Joel soft white blisters. Joel didn’t go back to the man’s booth to and might at one time have been pretty. The first night Joel ask if everything was OK. He didn’t want to watch that man. worked with her, she jerked him off in the dry stockroom Two of the other patrons were sitting together, talk- and then, wiping her hands on her apron, glared at him and ing. Two women, one perhaps eight or 10 years older than informed him that “this never happened.” Joel hadn’t had any the other. Joel walked by their table on his way back to the idea why it had happened in the first place, so the notion that kitchen and heard the older one saying, “God doesn’t want us it never had was easy enough to accept. to be like ourselves. He wants us to be like Him. That’s what Milo worked the kitchen, the arthritis in his hands never being made in His image means.” getting quite bad enough to stop him from flipping burgers Joel thought about that as he nudged the swinging door and chopping tomatoes. He was on probation or parole, or he to the kitchen open. He didn’t go to church anymore. He felt was wanted by the police or something. Naomi had a different it was for kids and old people. He picked up the women’s food story every few weeks, and she always told Joel in a hushed, — a soggy grilled cheese sandwich and an omelet with tomato harsh voice while Milo was making the coffee or frying an — and walked back toward the table. egg. She denied ever changing the story, and Joel didn’t make The fourth customer was sitting near the two women. He an issue of it. Milo never said much, anyway. The one and only time he had initiated conversation with Joel outside of “Order had actually arrived first, but had ordered a steak and so was up!” was when he’d clapped Joel on the back and said, “Today, still waiting for his food when Joel brought the church-women I’m sixty-six years old.” Joel had just smiled, and Milo walked theirs. The man was white, maybe light-skinned Mexican, Joel away nodding, as if he’d outsmarted someone. thought. Homeless or crazy, maybe both. The guy didn’t smell If the staff was skeletal, the customers were zombies homeless, though. Most bums smelled like piss and garbage, — a little more meat and a little hungrier, but still not but this guy didn’t have that reek. He definitely had an odor living people. The customers didn’t walk up to the diner and 2 3 — and Joel didn’t find it pleasing — but it didn’t make him “What you said before about how God wants us to be like want to retch like the smell of most bums. Him, not like us. Guess that guy’s still like himself, not God.” Joel realized he was staring at the guy and looked away. Milo smirked. “‘Leastways, I hope so.” He set the church-women’s food down and asked if they Naomi rolled her eyes. She didn’t believe in God. “I’m needed anything else. The older one looked up at him and gonna go get those ladies their check.” asked him if he was saved. Joel cocked his head at her. She Joel leaned on the wall. “God’s image,” he muttered. had stains on her teeth, and her breath smelled like old food “What the hell does that mean?” and coffee. The other woman with her looked politely bored. Milo shrugged. “I ain’t a preacher.” Joel wanted to ask them why they were in a diner at 3 A.M. if “My mama used to tell me that God couldn’t be seen or God loved them so much, but couldn’t think how to phrase the felt, just loved and worshipped. If He can’t be seen, how are question. we made in his image?” Milo probably wouldn’t have answered He didn’t get a chance to answer. The homeless man anyway, but a gasp from the diner caught their attention. reached over and tugged on Joel’s apron. “Where’s my steak, Joel rushed out and found Naomi holding the steak knife huh?” that she had placed on the man’s plate. The knife’s blade was “Comin’ up, sir.” Joel backed away from the table and covered in blood. The man was gone, but a $20 bill lay in a walked back to the kitchen. Naomi followed him. puddle of steak juice. The two church-women were staring at “What was that about?” the door, shocked. Joel saw the man walking away from the Joel shrugged. “Got some strange folk in here tonight. diner toward the porno theater. Them two women was talking about God wanting us to be like Joel pointed at the blood.