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To Val, Jonatha said, “So, as far I can tell, you three brought me here because of what happened to your brother and his wife, is that correct?”
“Not entirely,” Val said. “Mark is the most important reason to me, of course. I need to know that he’s going to be at rest. That he isn’t infected…but we also need to know if the town itself is safe. We think this is over, but how can we ever tell? I don’t want to have to live in fear every day and night for the rest of my life. Crow and I are expecting a baby…we need to know that this town is going to be a safe place for our baby to grow up. ” Crow reached over and gave her hand a squeeze.
“Wow,” Jonatha said again.
“We’ve been pretty candid with you, Jonatha,” Val said. “Now it’s your turn. You seem remarkably calm after hearing the story we’ve just told. Frankly, I expected you to laugh in our faces and storm out. But here you are. ”
“Here I am. ”
“So what does that mean?” Crow asked.
“It means, Crow,” Jonatha said, “that it’s a good thing Newton here didn’t contact my thesis advisor first. Or the department chair. ”
“Why’s that?” Newton asked.
“Because neither of those gentlemen believes in vampires. ”
“And you do?”
Jonatha paused. “Yes,” she said. “I do. ” She shook her head. “Before you ask, though…no, it doesn’t mean that I’ve ever met a vampire. I’m not Van Helsing’s illegitimate daughter. I have never in my life encountered the supernatural. Not once. ”
“So…why?”
She shrugged. “Not everyone gets into folklore because of an academic drive. Some of us—quite a lot of us, actually—pursue folklore because we do believe in some kind of larger world. I’m from Louisiana…from the real backwoods Louisiana. Before starting college I had a Cajun accent so thick you couldn’t cut it with a knife, but thanks to some undergraduate theater classes I learned to get rid of that. Where I grew up everyone believes in something, even those who swear up and down that they don’t. My grandmother and mother were as much vodoun as Catholic. In Louisiana we have plenty of legends of the loup-garou. I believed those stories as a kid, and still believe some of them. ”
“Some?”
“Sure, most of these stories are fake, or tall tales whose origins got lost over time and drifted into pop culture and folklore. ”
Val said, “What’s a loup-garou?”
“It’s French for werewolf,” Crow explained.
“Right,” Jonatha agreed, “and it’s because of that part of your story that I’m here. You see, after Newton here contacted me and I started reading up on Pine Deep’s history, I saw the name of the last known victim of the Massacre. Or, at least the person most of your town believes was the last victim. ” She paused. “Ubel Griswold is why I’m here. ”
Crow winced at the name.
“I’m not following this,” Newton admitted.
“Ubel Griswold is a fake name. It’s one of several false identities used by the most famous werewolf in European history. ”
“Peeter Stubbe,” Crow and Newton both said together.
“Bonus points to you for knowing that. Most of the pop-culture books on werewolves mention Peeter Stubbe, though often the accounts are missing many details that can, however, be found in the scholarly literature, among which is Stubbe’s probable birthplace. ”
“I thought he was German,” Crow said.
She shook her head. “No, and that’s part of the problem. He started using the name Peeter Stubbe when he moved to Germany, but he had already committed a series of murders in several countries before that. The earliest accounts of Stubbe’s crimes date back to fourteenth century, and that and other historical details suggest that Serbia, or possibly what is now know as Belarus, is where he was born. ”
“I’m sorry,” Val said, “but isn’t this all rather beside the point?”
“Oh, no, Val…it’s not. It’s the reason I believe so much of your story. ”
“Then you’ll have to explain, because I haven’t read many of these books. ”
“Okay, the short version is that there are hundreds of different werewolf and vampire legends. They occur in every country, and except in the case of folklore following population migrations, these creatures are all different. The Japanese vampire and the Chilean vampire bear almost no similarities. You with me? Well, the werewolf legends of Belarus and Serbia are different from those of Germany, and if Stubbe was born in one of those countries, and if he was actually a werewolf, then he would have very likely possessed the qualities of the Vlkodlak of Serbia or the Mjertovjec of Belarus. Those are the dominant species of werewolflike creature from those nations. Now, the thing is that even though most of the qualities of those two monsters are different, they share one really dreadful thing in common. ”
“And what is that?” Val asked. Tension etched lines in her face.
