Hunt By Day
#3 of Woods
Sorry for my absense and not giving anyone who reads my shorts a proper post. I'm back tonight, I hope to keep it going!
*****
The sun was about to set, the moon not showing tonight before would help. I instructed the tribe's hunters as best I could, 20 of them. I wondered how many would return, but only to guage the power of the beast I had smelled. If I had sent them out alone, I doubt half would return, alive and the the remaining half would have been mauled beyond usefulness, then I would be dealing with a few more werewolves than I would care to.
'Follow.' I strode into the forrest, old and powerful. The beast would draw power from all primal sources. I still only smelled the one. We marched a good ways in, right where I had made a kill a few days earlier, I looked around, all scraps where gone. 'How pathetic.' I groaned. Not only a low born werewolf, but it was also a scavenger to boot! A hunter who wouldn't or couldn't hunt. Maybe I had brought too many hunters.
The wind stopped blowing from the east and the forrest had become unnaturally quiet. Werewolves, as heavy as they where had a habit of never making a sound unless they wanted too. This one hadn't even howled and now I could tell it was about to strike. 'Get ready, the beast..!' Poor hunters, two where crushed by huge claws and another's face was bitten off in the instant it attacked. It howled, spinning the corpses into their fellows and I charged, unconfident that any of the hunters would stand their ground.
It was quite large, but that mattered little, I was older and stronger and much quicker. I jumped high, knocking the beast down and sinking my own sharp claws into it's shoulders. I stabbed my fingers into it's ribs breaking one. It swipped my head, leaving deep gouges. If I had been mortal it would have broken my neck, if not severing it all together. I hissed and barred my fangs, it roared back. It tucked it's legs and kicked me off, sending me flying, my tunic, shreaded. I slammed against a tree and tore away the rags. What I saw where pieces of meat with sharp sticks, poking and jabbing with a monster that though lower in intelligence, was their physical superior. It was distracted and if I didn't act now, it would kill the entire party.
'Now! Stab it! All of you!'
Thankfully, they did as they were told and again, I jumped on the beast, pinching a deep nerve hidden in it's neck. 'Shackles! Muzzle!' It took a few moments and a few hands, but now the beast was bound. 'We take it back to the village. Quickly, chain it up to the entrance of my cave, then I shall interrogate it.' It looked as though, we had just enough time to get back, in the summer months, the nights were much shorter then I would like.
*****
The sunlight wasn't touching me, but It was bright and high in the sky and it made me want to rest. But while the sun was up, the beast was also at it's weakest, though not weaker then I felt.
'Can you talk scum?' I called out, tired but my voice laid in beautiful arrogant tones.
'How can you call me that? As old as we both are, we must both remembered we where not always enemies.' A sweet voice called back.
My body lacked the capacity to drop dead of amazement and so I could only let my mouth drop open. 'You're... That old are you?'
'Aye, I'm sure we can smell it on each other. The ages... Eons.'
'How old are you exactly?' I was getting curious, intrigued.
'Old enough never to be owned.'
'Ha!' I scoffed loudly. 'Lies, the last of the Riverwood and Shiver Fang packs either killed eachother or where hunted down. And those my pridefull, disillusioned mongrel of a sweet, are the only two packs old enough to... Never be owned.'
'And If I recanted a tale to you how the Matriach of Shiver Fang came to her den to find her pack ripped to shreads with evidance that both Riverwood and a coven had visited ill on them, you wouldn't belive me?
If I could have been anymore amazed, I'm sure my heart would have started and I would have gone out for a tan, but as it was, I could only stand. 'You, are the Matriach of the Shiver Fang pack? Matriarch and ally to the House Blood Sword -Dimir?'
'Dimir? I don't know what house spawned you, but the Dimir, where arrogant and particularly weak. Spent all they had on shiny armor and portraits wearing them. No, the Court of Blood. House Iliz a noble house once. The last I heard they ran all they had and where into the ground. Less then what they started out as.'
I was almost about to smile until she said that. She knew her history, I was proud to have once ruled House Iliz, hearing it just made me realise I wasn't strong enough. My pregeny, ruin of my kind.
'Is there a particular reason you see fit to chain me?'
Snapped out of my revire, I had nearly forgotten! 'Yes. You are to be used against my enemies. Your enemies, but only as I comand you to and you will be rewarded.'
'There isn't a thing in this world that you could give me that I want.'
'What is it I cannot give you?'
'My pack.'
'Maybe you're old pack, true.'
I heard the shackles clang, she shifted her position. 'If i smelled you right, you would be the first of your ilk to make a bargin with the werekin since the begining!'
'Old habits die hard.'
'Is that supposed to be a pun?'
'You seem incredibly well spoken and smart mouthed for your kind!'
'My my you get worked up.'
'How is it that you do not croak or skawk like a peasent?' If I haven't showed my rising aggitation, I was begining to.
'Noble blood I suppose.'
'I think we're both old enough to know that niether of us began or now even ended nobly.' I turned and laughed, unfortunatly I was at the end of my dank little cave, so it wasn't nearly as dramatic as turning and storming off would have been.
'How did the first nobles come about? They saw power and took it. Over and over again from the ashes of what tyrants build, something bigger and in the begining at least, more virtuous is built. Or don't you remember how you saw your future?'
"Nothing like this!'
'I know it. Now just say it.'
'Say what?'
'Why you brought me here! You certainly didnt plan on keeping me here. She looked at me as if I where a jester giving a king advice on taxes. 'This cave is limestone. I could pull the chains out now pith a bit of tugging, it wouldn't be a problem at night at all. Just say you want revenge. Say you want to kill those you gave birth to. That your children are your downfall and now that you have been layed low you go to the only creature you think is lower then you!'
'I've already enlisted the cattle. I may be the only of my kind who would ever consider you anything more then a stupid beast. Not to say you aren't the largest vermin to walk. Don't think I could bare to talk to another of you like I have you. More then half the wolves that stalk the night are mindless ferals and the rest just become bigger, dumber more viscous then the farmhands they started out as!'
'Such a way with words, you really know how to sweet talk a lady into cooporation don't you?
'In undeath or true death, I want to see my hellspawn cease to act in such a arrogant manner by ending their timelines or putting them to heel. I know as individuals either of us can not get what we really want. But I believe myself lever enough and your desperate enough to end how we live right now. Tell me, how hungry are you?'