FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Smoke billowed above the trees of the Augret Forest, darkening the sky from its deep blue to a dull, flat grey. The smell of fire wafted through the branches creeping and scratching at the nose of Luyet. The Lycan stopped in his tracks and stuck his black nose in the air taking in several breaths of the different smell. Behind him, a small group of Lycans followed with what their leader was doing. All of them could smell it, and all knew what it was. Humans. A growl echoed through Luyet's belly.

"Damn Humans. Using fire as if they can control it."

He pinpointed the direction the smoke billowed from and twitched his spear in the direction signaling his group to follow him.

The group is a scouting party from the Lycan village of Frver. The five of them had been sent out to the western edges of the Augret Forest for regular patrol and hunting. They had spent the last four days moving in a tall zigzag pattern covering as much ground as they could. One of their objectives is to try and keep Humans out of their territory, so when smoke rises from the tree line in a matter such as it was, it was no doubt Human made and in their territory. Luyet crept through the dense forest, keeping his eyes and ears alert. Humans are crafty creatures and one of their favorite tricks is to set traps and he didn't want to be caught in one. His eyes had seen too many good Lycans die in the traps. Like pits covered with false ground that would buckle under the weight and you'd fall to your death to spikes at the bottom. If the fall or the spikes didn't kill you, they covered the tips with feces that would poison you. No matter what you would die. Another one of their favorites is to conceal a trap rope that would string you upside down from a tree. Then a human, usually one that was sitting in wait, would kill the helpless Lycan. Luyet had seen it all, from death by fire to a slit throat.

Soon, it became hard for the five to see as the air around them filled with smoke and became hazy. But Luyet pressed on, trying to stay low to breath clean air. Small embers drifted through the sky as what was left of the flames came into view. They had already started to die down, but the fingers still lapped at the charred remains of a small hut. Luyet coughed once into his arm and then used it as a mask to approach the homestead. Most of it was already in pieces, he studied them.

"Go search the immediate area; the humans may still be lurking around." His team dispersed and Luyet slowly entered the hut. The heat that still resided inside made him take several tries before he actually got in. Once inside his eyes scanned around the one room that it was made up of. What he saw just brought him to a sigh. He found two bodies, along with the smell of burnt flesh and fur. Lycan. But upon drawing closer to the two he found that only one was Lycan, the other was human. The large wolf knelt down and prodded the dead human forcing it to turn over from its facedown position. Female?

"What's a female human doing out here?" Luyet said to himself moving to the dead Lycan. He was laying on his side facing the human and under the burnt skin he could see that the two were staring at each other. Something wasn't right here and he knew it, Humans, no matter how cruel, don't kill they're own without cause. Usually. Unless they did something terribly wrong. The heat began to creep up on him again, forcing Luyet to flee from the hut. He just barely ducked outside when the entire thing collapsed in on itself erasing the two.

"Luyet! We found three Humans fleeing from the scene and killed them. But they had something with them."

Luyet turned to find the rest of his party coming out of the forest. "Yeah. Well what is it?"

"They had this."

He motioned one of the others to hand what he was holding to their leader, who mistook it for a rolled up blanket.

"A blanket, so what?"

"Look inside."

Luyet unfolded the flaps of the blanket to find a small furry ball inside, it cooed and moved slightly.

"A pup?" Luyet said looking up at his team. They nodded, "that's all they had."

Luyet unrolled the small pup and held him up to his face. The pup had several patches of fur missing and a couple cuts that were bleeding but nothing serious. His fur also smelt like smoke.

"What was in the hut?"

"Just two bodies, of what I believe are the parents of this little guy."

That's why it was burned, Luyet thought. This interracial couple was found by the Humans as they were on patrol just like them. The humans didn't know what to do so they killed the parents and burnt the house down taking the pup with them, but why didn't they kill him too?

"If they're Lycan then shouldn't we give them a proper burial?" One said moving towards the now smoldering remains.

Luyet shook his head, "no, the thing collapsed on them. They'll be nothing left." All his attention was on the little Lycan pup, he couldn't just leave him here. "Come on, let's head back to Frver. This little one needs medical attention."

With him in his paws Luyet turned and made one last look at the debris. "No one will know why. But you're going to be different." He whispered into his ears. "But that doesn't mean I won' t love you."

The pup cooed again and grabbed a hold of a patch of fur. Luyet smiled and followed the party back into the woods to go back to Frver.

Leith shifted his eyes back and forth, this was his chance, he had to move now. Circling through the Lycan town of Kamit he tried to keep out of sight and untraceble. Inside, butterflies filled his stomach he couldn't believe that this was actually happining. Luyet had finally left and gave him a chance to move. The young Lycan's plan was to get out of Kamit and keep south avoiding Tve and eventually reaching the Ile foothills. Across that lay the human city of Tempest. For some reason Leith had always had a fascination with Humans, finding them intriguing creatures. Although he had never seen one up close, he had tried to study them. Reading the few books that the Lycans had about them. He hiked up the sack that rested on his back and crossed the threshold of Kamit. It was not a fancy place, no where near Amita and it was the furthest away from any humans, a fact that Leith didn't care for all that much. He turned his head one last time ready to say goodbye for a while but somebody stood in his view.

"Hi Luyet." Is all he could muster. The two stood for a while and Luyet stared the young Lycan down. Only the sound of the forest filled the ears on the top of their heads while Leith racked his brain to find an excuse for the pack over his shoulder.

"Well, do you plan on telling me what you are doing?" Nervous chuckles left his muzzle trying to ease some tension. "Well, um..." His words stuttered. "I...I was..was.."

Luyet finished his sentence. "Was going to see a human?" Leith shrugged almost as if it wasn't a big deal, Luyet crossed his arms. "What have I told you about them?"

Leith lowered his head and started moving slowly toward Luyet keeping his head low in a submissive look. "That they're dangerous." Luyet said the last word with him as if he had told him plenty of times before.

"Thats right." The old Lycan sighed and shook his head, he knew perfectly well why Leith was so curious about humans, and really had no plan to tell him. Nonetheless, it still bothered him. His ear perked as he heard mumbling. "What's that I hear?"

"Nothing."

"Leith!"

Leith took the pack away from his shoulder and placed it on the ground. "I just...just..., I don't know."

Luyet took one of his paws and lifted the young Lycans muzzle, "What is it?"

He struggled some more but finally got it out. "I just don't understand why they're so dangerous."

Luyet just about fell back in disbelief, Humans, not dangerous? What was he thinking?

"I think that we...we just look at them the wrong way, they can't all be bad."

A slight growl echoed from Luyets diaphragm. "Leith you have never even seen a Human! How could you possibly know?"

Leith argued against his mentor,"Well maybe that's a good thing, you know, I haven't been poisened by them, or you guys about them."

"Don't you ever think that!" Luyet barked. "The humans are dangerous and extremely smart, more so then you or me. They will kill on site if given the chance, so don't give them that chance."

Leith winced at the harsh tone, slowly laying his ears down to show submission. "But what..."

"No! That's enough about humans. I'm tired of it."

"But?"

"No! I have had enough."

Luyet turned around keeping his tail up showing his dominance while Leith kept his down. Slowly, he trailed his mentor while they traced back to their hut. Thoughts echoed in Leiths mind, thoughts questioning what Luyet had just said to him and thoughts about his own studies. Leith was actually fairly academic for his race, the Lycans don't focus too much on reading and writing unlike the humans who write everything. Leith taught himself to read to help gain insight on what Lycans knew about Humans, but with the Lycan tongue his choices were limited, for he didn't have much access to the books that they possessed. So he resorted to learning to read in the human language, which he did with the help of several books he had saved from being destroyed after they were taken by a scouting party from a dead merchant.

Leith avoided Luyet once they made it to their hut and made his way to the place where he slept, in the far back of the single room hut. He pulled the human literature from under his things, hidden from Luyets sight. His mentor did not know he could read Human, and Leith planned to keep it that way. He didn't want Luyet to blow up at him again, and that was after he learned to read Lycan. His paws brushed over the thick first page, the title, once a mysterious jumble of strange symbols, now came together to form "The Tithe of the Poor Man." It seemed to be an early book in which a young human pup, thats what he though they called them, would learn to read on. At least that's what he thought because it's the one he learned on. He reached under and pulled out the second out of three books the title, a much more difficult title and one that he was still unable to get through. "An Opinion on the Politics of Futudra." It was full of words and expressions that he had yet to understand but at least he could pronounce them, right? Once again his paw reached under into his hiding place and pulled out his final book, "Expressions." A novel he came to find about a family that was eventually torn apart by the male leader of the family going off to another female. He didn't quite understand how one of the family could do that. For the Lycans, family was everything. Emotions, especially love, run very deep in them. A lot more then humans. Lycans are strictly monogamous, and not by law but by choice. His paw opened to a random page and he went about slowly letting his eyes drift across the page letting the symbols fill his head in the strange tongue.

"Leith!"

The young lycan hid his books back under his stuff when Luyet glanced over. "Yeah?"

"I'm going to head out back to the mechant, since you ruined my last one." Leith's ears picked up, could he really be doing this? Leaving him home again?

"And don't try to get out again because if you do." He paused for a quick second, "You will not be happy."

With that Luyet left leaving Leith behind. Leith still didn't quite get it why would he leave again? He waited a couple of seconds, stood up and then poked his head out of the hut only to find a pair of eyes beeming back at him. They belonged to the Kamits leader.

"Luyet told me that you were up to things again so he asked me to come and watch you so you didn't do anything stupid. Sorry though, I'm a bit late. He told me that you already tried to get out once."

Leith retreated back into the hut and layed down on his bed.The leader stayed outside.

"Well, at least he isn't coming in." He said to himself and laid down in his bed. He shuffled around to find a comfortable position and drifted off to sleep.

The human girl leaned on the desk in front of her with half of her face buried into her hand. Her eyes held a glazed over look and her mouth formed an expression of annoyance.

"You can't keep doing this!"

In front of her, a man, lectured her. "That's the third attempt at saving a Lycan from execution. Why? Why would you do such a thing?" She didn't bother to answer. "Luna. Luna!"

Luna shook her head to break from the trace she had formed. "You really need to listen to these words Luna."

The girl rolled her head and eyes at the same time. "Look!" The man continued. "I'm not talking to you just because I'm the head of watch but also because I'm your brother. I'm not going to be able to protect you if you keep doing this."

"Elest, relax you did it again this time." Luna rebutted.

Elest's hands slammed the desk in front of him. "Yeah, but I don't know how many more times I can before I get in trouble myself. You are going to have to stop trying to free these...these beasts."

Luna suddenly stood up. "They are not beasts! They are people, people with feelings and souls just like you or me."

Elest scoffed, "No they're not. They are just a bunch of dumb animals and I don't see how saving them is going to change that. Now sit back down." He made a motion with his arms that forced her to sit back in her seat. "Look, Luna. You need to let this go, the Elif will kill you with them if you continue to do this."

Luna leaned it, "but the Elif just murder them because...they're Lycan! That's it, no other reason, just because they're Lycan. You don't find any wrong doing in that?"

"So they haven't done anything wrong?" Elest paused to let her soak it in. "They've killed hundreds of Humans. Isn't that enough cause? An eye for an eye?"

Luna grew quiet she really wasn't ready to argue with her brother more about this. After all, he had just saved her life for a third time.

"Like I said Luna, cool down a bit and go home. You're lucky that I was able to get you off."

He placed his hands on her shoulder. "I just want to keep you safe. You're all I have left. Promise me, no more of these Lycan things."

Luna made the mistake of looking in her brothers eyes. For a man's they were extremely persuasive, and he had some good reasoning behind his plea, just to keep her safe.

"Ok. Ok Elest. I won't try it again."

A wave of relief swept over him. "Thank you Luna. Now head home, I'll be there soon."

He moved out of her way and let her go out the door. The sun hit her eyes making her squint for a couple of seconds before she grew accustomed to it. Her head sunk down and she looked at the dirt ground as she made her way back home. Around her people hurried, lingered, conversed, yelled and bickered with each other. She lived in the human capital of Futudra, surprisingly actually a Lycan word that the Humans assimilated. It happened to be the most inhabited area in known territory, a population of twenty five hundred. Luna herself is nineteen years old, and her brother Elest is all that is left of her family. Both her parents contracted the Falhoust Fever, her father died from it and even though her mother survived it, she became very weak. This weakness left her frail and she eventually took her own life when Luna was ten. Luna's eyes darted around but her head still focused on the ground. Lycan came up in her head. Why was she so attached to them? Why? She had tried to save the lives of four different Lycan's, why? It's not like she had that big of a heart, she'd punch anybody who got in her way. Her brother could attest to that. As her eyes roamed they fell upon a message board and her feet swayed from their destination towards the wooden board. There were several others standing around it taking in its info but Luna immediately searched for Lycan news. There it was, the death of prisoner 34, the one she had tried to save. He was killed by a beheading. Luna sighed, this was the closest she'd ever gotten to saving one of them. Her hand touched the parchment that was held up by two nails. She tore it down and stuffed it in her pocket quickly taking several glances around, and she ducked under the board to continued on her way.

"Why did I steal that?" Her hand squeezed the parchment and she took it out opening it to get a good look. It only contained an order and a bad sketch of the Lycan. Her nose crumpled and she tore it in half, throwing the pieces to the wind. "I...I just didn't want anybody to see it." She chuckled to herself, here she was, arguing with herself. First a Lycan lover and now psychotic, what next? Her path brought her next to an irrigation river and she gazed inside it as she walked. A tall, seemingly innocent girl stared back at her. Her hair fell to her right side, it was not very long and only reached to her neck. Her eyes glared back. They were a weird color, a dull grey as if she were blind. She didn't like them but it was something she had to live with. She looked up, there was her house, well it was mostly Elest's he paid for most of it. Luna opened the wooden door and walked into the simple dwelling. It was actually better than most of the world at the time. It had four rooms, one for her, Elest, a place to eat and a place to rest. Most all of Futurda had dwellings like this. Luna lazily made her way to her room and fell on the simple mattress, one made from straw that was sewn together, and quickly drifted off to sleep.

"Wake up!" Luna jerked awake, her hazy eyes could just barely make out Elest. His hands shook her. "Luna! Come on!" She sat up rubbing her eyes with one arm. "Elest? Something wrong?"

"You need to leave. They're coming!" His voice was weak and airy. He'd obviously been running.

"What? Who?"

He took a couple of breaths. "The Elif! They went over my authority and convicted you. They're coming to kill you!"

Luna jumped out of her bed. "What! W...where should I go?"

Elest picked up a bag off of the floor and started stuffing it with essentials. He ran down to the eating area and packed the sack with some salted meat and bread, Luna followed.

"Just get out of Futurda, head south past Helcrest and Listurne. Cross the Chrisitte River towards Tempest. Then try and make it over the Ile Mountains. That's Lycan territory; they won't look for you there."

Voices came from outside. "This is the place. She's in there."

Elest took a quick second to listen. "They're right outside. Lay low on the edge of their territory and then you can come back in a few months, everybody will have forgotten." The voices grew louder. "You have to go now!" He pushed the now full bag into her arms and turned her to a window. Banging at the front door brought them to a pause. A look of fear that Luna had never seen in Elests eyes before appeared. "You must go!"

He pushed her out the window. "Elest!"

"Go!"

Luna fell backwards out of the window landing on her back with the sack dumping to the side letting its contents spill on the ground. She quickly picked them up and put them back, her hands shaking as she did so. Inside the dwelling she heard the door open.

"Where is she!"

She could hear Elest play dumb, "Who?"

"The Heretic! Who tried to free that Lycan!"

Elest tried to hold them off. "Who? Luna? She's gone, left a couple hours ago to the market."

"The market?" He said. "We'll just check around, just in case."

Luna froze up, "I have to go. If I don't they'll kill not only me but Elest too."

She pushed her back up against the wall taking in some deep breaths and slowly started to stand up. She took a quick glance inside the window. Elest stood shaking as the large men checked the dwelling. If she made her escape at the wrong time they could see her running.

"Look the other way." She whispered to herself. Then, the two looking her way turned around blocking the thirds view. "Now!"

Luna bolted, taking advantage of what she could. She pushed her feet as fast as she could feeling like she was going to trip over herself. People yelled at her to slow down but she didn't pay any attention to them. She was only focused on getting out of Futurda. The wind dried the tears that flowed from her eyes as she ran.

"Goodbye Elest."