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Eos #6

Planet of the Lycan

By Shadow_Walker

The Storm Gale whipped and shuddered as its entire frame shook violently. The ship rocked and swayed, ever descending. Its passengers could only hold their breath and pray for safe passage. Even Jaavi, who steered the craft, felt his life was in the hands of fate.

It was two weeks since they'd seen Thomas. Two weeks since they first trusted the compass. Now, on the fringes of the map, they found a green planet on which they might land.

Jaavi was at the helm. Directly behind him, Marthus was clutching the sides of his chair. His eyes were closed tightly. To Marthus's right, Skyra looked nervous. She held on to the arm rests of her chair for dear life. To Marthus's left, Sehrab and Koli were sharing a harness. Sehrab seemed annoyed at Koli's inability to remain still. Behind Marthus, Ginasa was strapped to the wall by a pair of straps around her lioness torso. Theron was beside her, strapped into a spare seat. His knuckles were clenched so firmly they were white as bone.

Marthus opened his eyes and took from his pocket the compass Thomas had given him. He examined it. The needle pointed directly ahead at the planet in the window.

The ship began to sway like a leaf falling in fast motion. Jaavi wrestled with the controls. The rocking caused the already nervous Skyra's stomach to turn knots around itself. The shaking only intensified for several seconds before the ship gave one final heave to the right. She felt her lunch coming up, but she swallowed it down.

Jaavi brought the ship up right, and then glanced back at Marthus. Marthus returned the look, both of them sharing a moment of curiosity.

"That was..." Jaavi began.

"...Way too easy," Marthus finished his sentence.

"The scanner says that it was in fact ozone we passed through. The atmosphere is thin and if I didn't know any better, I'd say it was controlled."

Marthus looked past Jaavi out the window. The ground rising up outside brought the fact they were still flying a ship home for him.

"Deploy the landing gear before we crash," Marthus said with a slightly annoyed tone.

Jaavi turned back to find he was closer than he thought to an untimely death. He flipped a few switches and turned a few knobs and sat back to let the craft bring herself down. The landing gear deployed noisily with a sound like scrapping gear and the landing boosters could be heard firing beneath the ship.

The craft shuddered one final time and the landing boosters died. Jaavi whirled back around to face Marthus.

"All I'm saying is..."

"Drop it," Marthus interrupted him. "I've had enough weirdness to last a lifetime."

A console next to Sehrab began to beep urgently. Sehrab turned around, looked at it, turned around back towards the group, and reported to Marthus.

"Captain," he said. "We've got multiple heat sig's headed towards our ship."

"How long until they're on top of us?" asked Marthus.

"About a minute or so, depending on whether they're humanoid."

"Take Skyra and go figure out what the hell is going on."

Sehrab unbuckled and pushed Koli to the floor. The nemek landed on four feet and scampered on to the console nearest to Sehrab. The hatch was closer to him than it was to Skyra, and yet somehow, the jungthorian predator got their first. She was apparently eager to get off the ship.

Skyra hit a button and the hatch opened with a hissing of wind and the sound of a hundred tiny gears whirring away. She was out first. She scanned the area in front of her and turned to check her back. A blade was held by a white cloaked figure whose face Skyra had trouble seeing. Even so, she could tell that it was not a human she was looking at.

The creature began growling. Skyra soon realized it was making noises in a pattern, almost as if it were trying to communicate. She reached out and grabbed the wrist, hoping the bracelet Thomas had given her worked.

The cloaked creature reeled back as he felt Skyra touch his hand, and then slowly approached as he found himself staring at a member of his own species.

Skyra examined herself. She was human, sort of. Besides hair the color of her natural fur, she had other features which made her decide she was in fact, not human. Her ears seemed more in tune with the world around her and her nose picked up all the wildlife in the area. In her mouth, she had a pair of short, almost unnoticeable fangs.

She looked back at the hooded creature. It had removed its hood to reveal it too looked human now that there was nothing hiding its face. But Skyra found something peculiar. It came to her that this was not the face she'd been looking at under the hood. This was something else. Something calmer.

The human-like creature began to growl again, only this time, Skyra understood what it was saying.

"What trickery is this?" it said.

Skyra lifted her bracelet so that he could see.

"This bracelet allows me to assume the form of your species," Skyra explained. "Please, tell me that which you seek."

"What is this ship?"

"It is called, the 'Storm Bird.'"

"Why have you landed here?"

"We seek the one called Paero."

The creature sat down and crossed his legs. He rested his elbow on his leg and his head on his fist and studied Skyra for a minute.

"Are there more of you?" he asked finally.

"Yes."

"How many?"

"Six."

"You will follow me. I will take you to our leader."

"Thank you."

"It is for he to decide your fate."

Skyra turned back inside to the others. They were waiting eagerly for her to say something.

"He wants us to follow him," he said.

"How many are there?" Sehrab asked.

"I can only see one."

Everyone on the bridge exchanged a couple of glances. Then Sehrab turned back to Skyra and nodded. The rest of the crew filed out onto the ground.

There was some movement around them. The tails of creeping figures could be seen, though the main body of the creatures evaded sight for quite some time. When all of the crew finally nervously climbed out of the Storm Gale, several more cloaked creatures like the one Skyra had encountered came out of the brush surrounding the ship. They held obsolete weapons with wooden stocks and clip magazines. Marthus thought they might just have been old enough to actually fire bullets rather than blasts.

Sehrab put his hand on his own gun, but one of the creatures growled at him. He growled back, almost as though conversing with the creature. Finally, they came to an impasse and Sehrab surrendered the gun.

***

The crew of the Storm Gale was lead through a thick forest with wild and unchecked undergrowth that slashed out at them as they walked by. The creatures were always there, watching, waiting for one of them to make a break for it.

Eventually, the forest thinned out and the crew beheld a city right out of the middle ages complete with turrets, towers, and uneven bricks stacked one on the other to the sky to form walls. Their guards directed them to an iron gate in the wall. One of the creatures waved a flag and the door opened to let them pass. The creatures shoved them through. One was unlucky enough to catch Sehrab on the back and the werewolf swung out, but Sehrab's arm stopped just a little short. He looked back at his elbow to find Marthus had it.

"Let it go," said Marthus.

Sehrab sneered at the creature, but neither said nor did anything more.

The crew of the Storm Gale was lead through a city with architecture like nothing they had seen. It was ancient, yet fresh and clean. It was simple, yet sturdy and useful. It was simple, yet bizarrely more complicated than anything any of them had seen before.

People, men, women, and children gathered in the street to see them as they were lead toward the center. The creatures came in all sizes. Large, fat, skinny, tall, short, all of them hooded to prevent their faces from being seen. It was a strange sight to behold for the crew of the Storm Gale, though no more strange than it was for the creatures who stared upon a multitude of races and species walking in their midst.

All the creatures remained hidden in shadow with their faces veiled beneath the darkness of their hoods, all of them, save one. A figure no larger than a child wandered into the street in the path of the Storm Gale's crew and their captors. Its face was illuminated in the sunlight as its hood fell away. He had a dark mane around his neck and fur all over a face. Marthus, who spotted the child running into the street, found himself staring at the face and into the eyes of wolf.

"They're..." he started, but shock cut him short.

The mother of the child ran across. Under the hood, she too had a wolf's head resting on her shoulders.

"Werewolves," Jaavi finished the sentence Marthus had abandoned.

The look on Sehrab's face was one of a man who had found something he longed for though never known he'd needed it. It was confusion in the light of truth; the wish to run from something wonderful.

"There have been legends of werewolves traveling the cosmos throughout the ages," Ginasa said. "I never in my life believed them to be true. Just fairy tales of wolf creatures wandering the stars looking for a place to be their home."

Her eyes brightened.

"This must be their promised land," she said. "This is where they settled. It explains everything."

Sehrab began to growl at one of the guards. Once again, they went back and forth, the sounds flowing like a simple conversation had at a high pitch. They finished after what seemed like a brief discussion. When they were done, Marthus turned to Sehrab.

"What did he say?" Marthus asked.

"He said we were invaders to their home world," said Sehrab. "That we are to be tried before their king. That he would like to see us hanged."

Marthus was stunned at the last part. There had been many threats to his life throughout his years, but these people, these creatures, he hadn't even met yet.

"Why?" he asked in a baffled tone.

"We're invaders," Sehrab said calmly. "I personally believe he's full of shit but I've only got his word. Nobody else is talking."

Marthus glanced at the other guards, confused by what Sehrab had told him.

"Have you asked them?" he said finally.

"In a way, yes."

"What do you mean 'in a way'?"

"I asked, he was the only one who answered. That means the others are a little higher up on the food chain and think it's beneath them to talk to us."

"How do you know all this?"

Sehrab shook his head.

"I'm not exactly sure. Instinct probably."

A gate loomed ahead; a fortress hidden beneath the skylines of houses lining the center road. It was not long before the rest of it came into view. A massive castle extended with its towers and turrets reaching out to hold up the sky. Bricks laid perfectly, mixed perfectly. The walls were a pure white and smooth as a sheet of metal. It had been master stonemasons who'd built this citadel.

The iron gate past the walls opened up. The crew was pushed through or rather forced; most had taken to gawking and marveling.

Cloaked soldiers stood with pikes pointed straight up in the air. They lined the way to the entrance of the castle's main building. Beneath their cloaks, they wore white armor that, like everything else in the city, seemed to be from the Middle Ages. They guarded the entrance like statues, ready to fight like savages if the need ever arose.

The crew of the Storm Gale was lead straight up to the main building where two guards stood with their pikes crossing in front of the entrance. The guards straightened up and lifted their pikes away. The guards forced the crew through the doors into an empty hallway.

They were lead up the hallway to an open chamber where a regal chair was raised higher than the rest of the room. A king like figure in a cloak with a golden band around its head was in the chair. Several more scholarly individuals stood around the chair, robed rather than cloaked.

The room was covered in golden shields, sharp looking swords, and the crest of the current Lycan king hanging over a fire place at the rear of the room. The room was large and towering. It had an almost agoraphobic quality to it.

The figure with the golden band on his head stood and raised his hands. The creatures who lead the Storm Gale's crew threw back their hoods revealing their Lycan forms and bowed with a single hand across their chest.

"Leave us," the regal figure said. The scholars hurriedly left, their sandals clicking against the hard stone ground. The king waited until they were gone to continue. He growled to his fellow creatures in their language. Marthus turned to Sehrab for translation.

"What's he saying?" Marthus said.

"He asked who we were," Sehrab explained.

The guard began to growl.

"He said we sought Paero."

The king growled again.

"He..."

"He what?" Marthus asked urgently.

"He asked them to leave."

The guards shared glances and then did as they were told. They filed out promptly without any argument.

The king got off his throne. He walked toward the crew of the Storm Gale, removing the gold, crown-like band on his head. He threw back his hood to reveal a very convincing human form.

"Welcome to Lyc," he said. "My name is Carnassus. I am king of this world."

He waved his arm at Marthus.

"Why is it you have come?"

Marthus looked up. He opened his mouth to speak, but shut it and opted to think a little longer on what he was going to say.

"Speak!" the Lycan king commanded.

"We're here to speak with Paero," Mathus said finally.

Carnassus looked confused. Then he laughed and wandered back to his throne. He sat down, still chuckling to himself as he put his head on a fist and supported both on an arm of his royal chair.

"Is that a problem?" Marthus asked, a slight bit of aggravation in his voice.

"For you maybe."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Carnassus leaned closer towards Marthus.

"You ask to speak with our god."

Marthus exchanged a glance with Ginasa, who stood next to him to her left and Skyra to her right. The major expressions in the group were worried and confused.

"Can we speak to him?" Marthus finally asked.

"Why?" Carnassus asked, not a drop of malice or ill meaning in his voice.

"So that we may avert a tragedy."

Carnassus looked deep in thought. He sat and stroked his chin until finally, he came upon a decision.

"We will go tonight," he said. "Until such time, you may use my home to rest and prepare yourselves to speak with one of a higher power."

Guards flowed into the room making it perfectly clear that the Lycan king's decision was not a choice. They were shoved into a large area with doors leading to bedrooms and an open bath.

Skyra was suddenly struck with a thought. She looked around frantically for something.

"What?" Sehrab asked her.

"Where's Koli?" she said.

***

Koli wasn't in the castle. He was quite a ways from it both in surroundings and distance. Having snuck off when the group was lead into the city, he now found himself in what appeared to be a hovel. The room in which the owners kept their valuables to be exact.

Koli quickly and professionally went over the room, scanning everything, looking for something of real value. All he'd found so far was a simple painting, some chipped, crystal wine glasses, and a gold locket with a picture inside of a man who appeared to be like the creatures of the world of Lyc.

He pocketed the locket. It was the only thing he thought he could sell. He started to leave when a shadow flowed through the door way and he looked up into the soft face of a female werewolf staring straight at him. She wore a cloak, but the hood was down and the center was open. Underneath, she had torn peasant clothing on with the stomach open to a flat midsection.

"What do we have here?" she said.

"Just go away and nobody has to get hurt," Koli said, putting on his best tough guy look.

"So you want to fight?"

"Not if I don't have to. Now move out of the way."

The she-wolf's stomach grumbled. She smiled a wicked grin directly at Koli. She reached out and snatched Koli off the ground. His head band slipped off in the process but he managed to hold onto the locket until the she-wolf pried it from his fingers.

"What are doing?" Koli complained. "Put me down."

"You want down?" the she-wolf dangled him over her jaws.

"No!"

"You just said you did, didn't you?"

"Just put me on the ground and I'll leave the locket and go."

"Oh you've lost that right a long time ago."

Koli's eye twitched.

"Please reconsider."

The she-wolf's stomach growled again. She lowered Koli. The nemek thrashed about violently trying to free himself but to no avail. The wolf lowered him to her jaws and let gravity force him to the back of her mouth. Then with an enormous swallow, she forced him into her throat. He sank down as she continued swallowing, finally, he fell through to a large cavern.

The stomach. He was in the stomach.

Koli panicked. He struck the walls and kicked as much as he could, trying to upset the lining. The she-wolf sat back with her hands behind her head and enjoyed his struggles against the inside of her belly. Koli's form could barely be seen on her middle. Her stomach moved in time with him as he continued to struggle.

Koli put up a solid fight for several minutes before, eventually, he gave up from exhaustion. As he was succumbing to his fate, the she-wolf busied herself by covering herself once more and preparing to leave. She threw up her hood and left into the cold night.

***

The night was dark. The sleepy town surrounding the castle of Carnassus was quiet and still. Nothing moved on the streets nor could anything be seen through the shut windows. One lone female Lycan made her way to the front gate. The guards saw her and dropped on one knee, saluting with a single hand beneath their chest. The she-wolf hissed and one of the guards got up. He grabbed hold of the winch and turned. The gate rose with a metallic ringing and the gears in the winch all creaked against one another.

The guard whom opened the gate sank back to a solemn salute as the she-wolf passed. She went straight to the large door leading into the main complex and let herself in with one of the iron hopes that went up the right side of the door.

The wood creaked as it spun aside. The she-wolf entered and went down the hall to the throne room. She stood at the doorway and waited for Carnassus to notice her. The king was listening to his advisors rant and rave about things that made no sense out of context. Still, she listened as she waited patiently.

"My liege," one said. He looked like the military advisor as he wore a sword and scabbard in which to hold it. "How can you be so certain we may trust these people? Do you not remember the last time we allowed them to walk in our midst?"

"Of course I remember," Carnassus asserted. "It was but days ago."

The Lycan king rose from his thrown and paced about the room. His advisors remained next to his throne. One advisor, dressed in a holy robe decorated with gold lace, raised his hands to the air and spoke with conviction.

"If they wish to speak with a god," he said. "Why have they not shown faith? Why do they come here demanding to speak directly with our god rather than to pray to her?"

"That is what concerns me," the military advisor said. "My liege, they have brought weapons. What if they plan to kill Paero?"

Carnassus stopped and stroked his chin. He turned back towards his thrown and looked upon his advisors wearily.

"You base these assumptions on those who raided our city late at night," Carnassus said. "Those who came in large numbers. But we are wiser and we are stronger. And as such, we cannot live in fear of our enemies, lest they control us through our attempts to prevent them."

"This not a time to be sprouting ideals, my liege," said the religious advisor.

Carnassus grew red in the face. Angrily he took a step forward and clenched his fists by his side.

"No, of course not," he said, nearly shouting in rage. "Our enemy surround us and raid our most holy of cities and now is the time to be sending friends away in the night?"

"Sir-"

"No, do not speak," Carnassus said. "I am sickened by your voice and I wish you to leave."

"As you will," the advisors said at the same time.

The left through the hallway farthest from the one the female Lycan was hiding in, frustration clearly visible on their faces.

Carnassus sat down on the throne and glanced around the room. His eyes looked tired and his face appeared worried. The she-wolf gave up on trying to draw his attention and instead walked out from where she hid. She walked out in a seductive way, beckoning with her eyes towards her king.

Carnassus looked over at her. She flicked her hair and watched him. He stood from his thrown and ran to her, throwing out his arms to her. They had a quick embrace and then the Lycan king pulled back from the she-wolf.

"Are you...?" he started, referring to a slight bulge in her stomach.

"No, it is not child but prey."

Carnassus smiled painfully.

"That is good as well."

The she-wolf seemed to become angry with him.

"That is all that you care about?"

"It is the reason for mating, is it not?"

This only made the she-wolf angrier. She stormed out. Carnassus called after her, but she had gone. He slumped back onto the throne. He lay still for several moments before finally beckoning for a servant on the other side of the room.

"And then fetch the prisoners," he said in his language. "Hurry."

The servant nodded and went about his the tasks dictated. He rushed off down the hall, past several armored guards, and arrived at the door to where the crew of the Storm Gale was being held. Behind the door, the servant could hear them engaging in a heated discussion in common Human tongue.

The servant opened the door and caught an earful of their conversation. Something about a small, furry man sneaking off to somewhere and it being everyone else's fault. Nothing for a humble servant to get mixed up in. Someone spotted him after a couple of seconds standing in the doorway. One by one, all the heads turned on him, a worried look on all the faces except one. Sehrab, as always, looked virtually unaffected.

"My liege would appreciate your presence," the servant said. It was one of the few words he knew in human. The others were: "Please come with me."

All the heads in the room save one swiveled around and looked at Marthus. He looked around at the people staring at him, and then back in the eyes of the servant. He exhaled and got onto his feet. Everyone else stood up. He glanced around at his crew one last time, and then lead the way out of the door.

The servant guided them back to the throne room where Carnassus was waiting patiently. He looked up at them as they entered.

"I hope your accommodations have been fair," he said politely.

"You locked us in a room," Marthus said, his voice reeking of venom. "Then you posted guards outside. I don't know how your kind defines fair, but I don't know that I would call them that."

"Tell me sailor," Carnassus said, remaining casual. "What is your name?"

"My name?"

"What is it you are called?"

"Marthus."

"Marthus, we have every reason to suspect you mean ill. You come down from the heavens on an iron ship, clad in weapons, and not a week after our city was sacked."

"Sacked?"

"We were attacked, raided as it were, by purple-scaled lizard creatures with guns more powerful than ours."

"Wait, how long ago was this?"

"No less than a week."

Marthus glanced at Ginasa. Their eyes met for half a second.

"You knew the men who raided us?"

"We've been chasing them," said Marthus. "They want to cause the disaster we wish to avert."

"Then you are friends here. Against the advice of my council, I have decided your cause to be worthy. You may enter our most sacred temple and speak to the god to whom all this planet belongs."

***

The high temple of Lyc was a beautiful building on the inside. A massive, sky blue roof towering over what appeared to be statue of the dragon Paero that made even the large space inside the temple seem small. The ceiling was decorated with paintings of heroic war victories, important looking figures, and a hand within a paw, the symbol of the Lycans.

Along the walls, the kings of old slept peacefully within their stone tombs. There were hundreds of them, many bearing the names and dates of kings, each engraved with the special seal associated with that particular king. Marthus found one marked Carnassus. It had a birth date, but the death date had yet to be known, much less carved.

The crew of the Storm Gale huddled around the entrance, waiting for Carnassus to tell or show them what to do. The Lycan king stepped into the temple, stopped, and closed his eyes. His face bore a serene look. His breathing was shallow and completely unforced. After a good thirty seconds went by, he slowly opened his eyes and drew his sword.

He advanced towards the statue, holding the blade in one hand. With all delicacy, he drew back the sword and with a swift, striking motion, shoved the point into the ground. He bent down behind the sword and made a soft, whining noise with his mouth.

"What's he doing?" Marthus asked Sehrab.

Sehrab shot Marthus an annoyed look.

"Why don't you go ask him?" Sehrab said sarcastically.

"Marthus," Ginasa said before a fight broke out. "I believe he is praying."

Marthus suddenly became frustrated.

"Well isn't that great. So this is how we'll talk to his 'god'."

"Would you prefer something less face to face?" it was Carnassus. He had apparently finished and was now walking back to the group. "Or did you mean for direct contact."

"We were actually hoping to meet your god."

Carnassus smiled devilishly. He looked as though he knew something they didn't.

"There she is," he said pointing at the statue. "Right over there."

Marthus followed where the Lycan king pointed. The statue was still there. Made completely of stone. Not even giving the illusion of life.

Marthus felt his eye twitch and his pulse jump and skip. He suddenly had an amazingly strong urge to rip Carnassus in two.

"Is there one that will talk back?" he asked, laughing insanely.

"Oh ye of little faith," the voice was massive and it echoed through the cavern. It had a feminine quality to it, large as it was. It didn't take long for Marthus to realize it came from the statue itself.

"I am Paero," the voice came again. "I have taken this form for my own protection."

Scales appeared on the snout of the statue and spread to the rest of the head. The statue transformed into a blood red dragoness in mere seconds. The dragoness had a black spine and filled the entire temple. It lifted its head and punched through the roof. Shards of stone broke away and crashed to the ground.

The dragoness towered high above them. She was far larger than the statue they had seen. Her red scales glittered in the full moon over Lyc.

"Now you wish to speak with me?" she said.

Marthus was so caught up in staring at the legendary beast towering above him, he failed to notice when the rest of the group instinctively backed up. He realized a split-second later, with a glance around, he was on his own.

"Yes," he said, choking on the word.

"Of what do you wish to speak?" the dragoness asked.

"I was sent by Thomas."

"Ah, then you must have a great importance."

By some chance, the dragoness happened to lay eyes on Tyr, who bravely stood his ground next to Theron. Her eyes grew wide in shock and she paused a moment before continuing.

"Something has happened," she said to him. "What?"

"Ryt," was all Tyr told her.

She turned urgently to Carnassus.

"Good king Carnassus," she said. "You know that I have protected this planet, given it life."

"Yes," he said. "And I have paid my respects daily."

"I have no question of your loyalty. But I must leave, and when I do, the world will become lifeless once more. You must lead your people from this planet."

"I would rather not see our home wither. But if it is your will, I will so do it."

"Go, gather your people. You have ships that can traverse the stars themselves, use them to flee this doomed world."

"I will so do it."

He left, flagging a couple of guards as he did.

"Captain Marthus," Paero said. "You and your crew will accompany me. I know where it is you seek."

She paused and took a good look at the rest of the group for a moment, studying them, weighing them in her mind. She glanced once more at Tyr.

"Darkness approaches," she said finally. "It will be a time of great evil."

"And let me guess," Jaavi said, stepping forward. "'Even greater heroes,' right?"

"One can only hope."