Chapter 1 of my first attempt at a novel (Both story and title are majorly ~WIP~)
Chapter 1:
As Avra walked on the stone path leading to Vergan, he wondered if he really could trust the Seers back home. They told him he had a magnificent destiny and a magic-wielding partner to find. Did he believe it? No, he just grew weary of his old town. Now, traveling with only a pack of supplies, some armour, and a broadsword, he entered the gates of Vergan to be greeted by the destroyed section of the town. As he made his way to the inn at the other side of the rubble, the Seer's stone started to warm in his pack. Great, he thought, more non-sense. As he checked into the inn and made his way up to the room he was given, he undid the side pocket of his pack and retrieved the Seer's stone from it. Bolting the door behind him, he sat down on the edge of the bed and stared at the stone, waiting for the message it would be bringing him from the Seers. "We see that you are in Vergan, good. Your transportation will arrive shortly, a unique little ship named The Wind Rider. Board it and ask to go to the merchant city of Dirtrin in the East. We will contact you there." The Elder Seer said to him through the stone, which then stopped glowing and had the appearance of a regular stone. Avra sighed then unbolted the door and left to go wait for the ship, The Wind Rider, to come into port.
As he waited, he noticed a cloaked woman watching the same port as him. He, not being interested in the female, simply shrugged it off and watched as The Wind Rider finally made shore and docked. He walked up to the ship and began heading towards the man ordering the crew around, who he assumed was the captain of the ship, and took out three steel coins to pay with. "Another three after we get to Dirtrin." He said, walking onto the ship. Avra then looked back and saw the woman get on board too. He watched as she walked over to him and gave him a bag of steel coin. "What's this for?" He asked, looking suspiciously into the bag at the large sum of money he was just handed. "You paid for me so I thought I'd repay you." She said with a little wink. Avra might have considered flirting back if not for the paranoia this woman just caused him to feel. She had an almost delicate figure that complimented the eyes and lush green eyes almost the colour of emeralds. However, Avra wasn't about to fall for a stranger and stalk her, he had a quest to finish. A stupid quest, he thought to himself.
Hours passed as the ship sailed out of Vergan and headed east before he saw the woman on deck again, this time she wore a tight white dress that caressed her figure. Seduction doesn't work on me, harpy, he thought to himself. He saw her twitch slightly as if someone had lightly hit her in the arm. Bingo, he thought as he threw the bag of steel, now a bag of rocks, at the woman's head. It took not even ten seconds for the harpy to look back and launch into the air in order to dodge the bag or rocks, her white "dress" morphing into her wings as she hovered in the air, the gruesome harpy shedding the fake form and donning it's real appearance. Her face was a mix of avian and human with a beak protruding where her lips and nose would be, her fingers replaced by sharp talons and her body covered in dusty grey feathers. Quickly and with trained precision, Avra whipped his cloak back to gain access to two of his eight hunting knives and threw them at the harpy. Curling into a flying ball to dodge the knives, the harpy wasn't able to notice that her body wasn't his target, her wings were. As soon as the knives hit, Avra was stunned by a shriek louder than any normal harpy's. This was a mating harpy, and it just called for its mates. Avra immediately pulled his broadsword from its scabbard on his back and waited for the harpy's cavalry to arrive, only none did. Avra quickly slew the mating harpy, collected his knives from her wings, and threw her overboard just as a fully armed crew emerged from below decks.
"It's all fine, I took care of your harpy problem." Avra said, sheathing his broadsword. The crew all sighed in relief and started returning below deck but the captain remained above deck with Avra. "I never seen such aim with huntin' knives." The captain said walking up to Avra. "Thank you, Leopard." As soon as Avra said the word Leopard, the captain sighed and morphed into a half-feline, half-human anthropomorphic hybrid. "How did you know?" It said, half growling and half speaking to him. "Talent of mine." Avra said, walking over and leaning against the ship's mast. The Leopard morphed back and leaned against the other side of the mast. "It must be helpful to see who lies and who's in disguise." The Leopard said. "Like you and the harpy, eh Leopard?" Avra asked with a smirk forming on his lips. "My names if Fang Ripper." The Leopard said, holding his hand out to Avra.
Avra shook his hand and smirked at Fang Ripper. "You do know that most of your crew aren't human, right? Well, not fully human anyway." Avra asked as he let go of Fang Ripper's hand. "Yeah, I figured as much. Humans aren't as talented as these boys are." The captain said as he let his hand fall to his side, grinning. "And Humans get better work than you Hybrids." Avra said, returning Fang Ripper's grin with his own. "We may be Hybrids but we have more talent than any mere Human." Fang Ripper said boldly and pumped as his chest in pride. They both started laughing at that before Fang Ripper noticed something. In the distance, shadows were flying towards the ship. As they neared, they were easily identified as harpies. Faces with beaks, feathered bodies, talons in place of fingers and sometimes even toes. Some even had bosoms identifying them openly as females.
Avra quickly drew his broadsword and readied one of his hunting knives to throw when they were in range. Looking over, he saw Fang Ripper morph back into his Leopard form and run over to ring a giant bell that was placed near the stairway up to the helm of the ship. As it rang, the harpies started landing on the deck and Avra, after throwing his knife into the chest of one of them and losing it overboard, ran over and started hacking away at their numbers. As their numbers seemed to start overwhelming him, Fang Ripper jumped in and slashed at two of them, forcing them to back away and giving Avra some space to retreat into a better location. Putting his back to the wall separating the deck from the captain's quarters, the harpies had only one available path to him: Right where he could swing his sword and hack them down before they made any noticeable distance on him. Suddenly, however, the crew started emerging from below decks, many of them Hybrid species Avra couldn't recognize immediately. There were Mer hybrids, bat hybrids, spider hybrids, even a select few other Leopards, but the majority were Hybrids he couldn't identify the species of.
As he and Fang Ripper held their ground against the harpy onslaught, the Hybrid sailors all started charging at harpies, moving out and around to herd them into one area of the ship's deck, some of them being forced to take to the air to avoid being crushed by the others as the sailors closed in on them. As the rest of the harpies started to retreat to the air, a giant shadow passed over the ship as a giant winged manticore flew overhead. "Holy hell..." Avra said, watching it pass. "That's impossible! They don't grow to be half that size!" Fang Ripper said in awe. "You're right, they don't." A black robed woman said as she weaved between the sailors, who seemed not to notice her or react to her in the slightest. "Who are you?!" Fang Ripper snarled, quickly focusing himself to the probable threat in front of him. "My name is Shivora." The woman said, her breath visible as a cold mist when she spoke.
As the mysterious woman Shivora walked up to Fang Ripper and Avra, a sudden chill ran up their spines before they mysteriously slammed down to the deck floor. "What the..." Fang Ripper started to say before his mouth was covered in ice and froze shut. "That is called magic, my dear Leopard." Shivora said, kneeling down to closer to eye level with the two of them. "What do you want, demon?" Avra said looking up at not a woman in a black robe, but a creature made of ice that flowed like liquid water that was taking the visage of a human female. "Demon? No, my dear, I am no demon. I AM A GOD!" She screamed as an explosion of ice ran over Fang Ripper, Avra, and the rest of the boat. What stood before them instead was the flowing ice of Giaccu, the demon of ice.
"No, you're a filthy demon." Avra said, spitting on her feet in disgust. Furious, Giaccu kicked him in the jaw, sending him off the floor and into the wall he had been using to cover his back previously. As he slid to the floor, Avra grinned and threw one of his hunting knives at Giaccu, who simply slapped it away like a twig. During those precious few seconds of distraction, Avra ran up to Giaccu and used a second knife to stab her in the heart. Giaccu backed away from Avra in shock as she looked down at the knife in her chest. "But...how?" She said, bursting into snowflakes that flew away in the breeze. "Good job, mate." Fang Ripper commented as he stood. "Yeah..." Avra said, picking up his hunting knife off the deck, the blade of the knife now tinted a light blue. "The heart of Giaccu is now inside that knife of yours." Fang Ripper said, eyeing the blue knife blade. "Yeah. One down, nine to go." Avra said as he sheathed the knife, remembering what happened to cause the southern half of Vergan to become the rubble it was, before sheathing it, purposely separating it from his other knives.
The two looked around as the crewmen started moving again, fending off and scaring away the rest of the harpies, who had also been frozen seemingly in time. Back to business then, the two seemed to think at the same time as they ran towards the mast and raced up it. As they reached the top, the giant winged manticore was turning to pass over the ship once more. "On three?" Avra asked, looking at Fang Ripper. "We ain't no wimps, are we? On go." Fang Ripper said, grinning. Avra returned the smile as they turned to face where the winged manticore would be approaching from.
As it neared, Fang Ripper couched down to ready himself to jump on the winged manticore using the power in his Hybrid legs while Avra stood in a balanced stance that would let him thrust his broadsword up and gut the creature as it fly overhead. The moment the winged manticore's shadow touched the ship, Fang Ripper yelled "Go!". The ship's captained jumped high in the air and landed on the manticore's back, clawing at the beast while Avra thrusted up with his sword, stabbing at it. The winged manticore barely reacted, however, as the magic that had made it grown had also made it tougher, their efforts barely scratching the surface skin. Avra grabbed a coil of rope from the floor of the crow's nest and jumped onto the winged manticore's tail as it passed the ship a second time.
As Avra began climbing his way up the winged manticore's back, he saw Fang Ripper still trying to claw at the creature. "It's no use. We can't hurt it!" Avra said, grabbing onto Fang Ripper's wrist when he approached the Leopard. "Then how do we stop it?" Fang Ripper asked, looking quizzically at the rope Avra held in his other hand. "Maybe we can just steer it away from your ship. Can you tie this for me?" Avra asked, handing Fang Ripper the coil of rope. Quickly and expertly, the ship captain tied the rope into a noose big enough to fit over the monster's neck. "Hope you have a plan C up your sleeve as well." Fang Ripper said as they climbed towards the manticore's neck and threw the noose over it, pulling on the rope to tighten the knot as it reached the base on the creature's neck. Shocked and startled, the giant winged manticore made a turn sharper than either Fang Ripper or Avra thought a beast that big could make. Grabbing the rope and the manticore's fur, Avra watched as Fang Ripper's grip slipped and he spun around to swan dive into the ocean below them. Show off, Avra thought as he climbed up to the knot in the rope and pulled, reigning in the winged beast and forcing it to submit and go where he chooses. He looked down and watched as Fang Ripper was helped to his ship by Mer Hybrids and waved up at him. Avra waved back and flew the giant winged manticore next to the ship, scaring away any leftover harpies away from the ship.
Days later, Fang Ripper looked up at Avra from the helm of his ship and pointed straight ahead. In the distance, the silhouette of a city was forming. Avra steered the manticore close to the ship and jumped off, taking out a knife and cutting the rope to free the creature, who immediately turned and flew as far as possible from the ship as fast as it could. "Well that was a fun trip." Fang Ripper said in his human form, although to Avra there was no difference. "That is was." Avra said, handing the second group of three steel coins to Fang Ripper. "Forgot all about that, thank ye kindly." The captain said, pocketing the coins quickly. "No problem. See you around." Avra said, putting his cloak on to conceal his sword. "Good travels friend." Fang Ripper yelled after him, waving. Avra waved back then lost sight of the ship as he walked into the crowd of the desert commerce city of Dirtrin.