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Diago felt the moonbeams caress his back, and felt strength well within him. This was his destiny.

Under the starry sky, the wolves gathered, their weapons in hand, their clothes in tatters. Each one bore a scar somewhere on their bodies. Some snarled at each other, jockeying for space as they gathered around the hill Diago stood on. He drew the sword from his belt, gripping it in one hand, then in two, and the noises from the crowd stopped. The blade of the Silver Fang seemed to glow in the moonlight. Gleaming white metal in a lovely, single-edged blade, runes etched into the flat that announced its name and history. Diego had never seen anything so elegantly beautiful. He put it on his shoulder, languidly relaxing as he looked out over the crowd of wolves that were now his soldiers.

He saw fear, reverence, awe, and felt it too. He did not open his mouth to speak.

Brave sons and daughters of the Moon, tommorow we go forth. Tommorow, we teach the world to remember the Second Moon Crusade, and fear our forefathers-in-kin, when they came to these shores so many years ago and crushed all before them. Tommorow, we remind them that though Ironfang is gone, his legacy remains, in us_, and in this weapon I hold and speak to you with. Tommorrow, we remind them that we are their masters._

_ _

He flourished the sword, gracefully turning it about and settling it in front of his muzzle, edge outwards. For tommorow, we will begin the Third Moon Rising!

There were no cheers. There were no shouts. There were not even snarls of approval. Those would come later. Instead there was approval. Assent. A radiating feeling of purpose that he shared and magnified and reflected.

Diago's scarred muzzle split open in a feral grin, and he sheathed the sword and walked away. Then, and only then, did the cheers start.

--

"Are we really chasing cattle bandits, master Kawheek?" Thenyr sighed, trying to contain his annoyance at the third straight hour of marching and trying to keep his feathers clean in the trail dust. "Surely these people can handle them without us." He scratched at the dirt with a talon, absentmindedly, as the group came to a halt to let a herder and his flock of sheep cross the road.

"Thirty heads of cattle disappearing in a week is too much for this to be ordinary bandits. This is pillaging." Kawheek's eyes remained stoically cast downwards, in thought, as his staff methodically planted into the ground with every other step. "Have patience. I feel that we will do good here, by helping them."

Thenyr snorted. "We are unwelcome." The two avians walked alone, the other men in the ad-hoc mercenary group completely ignoring the two beastfolk, or casting surrepticious glances at Thenyr's armor. They walked in small groups, of four to six, keeping to those that they knew. The constable led the group with a few of his trusted men, up ahead, heedless to the fractured nature of his imprompteu fighting force.

"We are outsiders, and they are curious." Kawheek answered, still resolute. His master surely must have received patience as a divine gift as well, unlike him, Thenyr thought. Why did clerics not get such favor when monks did? "It's not often holy men travel with common mercenaries, let alone avian ones."

"All the more foolish are we." Thenyr sighed, but ceased his grumbling.

They kept marching throughout the day, until the sunlight started to fade and the stars started to show in the sky. The constable, a man named Het de la Viera, passed out little more than beer and hardtack, speaking little with his hired mercenaries and quite a lot with the two men at his side, always whispering out of earshot of the group. The mercenaries quickly dug into their packs when they next stopped for a marching halt, quickly pulling out salted meat and rations. Kawheek seemed to eat almost nothing, Thenyr noticed, as he dipped into his own supply. Instead the smaller hawk seemed to subside on little more than a single strip of meat. Thenyr heard mumbling about how his master must surely have grown up so small from eating so little, and glared over his beak at the culprits until they noticed.

"Thenyr." Kawheek spoke, tugging his pupil towards the side of the road. Half warning, half attention-getting.

"What?" Thenyr broke his gaze reluctantly and followed his master's clawtip as it pointed. He squinted, but could see nothing. There was precious little daylight left by which to see by, and he was no owl. His vision was rapidly growing useless in the night.

"Do you see that branch there, that is too solid to be a branch, next to the untilled edge of that field?" It was spring, and the crops had just been seeded, so there were no crops to impede vision. Kawheek pointed to a part of a farmer's fence, three farms down.

"... I do now." Thenyr blinked. "What is it?"

"It is either a farming tool or a curved piece of bone." Kawheek pondered, looking up at his student.

The thought was interrupted as the constable finally turned around and spoke. "The cattle-bandits," He announced in his rich central accent, reaching down to grab a helmet proffered by one of his retainers, pulling it onto his head. "were last seen around this area. The locals tell us the strikes only happened at night. As of right now, we are on guard duty. We are to patrol the area and look for the culprits. Sound the alarm if you see anything."

"Pray tell, where would you have us go?" One of the men in the lead mercenary group spoke, in what was a sure mockery of the very same central accent. There were a few snickers.

"You may have your discretion of postings, gentlemen." Viera lowered the visor on his helmet, apparently oblivious, or uncaring, of the joke. "Do not go beyond the edge of the fields, or beyond shouting distance. We will be on the road." His two retainers in tow, the constable turned and walked away, his armor clanking.

Kawheek and Thenyr looked at each other, and Kawheek gestured outwards. "Shall we?"

--

"I just do not understand why none of those men take their jobs seriously." Thenyr complained, as the two of them found their way through the fields without trodding their talons on anyone's seeds. "The mercenaries I met before this were all professional, kind, resolute! Do they think this is a joke?"

"Were you not disparaging the seriousness of this work just a few hours ago, my student?"

Thenyr fell silent.

Kawheek permitted himself a slight smile as he pressed onwards, closing a handtalon around a fencepost as he leant on his staff for support, pulling himself up the slight hill at the edge of the field they found themselves on. It lay fallow, the farmhouse it was next to dilapidated and abandoned. Past the edge of the field was forested plains and hills. They had reached the edge of the city.

It was, indeed, a bone. The bone was a long, slender, curved rib-bone, attached in turn to a rotting carcass that had been half-buried just outside the fence. With the way the terrain became hilly and rough, it was hidden from sight on the road, almost completely. The corpse itself was inside a steep ditch.

Thenyr blinked a few times, dumbfounded.

"The sight is foreign to a cleric, is it not? The corpse was dragged away from the grazing land, to here, and then eaten. Or eaten and then dragged here, it matters not. Then it was hidden." Kawheek peered at it, leaning down, his wings extending slightly to keep his balance. "This was no animal attack. Animals do not hide their carcasses after they have been stripped of meat."

"So an intelligent being did this. Ate one of the stolen cows without even waiting. Entrails and all." Thenyr shook his head. "What have we stumbled into?"

There was a shout from the left, and both their heads turned at the same time. Thenyr squinted, but it was useless. The light had gone and with it was his vision. Why had he not been born an owl?

"A struggle?" Kawheek flutter-hopped to the other side of the ditch, gripping his staff more tightly. "I hear scuffling. And I see fog creeping in."

Thenyr saw it now, too. A thick mist was filling the area. "Magic?"

"Yes."

Thenyr drew his mace from the baldric on his left side, and stepped around the ditch, decisively, raising it to his shoulder. "Let's go."

Together, the two sprinted forward, hopping over the detritus scattered about the decrepit road. Kawheek broke into the open, through the thicket surrounding the road, and Thenyr did afterwards, only for the cleric to almost plow into the back of his master. Kawheek left long, narrow lines in the dirt where he skidded to a halt, his head snapping back just in time to avoid the flash of a sword blade that appeared from the thicket. Kawheek ducked and rolled to the side, raising his staff, wings spread to maintain his balance.

Thenyr struggled to see his adversary. He seemed wreathed in a sheathe of dark fog, as did the rest of the area around them. He put the spike on the end of his mace forward and probed, only for his weapon to be battered aside. A point drove at his chest, and he twisted, letting it deflect off his armor. He tried to trap the blade underneath his arm, where it could do little damage, but the swordsman had already pulled the blade back. Thenyr swung his weapon up just in time to take the next swing square on, stepping backwards in surprise. He had been caught by surprise. No time to put his helmet on. Had to guard his head and beak. If only he had time for a spell!

Kawheek provided the opportunity, lunging in with the end of his staff towards the swordsman's face. The fog seemed to abate, just for an instant, as Thenyr heard the hard wood of the staff strike home. A shaggy body, a long muzzle, pointed ears, digitigrade paws, standing like a man.

"Werewolf!" Thenyr hissed, stepping back, snapping his fingers, running through a prayer as fast as he could in his head as his master battled with the night creature, his staff clacking against the silvery steel of the opponent's blade.

"I know." Kawheek answered, calmly, leaning his head aside as his adversary tried to bite him over a hard, close bind on his staff. A thundering kick upon the digit of a single talon to the werewolf's abdomen drew blood. The werewolf flinched, but not enough to avert the next blow. Kawheek stepped back too late, and the sword caught him on the upper leg, slicing into his flesh.

Thenyr stepped in, reaching out with his free left hand, grasping for the werewolf's shoulder. His hand crackled with energy. He was inches away when the wolf recovered and pivoted on the ball of one foot, striking powerfully to the side, knocking Thenyr's arm away. The edge caught the gap between Thenyr's bracer and upper arm armor, and he felt himself involuntarily caw in pain. Wounded, feeling his off arm go numb, Thenyr swung with all his might at his opponent's jaw, desperate to keep his teeth away, but surprisingly, the werewolf's jaw did not shoot forward like he was expecting. Instead he caught his opponent's arm, the mace connecting with a solid blow, and he felt bone give way.

The werewolf stepped back, off-kilter slightly, but then he shook his arm, as if in annoyance. The fog intensified suddenly, wrapping their adversary in whirling mist, and when Kawheek's staff snapped end-first into the cloud, it dissipated, leaving nothing behind.

Kawheek and Thenyr stepped into the middle of the road, and pressed their backs to one another, eyeing the thickets and branches, weapons raised. Thenyr shook his arm as blood drpped down it, flexing his fingers. It wasn't crippled. It just hurt. Good.

"You were not bitten?" Kawheek spoke, looking about, craning his head.

"No. What about you?"

"Not I." Kawheek nodded slightly, pausing. "The sounds of fighting have stopped."

"This is bad. We must find the constable." Thenyr murmured, his eyes shifting about, feeling his paranoia rise.

"We must find all of the others, Thenyr. And not be ambushed all the while." Kawheek slowly stepped forward, and flutter-hopped over the thicket to the left, moving towards where the sounds of fighting had been. He limped only slightly. Thenyr followed him, craning his head to look behind himself, paranoid. He cast a simple healing spell on the both of them, and felt the trickle of blood stop, and then prepared another Destruction spell, clenching it in his handtalon.

There were no corpses. No bodies. No enemies. The constable was nowhere to be found.

And once again, thirty heads of cattle had gone missing.

--

The march back was long and tedious. When they stopped to rest, Thenyr had restless dreams that he could not remember. Even Kawheek seemed disquieted, kicking his leg-talons slightly in his sleep. When they rose, neither of them felt particularily rested. Thenyr felt paranoia in the extreme, as if every movement of his was being watched, as if someone were trying to gather information from him.

"We must report this, find help, mount a rescue mission." Kawheek spoke as they rose and packed up camp. Thenyr noted his master's disquieted expression, and felt disturbed.

"If there is anything to rescue." Thenyr murmured, scratching at his arm.

"Then we will tell the city officials they have a werewolf problem, and help them eradicate it." Kawheek seemed to gain focus as he said this, starting to walk, but he looked backc when he realized his student was not following him.

Thenyr was peering at his arm, picking at the scab through the hole in his clothes. "The wound." He spoke, after a moment. "It has not healed."

Kawheek approached, and looked, frowning.

"Yours has not either!" Thenyr blinked, looking down at Kawheek's leg. In fact, new blood had started dribbling down the hawk's leg. Thenyr's wound bled anew as well, very slightly. "I healed us! I used magic! It was a divine blessing of slow healing! It should have..."

"It seems that blade had magic we were not aware of." Kawheek spoke, taking a breath, looking back to the city in the distance.

"We don't know what it was capable of. Master Kawheek, we need to get back to the temple. Now! Before the moon rises again-" Thenyr blinked as an involuntary shudder shot up his spine. One that he knew well. A haze fell over his eyes, and he wrapped his arms around himself, doubling over, his wings curling inwards.

"Thenyr, I-I..." Kawheek stepped back, his handtalons curling into fists of pain as he, at length, doubled over too. Distantly, Thenyr saw his master's feathers start to recede, to turn a brilliant gray-gold.

"What? No... how...?" Thenyr looked down at himself, silvery hairs starting to replace the feathers along his legs and his arms. "How?"

"I-I don't know. This shouldn't be possible." Kawheek stared at his handtalon as it became padded and his talons grew long and wickedly sharp, oblivious to his beak deforming and the pointed ears that were springing up from his head. "We are in daylight. We were not bitten..."

"I have wolfsbane!" Thenyr spoke, reaching down towards the herb pouch at his leg. His trunk spasmed, and he fell over on his side, his legs twitching as they started to twist and distort into paws. "I have-I have..." He pawed weakly at the bag, but his hands wouldn't obey him, and he sliced the package to ribbons with the new talons that were growing in. He stared up at the cruel sun seemed to mock his predicament as it rose, casting bright, silvery rays onto them. He felt his muzzle grow outwards and saw it press out in front of his eyes, heard Kawheek cry out in pain, felt himself scream, and then growl, in agony.

When the master and student arose again, they were wolves in the bright day, their clothes and armor having burst off and laying in tatters about them. They sprung on each other, growling, snarling, powerful digitigrade legs pushing at the dirt for leverage as they grappled and wrestled at each other, struggling in hazy, uncertain, undirected rage, trying to dominate one another. Thenyr stopped, for a moment, grabbing Kawheek's shoulders and shoving his master off of him. "Kawherrrkk..." He growled out the name with his new muzzle, and his master paused, confused. He was dizzy. It was so hard to focus. He could not find his center. "We mrrust... rrressis... rrrr..."

Distantly, Thenyr felt a presence enter his mind. Someone, something, imposing, far away, a will that was not his own. His eyes widened. He stared at the ground. His will unravelled, his mind was unmade, unable to resist in the face of his confused, directionless anger and rage.

A red mist descended over his thoughts, and then he remembered nothing, save a long, low, hunting howl.