*Huuh-huuh-huhh* “Run little puppy, run!! We’ll get you soon enough and enjoy every drop of your tasty blood.” came the voice of one of the three vampires chasing me.
I had been running for well over four days straight, the longest I had run since my first taste of vampire flesh. Their constant taunts had driven me insane while I had run but I needed to get out of the vampire territory I had been in since I was born.
As if I had just passed through an invisible curtain, the taint of the vampires’ smell receded giving way to a much stronger but reassuring smell of something….familiar. I turned around at the next clearing to face the trailing vampires for the first time and with a boosted vigor.
The three halted a mere four yards away and the leader spoke, “So you’ve finally agreed to become our feast then? Well I was hoping for a little more spirit from my prey but if he-“ *Hmhmhmhmhmhmhmhmmm….* “Do you really think that you could kill me? Me, a werewolf by birthright, and you three a simple trio of freshly dead, impure vampires? I doubt I’d even need to bother drawing my weapon let alone change. How about this, you can all attack at once and I’ll make sure you end up dead….again. How’s that sound?”
The lead vampire looked more than a little upset and shouted, “Die!” as he thrust himself onto my unsheathed rune sword. He had burst into flames just after I had sliced my dagger through the blood throbbing throats of the other two, tasting the blood as it flowed freely from their bodies. To my dismay the sun came up at that exact moment, ridding me of my prey. *sigh* “Looks like I’ll have to find a tavern where I can get some good meat from."
Two days later I walked in to the
Boars Head tavern completely famished and dehydrated. I didn’t care if I ate the meat cooked or raw and drank of the beer that I so detested; it was all I had to choose from. I sat down on a stool around the service bank and ordered a whole boar and half a gallon of beer. The innkeeper gave me a questioning look but after I said I had run out of food seven days ago and water only two, he promptly brought the meal and drink.
I ate like a wolf, downing a quarter of the beer in one pass and consuming the boar at an alarming rate…for a human. After I was nearly through with the boar and had drank all of the beer I felt better, so much so that my senses picked up on that same strange smell that was so familiar and yet I knew I had never smelled before. I looked to the door just as a man walked in to the tavern, tall as a giant and the muscles of Hercules himself. I stared at the newcomer with curiosity until I met his eyes….I knew where the smell had come from….and I knew what he was.
Strangely though, he sat on the other end of the bank and ordered half the amount that I had. I was curious as to why he had not even given off a scent that would ask me to come over, but I knew that if I were to even approach him, the innkeeper would know what I was. He obviously knew what the newcomer was because he gave off such a powerful stench of fear that I had to block some of my sense to escape the dizziness.
I finished my boar and went to wash up outside where the innkeeper had set up an aqueduct-like pipeline with flowing water that went back to the river from which it came. As I gazed at the moving image in the water I noticed a red glow coming from my pendant and immediately drew my sword.
I had not been fast enough and now had a blade at my throat, “So….what is the little pup doing out on his own?” whispered a female voice. The stench of her living dead corpse assaulted my nose as she said, “I think I’ll have a little nibble...” I wasn’t about to go down from a single vampire so I broke her grasp and her right arm at the same time, flung her over me, and stabbed her with my rune blade sending her back to hell in a burst of flames.
Sheathing my sword, I went back into the tavern to drink some hard liquor. This time however, the newcomer sat down next to me as I was ordering and asked the innkeeper for one too. “My name’s Fenris, you’re new around here and from what I’ve seen you’re from far away.” I looked at him and he seemed rather pleased, “My names Feirnon and I grew up in the far west near the Ternius Castle.”
Wrong thing to say because he had me by the neck and against the inn wall before I could even think. “Wh-*cough*-what the hell are you-*choke* doing?!!”
He calmly flexed his grip, “Are you one of the Ternius Clan?” I thought fast and realized that he thought I might have been one of the betraying werewolves from the Ternius Clan. They had committed the ultimate form of betrayal namely they had allied with the vampires, and it was not tolerated – anywhere.
“No-*cough* do you think that I would—go anywhere near them without—killing them myself?!!” I said with some difficulty.
His grip grew even tighter as he said, “I don’t believe you.”
I couldn’t stand it anymore, my pendant was blood red and pulsing so I released my strength a little. *BOOM* Fenris went flying across the inn and hit the wall but he was up within milliseconds. I only had enough time to show him the corner of my tattoo before I got hit…hard.
Unfortunately he had seen it a little too late and sent me flying to the back of the inn. Staggering to my feet from the blow he approached me with a grin, “Well that was a little bit late. Why don’t we finish up here and then head out to my families Domicile.” I nodded as I shook off the dizziness from the beer and the blow and we drank a pint of liquor before we left.