Hour of the Wolf (WHF)

[X] Stay Human

[X] Direct the injured to go to the healing station in the church then:
-[X] Hunt down the remaining beastmen

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"Go to the church," you shout to the watchman as you turn—not east, but south—and move after the vanished Ungors, Eleanor dogging your heels. "Take your friend. They can help!"

The man's answer—if he answers—does not reach your ears as you pass between shadowed cabins; the clustered buildings and the roar of eastward combat swallow his words like the night eats the sun. Unthinkingly, you lengthen your stride and glance down, the thin trail of beastman blood flashing beneath your borrowed blade, a stark dark line on the pale snow, frozen ruby beads sparkling as they catch the glow of distant fires. Beneath your feet, mud squelches and snow crunches, the sounds joining the symphony of screams and shouts from the east, the brassy roar of some great stag echoing through the night.

Left, you turn, then right. Over a crude fence, then around a clutch of firewood spilt without a thought. Drawn ever onwards by the trail, you feel your muscles start to burn from the effort of moving.

Taking the lead from you, her head low, Eleanor growls in a husky voice, "They're panicking."

You say nothing.

"The blood," she huffs. "The droplets. They're further apart. They're running now. They know we're after them."

Stirring as it recognises the intention behind your thoughts as you leap over a fence, the need for blood on your tongue and flesh between your teeth flashing into your thoughts, your wolf spirit growls from behind the gates of your mind.

Huunnt, it seems to say, your muscles tensing painfully tight as you crash to the ground. Kiiiiillll.

An instant later, your skin begins to writhe as if host to multitudinous worms, your fingers flexing of their accord even as you grasp a join and half swing, half hurl yourself after the still unseen beasts.


Cursing and grunting as your gift tries to take over—its joy at the hunt almost equal to your horror at its awakening in the village—your breathing grows, in turn, ragged and even as you struggle against the beast. Sparing a glance back, you see the same silent struggle written across your companion's face, her eyes shining like blood-red lanterns in the night and her scar bulging as if threatening to tear apart. Rushing ever onwards, you give one last mighty mental shove with all the strength you can muster, the last, perhaps, and then the wolf finally relents, the beast returning to the cage in your mind and your pace straightening alongside the woodswoman.



Slipping and stumbling over the snow-blanketed mud, you follow the beastmen's trail through the dense knot of alleyways formed by the town's clustered buildings with almost religious zeal—the pale faces of Varrel's inhabitants peeking between wooden slats or out open doorways before retreating with shouts of alarm as you race by. In mere moments, the trail's origin appears out of the flurrying snowfall, shaggy-coated Ungors materialising amidst the crystal flakes, the steady rasps of the tongueless creatures growing desperate as they spot you.

Boring your gaze into the fleeing quasi-men's backs, a part of you idly notes the belt of pouches slung over their shoulders, the formless leather bags sullenly stirring as they race away. An instant later, the same too-sweet scent from earlier strikes your nose, hot bile rising in your gorge, though from the smell or the thought of what they plan to do with the oil, you cannot say.

Come on! You scream at yourself as you force your body to new heights of exertion, the thud-thud-thud in your chest growing louder and more insistent with every passing moment and your sword turning to lead in your hand. Faster! Faster!

Inside your mind, forced by your will into patience, your wolf cautiously lends its not-voice to your cause, your eyes locking onto the stream of blood pouring from the trailing Ungor's arm.

Riiiiip. Your wolf says as if you need any encouragement. Killlll.

Heart pounding, lungs burning, and mouth salivating, you race through the abandoned streets with wild abandon, the world reduced to the prey before you and the ground beneath your feet. All at once, the beastmen dart right—through a gap between two apple trees—and you follow, mud spraying from beneath your boots as you slew around the trees' knotted trunks and into a small clearing. A heartbeat passes, and then a dark shape suddenly hurtles past your elbow, fleet-footed Eleanor fairly dancing over the snowy ground as she closes the gap between her and the trailing Ungor.

An instant later, she crashes into the man-thing, a thud of impact filling the night as she tackles the beast and drags it, rasping and kicking, to the ground. Instinctively, you move to join her, your boots' steady tattoo wavering as you reorientate and arrow towards the tussling pair.

"Go!" The huntswoman cries, not looking back at you, silver flashing in her hand as she draws her blade. "Get the other one!"

Without preamble, the woman slams the dagger into the shaggy fiend's thigh, black-red blood spraying out across the snow and eliciting a rattling howl from the tongueless creature. Heeding her words, you race past without slowing, the sounds of the bitter struggle dying away as you continue the chase, your heart thundering in your chest.

Move, you will your body as the burning in your limbs worsens. Move now. Faster. Faster. Faster.

Desperate to catch the creature and save the village, you repeat the words over and over again. Before you know it, the phrase becomes a babbling mantra, the world around you dropping away as the beastman's frenzied dash sees it begin to pull away.

Faster, you repeat in a mind filled with nought but thoughts of catching up to the beast. Faster. Faster. Faste-

The ground beneath your feet slips away without warning, your mantra ending with a strangled yelp as your boot strikes something hard and smooth and slides off without resistance. Instantly, the world vanishes into a melange of white and black as you tumble to the ground, your sword slipping from your grasp and spiralling away. An instant later, a sharp crack echoes in the night and an explosion of pain flares across your brow, your vision filling with roaring stars as your head strikes something buried beneath the snow.

A moment or a lifetime later—you cannot tell which it is—you open your eyes to an inky black sky, crystal flakes stinging your face as they fall from the heavens and strike your bare skin.

"Ulric, damn it," you hiss as you rise from the muddy snow, a disgusting sucking sound emerging from the liquid earth before a fresh bout of pain violently pushes its way into your skull.

Grimacing from the pain, the life-heat of regeneration creeping up your spine before suffusing your head, you steady yourself and look for your borrowed sword, finding it half-buried in the muck nearby. Pulling the silver blade free with an effortful grunt, you glance at your surroundings and feel your frown deepen as you realise how far you've chased the beastman saboteur, an unfamiliar clutch of cabins and other buildings looming over and around you, the dull orange glow of candlelight spilling between off-kilter door jambs and around shutters. Looking to the ground, you kick aside the snow at your feet and let loose a warning growl as you spy the stone beneath, the frost-slick rock undoubtedly responsible for your slip and slowly diminishing head pains.

Giving one last dog-like shake of the head, you turn your attention to the task at hand and let out a string of curses as you realise that you've lost the beastman's trail, the steadily falling snow covering your surroundings in a pale white rime.

"Shit," you hiss between clenched teeth as you hunt for a trail in the mud, finding nothing. "Shit, shit, shit, shit, shiiiit."

Sucking in lungfuls of freezing air—the chill burning your throat the whole way down—you glance back the way you came and find yourself wondering if you should return to aid Eleanor.

She can handle an Ungor, you tell yourself as you stare down the trail, the dark prints left behind by your boots already filling in with snow. She can. I know she can.

Despite your self-assurance, you find your eyes locked to the fading trail, a venomous doubt worming its way behind your eyes and poisoning your thoughts.

Sucking air over your teeth, you spare the buildings around you a look. "I should- I should go back..."

The desire to rejoin Eleanor tugging at your limbs with increasing earnestness, your wolf spirit reticent to lend you its thoughts, you take a single step back the way you came when a gasp—soft and fearful—reaches your ears, a cold fire blazing to life in your chest as you wheel around. For a moment, you see nothing—the buildings around you are as still and lifeless as they were when you first rose. Then you see it. Creeping around the door of a nearby cabin, the firelight flickers as some unseen body crosses in front of its source, the shadow it casts snatching your attention as neatly as the gasp.

For once, you find yourself in agreement with your lupine spirit, blood rushing in your ears as you stalk towards the doorway deathly silent. In a heartbeat, you find yourself standing on the cabin stoop, the weight of the sword in your hand all but gone now that you might have to use it and your fingers painfully tight around its hilt. Closer now, you hear a quiet, stifled sob emanate from within, followed by the clatter of some object striking the floor; the hairs on your neck standing on end as you hear a familiar rasping breath.

Ungor, something within you snarls, though whether it is yourself or your wolf, you cannot tell.

Tightening your grip on the sword, its leather-wrapped hilt creaking under the force, you pull away from the door. Briefly, you entertain the idea of having other options before shaking your head as a look at your surroundings reveals no sign of Eleanor or other aid.

You have, it seems, no other choice than to do the stupidest thing you can imagine.

Moving faster than your own reason, you grasp the door handle in one hand and raise your sword to your chest with the other before pushing with all the force you can muster. Springing open at your touch, the wooden door hurtles away before crashing, with a boom, against the wall opposite, your feet carrying you over the threshold and into the lamp-lit interior seemingly of their own accord. A heartbeat later, your mind catches up to reality and spies the dark-furred beast lurking within in all its befouled glory, your would-be rush ending before it can even truly begin as you note the child quailing beneath the beast's claws and the blade pressed against his throat.

Time passes decadently slowly as you stare across the bare meters that lay between you and your corrupted foe, minutes passing between every thought and hours passing between every breath as you stand and watch. Then, all at once, the frozen instants come crashing back together in a rush of compressed time, the goat-eared thing giving a bovine snort as it twists to face you, the motion of its body revealing a girl standing in the corner, her face blanched and pinched tight and her limbs trembling in fright.

Family, you decide as you flick your gaze between the boy and girl, the pair sharing the same thin chin, rosy cheeks, and bright blue eyes. Barely fifteen summers old, her eyes red-rimmed and wild, you doubt the blonde-haired girl is the boy's mother, her equally blonde counterpart at least half her age or older. Siblings, belike. Cousins, at most. As you watch, the boy hugs his arms tight against his chest, the straw doll of a soldier buried beneath creaking under his grasp.

As the seconds pass with agonising slowness—the silence hanging over the three of you deafening in its totality—your wolf starts gnashing its teeth in perfect harmony with the agony you feel in your soul, the urge to leap into action, to tear into the beast, perfectly counterbalanced by the psychic pressure of the knife it has pressed against the boy's throat.

Kill, your wolf whispers to you as the beastman slowly backs towards the cabin's sole window and drags the boy with it, the words of Ulric's Child clear as birdsong in the morn for once.

Shaking your head fractionally, you raise your sword toward the beast. "Let him go."

The command comes automatically to your lips, your tone as cold and hard as iron as you give it a once over, the beast snorting in irritation.

Having escaped the earlier fighting entirely unharmed thanks to its wit and speed, you see no easy weaknesses to exploit or injuries that would slow it down. If you moved, if you so much as looked at it wrong, it would like as not kill the boy before engaging you. Moreover, slung across its breast on a bandolier, you spy a handful of leather pouches hanging heavy as overripe fruit hangs from a bough, the sickly sweet scent of its queer oil tickling your nose even from this distance.

The beast, unsurprisingly, says nothing; a jerking shake of the head and a tongueless bleat are all the answers you receive. Seemingly struck dumb by your sudden appearance, neither the girl nor the boy say anything, only their quiet sobs piercing the silence. Despite knowing better, you can almost swear you can hear the sound of four frantic hearts ricocheting off the walls.

What can you say? You think frantically as the beast continues its slow retreat. What can you do to save the boy? What would it take?

Unbidden, flashes of violence fill your mind as you imagine the knife sliding across the child's throat, the crimson blood that would spill over the wooden boards that make up the floor, and the wails of grief that would rebound from the walls.

"Peace," you caution the creature as it backs up against the window, its hooved feet thunking against the timber floor with an ominous finality, nervousness, or something like it, readable in its expression. "Let the boy go and-"

"I will let you pass," you finish after a pause, your brow furrowing in surprise at the words that came from your mouth.

Distantly, a part of you—the cold part, the lizard part—wonders if that was the smartest thing you could say. If it might not be better to accept the risk of one child dying if it means the rest of Varrel will not burn in fires of the Ungor's making. Another part dismisses the thought out of hand, duty and desire cooperating fully in telling that part of you to fuck off.

Keeping your sword between you and the beastman, barely daring to breathe, you continue as its gleaming yellow eyes flick between your face and the blade. "Run from here-escape the town. I care not what you do so long as you leave."

Wordlessly, the creature glances between you, the girl, and your sword, a ruby-red drop of blood welling up from beneath where it holds the blade against the boy's throat.

"Please. Please let Klösel go."

The words, quiet and small, ring through the leaden air as the blonde-haired girl clasps her hands together, tears spilling from beneath her eyelids and carving tracks in her soot-smudged face. Snapping its pitiless gaze towards her, the tongueless beast gives a warning bark, and the girl's brother moans as the chaos-spawn forces Klösel's head up high with the flat of its blade.

Whimpering as she shrinks beneath its eyes, the girl cries out again. "Please! He shouldn't even be here. He just wanted his soldier. He's just a boy!"

Caught by compassion's claws, instinct compels you to step toward the girl before your conscious mind can even ponder the thought, the beastman's yellow eyes flicking toward you and halting you mid-motion.

"Please," you repeat, lending your voice to the girl's and ignoring the half-hearted snarl from within that makes clear that your wolf doesn't quite agree.

Thudding heartbeat after thudding heartbeat, agonising breath after agonising breath, you wait in near-silence; only the girl's soft sobbing and the boy's pained groans break the veil that hangs over the four of you. Its face set in a rictus of fear, the Ungor's stare flickers from you to your sword and from your sword to the girl in rapid succession. You, your sword, the girl. You, your sword, the girl.

Am I fast enough? You ask yourself, the open door behind you impinging on your consciousness as a chill gust blows through.

You, your sword, the girl.

Can I kill it before it harms the boy? If it cuts him, can I stop the bleeding?

You, your sword, the girl.

Doubt creeps into your mind through your own self-knowledge, the speed of your limbs, and the swiftness of your reactions known to you through a life lived in full. Your wolf spirit, ever-useful, fails you here; no god-sent words answer your desperate wish.

You, your sword, the girl. You, your sword, the girl. You, your sword, the girl. You. Your sword. The gi-

Without warning, the Ungor's eyes snap back to you—no, to something behind you—and a savage grin splits its face, the pink worm of its tongue visible between teeth as yellow as ripe grain.

WARE! Shrieks your body as an electric thrill races up your spine, your blade raised and ready as you twist in place. A heartbeat later, you freeze in shock as nothing confronts you, no lurking enemy or chaos-damned beast waiting in the dark beyond the open doorway.

Before you can turn back, a shrill cry suddenly pierces your ears, and something heavy and warm crashes into your side, the force of the blow tearing the sword from your hand and sending you sprawling into the nearby wall in a pile. Stunned and with the wind knocked out of you—the shrill cry rising and falling but never ceasing—it takes what feels like a lifetime for you to realise what has happened, the boy alive and crying and clutching at your borrowed shirt. Seizing the moment, the goat-headed beastman bleats and snorts and leaps towards the now unguarded exit, the thud-thud-thud of its hooved feet battering at your mind and filling you with an aching desire to feel its flesh between your jaws. Klösel's weight seeming as inexorable as the tide as he grasps at your arms, you grab the boy roughly by the scruff of his dull shirt and fairly rip him off you, his sister swooping him into her arms before leaping aside as you haul yourself up.

Moving swifter than a thought—far swifter than you would have thought possible—you lunge to the side and snatch at the fleeing beastman, your blind fingers closing around coarse fur and sweat-slicked muscles and locking tight. A moment, you and the goat-headed chaos spawn both go tumbling out the door in a tangle, wood and bones slamming into your sides and chest without remorse and thick nails scratching at your face as hideous braying rattles through your skull.


Accompanied by the panicked shrieks of both children, you and the Ungor land in the mud with a splash, snow and muck spraying through the air as you claw and jab at one another. Larger and heavier than the beast, you seize the upper hand immediately, an instinctive leap seeing you tackle the beast before it has time to bring its dark blade to bear on you, a bucking kick sending a hoof into your stomach but doing little besides annoying you. Moving with a swiftness you can scarcely believe belongs to you, you snatch at the creature's mud-splattered hand and wrench it aside as hard as you can, a horrid gargle bleating in your ear as the Ungor's sword goes spinning into the night.

Heart pounding in your chest, you leap after the blade a moment later only to curse as a hand snatches at your ankle and pulls you down, foetid mud filling your mouth as you crash to the earth. Not to be outdone, you slam your elbow back, a bestial grunt ripping through the night as the chaos-spawn's mad scramble over the top of you proves fruitless. Braying, the goat-headed thing slams a fist into your kidneys, your vision turning red even as a scream bursts from your throat. Furious, you counter with a blind barrage of your own, pain exploding across one fist as you hit its skull not once, not twice, but thrice; a sickening crunch runs up your arm as something breaks, followed an instant later by a stabbing pain in your knuckle.

Fight bite, the healer part of you notes while your wolf savagely howls within.

Giving a deafening howl of pain—a wet liquid sound infecting the noise courtesy of its broken nose—the Ungor all but leaps atop you, its sudden proximity filling your nostrils with a noxious odour and its weight pushing you into the mud; brackish water splashing into your eyes. Before you can react, the thing lunges for your throat with both hands, clammy fingers scrabbling for purchase over your mud-slick throat and stubby nails scratching your face. Acting without thought or reason—blind panic blooming in your mind and your lungs already burning for air—you do the only thing you can think of to do: you jerk your head forward and bite down. Hard.

Letting loose a hollow roar, the beastman jerks away, something tearing beneath your teeth and hot blood filling your mouth. Ignoring your wolf's joyful howl, half blind and gasping for breath, you buck and roll and do everything you can to throw the goat-legged thing off your chest, the foul-smelling beast holding on for dear life despite your comparative bulk, its nails digging into your shoulders so deep they draw blood.

Gasping for air, a curiously high-pitched scream from your foe battering at your ears, you suck down a chill breath and spit in the creature's face.

That out to shut it up, you think to yourself before frowning as the screaming grows louder. About to try again, you pause as, quite without warning, you discover that it isn't the beastman who's screaming.

Bursting into sight like a Wolf from Ulric himself, the teenage girl comes rushing towards the both of you with the Ungor's sword clutched awkwardly in her hands. Her face red and her blue eyes set hard, the girl lunges towards the still-unawares beastman in a clumsy thrust, the darkly gleaming edge of the blade hurtling out and down as she aims a strike for the furred creature's back. However, warned by her screaming or else saved by dark providence, the ungor turns just in time to dodge the blow, the blade missing its back by centimetres and instead stabbing into the meat of its thigh before halting with a bone-grinding thud as it strikes the bone.

Giving another rasping cry, the Ungor all but falls off from atop you, and you seize the moment to hurl yourself free. Adrenaline singing in your veins, you jump up in a flash and interpose yourself between the goat-headed cur and the girl, a blind jab slamming into the meat of its forearm and ruining its own attempted blow.

"Get back." You shout at the girl behind you, the clatter of her teeth audible above the sound of battle to the east. "Go. Go!"

Briefly, a lull settles over you as you eye one another warily, the sweet scent of its carried oil mingling unpleasantly with the harsher animal stink of its body. Then, with a howl, the beastman grabs the sword embedded in its leg and pulls it free, a rivulet of wine-dark blood trickling forth from the wound and spilling out across the ground. Eager to feel the Ungor's blood on your hands, your heart pounding painfully in your chest as you try to ignore the thought of what its sword could do to you, you throw caution to the wind and hurl yourself at the creature.

That proves the right move.

Heedless of the wounds you might receive in return, you lash out at the beast again and again and again. Fuelled by rage and dying to kill, you strike the beastman everywhere your training as a healer tells you you shouldn't, each one of your hits accompanied by a solid impact and a pained grunt.

"Die," you shout at the beast as it stumbles backwards beneath your blows. "Die! Just fucking die!"

Beaten and bloody, the creature says nothing, simply stumbling back as you strike its stomach, its ribs, and its legs. Incensed by its silence, you redouble your efforts, each bone-jarring impact accompanied by a roar of your own.

"Why."

Thud.

"Won't."

Thud.

"You."

Thud.

"Die?"

Drawing your fist back for another blow, one bound to send the thing plunging into the mud, your face curls into a feral snarl, and you make to lunge forward-

Only to freeze mid-step as an arrow sails out of the dark and slams into the beastman's battered face with a meaty thunk, the force of it sending your foe spiralling into the mud; sheer surprise locking you in place as it collapses bonelessly and falls still. Able only to stare at the arrow—the tawny fletching sparking recognition in your mind—you find yourself unsurprised when your companion, Eleanor, comes stalking out of the dark seconds later, the scarred hunter's front drenched in blood, her bow held loosely in her hand.

You're by her side in the blink of an eye, one hand instinctively clasping her shoulder. However, before you can pull her into a hug—the second one of the day—you remember yourself as you feel her stiffen beneath your touch, embarrassed chagrin winding its way around your thoughts.

Offering a lame smile as you withdraw your hand, you give her bloody visage a once over, your eyes lingering on the rose pink outline of a horse bite on the bare flesh of her arm, and say seriously. "Are you injured? Do you need help?"

"Not my blood," the woman grunts with a shake of her head, irritation plain to hear beneath her laconic words. "It... struggled."

At her remark, your sudden gravity dissolves away, combat's aftermath forcing a grin onto your face in its place.

"Thank Ulric," you reply as the woman turns her arm away from you, the vivid pink mark almost but not quite vanishing from sight.

Reminded of your own frantic struggle, you hock a wad of bloody phlegm onto the chill mud and try to ignore your wolf's exaltation at the taste of it.

Striding toward the fallen Ungor, the woman unsheaths her dagger, a wrist flick sending the knife through the wretch's throat and a vital spurt of blood spraying out. Watching from the side, you try to quash the pity that emerges as the unconscious creature thrashes, only to fail as it grows still, the bloody surge from its neck fading into a trickle and then ceasing. Rising from her stoop, Eleanor doesn't comment as the Ungor passes, the woman instead wiping her blade clean before returning it to its place and then wrenching her arrow from the beast's face with a sickening sucking sound.

About to ask her what next, you freeze as a gasp rings out, a jerk of the head revealing the teen clutching her brother for dear life; both stood outside their home and staring at the beastman's corpse in vile fascination.

"Are you alright?" You ask, stepping between them and the corpse, your voice snatching their attention.

They do not answer.

"Are you alright?"

Startled by your words, the pair look away from the corpse as if it burned their eyes. Examining them closely, it's clear that both are on the verge of tears, their faces pale and limbs trembling.

Klösel is the first to reply, the blonde-haired boy silent but nodding, his sister following suit with jerky movements.

"Thank you, good sir," the young girl says, quietly at first and then with gathering strength, her fingers knotting as she speaks.

"And," she turns to Eleanor, the hunter watching her dispassionately. "A-and you, miss. Thank you. You saved our lives."

Jerking your head in acknowledgement at the thanks, you change tack, your brows furrowing as a worry takes root in your chest.

"Where are your parents?" you ask, softer now, kneeling in the mud and looking them in the eye, the corpse still hidden behind you. "Why aren't you with them?"

At the question, the boy—Klösel—looks down, his jaw trembling. The girl answers, her eyes flicking between you and Eleanor before settling somewhere far away.

"We were with our mother," she begins, her voice tightening. "She's at the temple. She volunteered there; took us there to be safe."

She swallows. "Father is with the militia at the eastern gate."

"But why are you here?" You press gently, your features schooled into the same patient interest that works so well to extract embarrassing truths from those who need healing.

The girl grimaces and hugs her brother tight, the boy withdrawing into her embrace. "Klösel snuck out."

The boy shoots her a wounded look but doesn't deny it, his mouth working for a moment before falling still.

"I-I told him not to," the girl presses on quickly, her tone defensive enough you raise your hand to forestall the accusations sure to follow.

Behind you, you hear Eleanor shift in place, the squelch of mud betraying her discomfort, though she says nothing.

"He just wanted his soldier," the girl continues. "Once I realised he was missing, I followed and found him clutching the ratty thing."

Following her gaze, you smile as you see the straw doll clutched in the boy's hands, dabs of blue and yellow paint across its torso honouring Nordland's colours but doing little to make it appealing.

"I didn't mean to cause trouble," Klösel finally says, voice barely more than a whisper but loud enough for tears to sting the corners of your eyes.

"It's alright," you tell the pair, your smile fading but not entirely vanishing. "But you'll need to go back now. Do you know the way back?"

The children, silent, nod.

"Take your brother back to the church," you tell the girl, a gesture from you stopping her in her tracks. "And... Thank you for what you did. You were very brave."

For the first time since you met her, the girl smiles, her blue eyes sparkling in the firelight as she ducks her head, embarrassed. Watching as she shepherds her brother towards the church and disappears, your smile slips away, and you turn back to Eleanor.

"We need to go. They need us at the east gate."

Her words are blunt, unyielding, and perfectly correct. Underscoring them, another stag-like bellow splits the air, the roar so loud and close it rattles in your chest.

Taking a moment, you breathe in—the cold air stinging your lungs and sharpening your mind—and nod.

"Aye," you say, gesturing towards the sound of distant fighting. "Lead on."

Article:

Though he is not consciously aware of it, Kasled's mind is constantly picking away at the emotional scabs covering his spirit. Now that he's running towards the eastern battle, what is he subconsciously thinking about?

[] That He Might Fail
I'm not a soldier. What am I doing here? What if I freeze? What if they die because of me?

[] That He Might Be Seen For What He Is
If they see me fight, really fight, will they burn me afterward? Even if I save them? And what will happen to the others if they think me a monster?

[] That He He Enjoys The Violence
It would be so easy. To let go, to feel the strength, to tear them apart, to taste the blood and feel the flesh beneath my claws.

[] That He Enjoys Beastmen Suffering
Let it hurt. Let them bleed. Let every one of them scream. Hate. Hate. Hate.

Article:

Eastward bound, Kasled and Eleanor find themselves posed with the question of whether to embrace Ulric's gift and undergo the transformation now or wait until they arrive at the battle. What do they decide to do?

[] Embrace the Change
Bound for the battle at the eastern gate, the pair decide to transform despite the fear it will doubtlessly inspire in Varrel's people when spotted.

[] Stay Human
Deciding that the chance of being seen as beastmen is too great, Kasled and Eleanor decide to remain human. For now, anyway.

[X] That He Enjoys Beastmen Suffering
[X] Stay Human

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Blood thunders in your ears as you rush towards your distant allies, the shrill cries of dying beasts suffusing the night and feeding a deep satisfaction in your heart. Keeping alongside you despite the uneven terrain, her eyes shining like burning embers in the dark, Eleanor looks to share the same sensation, a rictus grin sketching itself across her face as she hurtles onward, panting gasps sending steam into the air as the pair of you move.

No more deaths, you repeat to yourself over and over again as the cries grow louder and a faraway, dull drumming joins it. No more. No more. No more.

Dimly, as if from a great distance away, some part of you takes a different tack; some wordless, formless thing within yourself howling savagely as unseen chaos spawn shriek and bray. Pushing yourself almost to the limit—even your god-granted endurance beginning to falter under the demands you've made of it this night—you barely notice when the coppery tang in your mouth transforms from cloying to wonderful, the sweetest wines and most toothsome meals incomparable to the pleasure it brings that sunken part of you.

Ahead, out of sight, the shrill cries of panicked beasts rise to greet you, the hollow thing within exalting in suffering's clarion cry. Louder now, stronger now, it calls out in a terrible voice.

Hate.

Your heart pulses at the unheard word, wrath singing down your veins despite having no conscious awareness as to why. Furious, you race onward, the night sky's orange glow growing ever brighter as you arrow in on its source, the crash of steel joining the pained shouts in the outskirts of your awareness.

Varrel's palisade flowing past to your left and an endless stream of huts and houses streaming by your right, you're almost to the battlefield when a man's pained scream rises above the melange of panic, your secret joy festering and transmuting into disgust. Between one footstep and the next, the coppery taste of blood turns rancid in your mouth, your stomach twisting as the sunken being inside your soul retreats and its voice fades to silence. Stumbling as you run, it takes an act of will to keep from voiding your stomach, nausea battering your mind and prompting you to spit up a streamer of Ungor blood.

"Keep going," you growl to your companion as she sends a queer look your way, the woman saying nothing as you wave her away. "We're nearly there."

Heeding your own command, you push onward and regain your footing, Eleanor following suit just in time for the both of you to corner around a hut together, the barricade of timber and stone looming out of the night and rising overhead.

Forcing your limbs to obey despite the fatigue weighing them down, you fairly haul yourself over the man-high pile in a mad scramble, sparks marking your passage as your borrowed sword strikes stone. Barely cognizant of the world around you—existence reduced to a thin slice containing only wood and sky—you reach the top in mere moments before throwing yourself off without hesitation.

An instant later, you crash to the muddy ground and half collapse into the mud, a gasp escaping you as the impact forces you to one knee, black water spraying in all directions and sending a shock of cold through your limbs. Cursing yourself for the instinctual leap, you unfold and rise in one smooth motion, muscles already tensing to continue your madcap race, before freezing as you catch sight of the battlefield ahead of you.

As a child, you learned from Roslas' elders that man and all his creeds were the progeny of Taal and Rhya. That in ages long past—so distant that history crumbled into legend and legend calcified into myth—Taal raised the forests, Rhya sowed the fields, and their sacred coupling begat the very first men and women. Born of the gods, these holy children begat yet more holy children in an endless chain of mother to mother and father to father, from the first till doomsday.

And yet you see no signs of divinity among the corpses that litter the earth before you.

No godly flesh or blessed blood stains the forgotten billhooks and spear tips planted in bellies and backs and skulls. No restful slumber lies lightly on the faces of the dead to tell of peace and tranquillity. No divine spark rests behind their open, staring eyes to promise hope, joy, and love. Instead, all you see are the broken bodies of men and beasts lying atop one another as wheat lies upon the earth, mewling figures stirring in the mud where a blow was inexpert or incomplete and a smokey haze hovering over the scene entire.

Clamping a hand to your mouth, the stench of piss and shit and blood almost overwhelming, you raise your borrowed sword and peer into the grey-white pall as you try to make out who is who amid the swirling snow and smoke, the ghostly forms of buildings drifting in and out of view like cautious forest beasts as the air churns. Beside you, your companion does the same, the huntswoman letting out a string of curses under her breath as she picks her way among the bodies, a glance revealing a stricken face and narrowed eyes. A heartbeat later, the wind shifts, the curtain of smoke thinning enough for you to make out the familiar figures of Ernst and his men beyond the field of supine dead, a towering figure standing afore them with a head crowned by viciously curving horns and an axe as large as yourself in its hands.

"Minotaur!" Eleanor hisses as she snatches her bow from her shoulder, an arrow drawn in a split second and aimed at it.

Growling over the drumbeat, now maddeningly unsteady, your wolf adds, Prey.

You're moving before you realise it, a force within you propelling you forward even as the pop-pop-pop of nearby gunfire spills over you. Charging recklessly, you race over the living and the dead in the blink of an eye, stepping past a stunned woodcutter and swinging your sword at the reeling minotaur.


Moving with a swiftness its bulk belies, the bull-headed beast reacts before you can bring your blade halfway to it, the minotaur's mighty axe swinging down in a brutal chop. Instincts screaming, you leap aside just in time to avoid the wickedly sharp blade, its passage so close a shrill whistle rings in your ear before, with a thud, its path terminates in the shoulder of the man beside you. Blood gurgling in his throat, the pale-headed woodcutter manages one more step before his corpse drops to the ground.

An instant later, your blow strikes true, the force of it rattling up the bones of your arm as a scarlet line explodes across the horned monster's hairy hide. Nostrils flaring, the enraged minotaur lets out a pained low as blood weeps from the wound before jerking its axe up and out of the man's corpse with a liquid squelch. A split-second later, a casual backhand sends you spinning away into the night afore an equally casual twitch of the wrist sends the axe's butt into Ernst's stomach, a grunt escaping the former soldier as he sprawls backwards into the mud, his attack aborted before it can even begin.

Wolf spirit howling, enraged, you halt your graceless pirouette and let loose a wordless warcry, muscles straining as you fairly throw yourself at the towering beastman. Both hands clutching the sword's hilt in a white-knuckled death grip, you lunge forward and send it stabbing up towards the minotaur's face without a second thought. For the briefest moment, you glimpse a placid bovine eye opening wide as your sword hurtles toward it. Then, a heartbeat later, its gleaming point buries itself deep within the umber orb, an arrow thudding into place beside it almost simultaneously.

The minotaur says nothing. The minotaur does nothing. Instead, it teeters, it sways, and then, without warning, it collapses bonelessly into the mud. Clustered around it like a murder of crows, the gang of woodcutters pause and eye it suspiciously, then let out a ragged cheer as it remains motionless.

Still clutching your sword as the beast lies still—the blade dripping with blood and brain matter—you find you need a moment to collect yourself, even your wolf silenced by the simplicity of the minotaur's death. Releasing a breath you hadn't realised you'd been holding, you're brought back to reality when a hand clamps down on your shoulder, Ernst materialising in front of you with a dirt-smeared face and wide, wild eyes.

"Kasled!" He nearly shouts into your ear, the bald man's voice hoarse but rising above the clamour of unseen battle and distant disordered drums. "Sigmar's balls, you're alive! You both are!"

Sparing a glance at your surroundings, the omnipresent haze turning anything more than a handful of meters away into flickering shadows, you immediately note the surviving woodcutters' weariness; all five, including Ernst, slumped over and panting hard. However, aside from Eleanor, you see no one else.

"Shouldn't you be at the church?"

You pause barely long enough to think about how to lie without truly lying, then shake your head. "The others have it under control—there's little need for us there. Besides," you tell the man. "We caught Ungors attempting to set fires."

"They're dead," your companion adds before the man can speak, her refusal to clarify met with an ambivalent shrug.

"We came here to help," you finish before furrowing your brow. "Where are the others? Where's Horst?"

Ernst grimaces. "Fucked if I know," he replies before gesturing into the smoke. "He was fighting another minotaur last I saw. That way, maybe. Damn this smoke."

Spying your look, the man shrugs. "Firebombs and handguns, boy. The bastard things will blind you surely as any spell."

Even as he says the words, you can tell he's right. Breathing deeply, you find the stench of death almost overpowered by the acrid taste of burnt oil and sulfur—the latter coming, presumably, from the merchants' firearms. Snorting as the sulphurous stink of the ugly weapons burns your nostrils, you fight the urge to mutter an oath to Ulric.

Joining the pair of you by the minotaur's corpse, her scar twisted by her tight expression, Eleanor eyes the battlefield warily before asking, "Who holds the gate?"

Ernst chuckles darkly, gooseflesh rising down your neck. "We do," he growls a moment later.

Your eyes bulge. "The five of you? Alone?"

"Seven with you two."

This time, you really do spit out an oath to Ulric, the prayer for strength venomous in your ears and mirrored by your fellow Child.

There should be more, you hiss, your wolf whining in agreement. Where are the others? What happened to them?

Though no general, even you know that there should be more men here to hold the gate; the force you saw gathered by Otto and Horst and yourself far larger than the paltry smattering assembled around you.

Damn it all.

"Ware!" One of Ernst's men—the same one whose buttocks you saved from an arrow—says above the discordant drums, his warning dragging your attention away from your allies' woes and to the east.

Squinting as you follow the man's raised axe, your eyes stinging, it takes but a moment for you to peer through the haze and catch sight of the figures silhouetted by the orange glow of smoke-covered fires. Wide-bodied and swaying, the hidden beings advance steadily towards you, snorts and snuffles filling the air as they lazily make their way through the fog. Smaller than a minotaur, you frown as you try to puzzle out what they could be.


"Gors," you say for the benefit of the others as the bulky creatures unfold themselves, the dark steel of their axes shining as they pass through the bashed-open gateway.

As you watch, a taller figure fades into view behind the Gors, a sword as long as your arm, glowing like a blade under the blacksmith's hammer, clutched in one hand. At the sight, some men curse, others spit, and the rest remain silent. Ernst, his adrenaline-fueled expression tightly drawn, looks at you. He doesn't need to voice his question for you to know what he means to ask.

Are you with us?

All at once, the pop-pop-pop of gunfire rips through the stifling air from rooftop height, your whole body twitching as the staccato bangs pour forth from the west. Chiding yourself for your sudden fearfulness, you make to answer the old soldier only to snap your mouth shut as something roars back, the sound rising and falling in a long, ululating cry that rolls from west to east.

Remorselessly pounding in your head, the howling wail strikes you with the force of a mallet blow, the alien sound freezing the blood in your veins and fluttering your heart, its every tonal shift vibrating in your chest. Your wolf, savage and wild as it is, likewise pauses, your fists clenching painfully tight as some primal terror takes over at the sound. Beside you, the woodcutters do much the same, the faces of the men around you blanching as they cast fearful looks at the haze behind them—the Gors before them seemingly forgotten.

A moment later, a voice thick with menace purrs through the night, the haze rippling and shuddering like a pond beneath a waterfall as its syllables scourge your ears and wind around your thoughts.

Vermin.

The words emerge from the crackle of flames, the clash of steel, the breath of the dead, silence and noise cavorting all around you and merging into a voice that speaks with endless, reckless hate.

Your heart, freely pounding, suddenly stills. Your breath, tickled by smoke, catches in your lungs. Your words, quickly spoken, grind to a halt in your mouth. Silence seems to reign all about you: Ernst and Eleanor and all the woodsmen pausing in their activities to look at one another, sweat-drenched faces turning pale as all think the same thought, but none wish to give voice to it.

Nightfiend.

Höllengeist.

Daemon.

Article:

Thanks to an unexpected twist of fate, Kasled has found himself at the forefront of Varrel's defence: a life-or-death decision with three branches spread before him. Off-balance and on a deadline, Kasled…

[] Decides To Stay.
The gates have broken, the defenders have scattered, and the beastmen are clawing at the doors. They must stand together or die.

[] Races to find Horst.
One man, even a holy man, cannot stand against a minotaur alone. Kasled cannot allow him to do it. He can't.

[] Rushes to meet the daemon.
His hands shake, his knees tremble, and still, he hurtles toward the monster—the wolf inside him ravenous for the kill.