The boy stared into the distance. His feet ached and his head hurt. His stomache growled. Had he just caught that fat lizard an hour ago! Hunger was hauting him for days now and the different environment had made it difficult to procure prey. When he was still part of a pack, he had feasted on his bad days, for his family also hunted. How he stayed hungry. Growing weaker.
But on the horizon he made out lights. They would give answers. Maybe he could find some prey there? Steal some food for other packs that were careless? Theft was not new to him. If he hadn't done so, he would have often stayed hungry in his old pack. Only the strong survived.
With a growling stomach he fought his way a few thousand meters further, before he blacked out. He did not notice anymore how his head hit the dusty road. Neither did he notice the wandering swordsman that scooped him up from there and carried him into the village.
When the kid woke hours later in the first floor of an inn, wrapped up in warm blankets, he did not know where he was. But his confusion quickly gave way to his instincts. Unfamiliar humans stood to the right side of his bed and talked with each other. When their looks fell on the recently awoken boy, he quickly jumped out of his bed and fled towards a corner.
They blocked his only exit with their mere presence. Growling and moving on all fours, he threw them a glare that held anger and anxiety. But the expected aggressiveness failed to take place. Confused and thoughtful stares laid on him, before a big and bulky man peeled off the group. Definitely their pack leader.
The other showed respect and stepped back as he advanced forward. The child growled louder and showed his teeth making itself as big as possible on all fours. But the threats showed no effect.
The man got close and knelt down to do something that the kid would have never expected him to do. He growled back.
Thrown off and a little scared the kid lashed out, his hand formed to a claw. Immediately his wrist was caught by the arm of the man, that looked down on him with a raised eyebrow and cocky grin. The boy reacted in turn to kick and punch, growling loudly and even going for a bite on the arm. But none of his attacks found their target.
From the so far silently observing group a horrified yell sounded: "Ollowyn! Ollowyn! Recirí dereu! Parante! Ollowyn!"
The cocky grin on the mans face died, before he knocked the kid back into the corner with a quick shove. Then he rose and turned his back to the boy to face the group. He casually brushed a loose strand of hair out of his face and bound it to his long ponytail before speaking. "What was that? Southerner?" His gaze in no way friendly.
The merchant clad in an orange cloak stepped out of the group. His gaze full of fear towards the little boy. "Ollowyn… Ollowyn…" he repeated again and again.
The swordsman, that had growled at the boy before, showed a much darker face now. His hand moved to grab his sword's handle. He emitted an aura that was felt all throughout the room. The child began to whimper and crawled deeper towards the supposedly safe corner. This man, that wore the shiny claws on his side, was dangerous!
"I will only ask one more time. Talk in my tongue or I will personally silence you forever. That is a promise."
Pale as chalk the man stumbled backwards. "Fo-Forgive me. The child. It's a demon! A wolvesdemon! See yourself! Under all this filth and dirt his hair is snow-white! He's a demon! A Ollowyn!"
The swordsman, that had already pulled his weapon a few centimeters out of its sheath, stored it away again. The smile of a devil crawled upon his face. "Hahaha. You religious Southerners… These superstitions, do you even know where they came from? Your imperial family made all of this up so they could slaughter the bloodline of the former emperor!"
He frowned. "But it seems it wasn't enough to snuff it all out. This innocent child will not be killed for the wars of old as long as I can prevent it. Go! Leave my sight before I forget myself!"
The merchant, however, made no preparations to leave. Seemingly rock solid in his belief that this demon had to be brought to justice. The speech had not let him waver for a second.
Before he was able to start up with his hate speech again, the swordsman had already dashed from his position in a fleeting motion and crossed the distance towards the trader. He then aggressively pulled his weapon from his crouched position and rammed the hilt into the sternum of the merchant before the blade was even able to leave it's sheath. Ribs broke like dry branches and the weapon disappeared in a flash of light, before the tradesman crashed onto the floor.
"Go. Now. When you force me to draw my sword, you will die." Then the swordsman turned to face to shivering kid. "Haha. Look at that. Now you have respect for me, huh? Don't worry, I will save you. You don't deserve to die here... From now on your name will be Ollowyn. Understood?"
Since the kid was unable to comprehend any word the man spouted, and his demeanor was confusing, it took a few days of language lessons to make the boy understand.
In that time, there were many soothing meals and the newly discovered way of communicating blew Ollowyn's mind. Now he was able to ask something, able to research things with the help of others and learn by having things explained to him, rather than finding out himself. That had never been possible in his earlier pack. As much as he had tried to describe his ideas of hunting to his family, the tilted heads of the wolves had made clear to him, that it just was not possible to communicate anything but simple things.
But not all was new and good in his life. Better said, it was far worse. Never had he left his family if he had know that such horror would be part of his new life.
"Nuu! Niee" Nee", tried Ollowyn, but the word "No" would just not leave his mouth clearly.
Of course the swordsman understood immediately what the child had tried to say. But it was all the same to him. -SPLASH!- And the boy hit lukewarm and soapy water again. It was already the second washtub, that they had filled for him, but the penetrating dirt was hard to get rid off.
For the swordsman, Thasun Torréi, however, this was a very fun and rewarding undertaking. The boy was powerful for his young age. Crafty, nifty and precise blows with arms, legs, his nails and teeth came Thasun's way. They more often than not were nearly able to hit their mark. It excited him to see such fighting potential in a child so young. If someone were to be able to teach him and tame that wild side of his, he would make for a very interesting soldier.
After two and a half hours of struggle, the bathing was finally over. Tired from the whole ordeal, he let go of the still writhing boy. It needed almost the whole day until Ollowyn had calmed down. His skin felt wounded, open and his hair smelled of the cursed water. He swore to himself that at the next possibility he would jump in a river and crawl through mud.
After all his troubles, the swordsman clad the boy in a soft robe of scratchy wool. Naturally the kid was far less happy to finally wear clothing than Thasun was. Over and over again he got rid of it and threw it away, no matter how often Thasun forced him into it. Finally frustrated over the resistance and energy the young boy presented him with, he bought him a much lighter and less scratchy linen shirt. This time he beat the boy whenever he tried to take it off, and soon he wore it without struggle.
The child still possessed no trousers or shoes, but Thasun got really tired off all this fighting for etiquette. He always had hated it to be with humans and the lone traveling had always been a good deed for his soul. He could not wait to turn the child over to his master in his hometown. He, Thasun Torréi, could not possible take care of a child!
Ollowyn would only adopt all his bad habits and turn into a copy of himself! And the world had enough angry hermits already. How could he of all people just have picked up a child? Sighing he shook his head at his actions.
The next morning they both left to travel. Ollowyn was especially excited to finally leave the inn. His new pack leader forced him to do a lot of things that he did not like, but he was strong and he taught him how to speak so he was fine with it.
"Whutch dis?", he asked for the hundredth time.
"It's a frog.", Thasun explained.
"Taschty. Hunt?", Ollowyn tried again. For some reason his new pack leader was overly lazy. And he did not want him to try and hunt for him either.
"We have enough left to eat." came the usual answer.
"Wai not hunt?", asked the confused Ollowyn again. "Ollowyn bestest hunter."
Thasun nodded. "Not necessary. We have enough food."
The boy tilted his head thoughtfully. "No hungry?"
"No. Not hungry." Thasun sighed.
To negate the flow of ongoing questions, he decided to run the next part of their way. The boy would not be able to talk once he had difficulty keeping pace.
"Ollowyn, we run now."
The boy tilted his head again and let his long snow-white hair hang in the wind. "Hunt?"
Thasun nodded. "Prey in this direction."
That was a lie, but it would not hurt to motivate the boy to run and keep quiet. Then he began to slowly pass over from walking to a paced jog and strapped the swords on his back so they would not get in the way. It felt good to finally move his muscles again and to expend himself a little.
Since he had found the child, his workout routine was a shadow of what it had once been. He did do one or two hours of sword exercises every day. Both in the morning before Ollowyn woke and in the evening after he fell asleep. Usually, however, he ran most of the distance he traveled and steeled his body with exercises whenever he rested. The slow paced jog started to take up in speed and they took him further and further towards their goal. The Valley of Ending. Thasun's Master had retired there years ago to fund a sword fighting school.
He would surely take in the boy. But there were another 65 kilometers of march before the Mountain Pass of Dunéin to the Valley of Ending would lie before them. Luckily the way was mostly flat before one reached the immediate area before the mountain pass and the boy kept pace easily.
After about an hour, Thasun stopped and took one sword off his back. Without unsheathing it he started to fulfill his usual sword exercises to further tire himself out.
Ollowyn ,however, was again puzzled to see his pack leader acting strangely. He ran so slowly, only to stop and whirl around with his metal claws for no apparent reason? It looked impressive, yes, but the boy saw no reason to do so. Was this a mating ritual? It would be much easier to just bring the female prey. Everyone in his old pack had done so. Maybe the pack leader was dumb? Bored he sat down in the grass next to the road and watched.
But it took seemingly forever! When Ollowyn wanted to finally lie down and sleep, the pack leader stored the claw away on his back and continued. This time he ran much faster, very much to the boys enthusiasm. With the pace doubled he was just able to keep up with Thasun. Usually he fell behind his own pack whenever they were running at elevated speed, but here he was able to keep up! They ran until deep night had come only to fall behind his pack leader as he raised the speed again for some time.
Then there was another pause. The pack leader practiced with his metal claw again and Ollowyn wasted no time to lie down and sleep. Thasun, however, was very impressed with him. A child, not even ten years of age, running nearly thirty kilometers in a pace that would have been impossible for most adults, that was just amazing. That incredible stamina paired with his strength and made Thasun think for a second that he really was a demonic child. The thought amused him.
The next day, Ollowyn woke him early. "Here, Rahbbit. Food. You eat first?"
Thasun rose tiredly and blinked a few times as he saw the freshly killed rabbits. Their tiny necks were broken. Apparently the boy was far more refined at taking care of himself than he had assumed.
"Well done. We will cook them."
Ollowyn tilted his head again. "Cook?"
"Look and pay attention. I want you to learn." Thasun drew a knife and cut the rabbit open quickly to dispose of the innards before he skinned the bunny with q few quick cuts and a strong pull. Which apparently had been the most interesting thing the boy had ever seen.
Excitedly he clapped his hands as he awed at the fur free rabbit. "Hahah! Cook good! Cook good!"
Thasun shook his head. "Not cooking. It's skinning the rabbit. Now we will cook, just wait."
Ollowyn tilted his head again to observe. When the swordsman lit a fire with two stones and dry wood, however, he panicked again. Fire was unnatural to him. It took a few minutes to calm him down and explain that the fire was not bad.
After grilling one rabbit and devouring it, they added the second to their rations and left for the road again. In slow paced jog the surrounding grassland slowly turned into a densely grown mixed forest. The path was still the same dusty country road, but now it was riddled with deep roots, cast by the surrounding trees. A big wagon would have its trouble to pass easily.
Before that dusty road could elevate towards the Mountain Pass of Dunéi, two men appeared at a curve a little down the road. Both wore swords on their sides in similar clothing to Thasun's. He slowed down to a slow stride and strapped his swords to his side again. Ollowyn felt a change in his new pack leader. He practically shone with anticipation and was ready to fight.
The two swordsman stopped about ten meters away from them and Thasun did as well.
"Where are you going, swordsman?", one of them asked.
Thasun rested his right hand on his sword handle and eyed them both. "Past you. To the sword fighting school of the great Ritto Iordai."
The men briefly looked at each other. "Heh. Great Swordmaster? Please. Which truly great sword school refuses challengers? I just can't understand how our lord can accept such a coward in his service. The man must have gotten too old to fight, huh? Truly laughable."
Thasun smiled a dark and evil smile. Nobody would ever insult his master and live to tell the tale. Noone. "You will get your challenge."
With a sharp -click- he slowly unsheathed his sword. Ollowyn stepped back in fear. The aura fe felt while standing right next to his pack leader was murderous…