The boy had finally woken up and Cyrene greeted him with a gentle hug.
"Good morning," Cyrene said. "You feeling better now?"
The boy lazily picked himself back up and rubbed his eyes. He still had a weird limp, but he didn't look to be in any pain.
"Come on," Cyrene grabbed the boy's hand. "We need you to meet the Chief. Then, I'll take you out hunting!"
Walking through the storm made it incredibly hard to see any part of this town. The boy just happened to stumble upon Cyrene's house. However, when not a single flake was falling from the sky, the town was quite a spectacle to behold.
The wooden houses were lined up together, each separated about ten meters away from each other. The streets were snow, but had a compacted structure and layout that made it look and feel like a street. It extended about eighty meters left from where Cyrene and the boy were until it reached the middle of the town where the huge steel tank was. There were people already there to ignite the flame and burn away the water.
To their right, about twenty meters away, there was a curve where a much bigger house sat. This was the Chief's house.
The town's streets were like a giant racetrack.
"The Chief's house is over there," Cyrene said as she tugged on the boy's arm. "Let's hurry this up, because I really want to get my hunting game on!"
The Chief's house was built with an exquisite amount of stone mined from a cave not too far from this town. This house took the Wolfpack about four-five months to build and it stood three stories tall and wide, like a mansion from the era of vampires. The doors were made of a darkened wood that had metal rings used as handles to open them. Unlit torches were placed on each side of the two doors.
The stained glass windows gave this mansion a more vibrant glow, almost like a beacon. Blue, white, and black were the colors that highlighted these windows.
At the sides and back of the mansion were flowers and stones placed in weird patterns along with carvings of what looked to be names chipped into the walls. A graveyard.
The boy stared up at the mansion with a blank expression, limping to barely keep up with Cyrene.
"He should be awake by now," Cyrene said, banging on the front door quite vigorously. "You may not be a Wolf-beast, but I think the Chief will understand. At least, I hope."
Cyrene suddenly seemed unsure, then a little anxious. And now, completely terrified.
"What if he throws you out?" Cyrene panicked as she paced to and fro across the giant living room.
There were carpets of different kinds of animal fur sewn together into one unique carpet. The walls had various watercolor paintings along with pottery, battle axes, daggers, and an assortment of old looking treasures.
A candle chandelier was dangling above the two with it candles lit for the day. The various pieces of jewelry strung onto the curved metal bars were all ores that were mined from the same cave. They sparkled like a blue sky and added to the majestic personality that this mansion had.
There was also a curved stairway that led to the second and third floors with many rooms in each floor. The Chief had two wives, a mother, a brother and a sister, as well as nine kids for this whole place. So the extra space wasn't for shows. The Chief just desperately needed it.
Cyrene panicked more and more as the seconds past. The Chief's brother, Chase, sat with the two while they waited for the Chief to arrive.
"What if he hates him," Cyrene continued panicking. "Wh-What if he sees him as a Bandit and kills him on the spot? This was a mistake this was a mistake this was a mistake!"
"Calm your tail Cyrene," Chase said with a scoff. "My brother may be the Chief, but he ain't cruel. He got a head that work fine, so I think your little partner will be fine."
"Hey, he's not my partner!"
"Yeah yeah, I know. You always hunt solo. Seriously though, you need to find someone as a partner, otherwise you're gonna end up hunting all alone for the rest of your life."
"I'm fine with that. If anything, I actually really like the peace and quiet I get."
"If you say so."
Cyrene turned away with a little "hmph" while Chase just sighed and shook his head a little. The boy just stared at the two with a blank expression on his face.
"Still at each other's throats as always I see."
This was a firm, gentle voice that echoed throughout the grand house. Chase grinned, but Cyrene froze. Coming down the staircase was a man with frosty blue hair and fur, eyes of the ocean, and two battle axes holstered to both his hips. He was bare chested with a robe made of high quality silk and fur. The scars on his face and body looked like scarily detailed tattoos. Each one was a tale of a battle this man had to fight for his life for.
The Chief of the Wolfpack.
"Brother Chase, Cyrene," he gleamed. "Have we had a good morning so far?"
"Besides my wife biting my neck to get me out of bed, the coffee was pretty refreshing today," Chase said, scratching the fur on the back of his neck. "Just gotta get ready for some quality hunting up in the mountains."
"The mountains eh? Do be careful up there brother. I hear that the storm has remained stationary there for a little while."
"Don't worry. If I do get stuck, I'll just set up camp there for the night."
"Very well then. What about you Cyrene? Say…who's this boy?"
"H-He's not a Bandit, I swear." Cyrene exclaimed.
However…
"Well of course he isn't," the Chief said. "I'd trust that everyone here wouldn't bring something vile like a Bandit over here. They'd kill them without hesitation."
Cyrene was dumbfounded, but also relieved. She couldn't believe that she got so nervous only to be reminded that trust was the biggest part of the Wolfpack.
"Oh yeah, sorry," she said. "I guess I got a little bit worried since this boy's not exactly a Wolf-beast or anything."
"Yes, but he's not a Bandit either so it's fine," the Chief reassured. "However, do tell me. How is it that you figured out he wasn't a Bandit?"
Cyrene made sure to remember all the details about what had happened during that storm. How she saw the boy walking with the insides of a Bandit covering him, while he was dragging its body with him.
"His eyes, they're so…broken," the Chief murmured, an ocean of sorrow filling his eyes. "I've seen these eyes too many times. What did this poor boy have to go through?"
"That's what I wanna know," Cyrene said. "But he hasn't spoken a word, so I don't really know what I can do for him. I'm planning on taking him out hunting to see if that'll lift his spirits up a little."
"That can be therapeutic, however this boy needs a release as well. I can't even begin to imagine how much anger this boy has. While his eyes show no light, beneath that darkness I've see a glimpse of rage within them. And it isn't pretty."
While most in the Wolfpack have, unfortunately, seen there fair share of broken people, the Chief has lived through forty straight years of evil. Bandits had taken everything away from him. Family, friends, freedom, even his souls for a brief moment. One day, he had enough of this torture, and single-handedly wiped out an entire camp of Bandits with his own claws. The Wolfpack's hatred towards Bandits ran deep, but nobody despised this group more than the Chief did.
And nobody could see through the eyes of this broken boy than he could.
"If you're wondering if he's allowed to stay, there's no need to worry," the Chief said. "He's welcomed to live here with us, away from those horrid creatures. Take him out for a hunt if you think that'll help him."
"I-Of course," Cyrene saluted. "Hey, come on. Let's go! Thank you Chief!"
Cyrene was twenty so she tried to act mature, but her excitement for hunting had completely taken her over.
The Chief and his brother waved goodbye to them as the pair dashed, or more like Cyrene dragged the boy out with a quickness, out the mansion.
After walking past various structures of drink stops, spices, gardens of fruits, and a blacksmith's shop, the pair reached the edge of the town where a deep forrest lay shivering in the snow.
"Here, I went to the Blacksmith's before you woke up and grabbed you a knife," Cyrene said, handing him the neatly crafted blade. "It's not as big as my dagger, but it a great starter. Made from natural Wolf-beast claws, light, very durable. Easy to use and gets the job done."
Most knives were made from the claws of them members in the Wolfpack. Since they're made from a very tough steel, they take an exceedingly dragging amount of time to break. An ability that a Wolf-beast has, however, is that they can detach these claws whenever they wanted. This mechanism was used to detach old, worn out ones for new ones. They took about three months to fully grow back, but they were also perfect materials for crafting a weapon.
"You want to know something funny," Cyrene asked the boy. "The claws they used were actually my old ones from a year ago. I could tell from the color since mine are the only ones that have this shade of black. I…hope you don't mind, since black is a bit of a boring color and all."
The boy stared at the blade he was gifted, his eyes connected to the dark color. He brought his left hand, while holding it with his right, up to the cold steel. Smooth, dense, well crafted. This blade felt perfect. And while it was only for a brief moment, Cyrene thought that he saw the boys eyes light up again. This time…with excitement.
Cyrene smiled warmly at him again.
"Come on, let's get going," Cyrene said to him. "Morning hunts are always a good time."
After walking a few paces towards the forrest, Cyrene started to think back on what Chase said.
'Seriously though, you need to find someone as a partner, otherwise you're gonna end up hunting all alone for the rest of your life.'
While Cyrene thought that hunting alone was what worked best for her, she started to wonder what it would be like to have a partner hunting with her. Of course, that partner being this strange boy. This boy that she met by chance. This boy she had grown strangely attached to. This boy who was left completely broken by some horrible encounter.
'Maybe I can try some partnership here and there.' She smiled.
Whether this boy liked hunting or not didn't matter to her. What she wanted more was to help bring this boy back to life. To help give him all that time he had lost fighting for his life in a hopeless battle.
Though she would be lying if she said she wasn't a little bit curious about having him as a partner.