"You were ordered to slay the beast, where you not?" George said, staring down at the quivering mercenary before him. The poor sod with his little goatee had arrived days earlier as a man of great confidence, his companions widely regarded as the finest hunters in all the local lands.
Now it was just him, reduced to this wretched state.
"It was a m-monster, unlike anything I've ever seen! Took me boys, and broke em against the ground! Arrow's didn't hurt the thing, our armour didn't s-stop its claws and - it was a werewolf!"
George laughed, the hunter flinching as he tried to wipe away the snot and tears the ran down his face like a festering wound.
"The werewolves....are loyal. It could not be one of them, it is not possible. So get back out there, and come back with the wretches head," George hissed, his back straightening as he caught the shadowy figure at the desk behind him raise a hand. Immediately George stood aside and bowed, while his master spoke.
"You will be paid the full price if you succeed, and you have my permission to seak out adventurers across the land to destroy this creature. But I refuse to accept any more casualties. If so much as one of my servants are consumed by this - thing - due to your lack of effort, I'll have George here bring me your head on a platter. Have I made myself understood?"
The Mayor had spoken through his milkwhite bird mask, his shining black tuxedo as restored as George could make it while his fingers glittered with gemstones. Such had been the great reward of securing the werewolves' loyalty, even if the strange occurrence of the 'Hound' had become its cost.
"Impossible," whispered the wretch, scratching at his goatee, "the monster is too powerful. Who would d-dare stand against it? It's not possible, its n-not-"
Lighting crackled, a flash of light brightening the room.
The walls were filled with werewolf pelts, their heads adorning placards while their bones rimmed the wood like sordid picture frames. Below the trophies stood wide-eyed maids with yellow eyes, fangs poking out from sweet lips and furred ears alert above. As the Mayor held his fingers up, the maids stared with a desperate intensity, fark rimmed eyes ready to pull themselves free as each stared to where the Mayor held a little black vial between two white-gloved fingers.
"Do as I have said, or you will be used to attract the beast. Perhaps a sacrifice could get it to where my pets could restrain the creature, or the Hunter General's men could but it in the grave. You have seven days, no more, no less."
The door opened silently behind him, the hunter was pulled away by one maid's powerful grip. Perhaps intentionally, she used enough of her strength to make him squeal while doing so.
Once he was gone, the Mayor gestured for George to follow.
"If he runs for it George, kill him."
George nodded, his yellow eyes flaring as his tailored suit bulged at the seams.
"As you wish, Mayor."
"And George, you've taken your medicine, right?" the Mayor held up that little black vial, every yellow eye in the room swivelled to stare with a deep-set yearning. George forced himself to look the same, "indeed I have, and it has worked as wonderfully as always. Thank you."
The Mayor sat back and nodded, none the wiser that George for quite some time.
And George- Grankash, had never felt better.