Tw - mild violence
Tw - mild violence
Prompt: "Everyone constantly says that Nature is beautiful. They forget—Mother Nature has been trying to kill us for millennia."
Silas bared his teeth at the wolf and smiled when the animal unconsciously took a step back, growling. The hilt of the bone knife dug inside his palm, scratching at an old scar that had the nasty habit of itching at the worst of times. At last, it stopped itching; but it pulsed with a hunger akin to the one inside the wolf's red eyes. The beast's fangs twinkled in the shadows of the forest, reminding Silas of the flickering torchlight he had left behind to protect his bedridden father. Green saliva dripped on the ground and sizzled; the dire wolf stepped cautiously in Silas's direction, its red tongue lolling out to reveal a second set of teeth, as its claws scraped the leaves under its five twitching paws. Its claws left deep lines where it stepped, and Silas snarled; he won't allow one of these creatures to touch him again. The last had been just a pup, and Silas had shown too much mercy. It had almost cost him an eye.
The scar on his cheek stung, reminding him of his arrogance. He'd been a fool not to listen to his father's advice. Sunlight filtered shyly between the tree crowns, exposing the fresh blood staining the wolf's maw. It had killed recently, but Silas saw no sign of a corpse which meant the beast was intelligent enough to hide its prey. With no other weapon than the dagger, he was at a disadvantage.
Maybe that's why he couldn't stop smiling. The villagers dubbed him Silas the Mad; he was a man of few words and you couldn't be a man of few words in a community and escape unnamed. They said he had a murderous glint in his dark green eyes and a laugh so similar to a crow's caw a few had found the courage to whisper he might be a changeling. Silas knew he was as human as they were, but he hadn't argued with them; his reputation protected not only him but his father, and it helped them survive in a world screaming constantly for blood to be spilled. But the dire wolf cared little for the social constructs of the humans; it knew only the beckoning of fresh blood, the limp of a wounded deer. These things attracted him and made his large stomach grumble under its black fur; they led him to the human settlements and drove him to attack the livestock in an attempt to survive the day.
Silas called the wolf Tar; it had been hunting in these woods for a year now, stealing the livelihood and souls of many good men. This night, it had threatened the life of Silas's father, and Silas could no longer watch from afar. Go hunt the rabid wolf, Mad Silas, the villagers had urged him, pointing to the bedridden Cassius. He's become a threat to you too now.
"Here, poochie, poochie," Silas crooned, grinning when the wolf snarled.
It knew Silas was toying with him and the longer they circled each other, the fewer chances of success it would have. Served him right for not staying in a pack; Silas had learned that lesson the hard way.
"Your hunting days are over, buddy. Do you know my father used to be a wolf-killer?" He took a careful step closer, watching Tar's legs twitch as he scrambled back.
Silas had found that whenever he told a wolf about his father, their eyes would flicker, and their fur would stand up like a cat's as if they knew Cassius' reputation and were afraid of him. No, not afraid. Downright terrified. Tar must have been a real alpha male if he didn't run away yelping as the last one had.
"He'd look at you and smile; before you knew it, his hands would clutch your throat and squeeze all the air out of your lungs." Silas threw the dagger on the leaves, flexing his palm. "He taught me his ways before the illness came."
He'd never tried it on a dire wolf, but it was about time he inherited his father's axe. Cassius had promised to give it to him after his first, and Silas was tired of waiting.
Tar moved so fast, Silas barely had time to throw himself to the right; the massive body flew past him and landed softly between the trees, leaving a trail of acidic saliva behind. It ate at the browning leaves, exposing the dark ground underneath. Silas stared at the huge paw print beneath the leaves, realizing his mistake.
His eyes darted to the wolf and watched as the beast began morphing. This wasn't a normal dire wolf. It had feasted on the dark blood of the wraiths and had hunted along with the Dead Cavaliers. It was a hellhound and one used in gladiator fights, judging by a small tattoo nestled in its ear. Silas had missed it at first, but now, as Tar's shoulders expanded, and his snout elongated, the tattoo grew as well, revealing the symbol of the Cavaliers. A red skull grinned at Silas, and from the skull, the amethyst eyes of a Dead Cavalier stared at him, whispering commands in the hound's ear.
Tar's fangs shrunk, leaving room for a forked tongue to loll out and taste the air around his head. Hellhounds were blind by nature and had to rely on all their other senses, which were heightened to three times those of a human's. Silas cursed under his breath as he kept his attention on the beast's tail, expecting it to sprout spikes anytime. If it laid any of its paws on him, he would be as dead as the wraiths it had eaten to morph.
Silas certainly didn't expect the wolf to speak.
"Little human," it growled, swinging its head left and right to sniff him out. "Have you run away already?"
His mind urged him to flee, but he found he was frozen in place; his legs refused to move even one inch and his eyes were glued to the hellish monster his taunts had conjured. If he had just killed the wolf, it wouldn't have turned into a rampaging hellhound; instead, he had played with it and disrespected the forest itself, and now the forest was striking back.
Tar must have sensed Silas' fear by now and gotten an idea of the thoughts spiraling inside his mind.
"Cassius can't come and save you, little human. The wraiths made sure of that."
It was true–their skeletal hand had touched his father, and he had fallen to an illness no one could cure. Once a wolf-killer, Cassius was now barely able to stand, let alone lift his axe again, and with every blood-stained cough, his strength withered away, leaving an emptiness inside Silas's chest he wouldn't have thought possible. They had never been too close, but he surprised himself with the efforts he had made for his father.
If he died now, Cassius would have no chance of survival. They would both die alone, just as they had lived. The loners of the village, with no one to go to for help or a kind word.
He willed himself to move as slowly as possible, barely daring to breathe, lest Tar hear him and pounce.
"Where are you?" Tar's voice edged closer as Silas darted out of the bushes and grabbed the knife.
Like a bullet, the hellhound whirled around and lunged to grab Silas' hand, but Silas was expecting it and managed, even if by a stroke of luck, to dodge the open maw and stick the knife right in one of the red eyes. Hellhounds were nearly indestructible and couldn't be killed even by a blade going straight through their hearts. Those blind eyes were the only weakness the hellhounds had. Many brave men had died to pass on that information, and their courage now saved Silas from a gruesome death.
The hellhound reverted to his wolf form, yelping. It tried to slink away, but the damage had already been done and blood pooled at its feet, causing it to skid right into a tree.
"Where do you think you're going?" Silas rushed right after it, seeing the flickering shapes of the wraiths in the crawling wolf.
They would come after their pup with the swiftness of a hippogriff; Silas would make sure they knew who had done the job. He took the knife out of the shuddering body, listening to its hissing breaths. A few more moments and life would flow back into the forest, as it was supposed to. Silas grabbed the scruff of its neck and stared at the remaining eye.
"Tell your masters I am done running away. If they want to come, I'm waiting." He sliced Tar's neck, reveling when the light in the wolf's pupil went out.
Cassius better give him that axe now, or he wouldn't be able to escape the wraiths.