On the outskirts of New Orleans, where all the little town houses were supposed to be asleep for the night, one house was wide awake. Candlelight shone through the windows, and the sounds of an argument spilled out into the street.
"I've obeyed my promise to you, Josephine, not to go out unless the downpour has fallen to a drizzle. It has." The man of the house kicked open his front door with a huff, his hands were occupied. In his left he held two suitcases, and in his right... a musket.
"Gerard, this is foolish!" she cried, bouncing a squalling baby in her arms.
"Foolish!? She's our only daughter, Josephine! I searched far and wide for the kindest, most gentlemanly husband I could find, only to hear he's been striking her! If I go over there and find just a single mark on our sweet Isabelle, there's no telling what I shall do!"
In front of the house a family friend drew up a little horse cart. Then he helped Gerard load his things into the back of it, and cover his musket with a sheet. He had personal stakes in this as well, he grew up with Isabelle, and, in truth, he wished to marry her, but Gerard deemed him too low class.
"Gerard, you can't go! It's too far for the night, go in the morning!" Now she started to cry, and that only made the baby in her arms cry louder.
"Take Jean inside or he'll catch cold," he said. Then, when she made no move to leave, he continued. "If it's the rains that worry you, I've brought a hat."
"Please, Gerard. Don't go." In the fifteen years they'd been married, she never begged for anything, he always listened. But now she begged.
And yet he simply leant forward and smiled. "Keep the bed warm for me, Josephine. I shall be back before you know it."
As the cart rattled away down the muddy lane, Josephine's heart sank to her stomach. On any other night she'd have been fine with this trip, she agreed with why he was going. But tonight... something gnawed at her.
Perhaps it was the rain, perhaps it was the war. "Or perhaps," she thought, looking up at the twilit sky.
"It's the Full Moon."
---
The forest reeked of wet dog.
Two shadows slithered between the trees. It was the night that made them black. In truth, the larger, longer one in front was brown, and his brother was a smoky grey, frosted silver at the nape.
They were wet because they were clumsy, and they were clumsy because they were young. Brown had seen only fourteen years, and tonight marked the beginning of Grey's tenth. They were still clumsy in their human forms, so as wolves they fell into every pool and got stuck in every mudhole.
But they were free! It was a Rite of Passage. Since Grey was ten, and already stood seven feet in his wolf form, it was his duty by tradition to kill a man... and drink his blood.
The rain stopped as they reached the causeway, a well-rutted road that snaked through the bayous of Louisiana. Now it was the cicadas that masked their movements, as they crept through the undergrowth.
It wasn't long before a little horse cart came rattling down the road, with two men on board. The wolves flicked their ears at the French they spoke, it was hard to listen to, so alien from their native Choctaw.
They stalked the cart for an hour, making absolutely sure no one would come to help these men. Secretly, both wolves hoped someone else would appear on this road, and force them to call off the hunt. It didn't matter if these men were aliens, enemies to their way of life. They could hear them speak, they could feel their heartbeats.
But no one came...
Brown gave a low howl, and the rest was instinct.
The horse was the first to die. Within moments her throat was gone, and a growling shadow was crouched over her like a Demon, its eyes red with blood-frenzy. But Brown had the restraint to go no further, this was Grey's task, his Rite.
Grey threw his shoulder into the cart, and sent the men and all their things flying to the mud. They were on the ground now, the older man spitting curses, and the younger man crying and pissing himself. Grey tore apart the younger man first, and thereafter was forced by instinct to pee on the dismembered corpse, to mark his conquest.
As he peed, the older man filled his musket's pan with powder; and as both Demons turned their red eyes toward him, he took aim at the closest and fired.
The shot had no effect.
If Grey were in his human form, that of a ten-year-old boy, he would've been killed where he stood. But he was a Lycan, a Beast of the Bayou, cursed by the Great Spirit to stalk the night. He shrugged off the shot like it was nothing.
The older man died like a warrior. With hate in his eye, and a curse on his lips.
---
Afterward, the two wolves went North to a clearing, where they bathed in the moonlight, and washed themselves by a pool. The world was silent, even the cicadas were asleep. Their shame hung in the air. To Grey it was deafening, painful. It gnawed at his soul like a fever, and after a while, he couldn't take it anymore.
He collapsed into his brother's arms, and sobbed into his fur. It was the first time in his young life that Grey... hated himself.
---
He was lucky to have his brother, who neither attacked him nor shoved him away. In fact, he cried too. This was their life, they didn't choose to be this way, but this was their life. It was a hopeless feeling.
After they were done crying they consoled one another as best wolves can, and made ready to head for home.
Then the song filled the air.
Well, it wasn't a song, it was a speech. Not a speech, a sermon. The words were stiff, but flowery; foreign but familiar. They weren't French, and they weren't Choctaw, they were something better, the wolves could agree. The words were bewitching, they danced through the mind like embers through the air; and conjured images of faraway wars, intrigues, and conspiracies. They tickled the brain with promises the wolves couldn't keep, and plans they couldn't understand.
They inched forward toward the words, and climbed a hill whereupon they could see their source.
In a wide pond cloaked in cypress trees, there were a hundred shadows. Brown gasped. They weren't in the water, they were on it! Standing on the pond without breaking its surface, they cast ripples all around them.
In the middle of the shadows was an old lady, she had to be at least a thousand. And perched stiffly on her head... was a True Daemon.
It was a horrifying thing, with thick legs and wide arms, the wings of a bat, and an elongated head, like a horse. When the wolves looked closer they saw that its mouth was wide open, and from its throat came the bewitching sermon.
The two boys had never been more scared of anything in their lives. No, this was beyond fear, this was creeping, agonizing terror. Grey began to uncontrollably whimper, and Brown had to shake him to shut him up. It was a quiet sound, but Brown felt sure, that ~any~ sound was enough for them to be heard.
And he was right.
The sermon stopped, and every shadow on the pond turned toward the boys. Then the Daemon opened its mouth wider, unhinged its jaw. And let out a scream so loud, so horrible, so Diabolical, it blackened the soul to hear. Then it leapt, and began to fly toward them.
They tried to run... but even as wolves, it was no use.