"God, it's massive," Rob slowly uttered the hushed words.
The savage dropped down to the garden below, its feet crashing and shaking the ground in its impact. The gray giant stared silently at each of them, its terrifying crimson eyes looking with a hunger so primal that it seemed out of place in this or any century where man dominated the earth.
Something else flickered in its red eyes which shocked the Texan, who himself was not easily surprised, yet he was entirely unprepared to find this one attribute in such a powerful savage. Behind those eyes was the spark of the sharp and keen intelligence of man.
A black tongue slithered slowly from its gray lips, slabbering its onyx skin and gray fur in saliva.
"You two!" Elijah shouted sharply, "Keep your distance."
"The offerings have been made - rightly paid in full - now you stand afraid ready for slaughter - like sheep of wool." the giant beast's voice boomed between savage growls, its every word shaking the Texan's ear.
Elijah felt his heart race and his palms sweat.
"What offerings are you talking about monster!" he yelled.
In an instant, the Hulking beast was in the air, leaving the ground shaking and a sound like savage thunder throughout the bloody garden.
Elijah quickly leaped to safety, landing and rolling in the dirt, and then, quickly raised his gun and started to utter a chant to take the monster down. The giant werewolf slammed Its huge hands on the ground where Black once was, missing its target but providing a clear demonstration of its strength to the gunslingers.
"Fire!" Elijah yelled.
They all fired and sent a blaze of fire from all directions straight at the gray demon's head. The beast quickly raised its giant arm and shielded itself from the flames, its thick gray hair barely burning for a second before becoming extinguished.
"Why isn't it burning," yelled Rob,
Its crimson eyes slowly swept across each of the Gunslingers, it's savage mix of fangs and molars twisting into a sadistic smile.
"Shit," Elizah gasped, her eyes wide.
The werewolf's giant hand raised swiftly into the air, its claws poised like giant scythes and casting a shadow that crossed half the garden, as they prepared to strike. The sythes swung with the sound of unsheathing swords, forcing Elijah to jump away yet again to avoid death.
He landed with a roll that the Texan would definitely not call comfortable, quickly but not painlessly getting back to his feet. He aimed his weapon again, the marks on his arms searing with wild flames that traveled to his revolver which became coated in flames.
"Over here!" Elizah fired at the beast to draw its attention.
A gust of cold wind quickly rose and swirled around her, glowing like the runes across her arms as it slithered to her gun. She leveled her weapon, and then suddenly, the icy wind disappeared, replaced by three giant crystal-like spikes that materialized above her and levitated weightlessly in the air.
Elizah squeezed the trigger, sending the frosted blades hurtling at the beast's back. The monster's shoulders shuddered and turned with the three sharp crystals piercing out its back like the spikes of a hedgehog.
A menacing shadow moved across its face as its crimson eyes stared intensely at the raven-haired woman, its black pupils shaking with murderous intensity.
"I'll – kill – you – now."
The werewolf's legs sprang and rocketed its giant body towards her, its claws extending with a sound like unsheathing swords.
"What the hell are you doing!" shouted Black, firing at the monster as it leaped.
It continued to lunge at her, its scythe-like claws swinging and cutting the air like butter. A slower gunslinger would have died there, but Elizah swiftly escaped, relieving the firing Texan, but only slightly.
The werewolf let loose a terrifying howl, a thundering sound louder than anything the gunslingers had thought possible from a living creature and almost deafening the trio.
The crimson eyes squinted under its furrowed brow at Elizah, who had fired another volley of cutting crystals. A flicker of thought crossed the beast's face and it growled softly, and then, as the shards approached it did the unthinkable, grabbing the hurtling ice in its massive gray claws.
Black saw the fear across his daughter's face and sprang dangerously close to the beast, still firing blazes of fire. The fires exploded on the beast's back and it snarled angrily. It spun, throwing the massive shard like a dagger at the Texan. Black leaped right and the shard, turning two of the statues in the garden to rubble, crashed loudly into the stone wall instead, sticking out like a giant splinter under a nail.
Black breathed deeply, shocked at the speed that the monster threw the object. Had he been slowe- no, now wasn't the time, he told himself, realizing that both Rob and Elizah watched concerned in the distance.
Rob and Elijah fired round after round into the towering beast, yet the monster dodged them all, leaping up on to and off of walls, which shook with every jump.
"How does that feel you bastard!" yelled Rob.
Both Elizah and Rob had finally hit the beast as it leaped, forcing it painfully down to the ground. Its crimson eye locked onto the Texan's daughter, an intense focus growing for the woman who had injured it with ice.
"If you have to look at one of us, look here mate," Rob quickly blocked Elizah from its gaze and leveled his revolver.
The werewolf snarled with a sound like twisted laughter, and then, leaped up into the air, its shadow trailing slowly towards the duo until it was directly above them.
"The bastard," Rob and Elizah leaped out of the way in opposite directions, avoiding the beasts that crashed down where they had stood.
The beast wasted no time, springing after Elizah like a rabid dog. It repeatedly attacked the dodging gunslinger, who was growing weary with each slash. Statues crumbled as flame, ice and claws filled the garden air.
The beast's attention, as before, stayed fixed on Elizah.
"You're too close!" Rob shouted.
Elijah ignored him, stepping closer and closer, his mind focused on taking as much heat from Elizah as possible.
Anger unlike Elijah had ever known fell on the beast's face and it went into a frenzy. It quickly gathered up the remains of one of the destroyed statues and panted wildly, its grey stomach pulsing in and out as it did. The werewolf raised its hand of statue fragments and threw a hail of stones at Elizah, that shredded everything in its path.
She dived out of the way and a gut-wrenching scream filled the air, and both men yelled with surprise. Elizah whimpered in pain as she landed on the ground clasping a growing red stain on her stomach.
"Move!" Elijah yelled, firing everything he had at the beast.
In one swift and bloody motion, the werewolf lunged and clamped down on Elizah, holding the woman in a vice-like grip between its countless fangs and dragged her kicking and screaming into the air.
A growing pool of blood gathered on the ground, trailing and dripping down from the wounded woman.
Elijah went numb, unable to move, his eyes locked on Elizah's arm swinging from the werewolf's bloody mouth.
Rob pointed his shaking barrel but didn't dare fire with Elizah in the crosshairs.
"Eli-El-E" Black struggled to say the name, his jaw dropped and a seething pain swelling at his heart.
The beast spat Elizah's shredded body to the ground, her head and her eyes blankly stared up at the moonlit sky.
The monster turned to Elijah, a sadistic satisfaction dancing behind its crimson eyes. Its black tongue licked mockingly around its gray lips and collected his partner's dripping blood back into its mouth.
A burning feeling rose within Elijah, a searing mixture of hate and anguish brimming from the deepest part of him.
The fang-littered mouth started to hang, growing wider and more menacing, while its legs bent and coiled preparing to spring. Its eyes locked firm on the numb gunslinger before him, and then, it lunged, leaping high into the moonlighted sky.
"Move!" Rob yelled.
Elijah didn't move, he merely stood and spoke silently, yet the words he spoke were forbidden by decree of his ancient order, but this did not stop a young and stubborn Elijah and a troubled researcher from etching the rune onto him. He did not know what it would do, only being told that whatever or whoever stood before it when cast, would be there no longer. Now that researcher is gone and Black's only daughter lay in a pool of blood, he did not care for the consequences, he didn't give a damn.
The beast was above him now, its fangs and claws within striking distance.
The researchers said that it would cost the user more than its target, some even say driving them to madness. He didn't care, one way or another he'd take this monster to hell.
Elijah's brow lowered over his gray eyes as he raised his revolver and aimed at the falling beast. He squeezed the trigger and the barrel of the cold steel erupted in a fiery blaze. He felt a sudden loss of control like a dark force taking over, filling him with its unsatiable urge to kill.
The werewolf was engulfed in infernos flames, which like the fires of hell wrapped and burned the gray monster.
Elijah dived out of its way and the massive body crashed to the ground, its skin charred, and a faint whimper escaped its wolfish mouth. Pain swelled behind its crimson eyes, the beast appearing as if this was the first time it had felt such a sensation. Its black pupil rolled back slowly, leaving only the lifeless crimson.
"Wake up!" Rob shouted.
Black turned and saw the young gunslinger shaking Elizah, yet the sight did not trouble him as deeply as it should have.
"S-Shit no not that o-"
"Shit not that it-"
"God damn it"
He watched Rob recite chant after chant, as he desperately searched for a way to heal her.
Elijah's eyes fixed on her body and his mind started to recount everything they had gone through, recalling everything they had done together. His hands began to shake.
"All those year-" he stopped himself.
Suddenly, he felt his mind whirl and a dizzying sensation began to take over and claw out from the depths of his thoughts.
"More, and more, the words!" echoed the words in his pain-stricken mind.
"What the hell is this," he clasped his head with both hands, attempting to relive the growing pain. The voices were getting increasingly louder, as they stabbed at his brain.
"More what!" the Texan shouted.
Then, silence, the voices vanished, and the pain he had endured left. Black lowered his hands from his head, his thoughts slowly coming back to him.
He looked around the garden, feeling an urge to distract his mind with anything to overtake his sadness filled his body. He stared at a section of the garden's stone wall, at first believing the surface to be painted white.
He walked to it and on closer inspection, he realized it was paint covering a door that stood before a gap in the surface.
Wind from behind, he felt it as he pressed the surface of the door.
Offerings, he mumbled, gently pushing against the door.
It opened, revealing a dark passageway behind it which was scarcely lit by hanging torches on the wall. His mind imagined what horror was in store for him at the end of his passage. He stepped through slowly, believing it better if Rob were left with Elizah.
"Elizah," he mumbled.
Strange, he thought, realizing that her name did not pain him to say.
He emerged from the passageway, and then, stopped, reality proving to be far worse than he initially imagined.
He entered a candle-lit room, larger than the garden and stretching up to a ceiling that was nothing but darkness. At its center, illuminated by the torches surrounding it, stood a grotesque monument built with naked human bodies.
"Dear god," Elijah whispered.
He stared at the debased idol, the bodies it was built with were young, disgustingly so. All of them were girls, their bodies twisted and mangled in some grotesque fashion.
The idol reached up to the ceiling, a savage fusion of flesh and bone that contorted into a sick ritualistic statue similar to those that stood in the garden.
A foul stench filled the room like a cart of carrion that invaded the senses and made him wish for the clear air of the garden.
He noticed one of the poor dead souls sewn into the monstrous drape. Her body twisted into an insufferable pose, her blue eyes positioned to appear to be looking up at right at him.
Suddenly he felt a cold shudder, "No your not real-, how could you still be –."
At first, he thought his mind had tricked him, but now he regretted proving that it wasn't the case. Elijah gasped and a tear swelled in the staring pale blue eyes.
"Still alive," he said.
The eyes watched him with pain and suffering swelling behind them.
"Who did this to you," he asked, his voice soft like a parent comforting a lost child.
A faint moan left her but no words.
There was no saving them from this and he knew it, the damage done couldn't be reversed, and something in Elijah told him he already knew what she wanted.
He raised his gun and pressed it gently against her forehead. He nodded slowly and softly closed her eyes. His revolver roared and her eyes stayed closed.
A numbness filled his mind, drowning out everything else.
He slowly pulled back his sleeve and raised his revolver again, slowly and emotionlessly uttering a chant. And then, he squeezed the trigger.
An inferno consumed the nightmarish idol, engulfing it in its flames and lighting up every shadow in that cursed room.
The sound of paper in the air gradually grabbed his attention and he turned, catching the drifting piece of paper that moved across the blood-smeared floor. He knelt down to pick it up, starting to read the carefully written black ink that filled the paper.
"They lulled in cotton beds
forgetful of primal fright
Now they are completely bled
displayed in the cold of night
Lycaeon will rise
werewolves will reclaim their might
Our deity will be at our side
so the man's world will fear our bite
Your resolute leader and brethren
Edward Stout – England Birmingaham UK