Lycanthropy

After a few days, one of the other packs managed to capture one of the attackers, after hurting it badly. So as quick as I was able to, I went to that pack, to interrogate the wolf.

Upon reaching Red Mesa Pack, I went to the cells, that they had dug out from underneath one of the massive stone pillars.

There, behind bars was a large man, broad shoulders, black hair and beard, with braids and silver woven into it. As he was captured in wolf form, he wasn’t wearing clothes, so I could see strange runes tattooed into his skin. They were sliced here and there, due to all the lacerations he has been suffered with. But even if his skin was unblemished, I don’t think I would recognize those markings anyway.

“Why are you here?” I asked him, when I stood in front of his cell door.

“Ég mun ekki yfirgefa konung minn.” He said, in a language that I’m not familiar with.

“Why are you here?!” I shouted to him now.

“Ég mun ekki yfirgefa konung minn.” He said again, with a face without emotion.

“I’m sorry my King, but that is all that he said all morning. He won’t eat either.” The Alpha of Red Mesa said.

I nodded to him, and allowed him to use more destructive force to get him to say something else. But even after several hours of torture and pain, he still said those strange words. I had contacted my historian, to find something more about the language and the runes on his skin. He had said that it was one of the ‘cold languages’, used by people living on the lands, in the far north of our planet. But even he doesn’t speak that language, so I demanded of him to find a translator, and send him to Red Mesa pack.

“Ég mu- mun… e- ekki yfirgefa konung minn!” He said in a roaring voice, upon receiving flogs on his back.

I growled in frustration and grabbed the wolf by its throat. As I yelled in his face, asking him why he was here, what he was doing here and so on, he just began to chuckle and spit in my face.

“Ég get ekki dáið. Svo pyntaðu mig allt sem þú vilt.” He said half choking.

I threw his body to the side and left the dungeon, while commanding the Alpha to notify me as soon as he said something useful, or when the translator has arrived.

Above the river:

“For crying out loud!” I yelled into the darkness.

Each time I go to a packhouse, which has just been attacked, another one gets attacked, it is so annoying and frustrating that I’m starting to lose my temper.

“Sorry my Queen, but the east packhouse has gotten theirs.” My new Gamma said.

“Fuck!”

“To all my loyal wolves! If they attack, keep women and children inside, and in the meantime, set up traps, to capture them! I want them alive!” I yelled to all of them over the pack link, and an instant agreeing ‘yes my Queen’ boomed over the link back to me.

Within half a day, I had wolves being captured in three separate packhouses. I had ordered them to be brought to the mountain, and throw them into the cells at the lower region beneath the rocks. Air was humid there as the underground waterway moisturized the walls, and made your breathing become stuffy. Of course they wouldn’t die of suffocation, as there was enough oxygen, but at least they could be partially distracted by their own breathing, making it easier to break them into talking.

I watched them being thrown in, from my office, using the cameras that I have had placed in the cells. All five of them, looked quite similar. As their rugged look of broad muscles, braided hair, and silver bands in their beards and ears, made them look otherworldly.

Yet, that look of them, reminded me of someone. I don’t know what it is, but I seem to admire their decorations and markings on their bodies. Especially all those braids, that were roaming around on their heads and in their beards.

“What are you thinking about?” Dakota asked me.

“I don’t know, so far they only fought the ones that attacked them, but no one else. And now that I see them, it’s even stranger, I’m not sure what it is, yet.” I replied.

As I looked at them, trying to spot out some weaknesses, to see who would be talking first, I suddenly noticed something. Each time they moved, or started talking in their pack link, they almost all acted at the same time, but not entirely… Looking at five men at the same time, it was hard to distinguish the one who instigated the actions.

“Terrence look with me, will you?” I said as I looked at the footage, the moment they were thrown in.

“What am I looking at?” He asked me.

“Which one, acts first? There must be a leader amongst them.” I explained.

Upon straining our eyes, and slowing the image a little, we found out that the one in the corner, who was sitting laidback against the wall of the cell, started every action. He was the first to grey his eyes over, into communication, and the first to move. He looked the most bulky of all of them too. Maybe he is an Beta or an Alpha even? I’m not sure, until I can catch their scents.

I decided to go down there, together with Terrence and a few warriors as back up.

As we entered the cells, I tried not to look at the supposed Beta or Alpha. Trying to throw him off at my thinking. I went to the far end of the hall, and spoke directly to the most thin, yet still amazingly broad wolf.

“What are you doing here? What is your motive?” I asked him.

He scoffed at my question, and didn’t answer me. So I asked him again, and for a second there, he looked at the man in the other corner, the one of which I assumed was the leader. Bingo!

“What? You need someone to agree with you, to talk to me?” I laughed at him.

As I looked into the eyes of the man in the corner, to see if he would let his warrior talk to me, his scent hit my nose and I got confused by it. He is strong, and I assume he is a Beta. But the most strange thing was, that not only their looks, look familiar, but their scent too. What is it with these men?

But he didn’t seem to catch on, on my confusion and nodded to the thin man, who I was talking to.

“Tell me!” I roared.

The man jumped up, a bit surprised and furrowed his brows. I’m an Alpha, he should know by now, so why is he acting so odd? He is strong, probably stronger than Terrence, so he shouldn’t be that scared, right?

“Við erum að leita.” He said, and I took a few steps backwards.

I tried ferociously to not let them see my surprise now. But I guess I’m failing utterly, as the man in the corner stood up and walked over to the bars of the cell.

“Þú skilur okkur, er það ekki?” He asked me, and I nodded.

All the while this happened, Terrence looked at me, in total disbelief and utter confusion. He couldn’t understand what was going on. But he wasn’t the only one that was acting confused.

Because the last time that I had ever heard this language, was the day before my mother got killed.