The Wolf & The Witch

Lestat rolled with Claire in his arms and a heavy hand smacked into the ground behind him. He rolled again, then backed up, and faced the wolf. He brought Claire’s ear to his lips. “Can you use magic? Don’t answer. Nod yes or no.”

Claire hadn’t tried yet- Megolte’s ring was supposed to cancel magic, but, then again, the metal cuff around their wrists changed things in odd ways. She shrugged, and mouthed, “I think so.” She scooted up in his right arm and held tight.

The wolf charged, and Lestat stood unmoving, waiting, watching, then at the last moment he dropped to the left and rolled while the witch ran fire down her arm and flung flames into the werewolf’s eyes. The howl was short- Lestat jumped and took his head before he could finish it.

Lestat turned his attention towards finding Megolte, but he didn’t need to turn far. He could feel them- wolves, in his feet. Their heavy step on the stone floor. Three. Four? He couldn’t tell how many. He turned towards the center of the house- a limestone hall stretched out before him, and at the end, a large room- chairs, a large table, the blood-orange flicker of fire, and the shadow of stairs, and the heavy thudding feet of werewolves. Lestat took a slow, steady, deep breath, and exhaled growls. He had fought, and killed, many wolves in his life, but never while holding, and protecting, a woman. Never while using only his left hand. He lifted her, and leaned close, and put his lips right on her ear, and as quiet as he could, whispered. “Let me fight. Don’t look at them. Don’t talk to them. Don’t use magic again until we fight Megolte.”

Claire pulled away, with chills running down her neck, and nodded. She looked around, spied a dead guard, and pointed to his sword. Lestat retrieved it for her, and took three loud steps down the hall, before the large room. “Come bow before me lesser wolves!” he shouted, his voice echoing off the stones. “You will either come to me, and bow like the cowards you are, or I will burn your home to the ground and you with it!”

Claire looked up at him. That was one way to start a fight. She felt his muscles tighten, and could feel him growling.

Thud, thud of heavy feet. Two wolves stepped into the hallway, blocking out the light behind them. They came down the hall, slowly at first, their heads nearly touching the ceiling; shirts shredded off their muscular frames, long, strong arms with sharp, jagged claws. The werewolf on the left leapt, his fur scraping the ceiling, and Lestat ran forward, slid under an outstretched paw at the last second, and continued towards the wolf in the back. That werewolf swung a large, furry paw and smacked Lestat off his feet into the wall. He had anticipated that, and braced himself, but it still hurt. He grimaced for half a second, planted his feet in the crumbling paneling, and jumped back at the wolf. The wolf hadn’t even finished swinging his arm around when Lestat drove the broken sword through his neck down to the hilt, just above his clavicle.

Lestat leapt back a few steps, closer to the center of the stone hallway. Light flickered from lamps and fires and the dying shadows of both. The wolf in front of him sputtered, and dripped life into his hands.

But Lestat knew there was one behind him, coming. But he did not feel the heavy thud of feet, which meant one thing- the werewolf was already in the air. He dropped his left hand to the hilt of the longsword, and then stopped moving- a half second, another, and he felt Claire tense in his arms, and heard her pull her breath in, which meant the werewolf was close enough. Lestat fell back and to the left and swiped up- a flash of white silver and the wolf’s hand went flying. He spun as he fell and sliced again and was glad the sword was sharp- he felt it snag, and chip, as it cut through the werewolf’s femur.

Lestat jumped back, down the hall. Two wolves were dead and dying and groaning, but he knew there were more, and he wanted to fight as many in this hall as possible- it would be suicide to walk into that room until there was only one wolf left.

He looked at his sword- chipped. It would break on the next hit. He flung it aside and walked back to a twitching, leaking soldier, and picked up a new sword. “Is that it!?” Lestat roared, and glanced around- he didn’t see any soldiers returning, or wolves, or anyone else that wasn’t dead or on the floor twitching. His little witch friend did a great job, but there were still at least two wolves waiting for him, one the alpha. “There once was an Alpha named Megolte,” Lestat said, his voice lilting, turning his words into poetry, and song, “Whose dick was as small as a bolt.” Lestat took a few steps forward, his bare feet smacking the stones.

Claire looked up at him, surprised. “Are you sure taunting him is a good idea?” she whispered.

She hadn’t whispered quietly enough, and Lestat was positive the other wolves heard. He was glad, for the first time since sneaking into this estate, that she didn’t know how to be quiet. He smiled down at her, then looked down the hall. “The wolves here are a bunch of scared runts with limp dicks. All these soldiers, guards, walls, and for-“ and then Lestat had a thought. He reached their cuffed hands and touched the wall of the hall- solid. Interesting. Not useful. But interesting. “For what? I guess Este was right- the alpha here is a coward. Let’s burn the place to the ground.”

That did it. There was a thud, and then another. Lestat turned, and slowed his breathing, and loosened his body. This was going to hurt- he could tell by the way the werewolf came around the door-frame: sure-footed, controlled-fury. The werewolf did not run, or jump. This was not Megolte, either. He pulled Claire back and waited. “You’re a stringy piece of shit, aren’t you.” He pushed Claire’s left hand open, with his right, and laced his fingers with hers, and closed his fist, locking their hands together. The werewolf did not run, and did not hurry, but thudded down the hall. Lestat ducked a heavy swipe of a long, black arm, then he sprung forward and cut the wolf’s legs off. Except the sword stopped at the bone, lodged. The werewolf ignored the sword and grabbed him by the head with one gigantic hand.

And the witch dangled in the air, and the werewolf punched Lestat in the stomach. A gentle tap that bent him in half. And then another, a little harder, that knocked the air out of him. And the next one a little harder, like large rocks falling on him.

Claire felt his hand, steady in hers. The cuff was nearly breaking their wrists. He tapped her with his left hand, and she wondered for a moment what he wanted, then realized- his sword was still lodged in the leg of this werewolf. She reached her right hand up, with the sword, as he was punched over and over.

The werewolf saw, and turned his attention to the witch.

Lestat knew this werewolf was too fast to attack straight on, and he guessed his chest, and neck, much like his leg bones, would be too hard for swords to cut. He snorted, and it tasted like blood. He snorted again, gathering snot and blood and spit in his mouth, stirred them together with his tongue, and spit at the werewolf and hit him right in his eye as he was pulling his fist back to hit Claire. The werewolf changed his target. Lestat relaxed his body, his muscles, and turned his head to the right while at the same time bringing his sword straight up. The blade cut the werewolf from his jugular to spine- throat, chin, nose, forehead, skull- split in two. And the punch hit Lestat hard in the face; he tried to roll with it but werewolves are too strong. His head bounced and his skin tore open above his eyes and his ear split and a gash ran bright red from his eye to his ear. Blood splattered the walls and floor, and he was flung back into the stone wall.

He caught Claire in his arm as he slumped to the floor. He took a deep breath, and looked down at her- One red drop, then another, plopped on her cheek. She was ok.

He stood, using the wall as a brace; he blinked blood out of his eye, and walked back to the middle of the hall, and leveled his sword at the flickering room at the end of the hall and growled.

Claire felt the growl in his chest. She looked at him, and frowned- he was a bloody mess and her heart was hurting. Claire wasn’t scared, not as much as she should be. And she wasn’t afraid- not in his arms. But her heart hurt for him, and she didn’t know what to do, so she squeezed his hand- her left and his right, and relaced their fingers together, and with her right hand she reached up and wiped blood out of his eyes. “Are you… ok?” she whispered. She looked up at him, frowning, sad, scared- for him.

Again, too loud. He glanced down at her, spit blood, and nodded. “Ok? They haven’t scratched me yet.” He squeezed her hand, took a deep breath, and stomped down the hall, holding Claire in his right arm. Barefoot. Dirty. Bleeding. Shirtless. Beat up. Tired and exhausted.

Lestat heard Megolte to the right, close to the fire. He was positive there were only four wolves, and so he walked straight to the end of the hall, turned, and was just in time to duck a swipe that knocked part of the doorframe apart. He spun, cleaved the air and missed, and the werewolf at the door grabbed him by the throat, lifted them off the ground, and threw them across the room. Lestat crashed into the wall and fell with a heavy thud. He dropped the sword- he could not hold it and shield Claire. He had just enough time to look around- two werewolves, one Megolte, and the other picked him up again, and again threw him across the room and Lestat felt his ribs creak. Another hit like that and they would break.

“Is that all you’ve got,” Lestat growled, and tried to stand, but his knee gave out and he stumbled forward.

There was a large table in the center of the room with plates of food, water, forks and knives, and mugs of beer. The werewolf walked around the table, lifted Lestat by his throat, and drove him backwards into the wall.

Claire didn’t know what to do. He told her not to use magic, and she couldn’t do much anyway, but he was getting beat up so badly, and part of that was protecting her. She reached down for her dagger and felt Lestat squeeze her hand- telling her to not do anything.

The werewolf took Lestat from the wall and slammed him down on the table, dragging Claire behind. “And you call us cowards? After poisoning our beer? Don’t make me laugh,” the werewolf growled, and, with Lestat pinned to the table by the neck, grabbed a mug of beer and forced it to his face.

Claire could not allow him to die by poison- she didn’t care what he was trying to warn her about. There was no antidote for this poison. She thought about blinding this wolf, she thought about turning the floor to ice, but there wasn’t time. She ran magic up her arm, focusing on the mug of beer, and froze the liquid- not completely solid, but into chunks of ice.

The werewolf forced the beer down Lestat’s throat, and he choked down four or five large cubes, painfully. And then the werewolf flung him into the wall.

The two werewolves stood, and watched as Lestat hacked, and coughed, and crawled away. Claire opened his right hand, and with her left, her finger on his palm, wrote: VOMIT. But he wasn’t. He was groaning, and coughing, and crawling slowly. NOW, she wrote, with her finger on his palm. Still, he wasn’t vomiting. Damnit- what was he waiting on? If those cubes melted... HURRY. She took his hand back in hers, and locked their fingers together, and squeezed.

Lestat knew she had just saved his life. But he needed to get to his sword first. He crawled, coughing and groaning till the hilt was within reach, then he forced himself to throw up, and the frozen cubes of beer hurt even worse the second time. He retched, and coughed, and groaned

The werewolf walked over and smiled down, pleased at the slow death of poison, and turned back to Megolte, “Are you keeping this bitch for yours-“ And then his voice was gone. The werewolf’s head toppled off his shoulders and hit the table and bounced off. The werewolf shifted back to a man, and fell over dead.

Lestat stood behind him, holding Claire in his arm. He was a bloody mess, but he was not dead, and he was not finished. He looked down at Claire, and nodded, and Claire looked up at him; she reached up and wiped blood away from his eye, and squeezed his hand- the cuffed one, and nodded. He had whispered to her with trembling lips on the floor, and she knew what to do. Megolte’s left arm was solid armor- hand, arm, all the way up his shoulder, and Lestat’s sword would not cut through metal armor.

Megolte was a large werewolf, but older. White and black fur, and not nearly enough scars to be an alpha wolf.

Lestat shifted- hair ran down his body, his muscles hardened, and he jumped at the old wolf.

Megolte was not worried about this runt. Not with armor. He caught Lestat out of the air and flung him into the fire. Lestat clambered out of the burning fireplace and then was caught again, by the throat. Megolte smiled, and simply squeezed, cutting off his air. “It’s a shame,” he said, to Lestat. “You truly are impressive to kill that many wolves without shifting. Why not join my pack?”

“Your pack... is dead,” Lestat croaked. He struggled, and kicked, and it did no good. He swung his sword to remove an arm and it bounced off metal. Then he felt what he was waiting for- Claire to go limp.

Claire ran life out of her body in the form of ice- she reached out, grabbed Megolte’s left arm, and froze it solid. As hard and as cold as she could freeze something, and she passed out. Megolte roared, and squeezed Lestat all the harder, intent on crushing his neck.

Lestat shifted again, from half-wolf, to man, which loosened Megolte’s hold for just a second, just long enough for him to turn and swing at the frozen arm with all his strength. The arm shattered, and the lights went out. The fire died, and the flames in the lanterns died, and the moon went black, and the stars winked out, and darkness, like heavy black funeral shrouds, lay across the city of Alma.

Megolte dropped Lestat and backed away.

Lestat held Claire in his arms and scooted back, following the wall- it was too dark to see anything.

“Oh, how happy you have made me children,” Este said, taking form in the darkness. “To leave this bastard alive, to not burn the city, to kill all his soldiers and wolves, but very few of the women. Very, very good.” Her voice dripped out of the darkness like black paint off a brush.

Claire woke to the sounds of the malefica killing her father- screams, and grunts, and the sound of skin being torn, and the crunch of bones- it sounded to Claire like Este was eating the man alive- skin, organs, probably his liver, and heart. But the malefica was the least of her concerns. She turned in Lestat’s arm and put her hands on his face, gently. She couldn’t see him, but knew he was hurt. She felt sticky blood, and open gashes. “Are… are you ok?” Her hands were trembling, and then she realized- she was crying. She was crying for him, because he was hurt.

“I’m… ok,” he coughed. “Good job.”

“Me? That was… that was… all…” Her words caught in her throat, and she cradled his head in her arms and hugged him tight, and her tears ran into his hair, and down his face.

Lestat was positive his throat was bruised, and he could hardly speak. He felt blood plop from his ear onto his shoulder. He felt his ribs creak as he held her and felt his stomach muscles groan every time he moved. He couldn’t open his left eye- blood had dried and crusted his eye closed. But for all the pain he felt, he also felt Claire holding him, and he felt her body trembling as she cried, and once again, her tears hit his heart harder than any punch he had just taken. He reached up and wrapped his left arm around her and pulled her close, till his face was in her hair, and his lips were at her ear. “It’s ok. Shhhhh. We’re ok. It’s ok.”