#wolfbann

They walked together in relative silence, just hearing the errant drip of water, the splash of a hagfish on its way in from the river. She watched the water ripple with unseen movement and her fanciful ideas wandered until her head was filled with sea serpents and massive swimming rats, with crocodiles and sharp-toothed merfolk. So many thoughts swam in her head that she didn't realize when Daud had stopped, nearly running into him. 

“Hey, what—” 

A hand came up to silence her and she obeyed, jaw working hard enough she could hear her teeth grinding into dust. Another glance to Rulfio, looking for some sort of answer. He met her eye and just nudged his head forward; they had stopped outside of a large door, probably to a maintenance room.

“It's in there,” Daud said, his voice filled with an unknown emotion. For whatever reason, Jordan watched him… hesitate? Daud didn't hesitate for anything; hesitation for an assassin was death. The sweat on her neck rolled down into her shirt and she blamed only the summer heat for how much the world closed in on her.

It was suffocating to stand still. When Daud didn't move fast enough, her impatience moved instead. Growling, she pushed past both of the men and rushed the door until it shifted. 

It was heavy and slippery but that didn't matter; Jordan threw her whole back into it.  After a moment’s resistance, the door shuddered and relented, scraping against the concrete before fully swinging open. 

Inside, a large amphitheatre with a huge domed cage showed itself to the trio, the seating lined in such a way that anyone in the audience could look down and into the center arena. On the walls and floor lay the evidence of what last happened here; Jordan’s eyes lingered on the gouged stone, the banged cage walls, the massive amount of splattered blood, and, upon further inspection, the half-eaten body of a man on the floor. 

It's not like it's her first dead body, but it's clearly been here a while and there's a difference between a fresh kill and advanced decay. Bones and mummified skin sat inside scraps of clothing while angry flies buzzed around, leaving their maggots to finish the job other bigger animals couldn't. The smell wasn't in the putrid stage anymore, but it was still awful and stale, like it had been left to mold rather than rot. 

“A lovely place to enjoy some drinks,” she groused, nose wrinkling. She turned back to the men; Rulfio looked pale while Daud was busy investigating the huge claw marks on the stone, the depth and width of their size. She frowned, tossing her hair out of her face. “What's with that face, Rulf? You ain't never seen a dead body before?” 

It was a friendly tease but Rulfio just averted his gaze anyway, watching Daud, addressing him first. 

“So, is this… is this where…” It was like he couldn't finish the sentence but he motioned to the ruined side of Daud’s face. 

Daud shook his head, brow furrowed and sharp. “No, this isn't where Jerome attacked me, this is the hound pit itself. He was chained up, blinded, forced to fight dogs for the money and the entertainment of disgusting people. I watched a pit hound split his neck wide open,” he pointed to the huge blood stain on the floor, more blood than a human could spill. “Bled him until he died, and then the bastard just— came back. That sorry sack of meat was already trying to collect his dog when Jerome came back to life. Too close, got sliced to ribbons.” 

Rulfio nodded, his face paling further as he studied the mummified remains, but Jordan's frown only deepened. 

“Hey, you guys want to clue me in here? Are you talking about the same Jerome who went missing a few months back? What's he got to do with this?” 

Daud's sharp blue eyes found her and she had to fight the urge to step back. 

“He's got everything to do with this. Fink and his brother have a sick experiment happening down here, leading chumps to get killed by a monster, or worse, become a monster themselves.” 

“What? You're telling me Jerome—” she pointed to his face, but the steely face looking back told her the answer. She whistled, hands going to her hips. An awkward moment while her foot twitched in a tune only she can hear. 

“So, what, he still down here?” 

“No.”

“You know for sure?” 

“I killed him.” 

“Even though you just said he came back from a ripped throat?”

“I saw the body.”

“Oh.” A pause. “And any others?” 

Daud blinked. Had the audacity to look confused for half a second. 

“Others?” He repeated, his harsh voice breaking. Jordan searched for something else to look at than his unnerving (inhuman) gaze. 

“Yeah, you know…” her arm waved. “Others. Other monsters. You said people come down here and get killed or become monsters. Which means Jerome couldn't have been the only victim, right? Someone had to-to change him too.” 

The horror was plain on his face; he hadn't considered this. Rulfio looked even more hardened, more concerned. 

“You brought me down here without thinking there might be more of these monsters running around?” Rulfio's voice was scarily even and deadly sharp. Jordan sensed the storm brewing, the return of the argument the men were having earlier. “I’m not about to let you lead me to an early grave, Daud!” 

Daud, to his credit, managed to look hurt, but it was hidden too quickly under a rising tide of anger. 

“I didn't know, Rulf, because when I crawled out of this pit half-dead, nothing was here. I don't know if there's anything else but—” Then, he took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and stalked away from both of them. 

“You asked me to trust you, Daud, and I do, but I don't want to be what you are, I didn't sign up for black magic and voices in my head and whatever other evils you're still hiding!” 

Jordan chewed on her cheek more, getting the creeping feeling she's privy to a conversation she was never meant to hear. Her eyes remained on Daud, watching as his hand waved, glowing and smoking. Then, his eyes were looking somewhere else, watching something else, through the walls and floor. The prickle at the back of her neck returned and her eyes widened as she realized, belatedly, that he was doing something magical again. 

Eventually his breath returned to normal and he looked back to Rulfio, his clawed (Outsider's ass when did that happen?) hand shaking out and back to normal (Is human normal for him now? Or is the beast normal?). Her head swirled with questions she couldn't ask, both awed and horrified that her fellow assassin had come across something so wondrous and terrifying. Rulfio still seethed; she worked to pick her jaw up off the ground. 

“From what I can sense, if there is anything here, it isn't just openly roaming around. But there… there are others, it looks like. Nobody fully changed but there were bodies in what looked like cages, maybe…” He squinted at the wall, as if being able to see through it with his naked eye. 

Rulfio sighed, ragged and annoyed. 

“And we're going to go and find them, aren't we?” Daud gave him a look: something apologetic, something imploring. Rulfio groaned loudly, rolling his eyes. 

“You're an Outsider's bastard for this, literally,” he complained, checking the sword at his side and his pistol at the other. “You promise me right now, Daud, that I'm walking out of here in one piece.” 

“I won't let them hurt you,” he affirmed, a deep conviction in his words. He looked to Jordan as well. “Both of you. I killed one already, I'll do it again, if I must.” 

Jordan's heart leapt to her throat, prompting her to clear it. “Well, what are we waiting for, then?” Her voice squeaked painfully. “Onwards, wolfman.” 

------

The Void thundered in his ears like a sour pulse, urging him towards a destination where he didn't know what awaited him. The Outsider had given him this power to hear and listen correctly, but whatever this noise was, it was repulsive as much as it was magnetic. Surely it wasn't supposed to make his head throb and his ears ring and set his teeth on edge. His hand itched and burned so much he was tempted to chew it off right then and there. The call to leap through the Void, to leave his companions behind was intense beyond measure; he swallowed it down, staying apace as best he could. 

The problem, however, was that he could hardly focus on anything they were saying behind him. 

“So, can I know exactly what we should be expecting when we get there?” Jordan asked, no doubt trying to wrap her head around everything. Rulfio had been filling her in on any other details Daud had neglected to recount, but still, neither of them had any idea what to expect going forward.

And to be honest, Daud didn't know either. What he saw in his Sight didn't make any sense and had only disturbed him; strange bodies had lit up for him like candles, bright yellow against a desaturated world. Sporting long limbs and too-thin bodies, they didn't look like monsters… At least, not yet. 

“Wolfbanner are gigantic, with claws and teeth and huge bodies that heal wounds,” Daud explained, his voice sounding as if his vocal cords didn't heal right after being slashed apart. “But they can also just as easily look like me. They could be weak from being down here so long. Won't know until we get there.” 

Jordan said nothing else; what else was there to say? They were along for his ride, trusting him with an unknown factor, putting their lives in his hands. 

From the amphitheatre, Daud led them down a long, hidden hallway. From there, they entered a room filled from head to ceiling with large, wired hound cages. Daud had not gone this direction when he was first here, but it's clear Jermone did; the cages were busted as if something massive had run into them and a few blood splatters coated the floor and walls. Nothing was fresh, not even the water left over in forgotten bowls. Daud could hear Jordan exclaim behind him. 

“How big did you say these things get, Daud?” She asked, trying to hide the waver in her voice as her eyes trailed the damage above her head height. 

“Whale sized,” he growled and his sensitive ears picked up the gulp in her throat. His jaw worked and he turned forward, another gaze into the Void telling him they were close. “Come on; nothing ahead of us is close to that big.” And certainly not as big as he could get, not that the idea of what he was capable of brought him any comfort. 

Truth be told, he hadn't fully transformed since that first night. Something about exuding such power, being so massive, so noticeable, didn't sit well with him yet. Maybe it would one day, but not now, not when he still had a shred of humanity left.  

The destruction only continued. Jerome, in the blinded state that he had been in, had spared no time destroying whatever his body could touch once he was freed. Splintered wood, tossed tables, a body under rocky rubble. And yet… 

Daud stopped to inspect a room filled with bookshelves and tables. Papers were scattered across the floor while delicate instruments sat behind broken glass. In places rubble was swept aside, pulled into piles of dust and dirt. Daud frowned, brows knitting together while the other two looted on their own time. The soft clink of coin reached his ear before he heard Rulfio grunt. 

“You might wanna take a look at this, Daud,” he rumbled out, pointing to a flipped board. Daud did as he was told, coming to inspect the scribbled writing in chalk. 

Drawings of a whale-wolf, of its size and properties. Dates of when test subjects were attacked, who lived and who died. The length of time between attack and transformation… something about an “incubation period.” And amongst it all, a paper with the crude scribble of the Outsider's Mark, the same as his, on the back of a clawed hand. 

His insides twisted unpleasantly as he turned from the board, cursing. He sat somewhere between ill and angered, of the thought of those innocent people who asked for nothing getting dragged into this for entertainment. How many died? How many were like Jerome, scarred and blinded and starved in chains? 

“This is so fucked up,” Jordan breathed and his gut clenched even more. Something prickled down his neck and he turned to see both of them looking at him, their faces holding too much concern, too much worry. He breathed out through his nose, hard and angry, all of his features turning severe. 

“I didn't bring you here to throw pity at me, you know.” His teeth felt heavy in his mouth and he willed them to stay normal as his fist opened and closed in agitation. “I'm not like those sorry sacks; I'm alive and I'm not locked up. Those individuals are all dead and gone, and I don't plan on joining them.” 

“And the madness?” Rulfio asks, softly. “What is going to stop that, Daud?” 

He snarled, teeth flashing as he brought his hand up. Jordan flinched, but all he did was let the Mark hidden under his glove burn hot enough even they could see it. His claws grew long and he was tempted to stop time, to jump through the Void, to get away from those scared eyes and those judgemental frowns. Instead, he yanked his hand back down, letting the smoke and ash fade away. 

“Do you think me so weak? You think I crawled out of this pit, with my face looking the way I did, to let madness take me? The god of the Void himself decided he wanted me to live, and that magic keeps me here and as myself. I don't intend for that to change any time soon.” 

He stalked out, ignoring their glances and willing away the fur trailing down his neck and over his shoulders. He didn't need to lose control here, in front of them, not when it wasn't their fault. But also he needed the space, needed some place where he could burn off energy and not be looked at like a freak for it. 

As soon as they were out of earshot, he clenched his clawed fist, rushing through the Void. The sensation was cooling against his angry-hot skin, the icy plunge a balm on his emotions, moving the humid air around his body. He jumped again, breathing in the smoke and ash and letting it settle in his chest like the draw from a cigarette. One more, and then another—

Suddenly, he found himself hanging in midair.

He had transversed out of the sewer pipe and above a lower room, sunlight bursting down allowing the whole circular area to be illuminated. It only took a moment of his suspension to realize where he was and why, perhaps, he was unconsciously drawn here. Beneath him were the cages, and through the Void, he could see their sleeping bodies. 

His fist clenched and in an instant he was rushing to them, appearing in front of them in a blink. As the world returned and air rushed back in, he could hear the echoing calls of Rulfio and Jordan. Looking for him, no doubt, as if he would answer their calls like a dog off a leash. If anything he wished now more than ever they would quiet down and act like Void-damned assassins. 

The irony in that, of course, being he was the only assassin in the Isles who actually was Void-damned.

They called for Daud. Daud didn't call back to them. Instead, his attention was pulled fully to the cages and their inhabitants. 

Inside, humans groaned and stirred, but they were only human in passing. Their eyes glowed in the gloom, their limbs long and their chests deep. Strange, heavy breathing escaped mouths thick with mismatched teeth, and broken and brittle nails grew from skinny fingers. Their clothes, if they had any at all, were ripped through, their feet deformed into strange shapes. As one of them locked eyes with Daud, he felt the trickle of a poisoned mind reach his and he recoiled, locking his emotions down and stepping away. 

The rippling growl he heard was his own, escaping out of his chest. 

“Ugly Turned.” 

Heavy footfalls approach from behind him, followed by a metallic scraping. Daud whipped around, his teeth lengthening of their own accord as his lip curled back into a snarl. He crouched into a fight stance, hand hovering over his blade. 

A man approached him, tall and hugely muscled. His head was hairless but only because it was shaved down, his prominent ears sticking out all the more for it. His severe face didn't hold much intelligence, but that was less worrying than the thick heated crowbar he held in his gloved hand. 

“Come to save them, filthy dog? They won't listen.” The man dwarfed Daud by at least two heads: as soon as he was close enough he swung hard for Daud's shoulder, but Daud was leaping away far before the blow landed. The swings were slow, uncoordinated; this man didn't know how to fight outside of brute force. Easy enough to deal with. 

Daud sneered, eyes flashing, and he called on the Void to stop time fully around him. All noise and all movement ceased, giving him full permission to rush his attacker, his sword unsheathing, shining and angry. 

“Won't work,” the man rumbled out, side-stepping Daud's sword swing and countering him easily. The hot metal rod hit Daud squarely in the ribs and his grasp on time dropped. His breath rushed out even as air and sound rushed in; his body toppled, rolling from the force of impact. Black, oily claws grab at his side, assessing if the rib was broken or not. His attacker stalked slowly over, unbothered. 

“You think you're special? I'm special too. Master makes me stronger than you ever will be.” The man brought the crowbar back over his head, looking to smash it into Daud's head. That was, if Daud hadn't already transversed through the Void; the metal clanged loudly onto the wet concrete, sending water droplets flying on impact. He reappeared, ending up behind the Brute, inching closer instead to the holding cages.

Too close, apparently, for the inhabitants behind bars. Wet, wild snarling started up and long, now-sharp claws swiped at his ankles from wherever they could reach. His teeth snapped at them in a bid to intimidate them away but nothing swayed them; their wide eyes held no self-preservation anymore. 

“See? Won't listen,” the Brute reminded him, voice deep and slow. “They’ll only listen to me. Wanna see?” 

He raised a gleaming hand, his smile broken and nasty. Behind Daud, the snarling grew deeper; bones snapped and whines dripping in whalesong ripped out of their throats. In horror, he turned to see their bodies lurching, heaving, changing… 

Metal groaned and claws pushed against bars, bending them like rubber. Their cages were far too small for the monsters those poor souls were destined to become. It was mere seconds before all of them would be bursting forth, rushing him, or worse…

A quick thwip and a heavy thud reached his ears and the man yowled, grabbing at his magical hand. A crossbow bolt had pierced his palm and he bent over, clutching his wrist, but not before another bolt was loosed and buried deep into his thickened thigh. The smell of blood filled his nose and drove the caged wolves into a frenzy as they pressed against their bars. His heart thudded too fast, whales singing in his ears so loud he almost missed the three pistol shots, the gun unloaded. The Brute definitely ate at least one of those bullets but Daud knew better; if that man was exactly like him, then he'd survive. He'd live. 

Through yowls of pain the attacker disappeared, and Daud knew he had fled. However, his absence didn't stymie the chain reaction already in place behind him.  He leapt away, gaining distance; soon those captives would no longer be captives. Blood and fur and screeching came from the cages and he could feel his body lurch and heave in response. 

Fur rippled across his neck and back. He brought his searing hand up to his face, as it stretched and grew and lost its humanity, and he laughed. 

“Fine, you mangy dogs, come to me! Fight! We will see who among us is truly mad!”

His thoughts thundered outward, not caring what minds he touched, and he had the satisfaction of watching at least one of those dogs stop and whine. But then the hinges broke, those mangled bodies poured forth, and his cackling, sharp-toothed smile was all that was there waiting for them. 

------

That wasn't Daud. 

There was no way. Everything in Rulfio's senses was rejecting what he was experiencing, what he was seeing, like a horror story becoming reality. Despite everything he had learned in the last few hours of his life, seeing it, bearing witness— that was another thing entirely.

And what he was bearing witness to, was the form of Daud heaving, smoking, growing, all while four amalgamations of fur and flesh bore down on him. 

Thinking fast, Rulfio grabbed Jordan and pushed her away from the ledge of the sewer pipe, keeping her as far away from this new pit as possible. She naturally protested but he gripped her arm tight, his eyes serious as they searched her face. 

“Get out of here. Now.” 

Her eyes were wide and terrified, darting from him to the commotion down below them. Rulfio shook her again, pulling her in, dominating her visual space so all she looked at was him. 

“But, but I heard him? Daud, in my head…” 

“Jordan listen to me! If you stay here, you will die, and I'm not about to have that on my conscience.” 

“But what about you?” She gasped. A sound like screaming whales reverberated through the room, shaking Rulfio's whole chest and limbs. He pushed her away again as she winced, whimpering from the noise. 

A huge thud. A cry of pain followed by a wet, squelching noise and the snapping of bone. Rulfio refused to turn and look. Jordan paled as the sounds worsened. 

He urged her harder, shoving against her until she was in the other rooms, further away. 

“Go back the way we came,” his voice shook but his hands were still steady. “Once you get to the ampitheatre, go to the right of the doors. There is a sewer outlet three clicks down, it should drop you into Rudshore—” 

Something shuddered the concrete they were standing on and Rulfio's head was filled with a dark, wild laughter. The giddiness of the other mind was enough to overwhelm his own feelings of fear, but he shook it off. Jordan still gaped, too terrified to move. 

Rulfio growled, his teeth gritting together as he pushed her as hard as he could. 

“GO!” He yelled, and that seemed to wake her up. She picked herself up, turned, and ran back into the sewer, leaving Rulfio alone. 

But he wasn't really alone. His breath was ragged, filled with the tumultuous thoughts of another, of someone in the throes of a killing spree. His limbs shook and he closed his fists, steeling himself to turn around and witness the carnage. 

It was more than even he expected. 

A huge wolf monster, black fur glistening with wet-red blood, towered in the center of the room, biting down on the neck of one of the last remaining test subjects. Its dying screeches were unearthly and nothing like what the wolves of Tyvia sounded like during the winters of his youth. It thrashed against the vice of his teeth but then he shook and it's neck snapped, blood gushing out and pooling on the floor in dripping rivers. His head raised up, pulling the neck with his jaws until it was snapping, rending, pulling away from the main body. Twitching, tongue lolling from a lifeless mouth, the prize was pried fully away, tendons giving way in a gorey mess. Daud’s huge hand grabbed it from his mouth and tossed it aside, where it wetly hit the ground, bouncing until it splashed into a puddle, contaminating it. Then, as if an afterthought, his head bent and bit into the creature's shoulder, popping the arm out with a tug, as if he was simply spatchcocking a chicken. 

The other bodies were sprawled out in similar fashion; in the minutes it took for Rulfio to convince Jordan to run, the monster that had once been Daud had completed his wet and gruesome work.

 And now, he was feasting on his kill, teeth crushing bone and tearing flesh. 

It was too much. Rulfio made a strangled noise before his feet gave out and he fell to his knees at the sight and smell of it all. He couldn't have run after Jordan, even if he had wanted to.

A long ear twitched, an eye opened, and suddenly a huge head was turning towards him. This was it; Rulfio’s once-friend brought him to the place he was killed, to be killed in turn. Or maybe worse, maybe he'd wake up tomorrow just as scarred and cursed as the man he once knew, the man who no longer existed, because Daud would never, he wouldn't—

When the curious tendril of emotion extended towards Rulfio, he could feel nothing but nauseated as a response. Concern, worry a small amount of fear. Rulfio shut his eyes, pushing that mind out, feeling it recoil apologetically. When it was gone, he expected to feel claws against his body, white hot and burning, teeth at his neck as he became the next meal—

The seconds passed and Rulfio counted each one. No blow came. No noise of breaking bone or squelching blood reached his ears. Just the drip of water, steady and infuriating. 

“Rulfio.” 

Daud's voice was so close it nearly gave him a heart attack. Eyes flying open, he gasped, seeing Daud standing in front of him. He fell backwards, crawling away before standing back up. 

“Get away from me,” he blabbered, trying to get his breath back, to steady his hammering heart. “Get the fuck—” 

He caught a glimpse of Daud's face, of the expression that would haunt him for weeks and months to come. The hurt hanging on those shoulders, the damaged look in his eyes, silent agony even under that layer of blood and grime and gristle. Rulfio tried to rescind, tried to reach out but it was too late.