Warm, fresh air surrounded the camping grounds and work was coming to an end just as the sun sunk below the mountains in the distance. Children of all ages were gathering in the middle of the camp area, waiting to be allowed into the largest tent there. I was bringing up the rear but that didn’t stop my heart from pounding with excitement. It was thumping so hard that it was almost painful. Every child looked forward to this night; when the moon was full and the story teller would come.
As I neared the tent, I could see thick smoke pouring out the top of the tent. It left the air around the tent hazy and had a strong forest aroma. Just at this simple smell, the children fell silent and calm. The parents all around smiled softly, the scent clearly reminded them of our home lands.
Finally after a couple moments of standing out in the heated night, I was allowed into the tent. Right away I could smell the oils that had been rubbed into the material of the tent. Sure it caused the inside of the tent to smell intoxicating but it was good. It caused my thoughts to slow and my eye lids to droop but I forced them open. I wasn’t going to miss the story since I had been waiting for a month for it. Being ushered to the side by a kind faced man, I sat down on a thin but soft mat. Others crowded around, making sure the children had room and in the end we were all shoulder to shoulder in a half circle, our backs to the entrance of the tent.
The same man from before walked to the center of the circle we were forming and called out softly, almost to the point of being inaudible, “Mez Tobria, we are ready.”
A lady who I hadn’t noticed before stood up from the shadows of the far end of the tent and glided towards us. A few of the younger children scooted away, taken back by the older lady’s appearance. I too had noticed her rather odd appearance. She wore her graying hair up in a loose bun at the crown of her head, and rosary beads hung around her neck and wrists. Her skin wasn’t smooth but was aged, mainly around her mouth from where she was smiling kindly. What I noticed the most was that she hadn’t opened her eyes yet.
The teller sat down in front of us where a pile of dried wood was burning. She reached into her sleeve and brought out a hand full of what looked like dust and tossed it in the fire. The fire roared and flared up until we couldn’t see her any more. It was colored a strange shade of green. When the flames went back to normal, a number of gasps could be heard through out the crowd of children. I’m pretty sure I even gasped because the teller’s eyes were wide open and was a milky white color. No pupil, no nothing.
The old teller gazed over the fire at us, or at least I thought, and said in a pleasant voice, “Tonight, we are going to hear a story never told in your generation. It happened right here in this valley, between the highest mountain to the south and the lowest mountain to the north. “
All the children crowded together so they could hear better, all eyes were glued on the older woman in front of us. I scooted closer too for the sake of the little girl behind me so she could actually see the teller.
The teller continued in a raspy voice, “When a blood filled war raged on in this valley, trees were burnt and huts were destroyed. Some families were torn apart while other stood strong.
“For many, many years the battle continued until only a few still had the strength to pick of their feet and fight. They had survived the harshest of winters and dreadfully hottest summer even to be heard off. Though there were only a few warriors able to fight, those few were just under a thousand. The war had started with a little over twenty thousand fighters and when the number came down to nine hundred, it was clear the war would end that day, and it was true. At exactly the beginning hour of sunset, Lord Valedon slew the leader of the Yazukins, claiming victory for the Mezians.”
The children around me all beamed happily, being of the Mezian clan. The thought of the victory my ancestors had won also brought a smile to my face.
“Over the years of ruling the Mezidan Valley, Lord Valedon married the beautiful forest dweller, Mirilith Iris. Together they brought up a child of their own who that had named Lenaris, who was to rule when Valedon passed away.
“Something went terribly wrong though. The day that Lord Valedon fell ill, darkness swept the lands and a new creature moved into the valley. It hunted down the forest dwellers and indiscriminately killed them off. With the loss of her friends and clan, Lady Iris’s health failed and she too was sickly. Lenaris was forced into ruling at the young age of nineteen.
“It didn’t help though. Many more people were killed by the new animals. No one knew where they came from or even what they looked like because anyone who had seen the creature was also killed. After searching through scrolls and dusty books, they came to call these dangerous things ‘wolves’ but they were unlike the description in the scrolls and books. When on their hind legs, they were well over six feet high. The head was enormous and when on all four feet, the shoulders reached three and a half feet high.”
Mez Tobria, who we knew as the Teller, paused to drink from an odd shaped flask and looked over the group of children. She stared at the children who were beside me. I looked over at them and saw that a little girl was sleeping against her older brother who didn’t seem to mind. Other than that, everyone was sitting restlessly for her to continue.
“Well Lenaris didn’t like the fact that the kingdom in the valley was growing weaker. Her gather fifty of his strongest men and a large amount of gold, silver, gems, jewels, and their finest swords, awes and other weapons. He was going to ask for help from a neighboring kingdom and use the treasured items as payment. He only chose fifty men though because he didn’t want to draw too much attention to the large amount of profitable items they were to be transporting. He and his fifty warriors departed at dawn the next day, heading north to the Kezanic Kingdom.
“After four days were behind them and many hardships had passed, they made it to the peak of the lowest mountain to the north. Half their supplies were gone and three of their men had been attacked by wolves. Hopefully the descent would be easier. On the first day down, a man and a cart fell down the cliff when the passage had collapsed, forcing them to go back up the mountain and find a different path. This time, after many hours wasted, they headed down a wider path at sunset.
“A single call broke the night, leaving the silence in shatters, as they walked down the torch lit path. It was a bone chilling howl, one of the wolves. It was a single cry to the beautiful moon above. Tomorrow would be a full moon, a night to be careful. A night when most of the people had died at the teeth of a wolf.
“The second day down the mountain, Lenaris could see the faint image of the castle. It was a clear and lovely day. The air was warm with no humidity.”
When Mez Tobria stopped this time, I watched as her head turned side to side and I couldn’t help but look around too. Half the children were dozing off. Her head turned in my direction and the split second that her cream eyes met mine, my hands started to sweat and shake slightly. I quickly broke eye contact and stared at the dirt ground around my mat. I was only a boy of eight but I wasn’t stubborn enough to admit…she scared me.
She smiled at me and continued, “Near mid-day, the trail veered off into a thick forest. It was strange, though. It was silent except for the twigs and leaves crunching under their boots. The trees shielded the group from the sun so now all they had to do was look for predators. Eyes peered out from every tree and bush, their stares were so intense but every time one of the men were to look in its direction, there would be no one there, no eyes, no creatures.
“Things went smoothly for a while until the sun was no longer high in the sky and was dropping behind the mountains. A silent chill raised the hairs on the backs of the necks and a chorus of howls pierced the cold night air. Everyone came to a halt at Lenaris’s raised fist. Their eyes darted from side to side for the source of the alarming sound.
“Lenaris said sharply, “Be ready!” The some of the forty men raised their bows and arrows while others that were left drew their swords, an echoing scraping sound filled the forest clearing and a torch was lit.
“The moment that the torch started to burn, the light reflected off the many pairs of red and amber eyes glaring at them. One of the men slipped with the bow and arrow, sending an arrow whistling into the darkness. It hit a tree with a thud but it was followed by a snarl.
“Time seemed to stand still as a huge gray and white beast flung itself out of the shadows and clamped its jaws around a warrior’s arm and slung him to the ground. A vicious fight broke out and soon the wolves were join by something much more horrible.”
Mez Tobria paused for a moment and that was all it took for me to realize how fast my heart was pumping. Not even the thick air could calm me down now.
“The wolves that joined the other were much taller and stood more on two feet than all four. It was a crouched over creature with finger like claws and their knees bent like humans’ did. It looked more like a mix between man and wolf. Within the night, all of Lenaris’s men were killed except for one who, much like Lenaris, was bleeding and on the verge of dying. All that he could remember from that night was Lenaris saw his last man collapse under an old rotting tree then he blacked out too.
“He woke two days later in something that resembled a tree house. His whole body ached but now he was wrapped up in bandages. The second he shifted from his spot a woman in ragged clothing came running over. She had stunning ice blue, almond-shaped eyes and the blackest curly hair. Her eyebrows were perfectly arched and dark eyelashes framed her peculiar eyes. She tended to him through out the whole day; changing his bandages, feeding him, and providing him with a clean pair of clothes. To him, she was an angel in disguise.
“He stayed with her for a week, until he was able to walk properly, and within that week he fell in love with her. When he was up and mostly healed, the only thing bothering him was the bite on his shoulder that would not heal. He located the treasured items that had been thrown carelessly all over the forest floor and hid them in a cave so that he could get a horse from a small village outside the forest and he would carry them to the Kezanic Kingdom himself.
“Things didn’t go as planned and his symptoms got worse. He got sick and for another week he was forced to stay in bed. It had almost been a month since he had been taken into care by the woman he loved, Olivia. That is what he knew her as. The next full moon was in a week and he needed to move the payment to the kingdom before the wolves and other creatures came again. He asked Olivia what the creatures were and she had called them ‘werewolves’. It was just a name her people had given them but somehow it seemed right.
“Within a week of the full moon, Lenaris now craved more meat and his temper snapped easily. This only made him angrier. It was only a day before the full moon and all he had done was neglect moving the valuable items. The thought of his own kingdom was lost somewhere in his anger and slipped his mind quite often. The bite burned painfully and he often found himself growling out of frustration.
“The day of the full moon, he left with a horse to go to the cave. Finding a wolf print along the way, he got distracted and it was well after noon before he realized he still had to moved the items and his shoulder felt like it was detaching itself from his shoulder though it looked perfectly fine, except for the teeth marks in his skin. When he reached the cave and loaded all the objects onto the horse’s back, the sun was setting.
“His heart sunk into his stomach and he stopped and stared up at the moon that was appearing. Oh, how it was so alluring. He just wanted to…Lenaris let out a twisted howl, one of pain and the other...from the thing he was changing into. His fingers cracked dangerously and his nails grew twice their size and were sharper toward the ends. His spine gave a sickening crunch and a tail made completely of bone protruded through his ragged bottoms. He felt his skull throb before it too changed. His nose and mouth grew longer into a snout and his teeth became razor sharp and fangs over lapped his lower jaw. His clothes held as long as they could before they ripped and fell to the ground.
“He groaned in agony and fell to the ground, digging his claws into the ground and clutching onto patches of grass. Hair grew all over his now deformed body and he was now what he considered a beast.
“He crawled over to a small pool of water just as his ears began to change into wolf like ears that sat on top of his head. Gazing into the mirror like water, a monster was cut loose inside of him and he threw his head back and called out much like the other werewolves and wolves did. He howled. When he stopped, he opened his eyes and looked back in the water only to see a pair of red eyes glaring back at him.
“He turned and ran. Never to be seen again as Lenaris Valedon. Some say they saw one of the creatures wearing a ring of the Mezodan Kingdom. Another person once said that they saw a creature with black fur and crystal blue eyes but if they were to ever look at the creature again it would have red eyes. I guess we will never know since the answer will always lurk in the shadows…just out of reach.”
With that said, Mez Tobria stood and almost automatically, all the children woke up. Groaning and yawning they all filed out of the tent, leaving for their own. I stood and brought up the rear of the group, stealing one last glance at the teller. She sure was weird but for some reason I felt the story was real. As I walked out of the tent, a lady with silky black hair smiled down at me. She whispered to the teller, “Is that Onaris?” The teller only smiled and nodded. They were talking about me right in front of my face but our attention was draw elsewhere.
A single howl called out to the moon. A howl of sorrow, anger, pain, and the life they would never live again. The life of a human.
At once I looked at the moon and for the first time I saw that it wasn’t a full moon. The teller had come a day early. Tomorrow was to be the night of the full moon.
The howl sounded again. The knight like king cried out to the moon then disappeared once again into the night.
