Chapter 1: "The Mechanist"
The sun rose high into the air heating up land and sea, signifying noon time. A lazy man stretched and yawned as the warm light poured through his window. Noticing the time of day, he concluded that it was far too early for him to awake, for one his occupations was in the dead of night, and the other wasn't as strenuous and was a long-time hobby of his. Doing the latter duty at his leisure, the chestnut-haired man, half human and half elf, took a moment out of his tinkering to crack a window to let the sunshine and sounds pour into his workroom. Finishing up the project he handed it off to a buyer, a tall burly man who was currently being nagged by another man, with the opposite build. The taller man was the definition of one who was tall, tan, and handsome. He wore his dark hair fastened into a bun, and a sword strapped to his back, he was clearly some form of soldier, or mercenary. Whatever his job was, he thanked the tinkerer for the weapon, asking if it was just an ordinary high-end blunderbuss, before paying ten gold coins.
"It fires as it used to. The trigger wasn't damaged." The, mechanist began to explain what the real trouble was, before he could get into further detail, he seen that the tall man was already confused. It was as though the half elf spoke a different language, though he was speaking the only language he was fluent in. "I didn't hafta fix that part, I had to fix a different part. I didn't add anything special." The lofty soldier shook the mechanist's hand, before asking to take it on a trial run to see if it performed as it used to. Before the man took the customer, and his nervous friend around back, the sign above the shop fell from its perch, above the door, nearly clobbering its owner. Had it not been for the soldier, the shop owner would've had a very bad day, or at least a terrible headache. Handing over the heavy sign, the soldier laughed heartily.
Jokingly the soldier inquired "How is it that you can make weapons and things, but not set up an ordinary sign?" Smiling wide the soldier patted the half elf on the back as they went about their business, only to be interrupted by the shorter man, who incessantly rushed the soldier, while being very vague in front of the shop owner.
Seeing that the short, bearded preacher was worrying himself sick, the businessman offered him a pint of ale to calm his nerves, promising "We won't be long, father. Make yourself at home, before you worry yourself to death." The holy man laughed, nervously, and composed himself, before kindly rejecting the shopkeeper's offer, reminding the half man that his body was of the lord. "Right, well the offer still stands, just in case." The shopkeeper asked the men their names, to which the taller man answered Roy, of the city of Ruthell. He continued by saying that he was a part of the city's militia. The priest was from the Church of Saint Eileen Ruthell. As the story goes, she fought in Pelor's name, and saved the City from some undead calamity, unfortunately she died while doing so. In her memory, the renewed city was renamed, and a shrine of her was erected in the heart of the vast city. The priest went by the name of Father Locke. The shopkeeper introduced himself as James E. Rustle, or Jimmy for short.
Father Locke continued about his beliefs, talking nonstop about what their clergy strove for and the local church's ideas. Jimmy hurried after Roy, whispering that he didn't care much for the religion, he just wanted to conduct his business and stay comfortable and to himself.
"I just want the three P's. A pint, a pipe and a bit of peace." Jimmy said to the duo, to which Roy agreed, patting the business man on the back. After some time, Roy tested his weapon, and the two of them were all set to take off. Bidding them farewell, and a safe journey, Jimmy, along with the other two, heard growling coming from the wooded area nearby. A trio of wolves hurried from the thicket, chasing the men into Jimmy's home.
"It's them!" Father Locke wailed, hiding behind his two friends. Puzzled, Jimmy repeated the last word of the father's sentence, as though it were a question.
Bravely dismissing the preacher's words, Roy reminded him to stay calm. "There's always been wolves in these parts. These few are just hungry, or ornery…nothing more." There was clearly something that was left unaddressed, an elephant in the room, but Jimmy could not quite be sure. He'd seen the way wolves behaved, this was unorthodox behavior, even for something as simple as a wolf.
"Wolves don't usually behave that way, and your responses are even stranger." Jimmy noted, raising an eyebrow. The two men whispered amongst themselves, before revealing to Jimmy that his suspicions were well placed.
"We are hunters…" Locke began, only to be stopped by their host who chuckled, momentarily.
Jimmy walked over to his vast collection of liquors to pour his new friends some refreshments, asking "Well, aren't we all these days?" Both men gasped in surprise. They didn't know someone as mild mannered as Jimmy would take part in such a thing, given his frail physique. "I only do it at night, and only around the surrounding area. Why do you think I tinker?" He offered the two of them a seat at his table while he dealt with the trouble outside. Assuming the man referred to the typical definition of hunting, Locke tried to stop him, but halted upon hearing the front door being beat like a filthy rug being cleaned.
Motioning for the two to remain silent, Jimmy drew a silver dagger, and a strange looking gun, before he flung open the door to see a giant, gaping maw with teeth like steak knives roaring at him. Straight-faced, the man shoved the blade through the bottom jaw of the werewolf, even piercing the tongue. The monster withdrew from the doorway before falling on its back to die. Its associates, hurried to the porch, before the half elf fired his complex gun. The gun was four miniature blunderbusses, on one large frame. With this, the brilliant Jimmy could fire four times, before having to reload. Giving the monsters two shots each, the tinkerer had them incapacitated long enough for him to acquire his silver dagger and plunge it deep into their soft torsos. The room was silent for a while, until the stillness was broken by Roy's applause.
"Well done, James! Well done!" The soldier cheered, chugging the last bit of mead. The two guests helped to remove the corpses from his home, and dispose of them. "How'd you learn to do that?" Roy wondered, digging a pit.
Pulling himself from the hole, Jimmy took a swig from his flask, preparing to explain his secret. "These monsters were once my family. They were once human." Jimmy looked at the wrapped bodies. "Some of them are random people from the town, or from your city, but most of the time, they are my family members returning home." Jimmy drew a heavy sigh, before lowering the corpses into the pit, and drenching them with oil. The father said a prayer, before Jimmy dropped a torch into the pit with the three loved ones. When the ceremony concluded, Father Locke explained their mission, saying that they were setting up to track down a man who their superiors believed to be the source of the infection. The two were expected to meet up with another group of hunters and work together to hunt the monster terrorizing a distant countryside. Their intelligence corroborated that this pack of werewolves was greater in number than any other, in recent history.
"These poor people are merely ill…" The father began, explaining the local church's views on the werewolves. "Just as we eat things that were once alive, so do these people. They suffer from an illness of the mind, nothing more." The preacher was very strangely accepting of the were creatures. His sect chose a different avenue than most. They viewed it as a form of being charitable by giving mercy to these afflicted people, be it a cure (if any), or death.
"'You can't help it if someone puts a curse on you…I suppose, but this isn't any ordinary curse, father." Roy began to disagree. "I mean, we should do something about them, but the only thing I know to do is put them out of their misery." Roy continued, harboring an honest feeling of guilt. He had killed men before, but in all his years in the militia, he'd never taken the life of an innocent. He felt that if someone just turned into a werewolf, and haven't committed murder, he or she should not be treated as though they have. A kind-hearted view, but an unhealthy one as well.
Jimmy rolled his eyes, preferring the term euthanasia to murder. He knew all too well that there was no cure, nor treatment, nor other means of deterring a werewolf, other than silver. Staying a while longer, the men asked for Jimmy to accompany them on their hunting trip, to free a countryside from an even larger threat. Valuing the peace and quiet, Jimmy looked at a list of names, many of which were marked off. They were all members of his family that were werewolves, those who had a line through their name were deceased, those without a line were still at large. Counting the remaining family members, Jimmy decided to accompany the hunters.