CHAPTER 18

EWODEN

The vendor looked very uneasy, and with good reason.

Ewoden had him cornered now, and armed with the knowledge he had obtained the ruins north of the town, the former Sarafan knew that this old man was one of the Werewolves; one of the Seroli smiths to be more accurate. He would never willingly reveal anything to them of course. The Seroli were highly secretive, fleeing deep into the wilderness of Nosgoth and hiding in the uncharted regions of the land and thus had largely escaped the wrath of the Sarafan knights over the centuries.

"You needn't cower, I mean you no harm." Ewoden told the old man, seeing the fear in his eyes. The Seroli had watched as the vampires were brutally hunted by the Sarafan. They had seen the forests of the crusades victims, barbarically impaled on pikes and they did not wish such a fate upon themselves.

"You stand there in a Sarafan uniform and tell me you wish no harm?" The old vendor replied, backing up against the wall. He tried to run to the side, but Sally, her form hidden in the darkness of a cloak did not let him pass and Ewoden blocked the other way, trapping him there.

"I am no longer Sarafan. I have no intention of exterminating you. All I want is information."

"I…I don't know what you're talking about." He stammered, his gaze drawn from vampire to human, sweat running down his forehead.

"There's no use trying to lie, we saw your hunting ritual in the ruins last night." Sally told him, her voice rushing out from the darkness of her hood as a shrill wind. Vampires were extremely good at intimidation, even in broad day light. "We saw you, and a good deal of the others from this town transform into Werewolves. We know you are Seroli smiths." Suddenly, someone laid a large hand down on each of their shoulders, the fingers clamping down tightly.

"Let him go." Someone ordered them. Looking back, Ewoden saw a tall, muscular man standing behind them. He was obviously a warrior of some kind, judging from the scars running down his face, neck and torso. His skin was tanned brown and hair jet black and in untidy and jagged Mohawk running over the top of his head. His eyes were set hard against them, a deep stare that unnerved even Sally. He was clad in light, leather brown armour made of animal skins and other tough materials. The only metal he wore for projection was a pair of bracers and a shoulder pad.

"Kill them, quickly, before they bring more Sarafan." The vendor told the large man, in the confusion pushing past them to his side. The man was silent, staring down at the former Sarafan, directly into his Emerald green eyes. Then he straightened himself up and crossed his arms.

"There is no need Anthony, he is not here to harm us." The vendor looked up at his large companion in utter surprise and confusion.

"What are you saying? Look at him, he's a Sarafan! Kill them Obelisk!" The man called Obelisk simply shook his head again.

"We've meet before." He stated and Ewoden raised an eyebrow in confusion. He'd never meet his man before in his entire life, and he was good at remembering faces. He paused, finally noticing the scars on the man's front properly. Deep cuts, that had healed too quickly. Cuts that could only been caused by the blade edge of a knife and an axe. Those marks were directly where he'd struck the Werewolf that attacked them on their way here. That scar down the right hand side had been caused by the Axe, Malice on his back. The cuts on the other side Sally had dealt with her many concealed daggers.

"You…" The former Sarafan stated, suddenly finding himself in mixture of awe and rage. He removed the bracer from his left arm and pushed the bandages aside, to reveal the horrific bite the Werewolf had left in the flesh. "I have you to thank for this!" Obelisk seemed strangely detached as he regarded the wound sceptically, reaching out with a finger to trace his way around it, studying the teeth marks. His tongue rolled around inside his mouth, examining his own dentures for a moment before he sighed and stood up straight.

"He's not Sarafan, Anthony. He's one of us." He told the vendor, who looked as confused as ever.

"One of us?" He repeated; his voice horsed in utter surprise. Then a revelation spread over his face. "So that's were you got those scars, and you bite him?"

"On the road to Stahlberg." Obelisk replied. "I was hunting a Bear when I picked up his scent. I thought him a Sarafan patrol, so I went after him." He turned to look at Sally. "This Vampire was with him."

"Vampire!" Anthony declared. "Are you sure?"

"I saw her fangs." The large man replied. "And she was afraid to follow the fight into the water." He paused, regarding the cloaked female, her cowl up so protect her from the early morning sunlight. "Strange that one such as you would be in the company of a human."

"Like I said." Ewoden stated, trying to divert the course of the conversation. "We came here only for information, and now I require it more than ever." He added, gesturing to his wound before wrapping it up. "We mean no harm, we only want to talk." The old vendor looked apprehensive again. He quickly looked around to see if no one else was around to listen in on their conversation. Apparently, not everyone in the town was a werewolf and they were trying to keep a very low profile, especially with Sarafan activity on the rise in the south-east.

"He could be a spy...sent by the order." Obelisk shook his head.

"He's not."The large manreplied. "Trust me." The Vendor mumbeled to himself, running his fingers through his hair.

"Come…this way." He finally replied, gesturing for them to follow him. He lead them through the small town to the tavern directly in the centre, a small place nestled almost directly in the centre of the insignificant hamlet. A wooden sign flapped outside in the wind with the words, Capt'n Bitter's Sudz printed on the top. Since it was still early in the morning with the sun barley up, the public house was locked. Anthony hammered on the door until someone answered, a small man still in a night gown, rubbing he sleep out of his eyes.

"It's six AM for god's sake, and we all had a late night so what is it? You know we don't open until ten thirty."

"I don't want Mead you stupid Ass!" Anthony declared, barging his way through with the others following. The inside of the tavern was a large space with one floor and a set of stairs leading up to a balcony above, along which were doors leading to the guest rooms. Round tables were placed in rows across the room, the chairs stacked upon them. The firepower had a good deal of ash in the bottom, showing it had been used recently and the musty smell of smoke still hung in the air. The small man looked alarmed as a man he had never seen before, dressed in Sarafan armour, walked in after them. "Don't worry, he's not Sarafan." Anthony exclaimed. "At least I hope not. I need to get down below, quickly now!" The small man muttered something quick and under his breath, before rushing to the bar at the far end of the room, pushing a large barrel behind it out of the way to clever the way of concealed trap door in the wall. Only a trained eye would have been able to notice it, the edges of the concealed entrance melted into the background perfectly.

"Get through, before someone sees!" The man ushered them all and as soon as they were in the stone corridor beyond, he shut the door behind them. They could hear the barrel being hastily shoved back into place after them.

Instantly the corridor curved downwards into a flight of stairs, leading down a dank passage lit by a few torches. Ewoden had been in one of these before. In order to escape Sarafan purges, The Seroli had their abodes in hidden chambers below the ground. Edward, the werewolf he had met had had his hidden inside a cave, the door concealed by some kind of Hylden technology.

"Who sent you here?" Obelisk asked as they descended down towards the bottom of the stair case. Now in the darkness, it was safe for Sally to remove her cowl, revealing his face, showing to them both that she was indeed a vampire.

"Vorador." She replied. "He wants information and only you have it." Hearing that name, both Obelisk and Anthony stopped and stared.

"'The' Vorador?" The old man asked. Ewoden nodded slowly. Vorador was a name know far and wide in Nosgoth, the name of the vampire that defeated Malek, assaulted the circle of Nine and then headed up the vampire resistance in Meridian. But it held special reverence amongst the Seroli, for Vorador had once been one of their greatest smiths and the forger of the Reaver blade itself. He would even have shared their curse, had he not been chosen to receive the Dark gift first. "I thought he severed his connection with us?" Anthony asked Obelisk.

"He did." The larger man replied. "He hasn't spoken with the Elders for over two thousand years. He would not even contact us for help when fighting the Sarafan, strange that he would now." He turned face their visitors. "Information on what?"

"Your Seers." Sally replied. "Look, who is in charge of you brigands? I want to speak to these Elders of yours." Ewoden grimaced. Sally could be forceful at times, lacking the slightest trace of diplomacy. "Don't you know it!" She told him seductively through the Whisper.

"Any Elder would not see you on a whim." Obelisk began, but then managed a large smirk. "But I'm sure the name Vorador could get you access inside a central chamber."

The stairs lead down for quite s distance before they opened up into an underground tunnel system, thick vines and creepers hung from the ceiling, worming their way down from the vegetation above through cracks in the Earth. From the way these rocky corridors had been put together, this place used to be a mine of some sorts. Support beams, freshly applied stood to attention along each wall and ceiling, some with lights hanging from them, a candle inside a glass jar. The faint drop of water could be heard resonating out from somewhere deeper into the maze of tunnels.

"It isn't so bad you know." The large man told Ewoden as Anthony lead them further down through the tunnels. "The transformation isn't painful, it's just hard to control once you assume the wolf form." It had taken all the will he could muster to resist that strong pull he had experienced last night. Everything was screaming at him to step fully into the moonlight and complete his transformation. He had wanted to run with the other werewolves, to tear some animal open and relish the sweet tang of flesh.

He shivered inwardly. Was this who he was now, someone desperately trying to keep some demon in check in case it was unleashed on some child?

-That's what I first asked myself when Vorador made me a Vampire- Sally told him, whispering into his head. He looked up at her. She was walking ahead of Obelisk and himself and had her back to him. It still felt a little strange to be talking this way. -The bloodlust was something I never thought I could live with. I refused to drink even a drop of it I don't like to admit this, but over time your resistance to it erodes.- Through the Whisper, Ewoden experienced one of her memories; of how she had finally gave in and fed for the first time. It had been on a rich merchant she'd found travelling south towards the Sarafan Stronghold, on the road that passed by the swamp.

Her feelings over that emotional moment had been mixed. She felt horror and intense grief over the man she had sacrificed to prolong her own existence, but within her dark side she could feel satisfaction and relief. Despite her existence as a vampire, Sally's humans morals had not been destroyed, only relaxed.

As for him, he didn't know what his morals were. He had never had much of a problem with killing to survive. The Order had taught him survival instincts and tactics, as well as how to fight and finish the opponent and his previous years in the Willendorf mines as a slave had left him bitter enough to lash out, yet deep inside he still had his own believes of what was right and wrong.

But what was rintg and wrong he asked himself? Morals depended on that difference. Yet what was the difference? One mans justice could be another mans' evil. Something one considered evil would not appear so if one was doing it to prolong his life or the life of others.

It was then Ewoden realised something important. Right and wrong were just words which in the end meant nothing. The only way another could live their lives and truly consider themselves free was to live it of their own accord, to be true to themselves.

The only question remaining was…what was Ewoden's true self? Was he the scared slave, the Sarafan knight or a wolf like creature hunting anything that moved? Or was he something more complex, a composite of all three, or maybe something completely different.

"What is it?" A guard stationed outside a wooden door blocking the tunnel stated as they drew near. She was a middle aged women with a few pieces of leather armour over his clothes and a sword at her side.

"We need to see the Arch-Smith." Obelisk told her.

"No one sees Ramek while he's working." She replied flatly.

"Tell him agents of Vorador would like to have a word." At the name Vorador, the guard suddenly looking uneasy thrown clear off her high horse.

"Well…wait here." Quickly she disappeared through the door, closing it behind here. There were a few moments of silence before she reappeared. "Come on then." She stated, pushing the swinging door ajar and letting them past.

Beyond the door was another short tunnel, which quickly opened up into a large underground chamber.

"This is Ramek." Anthony announced and finally Ewoden was brought back from his thoughts. Before them was a large round cave like chamber with a single stone pillar lancing down from the ceiling leading down to the floor. At the bottom it widened out into a pit, in which flowed a thick red sludge; molten lava. Stretched over this deadly mass were several metal bars that crossed over each other.

Forging a weapon of some kind using the heat from the lava was another man, just as large as Obelisk and tanned by years at the forge. From the back they could see he had a very shaggy hair and was extremely muscular. He wore over his cheat a stain brown apron that absorbed the flying sparks as the hammer in his right hand smashed down on a metal shard about a meter long, smashing it into a blade like shape. When he noticed their intrusion, he turned up from his work to face them.

Ewoden was left staring at a vision of what he could become over time and it shock him down to his core. Over the years, this elder of the Seroli had become more and more wolf-like. His face was arrange almost in a canine like snout and his ears were pointed and covered in a thin brown fur. He looked like he was part way to full werewolf form already.

"Not once in over two millennia has Vorador sent us a message." He stated, his voice very deep. When he opened his mouth they could see the two sets of fangs. "Ever since he assumed the dark gift has he never spoken to us. Not even during the first Sarafan purge when the Vampires were near extinction did he ask for help. And yet out of the blue here you are." He paused, sighting the wrappings on Ewoden's arm and the stained blood on them. "Ah…" Ramek began, a humoured glint in his canine eyes. "Well this is new." Ewoden glanced down at his injury that was healing, a little too quickly. A speed of recovery that could only be down to supernatural intervention. "A Sarafan knight with a vampire companion is rare enough, but now under the shadow of the wolf as well? This becomes more interesting by the second." The large man gestured to the two who had brought them in. Obelisk and Anthony lowered their heads respectfully, before bidding themselves exit. "Now, what finally forces Vorador to make contact with those he spurned in eons past?"