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Chapter four

Decisions and Battlecraft

For the next three weeks she trained under Clint's tutelage until she learned everything she could about healing. Riva sat in the forepeak in front of the foresail, watching as the line of land grew larger in the distance.

Thod's boots hardly mad a sound on the planks as he walked up to the forecastle. As he got closer he could hear someone singing and by the feminine voice he guessed it was Riva.

"Ancient spirits, come and take my hand. Show me, how to find my way. Please guide me..." Riva broke off her singing, as she heard the thud of someone's boots on the bottom step.

"You didn't have to stop." Thod barked as he came around the white sail cloth. He pulled up a pile of ropes and sat a respectful distance away.

"We'll be coming to port within the hour. I was wondering if you've thought any about staying aboard." he woofed. He had grown use to her presence over the past few weeks and if he was honest with himself he didn't want her to leave.

"I thought I should. Clint told me that you are one of the best users of battlecraft he's ever seen and I'll need someone to teach me that. I want to go home sometime and try to heal my mother." she said as she looked out over the shimmering green sea before her.

Thod watched as her eyes started to mist. It pained him, to his surprise, to see her so sad but at least he could help her with that. "My crew and ship are at your service then." he barked clasping her hand briefly, before they rose to their feet.

Mooring lines where thrown to the waiting hands of different species, before the ship was pulled alongside a long concrete structure sticking out into the sea. The gangplank was lowered to the ground with a dull thud as the wood reverberated.

The slaves that didn't want to become crew for the Tarbin, renamed the PolarStar, went ashore with the crew of SeaGryphon. Some found work and others found ships willing to take them back to their homes.

Thod walked down the cobblestone streets looking for a merchant to buy supplies and weapons from. Riva, Clint, and Selinder walked alongside and behind him.

Selinder disappeared into a tavern to look for some sailors to fill in for the recent vacancies. Thod thought he'd try an old merchant contact he had dealt with in the past.

He led them down a side alley where a lone figure stood, raising his arm. A whistling sound passed by Thod's right ear and the sound of something heavy hit the dusty trail that weaved through the housing district.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" A Jackal said as he moved foreword, his eyes on Riva. His black tattered clothing made him look like a beggar. "Oh, a pretty and delicious looking Kitsune." He drawled. He had a long knife in his left hand, almost the length of a short-sword. It looked like a piece of junk, but she could tell it was once meant for a noble.

Riva didn't like the tone he used when he said delicious. She realized she didn't have any weapons and the Jackal noticed to. He lunged forward only to be sent flying backwards as a shimmering wall of black and gold light flared into existence between them.

"Here's the perfect time for a lesson." Thod woofed in her mind. "Battlecraft is used the same way as Healingcraft except that you use both. Not just one as Clint has probably told you. Go into yourself and merge the auras together. Your Healingcraft will keep you alert and energized while you plan an attack."

"When you use your Battlecraft, you shape in your mind something for either defense or offense." Your magic is only limited by your imagination and cunning." He said withdrawing from her mind.

Riva thought she was going to cry from exasperation. "The perfect time for a lesson! Honestly!" She thought before calming herself and closing her eyes. She went deep inside to those shimmering walls of her magics and blended them together.

She formed around her a bubble of green and blue. She made it slippery on the outside so it was hard to grasp and reinforced it on the inside so it wouldn't cave or puncture. She cast her mind out, seeking for what her opponent was planning to do next.

She recoiled from what she saw in the Jackal's mind. It made her burn with anger that he thought to do such an atrocity to her. Her sea-green eyes snapped open as a clap of thunder sounded in the distance. Blue and green lights danced on her white fur like the northern lights as a spear appeared into each of her waiting hands.

Thod threw his own shields up and retreated to the prone figure of Clint. It took a lot to scare him and right now, she was worse than all the monsters and beings he had faced so far. "Hell hath no fury like a woman enraged." he muttered under his breath.

Riva poured as much energy into her two Spears as she dared before throwing them at the wretched Jackal. If he was aware of what was about to happen it didn't show.

The Jackal's life flashed before his eyes as the spears came towards him. He transferred what he could to his shields before they hit. "Forgive me." Was all he said before a brilliant flash of blue light drowned everything out until it was replaced by complete darkness.

A sonorous boom rocked the houses on their foundations as a whirlwind of dust and debris whistled through the air. When the dust settled Riva was still breathing in a rather heated fashion, struggling to control her emotions.

The prone figure of the Jackal lay twisted and mangled amongst stone, mortar and wood. When the police arrived they avoided Riva altogether as healers dressed in green, went to the aid of the wretched being. He was still alive they declared though barley.

A mixed crowd of humans and sapient-animals had gathered, but no one cheered at the news, instead they frowned. He had been the culprit behind so many robberies, rapes and most of all murders. Those who had been one of his victims rejoiced when the healers declared he would be a criple for the rest of his life.

Thod had revived Clint shortly after the blast and he stared around at the damage with a new found respect for Riva. "I think we better go." Thod woofed, herding Riva and Clint past the healers and towards the end of the alley. No one stopped them and no one saw them leave, except one black cloaked figure with a glass eye.

"We'll meet one day." The cloaked figure said before melting into the shadows.

Chapter five

Karin and Alan

A small mining town was nestled in a deep valley. Two passes, now closed with snow, where the only two know ways in and out of the mountain enclosed valley. Snow lay thick upon the land, buildings and fields. A tan building with two walls lay bare of snow as two towering columns of steam and smoke rose into the cloudy sky.

The roar of a fire and the steady ping of a smith's hammer split the quite noon air. A young man of seventeen and a young girl of sixteen, both with coal, black hair and dark, brown eyes, took turns hammering the bar of steel into the shape of a sword. He wore a light shirt, brown breeches, and a black pai of boots, While she wore a woolen, green dress.

"Brother, why are we making you a sword?" she asked handing the hammer over. The top of her head barley reached his shoulder. Their bare, white skin was bathed in the orange glow of the fire as the young man reheated the steel.

"Because Karin, Father's is to unwieldy for me and when I take his place I'll need a sword I can handle." he said between beats of the hammer.

"I don't want you to go Alan, It's too dangerous." She wailed her brown eyes starting to mist. She recognized that glint in is eye and knew that even the Gods and Goddesses wouldn't be able to change his mind.

"We both know father is too ill to go and this is something I want to do." he said dousing the finished blade into a vat of special oil with a hiss. He quickly put a rain and cross guard on, fallowed by a handle of leather on the tang, before hammering the pommel into place.

Night fell upon the land and a lone figure dressed in black, heavy winter gear and armor slinked across the snow laden ground. Horses nickered as the lone figure opened the stable door. He went down the isle until he came to a magnificent, jet-black stallion.

Alan threw his hood back as he came up to the stallion. He took a halter and reins from a hook on the wall before slipping it over the horses head. He threw a thick, blue blanket of wool on the stallion's back before placing the saddle on and tightening the girth straps.

The horses hooves barely made a sound as he rode through town and into the forest. The moon was so full the forest looked as if it were daylight instead of night. A bright flash of pearl-blue light flared between the trees. When Alan's eyes cleared, two wolves stood on all fours in the middle of the road.

"Hello Alan." the translucent, white male wolf barked, his fur rippled by an unseen force. "We've been waiting for you." a translucent black, she-wolf barked, appearing beside the male. The horse didn't seem bothered at all by their appearance and as they approached; the stallion began to graze absently on a patch of grass at the base of a pine tree.

Alan couldn't believe his eyes. He dismounted and kneeled before the two deities, as he bowed his head in respect the wolf God and Goddess came closer. "Why do you honor me so with you presence after all these years?" he asked of them as he straightened.

He had dreamed and longed for this moment of when he would meet the two deities since he was seven. He had gone against writ and the beliefs of those around him. Instead of worshipping their gods he turned and worshiped those of the animals he loved the most, wolves.

"We've heard your prayers for a long time now, at first my mate and I were confused for no human had ever done so before. As you grew so did our understanding and trust of you." the she wolf barked as she circled him, her eyes where pale green discs of kindness, speed and wisdom.

"Tonight we deemed you ready and worthy. You took your fathers armor and intend to fight in this bloody war in his place because he is temporarily crippled. You've gone out of your way to help your friends and pack and tonight we will reward you for showing the spirit of the wolf, Alan of the Lycas pack." The male wolf barked as he circled in the other direction. His eyes, where discs of bright blue that held truth, strength and justice.

Both wolves stopped and lifted their heads to the full moon and let out a long and sonorous howl. Alan's spine tingled as goose-bumps formed on his skin from the eerie howl. The moon went from it's pearl white to a light blue as the wolves' howl intensified. His father's armor took on the same shade before it vanished and was replaced by new armor.

He now wore a simple chain hauberk, greaves, gauntlets, a chest plate and a helm. The chest plate had two wolves, one black the other white, howling at a blue moon painted on the front. His helm resembled the head of a wolf and everything had a thin coating of some kind of dust.

A medium Kite shield appeared on his left arm. It had the same insignia as the plate and it was made out of some foreign metal. It too had the same coating of dust and it was really light. His sword came next as a bright blue flash of light made it disappear and in its place rested a curved sword like a wolf's fang. It was made of the same metal as the shield and had two stylized wolf heads for a guard and a leather handle.

The wolves howl intensified and Alan could have sworn every wolf on the planet was howling simultaneously. His body began to glow the same eerie blue and with a brighter flash of blue light he stood as werewolf in his new armor.

"You can transform thus anytime you wish it. You, Alan, are now a bridge between our two races. Use your gifts wisely. They are made of metals from the moon and it is all coated in moon-dust which is harder than diamond itself." The male and female wolves said simultaneously before disappearing with a bright flash of white light and a clap of thunder.

Alan quickly retrieved a small mirror from his saddlebags and examined his body. His head was that of a wolf's long and narrow for a muzzle and bright amber eyes. His body was covered in black, grey and white fur. His arms and legs were no bigger than usual but he could feel a strength that was foreign to him. His hands and feet were now the powerful claws of a wolf.

His body began to morph back into it's human form as he remembered his old body. He remounted his horse and rode off into the dawn of a new morning for the Capital of Argentia, Ghalidan. The two wolves smiled at each other before vanishing in a cloud of white mist.