I awoke to the low rumbling of a giant in conversation, or rather, a half giant. The sun was not yet in the sky and the moon still lingered on the western horizon. Its pale light cast an eerie glow upon the mists that our dwindling campfire was struggling to keep at bay. From my bedroll I could make out the hulking shape of Halvar Aevarsson across the fire. The half-frost giant was indeed deep in conversation with who I assumed was Kimari. The dragon born blood hunter was the only other member of our group who I could fathom being up this early.
Knowing better than to attempt a return to sleep, I forced myself upright and set about packing my things for another day on the road. I managed to gather than Kimari had been given a flyer by some passersby or a patrol even earlier in the morning. A bounty of sorts, offering coin to anyone who could slay a werewolf presumed responsible for several attacks in a nearby city called Upirsburg.
A werewolf! Though I had been with my companions for some months now, our adventures had not led us to anything near as exciting as a werewolf. Any tiredness that lingered within my left my bones immediately as I shot toward my sisters bedroll, dropping to my knees to shake her awake.
Though she protested at my sudden intrusion into her sleep, she too stirred quickly when I mentioned the bounty. Halvar set about waking the others so that we could depart for Upirsburg. And after a quick breakfast, we indeed set out.
After a time of travel we came upon the town. It was much the same as other towns in the south I had seen or been told about. Walls surrounded a myriad of buildings woven together by cobblestone roadways. Great braziers burned at the intersections of roadways. Halvar once told me the people of the south worshiped fire in a way. Supplicants, he called them.
The flyer said to seek out a man called Steffan about the werewolf contract. So into the town we went. Tho it was still early, we passed by several townspeople. A man stirring putrid smelling dye pots, a butcher who seemed upset as he ducked back into his shop, a few guards loitering around a tent in the middle of a particularly large intersection. The guards at this tent directed us further up the road where we found Steffan in some sort of government building.
The man looked tired as he gave us details of the case. Nine killings spread over the last six months. All women, tho women of all sort of different backgrounds and social levels. Including a young woman slayed the last night. A woman whose body was being guarded and covered by the tent we had just passed. Steffan suggested that we might begin our investigation at the tent where we would find the bailiff who could answer more questions.
Upon arrival at the tent, I was scarcely inside for more than a moment before the threat of loosing my breakfast forced me back outside. The sight of a woman, torn and bloodied on the ground, and the sharp smell of copper and gore sent flashes of memory through my mind. I had walked into a similar scene twelve years prior the night my parents died. The memory was perhaps more overwhelming than the actual scene, but nonetheless I could not linger within the tent. I stood instead in front of the flap and looked out over the street, listening to my companions inside.
The Bailiff and a man called Sir Halfran were within the tent. Sir Halfran was quiet, lost deep within his own thoughts. But the bailiff pointed out several characteristics of the wounds on Sophias body that lended well to the theory of a werewolf, notably the almost complete absence of most of her body below the navel. Even though I was outside I nearly lost my stomach at the description. The bailiff did not know why Sophia would be walking the streets alone at night. For answers to this question, hecsuggested we seek out her father. A shepherd called Giovanni who lived on the outskirts of town.
We departed quickly, for which I was grateful. The smell had begun to permeate through the cloth of the tent. The walk to Giovanni's farm was short and we quickly came to a cluster of farm buildings to find two guards begin yelled at by a man. The man was obviously drunk. If his slurred shouts and staggered walk didn't give it away, the bottle he was waving about as he yelled surely was.
I caught only one sentence of his angry tirade, "monsters in the barn."
