The old vulture watched it all from the tower roof. All of it with its eyes the color of aged paper gone yellow and caked with mold. It watched as the female turned into a wolf, only to then attack the armed man. Then the young male becoming a wolf dark as night, before throwing her off the man and pinning her to the ground.
It watched with rapt attention as another female and male came out of the castle. It watched their emotional display with vacant eyes as the female and male changed back. A heady feeling entered its body as it saw the females heal the man and bear.
The heady evil joy grew as the young girl fell to the ground, shaking from head to toe. It grew to a fever pitch when the bear became an old withered crone.
It pushes off the tower as the crone and maiden share an emotional embrace. A reunion of joy that would end very soon. The vulture flaps and soars towards the tall dark mountains that loom over the woods and valley. A menacing shadow that engulfs all in its path with a chilling darkness. It flies amid the cold and icy sleet that begins to fall from the sky.
It soon arrives at a stone ledge, the surface slick with blood and ice. The vulture lands sinking its sharp claws into the gore stained rock. It shuffles along the stone to the cave entrance just a few paces away. It passes under the cave's overhang, bits of aged metal and broken swords wedged deep into the rock above. Leather cords woven together with the bones of animal carcasses, resembling a macabre curtain of the newly dead.
The vulture continues across the wet stone, spiders, roaches, and other pests of the earth scuttle away from its iron black claws. The vulture stops at the entrance to a much larger cavern.
A carpet of moss stretches into the gloomy darkness, illuminated by the oily glow of cauldrons filled with fire, the color of fresh blood. The vulture convulses as red smoke surrounds its ragged feathered form. The smoke clears leaving a young man in its place. The man could only be described as a colorless being. Gray are his eyes, hair, and skin. His frame muscled but thin, pointed ears and long black nails adding to his feral but beautiful form.
A cape of feathers of vulture gray and black, flows down his back and brushing his ankles. A necklace of thin iron and owl bones, hangs down from his skeletal but swan like neck. His hands still covered in drying layers of blood and flesh. The man slowly walks into the cavern, a limp in his step from his ever broken leg.
He treks down the carpet of moss. Figures wrapped in cloaks of gray and black, stare at him from behind masks of bear and wolf skulls licked clean of flesh. Above his head, dangles a chandelier built from the bones of deer and the spines of snakes. Gobs of black wax drip onto the mossy carpet below, their wicks burning with gray fire.
The walls drip with drying blood, the red viscous liquid painted on the walls in symbols of skulls, broken swords, and a sickle moon. Snakes and lizards slither across the floor, their scales scratching the stone as the vulture man comes to the end of the mossy fabric.
On rock ledges and cracks in the wall, eyes stare down at the man, the messenger with news for his dark master. The vulture man revels in his knowledge as he bows before a throne of iron and bones.
"My empress," he drawls, cocking his head to the side as he gazes up at the deadly beautiful woman upon the throne.
The tall carved back of the throne, holds jewels of blood red and venom green. The jewels arcing in swirling patterns down the back and across the arms. The stones blazing bright light, the specks flashing onto the corpse pale skin of the woman.
YOU ARE READING
A Wolf's Courage(Tales of Europa Book 1)
Werewolf🥀Heat licks up my bones and into the surrounding skin, my groan of pleasure joining Damaris's low growl of desire. However, his lips stay as gentle as his grip on my waist, allowing me to choose how far this will go. My throat rumbles as I purr fro...
