The Wolf of the Wilds

The Ruins

Helena could feel the creature's hot breath on her skin as he held her arm within his festering hands. His nails pressed into her taught muscle, piercing the skin. As he lowered his head to take a bite her face relaxed and the look of anguish was replaced by a blank frown of annoyance. 

"Actually. I think you'll find that I won."

His head snapped up instantly, but it was already too late.

Helena bolted up straight, her hand wrapping around the man's neck in a tight choke hold as she rolled them over. The weight of her body sent them both toppling back, the nachzehrer's head clipping a stone step before crunching into the ground.

A feral noise erupted the monster's throat, his fingers clawing at her face to push her off. She grounded herself by pressing her fingers into his throat with increasing force. As he pulled at her hair she returned the gesture with a fist to the face. It was a glancing blow and the dull smacking noise filled the stone halls.

"Oh stop that. It's annoying," she chided, her lips pulled into a thin scowl. "It's your own fault for biting off more than you can chew. I would recommend you go after weaker prey in the future, but I'm afraid that there'll be no future for you."

She held a coin in her free hand, the small, glinting disc framed between her thumb and forefinger.

Coins were a weakness for the nachzehrer. A coin in the mouth had a debilitating effect on them and it made them sitting ducks. They were the nachzehrer equivalent of a wooden stake to a vampire's heart.

"Open wide," she said, not waiting for the nachzehrer to react as she shoved her fingers into his mouth and prized open his jaw. The man struggled violently and attempted to bite at her digits, but she was having none of it.

She used her knees to pin down his flailing arms and stooped forward, ramming her elbow into his maw and digging her fingers into his mouth. She pressed the coin atop his putrid tongue and withdrew her arms. Before he could spit it out she roughly gripped his chin and slammed his mouth shut.

The nachzehrer's body jerked beneath her unyielding mass, frantically trying to wrestle her off of him. Still she remained, her teeth peeking between her lips and her eyes alight with an insane glee. Slowly his movements grew stiff, his attempts less and less vigorous. Until finally he went still.

Helena relaxed as she relinquished her choke hold and pushed her hair from her damp face. Her eyes flickered to the fallen blade a short distance away and she pushed herself to her feet with a little too much of a struggle. The curse was indeed sapping her of strength. 

Nachzehrer, like vampires, were tricky customers. They had long lifespans and were a pain to dispose of without a load of bother. Only beheading could really finish them off for certain. As luck would have it most nachzehrer got a little ravenous when hungry, much like a vampire in bloodlust. Similar to wolf at full moon almost; their hunger sapped them of reason. It made them less negotiable, but infinitely easier to trick.

The blade was soon in her hand and she watched the paralysed monster dispassionately from the soft daylight that trickled down from overhead. The leather clad fingers that rested on the knife handle trembled minutely.

To most it would seem unfair to kill something whilst they were immobilised, but Helena had long since forsaken her soul. She didn't do fair. An opportunist at heart. An unforgiving beast. She refused to die of a curse just because of some noble sentiment about fair fights and dignity. Honour could go fuck itself for all she cared.

Her footsteps were slow as she trudged forward, her motions unnaturally heavy and sluggish. A bead of sweat rolled down her slightly hooked nose and her hair hung lank.

"You gave me no choice pig. I did ask you to lift the curse," she said gruffly, swinging the knife at her side as her foot nudged the monster's side. His eyes stared up at her with constricted pupils, fear palpable in his gaze.

She left the church with blood splattered on her cheek, her knife in a similar condition. On the way past a tree she paused to wipe the blade clean on the moss that clung to its peeling bark, staining the lime plants a deep brown.

"Father and Mother would be proud," she muttered bitterly to herself as she held the weapon in the light. The engravings seemed to taunt her as she ran her thumb across the intricate patterns. The weapon's simplistic beauty was deceiving. If someone where to look at the blade they wouldn't see the blood that it had spilt, the lives it had taken.

It had killed kings. Torn apart families. Toppled governments.

Its ever sharp blade had been wielded by many a monster and it had created even more. In just a decade it had made a monster of her as well.
She pinched her leg lightly and tucked it away, pulling her cloak over the leather sheath.

"Scavenging Helena, scavenging is why you are here," she reminded herself.

She headed in the opposite direction after that, making a beeline for another city district.

It was in a far worse state than the area before and the empty shops had clearly been ransacked at some point. None of the windows had remained intact, the boards had been ripped from their frames and many of the metal gates that had secured the shop fronts had been pulled from their hinges and now lay in the street forgotten.

She didn't bother searching any of them. It'd be a waste of time. They had long since been emptied of anything of worth. No, she was heading for a residential area.
Eventually she selected a tower block a few streets away from the commercial buildings. It was grey and innocuous, stained with neglect. The entrance was already caved in and plants grew along the sides of the passageway.

She travelled up the concrete stairs, occasionally sniffing the air to check for less than friendly inhabitants. It appeared empty though and she began systematically breaking into flats one at a time. 

Each was overbearingly musty, the air stiff with dust, cobwebs and decay. Wall paper was peeling off of the walls and dark ominous patches of black rot had become entrenched in many of the rooms. Old photographs of a time long past sat crushed and shattered on the moth eaten ground.

Every so often she'd come across bones, the remains of the people that had lived there once. She would respectfully nod to each of the deceased and would sprinkle rosemary over what little was left before moving on.

She was searching for jewellery. Rings. Necklaces. Pretty much anything containing precious metals and stones.

Silver was valuable as a weapon and often fetched a decent price within the right circles. Gold and platinum were pretty hard to come by and the lack of people with the ability to wear silver meant that nice pieces usually did well at auction. Many precious stones had cultural and ritualistic properties for certain paranormal communities.

It was just a rather efficient money making scheme. Humans had also had a habit of writing every detail down so she could easily tell the difference between genuine pieces and cheap knock offs.

In one flat she came across a particularly nice collection.

Within a box beneath a stack of crumbling newspapers was a mixture of rings and bracelets. She stood by the gaping window, inspecting each one under the natural light and dropping them into their assigned jars. When she picked up a rather large ring, she paused.

It appeared to be platinum in design. It was clearly made to be a man's wedding band, but it had the most exquisite pattern on its surface. The metal swirled, mimicking the swaying and complexity of plants. She had taken a liking to it instantly and she spent about a minute pacing, balancing her options. It would sell for a decent amount, but she was fond of it. There was no way she could wear it, but part of her wanted to keep it all for herself anyway.

In the end she decided to return to issue later on and slipped the ring onto the cord around her neck so she could revisit it another time.

As the sky darkened she returned to the Montis camp, the jars inside her bag tinkling with her bounty.