Disclaimer: The original characters Ambrose Maurlias and Kurt,
Thelia, and Sabin Duvert are (c) Arania (also known as GaiaOnline's "Sabin
Duvert") and arebeing used onlyby permission for a contest. The
followingtext (and all subsequent chapters) should be considered fan-fiction
and not canon.The scenario and writing are (c) E. A. O'Riordan (GaiaOnline's
"Kuronue-chan") and are not to be used in any way without the express
permission of the author, with an obvious exception for Sabin. Enjoy the story.
--
Chapter 1: Seven
--
“Help! Someone,
quick, prepare a compress! Louis, Louis, can you hear me? Louis!”
A panicked face swam
dizzily into Ambrose’s vision. At first he couldn’t remember what had happened.
Then a throbbing pain caused him to look down at his left forearm. Or, rather,
where his left forearm should have been. Now there was nothing left but a gory
stump in place of an elbow. And everywhere, everywhere, there was blood.
Ambrose started to faint again, but he was slapped back into consciousness by the
young man standing over him. His apprentice, Emmanuel.
For Ambrose Maurlias
was not Ambrose Maurlias here. He was Louis Herriot, horse dealer, age
fifty-three, no known relations. He had just purchased a new team of work
horses that day. Belgian breed, strong and usually not easily spooked. But
there had been a wolf attacking the town’s livestock, and the men were off to
shoot it. Some fool, probably young, had fired his rifle near the horse shed,
and the yoked team had bolted.
Ambrose had been
holding a rope that was attached to the yoke. He had looped it around his arm
and braced himself against a support beam for the jolt as the horses struggled
to run. He hadn’t counted on the loop tightening so suddenly. There had been a
brief moment of incomprehensible pain, and then everything was dark.
He must have been
out for at least a quarter hour, by the amount of blood soaking his clothing
and the dirt-and-sawdust floor of the stable he was in. Emmanuel was shaking
him hard, and another man was quickly knotting a strip of cloth around his
bicep, but even as Ambrose noticed this, he felt the grey tinges of death
sweeping over him. It was a familiar feeling for Ambrose…after all, this would
be his sixth time.
Emmanuel shook the
lifeless body of his employer, but to no avail. The old horse-dealer was gone.
No family to mourn him, no hometown awaiting the body for burial in its local
cemetery. In fact, realized the apprentice, no one could really remember when
the loner had first appeared in town. In a few short weeks, no one would really
even miss him.
So passed Louis
Herriot, seventh incarnation of Ambrose Maurlias.
Chapter 2: Eight
--
The first thing
Ambrose knew was the overpowering need to flee. Indeed, as he “awoke,” he found
he was already running on four paws as though his life was on the line. As a
rifle report echoed behind him and a patch of dirt exploded near his furred
shoulder, however, he realized he truly was trying to escape with his life.
In an instant,
Ambrose felt sick realization wash over him: the nearest wolf—the wolf that
received his spirit after his latest death—had been the one being pursued for
destroying livestock. Men from his very own town were firing at him now…men
with whom he had shared drinks and tales…men who had called themselves his
friends.
These realizations
were not kept in mind very long, for the animal instinct to escape was too
strong. A stinging pain in his left haunch was testament to one of the men’s
accuracy before he had inhabited this body. Half-crazed, Ambrose pushed harder,
willing the pain to recede.
He dodged trees and
scrub, conscious that the men’s voices behind him were growing more distant.
Then shot rattled against a tree trunk and Ambrose leapt to the side. That
proved to be a costly mistake. His wide paws slipped on dead leaves and he
tumbled down an embankment, landing with a sharp crash. When he tried to rise,
he found one of his front feet was sprained. He was unable to put any weight on
it.
Although he tried to
stop it, a slight whimper escaped him. The voices were getting closer again.
Then he heard the sound of running water. Hobbling towards the sound, he found
a broad and shallow stream. The wolf in him told him crossing it would throw
the pursuers off the scent. Ambrose knew that men didn’t follow scent the way
hounds would, but he couldn’t think of a better plan. He limped across the
stream twice and collapsed in a thicket.
Before long, the
group of men reached the water. Two or three stooped to get a drink while a few
others investigated the banks, looking for tracks. Ambrose recognized the
cobbler and his son, two farmers, the tailor, and the cooper. Also included in
the group were a few good-for-nothings that were practically part of the
furniture at the local tavern. They had probably joined the chase to have a
little fun.
As Ambrose lay
panting in the undergrowth, one of these ne’er-do-wells raised his gun and
began shooting into the surrounding area. A piece of shot caught the wolf in
the side of the neck and scored all down his right side. Before he could stop
himself, Ambrose loosed a squealing yelp and sprinted from the brush. The chase
was back on.
Ignoring his
sprained paw and wounded haunch, he dashed back across the stream and made for
the area where the trees were thickest. The joyful shouting of the men was like
a cruel perversion of the choir at Mass, where most of them sang every Sabbath.
Shot pellets ricocheted off of trunks, sending wooden shrapnel into Ambrose’s
eyes and gaping, foaming mouth. He could hear them splashing across the stream,
ascending the bank, crashing through the forest. Terror surged through him.
He reached the thick
woods, but hardly had he entered it when he burst though into a long, open
meadow. Every part of him recoiled at the idea of being out in the open, but he
didn’t have the strength or the will to stop or change directions now. His
vision was red, his heart fluttering, and his breathing shallow. He bolted
across the field, his eyes fixed upon the opposite line of trees. Any second
the men would enter the meadow, and he must make it to cover.
Thirty meters…
Twenty meters…
Ten meters…
The sharp report
from the rifle was followed an instant later by an explosion behind Ambrose’s
ribcage. His flying paws stumbled, and he rolled into the cover of the forest.
But it was too late. He could feel his life draining away already. Ambrose
struggled to his feet, collapsed, and crawled forward. He couldn’t die, not so
soon, not like this. His claws scrabbled against a rotting log and he tried to
pull himself over.
That’s how he was
when the hunting party found him: half over a fallen tree, wounded in numerous
places, eyes rolling, bloody froth all over his head and chest. Barely
conscious, Ambrose looked up at the men standing over him, congratulating each
other and thumping the last shooter on the back.
One of them, the
cooper, spat on the ground. Michel, Ambrose thought in his delirium. Michel,
my friend. I carried you home last week when you had too much to drink at
Annette’s wedding. Michel, recognize me. He tried to say the name, but it
only came out as a rasping howl.
Michel spat again
and lifted his gun, bringing the butt down between Ambrose’s ears with a
sickening crack.
So passed the
thieving wolf, eighth incarnation of Ambrose Maurlias.
Chapter 3: Nine
--
The sixteen-year-old
boy nudged the door to the cabin open with his foot. His arms were full of
firewood, which he deposited in the grate next to the stove. Sniffing
curiously, he managed to pluck a bun from the pan his mother was pulling from
the fire.
“Sabin!” his mother
scolded. “You’ll burn yourself!”
“Let him be,
Thelia,” came a croaking voice from the next room. Sabin poked his head into
the doorway and saw his father, Kurt Duvert, still in bed with quilts pulled up
to his chin. The trapper had caught cold a few days before. His wife had
advised bed rest, but he had shunned the idea. Now he had pneumonia, and was
confined to the house for several days while Thelia nursed him back to health.
“Sabin, come in ‘ere a minute.”
Chewing on his hot
bun, Sabin walked over to the bed. Kurt coughed into his fist and wheezed, “I
need you to go and check the traps. Just because your mother won’t let me go
outside—and I don’t know why, because I’m obviously fine—” Here Kurt had to
pause as a coughing fit wracked his body and Sabin rolled his eyes before the
man continued, “…just because I’m stuck here doesn’t mean we can leave the
traps alone. So be a good lad and check them this morning, all right?”
“Yes, sir,” Sabin
replied, brushing his unruly brown hair back from his eyes. “Should I start
from the east and move westward?”
Kurt nodded.
“There’s a smart boy. Better get going before dawn gets on.”
So a few minutes
later Sabin was shrugging on a woolen coat and grabbing another bun and the
game bag. He trudged off into the pre-sunrise twilight, eager to finish and get
out of the chilly fog. Sabin Duvert was an interesting boy. Part dreamer, part
scientist, and part mystery-hunter, he was the bane of his mother’s nerves and
his father’s idea of normality. Kurt and Thelia could never quite rationalize
how they had raised such a son.
Sabin had checked
the first few traps and was approaching the next one in the set when he heard
the sounds of a struggle. That meant an animal had been caught. Sighing, Sabin
readied the club he used on such occasions. Kurt had a gun that he utilized in
dispatching the often-frantic living game, but he did not allow Sabin to use
it. Instead, the teenager had to kill the trapped animals as quickly and
painlessly as he could with the club…and to avoid damaging the pelt, if
possible.
Upon coming closer
to the trap, however, Sabin stopped. Instead of the fox he had been expecting,
a huge creature lay foaming and panting in the underbrush, dirt and leaves
matting its fur. One of its huge legs was held fast in the iron teeth of the
trap, oozing blood all over the appendage and the surrounding ground. The metal
peg that held the trap in place had been nearly pulled from the earth, but it
seemed that the creature was now exhausted. It was facing away from him, but Sabin
could see its back rising and falling in short breaths.
Sabin approached
cautiously, but obviously the creature had heard him. It twisted its front half
around so that Sabin could see it had the head of a wolf. Its glazed yellow
eyes took in Sabin’s surprised face, then swept over the club and game bag. Its
lips lifted in a snarl and began to struggle against the trap again, but only
half-heartedly. Sabin could see now that the hip of the leg caught in the trap
was wrenched into a very unnatural position. It looked dislocated.
As the boy stood
contemplating all of this, the wolf-creature gave up its effort to escape and
collapsed again. Sabin wondered what to do…Kurt probably would’ve shot first
and investigated later, but the creature was so unusual that it made the boy
pause.
Suddenly, as if
responding to the would-be trapper’s hesitation, a voice muttered, “This has not
been my week.”
Alarmed, Sabin
looked around. There was no one to be seen in any direction. He glanced back at
the beast before him, and saw that it was looking warily at him, the tuft of
fur above one of its eyes raised. It was such a human expression that Sabin was
taken aback. Feeling a little foolish, he whispered, “You?”
“What about me?” the
wolf-creature rejoined, a look of weary amusement crossing its face. “Are you
going to stove in my skull or not? I hate indecision.”
Sabin had jumped
several feet back when the thing spoke, but now he looked confused. Then he
noticed the club he was gripping and understood; he dropped the wood and
gingerly walked closer. “No,” he replied firmly, “I’m not going to kill you.”
The creature seemed
to think about that for a moment before adding, “I’m sorry to disappoint if
you’re planning on making me into an attraction for crowds to gawk at, but I
won’t look like this for very long.”
Again the teenager
shook his head as he reached towards the trap. “No, I’m going to let you go.
But first…what are—er, who are you?”
The wolf-beast
averted his eyes for a moment. The name “Ambrose Maurlias” was on the tip of
its tongue before it changed its mind. “I’m…I’m Michel. Michel Blanc.”
Sabin had been
locating the release mechanism for the trap, and had his fingers on it.
Suddenly thinking better of loosing the beast just yet, he demanded, “Do you
promise you’re not going to turn around and tear me to shreds if I release
you?”
“Of course I
promise. I’m not an animal, you know,” the creature snorted disdainfully.
Loosing the trap,
Sabin carefully slid the injured foot out of the metal teeth. A sharp yelp
alerted him to the fact that he had jarred the dislocated hip. Wincing
sympathetically, he scooted forward to get a better look at the injury. All of
the twisting and turning “Michel” had been doing must have popped the hip out
of its socket. Which would, of course, explain why the wolf had come so close
to loosing himself from the trap and been forced to give up at the last.
“There,” the
brown-haired teen said, digging up the much-loosened peg with his thin fingers
and tossing the whole trap aside.
“Thanks,” Ambrose
growled, twitching his paw to see if it was still attached. “But I don’t think
I can stand.”
Sabin thought about
this. “I could probably pop your hip back in. I did it for my father’s dog
once. It’ll hurt, but it should heal afterwards. And I could go and get some
herbs from my mother to make a salve for your wound.”
Ambrose hesitated.
He knew it would be best to have his hip back in joint, but the inflamed area
hurt so badly that he didn’t want it touched. He scrabbled with his good leg
and arms until he was turned over on his back. “Um…”
“It would be best,”
Sabin said gently. “You can’t move like this.”
Suddenly sullen,
Ambrose acquiesced. The boy fetched a thick piece of wood and gave it to the
wolf-creature to place between his large teeth. Carefully, Sabin found a good
grip on the injured leg, avoiding the bloody wound made by the trap. He counted
to three, and then quickly shoved the displaced hip back into the socket. It
was harder to do that it had been with the dog, but he was able to do it. A
sickening crunch had accompanied the move, and at first Sabin was afraid he had
broken a bone. Then he noticed that the length of wood he had given “Michel”
had been reduced to splinters in the wolf’s mouth.
For a few moments it
was silent as Ambrose panted and Sabin waited nervously. Then came a muttered
“That hurt. A lot.” Sabin laughed weakly. Ambrose tentatively
moved his leg. It was still painful, but comparatively much better.
“I’ll be back in a
little while,” Sabin said, picking up his bag and club. “I need to finish
checking the traps. Don’t go anywhere.”
Ambrose snorted
derisively at this.
The rest of the
traps were empty. It was late autumn, too late for summer activity and too
early for winter desperation. The only game to be had was a rabbit that had
snapped its neck in one of the snares. The entire trek, Sabin couldn’t stop
thinking about the mysterious creature he had found. Had it not spoken, he
would have thought it was merely a deformed wolf. Now he wasn’t so sure. The
teenager hurried back to the spot he had left “Michel.”
When he arrived, the
beast was nowhere to be seen. A large trail of bare earth, however, led to the
base of a thick tree where a large pile of leaves was moving up and down almost
imperceptibly. Sabin stooped and brushed aside the top of the pile, only to
find yellow eyes glaring at him reproachfully. The boy chuckled as the
leaf-pile quivered and the rest of the wolf head emerged. “I was cold,” came
the annoyed explanation.
“We’d better go,”
Sabin said. “That wound needs treatment or it’ll fester.”
Ambrose blinked.
“Go? Go where?”
Sabin gestured to
the southwest. “Towards my home. If I’m going to be taking care of you, I need
you to be closer. Come on.”
“Who said you’d be
taking care of me?” Ambrose asked grouchily, but began getting up anyway.
Sabin barely checked
a gasp as the creature rose. He had expected it to travel on all four
appendages, but it obviously preferred to be bipedal. Standing, it was nearly
seven feet tall and much bulkier than a man. And now that he saw it on its feet,
Sabin couldn’t help but think it did resemble a man, in a way. The long yellow
hair curling out around its ears that he had taken as a mane of sorts could
really be hair like on a human. The long forelegs looked much more like arms
and the odd paws like distorted hands once they were off the ground. It had
shoulders and a torso not unlike men. Sabin could see that this creature would
have been fast and powerful had it not been injured…and potentially much more
dangerous than either a wolf or a man.
The teenager did
gasp, however, when Ambrose teetered on his injured leg and collapsed onto
Sabin’s shoulder. The wolf-beast must’ve been still supporting a good deal of
his own weight, though, because the impact didn’t buckle Sabin’s knees and make
him fall. Slowly the two moved forward, one hopping stride for Ambrose for
every two quick steps by Sabin.
It took the better
part of an hour for them to reach a suitable spot: a rotting lean-to that had
once stood near a cabin which had burned down two decades before. While the
exhausted Ambrose rested, Sabin scooped out the debris that had gathered in the
lean-to and scattered a thick layer of dry leaves to serve as bedding. At last
he helped Ambrose into the shelter.
“I’ll be back in a
little while with the herbs,” the teenager said, arranging the leaves around
the creature’s injured leg. “There’s a brook about twenty meters from here if
you get really thirsty while I’m gone. Do you need anything else? Are you
hungry?”
At this Ambrose let
out a barking laugh. “Hungry? You have no idea…”
Sabin reached into
the game bag. “I have a rabbit…it’s not properly dressed or anything, but if
you don’t mind waiting for me to…um…well, you probably eat your meat raw
anyway, don’t you?”
Ambrose nodded and
took the rabbit gratefully. Sabin was surprised when he laid it aside, but then
realized that the other was probably waiting for him to leave before he made a
meal of it. Taking that as his cue, he dusted off his breeches and began to
walk towards home.
At the last moment,
he spun around. His shoulders ached from being a human crutch, he was going out
of his way to get herbs and other supplies, and he had given the only game of
the day to this creature, so he thought he had a right to know a bit more
information. “What are you?”
Ambrose, who had
been inspecting the rabbit, turned towards him and wrinkled his nose before
stating simply, “A werewolf.”
Sabin murmured,
“Oh,” and then turned back around and continued on his way.
By the time he
returned, there was not a single trace of the rabbit, and the werewolf seemed
to be asleep. Putting down the horse blanket he had managed to “borrow,” he
unwrapped the various dried and fresh herbs and began to crush them together.
Fetching water from the stream, he soon had a paste which he applied liberally
to a strip of cloth. If Sabin had learned to hunt, trap, read and write from
his father, he had learned how to heal from his mother.
--
For the following
twelve days, Sabin cared for the werewolf in secret. Fortunately, his parents
were used to him wandering in the forest for hours at a time, so he didn’t
arouse too much suspicion by spending time out of the house. The wound on
Ambrose’s leg healed quickly, but the soreness in his hip took longer to become
bearable.
Fortunately, the
problem of the werewolf’s voracious need for food was solved on the third day
when Sabin found a deer with a broken leg caught in one of the wolf-traps.
Supplemented by what goods the boy could sneak away from home, this meat proved
to be enough to last Ambrose most of his recuperation time.
Every day Sabin
noticed that his charge looked less wolf and more man. Soon he was a bit
shorter, a lot slimmer, and much less furry. On the twelfth day, Sabin brought
some of his father’s old clothes to the shack, and a young man met him. This
man looked to be about twenty-six, with longish blonde hair and blue eyes,
which he assured Sabin would be deep yellow within a year. There were a few
other hints about his true nature in his form and presence, such as his long
nails and teeth and powerful, gliding strides, but only to the keen observer.
Even his voice, which might be considered rough by some, was a pale imitation
of the deep-throated wolf voice Sabin had come to know.
Ambrose dressed
quickly. He was Michel Blanc now, and it was high time for him to make his
fortune and settle down to a new life in this guise. He would need to find a
new profession. So far he had been a musketeer, a nobleman, a scientist, a
hunter, a merchant, and a horse-dealer, besides smaller, pettier jobs along the
way. He thought perhaps he might become a doctor: it was evident that medical
skills were something he lacked.
It didn’t take long
for all traces of the werewolf’s presence to be eradicated; he was generally
very tidy anyway. Soon nothing was left but goodbye. Ambrose took the first
step, holding out a hand. “Thank you.”
Sabin grinned
brightly and replied, “It’s been my pleasure, sir. It’s not every day one gets
to care for a real werewolf.”
The other coughed
lightly. “Yes…about that…”
The teenager, who
had shaken Ambrose’s hand, gripped tighter for a second, his face suddenly very
earnest. “I won’t tell anyone. Besides, who’d believe me? Just…please, contact
me sometime? Let me know how everything goes. You know, with the getting your
place back in the world and everything.”
Ambrose chuckled,
“All right. Goodbye, Sabin.” And with that he disappeared into the forest.
--
It was 1932, and the
rattle of automobiles on the streets below had become a lullaby for the old
man. Everything seemed distant these days, as Ambrose waited patiently for
death. He would’ve left the city, had he possessed the funds or the strength.
As it was, he simply sat in bed in his small apartment, trying to guess how
long it would take to die.
A knock on the door
roused the old man from his morbid game, and he croaked, “Come in!” It was
probably the landlord wanting rent.
To his surprise, the
opened door revealed what appeared to be a young man with very white hair. The
visitor carried a felt hat and a cane in his hands, and his suit was very
clean.
“Sabin!” Ambrose
chuckled, a tickling thing that grew into a cough before he could stop it.
“You...ahem, excuse me...you look great!”
Sabin walked into
the poorly-lit apartment and closed the door behind him. “I wish I could say
the same, Michel.”
Ambrose smiled. “I’m
not too worried. A few more days and I won’t have to put up with a tired,
broken-down body anymore. Well, at least not for another fifty years.”
Taking a seat on the
lone chair in the apartment, the white-haired man said, “I read about your work
in the medical journals. Very impressive. Tell me, what happened?”
The old man closed
his amber eyes. Like so many, Ambrose had been a victim of the stock market
crash. Though Americans might be feeling the pangs hardest, the crash had
victims worldwide. Of course Ambrose still had money hidden away, but now he
was too feeble to retrieve it. It was just as well, though, because he wouldn’t
have to deal with transferring his savings to himself when he started his new
life.
After Ambrose had
finished his tale, Sabin stood. “It is time to go.”
“Go?” Ambrose asked,
a feeling of nostalgia creeping over him.
“Yes. Times have
changed, Michel, and not for the better for people like you and me. I have been
looking for you for several years now. Tell me, Michel, where do you think the
nearest wolf is?”
Ambrose felt his
thick eyebrows knit. “I...I don’t know.”
Sabin turned cold
blue eyes to the window, staring out at the dingy streets beyond the tiny room.
“I do. It is at the new zoo. From here, the zoo is even closer than the
curiosity fairs that may have wolves. When you die, you will awaken there. What
do you suppose they’ll do to a wolf that starts slowly becoming a man? They’ll
take it in for research, of course. They might kill you. If they do, you can be
sure that the nearest wolf will not be a wild one. It shall be one that they
own. I doubt the closest wolf will ever be free of captivity again, and it
shall become a vicious cycle. Do not think they will understand that you are
human. The public has no use for monsters, no matter their level of humanity,”
the white-haired man said bitterly.
Ambrose felt a chill
wave wash over him. Why had he not thought of this before? It was hard being
old; his mind did not work as it did when he was young. Suddenly he saw that
what Sabin said was true. He had a desperate need to get out of the city.
As if reading his
thoughts, Sabin shifted his gaze to the werewolf. “That is why I am here. I
will take you somewhere safe. Gather up anything that you want to bring with
you.”
On the long
automobile trip to Sabin’s chosen place, Ambrose contemplated his friend. He
had changed so very much from the sixteen-year-old boy who had first helped
him. Ambrose had never gotten a full story on what had happened to the boy when
he was eighteen, but he knew enough to leave the subject alone. A small part of
Ambrose—the wolf part, he thought—was terrified of the changed Sabin: a man who
didn’t seem to age, who was occasionally prone to sudden bad tempers, who
smelled wrong. But Ambrose trusted him still, and felt pangs of
gratitude towards him for his help.
At last, they left
the car and walked into a forest, Sabin once again supporting Ambrose. Placing
the old man against a tree, Sabin said, “There are wild wolves here. Check in
with me as soon as you are able, so I know you are all right.”
Ambrose nodded. He
felt that death was very close now. Somehow being back in the woods, in fresh
air, had made his old body satisfied and ready to rest. He thanked Sabin as he
settled in between the roots of the tree and closed his eyes.
“One more thing,
Michel,” came the voice of Sabin, breaking in on Ambrose’s wandering thoughts.
“It has been my passion for many years to know as much as possible about
monsters, ghouls, and creatures of every kind. Not long after meeting you, I
turned my attention to werewolves for a short time. According to my research,
there was a certain house, by the surname Maurlias, who had for several
generations a man who looked surprisingly similar to you. It was said that he
was a werewolf, and perhaps a possessed one at that. For, according to legend,
whenever he grew old, he grew young again. Do you know anything of that?”
Ambrose looked up at
the man crouching above him. For a moment, he saw the clear, curious grey-blue
twinkle that had defined young Sabin’s eyes. He smiled vaguely. “I have had
several names, some of them more famous than others. But to you, in this life,
I am Michel Blanc. The next time we meet? We shall see. Now go away and let an
old man die in peace!”
“You are not so much
older than I.”
Ambrose groaned, “I
am, I am. I have a good two hundred years on you, if not more. Are you happy
now? You’ve made me speak where I’d hoped to remain silent. Give my regards to
Samantha, and let me be!”
Sabin smiled, pulled
out a small book from inside his coat, and made a few markings in it. Then he
bade Ambrose farewell and left, calling back, “I’ll be in
Ambrose relaxed
again. Despite his minor irritation with his friend, he was happy to be back in
clean air, surrounded by natural sounds. He felt the numbing coldness claiming
his limbs and sighed. Perhaps next time he would be a lawyer.
So passed Michel
Blanc, ninth incarnation of Ambrose Maurlias.
--
The end. Thanks for
reading!