It was an exceptionally lovely day to be outside hunting in the Rift. That was what was on Chip’s mind after he left his father and headed west along the southern bank of Lake Honrich. He’d thought of going to visit his mother, but the call of wildlife pulled him away the moment he stepped outside Riften’s gates. It was plentiful here; for the nearer one got to the mountains the more sparsely the land was populated. There were goats galore, hare, pheasants, and most of all deer and elk. And he intended to take down every one he could, between here and crossing back over the waterways to return to his home.
He worked his way to the very edge of the mountains’ rise, keeping just beneath them and dropping every animal he could find. He’d always been a good archer, but could feel his skill growing with every hour he spent firing this odd-looking but finely crafted bow he’d taken from the shrine on Solstheim. He was backing up against the steepest part of the incline, looking back over the valley of the Treva River and toward the Throat of the World, when he noticed movement to his left in his peripheral vision. He swiveled to find a pair of deer grazing their way slowly up into a grassy mountain pass; and he grinned to have discovered his next targets.
He lined up a shot on the nearer of the two, but it moved just as he was getting himself into position. He tsk’d and dropped into a crouch, following the deer at a substantial distance to avoid being heard. At the top of the nearest incline he rose to see the two beasts fairly far apart up the pass. In his peripheral vision he registered the presence of a small log cabin just to his left, but his gaze never left the nearer deer. He raised his bow, drew, and loosed the arrow in one smooth movement; it took only two or three seconds to reach the deer and drop it. Chip’s gaze now fixed on the deer higher up in the pass; it had frozen in place and did not seem to notice his presence, so he crept forward a few paces to have a slightly better angle of attack and repeated his shot.
Chip was a grown man, but a very young one; and he couldn’t help but utter a whoop of satisfaction at having taken down two deer with a single shot each, so close together. This. This is what I was made for! And I can only get better. Soon I’ll be taking down bear with a single shot.
He grinned at himself. OK, maybe it won’t be a single shot. Maybe two. But still!
He scurried across the pass to find his prizes, following his nose toward the scent of decay. Realizing that reminded him of the conversation he’d just had with his father, and he frowned.
I never would have imagined it. He obviously hasn’t been a vampire for as long as I’ve known him. Or at least for as long as I’ve been… aware, of him. I would have remembered that scent of decay. I’ll never mistake it for anything else. So why does it bother me to know that this thing happened to him before I was even old enough to remember?
Because he’s my father. And I’m a werewolf. That’s why. The two things are incompatible with each other. And it still leaves me in the dark, wondering about myself.
But those thoughts were intrusive, and unwelcome; and he had work to do right here in front of him. He turned his attention to the task at hand. The light was beginning to fade by the time he’d dressed the second deer and collected those parts of it that he intended to keep. He turned to face back out over the valley and caught his breath. It was still the most beautiful landscape he’d ever seen. The Reach was a beautiful place; the snowy north had its own appeal. Even the volcanic tundra could be picturesque under the right conditions. But the Rift? The Rift was a place unlike any other, with its riot of color, its mountains, and its vistas that in places allowed a person to see all the way to the Sea of Ghosts. It was his home, and no place would ever surpass it as far as he was concerned.
He sank to his knees and raised his face to the sky. Hircine wasn’t a god like Kyne or Arkay, to be worshipped and prayed to; but a display of reverence and an acknowledgement of the boon he’d been given by the Lord of the Hunt was something he felt right in doing.
“Thank you, my Lord,” he whispered. “Thank you for this hunt and the many to come. I harvest these souls, these pelts and these bounties for your glory and for the glory of the hunt.”
As he sat gazing out over the landscape below him a rabbit ran by, down the pass into the undergrowth below. Chip smiled. It was perfect timing. Perhaps that rabbit had been a sign. He felt at peace with himself, and his situation in life. He even felt a bit more relaxed about his relationship with his father now that he had a clearer picture of what the whispers, and veiled references, and sideways looks among all the adults had been about. He had no illusions about knowing the full story. On the other hand, they all had their own lives, just as he had his.
He rose to his feet and stretched. Yes, he had his own life. He would share it with them up to a point; after that point he would be circumspect and private. It was his right to do so. Keeping some things to himself in no way meant that he didn’t love his family. It just meant that he had his own path to follow.
“And many, many more animals to hunt,” he murmured aloud.
Just below him, the rabbit ran out of the tall grasses and up the steps of the cabin he’d seen on his way up the slope. He followed, watching the rabbit freeze on the steps until he was close enough to climb them himself. It then did what rabbits usually did, and bounded off the top step to find a new hiding spot.
Chip had been considering knocking at the door anyway. He’d never seen this cabin before, because he rarely climbed this high into this particular set of mountains. He was very curious as to who might live there. The rabbit, however, convinced him to do what he’d only considered doing before. He strolled up the path to the cabin and mounted the steps to the landing. There was a cooking pot there perched over a large stone vessel with glowing embers in it. It seemed an odd place to have one’s cooking area, especially given the abundance of wildlife that might be drawn to the smells of roasting meat. He knocked at the door and waited for a response.
“Yes? Come in!” a raspy male voice called from inside.
An elder. I’m surprised. This is a pretty isolated spot. The closest assistance in case he needed it is Ivarstead, and that’s a good long run down through bear country.
Once he pushed open the door and stepped inside he understood why the cooking area was not there. There was no space for it. It was a simple one-room cabin, built as tight as a drum against the cold and elements and with no openings above for smoke to exit. There were pelts and animal heads mounted on the walls, and a couple of rolled-up rugs stacked vertically against one wall, doubtless for use on winter nights to keep additional cold from getting in. The only furnishings were a tanning rack, a single bed, a large set of shelves and a small table.
An older man sat at the table, having a light meal. He looked up at Chip and spoke.
“Well look at this. Another city rat crawled outside the walls!”
Chip grinned. “Not me. I live in the open, away from the cities, just as you do. It must be difficult living up here by yourself. It’s a long walk to the nearest village.”
“I don’t suppose you’ve come up here to tell old Froki about your supposed divines,” the man sneered.
Oho. This man is a loner, just like me, tired of having people tell him what he should and shouldn’t believe in. It would seem we have something in common.
He chuckled. “No. Not me,” he said again. “I’m afraid I don’t believe in the Divines. I’m a simple hunter.”
“Good!” Froki exclaimed, a light twinkling in his eyes. “This is Skyrim. We should honor the old ways! These foreigners don’t even respect their own gods, much less Kyne and her sacred trials.”
Chip frowned, puzzled. “Huh. I’m afraid I’ve never heard of such a thing. Sacred trials? What’s that all about?”
“It’s an old Nord tradition. A test to prove your worth in the eyes of Kyne.”
Chip didn’t know much about most of the Divines; as he’d told Froki he had more or less pushed anything beyond basic knowledge of them away, vigorously, even when he’d been slightly curious. Part of that, undoubtedly, was that both his mother and father seemed to be devout unbelievers as far as he could tell.
“Kyne? Not Kynareth?”
Froki snorted. “No, I said Kyne and that’s what I meant. Kyne! Blessed Warrior-Wife. Shor’s widow, sacred to any true Nord hunter. She’s the mother of men and beasts, and her veil is the storm. If you call yourself a hunter you should take her tests. Show that you’re a hunter and not a simple butcher.”
Chip found himself becoming surprisingly irritated by the direction this conversation was taking. He was a hunter. He was Hircine’s own hunter, and he would not stand for being called a butcher. He was about to open is mouth to say something, but Froki continued.
“Kyne teaches us to respect the beasts and blesses the hunter who will face their champions. True Nord hunters are those who survive the Trials. Do you think you’re strong enough for Kyne’s blessing?”
Chip’s mind whirled. Of course I respect the beasts. They are my prey, just as I am theirs if my hunting skills are not good enough. Hircine would have it no other way. He lives for the hunt, and he rewards the victor, even if the hunt is turned upside-down. That’s what he told me in the cave where I skinned Sinding.
He tried hard not to smirk as he said “Yes. I do believe I am strong enough.”
Froki smiled. “I would be glad to pass this tradition down.”
“Very well,” Chip said. “I’ll take your tests. Tell me what I have to do.”
“You must defeat the guardian beasts blessed by Kyne,” the old man said. “I’ll anoint you with the symbol of the wolf, the crab, and the skeever. This will compel the guardian to appear when you reach his lair. It is up to you to discover those lairs and defeat the creatures; but if you have a map I’ll give you a general idea of where to go.”
“Here,” Chip said, passing his map to Froki with the slightest of grim smiles. Yes. I will take your tests. I will defeat these animals and hunt all others I encounter on the way. But I won’t do it for Kyne. I don’t know Kyne. If the old ways involve the hunt, I will hunt, but my reasons are my own.
The sky was darkening quickly when he stepped back out of Froki’s small shack and started downhill toward the roadway. The nearest of the areas he’d marked on Chip’s map was in Falkreath Hold, west of Helgen. The next nearest was north of that, out on the plains of Whiterun. Both were areas he was very familiar with, and he was eager to get started on this challenge. But it would not do for him to shape-shift when he was on his way.
This has to be done with the bow. I will hunt in the other form, but I will hunt humans then. This hunt is for beasts, and I will take them for Hircine, with my bow.
“So no transformations tonight, Ok?” he said to the night sky.
It was the deepest part of the night by the time Chip dropped down from the foothills onto Whiterun Hold’s western edges, thankfully still in his human form. He’d made excellent time down from the Jeralls and through the pass east of Helgen, hunting as he’d gone along. It almost seemed to him as though the bow he’d found granted him some kind of enhanced ability to sense game, above and beyond that he’d already developed over years of practice. Or maybe it was because he was a lycanthrope. It didn’t really matter. He’d first gone to the general area where he’d first met Hircine in the guise of the white stag. There was nothing unusual there, but he felt as though, if he went north toward the lake, he might well find the wolf he was looking for. As it happened, he nearly fell atop the Guardian Wolf when he scented a pack of his smaller brothers in a dugout cave just beneath him. He dropped down over the embankment, finding himself face to face with a much-larger-than-normal spectral wolf. He allowed himself no time to be surprised beyond the few heartbeats it took to draw his bow and shoot the creature; it dissolved into a pile of ectoplasm on the ground before him.
“I guess that must have been the right target, eh?” he said to the other wolves, who pointed their snouts to the skies and howled in reply. Chip ruffled each of them behind the ears and turned his attention north and westward, once more finding himself running along the lake, past Mammoth Manor and down onto the plains beyond.
And now he was adjusting his senses for a longer range than he needed in the dense forests. Here, he needed to listen not only for prey but for those things that would prey on him. In particular, saber cats were abundant in the plains west of Whiterun and just east of the Reach. They had a nasty habit of coming out of nowhere, and they were deadly. He also stopped every few minutes to taste the air. He might well scent a deer or a cat approaching; but he was even more concerned about the potential for vampires, out here in the dead of night. Chip didn’t know whether vampires could sense werewolves the way he could sense them; but more importantly, he didn’t know whether or not he could be turned by one if he had a random encounter.
Da, I could tell by your face and the sound of your voice that you enjoyed your time as a vampire. Or at least parts of it. No offense meant, but I’m not interested in following in your footsteps.
Not at all.
There were at least four deer in a group wandering along the road toward Rorikstead when Chip crossed the four-way intersection near Fort Sungard. He lobbed an arrow in the direction of the first, but the shot fell short of its mark, and he growled.
I guess my head’s getting a bit swelled by all the recent success. Best not get too big for my own armor; I still have a lot to learn about hunting before I’m anyone’s champion, much less Hircine’s.
He considered trying for the second deer in line; but when the first arrow clattered to the roadway the deer spooked and ran farther into the tall grass beside the road. Chip crept forward, slowly, and looked around until he re-located the third deer. This one was on the near side of the road, and had almost miraculously not run after his last shot. He moved forward a few more careful steps, out onto a boulder so as to have an unimpeded view of the beast, and took it down easily. The fourth deer moved nonchalantly up the road, not startled but inconveniently stepping out of sight behind another boulder.
OK, pay attention. Where’s the next Guardian?
It was truthfully a bit silly, he thought, that one of the supposed goddess’ guardian animals was a mudcrab. Just the name was silly. Only the idea of a guardian skeever was sillier. It wasn’t as though mudcrabs couldn’t be worthy adversaries for people who were not natural fighters or hunters. They had nasty pincers and were dogged opponents once they had a person in their sights, following quietly for great distances just to get in a single attack. But this was a goddess setting these trials.
Shouldn’t her guardian animals be something impressive? Wolves are everywhere, and I took that Guardian down with a single arrow.
He crossed a low pool and plucked a noisy Nirnroot from its banks as he went by. There were more pools in this area, as the terrain lowered; places where rainwater and snow melt collected and creeks meandered across the grasslands until meeting, to empty into the rivers and then leap noisily down from Whiterun toward the swamplands of Morthal. One of these pools would be a likely spot for a mudcrab guardian.
He pushed north, up over a low mound, and froze when he saw a flash of bluish-green light far ahead. It was a similar light to that the spirit animals emitted; or so he thought for a moment until realizing that he was witnessing a battle between groups that included a mage.
“Best steer clear of that,” he muttered to himself.
The sounds of a deer running by just behind him startled him a bit. He turned around to locate the target, but it was too dark to see it. Still, he squinted and stared into the night, employing all his senses to find his prey, slipping through the grass as quietly as he could. He crossed the road again, following the direction he thought the deer had gone, and then, just over the lip of a dirt embankment, he stopped dead in his tracks.
It was the Guardian Mudcrab. It appeared suddenly, out of thin air, the blue glow of its spectral essence casting light on a wide area around.
Chip had expected this creature to be larger than a normal mudcrab. He hadn’t expected it to be enormous. Or perhaps it only looked enormous because it glowed with the same spectral light as the wolf had, or Hircine himself had, for that matter. It took him aback, though, to see how huge it was. He shot; but whether because of his surprise or something else entirely, his shot fell short once again and the crab turned toward him, its pincers raised in an aggressive stance.
“Damn it,” he spat, fitting another arrow to his bow. The crab scuttled several paces forward. Chip loosed the arrow; it looked to be heading straight for the crab, but at the last moment the beast swerved to the side and the missile flew past. He growled. Before the crab could turn to face him again he fired another shot. This time his efforts paid off; the arrow struck home and the crab dissolved into a pile of glowing remains.
Chip sighed, and shook his head.
“That just won’t do. Three arrows? Why am I so bad tonight?” He gazed up at the moons, glowing brightly but only in a crescent on this very dark night. “Maybe I need the moons in order to be my best?” He wandered toward the Guardian Crab’s remains.
What he hadn’t anticipated – and should have – was that there were several other very large, very much living mudcrabs inhabiting the same shallow pool as Kyne’s guardian had been. Each and every one of them took great offense at his having disturbed them. For the next very long while Chip shared an intricate dance of hide and seek with them, trying to locate the movements of their very dark shells in the very dark grass mostly by sound and partially by scent. He took the largest of them out at last when it chattered in triumph at having gotten near to him; he whirled and buried an arrow in its face.
He sighed and turned on his lamp to search for his lost arrows and check the mudcrabs’ bodies for meat. It wouldn’t hurt to light his path for just a few moments, so long as he stayed in place after he turned it off again, until his vision adjusted to the dark. And he would do that, while he consumed the meat of these normal crabs he’d killed, for he next needed to make the trek all the way to Dawnstar.
“Kyne’s crabs,” he mumbled, snickering. “Well, I guess the joke was on me. They were a lot harder to defeat than I would have expected. I guess I’m not really good enough after all. Not yet, anyway. At least I’m heading into country where I’ll get plenty of practice.”
He had a drink of water and got his gear settled. Once more he started north, stopping beside Hircine’s shrine to rest for awhile before continuing his journey.
The crescent moons had sunk beneath the horizon and the sun had risen by the time he approached the place known as Robber’s Gorge. It was so called because of the fortified complex on an easily-defended prominence just beyond the bridge. Over the years various groups of bandits had come and gone in this place, building – among other things – an elevated walkway over the road. It allowed them easy bowshots and provided a convenient location for a rock fall trap directly over the road. Chip intended to go the long way around, wading through the stream directly just west of the complex rather than dealing with the threat on the far side of the bridge. He’d made it across the waterway and across open land to rejoin the road on the far side of the bandit camp when the sounds of shouting reached him.
He turned to look back at the hillside entrance to the camp and saw a battle beginning. A group coming south through the gap had been spotted by the bandits and were being attacked. To him it appeared as though the travelers were in trouble.
Chip’s temper flared.
One of the reasons he had always preferred being on his own was that he had a very short fuse. Rumor had it that his mother had been the same way in her younger days; and his father was still visibly short-tempered, although he controlled it well, mostly limiting his reactions to sharp, sarcastic retorts. Chip had always found it easier just to avoid people who made him angry. Unfortunately, a great many people did.
These bandits made him angry.
“Leave them alone!” he shouted. But the shrieks and clashing of battle drowned out any sounds his light human voice might make.
He roared. And suddenly, without consciously thinking about it, he found himself gritting elongating teeth against the brief but horrible pain of shifting to his wolf form, right there on the road. He shouted again; but this time it was the long, loud howl of the werewolf.
He ran forward, slashing with his claws at the nearest of the humans before him. It was a bandit, in low-quality leather armor that could not stand up to the mauling of his attack. The bandit fell to the roadway; but before the wolf could sate his hunger for human flesh two more moved across the gap to confront him. These were two women, one dressed only in light clothing. The wolf lolled its tongue at her in glee; but the part of them that was Chip said wait. No. This is just a merchant!
The wolf leaned forward and roared in utter fury at the two women. The one bearing a wicked-looking greatsword – either a guard or one of the bandits, he didn’t know – turned tail with a shriek and ran back toward the camp. The other cried out and ran away north, in terror. That was the point at which Chip lost any control over the situation.
The wolf chased the merchant north, maddened by the scent of her fear. He slashed at her once, twice, and on the third blow she slammed backward into a nearby boulder and stopped moving. The wolf fell on her corpse, greedily tearing it open and consuming everything he could, crunching bones and slurping blood.
More.
He ran back toward the bandit camp, both hearing and scenting that there were far too many adversaries there for him to defeat. He raised his muzzle to the skies and howled again; the dark-furred werewolf he had seen before shimmered into being beside him and howled a greeting, along with a golden wolf. Together they ran toward the humans. He heard his summoned pack members break away, toward the hill where the bandits’ walkway ended, and heard screams of pain and terror even as he eagerly consumed the corpses along his path toward the main camp.
More!
He rushed into the lower level of the camp, filled with small leather tents, and was greeted by a Nord bandit shouting some taunt or other. He laughed; but the laugh was a snarl that ended with the bandit falling dead to one powerful blow. This bandit, too, was consumed, as the golden wolf swept past them to leap for the throat of a heavily-armored foe at the top of a short flight of wooden steps.
But the wolf, the weakest of the pack, was shimmering out of existence as he reached the bandit. Chip tried to slash the man but found himself needing to leap over his werewolf companion, who had hurtled up the stairs to help. He kept going, even as he heard the sounds of battle behind him; for ahead of him was an Argonian frost mage who had his sights on Chip.
For just a moment the situation turned against the werewolves. The mage fired two ice spikes that landed solidly in his fur, and he howled in pain and rage. The heavily-armored warrior from below hadn’t gone down yet; and he rushed to help his comrade, swinging his short sword wildly and landing several glancing slashes that, while they weren’t lethal, were highly painful in combination with the agony of the Argonian’s ice spikes. Chip flailed at the mage, snapping and snarling, his heartbeat starting to speed up and pound in his ears as he closed in on the lizard-man. He heard a familiar roar behind him and glanced back to see his pack mate take down the swordsman just as his own claws finally ripped open the Argonian’s throat.
Feed!
The werewolf fed. He consumed the two dead bandits as quickly as he could, feeling his strength and health returning. Then he swiveled to his left, up toward the walkway, just as his summoned fellow werewolf dispatched the last two in line – one a man, and the other a Bosmer. They both went down without much of a fight; so easily, in fact, that the dark werewolf was flickering out of sight as Chip reached the two fresh corpses. Those, too, were consumed.
It was suddenly deathly quiet in the camp. The werewolf’s heart still pounded; his senses were on high alert. He ran through the camp, checking for uneaten corpses and finding none. Finally, as his breathing slowed and his equilibrium returned, he made his way back to the lone wooden cabin where the bandit chief had stayed, and stretched out on the bed therein to rest for a short while, until his human form returned.
Hircine has had many souls today.