Everwinus

I looked at the snarling werewolf that had appeared unexpectedly. Meusewin held a sword to his throat.

"How cute! He has very soft ears. Do you think his fur is suitable for making clothes?" he asked.

The werewolf growled all the louder and showed strong teeth. It probably wouldn't be fun to be bitten by him. But vampire fangs were not known for their 'gentleness' either.

"He would give a nice coat, but his ears won’t be enough”, Zarko confirmed. He had also drawn his weapon. A dagger with some blood stuck to its blade. The blood of another werewolf. The sweet, strong smell tickled my nose.

The weapons were stolen, of course. And not without shedding blood. The wolves fought back, but we needed weapons, food, and blood. I hated spilling blood. I had injured a wolf, but not fatally. Since wolves healed quickly, he should already be feeling better. But as far as this wolf was concerned...

"What do you want to do?" I asked, annoyed. I wanted to rest and not have to deal with that kind of shit. "I won't sew you a coat."

"You can't sew!" Zarko reminded me. "Agnes can sew."

"Funny!" My cousin rolled her eyes and knelt in front of the wolf, a small knife drawn. "Will he cause us trouble?"

The wolf watched us lurking.

So far, he had not moved and said nothing.

He had dark skin, just like the wolf I had to hurt earlier.

Meusewin thought this wolf was dead. The werewolf was unconscious from the loss of blood, and his heart was beating slowly because I had also stolen some blood from him. The wolf's heart had beaten too slowly and quietly for the ears of my friends. They were standing too far away. Only I knew that the wolf would survive.

Our leader insisted on leaving no witnesses behind.

We had argued about it the day before, and I struck. Zarko and Agnes stopped me, held me tight, and Meusewin took revenge for the black eye I had given him in my anger. He punched me in the stomach. I threw up.

And now another wolf was sitting in our camp.

Wonderful.

I knew that if I stood against them, against my best friend, they would kill me. Or I them. Depending on who won. I could do without that.

Normally, I agreed with them on many things. Murder was not one of them. They therefore considered me weak.

Meusewin had patted me proudly on the shoulder. He thought I had killed that one wolf. Would have finally found my 'strength'. If only he knew... And now I looked at the next doomed wolf.

A handsome wolf with fine muscles. He seemed strong. His strong teeth sparkled snow-white. "Who are you? What do you want here?" The weapons didn't scare him. His body trembled, but not out of fear. He wanted to take wolf form.

"Sweet," Meusewin repeated.

In my pocket was a narcotic that I had taken with me. It was on my cloth handkerchief. The only thing I had from my biological mother. I always carried it with me. I was already reaching for both.

I had to act before the wolf attacked.

I knew that the moment I saw the wolf.

So I pushed past Meusewin before he could stab the wolf, which was already transforming, and hastily pressed the handkerchief to the intruder's nose and mouth.

He blinked in surprise. The anesthetic with which I had quickly soaked the old handkerchief worked immediately. The werewolf's eyes rolled backwards, and he lost consciousness. His eerily cracking bones, bones that had begun to change, cracked again and returned to their human form.

I had stopped the transformation. "Problem solved!" I grumbled and tried to look bored. I'd rather give Meusewin another black eye. "Are we going to leave him and move on?"

"What?" Meusewin now held the sword to my throat. "Why should we? Leaving it?"

"Someone surely misses him. We can't leave too many corpses behind!" I said as calmly as I could. My voice trembled a little.

"Know your place!" Meusewin grabbed my hair and pulled me close to him. "No witnesses!"

"He's unconscious." I tore myself away from him and clenched my hands into fists so as not to strangle him, hit him, or anything else. "I know my place! This wolf will not know where we have disappeared to."

"Everwinus?" Meusewin grimaced. "Calm down. It's just a wolf."

I forced myself to stay calm. I was not allowed to strike, even if the anger in me demanded violence and blood. Meusewin, you idiot! I didn't want to die in a stupid fight against him or have the blood of my friends on my hands. I wanted a better life. What else did I do all this for? The overall situation was already bad enough. "Then we'll take him with us! We need blood. He has plenty of it," I forced myself to say. "As long as we hold back, steal only a little, we will be fine for a long time. Until we have reached our goal!"

And then?

This plan had gaps, but I couldn't think of anything better.

"He's right." Zarko put his dagger back behind his belt. "We need blood. Even if we drink too little, as long as we drink blood, we do not starve to death immediately. And we are making faster progress."

"But we remain hungry. I say, let's kill the little wolf! I want a coat." Agnes snorted. "Everwinus? Couldn't you have stunned him after he transformed? Now there is too little fur on him!"

"Agnes?" Meusewin laughed.

"What?" My cousin pulled on one of the wolf ears of our 'hostage'? Our 'victim’?

Meusewin folded his arms. "I agree with you, a dead wolf can't talk, but unfortunately, our coward stopped the transformation. He won't become a coat." He was still laughing. "And Everwinus is unfortunately right. We can use a snack on the go. We have almost starved to death once! There were several days between this village and the last town. Several days without blood. And animal blood doesn't keep us strong for long."

And here we had the next reason for the bloodshed in the last village.

We had been starving. And I, forcing myself to hold back, was still hungry. Thirsty. And this thirst didn't exactly help to keep my anger under control. Instead of my friends, I hit the stone on which the unconscious wolf was now leaning. "We need him! We can anesthetize him!"

"You want to keep him unconscious?" Meusewin raised his eyebrows. "Then we have to carry him with us! We already have our goods to haul around."

"We stole a cart..." Agnes pointed to the wheelbarrow, which we had hidden under branches.

"No wolf fits in there. Not additionally!" Zarko frowned, pushed the branches aside, and put his stolen goods next to the things that were already in the cart. It fits a lot on the wing. But not if we wanted to transport a werewolf with it.

"Stunned. Not unconscious," I explained. "I took some dried herbs with me. They are not useful for drugs, but they are used as narcotics. The wolf is dazed. We mix it with his food. He won't be able to defend himself against us."

"But we have to feed him!" Meusewin spat on the floor. Right in front of me and the wolf, whose skin was darker than Meusewin's. His white-gray ears twitched slightly, but he didn't wake up.

"We tie him up. We give him just enough food so that he doesn't starve. Hunger and the herbs keep him weakened, but he will be able to walk on his own." I held the cloth in front of the wolf's nose and mouth again. Carefully so that he could breathe. He couldn’t wake up. Not now.

"Sure... Zarko? Tie the wolf to the cart with the rope," Meuswin ordered, and I forced myself to hide my relief.

The wolf would live.

For the time being.

"We kill the wolf as soon as we no longer need him," Meusewin continued. Of course, he wanted to kill this innocent man.

This wolf with his soft facial features and defined, fine muscles. He was not too muscular; his stature was slender, but not delicate. A stranger. I shouldn't care about his life. But I did. Somehow I would save him...

As long as I could keep my hunger under control, and he wouldn't end up my next, filling meal. By mistake. I kicked at the stone again.

"Dude, calm down!" murmured Meusewin. "You got your way. Where is my thanks?"

Zarko tied up the wolf while I stared at my best friend. "Shouldn't you thank ME? My plan will save our lives."

Meusewin only nodded.

For the time being, the wolf was safe.

Not from our teeth, but from our blades.

I had to think of the woman and the old man from the pharmacy.

I had argued with my friends shortly after we had left the border far behind us. It had never been the plan to just anesthetize the woman. Of course not. None of us had worn masks.

I had just been stupid enough to believe the 'wrong' plan.

My friends, great friends they were, had lied to me because they didn't want me to 'whine around' before we acted. Their words. Not mine. Sometimes I wondered why they hadn't killed me long ago if I was so much of a burden to them.

Why did I stay with them?

Meusewin and Zarko won the brawl to which this revelation had led. Of course, I had been angry. And now there was this wolf...