The Journey, Book 3: Chapter 15 - Previous Chapter
Chapter 16, Fear
Matthious did not summon his army.
That omission curdled the air of the tower.
The undgrol lay far below, unbound and unmoving, their obedience absolute. They did not need chains; Matthious had made them, and creation itself was their command. They continued to make crude weapons and armour, their hunger for blood misting upward through cracks in the stone. The blood book lay open upon its lectern, pages slick and distended, veins crawling across the parchment as though it wished to be read, used, fed. Shadows thickened as the wraith-council gathered—forms half-remembered, half-regret, their voices like breath dragged over broken glass.
Do not go alone.
Prey that hides among cities hunts back.
Your blood is not yours alone.
That last whisper struck deeper than the rest.
Matthious reacted without thought. A convulsion of will ripped through the chamber, and blood answered blood. A crimson lash tore through the air, unravelling three wraiths mid-warning. Their screams collapsed into static murmurs before vanishing entirely.
“Silence,” Matthious commanded. His voice rang with certainty that bordered on mania. “You advise a god. Remember your place.”
The surviving wraiths recoiled, bowing, whispering fearfully among themselves.
Matthious turned inward.
The dire-wolf blood surged at the center of him, hot and defiant. It did not behave like mere power. It resisted. It pushed back.
Convel.
The name was never spoken aloud, but it echoed in his marrow all the same.
The dire-wolf whose blood he had taken had not dissolved into fuel as it should have. Matthious had learned that too late. Convel’s soul had clung to the blood, binding itself to flesh that was not its own, refusing annihilation. It prowled inside him now—teeth bared, will intact, hatred pure.
You are not my god.
The thought slammed into Matthious’s mind like a skull against stone.
He bared his teeth in a smile that was almost feral. “You are meat that forgot how to die,” he whispered to the thing inside him. “I am divinity.”
Convel answered not with words, but with pressure—tightening around Matthious’s heart, clouding his senses, blunting instinct at moments it should have sharpened.
Matthious cut his palm open to the bone and pressed it to the floor, grinding blood into ancient sigils. When the magic hesitated, he carved new runes with his fingernails, hissing in pain and rage.
“Show me,” he commanded. “Obey.”
The blood slithered outward… and stopped.
It trembled, confused, threads curling back on themselves like a wounded thing.
Convel had sunk its claws into the spell.
Matthious felt it then—deliberate obstruction. The wolf did not hide the were-cats. It refused to hunt them.
A roar tore out of Matthious, cracking stone. He slammed his fist into the floor again and again until blood splashed the sigils into useless smears.
“I am THE god,” he screamed. “I decide what is seen.”
Convel endured.
The shadows folded, grinding reality thin, and Matthious forced the transition anyway.
He emerged on a village road slick with rot and rain. The smells of livestock, old blood, and human fear tangled thickly in the air. Lanterns flickered as doors slammed shut.
The first man he caught tried to run.
Matthious pinned him down with blood hardened into hooks, driving them carefully through muscle while sparing bone. He leaned close, breath shaking, eyes fever-bright.
“Tell me,” he murmured, voice trembling with barely contained violence. “Where do the cats hide when they remember how to walk upright?”
The man sobbed, denied, prayed. Matthious flayed his arm in one clean pull, wrapping the skin around his own wrist like a devotional ribbon.
“Your flesh will confess,” Matthious said.
It did not.
The blood gave him crops, superstitions, children’s rhymes. Nothing else.
Matthious killed the man anyway.
He moved through the village like a heresy made manifest.
A woman was nailed to her doorway and questioned until her throat collapsed. A teenager’s shadow was torn loose and interrogated while his body screamed without comprehension. An elder’s memories were siphoned from his skull and poured into the blood book, which drank greedily—and learned nothing.
Inside him, Convel watched. Silent. Defiant.
The wraiths gathered their courage and whispered again.
This is obstruction.
The wolf denies you.
Your divinity is contested.
Matthious seized one wraith and crushed it in his fist, smearing its dissolving essence across his face like sacrament.
“There is no contest,” he snarled. “I am worship and truth made flesh.”
The city fared no better.
People vanished into alleys and cellars. Matthious questioned them with needles grown from his veins, with sigils carved slowly so pain could not outrun comprehension. Those who had never heard of were-cats were punished for ignorance. Those who lied were punished for daring to imagine themselves clever.
Still, the blood refused him.
Only impressions surfaced—scratched tiles, disturbed refuse, rooftops warmed recently by bodies no longer present. The were-cats flowed around his search, not fleeing him, but anticipating him.
Convel tightened its grip.
The dire-wolf did not protect the were-cats out of kinship or mercy. It did so out of spite.
Matthious staggered as fury and divine certainty tore at each other inside his ribs. He carved the word RUN into his own chest, not as a warning—but as a promise.
“Hide behind the wolf,” he whispered hoarsely to the empty streets. “It will not save you forever.”
Dawn found the city broken and Matthious shaking, blood steaming in the cold air.
Matthious did not stop hunting.
Failure did not end his obsessions; it merely warped them.
When blood, terror, and divinity yielded nothing, he turned—retching inward—toward something worse.
Subtlety.
The decision made his skin crawl. Convel stirred at the thought, not in triumph, but in wary curiosity. The wolf knew this shape of danger.
Matthious drew his cloak tight around his body, as though cloth alone might smother what he was. He pulled the hood low, shadowing his eyes, and walked—not stalked, not emerged—down a city street.
Each step felt obscene.
The tavern door creaked as he pushed it open. Warmth, noise, the stink of ale and sweat and old wood rushed over him. Laughter struck his ears like blows. For a breathless moment, his fingers flexed, itching to turn the room into meat and silence.
No, he commanded himself. Observe.
A bold woman stood behind the bar, sleeves rolled, eyes sharp with the practiced confidence of someone who had thrown men out by the collar.
“What’ll it be, sir?” she asked.
The word sir hit him harder than any spell.
Matthious swallowed. His throat convulsed. Manners—dead, buried, unneeded for centuries—scraped their way back up through him like broken bones knitting incorrectly.
“F-food,” he managed, voice thin and unfamiliar. His fingers twitched at his sides, blood eager to leap. “A-and a-ale… p-please.”
The word please nearly broke him.
Bile surged up his throat. He forced it down with sheer will, nails biting into his palms beneath the cloak. Convel pressed close inside him, a low, unreadable presence, as though listening.
The landlady blinked, studying him. For a terrible second, Matthious was certain she could see—the corpses, the rituals, the godhood clawing at his skin.
Instead, she shrugged.
“Take a seat. I’ll bring it to ye.”
Matthious nodded stiffly, head dipping in a gesture that once would have been called polite. He moved to a corner table, every instinct screaming at him for placing his back to the room.
He sat.
The chair creaked. The sound felt like mockery.
Around him, people talked. Traders complained. A couple argued in low voices. Somewhere, someone laughed too loudly. Matthious listened—not with blood or magic—but with ears.
It was revolting.
And useful.
Stories flowed where screams had failed. Whispers of a quick shadow. A dockside thief no one could corner. A cat that vanished when chased, leaving claw-marks too high for any animal.
Nothing certain.
Enough to continue.
Matthious’s hands shook as the ale was set before him. He did not drink. He watched the surface ripple, reflecting a man he barely recognised.
“I am still hunting,” he told the wolf inside him, silently, viciously.
Convel did not answer.
For the first time, Matthious understood why predators sometimes waited in plain sight.
The tavern noise settled into a rhythm.
Matthious listened.
It disgusted him how effective it was.
Loose tongues traded more truth than flayed flesh ever had. Names surfaced, then were dismissed. A dockhand who moved too fast. A thief who vanished up walls. A sailor who swore he’d seen eyes gleam wrong in lantern-light. Every rumor frayed into uncertainty—but the pattern pleased him. That realisation made his stomach twist harder than any spell backlash.
For a fleeting, traitorous moment, Matthious almost smiled.
The thought horrified him.
His fingers closed around the mug without conscious command. The weight was mundane, insulting. He lifted it, meaning only to move it aside—but habit, older than his ascension, betrayed him. He took a sip.
Ale flooded his mouth.
Warm. Bitter. Alive.
His body reacted before his will could intervene. Matthious lurched forward and spat violently onto the tavern floor, the sound sharp and wet, cutting through conversation like a blade.
Silence rippled outward.
“What in the—” someone muttered.
Matthious wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, chest heaving. Rage and revulsion warred inside him—not at the ale, but at himself. At the weakness that had allowed such a thing. At the reminder that his flesh still remembered being mortal.
“I do not consume,” he whispered to Convel, venomous. “I command.”
The wolf stirred, amused in a way Matthious refused to name.
The tavern’s noise resumed, cautiously. Laughter returned, thinner than before. The landlady shot him a hard look, then turned away. To them, he was merely another strange man with poor manners and worse taste.
Invisible.
Useful.
He forced himself to remain seated, to listen, to endure. More fragments emerged—coastal routes avoided at night, rooftops preferred over alleys, a shared instinct to scatter when the air felt wrong.
Still, no names. No dens. No certainty.
The were-cats continued to evade him.
What Matthious did not know was that he was being watched, right there in front of his face and he was oblivious.
The throne room of Caa Alora was calm, almost deceptively so, until the doors slammed open with a force that rattled the guards. Tunstall barrelled in, massive, fur bristling, purple eyes flashing with anger and hatred. His growl rolled through the hall, a deep, primal warning that froze everyone in place.
“That bastard Matthious killed my father… drank his blood!” Tunstall’s voice rumbled, shaking the stone floor. He pushed past the guards, ignoring their protests, his claws scraping the polished tiles. “Just like he did to Vivi… Tivor… but why?”
Queen Gabija rose from her throne, her composure taut as a drawn bow. She had felt the ripple of unrest first as whispers in the psychic network of were-cats, a trail of urgent thoughts spreading across the land: Matthious is here. Those whispers had reached her long before Tunstall arrived, giving her the forewarning of danger—but nothing could have prepared her for the raw presence of grief and fury that now filled the room.
“He does not kill without reason,” Gabija said, her voice steady but edged with steel. “He drinks the blood to gain power—ancient, unnatural power. And he grows stronger with every life he touches. Your father… your rage… it is proof of how far he has gone.”
Tunstall’s tail lashed, his growl vibrating through the hall. “Proof? Proof doesn’t bring him back!” He lunged forward slightly, forced back only by the sheer mass of the guards. “That monster! He has no right—no right—to take what is ours!”
Gabija’s gaze hardened. “We must not act in blind anger. If you strike without planning, Matthious will be ready. But you… your presence here, your warning, gives us a chance.” She gestured subtly toward the guards, signalling them to stand down from immediate confrontation. “The were-cats have spread word of his movements across the land. The network is awake. And now, we can plan.”
Tunstall’s growl softened into a low rumble, his ears flicking toward the corners of the room as if listening for the distant pulse of that network. His purple eyes never left Gabija’s. “Then we plan fast,” he said, every word vibrating with tension. “Because he is not waiting, and neither will I.”
The throne room softened in tone for a moment, the firelight flickering across Tunstall’s massive form and Snowy’s tiny, delicate frame. She nestled into Gabija’s lap like a shadow of warmth, her fur shimmering white in the torchlight. One amber eye fixed on the dire-wolf, assessing, judging, yet gentle.
“You’ve right to be angry, wolf,” she purred, her voice a soft melody that seemed to vibrate with calm itself, “but your anger here… is at the wrong person. Calm your nerves.”
Tunstall’s nose twitched, a low, rumbling growl escaping his maw, the vibration rolling across the floor like distant thunder. His purple eyes narrowed at the small furball, who dared offer counsel to a creature of his size and wrath. Always the little furballs with interfering advice… he seemed to think, muscles tensing even as his tail flicked once in irritation.
Gabija’s fingers absently stroked Snowy’s fur, her gaze shifting between the two extremes before her—the raw fury of Tunstall and the serene insistence of Snowy. “He is grieving, little one,” she said softly, her tone even, commanding yet compassionate. “And yet, the wolf is right to come. Matthious has taken too much, and now we must act.”
Snowy’s purr deepened, eyes still fixed on Tunstall. “Then let that fire sharpen your focus, not blind it,” she murmured. “We do not strike recklessly. But the storm you feel… it is justified. Let it guide you, not consume you.”
Tunstall’s growl softened into a low rumble, his massive chest rising and falling as he considered her words. The tension lingered like a coiled spring, but something in the little white were-cat’s voice—the quiet, measured cadence—seemed to anchor him just enough. His ears twitched, but the tail that had lashed moments ago now shifted to a slow, contemplative sway.
Gabija watched the exchange carefully, aware that both creatures brought strengths she would need.
The tavern seemed to shrink around him.
Matthious stood fully now, the hood fallen back, firelight crawling across the hard planes of his face. His green‑grey eyes burned with a sharp, predatory intelligence—anger sharpened into focus. The low murmur of conversation died instantly. Tankards froze halfway to lips. Breath itself felt too loud.
“I want to know where the cats that walk on two legs are hiding,” he said, each word pressed flat and cold. “And you are going to tell me.”
No one moved. Fear thickened the air, sour and metallic.
Then a man bolted for the door.
Matthious didn’t even look at him. He snapped his fingers once.
The sound that followed was wrong—wet, brittle, final. The man screamed as his ankles collapsed inward with a sickening crunch, bones folding like kindling beneath a boot. He hit the floor hard, howling, dragging useless legs behind him.
Matthious turned slowly, deliberately, letting them see what patience looked like when it had run out.
He began to speak in the ancient language.
The words were not loud, but they bit. Symbols flared briefly along the walls, crawling like luminous scars through wood and stone. Doors slammed shut as if struck by invisible hands. Windows sealed over with a shimmer, glass clouding, frames locking tight. Even the chimney groaned, a sigil snapping into place as smoke curled back into the room.
The tavern was now a box.
A hunting ground.
Matthious inhaled deeply, nostrils flaring. “You can smell them,” he said softly, almost conversationally. “I know you can. They’ve been here. Watching. Listening. Whispering.”
His gaze swept the room, lingering too long on each face. A few people sobbed quietly. Others stared at the floor, praying invisibility might be enough.
“Tell me what I want to know,” he continued, voice dropping to a silken threat, “and some of you might make it out alive.”
He smiled then—thin, humourless, sharp.
“Might.”
The fire cracked loudly, sending sparks snapping up the chimney that would not open. Outside, the night went on as if nothing had changed. Inside, the tavern held its breath, and Matthious waited, perfectly still, certain that fear would do the rest.
He grabbed one of the wenches by the throat and lifted her off the ground. She kicked and clawed, eyes wide with panic.
“Well?” he snarled.
She shook her head, pleading, but it did nothing to slow him. Slowly, almost casually, Matthious’ thumbnail lengthened unnaturally, sharp and wicked. In one swift motion, it drove through her chin and pierced upward. A sickening squelch echoed through the room as life left her. He retracted the nail, letting it snap back to normal, and dropped her to the floor. “She’s useless,” he muttered, moving on.
His gaze swept the room with feral delight. “Who's next?”
A miner in the corner tried to shrink away, hands raised in fear. Matthious didn’t hesitate—he seized the man’s head between his hands, and the room froze as a crushing sound broke the silence. The miner crumpled instantly, leaving nothing but the echo of his final scream behind.
The surviving patrons stared, frozen in terror. Breathing was shallow, hope evaporated. Matthious walked among them with a predator’s calm, revelling in the fear he inspired.
“Some of you might survive,” he said, voice soft but deadly. “If you tell me what I want to know. If not…” His smile widened, green-grey eyes glinting like knives. “Then you won’t matter at all.”
The fire crackled, shadows stretching across the walls, but no one dared move. Matthious’ presence alone turned the tavern into a cage
Matthious strode past the hearth. The cat—an orange-tabby, curled up in the warmth of the fire—didn’t move at first. Matthious muttered “akvo”, and a shimmering green-grey orb of water shot from his hand, splashing the fire out in a hiss of steam. Some of the water splashed onto the cat, and it leapt up, arching its back and hissing, shaking droplets from its fur.
Matthious rolled his eyes, turning to move on to another terrified patron. Then he paused, noticing the small animal staring up at him with cautious amber eyes. “Miaow?”
He shook his head and moved on.
The landlady stepped forward, trying to intervene. “You think I’m going to give you answers? You can fuck off!” she declared boldly.
Matthious’ green-grey eyes gleamed with dark amusement. He picked up a mug from a nearby table, and without hesitation, rammed it straight into her face. The sound was sickeningly final. She crumpled instantly.
He stepped back, surveying the room with a twisted grin. “What a bitch,” he cackled, the words echoing like a knife through the terrified silence.
Matthious snapped his fingers. The next wench suddenly floated in the air, moving toward him as if drawn by invisible strings.
“Oooh, sassy!” he retorted, grinning. “My type too. We’d have had so much fun when I was younger.”
She had brown eyes, long black hair, tanned skin, and a tidy appearance that only made her defiance sharper.
“Where… can I find the were-cats?” he demanded.
The wench spat in his face.
Matthious’ grin widened, and with a casual motion of his hands, he flipped her upside down, suspending her near the ceiling. For a moment, she dangled helplessly, the room watching in horrified silence.
A thin, deep cut appeared across her neck at Matthious’ command. He leaned back in a chair, resting his feet on the table below her, tilting his head back as if savoring it. The tavern fell utterly silent, save for the subtle drip that marked the moment.
Patrons gasped, shivering with revulsion.
Matthious laughed then, loud and manic, leaning back in his chair. “My kind of drink,” he said, mockingly cheerful. “Don’t knock it until you try it.” His eyes glimmered with sadistic delight, green-grey sparks catching the light as the sound of his laughter reverberated through the terrified tavern.
No one moved. No one dared. Matthious was in full control, his cruelty a performance, a terrifying display of power—and everyone knew, in that moment, how truly hopeless resistance would be.
Matthious leaned back in his chair, still smirking, but there was a subtle shift in his posture, a tightening around his eyes. He had been patient, yes, but the trail of these creatures—the cats who could walk on two legs—was slipping through his grasp, and his frustration began to bubble.
“Stop hiding!” he snarled suddenly, his voice cutting through the terrified whispers like a blade. “You all know something! Names, places, movements—I will have them!”
A few patrons whimpered, cowering in corners. One old man tried to murmur something, perhaps a lie or a plea, but Matthious’ attention snapped onto him. A sharp gesture, and the man’s chair flew apart beneath him. He fell to the floor, stunned and terrified, and Matthious crouched low, leaning in.
“Useless,” he spat. “None of you are useful! None of you know anything. And yet…” He let the words trail, green-grey eyes flicking around the room like a predator assessing prey. “The cats are here. Watching. Listening. I can feel it. You are holding back. And I… I hate being denied.”
Panic spread like wildfire. Patrons whispered, some shaking uncontrollably. Matthious clapped his hands, laughter bubbling from him, uneven and manic.
“Enough hiding!” he roared. “Someone will tell me!”
The small orange-tabby by the hearth, previously ignored, lifted its head to watch him, tail curling uncertainly. Matthious’ eyes locked onto it, narrowing. “Ah, you,” he muttered, standing and stalking across the room. Every step was deliberate, a predator closing the distance, teeth glinting faintly in the firelight.
He reached down and scooped up the cat effortlessly. Its claws flexed, its small body tense, but Matthious didn’t care. He raised the creature to his mouth and bit sharply into its neck, drinking. For a heartbeat, the room seemed to stop—then, a subtle shimmer ran across the cat’s fur, the eyes flashing amber with intelligence that no normal feline should possess.
It wasn’t just a cat. It had never been.
Matthious froze for a moment, the realisation dawning too late. The small body squirmed fiercely in his grasp, and those amber eyes glinted with recognition and defiance. A primal, alien intelligence radiated from it.
The patrons gasped, frozen in horror, while Matthious’ grin faltered, just slightly, as a spark of danger reached him too late. The orange-tabby had been a were-cat all along—and for the first time that night, the hunter had truly bitten into something that could fight back.
The orange-tabby squirmed violently in Matthious’ grasp. Then, with impossible speed, it raked its claws down his face, leaving long, curved gouges. The green-grey aura of his anger flared, and he recoiled, momentarily startled.
A wide, manic grin split his face. “Now I will have scars to match the arsehole King Thomaz!” he cackled, laughter echoing off the walls.
He looked down at the cat, eyes blazing. “Tell me your name! I want to know whose blood I’m drinking!”
There was no answer. Only defiance in those amber eyes.
Matthious snarled, snapping the small creature’s neck with a cruel motion. He finished drinking, feeling the surge of dark power pulse through him. His green-grey aura flared outward briefly, lighting the tavern with an eerie, sickly glow before vanishing. The cat’s body hit the floor, lifeless, but Matthious’ grin never wavered.
He turned slowly, surveying the remaining patrons. Fear froze them where they stood. Matthious moved with playful, deliberate exaggeration, snapping his fingers at each terrified figure. Instantly, one by one, they collapsed, gone before they even realised it had happened.
The tavern had become a tomb. Silence hung in the air for a heartbeat—then Matthious skipped to the door, mockery in every movement.
He paused, turning back to the ruined room. “Fajro,” he muttered.
A stream of green-grey fire erupted from his hand, licking across the walls and ceiling, setting the tavern ablaze. Flames hissed against wood, smoke curling thick and black. The heat surged, the fire roaring like a living thing.
And then, as suddenly as he had arrived, Matthious disappeared, leaving behind nothing but smoke, scorched stone, and the lingering terror of what had just unfolded.
The throne room doors burst open. A tortoiseshell were-cat stumbled in, breath ragged, tears streaking his fur.
Snowy lifted her head, amber eyes widening. Gabija’s gaze followed the rushing figure from her throne, sharp and assessing. Even Tunstall, massive and stoic, turned his head slightly, giving the feline a sidelong glare that conveyed both caution and curiosity.
“Tabby… is gone,” the were-cat sobbed, voice breaking. “The Corruptor… he got her…”
Snowy’s purr turned to a wail, grief spilling out uncontrollably. Her claws extended, digging into the elf queen’s legs as she leaned into the pain, trembling. Gabija’s eyes softened slightly, but her posture remained commanding.
The tortoiseshell continued, voice trembling with horror. “He… he killed all the patrons in the tavern… tortured most of them… and then—he used the ancient language… he set the fire… no one can put it out…”
A hush fell over the throne room, the weight of the news pressing down like a physical force. Even Tunstall’s growl, low and rumbling in his chest, seemed to vibrate with restrained fury.
Gabija’s fingers flexed lightly around the arm of her throne. She turned to one of her guards, her voice sharp and precise. “Send Jortle to assist in putting the fire out, as quickly as possible. If the flames spread, many more lives will be lost.”
The guard bowed and bolted from the room, urgency in every step, disappearing into the corridors to find Jortle and relay the message from his queen.
Snowy’s claws retracted slowly as she composed herself, though tears still glistened on her fur. Tunstall’s purple eyes narrowed, jaw tight, muscles coiled like springs. The room felt charged—grief, rage, and the flickering urgency of a threat that could no longer be ignored.
Gabija straightened, her voice carrying authority over the murmurs. “We cannot let him continue.”
Chapter 16, Fear
Matthious did not summon his army.
That omission curdled the air of the tower.
The undgrol lay far below, unbound and unmoving, their obedience absolute. They did not need chains; Matthious had made them, and creation itself was their command. They continued to make crude weapons and armour, their hunger for blood misting upward through cracks in the stone. The blood book lay open upon its lectern, pages slick and distended, veins crawling across the parchment as though it wished to be read, used, fed. Shadows thickened as the wraith-council gathered—forms half-remembered, half-regret, their voices like breath dragged over broken glass.
Do not go alone.
Prey that hides among cities hunts back.
Your blood is not yours alone.
That last whisper struck deeper than the rest.
Matthious reacted without thought. A convulsion of will ripped through the chamber, and blood answered blood. A crimson lash tore through the air, unravelling three wraiths mid-warning. Their screams collapsed into static murmurs before vanishing entirely.
“Silence,” Matthious commanded. His voice rang with certainty that bordered on mania. “You advise a god. Remember your place.”
The surviving wraiths recoiled, bowing, whispering fearfully among themselves.
Matthious turned inward.
The dire-wolf blood surged at the center of him, hot and defiant. It did not behave like mere power. It resisted. It pushed back.
Convel.
The name was never spoken aloud, but it echoed in his marrow all the same.
The dire-wolf whose blood he had taken had not dissolved into fuel as it should have. Matthious had learned that too late. Convel’s soul had clung to the blood, binding itself to flesh that was not its own, refusing annihilation. It prowled inside him now—teeth bared, will intact, hatred pure.
You are not my god.
The thought slammed into Matthious’s mind like a skull against stone.
He bared his teeth in a smile that was almost feral. “You are meat that forgot how to die,” he whispered to the thing inside him. “I am divinity.”
Convel answered not with words, but with pressure—tightening around Matthious’s heart, clouding his senses, blunting instinct at moments it should have sharpened.
Matthious cut his palm open to the bone and pressed it to the floor, grinding blood into ancient sigils. When the magic hesitated, he carved new runes with his fingernails, hissing in pain and rage.
“Show me,” he commanded. “Obey.”
The blood slithered outward… and stopped.
It trembled, confused, threads curling back on themselves like a wounded thing.
Convel had sunk its claws into the spell.
Matthious felt it then—deliberate obstruction. The wolf did not hide the were-cats. It refused to hunt them.
A roar tore out of Matthious, cracking stone. He slammed his fist into the floor again and again until blood splashed the sigils into useless smears.
“I am THE god,” he screamed. “I decide what is seen.”
Convel endured.
The shadows folded, grinding reality thin, and Matthious forced the transition anyway.
He emerged on a village road slick with rot and rain. The smells of livestock, old blood, and human fear tangled thickly in the air. Lanterns flickered as doors slammed shut.
The first man he caught tried to run.
Matthious pinned him down with blood hardened into hooks, driving them carefully through muscle while sparing bone. He leaned close, breath shaking, eyes fever-bright.
“Tell me,” he murmured, voice trembling with barely contained violence. “Where do the cats hide when they remember how to walk upright?”
The man sobbed, denied, prayed. Matthious flayed his arm in one clean pull, wrapping the skin around his own wrist like a devotional ribbon.
“Your flesh will confess,” Matthious said.
It did not.
The blood gave him crops, superstitions, children’s rhymes. Nothing else.
Matthious killed the man anyway.
He moved through the village like a heresy made manifest.
A woman was nailed to her doorway and questioned until her throat collapsed. A teenager’s shadow was torn loose and interrogated while his body screamed without comprehension. An elder’s memories were siphoned from his skull and poured into the blood book, which drank greedily—and learned nothing.
Inside him, Convel watched. Silent. Defiant.
The wraiths gathered their courage and whispered again.
This is obstruction.
The wolf denies you.
Your divinity is contested.
Matthious seized one wraith and crushed it in his fist, smearing its dissolving essence across his face like sacrament.
“There is no contest,” he snarled. “I am worship and truth made flesh.”
The city fared no better.
People vanished into alleys and cellars. Matthious questioned them with needles grown from his veins, with sigils carved slowly so pain could not outrun comprehension. Those who had never heard of were-cats were punished for ignorance. Those who lied were punished for daring to imagine themselves clever.
Still, the blood refused him.
Only impressions surfaced—scratched tiles, disturbed refuse, rooftops warmed recently by bodies no longer present. The were-cats flowed around his search, not fleeing him, but anticipating him.
Convel tightened its grip.
The dire-wolf did not protect the were-cats out of kinship or mercy. It did so out of spite.
Matthious staggered as fury and divine certainty tore at each other inside his ribs. He carved the word RUN into his own chest, not as a warning—but as a promise.
“Hide behind the wolf,” he whispered hoarsely to the empty streets. “It will not save you forever.”
Dawn found the city broken and Matthious shaking, blood steaming in the cold air.
Matthious did not stop hunting.
Failure did not end his obsessions; it merely warped them.
When blood, terror, and divinity yielded nothing, he turned—retching inward—toward something worse.
Subtlety.
The decision made his skin crawl. Convel stirred at the thought, not in triumph, but in wary curiosity. The wolf knew this shape of danger.
Matthious drew his cloak tight around his body, as though cloth alone might smother what he was. He pulled the hood low, shadowing his eyes, and walked—not stalked, not emerged—down a city street.
Each step felt obscene.
The tavern door creaked as he pushed it open. Warmth, noise, the stink of ale and sweat and old wood rushed over him. Laughter struck his ears like blows. For a breathless moment, his fingers flexed, itching to turn the room into meat and silence.
No, he commanded himself. Observe.
A bold woman stood behind the bar, sleeves rolled, eyes sharp with the practiced confidence of someone who had thrown men out by the collar.
“What’ll it be, sir?” she asked.
The word sir hit him harder than any spell.
Matthious swallowed. His throat convulsed. Manners—dead, buried, unneeded for centuries—scraped their way back up through him like broken bones knitting incorrectly.
“F-food,” he managed, voice thin and unfamiliar. His fingers twitched at his sides, blood eager to leap. “A-and a-ale… p-please.”
The word please nearly broke him.
Bile surged up his throat. He forced it down with sheer will, nails biting into his palms beneath the cloak. Convel pressed close inside him, a low, unreadable presence, as though listening.
The landlady blinked, studying him. For a terrible second, Matthious was certain she could see—the corpses, the rituals, the godhood clawing at his skin.
Instead, she shrugged.
“Take a seat. I’ll bring it to ye.”
Matthious nodded stiffly, head dipping in a gesture that once would have been called polite. He moved to a corner table, every instinct screaming at him for placing his back to the room.
He sat.
The chair creaked. The sound felt like mockery.
Around him, people talked. Traders complained. A couple argued in low voices. Somewhere, someone laughed too loudly. Matthious listened—not with blood or magic—but with ears.
It was revolting.
And useful.
Stories flowed where screams had failed. Whispers of a quick shadow. A dockside thief no one could corner. A cat that vanished when chased, leaving claw-marks too high for any animal.
Nothing certain.
Enough to continue.
Matthious’s hands shook as the ale was set before him. He did not drink. He watched the surface ripple, reflecting a man he barely recognised.
“I am still hunting,” he told the wolf inside him, silently, viciously.
Convel did not answer.
For the first time, Matthious understood why predators sometimes waited in plain sight.
The tavern noise settled into a rhythm.
Matthious listened.
It disgusted him how effective it was.
Loose tongues traded more truth than flayed flesh ever had. Names surfaced, then were dismissed. A dockhand who moved too fast. A thief who vanished up walls. A sailor who swore he’d seen eyes gleam wrong in lantern-light. Every rumor frayed into uncertainty—but the pattern pleased him. That realisation made his stomach twist harder than any spell backlash.
For a fleeting, traitorous moment, Matthious almost smiled.
The thought horrified him.
His fingers closed around the mug without conscious command. The weight was mundane, insulting. He lifted it, meaning only to move it aside—but habit, older than his ascension, betrayed him. He took a sip.
Ale flooded his mouth.
Warm. Bitter. Alive.
His body reacted before his will could intervene. Matthious lurched forward and spat violently onto the tavern floor, the sound sharp and wet, cutting through conversation like a blade.
Silence rippled outward.
“What in the—” someone muttered.
Matthious wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, chest heaving. Rage and revulsion warred inside him—not at the ale, but at himself. At the weakness that had allowed such a thing. At the reminder that his flesh still remembered being mortal.
“I do not consume,” he whispered to Convel, venomous. “I command.”
The wolf stirred, amused in a way Matthious refused to name.
The tavern’s noise resumed, cautiously. Laughter returned, thinner than before. The landlady shot him a hard look, then turned away. To them, he was merely another strange man with poor manners and worse taste.
Invisible.
Useful.
He forced himself to remain seated, to listen, to endure. More fragments emerged—coastal routes avoided at night, rooftops preferred over alleys, a shared instinct to scatter when the air felt wrong.
Still, no names. No dens. No certainty.
The were-cats continued to evade him.
What Matthious did not know was that he was being watched, right there in front of his face and he was oblivious.
The throne room of Caa Alora was calm, almost deceptively so, until the doors slammed open with a force that rattled the guards. Tunstall barrelled in, massive, fur bristling, purple eyes flashing with anger and hatred. His growl rolled through the hall, a deep, primal warning that froze everyone in place.
“That bastard Matthious killed my father… drank his blood!” Tunstall’s voice rumbled, shaking the stone floor. He pushed past the guards, ignoring their protests, his claws scraping the polished tiles. “Just like he did to Vivi… Tivor… but why?”
Queen Gabija rose from her throne, her composure taut as a drawn bow. She had felt the ripple of unrest first as whispers in the psychic network of were-cats, a trail of urgent thoughts spreading across the land: Matthious is here. Those whispers had reached her long before Tunstall arrived, giving her the forewarning of danger—but nothing could have prepared her for the raw presence of grief and fury that now filled the room.
“He does not kill without reason,” Gabija said, her voice steady but edged with steel. “He drinks the blood to gain power—ancient, unnatural power. And he grows stronger with every life he touches. Your father… your rage… it is proof of how far he has gone.”
Tunstall’s tail lashed, his growl vibrating through the hall. “Proof? Proof doesn’t bring him back!” He lunged forward slightly, forced back only by the sheer mass of the guards. “That monster! He has no right—no right—to take what is ours!”
Gabija’s gaze hardened. “We must not act in blind anger. If you strike without planning, Matthious will be ready. But you… your presence here, your warning, gives us a chance.” She gestured subtly toward the guards, signalling them to stand down from immediate confrontation. “The were-cats have spread word of his movements across the land. The network is awake. And now, we can plan.”
Tunstall’s growl softened into a low rumble, his ears flicking toward the corners of the room as if listening for the distant pulse of that network. His purple eyes never left Gabija’s. “Then we plan fast,” he said, every word vibrating with tension. “Because he is not waiting, and neither will I.”
The throne room softened in tone for a moment, the firelight flickering across Tunstall’s massive form and Snowy’s tiny, delicate frame. She nestled into Gabija’s lap like a shadow of warmth, her fur shimmering white in the torchlight. One amber eye fixed on the dire-wolf, assessing, judging, yet gentle.
“You’ve right to be angry, wolf,” she purred, her voice a soft melody that seemed to vibrate with calm itself, “but your anger here… is at the wrong person. Calm your nerves.”
Tunstall’s nose twitched, a low, rumbling growl escaping his maw, the vibration rolling across the floor like distant thunder. His purple eyes narrowed at the small furball, who dared offer counsel to a creature of his size and wrath. Always the little furballs with interfering advice… he seemed to think, muscles tensing even as his tail flicked once in irritation.
Gabija’s fingers absently stroked Snowy’s fur, her gaze shifting between the two extremes before her—the raw fury of Tunstall and the serene insistence of Snowy. “He is grieving, little one,” she said softly, her tone even, commanding yet compassionate. “And yet, the wolf is right to come. Matthious has taken too much, and now we must act.”
Snowy’s purr deepened, eyes still fixed on Tunstall. “Then let that fire sharpen your focus, not blind it,” she murmured. “We do not strike recklessly. But the storm you feel… it is justified. Let it guide you, not consume you.”
Tunstall’s growl softened into a low rumble, his massive chest rising and falling as he considered her words. The tension lingered like a coiled spring, but something in the little white were-cat’s voice—the quiet, measured cadence—seemed to anchor him just enough. His ears twitched, but the tail that had lashed moments ago now shifted to a slow, contemplative sway.
Gabija watched the exchange carefully, aware that both creatures brought strengths she would need.
The tavern seemed to shrink around him.
Matthious stood fully now, the hood fallen back, firelight crawling across the hard planes of his face. His green‑grey eyes burned with a sharp, predatory intelligence—anger sharpened into focus. The low murmur of conversation died instantly. Tankards froze halfway to lips. Breath itself felt too loud.
“I want to know where the cats that walk on two legs are hiding,” he said, each word pressed flat and cold. “And you are going to tell me.”
No one moved. Fear thickened the air, sour and metallic.
Then a man bolted for the door.
Matthious didn’t even look at him. He snapped his fingers once.
The sound that followed was wrong—wet, brittle, final. The man screamed as his ankles collapsed inward with a sickening crunch, bones folding like kindling beneath a boot. He hit the floor hard, howling, dragging useless legs behind him.
Matthious turned slowly, deliberately, letting them see what patience looked like when it had run out.
He began to speak in the ancient language.
The words were not loud, but they bit. Symbols flared briefly along the walls, crawling like luminous scars through wood and stone. Doors slammed shut as if struck by invisible hands. Windows sealed over with a shimmer, glass clouding, frames locking tight. Even the chimney groaned, a sigil snapping into place as smoke curled back into the room.
The tavern was now a box.
A hunting ground.
Matthious inhaled deeply, nostrils flaring. “You can smell them,” he said softly, almost conversationally. “I know you can. They’ve been here. Watching. Listening. Whispering.”
His gaze swept the room, lingering too long on each face. A few people sobbed quietly. Others stared at the floor, praying invisibility might be enough.
“Tell me what I want to know,” he continued, voice dropping to a silken threat, “and some of you might make it out alive.”
He smiled then—thin, humourless, sharp.
“Might.”
The fire cracked loudly, sending sparks snapping up the chimney that would not open. Outside, the night went on as if nothing had changed. Inside, the tavern held its breath, and Matthious waited, perfectly still, certain that fear would do the rest.
He grabbed one of the wenches by the throat and lifted her off the ground. She kicked and clawed, eyes wide with panic.
“Well?” he snarled.
She shook her head, pleading, but it did nothing to slow him. Slowly, almost casually, Matthious’ thumbnail lengthened unnaturally, sharp and wicked. In one swift motion, it drove through her chin and pierced upward. A sickening squelch echoed through the room as life left her. He retracted the nail, letting it snap back to normal, and dropped her to the floor. “She’s useless,” he muttered, moving on.
His gaze swept the room with feral delight. “Who's next?”
A miner in the corner tried to shrink away, hands raised in fear. Matthious didn’t hesitate—he seized the man’s head between his hands, and the room froze as a crushing sound broke the silence. The miner crumpled instantly, leaving nothing but the echo of his final scream behind.
The surviving patrons stared, frozen in terror. Breathing was shallow, hope evaporated. Matthious walked among them with a predator’s calm, revelling in the fear he inspired.
“Some of you might survive,” he said, voice soft but deadly. “If you tell me what I want to know. If not…” His smile widened, green-grey eyes glinting like knives. “Then you won’t matter at all.”
The fire crackled, shadows stretching across the walls, but no one dared move. Matthious’ presence alone turned the tavern into a cage
Matthious strode past the hearth. The cat—an orange-tabby, curled up in the warmth of the fire—didn’t move at first. Matthious muttered “akvo”, and a shimmering green-grey orb of water shot from his hand, splashing the fire out in a hiss of steam. Some of the water splashed onto the cat, and it leapt up, arching its back and hissing, shaking droplets from its fur.
Matthious rolled his eyes, turning to move on to another terrified patron. Then he paused, noticing the small animal staring up at him with cautious amber eyes. “Miaow?”
He shook his head and moved on.
The landlady stepped forward, trying to intervene. “You think I’m going to give you answers? You can fuck off!” she declared boldly.
Matthious’ green-grey eyes gleamed with dark amusement. He picked up a mug from a nearby table, and without hesitation, rammed it straight into her face. The sound was sickeningly final. She crumpled instantly.
He stepped back, surveying the room with a twisted grin. “What a bitch,” he cackled, the words echoing like a knife through the terrified silence.
Matthious snapped his fingers. The next wench suddenly floated in the air, moving toward him as if drawn by invisible strings.
“Oooh, sassy!” he retorted, grinning. “My type too. We’d have had so much fun when I was younger.”
She had brown eyes, long black hair, tanned skin, and a tidy appearance that only made her defiance sharper.
“Where… can I find the were-cats?” he demanded.
The wench spat in his face.
Matthious’ grin widened, and with a casual motion of his hands, he flipped her upside down, suspending her near the ceiling. For a moment, she dangled helplessly, the room watching in horrified silence.
A thin, deep cut appeared across her neck at Matthious’ command. He leaned back in a chair, resting his feet on the table below her, tilting his head back as if savoring it. The tavern fell utterly silent, save for the subtle drip that marked the moment.
Patrons gasped, shivering with revulsion.
Matthious laughed then, loud and manic, leaning back in his chair. “My kind of drink,” he said, mockingly cheerful. “Don’t knock it until you try it.” His eyes glimmered with sadistic delight, green-grey sparks catching the light as the sound of his laughter reverberated through the terrified tavern.
No one moved. No one dared. Matthious was in full control, his cruelty a performance, a terrifying display of power—and everyone knew, in that moment, how truly hopeless resistance would be.
Matthious leaned back in his chair, still smirking, but there was a subtle shift in his posture, a tightening around his eyes. He had been patient, yes, but the trail of these creatures—the cats who could walk on two legs—was slipping through his grasp, and his frustration began to bubble.
“Stop hiding!” he snarled suddenly, his voice cutting through the terrified whispers like a blade. “You all know something! Names, places, movements—I will have them!”
A few patrons whimpered, cowering in corners. One old man tried to murmur something, perhaps a lie or a plea, but Matthious’ attention snapped onto him. A sharp gesture, and the man’s chair flew apart beneath him. He fell to the floor, stunned and terrified, and Matthious crouched low, leaning in.
“Useless,” he spat. “None of you are useful! None of you know anything. And yet…” He let the words trail, green-grey eyes flicking around the room like a predator assessing prey. “The cats are here. Watching. Listening. I can feel it. You are holding back. And I… I hate being denied.”
Panic spread like wildfire. Patrons whispered, some shaking uncontrollably. Matthious clapped his hands, laughter bubbling from him, uneven and manic.
“Enough hiding!” he roared. “Someone will tell me!”
The small orange-tabby by the hearth, previously ignored, lifted its head to watch him, tail curling uncertainly. Matthious’ eyes locked onto it, narrowing. “Ah, you,” he muttered, standing and stalking across the room. Every step was deliberate, a predator closing the distance, teeth glinting faintly in the firelight.
He reached down and scooped up the cat effortlessly. Its claws flexed, its small body tense, but Matthious didn’t care. He raised the creature to his mouth and bit sharply into its neck, drinking. For a heartbeat, the room seemed to stop—then, a subtle shimmer ran across the cat’s fur, the eyes flashing amber with intelligence that no normal feline should possess.
It wasn’t just a cat. It had never been.
Matthious froze for a moment, the realisation dawning too late. The small body squirmed fiercely in his grasp, and those amber eyes glinted with recognition and defiance. A primal, alien intelligence radiated from it.
The patrons gasped, frozen in horror, while Matthious’ grin faltered, just slightly, as a spark of danger reached him too late. The orange-tabby had been a were-cat all along—and for the first time that night, the hunter had truly bitten into something that could fight back.
The orange-tabby squirmed violently in Matthious’ grasp. Then, with impossible speed, it raked its claws down his face, leaving long, curved gouges. The green-grey aura of his anger flared, and he recoiled, momentarily startled.
A wide, manic grin split his face. “Now I will have scars to match the arsehole King Thomaz!” he cackled, laughter echoing off the walls.
He looked down at the cat, eyes blazing. “Tell me your name! I want to know whose blood I’m drinking!”
There was no answer. Only defiance in those amber eyes.
Matthious snarled, snapping the small creature’s neck with a cruel motion. He finished drinking, feeling the surge of dark power pulse through him. His green-grey aura flared outward briefly, lighting the tavern with an eerie, sickly glow before vanishing. The cat’s body hit the floor, lifeless, but Matthious’ grin never wavered.
He turned slowly, surveying the remaining patrons. Fear froze them where they stood. Matthious moved with playful, deliberate exaggeration, snapping his fingers at each terrified figure. Instantly, one by one, they collapsed, gone before they even realised it had happened.
The tavern had become a tomb. Silence hung in the air for a heartbeat—then Matthious skipped to the door, mockery in every movement.
He paused, turning back to the ruined room. “Fajro,” he muttered.
A stream of green-grey fire erupted from his hand, licking across the walls and ceiling, setting the tavern ablaze. Flames hissed against wood, smoke curling thick and black. The heat surged, the fire roaring like a living thing.
And then, as suddenly as he had arrived, Matthious disappeared, leaving behind nothing but smoke, scorched stone, and the lingering terror of what had just unfolded.
The throne room doors burst open. A tortoiseshell were-cat stumbled in, breath ragged, tears streaking his fur.
Snowy lifted her head, amber eyes widening. Gabija’s gaze followed the rushing figure from her throne, sharp and assessing. Even Tunstall, massive and stoic, turned his head slightly, giving the feline a sidelong glare that conveyed both caution and curiosity.
“Tabby… is gone,” the were-cat sobbed, voice breaking. “The Corruptor… he got her…”
Snowy’s purr turned to a wail, grief spilling out uncontrollably. Her claws extended, digging into the elf queen’s legs as she leaned into the pain, trembling. Gabija’s eyes softened slightly, but her posture remained commanding.
The tortoiseshell continued, voice trembling with horror. “He… he killed all the patrons in the tavern… tortured most of them… and then—he used the ancient language… he set the fire… no one can put it out…”
A hush fell over the throne room, the weight of the news pressing down like a physical force. Even Tunstall’s growl, low and rumbling in his chest, seemed to vibrate with restrained fury.
Gabija’s fingers flexed lightly around the arm of her throne. She turned to one of her guards, her voice sharp and precise. “Send Jortle to assist in putting the fire out, as quickly as possible. If the flames spread, many more lives will be lost.”
The guard bowed and bolted from the room, urgency in every step, disappearing into the corridors to find Jortle and relay the message from his queen.
Snowy’s claws retracted slowly as she composed herself, though tears still glistened on her fur. Tunstall’s purple eyes narrowed, jaw tight, muscles coiled like springs. The room felt charged—grief, rage, and the flickering urgency of a threat that could no longer be ignored.
Gabija straightened, her voice carrying authority over the murmurs. “We cannot let him continue.”