Wolf Awakens, Jackal's Lament
Legacy Of The Berserking Wolf - 1
Eons worth of dust and spiderwebs accumulated, undisturbed—until a heavy iron door opened into the crypt, bringing a beam of candle light. Spiders blinded by the sudden light sped away to their shadowy dens, to await ultimate darkness once again.
The lone intruder crept in, his savage teeth gleamed in a wily smirk as he examined the contents of the isolated tomb. Among the mummified bodies of ancient royalty were a stash of riches from the age of tranquility. Ivory horns, urns of silver and gold stuffed with gems, string pearls, and coins that were much thicker than what are minted in the modern day.
‘Jackpot!’ the raider beamed to himself, as he perused the long forgotten treasure of old. Face as deceptively benign as a jackal, with a row of canine fangs, made jagged from surviving on nearly meat deprived bones, and dry, crunchy bread.
His yellow eyes sparkled as they were transfixed on the gleaming prizes. Pulling the satchel around his shoulder he allowed his fingers to linger on the treasure. Wiping the dust aside with his fingers till the shine returned to their surface. Placing the candle holder on a nearby stone table, he opened the satchel and poured an urn full of gold pieces into it; as he emptied the urn the weight of the satchel continued.
The leather material creaked as the threading struggled to hold the container together under its new burden. Filling the satchel with a small fortune of gold, the jackal of a man placed on top various gems and pieces of jewelry he perused from the rest of the crypt.
Just as he stuffed a rather large ruby into the satchel and was trying to latch on the cover, he heard the door slam. Turning over quickly, he saw an amber eyed demon standing by the closed door. Vaguely human, the demons have skin of metal that is paler than a white cloud, this one wore an ebony cape with red fringes, signifying its importance in their nightmarish hierarchy.
“Back demon! You will not prevent my escape.” The Jackal’s words did not faze the metallic guardian.
“You will stay here, permanently.” the demon lumbered towards him, arms poised to snatch him with the speed of a viper.
Throwing the lit candle at the encroaching enemy, Jackal saw the flame smolder the cloak the demon wore, but the cinders needed more to become a blaze.
Scanning the room in rapid head movements as he moved to the long end of a worn, wooden table, he saw an ancient urn, its sides stained from pitch. Hoping it still had fluid inside its contents, he lifted it with one arm, and flung it at the metallic fiend.
Shattering against the chest of the enemy, the demon didn’t realize it then, as it rubbed its fingers with the gooey pitch. However when Jackal threw his candle at it, the black fluid sparked up into a strong blaze.
Warping the metal, and spreading to the cape. Despite the lack of screaming or panic on its stiff face, the demon twirled and shook its limbs around, trying to fight against the growing flames. Taking the opportunity, the Jackal rushed to the door, carrying his loot-loaded satchel at his side.
As he flung open the door he looked back and saw the demon fall to its knees as if accepting its fate, but not before it looked into the Jackal’s yellow eyes. Opening its mouth, the demon let loose a banshee shriek that sent a haunting chill up his back.
Slamming the door shut, the Jackal rushed down the halls of the ancient crypt still hearing the echoing cry follow after.
***
Rhüthdag was the capital of the Thieves Cartel, a secret society of robbers and cutpurses that run chapters all across the known world of Kul’Rabia. Also known as the City Of Towers, Rhüthdag had built nearly all of its buildings into a stone tower. Some narrow, other fantastically sized, inside each tower were dwellings, places of business, and official buildings of the city's government.
However where the tallest tower peak meets the ground, that leads deep into a canyon. Thought to be bottomless, the towers seem to grow from in the lowest levels of the world, where the sun doesn’t shine, that is where the Thieves Cartel does business.
Black market goods, slave trade, and even murder contracts are purchased by agents of the cities High Ministers, a cabal of wizards who guard the city against foreign powers.
The Jackal as he moved across a narrow bridge spanning two towers saw one such Minister. A bloated face man, who looked like someone stuck a blowfish on a man’s neck, was flanked by his personal guards. Behind him were his servants, nearly naked, boney dark skinned indentured servants who were wrangling with the chains of freshly purchased harem slaves.
Ebony beauties from the southern lands, their nearly naked flesh shivered in the cold of the underground. Jackal had no doubt they would be kept in a luxurious gilded cage, till their looks faded. Then they’d be sold into the mines, a slave labor enterprise that uses prisoners and slaves to dig up precious ore at the bottom of the canyon.
“Get away from his highness scum!” a guard warned Jackal, as he was just one step closer to the High Minister than he would’ve liked. Flashing his falchion from its scabbard, Jackal said nothing, instead he kept his head down, and skirted around the entourage.
Fortunately nothing came of that, but he saw the pitiful eyes of the women, their mournful expressions begging for salvation. Jackal knew there was nothing he could do that would bring him any form of lasting satisfaction. Going against a High Minister would have him expelled from the Thieves Cartel, and branded a renegade wanted dead for miles around.
Life was just good enough to supply his needs, and to risk that for a stranger, even one that would suffer so greatly was not for him to gamble. In the world there are hard luck cases, and if someone were to intervene in everyone he comes across, he’d be dead or left worse off.
Evil always has a way to justify selfish acts, and make the innocent suffer if it were interfered with; often the cure to evil is indiscriminate bloodshed. Trying to think of the bounty he carried with him, he lugged his ill gotten gains several more floors down, till he came to a narrow hallway.
A large oil brazier was lit in halls on either side of the hallway, providing enough light to see the faint etchings done into the brickwork. Making sure he wasn’t followed, he looked intensely on either end, and once he was sure he shifted an out of place circular brick.
Rotating it right for seventy paces, then left for sixty, finally two for eight. After pushing it in, a doorway was revealed, as it came ajar, leading inward. Pushing his way inside, the Jackal quickly closed it shut behind him, making sure to listen for the mechanism to be reset before he went further in to conduct his business.
After a narrow passage that led to a sharp turn, he found himself in the Den Of Five. Each chapter having Five Pillars, or sects that follow one of each of the five roles of the Cartel, the fifth pillar is overseen by the Master Of Den Five, Brutüs. Half covered in shadows, the four corners of the room were lit by scorches that left the center awash in ethereal shadow.
Brutüs was a subhuman primate cousin of some kind, more developed than most of his savage race, he dressed in fine fur outfits as if he were a High Minister. Jade jewelry was made into buttons and rings on his hairy fingers, a stone that is often lauded for granting high intelligence to scholars.
“If it isn’t Jackal.” Brutüs’s sharp, ape fang gleamed in the dim light. “Come here and show us what you brought me.” all around the edges of the shadows, the silhouette of his guards stood in the darkness. Ever watchful for any treachery, especially those who run a particularly large debt to their master.
Jackal steadily came to the round table placed before the ape-man, and as he undid the satchel, he saw the large round ears of Brutüs twitch at the sound of gold.
“This is all I managed to get from the mausoleums.” Jackal carefully poured the jewelry, and coins before his boss. Scooping it into one large pile to be examined.
Letting loose an excited ooh-ooh sound, the ape-man clapped his hands in excitement, as he took each coin to the scales.
“You’ve done well Jackal, I can get a princely sum from this. Just let me see how much this pays off your debt.” Brutüs counted the wealth with his hair hands, as he then calculated on his abacus with his long fingered feet.
“There shouldn’t be any left.” The Jackal spoke harshly. Perhaps forgetting he was in the den of throat slitting brigands, but he didn’t notice Brutüs taking any offense to his words. To him, the Jackal was just an impudent child, who is best left to pout.
“Of course, of course. I forgot that payment you made before you left. Good thing you got this haul—” Brutüs’s next words took on a sinister tone. “—I would’ve had to visit your wife.” Licking his large lips, the ape-man smiled at him, showing off his wide, fanged filled maw.
“She has nothing to do with my debts.” Jackal wanted to threaten him, but was aware at least several throwing knives would be launched at him before he could draw his dagger.
“Women are collateral, just as your home, holdings, and coins are. Don’t act the fool, you know what would’ve happened to her if you didn’t pay your debts, best not risk it on dice if you can’t afford to lose." After Brutüs pocketed the jade pieces he found for his own personal use, he calculated the results. “You have a credit with us now. At least five hundred pieces.”
“Five hundred?!” Jackal was incensed, he had never seen such a devaluing anytime before, Master Of The Den had gone crazy with greed. “I should at least get three thousand.”
The ape-man laughed in a high screech, as he pushed the cold coins into a nearby pot that was taken by his subordinate. A long armed, desert-man who no doubt would put it in the vault.
“A change in rates. Haven’t you heard? The old Grandmaster is dead.” Brutüs’s smile never faded, as it was clear he enjoyed the crestfallen expression on his subordinates face. “Yes, Grandmaster Argüs was found in his bath with his throat slit. His son will be the new Grandmaster when he comes of age.”
The Jackal as soon as he heard it, instantly recognized it as anyone with a sane mind would understand, the Thieves Cartel had just undergone a coup. No doubt as the heir grows in age, he will be taken into isolation, only to die when his uncle fathers a son to usurp his place. Saying anything aloud to speak against the new regiment would be suicide. Thankfully Jackal knew how to disarm the trap he stepped in.
“Of course, I just didn’t realize about the tragedy, of course there would be an increase. I should be lucky to get five hundred.” feigning a smile, as he saw the ape-man smirk at the Jackal showing his belly.
“As you should be. Five hundred is enough for you to take care of that wife and child of yours, and another on the way, you’ll need all the high payings jobs you can get.” Brutüs dipped his quill and wrote into his ledger the current value of Jackal’s account.
Everything the lower ranks of the cartel bought were done by credit. All through the Thieves Bank, an underground banking system that saw food, rent, and anything else paid for, so their members would be solely dependent on the organization.
Those that try to leave with or skim any proceeds of their contracts would be met with brutal repercussions. Jackal bore witness to such punishments that torment his dreams on quiet nights when the nose of the city couldn’t be heard over his beating heart.
“I hope the next job might be a bit easier however.” The Jackal wanted to test the waters of getting a safer job, since his graverobbing had some pretty close calls of late.
Brutüs glared at him with a dissatisfied sneer. “What is safer than pilfering the crypts of the long dead? Did you see a ghost?” The ape-man mimicked a whaling specter that drew some laughter from some of his underlings.
“A demon cornered me in a tomb. If I wasn’t lucky it would’ve killed me.” The mentioning of the metallic fiends brought a sobering coldness in the air. As a ghostly breeze blew into the room by some unseen play, causing the flames to darken.
“Don’t mention that again!” Brutüs kissed the jade talisman around his neck to ward off the ill fortune that started to brew over his head. “You know it's bad luck…did it see your face?” Jackal was caught off guard by the question. “Did it see your face?! Those demons never forget, and have been known to hunt trespassers for decades, till they catch them. Now answer me!”
Brutüs held up a large knife, threatening his underling to give him some assurance he didn’t lead the creature to his lair.
“I set him on fire. I doubt it would be able to follow—”
Brutüs interrupted with a mean look in his eye “Don’t be so sure. Once they mark you they won’t stop till they drag you to hell.”
Both of them looked at one another. Jackal was unsure if the Den Master would kill him just in case the demon followed him—but the Jackal always brought in the big hauls.
“Get out of here Jackal…you’ll get a message when we need you.”
Jackal was thankful that greed won out over fear, as he hurried out of the den before Brutüs changed his mind. Leaving the den in a hurry, Jackal rushed out of the hidden door, and rushed towards a shortcut to his home.
As the sound of his scampering sandals echoed down the quiet hall had faded, a new sound came, one that sounded as if it were grinding metal. A shadow darkened the narrow hallway, and loomed where the doorway was once again concealed.
However instead of twisting the circular brick, a pair of metallic hands gripped the brick, and forced it open. A fissure spread across the wall, and the Thieves Den was exposed to an intruder.
A passing thief going to deliver his bounty to the Den Master looked down the hallway where the den was hidden—but he stopped as he heard a commotion from within. The wall was splitting open, and the door was forced open, and from within he could hear a gruesome sound akin to a hog at a butcher shop.
Sickly moistness, the ferry dripping of liquid far thicker than water, and finally a horrific scream for mercy.
“No! No! Mercy! Mercy!—” what followed was an ear splitting screech that sounded guttural before being stretched into a high pitched squeal.
Quietness came, and a silhouette emerged from the doorway. The thief was paralyzed by fear, as he saw Brutüs’s severed head, in the hands of a charred demon, whose head seemed to be a black skull, with two glowing blood red eyes. Running away in the panic, the thief hurried back to his dwelling, forever fearful that the demon would be hunting him next.
***
Jackal lived in an old dwelling near the mid areas of the towers. Where the sun would warm them up quickly, and the wind would cool them at night.
Before he even reached his door he smelled his wife’s cooking. Savory curry, and moist rice, one of his favorite meals. Opening the door he looked in and saw her, a tanned beauty of the desert, her belly plump with child, as she sweated over a charcoal heated stove.
“You must have been expecting me.” his words were met with her turning her head, and giving him a weary eyed smile. Embracing her, he squeezed her belly, and grinded his hips into her backside.
“You have some gall disappearing for weeks and coming back all of a sudden.” her soft words had a sharpness to its undertone.
“It's my work.” he sounded worn, his vitality drained by her womanly criticism. “I have the debt paid, and credit to our accounts, and you show me very little love.”
Hearing that she slammed a clay bowl on the table, and tossed in roughly piles of rice, that splattered all around. “I cook for you, I look after your son, yet you shame me by acting like you take those dangerous jobs to pay off your reckless gambling.”
Picking at the rice with his spoon, Jackal tried to pose a façade of indifference, if only for her not to feel as if she didn’t have good reason to be upset. “As a man, I have a right to gamble.”
“Not with food meant for your children!” she slapped him on the back of the head, causing him to stand up with a flash of anger in his eyes.
“I just arrived home, I had a long journey home. Just try to act as the dutiful wife and give me supper.” Jackal was often shamed by the other men at the Games Den for having a willful woman as a wife. So he wanted to prove his manly authority by asserting dominance, which would have resulted in a spoon whacking him on the back of the head, but their son awoke, and rushed to his father’s side.
“Papa!” his eyes gleamed and his mouth opened as wide as a jackal pup, eager to see a parent back home from hunting. “Papa!”
“Is that all you can say?” Jackal playfully asked his son, as he picked him up, and cradled him on his lap. He was still a child, but was growing enough to learn more than a few words.
Mama and Papa were music to their ears, but both of them wanted to have conversations with their young pup, especially if he wanted to be taken in by a decent school.
“So my boy, what did you do while Papa was away?” the Jackal smiled, and his eyes showed a brilliance of love for his offspring, who gnawed on his father’s spoon.
“Um…—” his son seemed to have trouble coming up with something to say. “—Papa!”
Both Jackal and his wife shared a look of parental sympathy at one another, with endearing smiles on their faces, they hugged their son tightly, as they enjoyed the day together.
***
The fireplace was lit by coals that would burn throughout the night. Jackal had just finished pleasuring his wife and was getting dressed believing she was fast asleep, as he slipped on his boats.
“You’re not going to those dice games again!” The words she spoke were a clear command.
“I won’t bet more than I can afford.” he fastened the straps on his boots.
“That is what you said before, and always they trick you into waging too much.” she sounded more pleading than she did before.
“I don’t always lose, I do win and you don’t complain then.” Jackal felt his guilt start getting into his mindset for planning out his strategies at the gaming table.
“I always worry, I don’t know if you come back with presents for me and our son, or with a shameful look, knowing you are indebted to that ape.” Anger was in her eyes, as she tried to dig her nails into his shoulder, trying to hook him as if he were a fish that had almost escaped the line.
Jackal looked at her, as he inched towards the door of their room. “I will be careful.”
Her eyes pleaded with him to stay, but he turned his back to her and left. He hurried out as he began to hear the soft sobs of his wife in their room.
***
Down below the city, in the lower floors of the largest tower was the Games Den. Ceiling was clouded with opium smoke, stages were set up depicting carnal shows of nearly naked female dangers, or live, horrendously perverted sex shows.
Pockets of games happened on elevated tables, some being cards, other roulette, but most crowded were the dice games.
Liars dice, snake eyes, seven die, or just basic tower style dice. These games were preferred as the player would play against other players, and not the house. Since it had better odds over the house rules, though just as easy one can win a small fortune, one can also lose it, and if they are on credit, they become indebted to the Thieves Cartel.
Even non-thieves who incur debts end up working off their debts, though not with contracts for their members, often the debt is paid by grueling labor. Though some players often put up with their wives and children for collateral. Many men end up going to an empty home, after having their savings stripped from them, by the false impression of a winning streak.
No matter what the den always collects its debt, and Jackal as soon as he entered had a terrible feeling shoot through his spine. Feeling almost certain he was going to lose something irreplaceable, he stood in the entryway, uncertain whether to join a game or leave.
“Jackal!” called out one of his fellows in the cartel. “Come join in on a game of tower dice, the pot is up to five thousand, we can split the winnings, come on!” He was trying to rope Jackal in, as he was known for being quite skilled in dice games.
Despite losing at times, he had a better winning record than the rest of his peers. Trying to drown out his guilt with thoughts of a big payday, he couldn’t help but feel he was losing his wife, and started to believe the anguish he caused his wife wasn’t worth the payouts.
Shaking his head, Jackal despite his friend calling for him, rushed out of the Games Den, and was resolved to return to his wife, a resolute man.
***
Breathing heavy from rushing back to his wife, Jackal rested on the stairs leading up to his domicile. After he caught his breath, he nearly stumbled as he climbed the last few steps, to reach the large chamber that his apartment and several others were situated.
Looking at his home, he felt a squirming anxiety set into his guts. The door to his home was forced open, and through the doorway he saw his furnishing destroyed, as if by a rampaging bull. Rushing into the doorway, he looked in to see blood smeared on the walls, his body trembled, and heart quivered at the sight.
Calling out for his wife, he went into the bedroom, but stopped as he saw a small, mangled body left bloodied and twisted on the floor.
“Son!” Jackal’s son’s body was warped, becoming a fleshy towel that had been wrung for every drop of blood. Stomach split open, viscera fell out of his torn abdomen. Trying to hold his child’s body, he was too disgusted and mortified by the state of the body to touch it, yet he anguished over the loss of his son.
Fear gripped him as he ran to his bedroom, praying to find his wife survived, running into the room, he saw sprawled out on the bed, the eviscerated corpse of his wife. Blood flowed from her torn open stomach, as if it were a shell of an egg emptied of its yolk.
The empty cavity that housed her womb was torn from her body, and the unborn child was stomped into a splatter of half-made flesh onto the floor.
Eyes wide in bewilderment, his wife looked almost alive, as her face was stuck on some animate expression of grief and terror.
“Why wasn’t I home?!” Jackal cried as he ran to his wife’s body, and gently stroked her face. Tears forced themselves from his burning eyes, as he tried to conjure rage enough to release a savage cry of anguish and vengeance, but the guilt for leaving her was too intense. “I love you.” he kissed her face, repeating, “I love you.” over and over again, till he heard the door close shut behind him.
He didn’t need to turn around to know what was behind him, the murderer of his family.
“Don’t be sad. You will join them in Hell.” that familiar, unholy voice echoed in the room. Both vindictive, yet unemotional, it was an apathetic evil that reaped the joy from his life, leaving him bereaved of loss and love, mutating him a feral man-beast.
With a spit foaming from his mouth, a barbaric hatred came to his yellow eyes, as he picked up an end table and flung it at the demon.
Charred into a skeletal form of crinkled metal, the demon wasn’t fazed by being hit by the heavy wooden furnishing. Approaching the Jackal, the demon’s hands had melted into sharp claws that were still sticky with the gore from murdering his family. Seeing their blood on flesh on its hands, drove him into a rage, as he lunged at it, throwing his weight without thoughts of self-preservation into his tackle.
Surprised by the unreserved attack, the demon stood back, but lost footing to the Jackal’s continued rage. Throttling the metal limbs with whatever he could get ahold of, stone cookware, heavy wood chairs, and even crockery was smashed into the demon’s metal body.
Ceaseless in his attacks, he then smashed his fighting trained hands into the metal skull, with such force it managed to leave an indentation into the skull. Muscles of the thief swelled, and his throat thickened, his blood was empowered by loss, and gave him strength that he never would’ve believed before he possessed.
Throttling the metal killer with his bare hands, he started throwing strikes laced with his own blood, as he scraped his hand’s terribly on the jagged metal. Despite the sharp pain on his hand, Jackal was possessed with the spirit of vengeance, an indomitable urge to kill whoever wronged him to such a foul degree.
Family dead, murder so brutality demanded the justice of death, a fierce, terrible demise that only he could deliver with decisive fighting he learned from his father. Before being conscripted into the Thieve Cartel he was a disciple under his father’s fighting style, a fighting technique from his far off homeland.
Using controlled spiritual rage, and a well developed body, one used a variation of poses and strikes to deliver death without the need of a weapon. Smashing through stone with one's bare hand, or even puncturing iron with a jab from a finger, the martial arts school of the Berserking Wolf, Jackal thought died with his father.
However, being overwhelmed by such profound rage, had awakened his father’s teachings and Jackal’s killer instincts had reawakened. Years of being indentured into the Cartel had weakened his predator nature, but after his ancestral blood was made to boil again, it had turned into a seething fury that would not be extinguished.
Karate chops hammered at the skull and torso of the demon, making it actually feel something close to resembling human pain. An echoing moan of resentment came out of the demon’s gaping jaw, as a crimson fist broke off the lower jaw. Attempts to retaliation were met with a smooth, purposeful dodging, that same the Jackal fade in and out off dodging and counter striking as if he were a ghost.
Spreading his hands and contorting them into claws, Jackal paused from his final assault to see the demon tremble as it had difficulty standing. Sparks shot out of its split metal body, and before it could even process what to do next, there was a final frenzy of punches, slaps, and clawing that pushed it further back.
Forcefully the barrage of strikes brought the demon to the railing of an open window, and as its flickering eyes gazed upon its target, it tried to utter a final screech. Before it could utter a sound a double fist strike sent it smashing through the railing, and flying out the window. Then the demon let loose a screech that echoed in the air as it rapidly descended into the vacuous canyon, rapidly vanishing into the darkness.
***
Jackal burned the remains of his family on a pyre outside of the city. Flames devoured the remains that were bundled in white cloth and placed on an altar of dry tinder. Staying by the blaze, as the morning light rose over the horizon, it wasn’t till high noon when all that was left were bone and ashes.
Breaking up the brittle bones into smaller fragments, Jackal placed them in an urn and spread them across the desert, allowing the wind to carry their souls onward.
Praying that their ashes would fly, sprout wings, and they would fly into the sky, freed of the troubles of the world. Feeling as though tears were flowing from his eyes, Jackal knew he had cried his last tear for his wife, son, and unborn child.
Having bandaged his bloodied hands, he decided to leave Rhüthdag. The degradation of the city had eroded his warrior’s instincts, making him susceptible to sin that pulled him away from his family when they needed him most. Years wasted serving evil, and at the cost of everything he loved.
Taking only enough food and water to see him to the next patch of civilization, he wore a hood and cape, and went off into the desert.