Wolf Moon.

Note: This story is based off the movie King Arthur, and features the character Tristan as the main subject.


With the winter snows high the wolves had become fiercer due to a lack of wildlife to hunt. This meant livestock was being slaughtered, and a few children had been attacked as well. Arthur had commanded the garrison guards to hunt, but they were useless for such things. Therefore he had turned to his knights.

Gawain and Galahad had spent most of the day patrolling the woods. Dagonet and Bors had hunted in the evening. Now it was night, and Tristan was perched in a tree, sitting with his back against the bole and his legs stretched out before him on the thick branch. Upon his lap was his bow, and a quiver of arrows hung from a smaller branch just beside him within arm’s reach.

The cold was sharp and the smell of snow hung heavy upon the air. The damp made the cold seep through his layers of clothing and into his bones. Tristan’s eyes lifted to look at the full moon through the bare branches of the tree. Without its canopy of leaves it resembled clawing skeletal fingers, reaching painfully in all directions.

Tristan heard the hawk restlessly shifting and fluttering its wings a branch up and to his left. Alerted his eyes narrowed, and he scanned the shadows. The moon was bright enough to reflect off the snow and push most of the shadows back, but not all of them. Motionless he waited, his hand clenched on the bow and one arrow he had ready to knock. The hawk squawked, and took off. Tristan then saw the glow of eyes nearing. Moving so slowly he made nearly no sound he knocked arrow to bow, and aimed. As he let the arrow fly the wolf lunged at the tree from two feet right of where he’d aimed.

Cursing he reached for another arrow. How could the animal have known and moved so fast? It snarled at him, retreating back towards the shadows. For a good half hour it was a game of cat and mouse, the wolf leading him to shoot, and appearing just to the side. Tristan had two arrows left, and cursed himself for being so quick to shoot. He knew better. He was usually more patient. He could not explain why he was so inaccurate and impatient.

“Cunning,” he whispered. “Come on, then. It is just you and I. Two trackers. Let us see who the last one standing will be, my friend.” The sudden sound of a scream, very much like the cry of his hawk, pierced the night, and Tristan leapt off the branch, one arrow knocked. He sprinted a few feet, and then froze. Before him came the glow of eyes, and yet behind and to each side of him came the sounds of growling. “You do not have me yet, wolf.”

The bow dropped and his hands went to his knives just as a large gray form before him lunged. It was like a deadly dance. Holding onto his calm with total determination Tristan swiped and stabbed with the knives, keeping the four wolves far enough back from his body. He was trying to maneuver them in a way to put the tree at his back. Only three strides for his target he noticed the wolves hesitate as though suddenly comprehending his intent. Tristan blinked, startled, and then had no time to examine their intelligence when all four leapt at once.

He wanted to shout. He wanted to rage. He did neither. Either would expend energy he desperately needed to fight. A nip here, a hit there… they were taking their toll. One went for his throat, and Tristan slashed with a knife, and fought it off, but howled in pain when another sank its teeth deep into his calf. He felt the hot stream of blood, and his leg gave out. Falling to his knees he continued to slash, with one hand, and with the other buried his other knife to the hilt in the wolf’s spine, feeling the jaws let go of him. He did not see the body twitch, but he could hear the whimpers of the animal as it died slowly.

Fumbling for another knife he saw the last two wolves back up. “Come on,” he snarled, his nostrils flaring and his breathing harsh. “What are you waiting for? Come get me, you bastards!”

The biggest one sat and simply watched him, and Tristan realized it was waiting for him to bleed to death. He could not run, his leg was too severely damaged, the tendons possibly severed. The animal had the luxury of time. Sneering Tristan lowered his arms, but never took his eyes off the two animals. The smaller of the two lay down, and exposed its belly to the largest, submission to its leadership.

“When you eat me I hope you choke on my bones,” the tracker whispered, watching the animal’s ears twitch when he spoke. Since both were before him and the other two dead Tristan shifted, wincing at the pain, and shuffled slowly towards the tree. The big wolf watched him patiently, and the knight wanted to laugh at the irony.

Minutes went by. The moon was starting to descend towards the horizon. It seemed to just hang over the treetops. Tristan’s eyes were heavy lidded, his fallen into his lap. The snow about his legs was crimson. Head against the bole of the tree he mumbled, and the smaller of the two wolves slithered forward low on its belly and nudged his booted foot. When Tristan did not move the animal’s teeth clamped upon his boot and began to pull.
Tristan’s hand shot up rapidly, and the animal yelped once and fell dead with a knife in its throat. The larger one had never moved.

Tristan decided enough was enough. Using his knife he tore at his long coat, pulling free a strip that he used to bind his wound. Pain shot up his leg and nearly blinded him. With a grunt he took deep breaths to try to avoid passing out and therefore being vulnerable to his would-be killer. He tied it off tightly, leaned back against the tree, and held the knife’s point out to the wolf when it shifted forward. “Not yet. I have no plans on losing this battle.”

The moon slowly lowered, the stench of blood filled the air, and howls sounded from a distance that would dwindle as the scent called to other predators. The two killers stared at each other, both motionless, and both knowing the other may appear languid and deceptively calm but was not.

The wolf watched and waited. The moon lowered, and the human had not moved in a long time. Its hands were in the snow beside its hips, its eyes were closed, and its head hung forward. Still it waited. The human had killed its three best hunters, the last being too impatient to wait out the human’s tricks. No, it would not rush. This was no mere human. It was skilled in hunting. It was deadly. It did not deserve to be taken lightly.

The sounds of tramping through the snow caught the animal’s ears, and its head shifted, its eyes narrowing. That was no animal. It sounded human. Only a human would dare to enter the woods with no thought to the noise they made or the dangers that awaited. By the sounds it was more than one human, and the wolf snarled in frustration. Glancing at the man at the tree it growled, and then turned and fled into the shadows.

“There he is.”

“Goddess!”

Dagonet pulled his axe out and searched the shadows as Lancelot went to the fallen knight. “Does he live?”

“Of course I live,” Tristan hoarsely spoke. He groaned and pushed Lancelot away. “Must you poke so hard? Can you not tell it is a wound?”

Lancelot picked himself up and ignored the bloody snow clinging to him wetly. “It is always the silent ones who complain loudest when scratched. Dagonet, you will need to carry him. He is too fat for me to carry.” He pulled his twin blades out of their sheathes, and took up the vigil while the bigger man hefted the wounded knight upon his shoulder.

Tristan moaned aloud, and before passing out glanced at the dark. “I win,” he whispered, and then unconsciousness swallowed him.

Lancelot took one last look about the area, shaking his head. Before leaving he hefted the Sarmatian bow that lay in the snow, and followed the other two. It looked as if Tristan had had quite an interesting night. He couldn’t wait for the tracker to be strong enough to relate his tale.

THE END.