The night air was cold enough to see your breath, but the campfire Torin had built at the edge of Ivarstead fought back the chill with a determined crackle.
He sat on a fallen log, absently poking the embers with a stick while Echo snuffled contentedly at a bowl of table scraps he'd managed to barter for. The distant rush of the waterfall was a constant, soothing rumble.
His gaze drifted past the flames to where Skjor was having a quiet word with two women near the inn's side door. One of them, a girl with a shy smile, held a wooden tray laden with steaming bowls. After a brief exchange, the women retreated inside, and Skjor ambled back to the fire, a look of smug satisfaction on his face.
He set the tray down between them, revealing two generous portions of hearty vegetable stew, the steam carrying the rich scent of leeks and potatoes.
"Told you," Skjor said, a slight, triumphant grin tugging at his scarred mouth. "Women like my face just fine."
Torin didn't even look up from the fire. "Yes, I'm sure this was all thanks to your face, and not the fact you're a walking armory wearing the colors of Jorrvaskr." He accepted the bowl and wooden spoon Skjor handed him. "So, what was the price for this charity?"
"No price," Skjor said, settling onto the log with a grunt. "Their father's one of the drinkers inside. Recognized us as Companions. Sent his daughters out with a peace offering." He took a mouthful of stew, then gave Torin a strange, appraising look. "Though the younger one... she seemed very interested in you. Couldn't stop staring."
Torin scoffed, finally looking up. "Did you tell her my balls have yet to descend?"
Skjor let out a rough bark of laughter. "No. I just told her you were tired from the road." He took another spoonful, his eyes glinting with mischief in the firelight. "But now I think I should have said you'd be back for her once you had your first boner, boy."
Torin looked at him blankly for a moment, his spoonful of stew hovering an inch from his lips. Then, a slow, genuine chuckle escaped him. It was a dry, rusty sound.
"Maybe I will," he said, the ghost of a smirk on his face. He finally took the bite, and his eyes widened in genuine surprise. He chewed thoughtfully, then nodded. "Yeah. If nothing else, then definitely for a meal. This is good."
Intrigued, Skjor took a spoonful of the stew himself.
He chewed thoughtfully, then gave a grudging hum of approval. "You're right. A lot better than I expected from a place like this."
With that, they fell into a comfortable silence, the only sounds the crackle of the fire, the distant waterfall, and the quiet scraping of spoons on wood. Torin, his appetite seemingly smaller than his frame suggested, only finished half his bowl before setting it down in front of Echo.
The young bear needed no second invitation, eagerly devouring the leftovers with noisy gusto.
Once Skjor had polished off his own meal and set the bowl aside, Torin broke the quiet. "Now then," he began, his voice low. "About that howl we heard when we first arrived..."
Skjor, in the process of cleaning his spoon with a bit of cloth, raised a scarred eyebrow. "What about it?"
"That was a werewolf's howl," Torin stated, his tone leaving no room for doubt. "Did you really not recognize it?"
Skjor shrugged, a heavy motion. "I've fought a werewolf before. Killed one, too. But I didn't stand around listening to it sing. The howls didn't stick." He finished with his spoon and gave Torin a long, probing look. "The real question is, how do you know what a werewolf howl sounds like? That's not something you usually learn from a beast hunt."
Torin paused, the question hanging in the air between them. Right. The mistake was his. Skjor was too new. He hadn't been in Jorrvaskr long enough to be let in on the Circle's secret, the one Torin himself wasn't officially supposed to know about yet.
He covered the slip with a nonchalant shrug, his gaze dropping to the fire. "I read a lot. You'd be surprised by the things you can find in old journals and bestiaries."
He cleared his throat, steering the conversation back to practicalities. "Regardless, the beast probably won't get this close to town with all the guards and noise. But it's better to be safe. We should take turns keeping watch."
Skjor was silent for a moment, his single good eye studying Torin as if trying to read the truth written in the shadows on his face. Finally, he gave a slow nod. "Alright. Makes sense. I'll take the first watch. Get some sleep. I'll wake you when it's your turn."
Torin nodded back, the matter settled. He pulled his backpack over, using it as a makeshift pillow as he lay down on his bedroll.
Echo, her belly full, let out a contented huff and settled down beside him, a warm, furry weight against his side. But her dark eyes remained open, watchful, still nervously tracking the movement of the shadows beyond the firelight as Skjor took up his vigil.
...
A rough nudge on his shoulder jolted Torin from a deep sleep. He blinked his eyes open to find Skjor's scarred face looming over him, backlit by the dying fire. In the stark moonlight, the network of old wounds looked even more severe, and Torin couldn't suppress a slight wince.
Skjor's grin was a flash of white in the darkness, sharp with amusement. "Your turn to take watch, boy. Get up."
Torin responded with a jaw-cracking yawn, the cold night air sharp in his lungs. His first instinct was to check on Echo. He found her curled into a tight, furry ball beside the warmth of his abandoned bedroll, her sides rising and falling in a steady, sleeping rhythm. Reassured, he gave Skjor a tired wave and pushed himself to his feet.
He moved to the other side of the fire, sitting cross-legged and holding his palms out to the embers. He watched as Skjor, without so much as a word, dropped onto the bedroll, folded his arms over his chest, and went utterly still.
It wasn't just sleep; it was the instant, deep unconsciousness of a man who had learned to snatch rest wherever and whenever he could.
Torin shook his head in a mixture of disbelief and envy.
Alone with the popping embers and the chorus of the night, his mind began to wander. It had been two days since they'd left Whiterun, and he'd finally, he thought, put a name to the vague irritation he'd been feeling toward Skjor.
It wasn't really about the man himself. It was about the itch that had started as a faint whisper in the back of his skull the moment the city gates had closed behind them. An itch that was growing stronger with every stretch they put between themselves and Jorrvaskr.
It was the urge to find the nearest bandit den and paint its walls red. He could feel it even now, a low, thirsty hum in his blood. Slaughtering that first group with Aela had been a release, a catharsis, but it seemed a part of him—a deep, wounded part—didn't think it was nearly enough.
That part wanted more blood. It wanted a river.
The familiar stone walls of Jorrvaskr, the sound of the twins sparring, Kodlak's steady presence… it all acted like a balm, smothering that thirst without him even realizing it was there.
But out here, away from that safety, the hunger was making itself known.
And Skjor? Skjor was the embodiment of disrupting the familiar. He was a new, unknown variable thrown into the equation of Torin's hard-won peace. His presence was a change, an intrusion into the only real home Torin had ever known in this world.
His subconscious had been rejecting the new scent, the new voice, the new presence, simply because it was different.
Or at least, that's what he thought the problem was.
Torin let out a long, weary sigh. 'It sure would have been nice if this 'reincarnation' experience had come with a licensed therapist.'
Then he wouldn't be stuck brooding in the dark, trying to diagnose his own mental illnesses.
It was a sad affair by any account.
Dismissing the thought with one last, jaw-creaking yawn, he shook himself fully awake and settled into his vigil for real, making sure his shield and warhammer were within easy reach.
Time crawled by. The twin moons carved their slow path across the sky, beginning their descent toward the jagged horizon. The world was so still and quiet that the sound, when it came, was as loud as a thunderclap.
SNAP.
Torin's head whipped toward the source of the sound at the tree line. And there it was. It stood taller than a man, a hulking silhouette of matted fur and corded muscle. Its arms were unnaturally long, ending in claws that looked like shards of polished obsidian in the moonlight.
The creature's eyes, glowing with a feral yellow light, locked onto Torin for a heartbeat before its hungry gaze slid past him, fixing on the vulnerable, sleeping form of Skjor.
"Shit," Torin cursed, the word a sharp puff of frost in the air.
There was no time for his hammer. He snatched up his shield, his mind working faster than his hands. He wove two spells in rapid succession, a desperate, dual-cast whisper.
A gray, rocky texture flowed over his skin as Stoneflesh hardened his body, and a surge of energy, a novice-level Haste spell, jolted through his muscles. It wasn't much, but it was all he had time for.
He lunged, putting himself between the beast and Skjor just as the werewolf charged. It moved with terrifying speed, a blur of fur and fury. Torin planted his feet, raising the shield with both hands just as the creature swung a massive, clawed paw in a devastating arc meant to tear Skjor in two.
The impact was brutal. A deafening CRACK echoed through the clearing as claws like daggers screeched across the metal face of the shield. The force of the blow shuddered up Torin's arms, rattling his teeth.
He was just about to bellow for Skjor to wake up when he saw the veteran warrior already rolling smoothly to the side, his eyes wide open and utterly alert—his sleep wasn't as heavy as it first appeared.
But Torin had no time to feel relief, or even annoyance. The werewolf, enraged by the blocked kill, leaned its full weight into its attack. With a guttural snarl, it pushed, its immense strength overwhelming Torin's braced stance.
His boots skidded backward, carving twin furrows in the dirt. The numbness in his arms flared into a sharp, burning pain.
He was holding, but barely.
The werewolf's murderous gaze snapped back to Torin, its lips pulling back from teeth that were too long and too sharp, but he didn't give it his full attention.
A frantic part of Torin's mind was scanning the darkness for Echo, his heart sinking when he saw no sign of her. Had she run off?
That distraction cost him dearly.
The beast threw its head back and let out a howl that wasn't just loud—it was a wave of pure, primal terror that seemed to freeze the very blood in Torin's veins. It shattered his scattered thoughts, forcing his entire world to narrow to the monster in front of him.
The beast dropped to all fours and charged, a blur of fur and raw power.
His hammer was still five feet away. Useless. Gritting his teeth, Torin could do nothing but sink his weight behind his shield and brace for a hit he knew could shatter his stone-hardened arms.
But the impact never came.
Just before the beast reached him, a heavier, darker shape slammed into its flank. Skjor, moving with a speed that belied his size, drove the rim of his own shield hard into the creature's ribs. There was a sickening thud of metal on muscle and bone, and the werewolf was sent stumbling sideways with a pained yelp, its charge broken.
CLANG! CLANG!
Skjor began hammering the broadside of his sword against his shield, the ringing metal a direct challenge. "Your hammer! Now!" he barked, his voice cutting through the night like a whip.
Shaken back to his senses, Torin didn't need to be told twice. He scrambled for his weapon, his fingers closing around the familiar, comforting grip of the warhammer.
The weight of it in his hand steadied him.
Seeing Torin armed, Skjor kept his eyes locked on the circling beast. "I'll hold its attention! You watch for an opening. Don't get eager. When you strike, boy, make it count."
Torin took a deep, shuddering breath, his knuckles white on his weapons. He nodded, falling into a ready stance. The standoff was tense, the air thick with the promise of violence. The werewolf and the veteran warrior sized each other up, muscles coiled, each waiting for the other to make the first, fatal move.
And then, the moment shattered.
Shouts erupted from the direction of Ivarstead. A bobbing cluster of torches appeared, moving quickly toward them. Takind advantage of the distraction, Torin risked another look around and felt a wave of relief so strong it made him lightheaded.
There, running aheqd of the guards was Echo, her eyes wide with fear but safe.
The werewolf saw the newcomers too. It took a sharp step back, its glowing eyes darting between Skjor and the approaching torches. With a final, frustrated snarl that promised this wasn't over, it turned and melted back into the deep shadows of the forest, vanishing as quickly as it had appeared.
The tension snapped. Torin's warhammer slipped from his numb fingers and thudded to the ground. His legs gave out, and he sat down hard in the dirt, his body and mind utterly spent.
Skjor watched the tree line for a long moment longer before lowering his shield slowly. He turned to Torin, a slow, fierce grin spreading across his scarred face.
"Congratulations are in order, boy," he rumbled, his voice thick with something that sounded like approval. "You fought a werewolf and lived to tell the tale."
Torin let out a low, almost pained chuckle as he gazed into the darkness surrounding them.
The night felt hollow in the wake of the creature's departure.
...
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