All Luck

Banglador was a flourishing town in the great forest of Malkouth. It was founded by settlers who carved out a place for themselves in the midst of the forest of trees. Since the time of the ancient settlers, the city grew, and since the time the city grew, the trouble came.

The trouble was wolves, but the wolves of the forest were no ordinary creatures. They possessed ungodly power with supernatural strength and heightened senses. They hunted men for sport and dragged their victims deep into the forest. The wolves of Banglador were ferocious monsters with human spirits. In the day, they would take the form of a man, but their bodies would change with the rising of the moon. The men became cruel and savage beasts, hungry for blood, and the town was in fear because of them. Some called them demons and others shifting shadows, but they were known to the world as werewolves.

Since the wolves were such a menace to the town, the citizens of Banglador had developed a solution which allowed the people to sleep in relative comfort. They had formed an elite fighting force known as the Hunters, and every night these hunters would go out into the forest with guns on horses with armor to defend the city and its people. The Hunters tracked the werewolves to disrupt their hunts with the intention that they might rescue their prey and put an end to the furry menace.

One such Hunter was Lunus Reens, daughter of Chief Hunter Eccord Reens. Her father had been a hunter all his life, and she had grown up with tales of wolves and the men who fought them with fierce battles and bloodshed.

Eccord was a hero in the town. He had killed more werewolves than any man to date, and the people never let him forget it. People would part for him as he walked the street, women would swoon, and the boys would shout. Eccord Reens was a hero in the town, and his daughter wanted nothing more than to be like him.

Lunus walked the streets of Banglador that day with a spring in her step and a lightness in her breast as she went about her business with the anticipation of her first hunt shut up inside of her. There was nothing that she wanted more than to come face to face with a werewolf and kill it. There was such a desire she had to see one, to look into its demon eyes, to feel its dastardly breath and come to terms with the reality of it. Only then would she be content to kill it, to see the unnatural life drain out of it and know that it was dead. She had run through the scenario many times in her head, and she was anxious to live it out.

Tonight, she would have that chance. Tonight, she would bring safety to her people by her own hand as her father did and their ancestors before them. Tonight, she would hunt.

But now was not then, and for now it must suffice her to buy bread from the market. So, she walked down Main Street in her Hunter uniform with a book under her arm and some change in her pouch to go to the merchant booths.

Lunus was young, beautiful, and barely twenty, which was the age requirement for a Hunter to go out and hunt. She kept her orangey hair pulled back in a tightly wound bun with two locks left loose at the front. Her skin was fair with a peach tint of wellness. Her eyes were soft and green like jasmine. Her uniform was neatly buttoned to the collar, in perfect condition, and green as the forest with a name embroidered in gold on her left breast: L. Reens.

Some of the people recognized her and they waved at her as she walked down the loosely formed pedestrian way at the side of the broad dirt road between buildings. She greeted them all warmly - a few hunters, the bank man, the grocer's assistant, the paper boy, a seller of teas... for the most part, they were all people she knew. Some, she didn't know, but she waved at them, too, with the same friendly smile.

She bought her bread and was passing the Saloon on her way to the library when a man was forced out of the building. Lunus heard the swing of the doors and looked to see the bald-headed man fly through the air, hitting the ground with a thud. A cloud of dust rose up around him, dirtying his vest and shirt, and the man groaned. She stopped in her stride and stared over at him, looking to see who it was. The man was wearing a black vest with plain shirtsleeves and a bright red bowtie, and she recognized him as Lawrence Finnegan, the store owner.

Shocked that someone would throw him out of his own shop, she began to race across the street, checking passively for carts or carriages as she ran.

"Mr. Finnegan!" Lunus called out, darting her way through the street which seemed to have suddenly busied for the sole purpose of impeding her.

She paused briefly, pulling herself back out of the way of an oncoming carriage and waiting for a man in a stovetop hat as his beautiful brown horse faithfully pulled a small cart for peddlers. The cart passed, and she continued over towards Finnegan.

By the time she reached the steps of the Saloon where Finnegan fell, another man was already there, hovering over him. He was a young man, tall, built, and slightly muscular. His hair was thick and dark. The man was dressed in a brown vest and shirt sleeves with a gold tie. His appearance was neat, though lightly disheveled, and he wore glasses with rounded metal frames.

Lunus approached him cautiously. There was a bloody gash on Mr. Finnegan's head, which was of the most immediate notice, and there was some scuffed bruising besides.

"Hey, um..." she addressed, unsure of how to ask the unnamed man what was the trouble without the possibility of making more of it herself.

"He should be alright," the man told her quietly. "There were some men who said he owed a debt, but they were just robbers."

The man proceeded to remove a metal flask from the interior pocket of his vest and pour the alcohol out over Finnegan's wounds. Lunus smiled as she watched him, because it was known that no man could ever leave Finnegan's bar without a flask. Only now it seemed that "Flask" Finnegan's zeal for the perpetual keeping of alcohol may have finally been warranted.

"Where are they now?" she asked him, her eyes straying to survey the scene.

"I took care of them," he said simply.

"I see..." she said with quiet skepticism.

He looked up at her a moment and smiled as though he were somewhat amused but also offended. "I did," he said, assuring her. Then, he looked at Finnegan and paused. "Do you have a knife?" he asked her.

"Yes, of course," she said.

"May I use it, please?" he asked, stretching out his hand in expectation.

Lunus was hesitant, but quickly acquiesced, removing the small carving knife from her jacket pocket and handing it to the friendly stranger.

"Thank you," he said, cutting into the sleeve of his shirt and tearing it into long strips of white linen which he used to dress Mr. Finnegan's wounds.

The man's eyes stayed with Finnegan while Lunus's fixed on him.

"You're very kind," she said, watching him.

"And you are very helpful," he replied, still attending to the man who laid unconscious before them.

"Who are you?" she asked him.

"I'm Evan, Miss Reens," he casually informed her. "Evan Marshal."

"You know me?"

"Your jacket. You're a hunter?"

She nodded. "Yes," she told him, "but I haven't gone out on a hunt yet."

"Will you tonight?" he asked, raising his curious gaze.

"Yes," she said. "It's my first."

"Well," he said, finishing patching up Finnegan and pouring a bucket of water from the trough over his head to wake him, "I wish you all luck, then, Miss Reens."