They sneak out.

"We can't stay here," Adella said, crouching down. "We'll have to run."

"But the horse?" Courtney asked with quiet, forceful words, following the princess's lead and huddling down, beneath the view of the window. "You just saw how fast it was! We can't outrun a werewolf!"

"But maybe we can sneak past," Adella suggested with a whisper. "Wolves hunt by smell, don't they? He shouldn't be able to smell us over all that blood."

"But what if it has driven him into a bloodlust?" the lady murmured with fear. "What if he tries to eat us?"

"Would you rather stay around and find out if he's still hungry?" Adella countered, reaching for the door and opening it as quietly and slowly as she could, her handmaiden sighing to herself as they crept out into the cold air...

...and just as Adella had hoped, the werebeast paid no attention to them as it devoured the horse, ripping at its carcass with its claws and fangs faster than any butcher might do with his cleaver. The stink of iron, the stink of blood, the stench of it flooded the air, and it was all she could do not to gag and retch, but she **** herself through it, imagining she was at home at the castle, imagining that it was just the smell of the kitchens drifting up, imagining that it would be made into a pork roast or a honeyed goose as she and the lady behind her slipped past, creeping along in the darkness as the wolf - contentedly - gnawed on bones. She put her feet down lightly, the way she might during a dance, never daring to relax until they were at the treeline, lit as it was by the moon and stars above, hoping and praying that they wouldn't draw his attention, hoping and praying that they wouldn't step on a twig, hoping and praying that they wouldn't slip on the earth, hoping and praying to escape.

And then they were in the tree line, the wolf growing quiet and quieter as they got further and further away. Adella's thighs burnt from the awkward posture, but not for a few minutes more did she dare to rise back to her full stature, to stand and walk, and even then she dared not speak. She only walked, as quiet as she could possibly be. As quiet as Dunk, slipping into the castle after a night of whoring. As quiet as Stewart, slinking off into the shadows after court. She moved like a shadow, like a shadow amongst shadows, knowing that to make even one mistake in the vast, dark woods was sure to bring something terrible upon the both of them.

And so she walked for a few minutes.

And so she walked for a few dozen minutes more.

And so she walked.

But then they saw it.

A light, flickering and orange. A torch, high enough that it could only have been carried by a man on horseback, a man whistling cheerfully as they travelled on the dark road with another man, a younger man, behind them, riding a pack horse as the two travelled together. But it wasn't the torch that caught her eye. It was the glint it made underneath, that reflection of fire on metal. That meant that the rider on horseback had armor...and a rider on horseback was usually a knight. Even if it was a brigand or a bandit or any other criminal, she would rather take her chances with them than the beast behind - at least a brigand would know that the two of them weren't worth the trouble of hurting, but were worth a royal reward if they could be gotten back to the capital safely.

"Come on," Adella said, waving over at Courtney...

...who could only sigh with unease as they hurried towards the road, closer through the undergrowth, closer over a fallen tree and onto the road.

And what felt like a gift straight from the hands of the gods themselves, it was a knight with the symbol of Mirantia etched onto his breastplate, his squire riding behind. His visor was raised, but before Adella could make any attempt to recognize the man, to try and remember if she had seen him before, Courtney burst from the woods, laughing.

"Roderick!" Courtney said with delight, running to his side. "Oh, gods, am I happy to see you -"

"You know these two?" Adella asked as quickly as she could.

"Oh, she knows me very well, good princess," Sir Roderick smiled. "Especially after last summer's tourney. It wasn't just the crowds seeing what a knight's lance could do, I'll tell you that!"

Adella blushed, and so did her lady, but they had no time for this, not with the werewolf not far behind, not when he would have surely finished eating the other horse and found their scent and started after them. They didn't have time for anything.

"Who are you women?" the squire asked...before remembering his courtesies. "Uh, I mean ladies?"

"These aren't just ladies, lad," Sir Roderick said to his squire, pointing his sword towards the two. "That's Princess Adella, the good king's only daughter. The other lovely lady is Courtney...I would've called her a maiden, but -"

"Not the time!" Courtney insisted. "We can have this talk when we're safe!"

Roderick narrowed his brow, any playfulness gone. "Aye? Safe? Something wrong?"

"Werewolf," Adella said quickly, pushing through the murk of the thousand things she wanted to say, still catching her breath from the run. "Not far behind us."

"A werewolf?" Roderick asked, climbing off his horse and giving the reins over to his squire. "Is that so?"

"It is!" Courtney agreed. "He was just a huntsman - or trying to pretend to be one - and would have had the both of us if he wasn't busy eating one of the horses! We managed to sneak out over the sound and smell, but -"

"Alex, boy," Roderick commanded before she could finish, no longer playing, no longer japing, but a knight sworn and armed, his demeanor turning to battle-tested steel. "Pass me my lance."

"But you're not even mounted!"

"Does it matter?"

Alex hurried to his master's command, taking the long weapon from the side of Roderick's destrier, a massive thing of wood and steel painted with a spiral of blue and white from tip to rest - a true war lance, not some tourney one meant to shatter after the first hit. This was the kind of weapon that killed dragons in all the stories, mayhaps the most dangerous weapon any knight might carry. With such length and such strength, it could easily double as a spear in the right - skilled - hands...and what was a knight, if not skilled?

Alex struggled to carry it, but when it came into Roderick's strong arms it was as if it weighed nothing at all. That was the difference between a knight and a squire then and there. Strength. Certainty. Experience. Adella blushed. It was like she had just walked out of the castle and into some penny-bard's discount fairytale; a monster, a maiden and a knight in shining armor with the squire wishing to be one, all in one day.

"If he's out there, he won't be far now," the knight said, "He'll be on your tracks."

"You don't mean to fight him?" Adella asked with surprise.

"Oh, I mean to do more than just fight him, good princess," Roderick said, looking towards her with that same, playing smile he had just a few moments before. "I'm going to kill him. Might be I'll take his fur as a new cloak as well."

"But for now, good ladies," the knight said, pointing with a gauntleted hand to the far side of his steed. "Stay behind him. It'll keep his attentions where I want them."

"No complaints from me," Courtney said, picking up the edge of her dress and hurrying behind the horse with the princess not far behind. "I'm a lover, not a fighter!"

Roderick laughed, and then waved over his squire as the two ladies struggled to hide themselves behind the horse...a horse that sniffed the air and grew uncertain, yet held its strength and certainty as only a mount that had seen battle might, not like her horse from the castle's stables would. The knight and the squire talked and explained and planned, but Adella could barely hear any of it over the sound of her heart thundering in her ears. This would be close. Surely it would be close. How could one man kill that muscled beast she had just seen on his own without it ever being close? It had torn a _horse _apart with its own two hands!

Btu before she could look to Courtney, before she could say anything that might soothe her nerves, the horse stirred again at the sound of a howl, and she peeked out over the saddle to see it in the distance, sprinting towards them on all fours, its long muzzle covered in bloody froth and its fur stained with blood. It moved impossibly fast for a beast of its size, yet Roderick stood and his squire stood in front him, trembling as the fell creature ran, all as Roderick whistled high, the way he might whistle for a dog to come running...and Alex did jumping jacks, trying to keep the beast's attentions.

Adella might have laughed at the madness of it all, if she wasn't about to be the victim of a beast's lusts if this went wrong.

And then it leapt over a fallen log, using the wood as a step for a pounce -

"Now!" Roderick shouted.

Alex leapt out of the way in answer, seconds before the wolf would have been on him, and the beast that was Tegan shouted and howled and - yipped, crashing onto a speartip it could never have seen behind the squire. Adella peeked through her eyes to see the beast impaled on Roderick's lance, barely alive and yet with the weapon buried through its chest, the knight dropping the lance to the ground and leaving the man-turned-beast propped up on its rest. The mighty werewolf cried and whimpered as though it was nothing more than a dog.

"Aye, now you'll be something to put over the fireplace back home," Sir Roderick laughed as he brought his sword up...only to stop as he looked towards the princess and her lady. "Assuming you don't have anything in mind for him? Prisoner, mayhaps?"

"...I don't think it'd be wise to take a _werewolf _back to the castle," Courtney said, reasoning. "Besides, you know what he wanted to do with us. Imagine how many other women came to his house!"

"A-and he was going to kill me," Alex pleaded.

"Sir Roderick," the Princess said, speaking with her father's royal, commanding voice. "Take his head."

The knight nodded as he lifted his blade back for the swing, the wolf howled - and with a single strike it was done. The werewolf was dead, Tegan gone with him. It was over. Adella and Courtney both let out a breath they didn't realize they were holding. It had been a close call, but it was over.

"Find me a bag for this, Alex," Roderick said, leaning back and taking a cloth from his belt to wipe the blade clean whilst kicking the head over to his stunned squire like a football. "And watch yourself on the blood. Keep it out of your eyes and mouth and you'll be fine, else this wolf won't be the only one losing their head."

"Yes, sir!" the squire hurried, surprise turning to excitement.

"As for you ladies," Roderick smiled, sheathing his sword once more as he turned towards the princess and Courtney both, giving the two a respectful half-bow. "I think it best we find that horse of yours and make it to a tavern. If there's one werewolf about there's usually another."

"He's right, M'lady," Courtney agreed. "Tegan had to come from somewhere. He could even have had a whole pack!"

Gods, she thought. An entire pack of werewolves in her father's kingdom! They would need to send out the royal guard in strength to root them out, and that was more of an adventure than she wanted...especially after her wild, fun ride could have turned deadly.

"Then let's get going," Adella smiled. "I don't want to stay here any longer than I have to."