Minho walked next to Taemin with an intimidating air to him that made most of the vampires literally back up against the walls. Taemin walked with his head down to the ground, more focused on the breath that escaped from his lips than anything around him. No one seemed to really notice him until after he had walked past, his presence was that miniscule.

Minho enjoyed the fear he saw in the eyes of everyone around him, it satisfied him so much that he didn’t even bother growling or curling his lips back. It had to be his black face and piercing gray eyes. Sure the rest of him was brown and black with that tan patch on his back, but his face and sheer size was enough to send those bloodsuckers reeling.

Once they made their way to the butcher shop, Taemin held the door open for Minho to walk in, not trusting him enough to leave him alone outside since he knew he had a temper.

“Is your beast under control? Because I don’t need him trying to eat up everything in my shop.” The butcher said while furrowing his brows at Minho.

“Oh! Y-yes he’s pretty well behaved.” Taemin said shyly.

“You know… he looks like the wolf that’s hanging out on the post by his legs in the middle of the path. The same face and eyes.”

Minho froze, his ears pricked up and forward at the man’s words.

‘You mean…’

“There was a wolf hanging outside? Why?” Taemin asked, bringing his hand to his chest, taken aback by the butcher’s words.

“Those brash young vampires hung it up there for whatever the reason. I keep telling them, that doing that foolishness is what’s going to attract the Therians over here. They refuse to take it down though so there is nothing I can do about it. It’s not my problem.”

“What are Therians? And why would they come here at the sight of a dead werewolf?” Taemin asked.

Minho whined as he pawed at the door to be let out. He needed to see something in order to figure out if his growing suspicions were true.

“One second Minho I’ll let you out in a second. Actually come over here and listen to what the butcher has to say, you might find it interesting.”

The male growled with impatience but did as he was asked. Only because he was asked, and because it was the possibility of getting new information. Not to mention that as the man said, the body was going nowhere.

“You’re a talent bound vampire and you don’t even know what Therians are?” Taemin blushed at the man pointing out his ignorance and looked down.  He sighed before going into his explanation. “Alright, well Therians are the creatures that come after vampires for their blood. There full name is Therianthropes, but we just call them Therians. However while they’ll settle for a regular vampires blood to survive, they really want the blood of a talent bound fledgling. No one really understands why, but they use werewolves to help identify the location of talent bound vampires. They know that werewolves are sent to vampire clans with talent bound fledglings and that’s usually where they will flock to, waiting for the werewolf to slip up and leave their masters unguarded. Hanging a werewolf corpse up by its feet is basically shining a beacon of light down that there are in fact fledglings here that they want in particular. But, no one pays any mind to what I’ve said since no one really knows what a Therian actually looks like.  I think they did it to make it seem like they’re tough or whatever, but it’s all a bit of nonsense.”

“Oh… Oh my. That’s disturbing. I’ll tell Jaejoong’s father to make them take it down. That’s not something we need to be broadcasting. No one deserves to be devalued like that. Werewolf or otherwise.”

The man nodded and sighed. “Well what’s your order number?”

“Oh. Uh 13 sir.”

He looked at the bags of meat and then at Taemin, humming in thought before going to the back. He came back to the front with  saddlebags. “Put this on him.”

Taemin looked at the large leather pouches and then at Minho. “Oh no… I can carry them myself it’s okay.”

He looked nervously at Minho who stared at the butcher, un-amused at the suggestion he was making. ‘Are you seriously insinuating that I carry the food when it’s his job?’ He rumbled lowly.

“Well aren’t you a spoiled one. You look as though you don’t want to help.”

‘Well duh.’ He snorted.

He grabbed the saddlebags from Taemin and walked around the counter in front of Minho. “Now this meat here is for you and the others to eat. I’m not going to let him carry everything himself because quite frankly the boy is a mere waif. No offense to you.” He added quickly and placed the bags on Minho making him looks like some sad excuse for a pack horse with such speed that Minho didn’t realize that they were strapped to him until after the man backed away. Once he did he bared his teeth and growled. “You shut your mouth you mangy mutt. I’m a butcher. I hack things to pieces for a living dead or alive. So you better hush it up before I neuter you and raise that growl of yours up a few octaves for the rest of your miserable life.” He warned. Minho stopped growling and kept his teeth bared. It was obvious this vampire was not only serious, but he wasn’t intimidated. Not to mention he was an older vampire; unfamiliar territory for a late teenaged werewolf.

After five or so minutes Most of the twenty pound bags of red meat cubes were placed in the pouches, leaving Taemin to carry only four of them. “T-Thank you.” He said shakily as he left out the door stumbling a little. Minho rushed quickly to go see what was on the wooden pole outside and sure enough, there was a wolf hanging up by its left hind leg, eyes glazed over with death, and tongue hanging loosely from its mouth. The body was obviously stiff with rigor-mortis and the cold, and the sight of the wolf made Minho shudder. But It wasn’t his brother. Thankfully it wasn’t his brother. Which confirmed his suspicions.

What he had seen before was only a hallucination caused by the cold and hunger. Because the wolf that was hanging up there was his weasel of a cousin with the same name. Not someone he cared much for. His delusional aunt named the rascal after his brother in some odd hope that he would one day become the lead alpha of their pack. He huffed in relief, a bit disappointed at the same time that what he saw while he was chained up wasn’t real. But somehow he still felt lied to. So his brother wasn’t dead, and they weren’t eating his decomposing flesh, and Taemin wasn’t in on that. He suddenly felt foolish in believing the sheltered and naïve vampire would actually be capable of malicious, ill intent towards him. He huffed again as the twosome made their way back to the central plaza, still getting looks as they moved through the crowd. That was at least until they heard a shrill scream for help coming from their right. Which coincidentally was in the direction of the post office, which was where Jaejoong was supposed to be at.

Before they could even process anything, more screams were heard and eventually a majority of the town erupted in a panic and people ran towards and away from Taemin, from something they couldn’t see at first.  Taemin bolted away to the eastern most wall where the butcher shop was and placed his order back inside. “Something’s going on in the town. I’m leaving this here if you don’t mind!” He said quickly without waiting for a response and unstrapped the heavy bags from Minho, flinging them inside before rushing back out to the mass of people fleeing in every which direction. “Minho. I heard Jaejoong scream. We need to find Jaejoong.” He said urgently and the werewolf followed as he ran off. However he skidded to a halt when he heard that voice again. Eerie and chill-inducing.

‘You all have something I want.’

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Posted: 5/30/2012

I promised you all four updated today and I held  true to my promise yes? I hope they're all worth reading. This might be the last update I do for the night, who knows. BUT. tell me what you guys think of the four so far. I REALLY love feedback from my readers. Anywho before I start ranting on again about everything, I will see you all in the next update <3 Thanks for reading and subscribing :3