5:25 A made alpha.

In the darkness of an evening punctuated by the clanging and grunting of a few training sessions, Howler's nose twitched.  His hearing, made slightly sharper by the lycanthropy that had apparently been cast instead of contracted, caught the quiet rustling of thick fabric.  When a faint, but acrid alchemical smell wafted by, accompanied by the more welcome scent of fresh meat, Howler had to cover an involuntary huff by turning over on his bedroll.  The sound of rustling abruptly stopped, although the smells remained.  Howler, interested in how careful the unknown agent would be, began counting the seconds that went by in silence.  In their crates, a few of the dogs shifted and snorted, probably catching the smells themselves.

Howler's count had gone well into the hundreds before the careful stirring of fabric began again.  A series of thin, high squeals made Howler grind his teeth for more than one reason.  He hated having to admit that Kronmyr was right about anything, but apparently, the cage locks really were as easily picked open as the Drow had claimed.  Every single cage was convinced to open, then closed and- strangely enough- resecured.  The process didn't take very long, and when it was completed, Howler heard the intruder's whispered steps going out toward the training area.  He supposed that an intelligent rogue would be able to find a way to use the ruckus of multiple trainees to cover both a stealthy entrance and exit.  One of the more interesting points of the entire process, however, was the fact that not one of the dogs had been unfamiliar enough with the scent of the operator to awaken.  Food bribery or not, almost all of the regular breeding stock had at least been kept away from socializing with anyone who wasn't part of the mercenary crew.  They would react to any stranger- so it stood to reason that the interloper was familiar enough to ignore.  

Howler waited and listened, and while there were a few scrapes and hisses of claws or fur on the wood and metal of the crates, no dog awoke fully.  Slowly, quietly, the dogmaster got up from his bedroll, retrieved the key to the crates from the wall, and began the process of opening and checking the crates.  He found in each one a generous cut of meat, but one of the cuts bent strangely.  Howler laid out all of the meat cuts and used a stone and his cutting knife to light his fat candle, which sputtered and crackled as it caught the flame.  Carefully, he sniffed at each of the cuts, then separated away from the others the slab that had been intended for Niku, which smelled just that bit off.  He carefully considered the others, then began cutting through the slab that didn't bend in the same way as the others, which had been intended for his breeding female dog.  Slicing her slab first sideways, then straight up and down, Howler found small, thin, sharp pins, each no larger than his pinky fingernail, inserted throughout the meat.  With a snort, Howler scooped up all of the meat, save the strange-smelling cut, and threw it in the fat and scrap bin.  His breeding female dog and one of the young dogs woke up, sniffed the air, and began whining hopefully.  

"Hush you," Howler scoffed as he wiped down his cutting table and recovered the last meat piece.  He left his kennels and headed down the stairs toward the cellar- and more importantly, toward Kronmyr.

The Drow was absent from night training, since Rasha was working on forgery training with Mordren.  Instead of slinging spells or small pointy objects at the spiked chain wielder, Kronmyr was "rehabilitating" his mostly-healed upper back and shoulder.  By doing tiger rolls on the bare stone.  Howler paused to watch Kronmyr tumble all the way across his room before moving to block his return to the other side.

"What do you want?" Kronmyr asked, standing to his feet as he rubbed at his right shoulder.

"You got any antivenom or antitoxin around here?" Howler asked brusquely.

Kronmyr tipped his head slightly.  "Why?  The stuff Mordren's pet wyvern makes won't do, for you?"

"Of the two of you, you irritate me less, and you're awake now, when I need you," Howler replied.  "I don't want to have to explain the foundations of the world to the bitch when all I need is to not die choking."

Kronmyr nodded and walked over to his beat-up desk.  As he rustled around in the lower right hand drawer, he asked, "Gonna explain the foundations of the world to me after I make sure you don't die choking?"

Howler watched the Drow produce a single, slender bottle.  "Tell me you've got more than just that."

"You don't even need all of this, unless you want to take whatever-it-is into your system more than once.  Where I come from, both the poisons and our antidotes are very serious business."

Howler nodded.  "Another reason why I'm here and not with Mordren's bitch.  Now, prepare yourself; if whatever this is awakens Lycan Gan-"

"I've dealt with you before, and I'll do it again," Kronmyr cut in.  "Whatever you're going to do, do it now, before one or both of us loses our nerve."

And with a sharp nod, Howler took a bite of the raw meat that had been intended for Niku.