At the black forest nights, the boy, his two men and his beasts sought no cover or place of hiding, they simply dropped where they were and fell asleep. Such beings as they were, the boy knew without need for explanation, needn't fear man or beast. Their sleep was peculiar - the hounds, instead of circling and then huddling, simply laid down as they were, their eyes still open as they slept. The boar would let out a strange grunt, like a deathrattle, and fall to his side as if dead. The boy and the men would sit, their legs crossed, and stared - their eyes open and seeking, like the hounds.
 
And with that same strange silence and confidence that surrounded their slumber, did they attack - for the boy waited no more than a day to begin just that. Animals were easier, he reasoned, but men more valuable.
The first group they fell upon - a merchant's band resting in a roadside clearing - almost failed to struggle entirely. The boy, stalking forward while silently pointing the others to the other sides of the camp, crept upon the sentry. The poor man didn't manage as much as a yelp as the boy pounced, bit hard into his neck, and after nimbly jumping off his back removed a bolt from the sentry's own quiver to stab him repeatedly in the stomach. At the same time, the hounds and the men silently charged the men by the fire, and bit and clawed them viciously even as the men pulled fiery brands out of the fire and fought back, landing a terrible, hissing blow after another without making the dogs or the men relent in the slightest. The merchant himself, a portly fellow dressed in many airy silks, only took a step out of his tent to see what all the noise was about, when the boar charged and gored him in his side.
 
Once it was quite over, the boy and the men sat down in the middle of the camp and the dogs close to them, sitting patiently in their eery silence, quite ignoring the terrible burns on their bodies. The boar went a bit to the side and, with the usual grunt of death, fell on his side to doze off.
After about an hour of waiting, the corpses - the sentry with the terrible bite on his neck and the gaping wounds in his stomach, the bloodied group by the fire and the gored merchant began to rise, quite stiff-jointed. The boy smiled at them, and they stared at him, ready to follow his every order.
 
The carnage repeated itself throughout the forest several times - caravans left deserted with nothing but blood, and sometimes entrails, to testify of the men that drove it. One time did the boy vary from his routine, and with a snarl he wrestled a young lady from the general slaughter. The lady gasped at him, her blouse already cut in several places and covered with blood, and the boy threw her against a tree - where he pounced her and clawed her viciously in the chest, from just below the neck to the navel. The lady screamed in pain and promptly collapsed from the pain, and she still did not come to when the other bodies rose anew and left with the boy.
 
A few days after that particular attack, as the boy and his now rather large group - 30 strong, not counting beasts - were settling for their slumber, they heard a noise. The mindless men and beasts only looked in the general direction, not rising, but the boy got up - a smile playing upon his lips - and said "Ah, there you are."
The young lady approached him steadily, her skin deathly-white and her terrible wounds evident through her shirt, and came to a stop a few steps away from him. "Yes, I am here." She replied dreamily, while taking in her surroundings.
"I'm Patrick", the boy said, now grinning, and extended a pale hand with vicious claws.
"My name is Mary" the lady said, and took his hand gently in hers. She was still not quite focused - and her words felt as if they were directed at no one in particular.
"I have a feeling we'll be great friends, Patrick."