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The people of the Yulan Hills are proud, independent people. They enjoy quiet, rural lives, but they are not blind to the dangers of their isolation. Cautionary tales are kept alive in the stories they tell their children. The following is a frequently recounted tale, used to remind little ones to heed the warnings of the Gods.

Brandon Hull had lived in the Yulan Hills his entire life. He had hunted these grasslands. He knew every nook and cranny of the nearby coastline. He wasn't one of the city folk down in Aroxir. No, Brandon was born and bred a hillfolk. And that was why he knew the minute something was wrong.
He had been out on a hunt. There had been an unusual number of wolf attacks lately, and he had been searching out their tracks. Their pelts would get him a good bit of coin down in the town, to be sure, but that wasn't the only reason he was after them. His mother was pregnant again, which would bring the family to 4 kids under 5. Wolves weren't good to have around with so many young ones underfoot. It had been two days before Brandon finally came across some tracks. There were four wolves, by his estimation. One of them was favoring their back left paw. Looks like something had hurt it already. That might be good news, or it might make them even more vicious. Brandon hadn't seen the corpses from their attack last week on a neighboring farm, but he had heard about it. The cow was shredded, unrecognizable as the beast it used to be. But then they had turned on the Tad family's young daughter. She was about 12, if Brandon was remembering right. Rumor had it there wasn't even enough to bury. Once wolves got a taste for human flesh... Brandon shook himself. Now wasn't the time to loose his nerve. It was then that he heard it for the first time. A soft, ghostly whisper. Run.
Brandon spun around, pulling an arrow up to his bow. Nothing. Nothing and no one was there. A feeling of unease settled around him like a scratchy blanket. "Hello?" he called out. A long moment passed. And then another. Nothing. I must be tired, Brandon thought. Hearing things in the hills was something for a townie, not for a young man like himself. Attempting to shake off the unease, he eyed the tracks, disappearing off to the east, cresting the next hill. He figured he was only a day or two behind the wolves, so he would want to be careful now.
That night, Brandon made himself a small fire and set up his tent. The air wasn't particularly cool, but he felt cold, and decided the risks that came with the fire were worth it. It was long after darkness had fallen before he finally managed to find sleep. Moments after he closed his eyes, he heard it again. Run! He gasped and bolted up, his blanket falling to the side. "Who is there?" he yelled. Again, no answer. "I know you are there," he said, grabbing his dagger as he pulled the flap of his tent to the side. The coals of his fire were still glowing gently. Between that and the faint light from the moon, he could see well enough. There was no one there. Not that he could see any way. Brandon swallowed hard. In a strangled, broken voice, he asked, "What do you want?"
Run! The voice was louder, more earnest.
Brandon spun, trying to pinpoint the source less voice. "Run where? Why? What?" But again, there was no answer. "Who are you? What do you want?" His eyes were wide, and he was covered in the sheen of a cold sweat. The rest of the night, he stayed out there, jumping at every brush of the wind, every creak of plants rubbing against each other.

---

When the first rays of dawns light peeked over the horizon, Brandon Hull was still standing there, in the middle of his camp site, dagger out, waiting for the invisible voice to speak again. He thought it might be a woman's voice, but that might not have been right. It was hard to tell. Such a short word. He had tried several more times to get an answer, without any luck. With the dawning of the sun, Brandon collapsed his tent and rolled up his supplies. He looked east, at the tracks he had been following. Was the voice telling to run towards or run away from his quarry? Brandon wasn't a man prone to hysterics, and certainly wasn't one to buy into the more superstitious side of things, but something about the voice was eating at him.
He took a step towards the tracks. And then another. He waited, listening, eyes darting side to side. Nothing. He took one more step, and froze again. Silence. He nodded to no one in particular, and started marching off after the wolves. The sooner he had dealt with him, the sooner he could get home, away from whatever was happening out here.
By the time the sun reached it's peak in the sky, Brandon had convinced himself that the whole thing was some weird dream. Or perhaps there was some sort of toxic gas caught in the dip between those two hills. Or he had eaten something that didn't agree with him, and he had hallucinated. Yes, that must be it. A perfectly reasonable explanation. He didn't stop to eat, instead munching on some dried berries his mother had packed before he left home. Yes, everything was fine now, and business as usual. He would deal with the wolves, and then head home, just as he had planned.
As Brandon crested the next hill, he dropped the last few berries from his hand, too shocked to even grab a weapon. In a clearing before him were the four wolves, the very ones he had been tracking. They were strung upside down by their paws, hanging from the branches of a tree, tongues lolling out to the sides. Their pelts were half flayed off the bodies, and blood was still dripping off the exposed muscle. The buzzards weren't circling yet, so it must have happened recently, but he hadn't heard a sound.
A branch cracked, and a creature emerged into the clearing. It was tall, at least 7 or 8 feet, standing on two feet. It was grotesque, with a hunched back and rotten looking flesh, clothed in scraps of wild animal pelts. It was carrying a sharp scythe and whetstone, heading towards the corpses of the wolves. It hadn't seen Brandon yet, but it surely would in a moment.
Run!
Brandon did not need to be told twice. He ran, faster than he had ever run in his entire life. Behind him he could hear heavy footsteps, chasing after him. He flung his pack down, droping the extra weight in hopes of increasing his speed. He ran, and ran, and ran.
They found his body four days later, in the clearing with the bones of four wolves. When they found him, they said there was a woman there, with his head in her lap, weeping. "He should have listened. Why did he not listen?" And then she faded into mist, not to be seen again.