by Forest Wells
“Is that so? Have you ever considered...”
Both of our ears shot up when a chorus of howls erupted close by. So close that, at first, I looked around, thinking they were right on top of me. I rose in case they were and winced when my leg reminded me of the wound. I tucked it against my body to remove the pressure and stop the pain, then perked my ears so I could follow the sound when they repeated the call.
“That’s odd,” I said. “There aren’t any packs out there.”
“Could be roamers,” the old wolf said.
“Not likely. There aren’t any packs there because that’s where the humans build their dens.”
The old wolf’s ears and eyes shot up. “What? And you live here?”
Like I have a choice. Well, perhaps I did. Living so close to that much danger did seem to give me the solitude I thought I wanted. At least it used to, though now that it’d been broken twice in one day, I had to admit, the attention was starting to appeal to me.
Not that I’d ever tell the old wolf that. “They are not the cleverest of beasts, despite their power. Still, that doesn’t explain the howls. Um, what are you doing?”
The old wolf was stalking into the forest toward the humans. He looked back at me with an almost devious tension in his ears. “I thought I’d see where those howls are coming from.”
“Are you mad? Those humans see you, you’re dead.”
“Why do you care? I thought you wanted to be alone.”
I would have growled at him if I wasn’t so busy trying to answer that question. Estrella was at least someone I knew. This wolf had done nothing but annoy me since we met. Truth is, I would have been glad to be rid of him in any way possible. Yet some part of me didn’t want to see the old wolf get killed.
I latched onto that and turned it into another of my lies. “The humans have killed enough of our kind. I’d rather not see another pelt hanging on the trees.”
I don’t think he believes me.
“First blind rage, now a touch of compassion. Better be careful, pup. One might think you actually care.”
A growl formed again, more so because my feelings hadn’t changed. Or because I didn’t want to give the old wolf the satisfaction of being right. “Fine. You want to satisfy your curiosity?” I limped ahead of him, tested the air, and checked my ears to be sure we were alone. “Stay close, stay silent, and do what I say. The last thing I need is you repeating your pup’s mistake.”
The old wolf gave a nice impression of Toltan’s death stance. “Careful, pup. I’ll not have—”
“My name is Luna! If you plan to survive this investigation, I suggest you remember it. Now shut your muzzle and follow me.”
My insides tensed, expecting fangs, except the old wolf didn’t offer any. In fact, he didn’t offer any reprimand at all. Not even a growl. If anything, the old wolf had lowered himself ever so slightly. I counted myself lucky considering my injury, then hoped I had some luck left for my next endeavor.
I led the old wolf toward the humans with frequent tests of scent and sound. I was not going to let myself get pounced on after surviving so much. That’d just be insulting. Or stupid, given the fact that I was heading toward dangerous hunters with a leg I might be able to use if I had to. Though if I did, I’d probably never get to use it again. Permanent damage, or starvation while it healed, would see to that. Guess they were right. Solitude drives you mad.
We moved like two shadows, picking our way toward light in the distance. My limp broke an otherwise silent journey, but even it was soft, and I had yet to hear any indication that anyone heard me.
Our pace slowed further when we approached the humans’ dens, which still appeared to be smooth boulders that were oddly colored. Like the last couple of years, the humans were moving around these “dens,” many of which seemed to glow from the inside. Shadows on the sides appeared to be the silhouettes of more humans within. I saw no sign of a fire, though I did see them gathered around one of their rocks that held two glowing stones inside it. I didn’t understand those any more than their glowing sticks, other than it provided light the humans seemed to need. Poor creatures. So much power, yet they lacked the natural ability to see in the dark.
“I don’t see anything,” the old wolf whispered.
I scanned the humans' gathering area, looking for some sign of the wolves we’d heard. I knew I had the right direction, so where were they?
Some yips drew my attention to the side of the dens. There my eyes stayed while my brain refused to accept what they were telling me. There were wolves there. Five of them, not just among the humans, but interacting with them, rubbing against them with affection. Tails were wagging, an odd behavior in its own right, at the humans’ mere presence, as if they were their parents. There were tales of wolves going mad, but this was something far beyond mere insanity. At least we had discovered why the barks from before has sounded so wolf-like. They were wolves.
The old wolf started muttering. “Vinsi? Harso? Marron?”
My ears dragged my eyes toward the old wolf. His eyes were transfixed on the wolves, and he was walking toward them. He moved slow, step after step, almost as if absorbed in a hunt. Except this was much more dangerous prey, and I nearly turned inside out in panic when I realized he wasn’t going to stop.
I took a deep breath, then reached forward, grabbed the old wolf by the scruff, and dragged him down before someone saw him. My leg screamed in agony, but I held my breath, avoiding any noise beyond the rustle of me and the old wolf hitting the ground. Wolf ears turned our way, followed by human eyes. They pointed their light sticks out into the forest, shining beams of sunlight against tree and brush. I froze, too terrified to shake, or even be angry.
“Do. Not. Move,” I said. “Don’t even breathe.”
The old wolf’s voice was barely a whisper. “Luna. Luna, those wolves—”
“I said, quiet! Stay quiet or we’re both dead.”
The old wolf tried to move on until another human stepped out of a den with a thunder stick in his paws. The old wolf turned to stone, though I could feel his body tremble next to mine. I could only pray it wouldn’t give us away.
The light beams scanned the forest, looking for us. I heard things scurry away, but I watched those beams with all my focus. Every time they came near, my heart stopped, wondering if they’d keep going this time. When the humans’ wolves started to approach, I prepared to ruin my leg in retreat.
Then the humans started barking. Soft and firm at first, then with much more force. It was only then the wolves hugged the ground, their eyes up at their masters like they were their alphas. The humans grabbed them by a vine of some kind that was tight around their necks. Something I had seen on the dogs they’d brought before. For some strange reason, it appeared to be a source of control for the humans. However it worked, the wolves had halted their advance, though the humans were giving the forest one more look. I didn’t breathe until they led the wolves back toward the dens, and the human with a thunder stick vanished into his own.
“We’re safe,” I said. “For now.”
The old wolf rose with a shake of his shoulders. When he looked at me, he looked a lot like Martol the night she appeared to die within. The memory drew a twitch from my ears and a desire to look anywhere else.
“Luna,” the old wolf said. “Those wolves. We have to do something.”
The pain of my leg is probably the only thing that reminded me I was still alive. The rest of me was consumed by the question of whether or not the old wolf had lost his mind.
“We? What we? What makes you think... forget that. Why? Why do we have to do anything? Those wolves were submitting to the humans. Don’t you understand what that means?”
“More than you can know. That’s why we have to do something to free them.”
I take it back. Wolfor’s fang, I hope I am nothing like him in a few years. At least I’m still sane. “I return to my original question. Why does it matter?”
“Becau
se those are my pups.”
My ears shot up so straight it felt like they grew longer. “They’re what? You can’t be sure of that.”
“Spoken like a wolf with no young of his own. Trust me, Luna. When you have a litter, you’ll know them without trying. Their fur, their eyes, so many little things that to others mean nothing. But I tell you, I look at those wolves and I know, they’re my pups. The ones that vanished before the humans killed my pack.”
True or not, I couldn’t deny the old wolf believed it. That certainty did nothing for my insides, or my concern that the old wolf had gone insane. The question was pointless, really. There or gone, his mind had been made up. That left me in search of an answer as elusive as that fox.
Why do I care?
The question bounced around my head, stirring an internal battle while the old wolf stared at me. I tried to ignore his eyes, but they wouldn’t go away. There was a void behind them. An old shell where a wolf once lived. Just like Martol. That night returned to me as if it had just happened. Pain, fear, helplessness, it was all there, begging me to make it not so. The tears I’d cried that night broke me. Insane or not, I couldn’t let him go alone. For reasons I could never find, I just couldn’t.
“All right,” I sighed at last. “All right. But if we’re going to do this, we’re going to do it right. We can’t help them if we’re dead. You say you recognize them on sight even after all this time? If they’re anything like I am... was, it works both ways. They should know you by sight and scent immediately. The only way we can help them is if they help us.”
Light returned to the old wolf’s eyes for the first time. “So, what’s your plan?”
“We wait. The humans always sleep inside their dens together. We must wait until they are all asleep. Then, we approach the wolves as quietly as possible from downwind. They must see us before they smell or hear us, or they’ll alert the humans. If they do...”
“The humans will kill us,” the old wolf said. “I’ve waited this long. I think I can control myself for a while longer.”
“Please do. This is what one human did to me. I don’t like our chances against six plus their wolves.”
The old wolf growled, but stopped short of snapping. “They belong to no one.”
I was surprised to hear my voice come out calm and almost soothing. “Until they remember you, they are part of the humans’ pack. You above all know the power that bond holds.”
The old wolf sighed with a forward tick of his ears. Neither of us said another word.
We found a comfortable spot behind a bush where we could watch the humans in safety. The two humans that remained outside the dens continued to growl and ruff at each other, oblivious to our presence. They held what looked like ice in their paws, yet there appeared to be some kind of brown liquid inside. While it looked like water, the scent that drifted on the wind was far too harsh to be anything I wanted to risk tasting. At times, they’d tap the “ice” together, which appeared to cause them some manner of pleasure. I could only guess they found the clinking sound amusing, or maybe they were playing some kind of game to see whose ice broke first. If so, no one ever won, because the ice never broke.
The only change in behavior came when one of the wolves came close to them. He repeatedly pushed his nose under the human’s paw until the human rubbed behind the wolf’s ears. The human barked softly, affectionately, to which the wolf responded by sitting still for the rubbing, even leaning into it as if to make it feel better. When the human stopped, the wolf would nuzzle again, or nuzzle the other human to get him to do it, or sit and stare, begging, until one of them resumed the rub.
Wolfor, I thought the humans were an odd creature. To see wolves acting in such a manner, I didn’t know what to make of it. How could any wolf abandon their instincts enough to act like that? I wondered if our mission was little more than an elaborate suicide. If that’s what the old wolf had in mind, I decided I’d rather go soul dead, the final state in which sick or injured wolves will cease to care for themselves. It’s often more a final symptom of their injury or illness, but given a choice, I’d rather do that than charge into death as if it were a friend. It felt more respectable somehow.
Our chance to avoid death finally came when the humans gathered the wolves just behind their dens. There, they had something that looked like a giant spider’s web strung between stiff, bare trees that created an enclosed space. All of the webbing was the color of stone and seemed to be about as strong based on how little it moved when a human pulled at it. Instead of breaking, they swung part of the webbing out to provide an opening the wolves trotted into without protest. Then the humans closed the webbing, trapping the wolves inside. I couldn’t decide which was worse: the willingness to be confined, or the simple whimpers the wolves gave when the humans walked away. These were not cries of fear, but of longing, and short-lived ones at that.
Short as they were, they were long enough to force the old wolf to rise and shake like he had before. I watched him carefully, preparing in case he lost control again.
“Luna,” the old wolf said. “Luna, what do we do now?”
I watched the humans work with their glowing rocks. Some took them into dens that had been dark, while others put theirs out. A second later, many of the dens that had been glowing darkened, beginning a process I had seen many times. At least something is familiar.
“We continue to wait,” I said. “Just a little longer.”
“But... but my pups...”
“Appear to be okay for now. Look at them. They’re not afraid. Two of them are already settling in to sleep. Patience. We must be sure the humans are asleep.”
The old wolf continued to shake but held his place. I kept an ear turned his way in case that changed, while my eyes watched the humans’ dens for our chance. The silhouettes on the dens that were still lit moved around, rummaging for who knows what. Maybe they were eating cached meat, or mating, or fighting; there was no way to be sure.
The glowing eventually stopped within them all. I watched and waited as a few grunts sounded within. Then, at last, dead quiet.
Let’s choose our words more carefully, I thought with a ruff.
I waited a moment more to be sure before rising myself. I winced as my wound shot pain up my shoulder, reminding me of my limitations while forcing my leg to tuck.
“I can do this alone, Luna,” the old wolf said. “You’ve done enough.”
I only hesitated because I hurt too much to think for a moment. “And if those humans wake up? You don’t know them like I do. No, we started this together. That’s how we’ll finish it.”
The old wolf just huffed, which frustrated me because I couldn’t decipher the comment. Had he said something, at least then I’d have something to react to. Instead, I was left with a curious shift in my ears, wondering what it was he was saying.
I abandoned the search in favor of limping a wide arc around the humans’ dens. I stayed among the trees and brush, never letting the dens out of my sight for long. When I heard clinking nearby, much like the sound the webbing made when it was manipulated, I froze. The webbing was obscured by a tree, but I couldn’t hear any human barks, nor did any of the dens start glowing again. When the forest went silent again, the old wolf and I continued on our way toward his pups.
The more we moved, the more I wished I could hear something besides our paws. The forest was dea... wrong word choice!... completely silent, without so much as an owl screeching in the treetops. There was only the quiet grind of our claws in the dirt, as well as every beat of my heart. My ears were locked forward, my nose tested the air with each step of my good foreleg, and every hair stood ready to scream should they find anything. With any luck, it would be enough to avoid getting pounced on by anything, least of all the humans.
My ears perked further when they caught a rustling sound. My eyes dissected every shadow, finding only swaying leaves in the breeze. My ears said otherwise as the rustling continued, followed by the wind confirm
ing the presence of other wolves nearby. While the scent was too weak to identify, it was definitely familiar.
As the noises came closer, it became a uniform snuffling, as well as a fair amount of snaps and rustles from barging through brush. Whoever these wolves were, they weren’t very good. That said, I wasn’t about to chance it. This close to humans, we couldn’t afford the noise of a border dispute, to say nothing of my wound. I softly ruffed at the old wolf before hunkering down as low as I could get. The old wolf followed my example, though his ears also remained forward and alert.
Branches broke with loud snaps just ahead, while snuffles echoed across as if they were ruffing at each scent they found. Guess the humans are heavy sleepers. These wolves had to be on their first hunt to be making such a racket. I continued to hear them long before one came into view.
Definitely a young wolf, though not much older than I was, if at all. His fur was so smooth, so clean, it hadn’t seen a lick of real strife. Otherwise, he could have passed as the old wolf’s twin. His fur was dominated by dark gray, with brown highlights on his back, ears, and tail. Only difference was a brown vine tight around his neck and a slightly thinner build.
My head popped up as I realized I’d seen that wolf before. He was one of the wolves the humans had, except they were trapped by the webbing, or at least I thought they were.
Before I could doubt it was him, the old wolf stood up with a gasp.
“Vinsi?” he said.
This Vinsi, if it was him, stared at the old wolf without moving. His ears, still as stone, turned in the old wolf’s direction. They locked eyes, and neither appeared to breathe.
Another wolf, much like the first but with no brown at all, came around a tree shaking his head. “Vinsi. Will you come on? If we’re going to have any fun out here, we’ve got to get going before...” This second wolf became much like the first when he saw the old wolf. “It can’t be. Father? Is that you?”
The old wolf struggled to breathe as tears formed on his cheeks. “Harso. You never did learn our traditions well. You must use my name so I may retain who I am.”