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Post by Flamefur on Feb 9, 2009 12:39:28 GMT -5
Okay. I am working really hard on this wolf book and I JUST finished the prologue! I revised it and edited it many times but I want to see what you guys think of it. Please read it when you can and fill out the form posted at the bottom of the thread. Thanks!
In the heart of a wide clearing, over the trees and distant hills, the sun fell behind bloody clouds that drifted slowly along the fading sky. Throughout the forests and hillsides long black shadows were falling like dead bodies to the ground. The silence of the evening air wasn’t disturbed by even the call of a raven to its mate or the cry of a coyote searching for shelter. The bright apricot haze of sunset started to die away as the mountains seemed to grow taller over the sun’s deathbed of clouds.
Against the horizon, the tall gray mountains stood proud and strong. They were encircled by rows of plains and trees, spotting the terrain innocently like spider eggs on a leaf with the occasional clearings and large forests. Hillsides, cliffs, and fields curved beautifully around the vast expanses of land. The landscape looked as if a professional carver had created it with a smooth metal knife in a huge plank of pure oak wood and painted it with liquid emerald and gold.
Looking up at the crimson sky from a steep hilltop stood the noble, handsome outline of a wolf. By his size and distinct features, it was easy to tell that the dog was fully matured. His fur was a dark russet with blazing but shadowed amber eyes gave him a mysterious appearance. The wolf raised his narrow head alertly and suspiciously, pricking long brown ears for a hint of snapping twigs and rustling leaves. He peered threateningly around, yet it was easy to tell from the mask of fear hiding behind his face and the fright in his eyes that his watch was not a hunt, but a guard.
The dog was standing watch for a small pack that lived just downhill of where he stood silhouetted against the sunset, in a wide clearing surrounded by trees and sheltered with a smaller mound of grass with a crack in the opening wide enough for a wolf to slide in through. The large male at the peak of the hill glanced nervously down at the den, praying silently that the enemy didn’t attack so soon. The oldest pups, born in early spring, were barely half a year old with the youngest being only two moons since their birth. The wolf feared for his pack from the predators that had hunted down small and large wolves for the past moons: the grizzly bear.
The pack was no different than most others were in the past moons, with the best fighters standing watch night and day from the menace that picked off the wolves one by one. While some wolves believed the stories and gave every step of their paw to defending their packs and pups, others simply shook off the warnings like ticks. Wolves were very confused nowadays. Bears and wolves had never lived in mutual peace but had no reason to fear each other. Times were changing, though. Elk were dying off and less and less food was seen by either bear or wolf so there was even more reason for them to blame each other, as they had been doing so recently.
The bole wolf shuddered, his ochre orbs hazy with exhaustion but his eyes gleaming with a hard, determined stare with a forced impression stamped on it, tinted with concern and uncertainty.
Staring towards the edge of the trees, past the pack wolves that were lazily weaving around each other with their young pups, taking them out on small walks in hopes that their small whelp would be the strongest, fastest of the others if they did this. Frowning, he scented the wind again with a hint of ruefulness staining his handsome eyes. A faint line of worry appeared above the dog wolf’s amber orbs and he silently hoped that none of the wolves had seen how much he feared the strong scent that had flooded his nostrils a moment before.
The wolf urgently looked across the clearing and blinked worriedly at the pack den. His amber eyes were shadowed with fear and worry, his breath coming in short heaves and his broad russet chest jumping like a hare in a frenzy. Suddenly, the dog’s legs felt weak and he trembled with the effort to stand. His eyes met that of a dainty white shape racing towards him like horizontal lightning. Please don’t be her, he cried in his head. Let her still be with the pups. Not now, of all times!
“Pine!” Ever since she had run to meet him, he had known that it was true. A she-wolf with long, cream colored fur and bright blue eyes loped up the hill to meet him, not noticing the disappointment and fear in his eyes. Any wolf could sense the concern that pricked at her paws and uneasiness that squeezed at her belly. “Do you smell something? You look worried-”
“Clover… I smell bear.” Pine quietly murmured, shocked. “The scent is strong.” His mate’s eyes widened with disbelief and she frowned at him.
“No.” She refused to believe it. “The bear have been restless but we live at peace with them! Why would they attack us now? The attacks are myths.” Clover snorted. Pine sighed, shaking his head and looking urgently at her, desperately hoping for her to trust him.
“Get the pups back in the den. They’ll be waiting for you.” He quietly but quickly ordered, fear tainting his eyes. “They need you right now. I’ll be fine for now.”
Clover fiercely planted her gaze on him, blue eyes flashing. “No! Aleu and Millie are fine on their own. Aleu will watch out for both of them. You know how she is! Or are you too concerned about the bears?” she snarled.
“I care about my family more than anything, but every wolf must do its share of guarding, and as a guard, I am supposed to be concerned about the bears. We can’t abandon the pups now, though, especially with the bear attacks, and Millie’s sickness. I’ll be fine!” Pine rasped quietly but wildly. “The bear are coming! I can feel it in every step I take!” he added louder that he meant to. Clover and Pine turned to survey the crowd of wolves and see how much damage his loud announcement had caused.
The wolves at the bottom of the hill had pricked their ears and looked at him, wildly but slightly curiously as if he had been kidding or something just as ridiculous. Some quickly turned their gaze to the tree line, half imagining snapping bracken, while others hurriedly nudged pups inside the den at the other side of the clearing, worried and shocked. Pine whimpered as a large battle-scarred brown wolf limped rather quickly up the hill towards him, his long silver fangs gleaming and flashing in the setting sun’s rays and his ears pinned angrily. It was obvious that the approaching wolf was none other than the alpha male.
“What is the meaning of this? You have irritated the pack!” he gruffly snarled, glaring furiously with firm maroon colored eyes. “You are putting us in greater danger by making them worried!”
“I smell bear, Skye.” He almost silently rasped, slumping and tucking his short tail between his legs with embarrassment and fright of his leader. He whimpered as their eyes met and Pine looked away, frightened.
“It’s a false alarm, though!” Skye sneered. “There are no bears coming!”
Several of the wolves who had just calmed down jumped as the gorse twitched in the forest and several tree branches swayed, revealing thick, dark fur as black as midnight.
Before the wolves could register what was happening a stream of heavy, thick furred bears had rained into the pack’s home, large brown paws aiming blows everywhere with black claws as long and sharp as the alpha male’s fangs times three. Cries of terror mixed with furious roars and frightened whines. Loud screams of pain were cut off by bone shattering impacts and wolves that managed to survive the first rain of bears barked for their loved ones. Pine’s eyes went wide with terror and realization fell on him like a heavy stone.
The attack had begun.
The russet colored wolf blinked in fear and gulped. Clover looked at him, concern staining her beautiful white face, when he mate let out a piercing scream.
His cries were cut off as a large dark brown grizzly bear who had charged up the hill raised a huge, heavyset paw with long black claws. A sickening crunch sent the dark brown wolf flying down the hill, bouncing and tumbling like a small rock, and landing in a heap at a small white pup’s feet. She gasped and looked upward at her father’s murderer before staring at the broken body lying at her paws again. When she finally acknowledged the fact that he was dead in her mind, she whimpered.
“Millie! It’s father!” the pup whined, looking over her shoulder towards a small pale gray pup close by. “He’s dead!”
Millie shuddered and looked at her father’s crooked neck, his eyes wild with fear and lips drawn back in a snarl. She padded towards him and prodded it back in to place with a tiny paw. The small gray pup licked his dark brown fur, grief overcoming her, before Clover picked her up by the scruff and dragged her away fiercely, treating Millie like a piece of prey rather than her own daughter.
“But father-“ Millie protested, shaking and flapping her paws wildly, attempting to get away and be with her father, trying to convince herself that he hadn’t died. Clover ignored her and picked up Aleu roughly by her neck fur, holding both pups as firmly as she would hold live prey in her fangs.
“You must go in the den and stay there until I say you may come out!” Clover urgently ordered them, her voice raspy with grief, anger, and fear all combined. “Don’t let anyone stop you. Not anyone!” the white she-wolf’s voice was muffled through the pups’ thin, silky fur but was easily audible to the scared pups.
Clover bounded towards the wide gash in the ground across the clearing. She looked up at the red sunset and suddenly noticed a stench in the air. She recognized it almost immediately.
Blood.
The white wolf weakly shivered with pain and nausea as she sprinted for the cracked hill that served as a den, her heart pounding hard in her throat.
It only took a few moments for Clover to dart between the broken bodies and the large bears but it felt like an eternity, or even longer. Her legs throbbed as she pushed off hard and felt a back claw snag in an injured bear’s dense pelt, but Clover hardly noticed it tear and leave her limping heavily with blood staining her white fur around her foot. Millie saw it and whimpered at the sight of the blood, looking away weakly.
As soon as she had found the crack, Clover dropped the pups and nudged them in to the den before turning to face the battle fiercely, not watching to see if her pups obediently slipped inside of the den. She glanced around and the sight overcame her with worry and fear.
Beside a tree, a dark gray wolf clung to a bear’s back with long black claws and muscled legs, trying not to be shaken off like a mosquito, but to hurt the bear at the same time. The bear slammed itself against the tree’s trunk from behind and the wolf slumped lifeless to the ground, its body collapsing at a completely awkward angle. On top of the hill, a light buttery brown grizzly bear and a larger dark brown bear were batting at a small light gray she-wolf defending two small cream colored pups and a slightly larger black one. Clover shuddered and looked towards Pine’s limp body, not wanting to see the gruesome fate of the poor she-wolf.
“This is for you, Pine.” She growled, bravely nodding and turning away from his body for the last time and galloping forward in to the battle with a loud cry of anger and rage. The huge mix of bears, wolves, and blood, enveloped her as she charged in to battle.
Meanwhile, Millie was cowering in a corner of the small den and Aleu arguing with a younger red-brown wolf pup who insisted on helping his parents.
“You can’t leave!” she snarled, guarding the entrance as if it were some juicy hare for her alone to have. “You’ll get yourself killed, Sparrow!”
“She’s right!” Skye came padding slowly in.
Sparrow glared at the pack alpha male. “Why aren’t you in battle?” he grumbled warily, narrowing his pale amber eyes.
Skye ignored him and started chewing on an overgrown claw.
From behind Skye emerged Skye’s son Rowan, an exact image of his father but smaller. None of the other pups really befriended him, most likely because he was very boastful and fierce. “You can’t go out there! Aleu’s right!” Rowan sneered.
“Great! Now we have two bossy know-it-alls in the den!” Sparrow growled sarcastically. “Why can’t you be more like Tobi?” He motioned to a gray newly born pup that was, too, curled up in a corner. Millie was crouched beside him, her weak body quivering with fright and illness.
Rowan didn’t seem to hear and went beside the entrance, sitting beside Aleu quietly and bulging his chest to make himself look bigger and more important.
“I-I hope that my f-father and mother are doing f-f-fine.” Stuttered Tobi weakly, gray eyes sad and wide with grief.
Sparrow thingyed his head and frowned. “Why not your brothers?”
“Jake and P-P-Perry?” Tobi shivered, stammering through the sentence shyly. “Those know-it-alls w-would be n-not much of a l-l-loss. But R-rock would. He’s n-nice.”
Aleu rolled his eyes. “Why are you so bad at talking?” she growled, prodding him with a pale white paw in the ribs.
Skye stood up and limped towards the entrance. For the first time, the pups noticed that the noise of battle cries and yowls of pain had died down. In fact, there was complete silence. Tobi went to stand beside Sparrow as Skye stepped out of the den cautiously, unprepared for the sight that beheld them.
The pups heard a sickening groan. Aleu, Rowan, and Sparrow scrambled out of the den hurriedly to see Skye lying on his side, eyes rolled back in to his head and leaving only the whites exposed. His body was completely in tact besides the urgent look to him. Rowan gasped and Aleu shuddered and backed away at the sight that beheld them.
The violet sky that covered the clearing seemed to be seared with blood even though there had been no battle in its own rankings. Back on the ground scarred, wrecked bodies were laying in the most awkward positions and were scattered on the ground like beads of dew in the summer. Pine’s once warm body had gone cold as ice at the foot of the hill while Stone, Tobi’s father, was still in a battling position with his glaring eyes glazed over. You couldn’t tell he was dead besides the fact that he was crippled on the ground and had no heartbeat. Sparrow whimpered and looked at the ocean of carcasses that awaited them, his eyes quivering like grass in the wind.
“No!” he squealed disbelievingly. “No!” Sparrow turned and blindly ran away, his short legs outstretched to their length as he ran towards the trees behind the den. The young russet colored pup noticed the sky disappear through thick layers of branches that replaced it as he reached the tree cover but kept going onward, paws beating the ground with each stride in tune with his heart’s furious pounding and his lungs’ heave for air. He wasn’t sure how long he had been sprinting along the trees for but didn’t care to keep track. A few moments later the trees thickened and branches started to lower.
Sparrow whined as he realized it. He had reached the layer of the forest where the trees started to sit lower, which could be dangerous at such a breakneck speed for a pup. The young wolf had heard of it here. At least he would be safe from any remaining bears here. All positive thoughts left his mind when the first twigs scraped at his forehead and he moaned quietly, slowing down slightly.
Blood dripped in to his eyes as his muzzle and ears were scratched by the sharp branches and he shook his head in a reckless attempt to wipe the scarlet drips from his gaze. The young wolf stopped momentarily and pricked his tiny ears, trying to listen for anything that could still be alive. He wondered if the bears were still hanging around. Not that they could break through the thickness of the small trees, though.
Sparrow sniffed the air. He could smell grizzly, but it was stale. His heart beat hard with exhaustion and the small pup took a few deep, anguished breaths as his thoughts wandered back to the battle field. Everyone had been killed but five small pups who had been lucky enough to be in the den. Are we lucky, or should we have died?
He frowned, pondering the question. There was something about them unique, the pup could tell. Skye had been the only full grown wolf who had survived the battle, but died on the spot when he saw the mass of dead bodies. The others hadn’t died, yet Sparrow would have more than welcomed his own death right then.
Sparrow started to slowly walk, deep in thought. I hope Aleu and the others understand. I just need some time alone. The young wolf was scared, of course. He wasn’t sure what to expect. Suddenly, the pup jumped. He didn’t feel much sense of loss. Sparrow didn’t remember his parents very well. They hadn’t spent much time with him, and he hadn’t even remembered their names. He started to mentally talk to himself again. I hope my parents understand how I feel. I just don’t... remember… them. Not a colour, bit of warm fur, or even a voice.
Sparrow stopped walking and looked over his shoulder ruefully. He needed to see his friends again. Maybe they would be able to understand what he was feeling. Or not. The russet colored wolf pup turned slowly around and took a few weak steps, his heart aching with grief for the others and the pack. He wouldn’t have minded if Rowan had been old enough to battle and was killed. Rowan was a show-off.
Sparrow took a few more deep breaths, trying to forget the pain in his chest, and lifted his head proudly. He wouldn’t go back a weak little pup. No, Sparrow wouldn’t settle for that. Sparrow wanted to go back as a mature young wolf, even at only six moons old. He took one last comforting breath and started to walk slowly towards the clearing, forgetting about his ragged wounds that stung his ears and nose.
As the trees passed by the moving wolf, he found himself deep in thought again. Was there something wrong with not remembering his parents? Considering the way the older wolves had treated him, Sparrow doubted it. There’s nothing wrong with forgetting about parents that never loved you.
The young wolf threw back his head, now driven by anger and courage. He started to walk slightly quicker. For a moment, Sparrow appeared to be a noble alpha male with the bravery and loyalty of a lion. He felt strength enter his muscles and years of battles shape and mold his body like clay in to a strong, fully developed male.
Before Sparrow could blink at his new body the wolf felt his small pup shape return to him and groaned as he lost his footing over a tree branch, stumbling forward. He scraped his front left leg on a stone and groaned as he limped to his paws, but he staggered onward and blinked back frustration and limped forward.
A few minutes later, he was at the tree line. Aleu was murmuring something to Tobi and Millie while Rowan was standing over Skye’s body, his eyes wide with shock, pain, and grief all mixed in to one rueful gaze- rage. Sparrow thought one last thing before he entered the clearing to be awaited by the scene that haunted the six pups like a nightmare.
He would get revenge for the death of his pack someday.
Someday.
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So there it is. Hope you enjoyed it! Here's the form. Please fill out all the parts, and remember that I want HONEST opinions. If you think that it's really stupid,put that. I want your honest opinion. HONEST. If you feel there are more positives/negatives to add, feel free to! User Name:
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