Forest Pack book I: A Wolf's curse
In the aftermath of a devastating wolf war, a lone pup called Nashoba battles for survival. The victim of a horrific accident that left her with an electric curse, she burned her family down just by touching them. Now, when she stumbles upon the survivors of a ravaged pack, she must face the nightmare within herself to spare the tatters of their hearts that remain.
Read the prologue Below!
The Bolt from the Blue
Warmth. Nashoba knew only warmth, and softness, and milk. She gulped it down by the mouthful from her mother’s teat. It was rich and full, the sweet taste coating her tongue in a thick film. She felt her mother tremble and whisper something tender to Father. “Aren’t they beautiful?”
“They’re perfect,” Father’s voice pounded into the pup’s form, even soft as it was. She felt his tongue slide across her fur, a streak of warmth quickly replaced by the biting cold. She whimpered for another lick, but he merely spoke. “Are they both females?”
“That’s okay, right?” Mother’s voice quivered. “They’ll be strong; I’ll teach them. Just two… a small litter-”
“They’re perfect,” Father repeated.
Nashoba, the firstborn, was pushed back as her mother’s breath settled. A noise sounded beside her: a whimpering that must be her sister. “Abequa’s all done,” Father chuckled. “Are they moving yet?”
“Just crawling around on their bellies. Nashoba hasn’t opened her eyes yet. I’m worried. Her eyes should be open by now.”
Eyes? Was Mother talking about those squirmy things beneath the skin on her face? Were they supposed to do something besides leak whenever she forgot to breathe between swallows of milk? A sudden rumble hurt her ears. It shook the whole den, threatening to tear her away from the gentle voices, the heat-giving fur and slow, rhythmic licks that pressed her down into a careless comfort not even milk could bring. She let go of the teat in her mouth to whimper for Mother’s tongue.
“Oh dear, don’t fret,” Mother murmured. That warm tongue caressed Nashoba’s face. She breathed in the sweet scent of milk and nuzzled closer against Mother’s fur, melting into the touch. “It’s just a storm, an outburst of Kerberos. Nothing to be afraid of, as long as we are safe in here.”
“Glory will quench it soon,” Father said.
Nashoba no longer cared for the storm, or anything that happened outside. Still, she whimpered again, feigning fear to assure the warm licks continued.
“How about you calm down and I will tell you a story,” Mother said. “I know the perfect one: Glory and Kerberos.”
“Oh come on. Aren’t they still a little young for such a gloomy legend?” There was a chill in Father’s tone, or maybe it was coming from the den mouth. It rippled along the small pup’s spine. Her heart sank lower when Mother lifted her down to her belly, back next to her sister. She let out whine after whine of protest.
“Hush now,” Mother chided, prodding her. “It’s a perfectly suitable story. What better one to tell lone pups?”
Father’s hot, pine-scented breath tickled Nashoba’s nose as he sighed. “Fine. But don’t scare them more.”
Mother cleared her throat, almost with the beginnings of a growl. “Alright pups, listen close and I’ll tell you the great legend of our kind. The story of Great Glory, Kerberos, and the Forest Pack.”
Nashoba pricked up her ears as much as she could.
“There was once a kind wolf named Glory, with fur as white as snow, and eyes green as Sun-Season grass. Every wolf belonged to her pack, the Forest Pack, and every wolf was treated equally and respected the delicate balance of the Forest. For her leadership, Glory was blessed by a divine Hallowed soul with powers of life, and named the Guardian of the Forest. From her power the great Forest Pack Bond was born, strengthening and uniting her entire pack under her selfless rule. But not every wolf was happy under Glory’s reign.”
Nashoba shuddered. Mother’s voice had deepened to a rumble akin to the ones outside.
“A black wolf called Kerberos with eyes the color of the hottest fire was jealous of Glory’s power. He made a deal with two evil Accursed souls to acquire powers to rival hers, in exchange for his soul. The Accursed infected him and turned him into a huge monster of a wolf with three heads. He burned the life out of any wolf who opposed him and consumed the energy of the wolves who followed him.”
“Eyotte,” Father’s growl prickled the air.
Mother growled in return. The warmth had evaporated, but Nashoba didn’t care. She was beginning to relish in the cool drafts of wind that tossed her fur. She had never felt anything like it before. There was a scent on it, a scent beyond milk and pine- something that expanded in her nose and enveloped her mind with longing. Her claws kneaded the ground. She had to find where that sharp, alluring scent was coming from. As soon as she heard what happened to the wolves in the story.
“The Forest Pack was ravaged, their bond weakened, and Glory stepped up to defend her wolves. The two and their followers met in furious combat that wiped out nearly all wolves, including Glory and Kerberos themselves. The only survivors were the ones too young to join in the battle. All power, both Hallowed and Accursed, left this world, as did the Forest Pack Bond. But the Forest Pack found a way to survive without it.”
“And it was all thanks to a strong young wolf named Alpha.”
That voice was different. Lighter. Father!
“He saw that what his broken pack needed was a code and a structure of ranks. If every wolf knew where they stood and obeyed a code enforced by the strongest wolf, there would be no more fighting unless under his command. And so he created Pack Law.” “A lot of good that did,” Mother snipped, startling her pups’ hackles up. “Placing greedy alpha wolves in command of all. We lone wolves follow no code but our own.”
Nashoba was hardly listening any longer. She was more focused on the distant roar.
“Oh-okay!” Father laughed, drawing a breathy yip-yip of laughter from deep in Nashoba’s ribcage. “That’s enough story time for one night, huh?”
Great! Now it was time to go out into the storm! The pup planted her big paws and was discouraged to find she could not lift herself off the ground. She felt Father’s jaws close around her scruff, his teeth gently poking into her skin, pine scent cascading all around her. The chill bristled through her fur as she was whipped around and placed next to the dusty, crumbling den wall. The dirt floated up her nose and she sneezed so hard it blew her backwards. A growl of thunder rolled, and she jolted.
Father laughed. “Do not be afraid, whirlwind. You are not in any danger of Pack Law or its evils, we’re free from its rule out here in the Lycos Forest. Free to create our own code, as your mother said!”
Free. Nashoba liked that word; it sounded like a cool breeze. She whimpered for a lick and heard Abequa follow, a gentle chorus calling the warmth of Mother’s tongue to their backs. Nashoba never wanted the feeling to end, but the cool draft that whipped through her ruff wasn’t as horrible as she’d expected. Mother was laughing, barking ‘free, free’ as hers and Father’s scent spun around the den. How did they move so quickly?
Abequa and Nashoba tried to join in the chant with their whelp-whines. “Free, free!”
“Sitka!” Mother whuffed, still giddy. “That’s too much nuzzling. Abequa’s watching!”
Abequa yipped in confirmation, and the den floor shook as they collapsed. Nashoba crawled towards the noise and was swept into the familiar embrace of fur on all sides. It didn’t remove the curiosity of the rumbles beyond the den, but any discomfort within her tiny body evaporated as soon as she was swaddled by her family’s warmth. Their scents filled her nose: Father’s pine, Mother’s milk, and Abequa’s dust from crawling around just like her. This time, it didn’t make her sneeze. It only drew her to snuggle deeper, burrowing into the living comfort. The noises of them, the beats beneath their fur and the soft shift of their breathing, stole all fears from her mind. She was here, and she belonged here. Here was home, family, warmth.
She felt the flex of Father’s throat beneath her forepaws, Abequa’s tail coiled around her haunch, Mother’s flank against her own. Father’s slightly rougher tongue ran over her head, and she couldn’t fight a yawn.
“You can thank your Father for that,” murmured Mother. “It’s not often a pack wolf sees it too.”
As the evening wore on, the den was surrounded by noise. The wild howls of the wind, and the roaring of the sharp-scented earthy milk called water. Nashoba slept snuggled against Abequa, Father, and Mother, but she was awakened by a brilliant flash of light. It was the most spectacular thing she had ever seen. It was the only thing she had ever seen.
The flashes grew brighter and more frequent, and she couldn’t help raising her head a bit with each one. Growls of thunder rolled between them, but Nashoba wasn’t scared. No, she was brave, like Glory. She didn’t know why she was shaking.
This time, the flash made a sound. It wasn’t like the rumble the thunder made, which resembled the snores of her family. It was an exciting sound, a sudden crash that caused her fur to stand up and her whole body to feel like it was about to burst. She had to hear that sound again. She needed to get closer.
She couldn’t stand or move fast and far like Mother and Father, but she could crawl on her belly. She had been outside the den before and felt the warm sunshine, but only for a few moments, and only a few steps from the den. This time, the grass was covered in water. It poured down onto her in fast drops. It kind of hurt, but she remembered she was brave. She shook because she was brave.
There was the flash again! A blaze of red against her eyelids! It called to her, and she drug herself closer to where she thought it had come from. Her paws slipped in something sticky, and she began to wonder if she should call for help. Father would know what to do. Or he would drag her back to the den and force her to sleep, forever dreaming about the unknown flashes. A distant sound rose alongside the wind: voices, multiple voices weaving together. The harmonies flowed through her tiny ears and into her veins. Where one dipped, another rose, knowing exactly what pitch to strike to create the perfect song. As if in opposition to the fierce wind, they sang from somewhere in the distance. The caw of a bird echoed somewhere above her. Water was landing on her nose, and the chill was biting through her thin pelt. She whimpered, but the flashes and the mysterious song beckoned her onward. There was a chant embedded their cries: “home, home, home.”
With each push and pull Nashoba inched closer to a sound of rushing even fiercer than song or storm; it was like it was right before her. She reached out a paw and felt nothing.
The crash sounded again. This time, it gripped her heart and she yowled in terror, scrabbling and falling forward into nothing but water. She moved every part of her that moved but there was no ground, nothing but rushing and noise and fear, and she yelped out for help as loudly as she could. Water was forced down her throat and her tiny body convulsed. Her body clawed for air, choking her, but she did not know which way was up.
Then there was a final blaze of light, and a crash.
A terrible pain ripped through Nashoba, jamming into her neck and searing every nerve. All the noise silenced; there was nothing but a ringing. She couldn’t see anything but blue. She couldn’t move anymore. The pain lit up her entire body and she was floating above it, not here, not here…
She became aware she was howling first. Howling in agony. She couldn’t hear herself, but she could feel it. Her voice burned in her chest. Her heart was… different…
Something else was different too: she could see. As she floated along her eyes had drifted a bit open, and all around her she could see red petals. Flowers? Why couldn’t she smell them? Why couldn’t she smell anything but this hot stench of pain?
At last she could feel ground beneath her, and though she was covered in water she wasn’t shaking anymore. She clung onto the slick ground as best she could with her forepaw. It didn’t feel like her paw anymore.
There was a faint sound beyond the ringing. “Eyotte, get out here! Nashoba fell in the stream!”
Father was above her. She opened her eyes, the only movement she could make. She had never seen Father before, but his fur matched the sky. His eyes were big, and his ears were back against his head. He backed away from her. Mother ran up next to him. She was beautiful. Nashoba wanted to smile, but it hurt so much.
Father was trying to say something to her, but she couldn’t hear him. He wasn’t loud enough. Mother finally picked her up in her jaws.
A flare of wild pain tore through Nashoba’s tiny body, and she yowled out as she hit the ground. Mother screamed, a sound that split the very skies. Father started after her as she hurried to the stream. “Eyotte-?!”
“It burns!”
Mother? The echo of poor Mother’s twisted cry shot through the pup’s mind. Nashoba’s eyelids were growing heavy, but instead of black now, she was being covered by blue. She couldn’t fight it any longer. She let it overtake her and drag her down into a new sleep, her heart beating a crackling, hissing lullaby that would never leave her head.
One full turn of the moon later, Father and Nashoba sat at the mouth of their den. It was raining, but not storming, though the veil of dark grey above them surely threatened more.
Father hadn’t spoken yet, only called to her from the entrance to their den after Mother and Abequa left for hunting practice. The milk had stopped just last week, and though they weren’t old enough to hunt big-wolf food yet, it was never too early to watch and learn. It had been disappointing when the rain began. Nashoba sat obediently in the shadows, out of reach of the raindrops falling a few pawlengths in front of her muzzle.
Father heaved a great sigh. “I didn’t think it would turn out like this, Nashoba.”
She looked up, eyes heating with worry. He sounded sadder than usual. “Like what?”
He wouldn’t look at her, and he hadn’t called her ‘whirlwind’, which meant he was being serious. “Did I ever tell you how your mother and I met?”
He hadn’t answered her question. She shook her head. “No.”
“I was on a solo patrol. I used to be a scout in my pack, one of the wolves in charge of scoping out the territory and chasing out intruders.”
“The Forest Pack?” Nashoba asked, fighting the urge to scoot closer.
Father laughed bitterly. “No, the Forest Pack is an old story. My pack was the Windhowl Pack. Out that way.” He nosed to the west, in the direction Mother and Abequa had gone. “Go long enough that way and you hit the border to the Howling Wood. That used to be Windhowl territory, where I was born.”
“You were in a pack? How long?”
“Years,” Father replied. “Four and a half years, to be precise. I knew some of the laws were corrupt, but I didn’t have any reason to leave. Not until I met your mother on that patrol. I was supposed to chase her out, but something about her enraptured me.”
“En-rap-ture?” Nashoba tried.
“Got me curious,” he said with a smile. That was the smile he wore when playing with Abequa, or dancing around the den with Mother. He didn’t do those things as much anymore. “My alpha had always told me lone wolves were dishonorable savages, but I’d never met a wolf as honorable as Eyotte. I started going on more solo patrols to spend more time with her, and she opened my eyes to how controlling the pack life really was, how I’d been brainwashed and enslaved by Pack Law. I finally decided to break away from it, and I left.”
“Was Mother from a pack too?”
Father huffed. “Yes, one called Thundergrowl. Only she didn’t leave them, they left her when she was a pup. Thundergrowl still lives, unlike my pack.”
“What happened?” Nashoba whined. How could a whole pack be gone?
Father didn’t answer for the longest time. He closed his deep green eyes and leaned into the rain, letting drops darken the fur on his muzzle. They dripped from his whiskers down to a puddle forming at the den mouth. Nashoba backed away from it.
“There was an attack,” Father said at last. “Thundergrowl attacked my pack. There isn’t much left of Windhowl now.”
Nashoba whined again. “Dead?”
“Yeah. Dead.” His muzzle dropped to his chest, and he finally looked at her. “Not long ago, actually. Windhowl’s borders have all been re-marked by Thundergrowl wolves, and I haven’t heard a single howl from my old pack in a week. Finding the body of a Windhowl wolf in our woods made me sure. She wouldn’t have dared to cross the border unless it was a matter of life or death. The Thundergrowl Pack is corrupted worse than mine was, and now they’ve taken all of the Wolflands except for our little Lycos.”
Nashoba had heard that word before: the Wolflands, the name for all the lands that belonged to wolves. The Lycos Forest belonged to no pack, and that was their home. “What about your family?” She whined.
Father’s face tightened, and she had her answer.
“How horrible.”
His eyes snapped open suddenly. “Horrible, yes!” He gazed at her so intensely her insides burned. “It is horrible, isn’t it? To hurt other wolves for no reason but ego and rage?”
She didn’t know what those last two words meant, but she nodded anyways, too shocked to do anything else.
“You aren’t like that, Nashoba. You wouldn’t hurt another wolf unless you had no choice, right?”
Of course. Right. She nodded so hard her neck ached.
“I need you to promise me you’ll try, Nashoba. I know sometimes you may not have a choice, but I need you to promise me for sure these two things: one, you won’t ever hurt Mother or Abequa. Can you promise me?”
“It was an accident,” she whimpered. “I didn’t mean to hurt Mother.”
“It’s okay, it’s okay, you didn’t know,” he soothed, though he left the paces between them empty. “Now you know. No touching, never. Promise?”
“Promise,” she said so breathily she was scared he hadn’t heard, but he had. He sighed, and looked back to the rain. “Good. Second, I need you to promise you won’t follow me. Don’t ever come looking for me, no matter what.”
“What?” Panic gripped her and she took a step forth.
“Stay back!” Father growled, and she froze. “It’s raining! We don’t go out in the rain, Nashoba! That’s one of our special just-for-Nashoba rules, remember?!”
“Uh-huh, sorry,” she tucked her tail between her legs and retreated further back into the cave.
“Promise me.”
“Where are you going?”
“Promise me,” he growled with his eyes closed.
Nashoba was still shaking from the scolding. “I, I,” her eyes were getting misty. She took a deep breath. No crying was another special just-for-her rule. She didn’t want to hear Father yell again. “I promise.”
He sighed finally, and smiled. All the heaviness he’d carried since the day of the accident, the day her eyes had opened for the first time, seemed to fall from his form. “Thank you, whirlwind. I love you, you know that? I love you so much. That’s why I gotta go now.”
“When are you coming back?” She whispered.
“No following.”
“No following,” she repeated, sitting down. “Yes Father.”
“Don’t you cry now. Mother and Abequa will get hurt.”
“Yes Father,” she sniffled.
“Goodbye, whirlwind.”
“Goodbye,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say. He was gone then, running through the rain, lost among the trees.
“I love you too.”
Warmth. Nashoba knew only warmth, and softness, and milk. She gulped it down by the mouthful from her mother’s teat. It was rich and full, the sweet taste coating her tongue in a thick film. She felt her mother tremble and whisper something tender to Father. “Aren’t they beautiful?”
“They’re perfect,” Father’s voice pounded into the pup’s form, even soft as it was. She felt his tongue slide across her fur, a streak of warmth quickly replaced by the biting cold. She whimpered for another lick, but he merely spoke. “Are they both females?”
“That’s okay, right?” Mother’s voice quivered. “They’ll be strong; I’ll teach them. Just two… a small litter-”
“They’re perfect,” Father repeated.
Nashoba, the firstborn, was pushed back as her mother’s breath settled. A noise sounded beside her: a whimpering that must be her sister. “Abequa’s all done,” Father chuckled. “Are they moving yet?”
“Just crawling around on their bellies. Nashoba hasn’t opened her eyes yet. I’m worried. Her eyes should be open by now.”
Eyes? Was Mother talking about those squirmy things beneath the skin on her face? Were they supposed to do something besides leak whenever she forgot to breathe between swallows of milk? A sudden rumble hurt her ears. It shook the whole den, threatening to tear her away from the gentle voices, the heat-giving fur and slow, rhythmic licks that pressed her down into a careless comfort not even milk could bring. She let go of the teat in her mouth to whimper for Mother’s tongue.
“Oh dear, don’t fret,” Mother murmured. That warm tongue caressed Nashoba’s face. She breathed in the sweet scent of milk and nuzzled closer against Mother’s fur, melting into the touch. “It’s just a storm, an outburst of Kerberos. Nothing to be afraid of, as long as we are safe in here.”
“Glory will quench it soon,” Father said.
Nashoba no longer cared for the storm, or anything that happened outside. Still, she whimpered again, feigning fear to assure the warm licks continued.
“How about you calm down and I will tell you a story,” Mother said. “I know the perfect one: Glory and Kerberos.”
“Oh come on. Aren’t they still a little young for such a gloomy legend?” There was a chill in Father’s tone, or maybe it was coming from the den mouth. It rippled along the small pup’s spine. Her heart sank lower when Mother lifted her down to her belly, back next to her sister. She let out whine after whine of protest.
“Hush now,” Mother chided, prodding her. “It’s a perfectly suitable story. What better one to tell lone pups?”
Father’s hot, pine-scented breath tickled Nashoba’s nose as he sighed. “Fine. But don’t scare them more.”
Mother cleared her throat, almost with the beginnings of a growl. “Alright pups, listen close and I’ll tell you the great legend of our kind. The story of Great Glory, Kerberos, and the Forest Pack.”
Nashoba pricked up her ears as much as she could.
“There was once a kind wolf named Glory, with fur as white as snow, and eyes green as Sun-Season grass. Every wolf belonged to her pack, the Forest Pack, and every wolf was treated equally and respected the delicate balance of the Forest. For her leadership, Glory was blessed by a divine Hallowed soul with powers of life, and named the Guardian of the Forest. From her power the great Forest Pack Bond was born, strengthening and uniting her entire pack under her selfless rule. But not every wolf was happy under Glory’s reign.”
Nashoba shuddered. Mother’s voice had deepened to a rumble akin to the ones outside.
“A black wolf called Kerberos with eyes the color of the hottest fire was jealous of Glory’s power. He made a deal with two evil Accursed souls to acquire powers to rival hers, in exchange for his soul. The Accursed infected him and turned him into a huge monster of a wolf with three heads. He burned the life out of any wolf who opposed him and consumed the energy of the wolves who followed him.”
“Eyotte,” Father’s growl prickled the air.
Mother growled in return. The warmth had evaporated, but Nashoba didn’t care. She was beginning to relish in the cool drafts of wind that tossed her fur. She had never felt anything like it before. There was a scent on it, a scent beyond milk and pine- something that expanded in her nose and enveloped her mind with longing. Her claws kneaded the ground. She had to find where that sharp, alluring scent was coming from. As soon as she heard what happened to the wolves in the story.
“The Forest Pack was ravaged, their bond weakened, and Glory stepped up to defend her wolves. The two and their followers met in furious combat that wiped out nearly all wolves, including Glory and Kerberos themselves. The only survivors were the ones too young to join in the battle. All power, both Hallowed and Accursed, left this world, as did the Forest Pack Bond. But the Forest Pack found a way to survive without it.”
“And it was all thanks to a strong young wolf named Alpha.”
That voice was different. Lighter. Father!
“He saw that what his broken pack needed was a code and a structure of ranks. If every wolf knew where they stood and obeyed a code enforced by the strongest wolf, there would be no more fighting unless under his command. And so he created Pack Law.” “A lot of good that did,” Mother snipped, startling her pups’ hackles up. “Placing greedy alpha wolves in command of all. We lone wolves follow no code but our own.”
Nashoba was hardly listening any longer. She was more focused on the distant roar.
“Oh-okay!” Father laughed, drawing a breathy yip-yip of laughter from deep in Nashoba’s ribcage. “That’s enough story time for one night, huh?”
Great! Now it was time to go out into the storm! The pup planted her big paws and was discouraged to find she could not lift herself off the ground. She felt Father’s jaws close around her scruff, his teeth gently poking into her skin, pine scent cascading all around her. The chill bristled through her fur as she was whipped around and placed next to the dusty, crumbling den wall. The dirt floated up her nose and she sneezed so hard it blew her backwards. A growl of thunder rolled, and she jolted.
Father laughed. “Do not be afraid, whirlwind. You are not in any danger of Pack Law or its evils, we’re free from its rule out here in the Lycos Forest. Free to create our own code, as your mother said!”
Free. Nashoba liked that word; it sounded like a cool breeze. She whimpered for a lick and heard Abequa follow, a gentle chorus calling the warmth of Mother’s tongue to their backs. Nashoba never wanted the feeling to end, but the cool draft that whipped through her ruff wasn’t as horrible as she’d expected. Mother was laughing, barking ‘free, free’ as hers and Father’s scent spun around the den. How did they move so quickly?
Abequa and Nashoba tried to join in the chant with their whelp-whines. “Free, free!”
“Sitka!” Mother whuffed, still giddy. “That’s too much nuzzling. Abequa’s watching!”
Abequa yipped in confirmation, and the den floor shook as they collapsed. Nashoba crawled towards the noise and was swept into the familiar embrace of fur on all sides. It didn’t remove the curiosity of the rumbles beyond the den, but any discomfort within her tiny body evaporated as soon as she was swaddled by her family’s warmth. Their scents filled her nose: Father’s pine, Mother’s milk, and Abequa’s dust from crawling around just like her. This time, it didn’t make her sneeze. It only drew her to snuggle deeper, burrowing into the living comfort. The noises of them, the beats beneath their fur and the soft shift of their breathing, stole all fears from her mind. She was here, and she belonged here. Here was home, family, warmth.
She felt the flex of Father’s throat beneath her forepaws, Abequa’s tail coiled around her haunch, Mother’s flank against her own. Father’s slightly rougher tongue ran over her head, and she couldn’t fight a yawn.
“You can thank your Father for that,” murmured Mother. “It’s not often a pack wolf sees it too.”
As the evening wore on, the den was surrounded by noise. The wild howls of the wind, and the roaring of the sharp-scented earthy milk called water. Nashoba slept snuggled against Abequa, Father, and Mother, but she was awakened by a brilliant flash of light. It was the most spectacular thing she had ever seen. It was the only thing she had ever seen.
The flashes grew brighter and more frequent, and she couldn’t help raising her head a bit with each one. Growls of thunder rolled between them, but Nashoba wasn’t scared. No, she was brave, like Glory. She didn’t know why she was shaking.
This time, the flash made a sound. It wasn’t like the rumble the thunder made, which resembled the snores of her family. It was an exciting sound, a sudden crash that caused her fur to stand up and her whole body to feel like it was about to burst. She had to hear that sound again. She needed to get closer.
She couldn’t stand or move fast and far like Mother and Father, but she could crawl on her belly. She had been outside the den before and felt the warm sunshine, but only for a few moments, and only a few steps from the den. This time, the grass was covered in water. It poured down onto her in fast drops. It kind of hurt, but she remembered she was brave. She shook because she was brave.
There was the flash again! A blaze of red against her eyelids! It called to her, and she drug herself closer to where she thought it had come from. Her paws slipped in something sticky, and she began to wonder if she should call for help. Father would know what to do. Or he would drag her back to the den and force her to sleep, forever dreaming about the unknown flashes. A distant sound rose alongside the wind: voices, multiple voices weaving together. The harmonies flowed through her tiny ears and into her veins. Where one dipped, another rose, knowing exactly what pitch to strike to create the perfect song. As if in opposition to the fierce wind, they sang from somewhere in the distance. The caw of a bird echoed somewhere above her. Water was landing on her nose, and the chill was biting through her thin pelt. She whimpered, but the flashes and the mysterious song beckoned her onward. There was a chant embedded their cries: “home, home, home.”
With each push and pull Nashoba inched closer to a sound of rushing even fiercer than song or storm; it was like it was right before her. She reached out a paw and felt nothing.
The crash sounded again. This time, it gripped her heart and she yowled in terror, scrabbling and falling forward into nothing but water. She moved every part of her that moved but there was no ground, nothing but rushing and noise and fear, and she yelped out for help as loudly as she could. Water was forced down her throat and her tiny body convulsed. Her body clawed for air, choking her, but she did not know which way was up.
Then there was a final blaze of light, and a crash.
A terrible pain ripped through Nashoba, jamming into her neck and searing every nerve. All the noise silenced; there was nothing but a ringing. She couldn’t see anything but blue. She couldn’t move anymore. The pain lit up her entire body and she was floating above it, not here, not here…
She became aware she was howling first. Howling in agony. She couldn’t hear herself, but she could feel it. Her voice burned in her chest. Her heart was… different…
Something else was different too: she could see. As she floated along her eyes had drifted a bit open, and all around her she could see red petals. Flowers? Why couldn’t she smell them? Why couldn’t she smell anything but this hot stench of pain?
At last she could feel ground beneath her, and though she was covered in water she wasn’t shaking anymore. She clung onto the slick ground as best she could with her forepaw. It didn’t feel like her paw anymore.
There was a faint sound beyond the ringing. “Eyotte, get out here! Nashoba fell in the stream!”
Father was above her. She opened her eyes, the only movement she could make. She had never seen Father before, but his fur matched the sky. His eyes were big, and his ears were back against his head. He backed away from her. Mother ran up next to him. She was beautiful. Nashoba wanted to smile, but it hurt so much.
Father was trying to say something to her, but she couldn’t hear him. He wasn’t loud enough. Mother finally picked her up in her jaws.
A flare of wild pain tore through Nashoba’s tiny body, and she yowled out as she hit the ground. Mother screamed, a sound that split the very skies. Father started after her as she hurried to the stream. “Eyotte-?!”
“It burns!”
Mother? The echo of poor Mother’s twisted cry shot through the pup’s mind. Nashoba’s eyelids were growing heavy, but instead of black now, she was being covered by blue. She couldn’t fight it any longer. She let it overtake her and drag her down into a new sleep, her heart beating a crackling, hissing lullaby that would never leave her head.
One full turn of the moon later, Father and Nashoba sat at the mouth of their den. It was raining, but not storming, though the veil of dark grey above them surely threatened more.
Father hadn’t spoken yet, only called to her from the entrance to their den after Mother and Abequa left for hunting practice. The milk had stopped just last week, and though they weren’t old enough to hunt big-wolf food yet, it was never too early to watch and learn. It had been disappointing when the rain began. Nashoba sat obediently in the shadows, out of reach of the raindrops falling a few pawlengths in front of her muzzle.
Father heaved a great sigh. “I didn’t think it would turn out like this, Nashoba.”
She looked up, eyes heating with worry. He sounded sadder than usual. “Like what?”
He wouldn’t look at her, and he hadn’t called her ‘whirlwind’, which meant he was being serious. “Did I ever tell you how your mother and I met?”
He hadn’t answered her question. She shook her head. “No.”
“I was on a solo patrol. I used to be a scout in my pack, one of the wolves in charge of scoping out the territory and chasing out intruders.”
“The Forest Pack?” Nashoba asked, fighting the urge to scoot closer.
Father laughed bitterly. “No, the Forest Pack is an old story. My pack was the Windhowl Pack. Out that way.” He nosed to the west, in the direction Mother and Abequa had gone. “Go long enough that way and you hit the border to the Howling Wood. That used to be Windhowl territory, where I was born.”
“You were in a pack? How long?”
“Years,” Father replied. “Four and a half years, to be precise. I knew some of the laws were corrupt, but I didn’t have any reason to leave. Not until I met your mother on that patrol. I was supposed to chase her out, but something about her enraptured me.”
“En-rap-ture?” Nashoba tried.
“Got me curious,” he said with a smile. That was the smile he wore when playing with Abequa, or dancing around the den with Mother. He didn’t do those things as much anymore. “My alpha had always told me lone wolves were dishonorable savages, but I’d never met a wolf as honorable as Eyotte. I started going on more solo patrols to spend more time with her, and she opened my eyes to how controlling the pack life really was, how I’d been brainwashed and enslaved by Pack Law. I finally decided to break away from it, and I left.”
“Was Mother from a pack too?”
Father huffed. “Yes, one called Thundergrowl. Only she didn’t leave them, they left her when she was a pup. Thundergrowl still lives, unlike my pack.”
“What happened?” Nashoba whined. How could a whole pack be gone?
Father didn’t answer for the longest time. He closed his deep green eyes and leaned into the rain, letting drops darken the fur on his muzzle. They dripped from his whiskers down to a puddle forming at the den mouth. Nashoba backed away from it.
“There was an attack,” Father said at last. “Thundergrowl attacked my pack. There isn’t much left of Windhowl now.”
Nashoba whined again. “Dead?”
“Yeah. Dead.” His muzzle dropped to his chest, and he finally looked at her. “Not long ago, actually. Windhowl’s borders have all been re-marked by Thundergrowl wolves, and I haven’t heard a single howl from my old pack in a week. Finding the body of a Windhowl wolf in our woods made me sure. She wouldn’t have dared to cross the border unless it was a matter of life or death. The Thundergrowl Pack is corrupted worse than mine was, and now they’ve taken all of the Wolflands except for our little Lycos.”
Nashoba had heard that word before: the Wolflands, the name for all the lands that belonged to wolves. The Lycos Forest belonged to no pack, and that was their home. “What about your family?” She whined.
Father’s face tightened, and she had her answer.
“How horrible.”
His eyes snapped open suddenly. “Horrible, yes!” He gazed at her so intensely her insides burned. “It is horrible, isn’t it? To hurt other wolves for no reason but ego and rage?”
She didn’t know what those last two words meant, but she nodded anyways, too shocked to do anything else.
“You aren’t like that, Nashoba. You wouldn’t hurt another wolf unless you had no choice, right?”
Of course. Right. She nodded so hard her neck ached.
“I need you to promise me you’ll try, Nashoba. I know sometimes you may not have a choice, but I need you to promise me for sure these two things: one, you won’t ever hurt Mother or Abequa. Can you promise me?”
“It was an accident,” she whimpered. “I didn’t mean to hurt Mother.”
“It’s okay, it’s okay, you didn’t know,” he soothed, though he left the paces between them empty. “Now you know. No touching, never. Promise?”
“Promise,” she said so breathily she was scared he hadn’t heard, but he had. He sighed, and looked back to the rain. “Good. Second, I need you to promise you won’t follow me. Don’t ever come looking for me, no matter what.”
“What?” Panic gripped her and she took a step forth.
“Stay back!” Father growled, and she froze. “It’s raining! We don’t go out in the rain, Nashoba! That’s one of our special just-for-Nashoba rules, remember?!”
“Uh-huh, sorry,” she tucked her tail between her legs and retreated further back into the cave.
“Promise me.”
“Where are you going?”
“Promise me,” he growled with his eyes closed.
Nashoba was still shaking from the scolding. “I, I,” her eyes were getting misty. She took a deep breath. No crying was another special just-for-her rule. She didn’t want to hear Father yell again. “I promise.”
He sighed finally, and smiled. All the heaviness he’d carried since the day of the accident, the day her eyes had opened for the first time, seemed to fall from his form. “Thank you, whirlwind. I love you, you know that? I love you so much. That’s why I gotta go now.”
“When are you coming back?” She whispered.
“No following.”
“No following,” she repeated, sitting down. “Yes Father.”
“Don’t you cry now. Mother and Abequa will get hurt.”
“Yes Father,” she sniffled.
“Goodbye, whirlwind.”
“Goodbye,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say. He was gone then, running through the rain, lost among the trees.
“I love you too.”
