Wolves of the Beyond: Cougar Wolf

A First Encounter

        Maya led the way out of the den, noticing how exhausted Tann looked. Basil shot ahead, and Plumb walked right beside her mom. Tann lagged behind.

        "For Roloc's sakes, are you okay Tann?"

        "Yeah..." Tann yawned. "I'm fine..."

        "Are you sure, we can always wait another day?"

        "Yeah, I'm sure."

        Maya feared she would lose Tann, so she kept with Tann's pace. Tann walked with an odd gait, and when three of her paws pointed foward in the mud, on always pointed back. Maya found it intriging.

        "Mum, what do you call this place, y'know, where we live? Like how we call our home a den, and our den is in the mountains."

        "This is called the outtermost. Very few wolves actually come here, dear, and when they do, they most certainly aren't decent wolves."

        "What is the difference?"

        "Decent wolves are like you, and undecent wolves are...well, bad wolves."

        "Oh, okay." She said this as though Maya's answer had indeed answered all her questions. But Tann still couldn't be too sure what Maya meant exactly. A roar suddenly came from about a half-mile away. Maya quickly, quietly began to round up her cubs and Tann, then she herded them back to the den. Too late. The bear was upon them...

        Tann's dream caught up with her from a couple weeks ago. She kept running, but couldn't run quickly enough. Her paws couldn't carry her fast enough. She stopped around a cliff, but instead of being at the top of it like she had in her dream, she was at the bottom of it. Basil and Plumb by her side.

       At least they're with me here. She thought to herself. She watched as Maya fought on bravely, and took her chance while the bear had to rest, to leap toward her cubs and one by one she lifted them to saftey. They watched from the tree in which they had been placed in. Maya knew bears could climb trees, but this tree was too small for a bear of this size.

        Plumb shook with fear. Basil clung so tightly to the branch that Tann was sure he would dig his way right through it. Tann's heart beat so hard it knocked againster her ribcage, a bone prison to the heart as it tried to escape.

        By my guts, I can already sense who'll win this battle! Tann thought. She watched on and on, Maya facing a bear. The bear was twice her size. Wolves with ragged pelts began to surround the area. Maya seemed to want to flee more than anything. But the wolves nipped at her and forced her back to battle. She might swipe at them here and there with her massive paws. Are these the wolves of which are undecent? Turalann began to see exactly what Maya had meant by "undecent wolves".

        The bear began to swing his paws, too. A cougar and a bear, such a deadly team, and yet, such great enemies. Maya and the large, female brown-bear fought for their lives. The wolves outnumbered them, but they did not know how to work together. For now, cougar and bear would fight side by side, back to back, paw-in-paw. Eventually the wolves began to scatter, and both the golden-eyed brown-bear and the blue-eyed cougar gave up in their fight and parted ways.

        Maya came back and placed them down from the tree and onto the ground. She now had a slight limp, and Tann heard Maya curse something beneath her breath. They all walked home toward the den.