Rogue Wolf

Chapter Eleven - The Voice of a Rabbit

Hours later, I woke up beneath a vibrant green canopy to see a certain mare glaring intensely at me in a proximity way too close for comfort. I let out a very macho yipe and scrambled back as fast as I possibly could. Still more than a little groggy, I tripped over my own tail and stumbled directly into something fuzzy. Something very warm, very fuzzy, and very, very unfriendly. I could feel the menace coming off of him in waves.

Startled, I scrambled back onto all four paws and looked up to see - you guessed it - Ceraron glaring back at me. He looked furious, eyes blazing and fur ruffled. I saw his lip curl into a snarl, but at the same time his gaze drifted slightly upwards and the snarl died in his throat before he could utter a sound. I didn't have to turn around to know that Pavor had shot him down. The massive beast had a sort of aura about him, so powerful that you could feel his presence without needing to see, hear, or smell him. If he was nearby, you'd know it immediately.

That seemed like it would be both useful and incredibly inconvenient at the same time. After all, how would he be able to sneak up on prey with such an overwhelming presence? Well, here's your answer. Pavor doesn't eat meat. He eats nuts, berries, roots, fruits, and vegetables. Pretty much anything other than meat that is even remotely edible.

Even weirder is that he's not unique in that regard. Where he comes from, nobody eats meat. At all. Whatsoever. In addition, the animals in his home region are gigantic compared to the ones in mine. That's why Pavor scared the wolves so badly. They had never seen such a massive beast before. For those of you looking for an exact estimate, Pavor is so tall that a normal male grizzly's head would just barely reach past his belly. He's a...What's that word humans use again? Ah, yes. A veritable tank if you will. For those of you nonhumans reading this, think of him as being like the Bravand of grizzly bears. I'll talk more about this later, because I'm pretty sure I'm throwing off the flow of this whole narrative. Honestly, I'm just trying to cram in as much as I possibly can before I die. And with that lovely thought, let's move on.

What was I talking about again? Hold on a moment, let me go back a few paragraphs... Okay, got it! We were talking about how Ceraron got shot down by Pavor. Ahem.

Pavor loomed over the both of us, scowling. His dark eyes flicked first to me, then settled on Ceraron. His booming voice rang out, startling a flick of birds into flight. "You. Wolf. What are you still doing here?" he asked, eyes narrowed slightly.

Ceraron tried to draw himself up to appear calm and confident, but looking up at the gigantic grizzly, he couldn't quite pull it off. Instead of standing taller, he instead appeared to visibly shrink. After all, how could one be brave in the presence of a scowling bear so huge you could walk right under his belly without needing to crouch? If I were in Ceraron's situation, I would have balked too.

"I am here for only one reason. This mangy stray is at fault for my expulsion from my pack. I tried to help him, to be noble and honorable and this is how he repays me." Ceraron shot me a baleful look. Yep. He definitely wanted to rip my fur off. That wasn't in question. But I still felt offended.

I won't lie. I was feeling a little bit overconfident knowing that Pavor was on my side. So I stood tall, raised my tail, and looked directly into Ceraron's eyes. "Excuse me? You were the one who walked right into a group of clearly hostile wolves and started getting mad at them. How exactly did you think that was going to turn out? Did you think they'd just apologize and walk away? 'Oh, sorry we murdered your packmate. Your feedback is appreciated and we won't do it again.' Are you kidding me? It's only because of me that you didn't get yourself killed!"

The cream colored wolf, forgetting his fear of Pavor, snarled at me, his rusty fur bristling. "Do you really think I'm that dumb? I knew you were nearby. So did the two other wolves I brought with me," he growled, eyes full of fury. "We were sent to kill you. So we tracked you. They wanted to kill you right then and there. But I figured a dopey idiot like you wouldn't have been able to murder Sly. I saw how ridiculous you were acting when I first met you. That's not how a savage killer behaves. So I hatched a plan to instigate a fight and see if you'd come to my defense. And you did, which was enough for my companions to be convinced of your innocence. They helped me round up the Pack to go and drive out the hostile wolves."

Nobody spoke as Ceraron finished his story. His expression still held rage within it, fixed directly on me. The silence was so heavy that I didn't even register the dead leaf that drifted across my nose. I didn't know what to think of his story. I had thought he was just a bumbling idiot who I ended up having to rescue. But he was there to kill me. It sent a cold shudder down my spine to think that I had been so close to being killed and I hadn't even noticed. I had been so fixed on the Caedes wolves that I hadn't even noticed the ones from Root's Pack. It was unsettling to think that I was so close to death and hadn't realized it. And Ceraron - Ceraron of all wolves was the only one who believed I was innocent.

I felt a grudging sense of respect for this very angry wolf. He had every reason to hate me and no reason at all to help me. But he disobeyed Root's order to kill me and instead put his life in danger to prove I wasn't a murderer. For all he knew, I could have just turned tail and fled. Left him to die. There was no doubt about it. Ceraron was a brave, noble wolf who wasn't afraid to stand up for what he believed to be right. He wasn't the kind of wolf who let personal feelings get in the way of his sense of justice. And he was willing to risk his life to save a wolf he hated. There was no denying it. My opinion of him shot up several notches. No matter what your personal opinion, you had to admit that Ceraron was somebody to be respected.

Just as I was thinking this, Pavor, being Pavor, interrupted both my line of thought and Ceraron's glarefest with a bark of laughter that rumbled like thunder. "Oh yes, I can definitely see that being true. After all, Sleek is quite the bumbling moron." Apparently finding this hilarious, the grizzly slapped the ground with one enormous forepaw, making the ground shudder beneath us. That wasn't spectacular, watching a supposed friend laughing about how dumb I apparently am. It definitely stung.

Still wondering what exactly to make of all of this, I turned to Ceraron and frowned, expecting to see his snarky grin. Instead, I wound up staring at a dark-furred face half covered in long black hairs, about a paw's length from my nose. Both Ceraron and I let out a unified bark of surprise and stumbled backwards. Both of us hit the dirt in an unceremonious heap. It was clear neither of us had sensed the mare approach. She had slipped right between us while we were distracted.

I shot to my feet, shaking off the dry leaves that clung to my fur. Across from me, I could see Ceraron doing the same. The two of us almost mirrored each other, both of us startled, with our fur bristling. Lyna let out a whinny of laughter, tossing her head playfully. Her long mane bounced with the movement, but the forelock that hung across half her face only jostled slightly. The mare's head swung, her single void of an eye taking us both in with amusement.

Then, Lyna spoke. "See? For all that you yell and snarl and bicker, you both reacted exactly the same. You're both wolves and both kind, so let's try not to fight so much." She smiled, and her expression was something I'd never expected from her. It was warm and friendly. Her voice was gentle and quiet. If you took a rabbit and turned it into sound, that's what Lyna's voice sounded like. It was almost unsettling how innocent it sounded. Here was a mare who had just driven pure terror into the hearts of an entire Pack, and her voice reminded me so much of a pup. A tiny pup, asking her littermates to play. That was the purest essence of Lyna's voice. Innocence. Looking at her now, she seemed so much more frail and small than she had before. I had no idea how to react. But something still bothered me. It only took a moment for me to figure out what it was.

I had shaken dry leaves from my coat. In the summer. I looked around, and sure enough, the ground was covered in brown leaves. Even now, they were drifting from the canopy overhead, dancing like a feather in the breeze. The branches rattled like bones in the wind, sounding hollow and empty. I looked back to where we had been standing a moment before and realized that the ground there was also covered with leaves. I didn't know why, but that bothered me. A lot.

Then my eyes stretched wide with realization. These leaves were dry and crunched underpaw. Even now, I could clearly hear Ceraron approach me, each step crushing more leaves with a crisp, audible noise.

Lyna was far bigger and heavier than the both of us. So why didn't we hear her approach?