A Reckoning With Wolves
The wolf did not need to be muzzled or restrained, but it did have to be carried. Frost and wind had taken their toll, and the creature was more than half dead even before its paw had been snared. The stagnant blood it had lain in was probably the only thing that had saved it; thawing the hard ice it had lain upon and attracting the odd crow that had suffered for its greed. Black feathers littered the ground, and the Huntress, displaying some quirk of her unfathomable kind, carefully gathered them before turning her attentions to the matter at hand.
It was only with great reluctance that it submitted to the Human's ministrations; alternately growling and whining as the Huntress handled its wounded paw. Her misgivings made clear, she clucked uncertainly and shook her head the entire time, and was only stopped from running it through when the Hatchling threatened to walk off into the snows and never return.
"You should let her help." The Hatchling said reassuringly in the wolf-tongue. "You'll die if you don't let her close that wound."
"Murderer! Blood-foe!" The wolf spat, whining and licking weakly at is torn paw. "She dresses in the skins of my kin!"
"And you would eat the flesh of hers, if you could." He chided, very much conscious of his own hurts and wishing only to be quickly away.
In the end, the Huntress marched back to the cabin and returned with some sinew and a bone needle, setting about closing the rent with deft fingers in the same manner as she would fix a torn garment. The Hatchling watched and sat upon its head as she worked, lest it try to bite. Just as he was about to give up trying to calm the panicking beast, the surge of adrenaline which had given it strength even to resist petered out and it collapsed into a quivering, comatose heap as the human gave its injury a final look over. She improvised a litter from one of her cloaks and hauled the animal on to it, but the wolf was too weak to hold its own weight and rolled off twice as they dragged the contraption over a hummock, flopping limply into the snow and panting. In the end, with much cursing and swearing, she slung the insensate creature over her shoulder and trudged off irately through the drifts.
They probably made the strangest procession ever seen in that part of the world; a wolfish huntress with an actual, albeit half-dead wolf slung over her shoulder, and a wet-winged dragon hopping on frozen paws through the snowdrifts. The Hatchling could only hope that there was no one around to watch.
"I'm mad. I must be to keep finding m'self in these predicaments." The Huntress muttered to herself dryly. The Hatchling marvelled at the strength in her wiry frame; the creature had to weigh at least as much as she, but she bore its weight with little discomfort. She hitched the wolf up higher on her shoulder and grimaced as it started a high pitched whine.
"First a dragon, and then the damned thing starts talking, and now a bhari wolf! As though the bloody cart horses weren't bad enough." She grumbled through clenched teeth. "If I spend any more time on this mountain I could start me own circus... Quit yer' screeching or I'll turn you into a pair of breeches!"
Her mood did not improve as they reached the lodge, the sour banter intended for her ears only becoming increasingly more punctuated with curses and threats of stretching them both on the drying rack. Scarcely strong enough to protest, the Wolf was deposited unceremoniously on the bare floor where it lay twitching as the Huntress hung up her spear with angry movements, kicking the still smouldering coals of the dead fire back to life and piling wood onto it. The creature patently didn't like being inside the lodge and growled weakly, curling its lips back over yellow teeth and snapping at the Hatchling when he tried to calm it. Its pale eyes held a sunken and glazed countenance; hollow hunger and fear that was disquieting to look upon in the flickering firelight. The Hatchling could not help but be reminded of the time not so long ago it had towered over him, trying to determine if he was good enough to eat.
Despite her loudly voiced misgivings the human went to some pains to bind its wounds tightly in soft linen, and was even persuaded to strip a haunch of deer from the cold-room after the Hatchling badgered her past stubborn indignancy. The prospect of food seemed to do little to brighten the creature, and it huddled all the more tightly into a corner when the joint was proffered, only snatching the thing away once he had retreated to the more secure safety of the Huntress' lap. She suggested they take a wager on whether the animal would survive the night, though by the time she was done explaining to him what a wager was the sun had long sunk behind the mountain, and the creature in question had finally passed out and was snoring nasally in its commandeered corner.
The Hatchling paced uneasily throughout that night. The dirty predatory scent of the wolf so near and thick that it left him unable to sleep. In desperation he even sought out his iron bowl, but to his chagrin found he was now far too large to fit within its familiar, comforting confines anymore. Even the remains of the deer haunch couldn't quell his insomnia and he sat before the door; the freezing draft that whistled under the weathered woodwork cooling his blood enough that torpor stole him into a fitful, dreamless sleep.
He was woken to the sound of the wolf and the Huntress engaged in a bitter, albeit somewhat one-sided argument. It was apparently uneasy to have the bandages on itself and would not relent in chewing them, and would only be cowed when he explained at great length that the wrappings would help it to heal. The realisation that wolves and other creatures of the world had languages of their own came only as a half-shock to the Huntress, who listened intently through the exchange as though trying to decipher the meaning of their growls. No one who spent time around animals, she said, could ever deny that they had their own ways of communication- what surprised her was that it was so complex. Though her human throat could not easily replicate the noises needed for wolf-speech she insisted on ever being near- using the Hatchling as an intermediary to pass on her endless supply of threats against its good behaviour.
As days passed, the rhythm of life on the mountain gradually spiralled wide to include their new addition. The Wolf grew stronger as the week closed, and though it appreciated the heat from the fire and its share of the stews and occasional dried meat, it was only ever grudgingly easy about being indoors when the Hatchling was near. The natural shyness of its race showed most around the human; it whined when she stepped outdoors, and bared its teeth if she came near with her spear. From the moment it had the strength to stand it paced constantly, until at last the Huntress forcibly bound its injured limb in a splint for fear it would never heal. For her part she took to treating it with an air of studied indignancy, as though the solution to being unable to remove the problem was to ignore it. She changed its dressing and feeding it only with rough formality, shouting and making threats with distressing frequency when it fouled the floor. One particularly colourful outburst was a minor revelation in itself, for after threatening to remove certain parts of the hairy animal's anatomy it became apparent that the wolf was a female.
The two seemed constantly at odds; neither could understand the other and relied entirely on the Hatchling to arbitrate between them in what was increasingly becoming an asinine and relentless war of egos and contrived grievances.
And so he learned about negotiation.
Persuading the hard-headed Huntress and the untamed Wolf became something of an art form, as the insults they made would likely inflame tempers until they were at each other's throats. It was almost like lying, but without the guilt; he would pass messages between the two with some alteration, adding or omitting what he thought would help maintain the peace between the natural enemies. It didn't always work and it often happened that he made things worse, for the human constantly threatened to turn the wolf back out into the snow. He put great effort into persuading her otherwise; be it by begging and wheedling or reminding her of her own lessons he was always able to get her to relent. The Huntress would sigh and tickle his chin, casting dark glances at the wolf if it looked likely to gnaw at its restraints.
Sometimes the natural enmity between the two proud hunters was too much to bear and he would wander alone in the snow, though he made sure to be more aware of his surroundings. Birds emerged from their winter sleep and set up a cacophony of noise wherever he passed, and black fan-tailed grouse kicked up clouds of snow, their bass voices shrieking alarm if ever he came near. Occasionally he passed traps the Huntress had laid out in the underbrush; markedly smaller now and baited with greenstuff fit only for snagging hares, which he would retrieve and take along with news of the forest back to the lodge. The offerings were well received by the Huntress, who he would lead to the deer herds and flush into a clearing so that she might spear one. They would wedge the kill in the fork of a tree, and the air would be filled with the sound of her bawdy singing as the kill was gutted, skinned and quartered ready for the pot.
The Hatchling would treasure those moments for the rest of his life; the easy camaraderie and contentment he had with a human who had saved him against her race's impulses and her own common sense. He would look out across the distant horizon as he eagerly devoured the offal of their kills, never once wondering what lands lay beyond the endless peaks.
Sadly, he knew those timeless early days would not last forever. Spring was here, and it seemed the sun lingered longer in the sky with every passing day. Snow arrived in thick, periodic gales rather than a constant light fall, and there were other changes. The frozen majesty of the sleeping world began to awaken and come alive once again; crows called and flitted from tree to tree, greedily seeking the remains of winter's toll in the receding snows, and sometimes frogs would crawl unexpectedly from deep drifts and hop torpidly across the surface. They made a pleasing change from the hares, which were getting harder to catch and more stringy as they grew. More often now the Hatchling found himself covered in freezing water melt than snow dropped from branches, and the prey seemed flightier and more full of energy. Sometimes melting snow would avalanche; high up and far off, but the stampeding clouds and the trail of destruction they left in their wake were quite visible across the panorama of peaks. He feared the same might engulf them in a deluge of frosty death, though the cabin had been cleverly sited on one of the few pieces of nearly flat land in the mountains so that it was far more likely the snow would fall to either side of their plateau than engulf it directly.
The wolf grew too; lack of exercise and regular meals filling out its lean midsection. The creature was often to be found curled before the fire, and could hobble about now on its stiffened leg, sneaking a lap of blood from the cool-room or even tidbits the Huntress left from her meals. It seemed less aggressive, and would sometimes go outside and pace around, sniffing here and there though never straying very far. The Hatchling enjoyed the sight of its brilliant blue eyes; the only splash of colour against the drab, monotone hues of the outside. He found that it would tolerate him running rings around it, nipping at its feathery tail and pouncing at its sides in his more spirited moments, and it would sometimes awkwardly join in the play; always careful to keep its stiff leg away from the melee. The human would often come outside to watch them frolic, frowning at first, but gradually her face warmed and she could be seen to smile.
When one day out foraging they came upon the earliest flowers struggling through the snow, he knew it would soon be time to leave.
The hunting all but stopped, and the musty pieces of furniture that dominated the inside of their cabin took on a life of their own. The Huntress would stack the gathered hides into bundles nearly as tall as she and load them into crates along with all the other necessities of life in the mountains, which would remain here until next winter, awaiting her return. Barrels of dried meat would be un-stacked as their contents checked and she busied herself repairing the aging timbers, working long hours with a hammer and arch saw beside the curing rack. What intrigued him most though was the sled. It was a large thing that had stood covered and immobile in the corner since before the Hatchling had cracked his shell, and now the Huntress attended to it feverishly; rubbing fats and rendered oil into the sturdy wood until it gleamed. There were no beasts to pull it, but the downhill trip to the lowlands would take only a little effort on the well-kept skis. From there she would travel to the markets of the towns, using a wagon and horses kept at great expense through the winter months in more hospitable climes.
The two animals were swept up in the bustle and found themselves put to work; The Hatchling could scramble easily up to the roof with a bucket of tacks clenched in his jaws, and with a little chivvying the Wolf was persuaded to fetch tools or wood, and help the dig deep holes into which the cesspit was gradually emptied through several pungent days. Though it still walked with a limp its wounds were mostly healed: it would forevermore bear a ring of naked skin where the deadly snare had bitten deep, but the cut had been clean enough that with care the veins and muscle had knitted back together. That it still lived was a minor miracle in itself, that it hadn't succumbed to gangrene or blackrot doubly so. It also raised a conundrum- one that over the course of several weeks the Huntress had awkwardly avoided addressing.
"We'll be going into human territory." The Huntress told him tersely, after he badgered her over the issue for the twentieth time in as many days. "I don't ken if you've any idea what a city is like, but it's nay a good place for a young dragon. If they knew what you were they'd skin you alive and sell your bones to some alchemist. People are just like that, always attacking what they don't understand." She added, angrily forestalling any argument. He had proven he could behave civilly around her, why would other humans reject the evidence before their very eyes? It made little sense.
"There'll be no argument. I don't want to see bits of you over the city gate; you're not coming."
"Then where am I supposed to go?" He responded sulkily. Though in theory the Dreams would provide him with all the knowledge he would ever need, they had all but ceased. He had a creeping suspicion that this cosy life indoors before a warm fire had tamed some part of his inherently feral nature; though intelligent, dragons were as different from humans in mind as body. He even occasionally caught himself thinking like a human- something that he found positively disturbing, but made him all the less eager to confront the world alone.
"You're a dragon, you've wings don't ye?" She thought for a moment. "What about those funny family-mind things of yours, them dreams? I thought ye saw places and other dragons in 'm?"
He extended his wings and gave an experimental flap; instinct and restlessness compelled him to do it now and again. Though pretty, his wings were little more than large leathery ornaments and endlessly caught on branches or got in the way, and were good only for blowing dust off the mantle or wafting away wolf-smell.
"Even if I had the faintest idea how to fly, it will be years before I could manage it." He said miserably. "And as for the dreams, they're useless. They don't come to me so often any more now that I'm out of the shell. For all I know that could have been centuries ago; they give no perception of time or place."
"Well bugger it, what are we supposed to do? You're getting too big to feed on a forester's keep and you can't hide in the city, not like you can in the forest. The first jowl-faced mutt to cross tracks will sniff ye out. An' even supposing I could get this lot flogged off before some guardsman sticks ye, what then? I work carpentry in the plains through the summer months and then it's back to the mountain before the corn is struck.
"I took you in as a kindness little drake, and a curiosity. Dragons manage in the wild, I'd intended to see you into the world and maybe pay back a little of what I've taken." She gestured to the piles of pelts and meat. "I never expected you'd be smart enough to back-answer me when I heaved your egg from under the dead dame."
"A curiosity?" He said, leaning into her caress as she scratched his ear-fins
"Aye, your kin are rare in the world. Keep to the wild places mostly, though they come into civilised lands sometimes if the winters are hard. So little is known about dragons that the bookish types in the plains think they don't exist. I know rumours of a few, seem to like the lands far down in Cimeria where there's warmth." She chuckled. "Not much of that here, so I figure there isn't always truth in farmhand's tales. Still, it would be better for you there. You wouldn't have to spend half the day in front of a fire just so you can wake up properly."
The Hatchling laid his head on her lap as he ruminated. The prospect of being sent far away to unfamiliar lands was an unappetising one. Even if the chill grated on him in the mountains, it was all he knew.
"I don't want to go." He all but whispered.
"Well tough shit. Trust me, it's for the best. Less'n you want both of us nailed above a Westgarder gate." She ran her fingers down the elastic leather of his immature wings, making him shiver. "I'll take you down the mountain. Five days will carry us into the foothills, barring delays. It's still far enough away that we can part on good terms without an army on your heels." She said, relenting for now, though a brittle edge in her voice let him know this discussion was far from over. "Besides it will be nice to have some help pulling this damn sled for a change."
***
He paid a visit to the icy tomb the before they left the plateau. The work complete, the Huntress had given him leave to wander the woods one final time. In the past he'd avoided the place; scavengers and other hunters had been drawn by the promise of an easy meal, and the air carried with it a forbidding note that he was loath to test since his near miss with the Wolf. Quite why he went he was not sure; preoccupied with fixing the sights and scents of the woods into his memory he failed to notice where his treacherous feet carried him, until his reckless tread disturbed a tiny skull, dislodging the polished whiteness from the soil that had nearly claimed it.
There wasn't much left, either of the tomb or its occupants. Even the crows had moved on and the evil smell he's associated with it was entirely gone; receding ice had exposed all but the rearmost hollow to the bitter elements so that not even hardy bears would find shelter. But even in this place of death, life struggled on. Plants were beginning to push through the loose soil, framing those bones which had been too large for the scavengers to carry off with a wreath of green and flowers, and even a small sapling was struggling besides a gigantic upturned ribcage, furiously growing towards the brightening sun. In a few years this place would be a verdant grove, filled with life once again. It was a cold comfort.
He reverently gathered up the skull and turned it over in his paws, lost in thought. Grief did not come naturally to dragons, that much he knew if little else. But he felt it now; a sharp stabbing twist in his gut like the time he'd chanced upon carrion too rancid for even his robust stomach to handle. Dragons did not recognise their kin, save for a brief time just after hatching. Hatchlings were abandoned to the world from the moment they were strong enough to hunt for themselves, and would live or perish by the vagaries of fate and what wits the Dream lent to them. Familial ties barely existed amongst his race, but... he felt as though he owed some duty to his fallen kindred. Perhaps he thought, maudlin, too much of the human had rubbed off on him, and regretted the notion even as it came.
With some care he scaled the slippery bluff into which his fallen mother had scorched a shelter against the brutal elements, climbing on three legs to where the ice gave way to good solid rock. It took a little time, but with effort he managed to dig a small crevice of his own. It was barely large enough for a bird to perch in, and he slid his sibling's skull into it, blocking it off with lichen-crusted stones until not even the most cunning scavenger would notice. He then took another rock- oh how he wished for a human's nimble hands- and scored a shape into the stone of the bluff, working at it until he was sure the crude outline of a dragon in flight would last for at least a few years to come. Maybe some other dragon would stumble upon it one day and guess what happened here; maybe even his father. The thought gave him some vague comfort.
Duty done and with nothing left to dwell on, he turned and headed for home.
Life goes on, for some.
***
As it turned out, he didn't so much pull as push. The sled was steered by the Huntress, who perched upon the burden at the front end and guided contraption down the mountainside in its own personal miniature avalanche. It was bumpy, barely controllable and its speed varied greatly with the steepness of the path, but at least she was able to keep it from plummeting down into the sheer rocks below (even if there were some scale-raisingly close calls!). Most of the time gravity did the work for him and more than once he was left floundering in the snow when it got away from him; at other times it required concerted effort from both of them to heave over berms and ridges. How she had managed this trip alone he could not even begin to guess.
Strangely, and without invitation, the Wolf came too.
It remained wary of the Huntress and spoke but a little when he pressed it, though the signs of improvement were there for all to see. On the day the human removed its bandage for the last time it vanished into the forest as it was want to do sometimes, but that night it did not return, nor the following night or the night after that. The Huntress said they were well to be rid of it, though he noticed that the words lacked their usual bile.
Its pack dead, it had little chance of surviving alone on the mountain. He had been sorry to see it go but felt that it would be wrong to keep the animal prisoner against its will, even if allowing freedom would mean its death. The final preparations seemed to take all the longer without a third set of paws to take some of the burden, although on the plus side there was more food to go around without a second mammal's ravenous appetite to sate. The issue of the Hatchling's eventual departure did not come up again; indeed, it seemed that the human was actively avoiding speaking on the matter. It was just as well, for the Hatchling had little time to think with his attention needed elsewhere around the cabin. The numerous rat holes were boarded up, and poison laid down at their more frequent haunts. Even the ever-stocked cold room started to look distinctly barren, until finally it too was empty and ordered. Even the gap at the bottom of the door was repaired, and he missed the familiar whistling of the wind through its cracked timbers. When there was nothing left to do, the sled was dragged through outside- a task that took half a day and required much shuffling of furniture and turning the thing on its side- and loaded with the varied boxes, crates and bales that would be needed for the journey into the lowlands. He stood atop the stacks as they slid away; watching the cabin that had been his home as it disappeared behind the trees with an aching, strangely hollow feeling.
His regret at the Wolf's departure was short lived; the three crossed paths again less than an hour later when it limped, lean, muddy and bitten about the face and neck from trees at the side of the path. Rolling her eyes, the human wordlessly pulled the sled to a halt and allowed the animal aboard, slapping the side of an open casket of dried venison from which the two had been eating between pushes. The Wolf tore into the meat ravenously, tail wagging for the first time since he had stumbled upon it in that ill-fated expedition.
At a word the Hatchling jumped down and pushed, digging all four paws into the snow and mud until the sled finally shifted, and then hopped upon it as it gathered speed, ignoring the burningly cold clods of ice thrown up in its wake. Getting it going was the hardest part, and once aboard he could wrap up in furs to preserve the little warmth left in his muscles and set about licking clean the Wolf's wounds. The scrape of the skids and grunting of the Huntress during the pushes made a kind of symphony that in its own way was as sweet as birdsong, and even in the freezing wind the Hatchling could not suppress a tingles of warmth that ran through him knowing that they were together again, or when the human reached across to stroke the Wolf's matted ears.
Quietly at first, but with increasing volume, The Huntress began to sing.
***
They skidded through water older than many civilisations as they made their progress towards the foot hills. The lofty plateaus and thin, spike-leaved trees gave way to narrow ridges, melting glaciers and sheer cliffs that left them exposed to wind and elements. Rivers snaked in glistening coils through these, diverging and converging seemingly at random. The Huntress told him that it was some trick of the melting water washing out fine silts of the floor, giving it the appearance of a half-finished braid. There were roads too. The Hatchling thought it some enormous serpent when he saw one for the first time; far below but already visible- a black, coiling mass working its way through the still-snowy hummocks on the distant valley floor. In parts it was arrow straight, but there were other places that the black faded to brown where wayfarers had to go around some impassable barrier. He learned that once the path had indeed been straight, for the makers- some ancient and long forgotten empire- tunnelled or bridged past obstructions, but that most of these had long since fallen in with wear of time and ice.
Their own path was much narrower and far more dangerous; at times passing between peaks and at others precariously overhung wide valleys far below. The vertigo-inducing careening of the sled was at times thrilling and others terrifying; a single misplaced turn and they would find themselves in air, with only jagged stone to break their fall. The Huntress refused to allow them to speak as they moved through these, and tested her footing carefully so that their journey slowed down to a snail's pace.
It wasn't too long before her reasoning became clear; falling torrents of snow had swept aside trees, stones and earth further down the valley to reveal soft bedrock riddled with caves and out-flows of meltwater. Picking a path through the river of rubble took the better part of two days, and all three had to take turns carefully digging to clear the way. The task was arduous, for the snow was far from the powdery whiteness that fell and lay thick in the plateau; this was a shattered, solid mass of frozen crust as hard as the stones it had uprooted and dragged from the mountain slopes. The Hatchling often found it easier to simply move chunks of the out the way than to try to break it up or tunnel through it.
As night fell they would huddle up close around a meagre fire, wrapped tight in skins to preserve the little warmth their muscles worked up through the labour. Almost as though the ground itself were apologising for the wear on scale and claw, they managed to unearth the crushed remains of a mountain goat which made a pleasant change from the endless supply of tough jerky. Pitiless weather hampered their attempts at crossing the devastation, though when they finally broke through to higher, safer ground that the icefall had not touched it was all the Hatchling could do to remain composed. Looking back over their treacherous path, he was horrified to see that in two whole days they had crossed no more than five hundred meters.
It was a relief to finally be on the way again.
The next day they made good progress through one of the few hanging valleys that were flat enough to offer an almost clean slide if one avoided the meltwater channels. The Wolf bounded ahead, its tongue lolling happily like an oversized hairy dog as it frolicked, chasing everything that moved and setting the entire forest to alarm. The Huntress was humming to herself contentedly when she suddenly took a queer aspect and poked his snout, waking him from torpid daydreaming.
"What is your name?"
"Name?" He murmured sleepily, blinking brightness out of his eyes.
"You know, what you call yourself? Like, my name is Cynwise; that's how I'd be known to other humans."
He cocked his head, wondering if this was another trick question, like the riddles she sometimes told.
"You can't seriously tell me ye don't have a name." She said, looking put out.
"I don't think so," He replied tentatively. "How does one go about getting a name in the first place?"
"Your parents usually give you one when you're born, although in your case I guess that might be a bit of a problem." She said, sucking her teeth. "I should've given you one, thinking about it. I've been too long from human lands if I'm forgettin' the basics like that. Ye need a name." She said, poking him again. "I don't s'pose you have any dragonish insight into what you call yourselves?"
"None," He said, searching his inherited memories. "I think we usually go more by smell and scale pattern."
"Buggerit, I can't keep thinking of you as some kind of pet when you're brighter than I am. How's about I give you a list and you pick one you like?"
"That... sounds reasonable." He chanced, not really sure. She ran through a list of names, some he recognised as being from the fables she told; some were human names, others from heroes and monsters or sages. When he asked for a demonstration of how a name would be applied she called the Wolf over to her, which returned looking pleased with itself and a hare hanging limply between her jaws.
"You'll be... Thrymja. A nice name. It means 'thunder' in the old tongue, since your coat looks like a stormy sky." She said, leaving the Wolf looking rather nonplussed but happy when the Hatchling translated.
"What's that mean, hey?" The Wolf, newly Thrymja, said as she spat out the hare. "More mannish nonsense?"
"Probably," The Hatchling said, "although I get the feeling it might be important. I think it's meant to be a kind of honour."
"Oh. That's good is it?" Thrymja said, wagging her tail.
The Hatchling sat and considered what his name should be, occasionally asking the Huntress to explain what they meant or the meaning behind them. Some of them were all but unpronounceable to him and he discounted those immediately, as he did others in languages he did not understand since he felt that introducing himself as 'Osedax' would be all well and good to humans in these mountains, but would likely not have the same effect on southerners to whom it meant 'bone-eater'.
It was a question he gave little thought to as the sled continued on its ponderous journey down the mountain glens. He couldn't really care less what the Huntress called him, but she repeatedly stressed the importance of a name amongst humans and he decided that it would be best to find a suitable one. He turned and nosed Thrymja's hairy flank.
"How did you get all those bites?" He said. "By the look of it you got brain-frosted and tried to bring down a bear."
"Don't like to say." She said, laying her ears flat on her skull.
"Go on, it'll pass the time. It's not as though you're going to anger me." He said, his curiosity prickled.
"Oh, very well then. I tried to get in with another pack." She said, looking slightly shamefaced.
"Of wolves?"
"No, snow leopards. What else hey?" She nipped at his wing. "Northern wolves. Scavengers come south from the tundra. They wouldn't have me. 'Not old enough for breeding and too hamstrung for hunting' they said. So I went away. And then found a goat in the thawing snow to fill my belly. Didn't take too well to foraging on 'their' land and chased me off."
"That doesn't explain how you got so torn up."
"It was the territory of my old pack they were living on." She said, looking strangely ashamed for an animal without much facial mobility. "I knew the land better. I thought I'd make a stand, maybe try to put my pack back together. Was lucky to get away with my throat intact. I didn't realise how much better it was with the two of you until I tried to go it alone."
"I'm glad you did, hey." He said, mimicking its odd inflections with a nuzzle, regretting it nearly immediately when he caught a whiff of the wolf's fur.
"As am I." She said. "You're an odd one Scaly. You have the smell of something that should be twenty times as big. Want some of this hare? There's plenty more where it came from."