But Some Survived

It was a battlefield. 

Old blood, still gummy and only half-dried, littered the grasses. Chunks of fur and rent skin were scattered among scratched-up soil and in two places, the body of a slain wolf could be seen. One wolf had died where it had been attacked; it had struggled, mightily, its paws clawing uselessly against the dusty ground until its last breath was forced out and into the cold night sky. The other wolf had dragged itself, pulling and heaving its damaged body underneath a shaggy juniper shrub where it had slowly, gradually, passed away. On each of these two bodies, the marks of battle with other wolves was unmistakable. On the ground, around the fallen, the signs of a fight between a small family pack and a team of vicious raiders became clear.
 
There was more to this battlefield. There were survivors.
 
The raiders had lived. The victims in the two dens nearby, at least some of them, had survived to escape and scatter. But there were so many tracks, so many scents of fear and blood and death… Wolves of strong hearts and keen senses would be needed, or else those few survivors would remain lost, or be chased down by the predators who had come to fight and kill...

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 She had been up, searching for breakfast for herself and for Rosencrantz. The benefits of group living. Someone to aid you, as she did now. In her mouth was a large white goose, killed easily while the others had scattered. It wasn’t the biggest meal but it was enough for them to get going in the morning. She prepared to head back… but then, the scent of blood and death lingered in her nostrils. It had not been here before.

 Two things warred in her mind, a fight between turning around and walking the other way… and searching for any injured. After a moment, the latter won out. She walked forward, on guard with a bristling coat. When the scene came into view, she dropped the goose and kicked snow over it. There was a story here. A terrible one, full of death and carnage and now, confusion for her. The scene was too chaotic for her to chase down footprints. Would she even want to? What if she were attacked? What if she were attacked for being here? Her face, impassive as always, slowly drew a frown that creased her brow. She walked up to the first wolf, slain on the earth. She touched them but found that there was no life. Yes, her former assumption as correct, all dead… and yet…

 Chaotic as this was… something was amiss.

 She looked towards a couple of dens, ears tilted forward. This scene… it was familiar and yet it was not. Just like meeting Monroe, it jogged something in her. A different place, a different time. She placed a paw over her head, a headache starting to form. She grunted and then let out a gruff bark. She felt, well, she felt that it was appropriate. That there was more to this scene.

 Just as there had been in another life.

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The corpse that Blackfoot touched was only wounded in one place. There were no bites along its sides, and its paws had no signs of trauma. The broken neck was the only sign of the violence that had ended it. An ambush victim, perhaps the first to die. It was a male, maybe one of the only adult males who remained at the dens with the mothers and… with their pups. 

This tiny pack of two families had begun rearing pups at around the same time, but none of the young had grown enough to range out on their own. Tiny pawprints in the dirt and clusters of snow could be seen, though their trails were broken by the fighting and the fresh snowfall. Normally the little ones might have remained in the dens during a fight, but a mother must have brought them out to flee. Sacrifices must have been made here to stall the raiders enough so that the pups could escape. Or, at least, so that most of them could escape. The second adult wolf who had crawled under the juniper was not alone under the bushy, scraggle-leafed plant. A slain pup was also there, likely grabbed during their attempted flight and quickly killed, before being hurled away. The raiders didn’t appear to have returned to eat any of these bodies, and even the carrion-birds of the colder lands hadn’t yet flown in.
 
At Blackfoot’s gruff bark, there was no vocal reply, but there was just the tiniest sound… The rustling of snow, as if a pile of it had been disturbed, and the outer crusted layer of frozen ice had broken away and tumbled. Blackfoot’s eyes might spot the movement of the pile, and of something small that had been dropped or thrown into a snowback, and which was now twitching or stirring at the sound of a wolf’s bark.
 
Under the snowpile, a gray-furred female wolf pup, just barely old enough to begin ranging out of the den on her own, but only half-conscious. She had been hurled here, after being snatched up in the gripping jaws of a raider. The bite had been quick, too quick to kill, but strong enough to pinch her around the middle and back. She was bruised, and in pain, but she wasn’t dying yet… Her eyes were shut to the world, but she was alive...

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I looove this scene setting that you’re doing. It’s awesome.

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 She looked and observed, taking in the information that she could. Noting that the order of which that first wolf was killed. She could scent the fresh smell of pup and looked at the bush, noting the wolf and the pup. A flash of anger lit into her body, hot and red. Who would stoop so low as to kill pups and fleeing mothers? Not even her own mother had ever done such an abhorrent thing.

 Revulsion and disgust coursed through her as she expected nothing to answer her bark. There was nothing here but dead bodies and terrified memories.

 She had started to turn away but she heard the sound, the movement. She looked and there, easing her way out of a snow-covered pile was a she-pup. Her eyes widened in disbelief.

 A pup… was alive…

 There was a flash in her vision, another pup, another time. That one was a dark shadow compared to the light gray of this ones pelt. The blue she-wolf shook her head and the vision was gone with a sharp pain in her head.

 What on earth was happening? What’s more… she felt a pull. She couldn’t leave this pup here. Not alone. Not with no way to survive. It was a death sentence and though she was not above a lot of things. Leaving someone so innocent in this world all alone was not something she would want to do. She couldn’t do it, for reasons unknown to her.

 She turned around and made her way to the youngster, eyes intent on her form to see if there were any injuries but thus far there seemed to be nothing. Her head lowered with the intent to sniff them and search a bit closer, careful not to touch. She didn’t know much about pups, not anything at all… or at least, she didn’t think that she did. Why then was this so familiar?

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There was no blood, and no puncturing visible through the still-downy and light-gray pup fur. Still, the pup was only half-awake, shivering in an ugly mixture of pain, fear and cold. The marks of the raider’s teeth would bruise, were bruising, but her young body would recover, and no bones were broken. The frigid snow and the shock were the greatest dangers for now. Blackfoot’s sniff would confirm a female, cold and frightened. Its heart was beating, and it was breathing, low and quick.
 
Two dark eyes opened, staring straight forwarding into the snowdrift. She was awakening, her ears twitched, and her sides moved more rapidly. It hurt to breathe, but she had to keep breathing, so she worked through the lung-straining agony. She looked just slightly to the side, up at Blackfoot. She saw dark fur, the mismatched ears, and a face that appeared to be working through more than one emotion. What the pup did not see was slavering jaws, opening to bite down and finish what the raiders had begun. She did not see the light brown fur that all the raiders shared. She did not hear their words, their promises.
 
Not a raider.
 
Perhaps this black-furred wolf was an opportunist looking to make a meal out of an abandoned youngster? Possible, but there was no drool dripping down from her jaws, no flash of hunger in the eyes of the standing stranger.
 
But there were emotions in those eyes.
 
The she-pup attempted one weak wag of her tail, flopping the little appendage in the briefest sign that she was alive, and in a desire to express something to this stranger, to communicate, as her breath was fully occupied doing all it could to keep her going.

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 There was no obvious injuries that the she-wolf could see but she was no healer. What she could see was the shivering which she assumed was from the cold. The pup was breathing quickly but the blue wolf chalked that up to fear.

 What to do now?

 She worked through it logically. If the pup was cold… then she would likely need to be warmed. If she needed to be warmed… then the easiest method was to do so by way of warming her with her own fur.

 The idea made her uncomfortable as she didn’t like others touching her. However, it was a sacrifice that had to be made if she wanted to save the pup’s life. She would clear away a less bloody spot in the snow and then would move back over to gently grab the pup with some hesitance. Whereupon she would lie down and place the pup at her side, to curl around her and offer warmth with her coat. It felt… strange… The touch of someone else. The breathing that she could feel. As a pup herself she never slept curled up with her own mother and any touch was always negative. She looked away from the gray pup, eyes focusing on the horizon as she kept watch while she curled further around the shivering mass of fur.

 It was uncomfortable, but it was also something that was, again, familiar. As if she’d done this before. She glanced back down at the pup, wondering if this was helping at all.

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Arncine’s eyes hardly left the face of the adult wolfess. The pup was attempting to resolve something in her mind; the goal of this other, this rescuer. Thinking about the now helped to hide away the thoughts of the before, even as Arncine’s own nose betrayed her by bringing in the stink of old blood and the fear of the fight. As Blackfoot herself ruminated on memories of her own mother, and how they never slept like this, Arncine experienced similar maternal thoughts. She immediately tried to push those memories away; the den, her mother, her siblings, all too tied to what had happened, to the battle, to the blood… 

The she-pup blinked, and refocused on Blackfoot. Dark eyes stared out through equally dark fur, wondering, questioning…
 
They seemed to ask Blackfoot… “Who are you? Why are you helping me?”

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 She looked down at the pup that was peering through her fur, her own eyes held nothing but a faint glimmer of curiosity. The pups eyes were dark, were questioning. She didn’t need to hear the words, she already knew what they were asking. It was similar to how she and Rosencrantz were able to speak with no or very few words.

 But here? What did she have to say? She helped the pup because it was the right thing to do, because she couldn’t just leave a child to die. She felt obligated –and pushed by something in her past—to do something to aid her. Was that a sufficient answer? Who cared about the why anyway?

 She didn’t give the why but she gave something else. ”Am Blackfoot.” Matter-of-factly, as if she were talking to an adult and not a child. ”Your name?” She was being generous by adding the “your”, normally she was a lot more frugal with her words. Could this pup even talk? Was she at that age to even remember such things? She didn’t know the first thing about pup care despite her strange visions and feelings of deja-vu.

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Blackfoot went off somewhere and though it wasn't unusual for the two to split off as they travelled, it was about time for him to check in on his companion and make sure they were still travelling in the same direction. Following her trail with his nose to the ground, he'd pick through the snow and what little he could see of her trail upon the snow until finally coming across a sight he was less-than-pleased to see.

The smell of blood filled the air, and the sight of the child and corpses around painted a pretty clear picture of what had happened here. “It isn't our duty to care for it.” He'd say coldly, but calculated. Miriam was one thing with her own children and the older Ivar, but this child was barely the same. They were travellers without a home, no place to raise a dying child who had already gone through tragedy.

Children were abandoned, orphaned and killed on a regular basis. They couldn't stop and try to rescue them all, their job would never come to an end. “Come, let it join its family in the afterlife.” There was a thought of mercy there, they could finish it here and now as opposed to letting life sink its ugly claws into it through days and nights of torture; but if Blackfoot couldn't do that, letting nature takes its course as the next best thing.

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The tiny thing was warming now, the body heat flushing through her shaking body until it finally reached her core. The snow seemed far away. The sounds of barking, snarling, the shouts and the threats were far. The vision of her mother, her siblings… All far. Just this one face above her, looking down. And she spoke! She gave her name! Blackfoot was the name of this rescuer, and she asked for a name in return. 

The she-pup opened her mouth, croaked a little, and then shut it. Her voice refused her. She opened her mouth again, pushing the air out, but something else threatened to come with it; a shriek, or a cry, or both. Bottled up horrors demanded their right to spill over and gush out, and the pup couldn’t handle that yet, couldn’t think about it, so she swallowed it back down so that she could speak with only her own voice…
 
And then Rosencrantz was there. And then Rosencrantz spoke. A cold calculation was made, and then declared. The she-pup considered the words, as far as she could understand them. ‘It isn’t our duty’, he had said. ‘It isn’t our duty to care for it’. The words sank in as deeply as the heat from Blackfoot, and the older female’s question was lost in the swirl. It wasn’t their duty, was it? Who were these two wolves, who had stumbled into this bloodbath? The pup had never seen nor smelt them before, and they weren’t raiders, so what interest could they have in the plight of a wounded juvenile?
 
Rosencrantz suggested a plan of action. The pup didn’t know the ‘afterlife’, but to join its family… It knew what had happened to its family, even as it tried to hold the red memories at bay. To join them meant… to go into that place of loud noises and white teeth and struggling endings. It would be a reasonable thing, for two wolves with no ties to the pup or her pack, to simply walk on by.
 
The pup herself didn’t know what she wanted. She could extend her neck, ask for a swift bite. It would be more merciful than a starving, wasting death, or a mauling at the hands of the returning raiders. If she had the will, she could try to stand, and bravely show these two wolves that she could walk on her own, and that she was worth the sense of duty that the white-furred male declared they were missing. But either act, submitting to death or standing to live, required a will and a desire that the pup was completely void of. She simply did not know.
 
The young wolf looked up, gingerly turning its bruised neck to scan the one-eyed, badly scarred face of the huge white male. What had come to pass to leave such marks… That was not the mark of tooth or claw, as far as the pup could tell. Some other force, something the pup had never seen had marred the visage of this white-furred creature. They both had marks, didn’t they? The female, her ear, the male his eye and the side of his face. They had both come away from something that had scarred them, perhaps in more ways than one. So, too, had the pup come away from something, had lived through that moment of screams and crimson stains so that she could…
 
Could what?
 
She did not know. But she had lived. Her heart was still beating, and her lungs kept breathing, so...
 
Foolishly, the pup summoned what little energy she had in her body, the reserves of the reserves after her heart had pounded and her body had been lifted and squeeze and hurled into the freezing snow, after hours in the snowdrifts. She brought this energy to bear, and in the midst of Blackfoot’s warming fur, the pup stood. She couldn’t speak, but she wouldn’t cry, even with the pain. She kept her mouth shut, and remained standing. If she would die at the fangs of these wolves or others, or if she would be left behind, the solution to a cold calculation, she would do both standing on her own four paws.
 
She looked at Blackfoot, and Rosencrantz, having no choice but to let them decide.

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 Blackfoot frowned, a subtle expression when nothing but wordless noise escaped the pup's mouth. It seemed as if she were old enough to understand but for some reason or other she could not enunciate words. If the pup was to come with them then that might make it difficult to get her attention if she had no name. They couldn't very well just call her "the pup" or "pup", could they? 

 The sound of approaching pawsteps captured her attention and no sooner had she laid eyes on her travel companion, did she hear the words come from his mouth. Others might have balked at his words, or become enraged at their callousness... but Blackfoot considered their logic. They didn't have to care for the pup. She wasn't theirs and it would be no trouble but to get up and walk off. 

 Yet... she could not sentence to death this creature that clung so desperately to life against all odds. 

 There was a heavy silence in the air, as she did consider his words for those few moments. And in those moments, the pup acted. Blackfoot's attention was grabbed as she felt the movement and witnessed this bedraggled pup rise to her paws, some determination there to stand against --or for-- dying. 

 Either way, this motion earned the blue wolf's respect and she was even more secure in her decision. She would let out an approving "hm" at the youngster but then would say, "Lie down. Rest. Get warm. Stop wasting energy." Then she would look to Rosencrantz and the words she spoke next were for him but also for the currently nameless pup to reassure her. "Won't die today." No, there would be no mercy killings this day. "She's strong. Would be a waste of life." Strong and as far as she could tell, uninjured beyond being cold. 

 "Not our duty... but will care for her anyway." Because when she looked at this pup, there was something more to her.

  And something more to herself.  

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The pup rose from Blackfoot's care and stepped forward, eyeing the archangel with nothing but a look. The silent guardian offered nothing in return other than a dismissive coldness. He didn't hate pups or wish harm on them for no reason, however, it was illogical to think they could care for someone so young that didn't belong to them. That they didn't wish to bring through their own actions, but instead someone else's burden they failed to raise.

Even if that failure wasn't met with the best of efforts to attain that goal. Sometimes, your best just wasn't good enough.

Blackfoot spoke back. “Why?” Pale lips quivered with an annoyance toward her decision. Why were some so keen, so willing to take on youth that wasn't theirs? “We cannot save them all. That is the way of life.” Her parents failed to provide a safe place to raise their youth, and so nature reared its ugly head to weed out those who weren't prepared for the worse.

It was why most joined packs in order to raise a family.

“The road is no place to raise a pup. Quality over quantity must be taken into account.” His honeyed stare hardened with this.

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The pup struggled with which path to take; even in this one simple moment, the choice was symbolic, and too complex for her to completely understand. 

If she sat down, returning to the warmth of Blackfoot, she’d be showing that she needed that support, that she had to stop and rest and get warm. Such an act might only give Rosencrantz further evidence that she would be a burden on the road. Proof that she wouldn’t survive without coddling and care and previous energy.
 
And if she were proven a burden, truly if she were a burden on these two, it would mean death. It would mean being left behind if not now, then in a day along their travels.
 
Standing also meant defying one of these two wolves, ignoring her command. Previously, with her true mother, this pup would have never imagined ignoring a demand but… That mother was gone. And that puppy was gone as well, wasn’t she? The ignorant youth she had been, playing and nipping and dozing off as she grew, was there only yesterday but… That was gone. In her place was a creature who needed to stand, and remain standing, and survive this ‘road’, even if she didn’t know what that meant, because if she didn’t, and if she failed, she’d die and become yet another corpse on this battlefield of her former family.
 
So the pup remained standing. She bopped her little head into Blackfoot in a show of affection, but she stayed up on her four feet, with the merest quiver. Rosencrantz remained an intimidating thing, but he was a thing that had survived. The pup knew that if she meant to survive, she’d likely be earning some scars of her own.

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 Why? That was a good question. The best question he could have asked... and yet, she had no reason as to why. It should have been simple to come up with an answer, to explain away the bad decision this likely was... but she couldn't. It was just a feeling, a need, that she had to take care of this child. Could she explain the sense of deja vu? No. Because it was illogical and senseless. Some silly emotion as that shouldn't dictate her actions to take care of this child. It would be simple to end her life right here and save her from a life of hardships. It'd likely be the kind thing to do in the long run. 

 But she couldn't.

 She knew even that she'd fight Rosencrantz for this child... but she still didn't know why. It was stupid, a bad decision, pointless... and yet, she still felt like she was obligated to do it. 

 So, she couldn't answer the why and let the dead space ring between them without a word. Although she could answer the other things. "Yes... but I'll save this one." There was a hardness in her gaze as she looked at him. Her mind had been made up. If he wanted to leave her because of this, then so be it. It was her line in the sand. And then, equally as determined, she said, "We'll find a pack." Because he was right. Quality over quantity for sure. They couldn't easily raise a pup alone, but a pack could. It was what she wanted anyway, to find a permanent place to live where there was backup. The logical solution. The pup was only fasttracking this. 

 Speaking of the pup.

 She felt a nudge against her neck and on instinct she tensed, growled, and turned sharply to the tiny being with a glare. 

 She hated being touched. Especially when she wasn't expecting it.

 Why wasn't she lying down again, anyway? 

 "Lie. Down." And this time there was a hint of an impatient growl as she snapped at the pup. She didn't like repeating herself. "You will come to no harm." She would make sure of it.

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There was a thought... as brief as it was, to snatch the pup here and now and end this all with one swift blow. Blackfoot would hate him for it, and blood of someone so young would be on his paws - but in the end it was mercy. To prolong their suffering, the reminder of heir families being taken away from them, to be the only survivor and live among strangers on a hard road they travelled. What life was that for a little girl?

Mercy wasn't always kind or beautiful - but it was right.

The muscles in his jaws tightened, readying to strike. His features twisted with the signature movement of skin and muscle readying for the inevitable, only stopped by the girl moving closer to Blackfoot in a sign of... well whatever that was. Appreciation? Affection? They didn't know one another, how could such strong emotions be created so swiftly?

He'd have to go through her.

To save Blackfoot from herself, from a terrible decision he would have to forcefully take it away from her jaws he was certain would reach back in defiance. Hackles raised and in an instance - he turned away with a frustrated snarl. A guttural growl with warning dripped from his words. “She is your responsibility. Not ours.” He would not be saddled again with someone else's luggage.

“She will eat your share, if you need more, it is on you to find it.” If she wanted to take in this stray, she would have to put in the effort that he was unwilling to give. Though glad he didn't have to bloody his maw with the blood of someone so young... so innocent, he feared for her future. Of what this one would become without proper parents, the damage that had been done to her psyche.

With a snort, he walked off. Not wanting to look in their direction any longer and stormed off to brew elsewhere.

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The growl! The she-pup immediately ducked down, all her instincts demanding she show submissive behaviors. Her ears lowered, she turned her head, all as if to say “Okay, okay, I give, I surrender”. She sat right down as ordered, not knowing if she had made her point, and hardly sure whether it was the right point to make. She dropped down, and… and it was warm… And being close to this new adult made her feel safer. Safer from… what?
 
Oh… safer from the memories…
 
She had no way of knowing the thoughts in Rosencrantz’ mind, but there was a truly valid question there. ‘What life was that for a little girl?’ Surely not the one that lay ahead. To be so young, still only half-trained, with who knows what kinds of bloody nightmares ready to trouble her sleep, to face threats with barely any tools to fight back, and all under the tutelage of imperfect guardians… What kind of life was that?
 
It was life, at least. It wasn’t falling into a frozen sleep in the snow, heart rate fluttering down, lungs giving up, body giving in to the cold. Maybe the Rosencrantz ending would have been kinder. But it wouldn’t have been life.
 
Rosencrantz made his declarations about responsibility, his words about a ‘share’, and finally the snort as he departed, the question on his mind… What would she become?
 
What indeed...

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 She thought it was going to come to blows. That she would have to defend this pup. Rosencrantz was a fighter, the clear wolf that was more likely to win between the pair of them. However, Blackfoot would take any advantage that she could and use the environment and any dirty tactic she could think up to get an edge. Something that would have to be taught to the pup...

 It never came to that though, the flash in his eyes wouldn't come to fruition. For now, the child would live. 

 Her submissive posture would be noted and for a second, she saw a flash of herself there. When trying to seek affection from her mother and she would be bitten or snarled at. She ran her tongue over her lips, not realizing how intense her actions would be seen as or perhaps she hadn't expected the pup to react so strongly... She should have but she hadn't been bothered with the consequences, only that she wanted her orders obeyed. 

 But what if she turned the child into someone that was like her? Someone who hated intensely their upbringing... Perhaps that was what Rosencrantz wanted to save the child from. 

 She stared off into space, lost in her own memories as she curled tighter around the pup. Almost her own way of making up for her loss of temper. This was not going to be so easy... the child had physical needs but to be better than her own mother, there were other needs that had to be minded. 

 Rosencrantz words snapped her out of her reverie. This, anger and annoyance, were things that she knew well and she shot back a matter-of-fact, "Clearly." To his retreating form. Obviously, it was her pup and her responsibility, he'd made it abundantly clear he wanted no part of this. That was why they needed a pack and fast. 

 She gave a world-weary sigh and settled down amongst the carnage. She would allow the pup to rest and then they would hit the road and make camp elsewhere, perhaps she could find out more about this strange child.

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