A Wolf's Call (complete)

Chapter 5

The twowalkers had taken me from the weird room. They led me to a new room, this room was strange and I didn’t like it. It scared me how only outside of this large white shell thing there was so many scents, so much to smell but here there was nothing. No matter how much I tried I could only smell the blood that had been running from my paws. There was only one twowalker I remembered from outside. It was a shewalker who had been watching me for a long time. I felt her stare on me almost all the time but couldn’t think why she was watching me so.

The two other twowalkers also wore the white colour and were doing something around a shiny thing. I didn’t like them. I didn’t like the shiny thing. I could feel my heart starting to bang angrily and felt hostility towards the twowalkers. I wanted to understand. If I understood I would feel safer. But they didn’t tell me anything, just made their rumbly sounds and watched me. Then I heard a familiar sound, the sound of rivers. I looked around me but saw no water, no rivers. Glaring at the twowalkers I barked for them to tell me where the sound was coming from. They made happy rumbles and I didn’t understand why. They ignored my anger and just seemed to communicate with each other. Then they all stopped and turned to me. I wondered what they wanted and sank to the ground preparing to attack them as I would when hunting. I watched as they looked at each other then moved towards me. I backed away, seeing them so high above me reminded me of the vicious bears that occasionally passed by my den. They would go all tall then peer over you so you felt small and weak. Most wolves feared bears and all knew that they meant danger. These twowalkers must be trying to threaten me. I’m a wolf though, and we wolves don’t give up so easily. We fight until our last breath, that’s what the alpha taught me when I was a cub. He let us all know that if you won’t fight when you know you can’t win then you might as well lie down and die now. Alpha was smart. I wanted to be as smart as the alpha. I needed to be as strong.

Their hairless arms stretched towards me. Looking up at them I could only feel that they were challenging me. Then as the paw was a whisker from my nose I lunged forward and sank my teeth into it. The soft flesh broke beneath my powerful jaws. The twowalkers eyes and mine met and I sparkled a warning to let it know I wasn’t going to go down without a fight. The twowalker then yowled in pain and tried to pull its paw out of my teeth. I let it retrieve its hand and tasted the warmth of its blood in my mouth. It reminded me of my hunger and I paused in my growling before quickly starting again. I made sure the twowalkers knew that I wasn’t friendly. The two unknown twowalkers quickly left through the wall opening that could close and left me there, growling with the shewalker across from me. I watched her but she didn’t do anything, just watched me. I was unsure now; she didn’t seem hostile like the others. I wavered in my growling and stopped to watch her fascinated. I was curious now. With no threat I saw no reason to growl. If I could learn their weak spots I knew that the twowalkers might be easier to defeat. It was as all wolves knew, that to catch your prey you need to know it, especially if it is bigger. My pack mates never actually told me these things, somehow I just knew them. There were different things in my self-barking than when I communicated with my pack. I could think about things, what I did wrong, how to trick the prey. I didn’t know how I knew these things, but I knew them.

The shewalker now moved towards me but instead of standing like a bear she sat on the floor and moved slowly towards me. She moved weirdly, like I’d never seen before and I knew that it wasn’t how she usually moved. She sat near to me and seemed to think for a second. I was surprised, did twowalkers also have self-barking? Then she started to make rumbles that the twowalkers used to communicate, much like I would use barks, howls and whines. She pointed to herself and repeated a sound. It was like Andy had done! I pricked my attention at her as I tried to understand what she wanted me to know.

‘Holly,’ said the shewalker pointing to herself.

I looked at her and she seemed to be unsure of herself, like a pup trying to catch a loose leaf and missing it.