Ideas and Rejects

GT prompt- Big Boy

A/N: I'm not quite sure where this prompt came from but I've always adored the "Raising the dangerous predator/creature as your own child" scenario. (I believe there's a really old cartoon where a duck raises a chick that no one wants and it grows into a big eagle that saves the duck one day.)

Anyway...I wrote this but am not sure if it'll ever be anything more than this snippet. Enjoy!

Opal was barren. She had been married long ago but when she failed to produce any children for her first husband, he had quietly divorced her and left. It was disheartening for the mouse-haired, young woman as she knew being barren meant she would live alone as a spinster until her end. Most women of her time period would've been cast out, living impoverished on the scraps of those who took pity. But luckily for Opal he had a family farm and orchard of her own. Granted, caring for such a place was a full-time, back-breaking endeavor by herself and she never truly got everything that needed done, finished. Yet she managed to raise enough produce and animals to keep herself fed and the taxes paid.

Now bordering her thirties, Opal didn't have prospects of living with anyone besides her dog Loper. The stocky, black and white speckled mutt had shown up one day, following her cart and spooking her mule. Try as she might to shoo him away he stuck around her farm, begging for scraps and being a general nuisance to her chickens. It wasn't until he proved himself a capable hunter by bringing a few freshly caught rabbits to her door that Opal decided it was worth it to allow the dog a place and a name. Now, Loper was her main companion and avid listener to Opal's woes.

...

Opal had just finished her supper and fed Loper when the dog lifted his pointed ears, stared at the door, and growled deeply. Loper would bark at anyone who passed by the farm but he rarely growled.

"What's the matter with you?" Opal inquired, sounding a bit worried.

The speckled dog didn't move, staring and growling. Opal moved to the spot near her bed and retrieved her bow. She wasn't an expert marksman by any means, but she could hit enough game to keep her and Loper well-fed. It also made an ideal tool for her own protection. Nocking an arrow preemptively, Opal peeked out of her window for an intruder. She didn't see anything in the dark.

A frown turned down her mouth, "What's the matter, Loper?"

She scratched the dog behind his head but the vibrating growl still remained. He was dead focused on the door. Opal sighed, picked up her lantern and awkwardly opened the door despite having full hands.

Suddenly, Loper tore past her out the door and into the darkness, barking.

"LOPER! LOPER GET BACK HERE!" she yelled.

Even in the dark she could tell he was running out toward the orchard beyond her sustenance garden.

"I swear, Loper. If it's a racoon again, I'm going to cook you for tomorrow's supper." She warned under her breath as he ran after his bark.

It was very dark out even with her lantern aiding her; clouds had covered the moon momentarily. Normally she wouldn't worry about Loper so much but he was acting so weirdly defensive. As if he sensed something dangerous out in the dark.

As she made it to her orchard of various fruit trees she could still hear Loper barking but he sounded like he was at bay rather than chasing something. Opal directed herself toward his sound until she heard him yelp sharply.

Opal's heart went to her throat, "Loper!"

She had no idea what had happened but the dog wasn't barking anymore.

What in God's name was out here?

Then Loper yelped again, giving a short fearful pair of barks. Opal ran faster and suddenly the clouds above blew to the side and the moon revealed a massive form filling the path between the orchard trees. Her lantern shook in the dark when she caught a glimpse of Loper, held aloft almost ten feet off the ground by a dark shadow.