The Oblivion

the pack

IN A TRAP, us humans exchanged petrified looks. The animal sounds were nonsense in our ears, but since I had experience with Arch, I knew for sure that they were angry, but unsure of how to act. In any moment they could choose to lunge at us, or leave us alone. But this pack of wolves were hungry. Frail. Weak.

But with the power of their fangs, it was no use to our sharpest weapon.

A wolf came drastically close to Ariana, so that my sister took its life within a second with her bow. The wolf gave a howl, then thumped to the ground lifelessly, its dull glass eyes staring at us.

The wolves behind the dead one looked at it with disgust and distaste. After a few second, they forgot about the wolf and turned attentions back to us. Did they really have that much carelessness to the pack members? what did the word 'allies,' define in their language?

Those rascals played tricks on us, darting forward to our feet, circling us until we were huddled together, back to back, as the ready wolves formed a circle around us so that there was no way out. Arch was losing control, and at any second we knew we were about to be killed. A wolf was so close that its fur brushed my ankles. I gave it a nervous harsh kick, so that it flopped to its belly, then was up on its paws to snarl at me.

Abruptly Arch bickered something in wolf language to the other wolves. It was a scene of momentary barks and yelps, so that Brook, Brian, Ariana and were squashed up in our small circle awkwardly. At one point Arch drew his lips backwards to show his impressive teeth, froth flickering out from his mouth. I never saw Arch look this dangerous before. His tail was tucked in between his legs in warning, which told me that he could be slightly scared too. Ears angled backwards, eyes expressing nothing but indifferent anger.

At that moment, I realized that this was the pack of wolves that attacked that screaming woman yesterday. Their teeth still had blood stains, which meant they had a fresh meal recently— that lady. If they were still hungry, we would undoubtedly be their next meal. I tried my best not the think about how the remains of the dead woman would look like and what we would do if we found her corpse.

At the moment every single wolf was straining to listen to what Arch was telling them, communicating with them. There was a silence.

The largest one, which seemed like the leader, twitched its ears in anticipation. He had black fur, which made his features more vicious, and bright yellow eyes like the others. The leader seemed to be considering Arch's words.

Finally, the leader whimpered something, then turned his tail and ran back into the darkness. All the wolves trailed after them, the ground thumping in their wake. I saw Arch speaking softly with a pretty looking wolf, and smiled to myself. As the last one's tail disappeared into the bushes, all our heads turned to Arch in amazement. Arch just cocked his head to the side elegantly and arrogantly, but I felt proud of him.

Brian was the one who broke the silence. He cleared his throat and said, "Well. That was interesting. What did Arch even say? Can we trust him?"

"Of course!" I snapped a little too harshly, so that Brian stepped backwards anxiously. I felt a little bad, but Ariana had the same challenging blaze in her eyes. To know that my sister was on my side made me feel more confident. Arch was the apple of our eyes, and we trusted him above all.

Arch may have been just a wolf but we meant way more than that to me and Ariana. Since we were young he stood by our side, and I never recalled a time when he betrayed me and Ariana.

Even Brook looked wary even though she said nothing, but she kept casting nervous glances like her brother to my wolf. We even kept a little distance from each other as we carried on with Brian leading, but later that night we all eventually thawed from feeling worn out. The tension from our moods disappeared, and we were too lost in our thoughts. No one was in the mood for discussing anything. In fact, we were all too tiered to even open our mouths and use our voice to talk about the igniting event of wolves. We just plonked our selves onto a shady spot in between a couple of trees, our legs propelling us forward to the last of energy. It wasn't safe, and for once I didn't see the same willingness to take watch in Brian's stance and expression. He kept frowning, and the deep circles under his eyes told us alot. There was no way I could take watch either, and Ariana seemed to have the best energy of us all. Or determination. Whichever, but she took watch. Reluctantly, she sat down in front of us, while the rest of our sides remained exposed to any dangers lurking about. But I trusted Ariana, and other than Brook, I knew she had clean eyes that didn't play tricks on her. Unlike me. I closed my eyes and waited for the darkness of dreams to consume me.