Bared

VII

A shining field of green, turned gold by the rising sun. The light blue of early morning chased the dark blues and purples to the western horizon, where they faded, giving their nightly throne to their lighter brothers. Lounging on a rock, waiting for the sun’s warmth to reach my paws, I stared down into the valley below me.

Three wolves were playing in the long grass. One, a tawny red like his grandfather, tackled a silver-white one. The silver-white’s growl of effort to push her brother off of her could be heard even from my perch. The third wolf was a gray, with black rimming his tail and hindquarters where the sun’s rays had yet to reach. The gray-black yipped at me from below, inviting me to come down and play.

I shook my head at him, and laid my head back down to gaze at the northern horizon ahead of me. “You’ll have to play sometime. Or else they’ll get restless.” I looked to my left, and saw a beautiful wolf with different colors mixed into her fur, so she looked like a rainbow in the dawn light. I huffed,”No. I can’t. You know that.” The wolf just yipped with quiet laughter, then moved down the slope leading to the valley.

“Morning, Alpha,” said two sleepy voices from behind me, where a cave led into the hill that we called our home. I growled at the two wolves coming beside me on my left,”You two should’ve been up earlier. Now, the prey will run after they’ve had their share of the sun.” The gray laughed, and the brown muttered,”You get grumpier every day. I hope your pups are worth it.” Before I could snap at them again, the two wolves, almost like brothers, leaped down the slope, and turned around it at the bottom to get into the hunting-woods.

Another voice behind me sounded, a little while after the gray and brown had left. “You shouldn’t be so hard on them. They have their reasons for staying up late,” a black male said. His electric eyes glittered in the morning sun, and I felt a tiny, almost friendly, kick in my stomach. I growl unhappily,”Yes. Staying up until midnight to visit ‘secret’ girlfriends is always a good reason to miss morning hunting. I’ll keep that in mind. Why don’t they just admit that they have girlfriends and ask me for permission to let them join the pack?”

The black laughed, and lay down next to me. He licked my ears, and muttered,”Because you’d be hard on them.” Before I could retort, though, the vision faded into static. I had lost the connection.