way of the wolf ☾ // warrior cats

two - the wolf

     The wolf was haggard. Its grey fur was ruffled and streaked with muted russet. It had yellow eyes like moons, and its breath reeked of meals past, a putrid scent capable of inspiring fear even in a cat with his nose shorn off.

     Drift's nose was in perfect order, though, and the wolf's breath put terror into every inch of his bones. Tribe of Endless Hunting, he prayed silently, unable even to move his mouth to the words, let me join your ranks with painless haste. You hold my life in your paws.

     He screwed his eyes shut as if the wolf would vanish without anyone looking directly at it. It only stepped closer, sniffing Drift's ears, his side, his tail. It huffed its way through the inspection with deliberate slowness, its hot breath sending chills racing down Drift's spine.

     Then, as suddenly as it had appeared, it was gone, loping away through the oaks without so much as a howl. Overwhelmed with relief, Drift sank into the detritus of the forest floor, legs too weak to support him. Coherent thought eluded him as he crunched leaves in his claws. The crinkling noise, he realized dimly, meant that he was still alive instead of roaming the silent forests of his ancestors. Shortly thereafter, cognizance restored, he unleashed every grateful prayer he knew in rapid succession, some aloud. The Tribe of Endless Hunting had delivered him from a gruesome death, and if Drift was ambivalent about his religion before, there was no doubt of his devotion now.

     By the time Drift recovered his composure well enough to stand, thin threads of dawn glowed atop the forested hills on all sides. He staggered a few paces, limbs quavering, but after pausing to suck in deep lungfuls of cool dawn air, he found his balance again and hurtled homeward. He had to stop the next shift.

❧ ☙

     Peak was waiting for him at the camp entrance, a knotted bracken tunnel crafted generations ago. Her dark fur was smooth along her spine, and she yawned, exposing her sharp white fangs. Among the hollow-guards, she was the youngest, but arguably just as skilled as the rest, and as Drift scampered up in disarray, her whole demeanor changed to something sharper, something warlike. "Did you see something?" she asked, bolting to her feet, tail lashing.

     Drift nodded, chest heaving as he caught his breath. "The wolf," he choked out. "Don't go."

     The other hollow-guard needed no further explanation. Without asking questions, she ushered Drift through the bracken fronds, valiantly bringing up the rear even though there were no threats in sight. Once inside, among the tightly knit thicket of ferns and brambles, she ordered him to sit in the shadow of a blackberry bush while she fetched the Poolteller.

     Drift agreed to the proposition readily, and did not sit so much as fall into a heap underneath a low-hanging fern. He scraped together a weak excuse for bedding from the nearby scraps of moss, and by the time the Poolteller arrived, the shock of meeting the wolf, of surviving the wolf, had returned, and he stammered a greeting, if only just.

     "Tell me what you saw," the Poolteller commanded, laying her tail neatly over her front paws. Like Peak, she was also remarkably young for her position, but more than skilled enough to hold her rank with dignity. It helped that she had been destined as the next Poolteller from the moment she opened her eyes.

     At first, the words could not be found to describe how narrowly Drift had escaped the wolf's grasp. And yet had he escaped? Or had he been spared? In halting words, he crafted as clear a narrative as he could, though it was colored by blind fear. He could not recall what he had been doing when the wolf appeared, or how it had crept up on him so stealthily. A haze clouded the details, and though he struggled to break through it, the effort was in vain. He could only tell the Poolteller so much.

     She looked upset as Drift finished. Her shoulders were rigid, and a wistful film passed over her green eyes, normally so startling and clear. Once she caught Drift staring, though, she snapped back to attention. However, she did not leave like the previous Poolteller might have. Instead she sank to her belly beside Drift and began to groom his ears.

     The familiar motion set Drift at ease. Unbidden but not unexpected, kithood came to mind, the days when his mother would tug him close to set his fur right, even against his will, while his sister laughed away. She would then get caught and subjected to the same thorough cleaning.

     In the nursery, before their to-be days, he and the Poolteller had been close. Then, she had been known as Fawn Leaping Over Stream. Now, though, her duties kept them well apart with few moments for shared tenderness. The last time they had been so close to one another was when they lost their father to an accidental wolf encounter.

     They did not speak of it.

     Drift allowed his sister to groom him without protest, taking comfort in her steady warmth and the precise strokes of her tongue. She was efficient, but not heartlessly so. With her time so confined to watching the sacred pool, waiting for guidance from their ancestors, she had mastered the art of comfort in limited moments long ago.

     And this was a limited moment like any other. "I need to consult with the Tribe of Endless Hunting," she said, shoulders sagging. "I believe they saved your life, but they do not do so lightly. They will want something in return, no doubt, and I will have to provide it." She sighed. "I'll send Peak on her shift, but warn her to stay close to camp. You have the dusk shift, so you should stay nearby, too."

     With that, she was gone, leaving Drift to shiver under the ferns with dread. He would fulfill the dusk shift, especially since there was no one else to step in but the other three hollow-guards, who would be exhausted from their own shifts, but he could not say he was happy about it. He had almost died.

     But almost dying was not the same as death.

     Laying his head on the paltry moss pillow he'd collected, too exhausted to consider crossing camp to his own nest, Drift tried to ignore the twisting of his gut, the suspicion that today was not the end of things. The wolf investigating his pelt hadn't been a truce or treaty. It hadn't been a sign of acquiescence, proof that the wolf was finally leaving the Tribe to its own devices.

     Something about him had captured the wolf's attention, and it would be back for more until its curiosity was sated. After that, it would likely sate its hunger as well. Drift could almost sense the beast waiting among the oaks for the right moment to strike. It was not gone. It was just patient.