Jade Fern Grove run, and grow up fast

For @Allure II and @Swift. I'm taking you on a ride if you don't mind the PP!

Life was returning to normal for the wolves formerly of Nova Peak. Jade Fern Grove gave generously, and seemed they would be staying put for the foreseeable future.

Or not.

Bazi had herded Allure and Swift to one of the shallower creeks for a swim. With the sound of rushing water in her ears and one eye on the children, the mother dozed whilst her offspring inspected the area.

But a peculiar noise brought her back. Bazi raised herself onto her elbows, looking around for the source of what sounded like.. ragged breathing? Or branches breaking? "Kids? Get out of the water. "

Allure had decided she liked the area – it had taken awhile for her to get used to the moister air in comparison to the mountain they had lived on earlier, but the softness of the ground and the delicate beauty of the trees was not lost upon the girl, even at her young and tender age.

Splashing in the water, Allure gave a play bow to her brother, eliciting a gentle growl to encourage him to play when Bazi’s voice broke the air. Blinking, the girl did not question her mother, and instead, she pulled herself from the shallow creek, giving her pelt a shake. “Ma?” The question was subtle her bright eyes blinking between her mother and brother – and feeling the tension of the pale Alpha seep in to her own bones.

Just ooone more lil' post..

Bazi was on her feet now, aiming her senses in a full circle - ears high on her head, nostrils wide, and eyes staring. She was dimly aware of her daughter's voice and bid her stay silent by means of a sharp, urgent "Shh!" She could not pinpoint the sound - there was too much interference from the water, and nothing in the olfactory landscape suggested that anything was wrong. But something was.

There was a rustling from the shrubbery and tall ferns that ringed the family. At this time of year, the foliage was thick enough to disguise an army. Bazi froze, breath frozen in her throat and legs spring-loaded to run. Something was watching them.

Mothers all over would tell their kids that if they made a face too long, it would stick, and it seemed that had come true for Swift. At some point during their transition from the mountain to here, the boy's fearful countenance turned to an angry scowl, and his face had hardly been free of the deep creases ever since. His brows were dropped over his eyes, and he carried his head low as he trudged along.

His mother herded him and his sister to the creek. He had no interest, as he stepped into the creek with his sister he swatted at the water, growling as it backsplashed into his own face. He lifted a leg to wipe his face, and then his cold gaze settled on his sister as she play-bowed before him, attempting to coerce him into playing with her gentle growl. His ears drooped, and he shook his head no, before he turned his back on her.

Bazi spoke then, beckoning them out of the water she had wanted them in. This angered her son, who did not want to be in the water in the first place and thus did not take kindly to being ordered out. "We just—" his seething grumble stopped abruptly, as he realized his mother was tense. Just as his paws touched the stream bank, Bazi jumped up, shushing his sister and frantically scanning their surroundings.

Swift bristled, feeling that cold, flighty fear coming over him.

Then the bushes moved.

Allure’s ears splayed back in indignation as Bazi shushed her, and casting her brother a sideways glance as he also began to protest, and then seemed to think better. Swift had been moody ever since the ‘journey,’ but she hadn’t thought much of it.. her pale brother was always grumpy or anti-social.

She maneuvered out of the water after her brother, and as a bush moved, her annoyance quickly dissipated to unsettled. Tensing, the black and white girl shifted her weight, her shoulder grazing against Swift’s flank, though she made no notice of the contact. Instead, her aqua eyes were fixed upon the bushes, and her instincts screaming at her to move.

I'm setting this AFTER the claiming howl for ease!

Bazi's instincts told her to flee - immediately. Sketchy noises in the woods were almost universally a bad thing, but something kept her rooted. Her children, guided by their mother's behaviour despite what their inner voices were telling them, stayed where they were. There was a snap, a growl..

..and a bundle of foxes tumbled out of the shrubs.

Bazi nearly lost her lungs and breakfast to the force of her exhale. "Bloody shit," she murmured. 

But the relief was short-lived.

Morran and her cronies rose out of the shrubbery like black ghosts. No sounds or scents to warn the canine family - all of a sudden, it was (barely) 1.75 wolves against three fully grown grizzly bears, just like that. 

One, two, two and a half second passed in stunned silence. Bazi wilted under the glare of six gleeful, piggy little eyes - her own pupils became pinpricks in a sea of blue. For one shameful moment, she considered death. No more pack, no more children - the endless burden of life would be over, once and for all. 

Morran's lips pulled back over the largest teeth canines Bazi had ever seen. The other two folllowed suit. In face of these odds, Bazi made a decision. "..run."

He, too, felt relieved when he seen the red-furred creatures tumble out of the brush. Fox were elusive and never bothered with them, and though he still stared suspiciously after them, he did not fear them. But all feared what rose out of the bushes after them, and he trembled uncontrollably as his wide-eyed stare lifted to gaping jaws and monstrous fangs. A chill more fierce than the cold of an arctic winter invaded him, and it froze his paws to the ground. He shrunk, sinking down to the ground as if he could press himself into the dirt and disappear. He held his breath, and even as his mother commanded them to run, he found he could not will his legs to move.

I'm not gonna lie.. I might have just voiced Allure like Forrest Gump when I wrote it in my head.

The family was jolted -- Bazi's tensions and shushing had stirred a flutter of panic to set in the nerves of the little girl, and it would have been a lie to say that when the foxes had piled from the brush and scattered, she had not peed herself just a little bit on her inner leg.

A chuff was released, her tail about to wag stiffly as she would make to move back in to the water to wash herself off, when suddenly three large heads reared themselves up. Allure had thought her father a massive beast -- but he paled in comparison to the size of the animals before them. That was when Allure's bladder did fully let go, and her mother's words seemed to ring in her ears -- run.

Her eyes shot to her brother, who slunk further down, and tripping over herself clumsily to stand closer to him, she plowed in to his side to push him, hoping to bring him back to reality "Run, Swift, run!"

The next sixty seconds were a blur. Years later, Bazi would not be able to recount exactly what happened, but the smell of Allure's urine and the sinking feeling of terror would follow her to the grave.

All at once, the scene became a blur of motion - the bears lunged and the wolves ran. Bazi snatched Swift up by the scruff of his neck just as Morran's endless claws landed the first blow, slicing straight through the alpha's plush ear on the way down. Bazi was dimly aware of a sickeningly wet 'pop'. Allure received a sharp jolt to the rear, urging her to move - and fast. The family began to run, heading south-west out of Jade Fern Grove, tearing through the woodland trails with three bears hot on their trail.

No more Morran posts for now, feel free to post after this!

Lmao Rach

His sister crashed into him, urging him to run, but that was not enough to stir him to action. He was seized, done for, but fortunately his mother was there. She grabbed his scruff and hoisted him into the air, all in the same moment that bears lunged and took a swipe at them. Their claws tore through his mother's ear, travelling downward... that sickening, wet pop. Swift screamed, a gut-churning, ear-shattering squeal that cut so sharply through the territory it overpowered the thunderous roars of the bears.

He writhed in his mother's jaws, pawing at his face as blood poured from of the trenches torn across it. His wailing and struggle ceased abruptly. He hung limp from Bazi's grasp. Limp like the battered, bloodied eyeball that hung from it socket, lightly tapping his cheek as the family fled.

Allure couldn't get him to move but Bazi did. Their mother -- a heroine at best -- swept in and grabbed him, plowing in to her in the same moment and giving her all the encouragement she needed to run. She barreled after her mother, watching in terror from the corner of her eye as a bear swiped at Bazi, slicing her.

There was crimson, just as there had been the day she killed the rabbit. The scent of bitter and iron infiltrated her senses, and she barely even registered the shrill scream of her brother. Her paws ran, and yet despite her growth spurts, she could not keep to the same pace as her mother, and bit by bit, she fell behind.

The scream pierced her heart. Something terrible had happened, but there was no time to stop and assess the situation. They had to get out  of Jade Fern Grove. Bazi was operating in a different world. She had no concept of what her legs were doing, much less her heart and lungs. But she sensed Allure. Knew that her little legs would not carry her much further - that she was on the verge of losing a child.

In an act of desperation, the Grove mother put on the breaks. She felt the sudden halt in the very core of her bones. Allure crashed into her rear and the bears flew over their hunched backs, their vast bodies crashing through the undergrowth. Bazi barely paused for breath - in an impossible, desperate feat of strength, she snatched Allure up by the scruff of her neck, joining daughter and son in a mouthful that amounted to the same weight as a fully grown adolescent.

Against all odds, she ran - and within second, the bears were hot on their heels.

He had lost consciousness. From shock. From fear. Blood obscured his face to the point where the extent of his wounds were indiscernible, though the dangling eye was sickeningly apparent, hanging against his cheek for all to see. His mother's actions had saved him and his sister for now, but they were not yet done running. The bears sailed over them, only to gather their paws and be back on their heels in the next second. Their snarls and the sound of them pounding after his family would wind into his mind, and lodge there with the image of them rising like death from the brush, of a angry claws reaching for him and his mother.

It could have been her imagination, and yet the girl would swear she could feel the hot and putrid breath of the bears just upon her haunches. Envisioning one was likely to just suck in air and with it, swallow her whole, she made to push faster and harder—anything to separate herself from them.

But she was winded, and just as she felt the pull of death, Bazi stopped and scooped her up beside her brother, this time moving even faster than before. Swift was unconscious by her side – from the corner of her eye she could see his eyeball dangling, and trying not to throw up the contents of her stomach, she stared ahead of them, feeling the panic in her chest even as her mother’s paws thrummed at the earth and pulled them further from their attackers.

At four months old, the pups weren't small - their feet dragged on the ground and the muscles in Bazi's neck would pay dearly when the adrenaline wore off. Had the larger Pasha or Whittier been among them, the family would have lost at least one child. It was the Grove that saved them in the end. The first feint threw the bears off course, allowing Bazi just enough time to drag her children into a more densely vegetated part of the forest. Their bull-like pursuers no longer had a clear run to build up speed, and between that and the infighting that broke out as soon as success no longer seemed guaranteed, they fell behind.

The family burst out of the forest and onto the downs. Bazi cleared Lost Creek Hollow before she had to set Allure down and urge the girl to run unassisted for a little while, telling her to stay low and make for the nearest forest if it looked like they might not make it. For now, the bears had lost their trail - their furious but distant roars made that much clear.

But Bazi didn't stop. Fuelled by the spirit of all mothers, she pushed on until the early hours of the morning, dragging a bleeding, unconscious Swift halfway across the map - Allure followed, and was picked up again near the edge fo the Tormented Tarns. They would not stop until the world dark, and utterly silent.

Concluding post!