Wolf RPG

it never failed to amaze val how quickly life took hold of those unshapely little lumps. it was poetic, the way their eyes opened and new light filled them - the way they looked at the world in quiet gasps, alight in wonder.

some time between when he'd been that small and now, he'd lost that luster.

a noise from within pulled val from his thoughts. behind him chani babbled, her little form dappled in moonlight. he waited for chacal's croon to call her back; when none came, he turned upon the reaching babe and glanced at the stars which held her attention. does your maman know you've escaped?

Chacal slept lightly, with her two young toddlers at her side. She flinched and startled into wakefulness when they moved, or when she heard someone approach the den. Perhaps she feared another of her children might be snatched by a bird, and her protective instincts had been heightened.

Her daughter’s voice caused her to awaken. She watched with one eye open as Chani moved toward the den’s entrance, wondering if the girl was sleep-walking. Chacal watched her daughter pause at the den’s entrance, prepared to sweep forward and brush her back in should she move further- 

But the sound of Valravn’s voice steadied her. His voice was soft, but it warmed her heart like the glow of a candle. She settled her head back down, uttering little more than a quiet cough as both reassurance and permission.

from within the den came a soft cough of permission from chacal. val rose quietly, his tail moving in gentle wags.

beneath him sapphique’s little sprite peered back. she was so impossibly small! once he had been that little, a life time ago.

he looked up, tracing the ribbon of stars which punctuated an otherwise stormy navy sky. you and me can’t catch those... but this.. he lowered to the ground, pulling a long stick from the grass adjacent to the den. want?

oops. the stick from val’s jaws fell with a clatter as he repositioned himself alongside the collapsed puppy. he should have remembered they had all the tactile agility of sea cucumbers at this stage — much cuter, of course.

upon chani’s little face a stormcloud brewed; it suggested great affront was threatening to break over their quiet night. he glanced to the den, then back to his niece. who put that rock there that you tripped over? planting an affectionate lick atop her head, val settled with both paws around her. maybe we start with something that isn’t your size. a bug? hmmmm. if you weren’t supposed to be in bed, i’d show you where all the good bugs are had. he wasn’t sure how much of speech chani understood at this time, but he recognized babies often reacted positively to voices.

delight swarmed the yellow of his gaze. she understood him, in some measure!

val hunkered down so they were eye level, canting his head back to where bed was and then to chani. as she patted the rock val inched towards it, turning it over with a nudge of his nose.

what slithery, delightful things crawled to life by such an upending? that's right! bug! see how they crawl across the rock?

oops. val hoped chacal hadn't already drifted off to sleep, for chani's voice was sure to wake her. he hunkered down near the stone, turning it from one paw to the other as chani squealed and then pointed to an interloper who'd scurried across her paws.

val couldn't help but laugh. yes, some of them are even edible. his grin turned mischievous. but, you have to smell them first. some of them taste terrible.

val's reflexes as a general rule were terribly slow. and children, it turns out, keep one on their toes. constant vigilance was not in val's nature, and so whoops! there goes the rolly poly.

blech! val grinned as chani spat the offensive taste from her tongue. he remembered that lesson well. the slug fared no better; he watched as she gobbled its slimy pelt down. careful, you don't want a tummy ache. he wondered if slugs weren't like other wormy denizens of the dirt - russian nesting dolls of worm upon worm, nematode to filiform, each designed to parasitize upon the other. he was grateful to be born something as noble as a wolf!

as chani cast about for a rock, val listened to the breathing within the den. at some point he imagined he would overstay his welcome -- but for now he was content to revisit a younger side of himself, playing chaperone to chani as she overturned rocks as if some tiny godzilla among a city of rubble.

val had eaten enough in the world that bugs were not often on his menu. their meat was small, and scarcely worth the expenditure effort -- but for a puppy, it was a valuable learning tool.

he pretended to root alongside chani, flinching as she shrieked and flung something hard and leggy his way. at first val mistook it for some creature of the deep and recoiled -- but his gaze adjusted to the slender limbs and rounded carapace, and he laughed. those are ones that don't taste good. he warned chani with a flick of his paw towards the cricket, motioning to the defensive sack of fluid which it housed in its mouth. val had learned at her age such liquid was highly corrosive and unpleasant, especially when it landed upon your tongue.

great ugly thing as it was, val felt relieved to see the cricket amble away. at his feet chani collapsed - val nibbled her forehead in an affectionate kiss.

her yawns came in little waves. val continued to preen her soft fur, feeling the tug of his own tiredness. a nap sounds good. he affirmed, yawning wide before he nudged chani towards the watchful embrace of her mother.

chani would return on sleepy legs to chacal, and nestle into the warmth of her mother's body for her nap. but not before her babyish gaze beheld val a last time, reinforcing today as a formative moment for her in multiple ways. 
foremost among them was to be careful what you ate and that val was part of the the intimacies of the sapphique densite. against him and her brothers would the girl grow to measure all men, and for many reasons, her understanding of val as role model was a healthful one.