The Firebird cubs had once more been led out into the patch of grass just outside the den. The sun was brilliant as it contributed to the warmest day of the year thus far, and meltwater ran in rivulets from the shadows of trees. Fox hovered nearby, watching the pups and making sure none of them wandered off. Raven and Wildfire were tussling in the shade of a bush, and Nightjar was alone, sprawled out and sunning himself like a cat.
Making a sound between a mewl and a yawn, the boy rolled himself onto his back and stared up at the sky with his paws curled over his chest. "Bah bah bah," he began to sing to the clouds above, his newly opened ears pricking at the sound of his own voice, as they had been for the past week. Surely, the sky could understand everything he was trying to say, but even then, his own excitement mounted and he began to "talk" louder: "Bah! BAH!"
Jaws had caught a fresh rabbit early that morning, before the sun had even risen, but he did not eat it - it was to be his bait. He was going to use it to get a bird, which he had promised Wildfire last time he had vistited as she had enjoyed the single feather he brought so much. By now, she was probably in need of another one, and her siblings might enjoy them as well. So, with a plan in mind, the crafty coywolf set to work, choosing a strategic spot beneath an opening in the tree canopy. Very nearby he excavated a hideout beneath the branches of some brush, and thanked his fortune that his coat disappeared into the shadows. He tossed the remaining half of the rabbit just in front of the brush, and crawled in to wait with the patience of a spider in the web.
It was an hour before the first crow started circling overhead, having caught a glimpse of dinner through the opening in the trees. It was soon followed by several other crow who wanted a share of the meat. Jaws waited another quarter hour before the crows finally descended, and then he waited some more, for just the right moment. A squabble broke out over one bird's proximity to another, and that was when the coywolf struck, while their attention was so squarely on each other. As the birds shrieked and try to fly off, he seized one by the back foot, and with a ruthless swing of his head bashed it against a tree with enough force to instantly kill it.
His gray jay approved, swooping in with an exuberant chirp from its vantage point in the trees and alighting on Jaws' shoulder. He bit off a small chunk from the rabbit, which the gray jay promptly carried back into the trees, and then gathered both his catches and headed toward the Alpha's den. He arrived to find Wildfire and one of her siblings, a black female, romping in the shade, and a third rolling around in the sun, babbling to the clouds. With a courteous nod, he dropped his catch near Fox, plucked a feather from the bird and quietly stepped over to investigate the tawny pup, peering down at him before dropping the feather, which gently floated down and landed on him.
"Your sister liked these," he mused
"BAAAAAH!" Nightjar screeched at the sky, earning a wince from his mother, whose delicate hearing was probably a few notches below its normal sensitivity by now. The children were hardly ever quiet, and in the moments where silence could be had, there was usually something else going on. If Fox continued having litters like this, she would be experiencing hearing loss within a few years.
Suddenly, a dark figure loomed over him, blocking out the sky and removing most of the glare from his vision. Nightjar's steely blue eyes widened and he grew still and quiet. For all intents and purposes, Jaws looked exactly like Peregrine, and so the cub's thin tail pressed between his outstretched hind legs submissively and a playful grin lit up his face. He was about to reach one of his paws out for the other male's leg when something floated out of his mouth and came into Nightjar's small zone of clarity.
He went cross-eyed watching it until it suddenly landed on his creamy breast. His right ear swivelled up when Jaws began speaking, although his left ear remained curiously pressed to the earth. Even the muted sound of the wolf's voice wasn't enough to tear his eyes away from the feather, which Nightjar studied with an almost concerning intensity.
The wind ruffled its downy fringe, and just like that, Nightjar decided he didn't like it. His face screwed up into a classic grimace of discomfort and he whined, lifting a leg in vain to try to swipe it away from himself.
Jaws had wrongly supposed that feathers were a universal play thing. They had been enjoyed by him, by Wildfire, and he had been certain that Nightjar would have enjoyed it too. But instead, the reaction he was expecting was no where to be seen. The pub was unsettled by the feather, whining instead for it to be gone from his presence as he swiped at it. Jaws was quick to bend down and gather the offending feather in his teeth, carrying it off a short distance, enough to ensure it would be no further bother, before dropping it. "Ok, no feathers for you," he commented as he returned to the tawny pup.
"So what do you like?" Jaws mused, more to himself than to a pup that could not understand him. The coywolf pursed his lips and glanced around. There was the rabbit fur that Wildfire had also enjoyed, but there were also sticks scattered about and they seemed like a safer bet. Jaws stepped away once more, picking a small stick from the ground for round two. He placed the stick in front of Nightjar rather than dropping it, giving it a small nudge with his nose as if that would encourage the pup somehow.
Jaws quickly whisked the feather away, but whatever had unsettled Nightjar wasn't as quick to disappear. Even with the offending plume removed, he continued to fuss and bat at his own chest until a new distraction was presented in the form of Jaws departing. Falling silent, the boy angled his head so that his blunt muzzle was pressed tight against his breast. He tried to trace Jaws' movement with his eyes, but found it hurt and soon let his head fall back against the grass.
The dark coywolf returned quickly enough, this time with a more welcome toy. Nightjar's right ear pricked at the gentle thud of the branch falling to the ground. His whole body seemed to lurch as he whipped his head around and locked on to his newest distraction. Without any further indication that he even noticed Jaws' presence, Nightjar loosed a loud battle cry of, "raaaaaaah!" and launched his tubby body at the stick. As young as he was, his form was far from perfect, but he hit his mark with the precision that all predators had even as little babes.
He went to work on the stick, gnawing and chewing, and only paused when he'd rolled around it like a gator and spotted Jaws once more. His pale eyes remained fixed on the elder wolf as he chewed, almost like he suspected that Jaws would try to take it from him.
Jaws' gift of a stick was much better received than the feather, and he settled to his stomach, crossing his forelegs, to watch the young pup boldly tackle the object with a challenging cry. The pup's aim was sound, landing upon the stick as though it were prey (and it would have been dead prey). It occurred to Jaws then that the pups were just shy of the age he was when he and his siblings were abandoned and left to die. It was unthinkable that they would manage to survive, and indeed his siblings had not. Briefly his brows furrowed. Looking at this pup, so young and small regardless of how precocious he might be, reminded him of the cruelty, the cold heartedness that had been required to toss him and his littermates to the wild.
The coywolf shook his head, retiring those thoughts to his subconscious. It was then that he became aware of the pup's gaze fixed upon him as it chewed the stick. A small grin formed on his lips. He slowly extended a paw, making for the stick, just to see what this young prince would do.
As expected, not by experience but by thousands of years of instinct, Jaws' paw crept toward the stick. Nightjar hunched his entire body, spiked up his itty bitty baby hackles in a futile effort to make himself look deadly enough to make Jaws think twice, and growled even louder around the stick. He was but a baby and possessiveness wasn't made out to be a rude thing. He couldn't consciously tell the difference yet between play and threat, though his tail beat his hocks as though his brain was aware of the distinction.
Suddenly, he backpedalled, turning his head to the side and laboriously dragging the stick along with him, until he was just out of reach of Jaws' paw. Satisfied that the adult couldn't possibly reach it now, the pup resumed his chewing, restlessly dancing his hind paws on the ground while his upper torso slumped down so that he was bowing.
Jaws' grin broadened as the pup's hackles rose and he growled. The coywolf did not move nor retract his paw as the pup dragged the stick backwards, putting some distance between himself and the 'threat'. It was promising behavior, as Jaws saw it, a strong attitude and willingness to defend his quarry. It was better than acting all meek and submissive and willfully giving up his claim.
As the young prince took up a bowed posture, Jaws rose his hindquarters to match it, both his legs extended in front of him now and his gaze focused on the pup. He stayed like this for several moments, and then slowly started to shuffle forward with as soft a growl as he could form. He wanted to see if he could get even more of a reaction out of the little wolf.
However possessive he may seem outwardly, it was unlikely that Nightjar would develop into a selfish wolf. Materialism would never suit him. His aspirations would not lie with possessions; even the prospect of inheriting this land would not appeal to him. Yet things he did own, he would protect as fiercely as he did his own life. He would never covet, but that didn't mean he would permit others to take from him, either. It was the way of the wolf to display ownership in a blunt, sometimes aggressive fashion, and Nightjar would obey this most keenly.
When Jaws began to creep forward, presenting himself as a threat to Nightjar's ownership over his stick, the boy rose to meet the challenge without fear or hesitation. True, Jaws was over twice his size and outmatched him easily, but Nightjar wouldn't be perceived as a pushover (nevermind the fact that he'd just cowered from a feather and showed himself to be weak in a way). Of course, deep down inside he knew that Jaws wasn't a real threat. Jaws was a pack mate, and this was a game.
His tiny hackles instinctively rose along his back, ruffled easily by a passing wind for they were scarcely more than fluff, and he stepped forward with a tooth-baring growl, accepting Jaws' challenge. If it were a question of authority, Jaws was definitely the dominant wolf and Nightjar would submit in an instance, but it wasn't, so he readied himself. And then Nightjar rushed the much larger male, clumsy and slow as puppies always were, in hopes of biting (read: barely more than gumming) the male's snout to deter him from taking his stick.
It was just the reaction that the coywolf had been expecting given the prince's attitude thus far. Jaws' fixated gaze watched as the pup's hackles rose and he stepped toward him with a toothy growl. Although he was attempting to feign a threat, he could not help but grin broadly at this behavior. It was not so welcome a response from an adult but with Nightjar it was adorable and a bit of a wonder to see this sort of instinct in action at such a young age, and the coywolf was thoroughly enjoying the display.
When the boy rushed forward, Jaws did not move, and thus got a bite on the nose from it. "Ah!" he exclaimed albeit in a hushed voice so as not to startle the pup, and he retreated back a few steps, flattening his ears and turning his head to the side a bit, deferring to the other male. "It's all yours!" he said, his gaze turned to watch Nightjar though he did not face him directly.
Jaws complied easily with Nightjar's brief show of possessive dominance. He fell back and wrung back his ears, and the pup's quick aggression ended instantaneously. He settled back down over his stick with his eyes fixed on Jaws, warning the adult away. This behaviour would be made more delicate over the course of his life until he was firm but not overbearing, but for right now, he relished the victory.
Of course, being a very young wolf, Nightjar's mind was prone to changing. Although he had warded Jaws away from the stick just moments prior, now he stood on his wobbly legs, stooped to slowly pick it up, and laboriously dragged it to the older male's feet, where he dropped it. His thin tail swayed behind him as he looked up at Jaws and lolled his tongue, his body language now saying, it's all yours.
As though to solidify this offer of friendship, Nightjar stood on his tippy toes and reached for the tall black wolf's throat, which he licked appeasingly before padding off toward Fox.
I'll fade here :)
Jaws expected the victorious pup to now enjoy the prize he won, and at first Nightjar did just that, but to the coywolf's surprise the pup had a change of heart and brought the stick to him, though not without some effort for he was yet small and the stick a challenge for his stature. The stick was dropped at his feet, and the prince gave him clear signs that he was passing ownership to him. Jaws smiled broadly, but was caught off guard when the pup leaned up and licked at his throat. He tensed momentarily, not accustomed to such contact, but relaxed quickly, more by instinct than anything. As Nightjar padded back to his mother, Jaws gingerly took the stick and on his way gave the pup a warm, gentle nudge with his nose, and then a nod to Fox, before heading back to his den where he would keep his gift.