Porcupine Ridge Melange, The Spice

Since his coupling with Vuk, the tawny wolf had not seen the patchwork woman. He neither sought her out nor expected her to come to him. While he failed to understand the spoken permission required for having children due to his own inability to utter words, the tawny beta knew well the consequences a non-alpha litter could face. It was likely that Vuk's children by him would die at the teeth of Taggarik and Capriccio. Perhaps for that reason, he sought not to find the slender woman and know the fate of them both.

He laid low for many days before emerging to pace the borders, worried that Taggarik would come for him, but the alpha male never came. This gave the beta a false sense of security as he strode along the edge of the ridge, hiking his leg now and again to refresh the scent markers, and that was how he discovered a slim crimson-and-creme female with a foreign contraption around her neck.

The wolf's head arced up and his tail lifted into a straight line over his hips as he approached, with wary blue eyes fixed upon the collar. A low rumble in his throat announced his discomfort with the object, but the wolf to whom it was attached did not seem ill or otherwise unwell, so it was mostly out of mistrust for something unfamiliar.