Stone Circle Come and meet the babies

Things were rapidly happening and it took almost all of Burr's focus to keep everything in his perspective. He first noticed the bumbling silvery shape heading in his direction with a loud cry, the sight of it setting his tail to frantically wagging. It was so small! Momentarily, Burr forgot that he was in the presence of Valette, his mother, and a few other pack mates. As Clary drew nearer, Burr stretched out his neck with a placating whine and sniffed gingerly in her direction, but abruptly drew himself back when he spotted Valette coming toward him in the corner of his vision.

Although Burr now understood that he had been at fault, the terror rooted in his breast that he associated with Valette was harder to dispel. Consequently, although the words coming out of the Alpha female's mouth were apologetic and perfectly reasonable, Burr was more concerned with her nearness and the fact that there was a pup nearby. While he was utterly enchanted by the tiniest wolf he had ever seen, he knew Valette had been so hostile because of them. His thought processes were currently simple cause and effect ones. Cause: Being near Valette's pups. Effect: Being punished. He didn't quite get that things were different now that the pups were older, so his response to Valette was to fold back into a ball and whine softly to ease her.

Illecebra's well-meaning nudge sealed the deal. His mother urged him closer to the toddling babe, which everyone sort of intended, causing a surge of unreasonable uncertainty to crawl up Burr's throat and loose as a whimper. He dug his paws into the ground, refusing to get any closer for fear of Valette's reaction in spite of her invitation, and as soon as the opportunity presented itself, he rose in a submissive crouch and bolted back toward the trees, where he intended to stay.