Arrow Lake I like my coffee like I like my nights: dark, endless and impossible to sleep through

Small tastes of freedom were no longer sufficient for Dragomir. He needed to get out there and experience the world. He was still too little to go venturing around on his own, but some loosening of the reins allowed he and Isi free roam of the grassy slope several feet outside the thicket. He took full advantage of it, spending as much of his time as possible in the open sunshine, where the wind blew uninterrupted and the world spilled out into a stunning vista overlooking the wide taiga below.

Dragomir spent a little time admiring the view for the umpteenth time, but his attention quickly shifted to littler things. Things closer to home. Out here there were more scents than just those of the wolves who frequently visited and watched over them; there were the scents of little mountain rodents and birds, the stench of bugs rising from their winter slumber, and the occasional whiff of urine on the breeze that belonged to no one Drago knew. His keen nose drank in all these things, cataloguing them away in his keener mind for reference, as he explored the area just beyond the thicket with an eagerly wriggling tail.

There on a blade of grass he spied a ladybird; he didn't know what it was, but the splash of red against the new growth was impossible to miss. Oooooo, Drago intoned, hastening on thick puppy legs toward it, only to fall back on his butt in alarm when it threw wide its shell and took to the sky.