Stone Circle Whisky’s good proofing water. Tells you who’s real and who isn’t.

Though he was a year old now, Charles didn't feel very a-year-old. He felt like he was still a little pup a lot of the times. He was always told what to do. He wasn't very useful, not so far, though he had done a little bit of patrolling. Until he figured out that that was just something good, but like, average-good. Charles only wanted to do exceptionally good things, so that others would see him, or bad things, so that others would see him.

Mother seemed exceptionally cranky these days. A few weeks ago she had had a weird smell around her and she had snapped at him, even attacked him, though when he showed submission she left him alone. Charles couldn't tell if she regretted snapping at him or not. He could never really tell what was going on in her head. That was one of the reasons he always did what she said, because he was afraid of what might happen if he didn't.

With his gangly yearling body that had yet to fill out a little more, and his coyote-like features, Charles looked more like a coyote than he probably would ever in his life. He had yet to figure out what that might mean for his future interactions -- all he knew was that he had really large (some might say prodigiously large) ears and that was funny for some.

Charles navigated past the grazing bison, looking up at their immense forms and admiring how their muscles rippled and how big they were. If only he were so big. Then he would never have to submit for anyone. He could just stomp all who got in his way.

But as it were, he was gangly and smallish and awkward and not very strong at all, so he would just have to do with submitting when he got in trouble and taking shit from everyone else. It just wasn't fair. Charles noticed another who was at the stones, which was where he was headed. He stood still for a moment, not far from the bison who did not seem to perceive him as a threat at all -- even to them it was obvious that he was weak and could not best them on his own -- and he waited to see if his pack mate -- or so Charles blindly assumed, though he did not know the wolf -- would notice him.