Ankyra Sound 'Cause only gold is hot enough

Time was an immeasurable thing to young Ephraim. Days and nights rolled by without so much as the barest acknowledgement from the baby coywolf, who grew exponentially in his first ten days of life. Most of the changes were physical and, as such, went unnoticed by him. He'd nearly doubled in size from the moment of his birth, his ears were beginning to grow, his body and limbs both were lengthening, and his muscles were growing stronger. He was already making efforts to stand, though holding his balance and walking were capabilities he had yet to develop.
The first change that cemented itself as tangible to the whelp was the development of some short term memory—he no longer forgot the scents of his siblings in the time between encounters, and recognized them nearly as easily as he did @Caiaphas. The second change that became known to him was the first in a series of very shocking ones; he couldn't ignore them if he tried.
In the mid-morning gloom of the grotto's bluelit interior, Ephraim sneeze. He'd sneezed many times before, but this time he froze in alarm when his eyelids peeled back, revealing an unfocused pair of steely blue eyes and granting him vision in the form of smears of dim shadows.

Any that would be welcome in the Caiaphas' whelping area!

It had been over a week since the child had been born. Life had still maintained a monotonous sort of schedule; Illidan would wake from his nap, eat, and nestle himself close to his siblings in order to sleep again. This had resulted in the young pup having grown increasingly rotund off of his mother’s milk. It was a fun game to roll atop one of his siblings so that they couldn’t move and wait until their mother or father had to pull him off. At least, Illidan thought it to be enjoyable. There was a feeling of being scolded that came in the form of Kierkegaard’s rumbling voice against his body, or the soft snipe of his mother’s breath against his coat. There was no other way Illidan would have known that he was being difficult.
 
His own blurry eyesight had started to form early in the morning when he had opted for second breakfast. He had been scurrying over his sleeping sister when he missed his step and landed face-first against the den floor. While he had released a shriek of fear and surprise, when he had steadied himself against his youthful legs, he found that the world had changed. All light had started to filter through, and he could see the movement of massive blobs within his vision. After a few hours, he’d grown used to the idea that life was a series of murky color. He’d puttered around with a few mewls before he saw an abnormal tinge to his otherwise grey world. Ephraim’s sandy coat appeared like a wiggling ball. Blinking his otherwise useless eyes, Illidan scrambled toward him with every intention to collide.

Somewhere on the canvas of shadows that served as his vision, something stirred. The only warning Ephraim had that Illidan—hereafter referred to, at least internally, as Premier Fatass—was coming for him was a blurry shimmer of grey against the blackness of the den, and then his heftier brother crashed into him.
With a grunt that petered out into a whine, Ephraim parted his jaws, twisted his smaller body, and aimed to clamp his gums down on whatever was assaulting his flank.

The rotund boy found purchase in his brother’s flank. He released a triumphant war squeal to announce that he had entered the battle dome. Almost as soon as he had, Ephraim whirled on him with a gaping mouth and clutched his cheek tightly with soft gums. Illidan made a peep of surprise before pulling his head back and losing all sense of balance on his legs. Sturdy as his girth made him, the boy was also prone to turning into a potato bug when his balance was threatened. The dark-hooded pup rolled backwards and landed in a lopsided position with nothing more than a grunt of displeasure and a youthful scowl on his face. 

He turned his attention a few times while trying to pinpoint his previous target. Seeing Ephraim was like catching sight of the beach after a coma. His eyesight was far from perfect, but his brother was paler than the others and it allowed for Illidan to single him out. With a yap, the boy fixed himself upright and meandered back toward his sibling with a few sniffs of interest. 

Illidan was larger than he, so Ephraim hadn't expected his hit, however fierce, to do much at all. Surprisingly, the heftier coywolf pup staggered back in an off-balance tumble, evidenced only by the fact that Illidan grew blurrier, and Ephraim's little muzzle crinkled with satisfaction. He didn't like others in his personal space.

Illidan was harder to deter than that, though, showing a willfulness that Ephraim matched with ease. He was stubborn about his preferences—the boy wanted his way, always, no matter the cost of it—so when Illidan's form sharpened once more, the much smaller coywolf issued a burbling sound in his throat. Neither of them could hear it, but instinct drew it to his lips nonetheless at the same exact moment that he clapped his toothless jaws in his sibling's direction.

As a young boy, Illidan did not care much for other’s personal space. He could not yet hear the cries of his brother or the warning squeaks that marked he had grown far too close. The dark-hooded youth was too brash and sure of himself to slow his pace. He trotted with a determined tumbling of his limbs and then realized – before he had time to change his mind – that Ephraim was aiming at him with gummy jowls. Illidan yipped an outcry as his brother clamped him harmless mouth around his muzzle. Not thrilled with the outcome that had befallen him, the young coywolf whined against the clasp and then reeled his head back. The glittering of his puppy gaze locked with Ephraim and he pouted, lowering his rump to the ground with a deep sigh. He eyed his sibling from the corner of his gaze for a long moment before he parted his own lips and stretched himself in an attempt to clamp down on the sandy boy’s ear. It was a push at play, though he did not know if the smaller boy would take him up on it.

His moods proved as mercurial as wind; in one instant Ephraim was growling lowly at Illidan as his jaws closed on his muzzle, and in the next he was letting go and moving back, whip-thin tail swaying invitingly. The lifting and lowering of his ears conveyed a shifting of his mood between assuredness and uncertainty, as if he couldn't decide whether or not he wanted to engage Illidan in play. At arm's length like this, Ephraim's behaviour suggested he was open to it, but perhaps it was Illidan's size that made him less sure the closer he was.

This time, he tolerated Illidan getting close. The pout had done its job for the moment, making Ephraim's emotions swirl at a sickening pace through his belly until he felt guilty for his volatile reaction. It didn't feel good in the moment, but was necessary for him; he learned then how to differentiate between threat and non-threat, and he even let Illidan grab his ear before he yanked it out of reach and countered by reaching a tiny paw up to try to bop his sibling's snout.