Chapter 3- The Journey Begins

The bright spring afternoon was full of life, the birds sang with glee, finally able to leave their nest and spread their wings. Shadow had not yet witnessed spring neither had Crystal as she was born during a winter night. The two gawked around and admired the pretty sight of the forest in its most lively time. They had been trekking for hours unsure of where to go, the two decided they would ask the wildlife around the forest if they had seen any wolf packs. Shadow stuck his paws up along a tree after seeing a raccoon climb inside. “Wait”! Shadow yelled up to the raccoon but this raccoon wasn’t being very friendly. “What do you want”! He screeched down the tree at Shadow, his shrill voice made him flinch. “I wanted to know if you had maybe seen a wolf pack come through at some point”. Shadow turned back to Crystal seeing that she knew this raccoon wasn’t going to be all that helpful. The raccoons eyes widened and a smile of satisfaction curved over his gaunt face. “Maybe I have… maybe I haven’t what’s it to you”? Shadow was already annoyed and he took his paws off the tree to sit and stare up at the raccoon. “I want to know if my pack came through here”. The raccoon’s smile grew even larger like a worm stretching out, he sniggered. “Oh but what if I did see some wolves but they weren’t your pack, then my information would be overall useless”. The raccoons satisfied look made Shadow want to growl and bark at him, but he knew if he did the raccoon would probably not tell them anything. “I just want to know if any wolves came through here, now please tell me if any did”. “Ya, well I want to some fish but we can’t get everything we want can we”? Shadow was near his breaking point, this raccoon was making it as hard as possible to get any word out of him besides smart mouth comments and stupid questions. “Just tell me if any wolves came though here”. Shadow said through tight gritted teeth. “I have a better idea”. The raccoon said climbing out of his hole in the tree and staring down at Shadow. “You and your broad over there bring me a big plump fish and I will exchange that for some information”. Shadow glared at him. “Oh this is ridicules”! Crystal shouted, but the raccoon brought up his paw to silence her. “No complaining or no info do we understand now”? “Fine”. Shadow said unenthusiastically. “Good I will be waiting” he said and he leaned up against the tree and sat and watched as the two wolves tromped over to a pond.

 

The fish danced about and splashed at amazing speeds. The fish at the bog were nothing like this, they were slow and large. These fish were small and fast. “Why do we even bother helping this creep” Crystal growled in a hushed voice. “Because he might be are only link to finding out if my pack came through here”. Crystal sat down for a moment, “Well I think I should just grab that little fluff ball in my mouth and bite down enough till he gets scared into telling us what he knows”. Shadow looked at her with wide eyes. “Little violent don’t you think”? Crystal rolled her eyes “I don’t care as long as we get what we want”. Shadow looked back over to the fish, still flopping and splashing. “This is best we can do so let’s just play along for now”. Shadow eyed one fish flopping high in the air. Without planning, he jumped for the fish managing to catch it for a moment before it slipped out of his jaw and he crashed into the water with a loud splash. Shadow popped his head up out of the water and could hear the Raccoon laughing hysterically. “Nice one wolfie doing real great out there” he shouted out. Shadow was losing patience and he barked out at the raccoon. “Come on don’t pay attention to him, just get that fish and lets get our info”. Shadow nodded and dove back under water. Under the water there were hundreds of fish they scrambled as they saw the wolf swim towards them. The one he had originally griped in his mouth came into view; its tail fin had been ripped from Shadows bite. It was straggling and slowing as it tried to rejoin its group. The blood from its tail drifted in Shadow’s direction. He could taste the meat as blood touched his tongue. He lunged forward and griped the fish’s tail, dragging it back. It put up a fight, trying to wiggle free of Shadow’s jaw. He reeled in closer to the fish now, plunging all his teeth into its body and pulling it up with him to the surface of the water. Shadow immerged up out of the water with the fish tightly held in his mouth. He spit it out onto the pond edge and Crystal stomped her foot on its tail to keep it from escaping. “You better not have rabies pooch, I don’t like contaminated meat”.  Shadow and Crystal only sneered at him in response. “Crystal carried the large fish over to the tree were the raccoon waited with Shadow trailing behind. “Okay, let’s see what you have”. The raccoon said climbing down the tree. He stood over the fish which had died after a couple of moments out of water and being wounded. “I don’t like the silver color, it’s too ugly”. The raccoon snorted and he turned with his arms crossed. Shadow eyed him with disbelief. The raccoon turned back to shadow and burst into laughter. “I was just kidding, but you should have seen the looks on your faces”! He said while his eyes watered in laughter. Shadow growled at him “look, jokes over just tell us if you saw any wolves”. The raccoon dapped at his eyes with his tail and started speaking still chuckling a little. “Ya I saw some wolves pass through, they was a good bunch of them”. The raccoon twisted his big tail in his paw while he spoke. “There was this one, big white one”. Shadow’s eyes went wide in interest. “What about the wolf”? Shadow asked. The raccoons green eyes focused on Shadow then he turned and returned to speaking “She was slower than the others; I was curious, so I asked why she was acting like this”. The raccoon started to sound a little unhappy now and his joyful tone had diminished. “She said she had lost her only pup a couple of months ago, unfortunate for her”. Shadow instantly knew he was talking about his mother. “That’s my mother”. Shadow said quietly. “Oh so you’re her son huh”? “Yes” Shadow said looking at the raccoon’s eyes. “Well she’s lucky you’re still alive, she was really upset”. Shadow looked down, the thought of his mother made him feel lonely. Best get moving now, she and the rest of the pack are heading west over the mountains”. Shadow and Crystal thanked the raccoon for his help and continued on their way heading out into a sunny pasture just a few miles off from the crumbling mountains. It was a late day the sun set over the pasture and the grass glowed in the suns beam of light. “Careful, the grass is tall here we might get lost so stick close”. Crystal advised. The grass loomed feet over there heads, the sun was barely visible as the tall grass closed down to form a roof like posture. Shadow had strolled out of sight of Crystal as he picked up a scent of some kind of meat. The smell aroused his senses and he followed it through the brush. “Shadow”? Crystal called out but he could not hear her, he was too far out of earshot and Shadows mind had been enwrapped on the smell. After several minutes of smelling and searching, there he saw it. A fat piece of meat had been lying in the grass, its aroma slipped into Shadows nose like a welcome guest into a house. He edged closer keeping his eyes locked on the meat, its succulent smell taunted him and forced him closer. Shadow dove for the meat and snagged it in his jaw. But before he could even enjoy a single bite of the morsel, a sharp pain split across this leg. He dropped to the ground with a thud and whimpered fiercely. “Shadow”! He could hear Crystal shouting out for him. He cried out back to her but she did not respond. He called her name again; her voice was growing fainter she had lost him. Shadow looked down to see what had snagged him. A sharp rusty trap of some sort had clamped its teeth onto Shadows leg; his blood slid over the sides and coated its orange brown color in a dark red. He bent over and started to lick at the wound. The taste of the rusty metal though forced him to jerk away from it. “What was this thing”? Shadow thought it wasn’t like anything he had ever seen. Before he could do anything else, there were suddenly heavy footsteps tromping in his direction. He looked around, there was nobody else around. Shadow swung his head to look in front of him; standing over him like a statue was a tall bearded man. “A human”! Shadow thought with alarm. He was wearing a large coat with a leathery hood and on his face were a pair of glasses and a long white beard that hung down over his chest. Shadow stared up at the man with sheer terror rushing through him. The human’s arms reached down, Shadow flinched and tried to move away from the human but the metal trap held him in place like a trapped fly in a spider web. The man reached down and snagged something on his attacking trap. It snapped off with a tug and the trap opened. Shadow would have sprinted and ran off now being free, but he couldn’t take his eyes off the human, he was too fascinated by his appearance. The man grabbed Shadow up and hefted him into his arms. Shadow wasn’t sure how to react he did not struggle to escape or bite at the human, he felt strangely safe with this human but why? Before long they were heading out of the tall grass and towards a large box of some sort, Shadow stared at it as he and the man came to a wooden wall with a knob on its front. The man griped the knob and the wall swung open and they both entered.

 

It had been hours, Crystal looked everywhere. Shadow was never found. She started to wonder if maybe Shadow had been attacked by something, is it possible he got injured. No, she thought. I would have heard him if he was in trouble. She was resting in a grassy part of a forest a couple of miles from the grassy field. Shadow was probably on his way to the Sierra without her, assuming she was gone now that she had lost him. She lowered her head and started to tear up. The only friend she’d known in a long time was already gone.