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They had seen such creatures before. Stunted things, walking about on two legs instead of four, a handicap that left those creatures capable of only ambling, wobbling movements. Yes, such beings had wandered through their territory before. At first, a curiosity, the beasts had taken great sport in stalking those things, grunting in laughter at their awkward, swinging gait.
They had crouched just behind the tree line and watched those creatures travel from place to place, over time, carving paths through previously unmarred forest. The beasts saw no need to interrupt or draw attention to themselves, simply watching was enough. The beasts roamed their forests, the beings claimed the land beyond, leveling meadows and covering them over in great swaths of flat rock, raising sparkling towers into the sky far above even the eldest of oaks.
The beasts saw this and shrugged, the land beyond the forest was for the concern of other animals. The forest was theirs, a virgin hunting ground ripe for their roaming and playing, hunting and sleeping. What mattered the affairs of the world beyond their borders?
Over time things changed. Their perception of those beings evolved from an idle curiosity to something more akin to distain as the first tree was felled and dragged away between the claws of some great shuddering metal creation. True, it might have been the first fallen tree that resonated most loudly, the crack of dying wood against earth echoing over the stunned landscape. Four pairs of ears flicked toward the sound in unison. Claws dug into earth, lips curled away from white fangs and a growl rose from each throat.
Unfortunately, it was far from the last crime committed. The encroachment upon their territory continued, the beasts retreated further and further into their shrinking domain. What once had been undisturbed earth insulated by a blanket of leaves became churned mud beneath the ministrations of those things, a weeping wound exposed to the smoke-churned sky.
Those things, those creatures, weren’t fair or benevolent beings. They rejected the laws of nature, raising those sparkling towers as offerings to the pagan gods they worshipped, Greed and Gluttony. The beasts surrendered their land foot by foot and tree by tree until they had withdrawn into the heart of their forest.
Each one of those creatures they spotted became one more painful reminder of the war they weren’t even fighting; aggression simply wasn’t in the beasts’ nature. It was a war they were losing by default, the enemy left unchallenged as they advanced further into the forest with each rising of the sun.
Their only chosen defense was avoidance. Hiding when one of those malevolent creatures wandered through, ducking low behind the bushes or nearest outcropping of rocks.
The scent of one of those creatures has three of the beasts running for the nearest cover. One of the horned beasts watches the three of his kin disappear behind a copse of tall grass. He defies the instinct to bolt, holding his ground on his chosen perch, an overlook above a meadow.
It’s a pleasant spot with a fine vantage. He’s rebuts the idea of surrendering such a fine perch to the mere chance that he could be spotted.
The sun’s been arcing across the sky throughout the morning, but he knows he can eek out at least one last bit of time bathing in its warmth before the trees chase it away with their shadows. It’s enough of a reason for him to hold his ground. His coat blends in with the surroundings well enough, if he can remain still as a statue, the creature shouldn’t see him.
He watches the creature below. It’s shorter than most. One of their cubs, he assumes, by the sight. It’s gangly instead of muscular, leggy and bright eyed, attention wandering like a hummingbird flitting between flowers. He watches the cub crawl on the ground after a bug for a time before dancing in circle after circle, gaze pointed upwards at the sky above, before dizziness triumphs and it collapses to the ground.
He rests, dropping his muzzle to rest on his paws, waiting for the creature to wander away back to its own kind so that serenity may return to his surroundings.
The sun dip lower in the sky, the shadows creep longer. The cub remains in the meadow, leaning against a tree far below his perch, etching a collection of lines and divots in the earth with a stick. Eventually, as with all other endeavors the cub has taken through the afternoon, its interest wanes. It rises, brushing the dust from its coat and wandering further into the forest.
Even if this creature’s interest has wandered, the beast’s has not. Digging claws into the earth, he rises to his feet, stretches the tightness from long dormant muscles, and sets off after the creature at a quiet trot.
Light gives way to the paleness of the night. Each exhalation of air leaves a faint mist in the air. The cub’s pacing has grown more frantic, more agitated. It emits muted whines from time to time, calling out for its kin. The beast trails it still. Though kin of this creature he is not, he cannot but feel a tenuous connection. This creature is different than most.
For the first time that day, he risks drawing closer to the creature for a closer look. It’s female, he can tell that much. The next feature he notices has him pausing midstride. Tucked against either side of her head are small, stag-like horns. Is this cub kin to those creatures or a child of this forest?
She can feel the pulse, he knows, from the way she rests her hand against the bark of the tree or rubs the texture of a leaf with a paw. Most creatures of her kind are deaf to the life force that pulses through the veins of each animal and plant, layered one upon another to form a symphony unlike any other.
She’s collapsed to the ground in a heap, water beads at the corner of each eye and creeps down along her face in small streams. He stares out at her from the shadows for a few moments longer before rising once more and striding into the small opening beneath the forest canopy. Bathed in the faint light of the moon, for the first time, he presents himself to one of these creatures.
She hears the rustle of grass beneath his paws; he meant for her to hear his approach. She turns, emitting a sharp yelp and scrambling backwards in retreat. He takes a tenuous step forward.
Her chest rises and falls in shallow, panicked breaths but her retreat stops.
He takes a step forward, then another, and another. Closing the gap, he lowers his head until they are eye to eye. There is panic in her eyes.
He is a beast of the forest, her, a spawn of the world’s demons. She raises a shaking hand. He presses his head against her chilled palm, chuffing a quiet greeting.
She strings a series of short noises together. A greeting perhaps? A curse? A prayer to find some of her own kind in this foreign place, not of their domain? The gibberish makes little sense to his ears. He feels the pulse in her hand, the same pulse that thrums in the land beneath his feet and is mirrored within the depths of his own body. Demon-spawn she may be, but demon this cub is not.
He picks the child up by the scruff of her coat, closing it gently within his mouth. She wriggles for a time, barking sharply in protest. A well-timed kick connects with his muscular chest but fails to earn her release. Eventually his patience prevails over her flailing and she goes quiet, content to watch the forest pass alongside them.
A child of the forest, this cub is, not a demon of the world. He takes her home.
The pack argues about the cub. They see her horns; they see the bits of the forest that she has woven into a necklace around her neck. More than that, though, they see the hairless body and the bipedal form twisted away from nature’s four-legged disposition. They see those creatures in her.
They fight about it. There are wrestling matches with his siblings. There are the times he clamps his powerful jaw around each of their necks just enough to let them know a bit more will draw blood. Thus his will is accepted as law, fight by fight, they fall in line behind him.
There is wariness to her presence in the pack, a refusal to share killed prey. The others trot along through the forest just quickly enough that she struggles to keep up on her too short legs. At those times he scoops her up and deposits her on his back just behind his shoulder blades. Her hands pull painfully at his matted fur, yet he takes pleasure in her presence. The two travel as one.
They hunt as a pack at times, bringing down small rabbits or a lamed stag. At the river each beast stands patiently in knee deep water, as immobile as a polished rock resting on the river’s bottom. The fish eventually grow accustomed to the beasts’ presence and weave between their legs as simply one more feature of a complex landscape. It’s then that they attack in a flurry of gnashing teeth, seeing little beyond the flash of a fish’s fins as their prey scamper in all directions.
It’s times such as this that he marvels at the she cub’s ingenuity. A sharpened stick spears fish beneath the surface of the crystalline stream more effectively than he and his kin are able to catch them with a snap of their teeth.
His kin eye her pile of flopping fish with yearning eyes and perhaps just a bit of drool at the edge of each mouth.
She looks between them and her pile. They prance up and down a few times, tails wagging. She makes a toothy gesture. Not a threat, as the baring of teeth might suggest, but something softer, a kindness in her eyes directed toward his siblings despite their lasting hesitation to accept her as pack. She makes the first offering, throwing a few in the direction of each beast.
They pounce upon them without further encouragement, devouring the scaly treats with vigor.
That night as he curls up around the she cub, the others creep in closer to the fire she’s built, shadows dancing on the ground and reflecting in their eyes. She raises a hand out toward the first of his siblings to approach, using her small paw to scratch that place behind his sister’s ear that she never seems capable of reaching. The beast’s foot thumps against the ground in rhythm with the she cub’s ministrations.
The nights leading onward from that have the five of them, four beasts and one she cub, gathering together in their chosen resting spot for the evening, beneath a black sky dotted with pinpricks of light on fine nights, in caves when rain hammers down upon them.
The creature in the she cub fades day by day; she becomes less of them and more a being of the forest. Her one sleek hair has gone awry, resembling more a shaggy mane. Once manicured nails collect chips from scrambling up trees and wrestling matches held in the meadows. The pungent odor of those creatures fades, replaced by a faintly musty smell that blends the wet earth and the cool nights and forest romps they have shared.
There are strange creatures in the world beyond their forest, and a pack of beasts within the woods. For eons the two worlds have remained separate. Now there runs a she cub on the borderlands, born of creatures and nurtured among beasts. If one listens closely at night, they may just hear the song knitting the two worlds together. Four horned beasts and an antlered she cub howl in unison, as pack, horned heads pointed upward toward the heavens as they bay a welcoming to the night and the many souls which roam its depths.