The Valley Of The Wolves

A long long run.

Tw: depiction of scars and bruises as well as implied abuse in the chapter. <3

My foot slipped on the icy rock and I tumbled down the slope. Bruised but at the bottom I looked up, I hadn't fallen very far but Aki and the others hurried down anyway. I stood up and shook off the snow.

Aki and the others stood by my side as we began to run across the icy tundra. Our claws helped us grip the slippery ice and snow.

Running as one wolf through the icy tundra made my heart pound faster and breath steady as we melted into one breath, one heart.

Making ground toward the fire kept us pushing, even when our pads were sore from the cold sharp ice and rocks. Not less than three hours had passed and we had made it close to the fire, now we could make out a small figure shivering as they leaned over it.

We slowed down to a trot and closed in on the camp like it was prey. The human looked up to see four wolves closing around them. They scrambled to grab a stick from the fire and held it up, shaking it to keep us away. Reacting to being threatened, Irakusa growled.

The human had long brown hair that had been mostly cut off at some point and wore fur pelts with a tooth necklace.

I dipped my head in submission. 'We won't hurt you.' I tried to tell them. Their leg had long scratches across it and smaller scrapes, scratches and bruises were all over their skin.

They had not moved from their seat on the ground, probably due to their leg. After closer notice rope was tied around her arm and ropeburns were on her wrists.

Four bed roles were in the camp and after a moment I realized she was a hostage. She threw the stick of fire at me. I dodged and leapt out to break the rope. She screamed but quickly silenced herself when she saw me chewing on the rope holding her there. I looked up at her and she calmed down, letting me help get her free of the rope.

The others approached and helped untie the rope from her leg. Once the rope laid on the ground as a slobbery chewed up mess I tried to figure out how to bring her away from here.

Aki dragged over a sled. It was a small wooden dog sled with some harnesses. The girl looked surprised as we dragged over the sled and asked to be harnessed. She clipped us into the small harnesses, and climbed on board.

Wincing on her bad leg. This time we ran for much longer. We watched the sun rise over the ice. Praying that the sun didn't melt any lakes we needed to cross we pushed on, even when a light snow turned into a small snow storm we pushed forward towards the mountain. We stopped once to catch some food and cook it but then continued on.

When we got to the steep mountain slope It was the afternoon, we were too tired to climb up the rocks so we camped at the bottom and fell asleep.

Authors note: We will see more of the humans that imprisoned our lovely friend... just you wait.