The Moon Wolf

Chapter 12 (1st Draft)

With Beta Lucas and his team in the lead and Anex and his subordinates in the rear, Penn and the pups followed a well used path down the mountain from the rendezvous point. At some point, along the winding trail, Penn and the pups got their first glimpse of the children's new home.

The pack was so enormous that several decades back they built a town in the valley below to accommodate the steadily growing pack. Penn could see little subdivisions, a main drag with businesses, and a few large buildings that were likely a school, a community recreational facility of some kind, and the town hall.

The 14 year old twins, Ace and Archer, came up beside Penn and both let out a low whistle of approval.

"This place is so much bigger than home!" Ace said with awe.

Their pack had only consisted of about 40 houses built along an old logging road that ran parallel to the river the cut through Griffin territory. There was no school, no grocery store, no coffee shop, or really anything at all in the Griffin pack village. The families had to travel nearly three hours on bad roads to get to the nearest human town with a grocery store. Comparatively speaking, the sprawling village below, with its 400 plus houses, was like a mini-city. All the children were as equally impressed as the twins.

Penn smiled to herself over their enthusiasm because chances were, when they reached their late teens and early twenties, they would probably come to think of this place as very small - too small for them to stretch their paws and run.

"Do you think they have a skate park?" Archer wondered aloud.

Penn just gave a shrug of her shoulder. She couldn't say. They were too far up still to be able to make out those kind of details.

But Archer didn't seem to mind her lack of response. Instead, he pointed with an eager finger and asked, "Do you think that is a public pool?"

Again, Penn had no reply, but a small buzz began among the children. They were all excited about the prospect of a pool. Penn gathered from the subsequent chatter that no one in the Griffin pack had even a small backyard pool. However, it wasn't like the kids were deprived. A huge, lazy river flowed right by their little pack and would have been perfect for swimming in every summer.

"Will we have to go to a public school?" twelve year old Olivia suddenly asked when Jackson pointed out what looked like a school building down below.

The children had been home-schooled all their lives. Griffin ack was too small to build a school and too isolated to be busing the kids anywhere. So, like many other small, isolated packs, the children were home-schooled.

"I want to go to school," Zoe, one of the two ten year olds in the group, exclaimed with a squeal.

Her enthusiasm was catchy and the kids who were 12 and under, minus the youngest pups who didn't know much about public school, all piped up saying they wanted to go as well. Penn noticed that the older kids didn't seem so keen. She didn't blame them.