For as long as I could remember – which admittedly wasn’t all that long – mother and father had always made a point in reminding me that I was special. To mum, I was her little lotus bloom. To daddy, I was his precious starchild. From my first memory, every vivid detail has been filled with the love of my family. Then again, I hadn’t roamed outside the small radius boundary that mom and dad had set for me from the den. But if I was so special, why couldn’t I see more of the home that was mine? The home that someday I would rule in mother’s place.

So, when mum and dad were off doing some parent-y thing, Sleek and Swallow were off doing their duties as princes of the realm, and Ceal was napping idly in the den, I crept from the cavern into the sunlight. As soon as I was in the clear I took off, bounding across the invisible border that had been placed to restrict me. I paused then, looking back momentarily. My dark auds pricked forward, the slightest feeling of guilt flashing through my belly. I didn’t want to get my sister in trouble for letting me roam off, but I wanted to have some fun! I loved my siblings, but I hadn’t had a chance to meet any of the other puppies of the mountain. Today was my day!

I leaped away, setting forth in an excited run. I jumped over sticks and rocks and skidded around trees. My legs were starting to get a bit longer than was normal for a pup my age, and even though I didn’t really notice the difference I did often find myself stumbling over the length. My aeolian fur tousled this way and that as I bounded across the territory. After a while, I crested a small roll in the landscape and found myself looking down on a small group of pups. Success! I had found them! Mother had told me that there were plenty of other pups that I would meet soon enough – the children of Ammy and Zild, Doe and Fenny, Rainbow and Gabby (I could never remember how to pronounce everyone’s names). But here they were! I almost couldn’t believe my mahogany eyes. So I sat down and watched them for a moment, slightly unsure of myself for the first time that I could remember.

Watching carefully, I noticed as the darkest of the pups pounced on the lightest. Surely they were just playing. But then I noticed another darker pup jumping on a boy that had looked like he was going to join in on the playing. My brow furrowed. This play did not look like as much fun as the play that me and Ceal did. I stood up and quickly descended the small hill, rapidly approaching the group of pups. “Excuse me,” I said as I approached, hoping to break up whatever was going on. But it seemed that no one heard my delicate voice.

I heard the words of the darker boy as I approached, and I didn’t exactly like the tone of his words. “Excuse me!” I declared once more, this time my voice loud and determined, “You are hurting him! and that is not OK,” I stated. I had regained my confidence, but I wasn’t really sure what to do with it. I knew that words could be powerful, but how could words remove the darker boy from the mahogany boy? Mother had taught me that hurting another living being was wrong. She’d said there were reasons to wound another – I couldn’t remember them right now - but certainly this was not one of them. Glancing at the darker boy, the one whose face was fringed with white, my head tilted slightly to the side. Why did he feel the need to be so violent? His words had seemed cruel, but I was intrigued by him. He spoke differently than my family. Was this what other families were like? Curiosity was certainly getting the better of me.