I Shall Not Waste My Days; I Shall Use My Time

Riuk, the former great King of Spring Grounds has returned to Blossom Forest. Riuk, the former great King of Spring Grounds is running as though for his life.

Several weeks of easy travel had brought the large timber wolf back to the expansive forest that had been his home for so many years. His heart had been light as he feet as he ran, buoyant with joy at his imminent return to those who he had missed so much. A burning need to see his land again, to hold council from his tree stump perch again, had driven him to run day and night back to the only place he knew as home. With only short breaks to hunt and drink, his energy had seemed boundless. His only desire was to heed the call. The call back to Blossom.

Upon arriving, the forest seems changed, but he puts this notion aside as a figment born of being away for so long. With steady, sure strides he lopes through autumn’s fallen leaves letting memory alone guide him to his old kingdom. But as he runs, the changes he had dismissed so easily begin to multiply. Strange scents assail him at every turn. Scents of new beasts, the likes of which he has never known before. New pack boundaries are apparent where before he knew none had existed. The air is electric, as though infused by some unseen power. He fights down a worried whine, yet his heart quickens in his chest, mimicked by a quickening of his feet. He is anxious to gain the familiar soils of Spring Grounds, to commune with his old pack once more, and to ask of them what these changes mean.

As he draws ever nearer to his old pack boundary, the light grows imperceptibly darker. The strange, electric feeling in the air begins to intensify, causing his dark coat to stand on end. Before long, he is running in a strange, cloying darkness. He is sprinting now, spurred by the certainty that something is terribly amiss.

Suddenly, the sky above him explodes into a net of brilliant white lightning. With a terrified yelp he leaps sideways into the shelter of a sagging pine just at the edge of his old territory. Before him is nothing. Gone are his wildflower meadows. Gone are the ancient oak trees beneath which he would bask. Gone is the tree stump from atop which he would address his pack. In their place, a charred landscape, with only a single burnt oak still standing. Above, a deeply unnatural storm whirls. This time he cannot contain the pained whine that emanates from within his broad chest; the sorrow at seeing his beloved home so destroyed is too great. Cautiously, ears laid flat and body pressed close to the ground, he places but one paw over what was once the territory boundary.

Immediately, as though to scatter him from this place, the sky above opens once more and a great bolt of blinding light and scorching heat crashes to the ground mere inches from his extended foot. His vision is gone, replaced by a burned-in image of the bolt. His only senses are pain, the smell of scorched fur and flesh, the sound of his own shriek of pain, and a deep, unrelenting terror. Scarcely a moment has passed, and the King is gone, -driven at a full sprint from the land he had once ruled by some malignant force.

He crashes through the underbrush, easy loping stride abandoned in favour of an all-out rush that would put distance between himself and that horrible place as quickly as possible. Still blinded by the impossibly bright light, he staggers clumsily over the uneven terrain, crying his hurt, his rage, his sorrow all the way. He knows not how far or in which direction he runs, but all at once instinct pulls him up short, forelegs digging deep into the leaf litter and soft, loamy soil beneath to bring his considerable weight to a hard stop. For a moment he knows not why his muscles have ceased their wild churning and simply stands with head hung low, flanks heaving, breath coming in great rushing gasps. His amber eyes are wide, wild, darting from side to side in search of the thing that has stopped his maddened charge. There is no movement, no danger in sight, no reason for halting. And yet he remains frozen to the spot, bound by some unseen force.

A gentle breeze sweeps toward him, scattering the fallen leaves at his feet and carrying, at last, the reason for his halt. His nostrils flare as the breeze carries up to him the unmistakable scent of another wolf, and another, and another. His blind dash through the forest has brought him to the very border of a pack territory. Immediately he retreats several yards for fear of crossing into the territory uninvited. He has seen what happens to the unwanted intruders. As alpha of Spring Grounds, he himself had carried out the punishment several times.

Finding a position atop a rock jutting from the soft earth, he makes some attempt to gather his wits. He gives his great form a vigorous shake, sending dust and all manner of forest debris flying from his earthy coat, before forcing himself to sit and look about himself. The forest is dense around him. A wall of ancient conifers presses in on all sides, imposing a threatening silence against which his ragged breathing sounds harsh. Through a break in their peaks, he spies the peak of a mountain and knows immediately where he has arrived: the edge of the Aurora Borealis territory.

But something is wrong. Riuk had known Borealis wolves before leaving Blossom Forest, yet he can detect none of their scents in this place. He stands once more, thrusting his thick snout into the air and breathing deeply, sifting through the pack’s signatures in search of one he might recognize. But to no avail. This place is changed as well. Not one familiar trace is to be found upon the cool autumn breeze.

Once again he feels the fear and confusion well up within him. What has happened to this forest he once called home? Where is the place he knew and loved so well? His injured paw smarts, insulted by his frenzied dash through the woods, and he remembers sharply the image of his beloved Spring Grounds, abandoned and reduced to a smoldering wasteland by some unnatural storm. He feels certain that his heart will break with sorrow. Defeated, pained, and spirit heavy with loss, he lifts his great head to the clear sky above and lets a low, mournful howl rise from his chest. Let someone come. Another living wolf, stranger or not, who might explain what has happened in his once-beloved land.

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