Feenix's Tale

Where ya want me ta start? Ya wanna story; painted in words of my father and his before 'im? Too bad...Y'all ain't gonna get it...I don't know 'em. There's a million sad stories out there. I don't need your pity and I certainly don't want it...you can stick to your own clichés. This one here is mine...oo-yeh-yie...

I s'pose I made a couple a months when I was froggy enough ta venture out on mes pattes. Bon temps...The stones beneath my paws came alive that day 'n I heard 'em screamin' ta run. I neva could get as fast as the wind though I kept tryin'. “Those flyin' paws” as my mother said...they'd get me somewhere. Yeah, they would but on top of those earthen hills I thought I already was the wind. Even then...especially then I had me an ahnvee for adventure.

Home or what it was, was nothin' but a hole in the hill; set ta the western sky so them burning hues would fall last upon us. Hell, I didn't care much 'bout the sunset then but I sure do miss it now. Ain't no tree tall enough ta block them burnt colors as they stretched out lazy like on their blue bed.

On the hills a that god-forsaken desert, just as I made half year, we made for leavin' our home for another. She'd done told me 'bout others...what she called family that would be where we were makin' for. She told me to shut my trap a number a time n' that suited me. I liked the scents comin' through my nose just the same. We climbed down the way for a long while until the light went out on all the day. I had no clue as to what the new scents were. I just knew they were new and right for sniffin' and rememberin'. She must'a known then...

The promise a stoppin' came and went. Tired paws got the more n'I knew we weren't stoppin' for the night when the light erupted in the east. We went ro-day 'til I thought mes pattes were near fallin' off. My mother's brown and grey frame skipped lightly through the rust brown colored terrain without so much as a pause. She was a lithe one and known in my mind for the grace a'water...but she sure could bite like a snake. Mais, we made it to a point some distance away when I remember seein' fires in the skyline. They were 'nothin' and we kept on movin' forward at an anxious pace, finally stopping for the night when the cloudless sky rang out in thunder. I watched for the lightning...it neva came.

My mother lead us to a new home in the comin' days and throughout my incessant questionin' of the others...she somehow managed to teach me proper. I made one full season and was takin' down jack rabbits like they were meals on the go. The others? I asked 'bout them and she'd say “See those mountains. They're there waiting for us, they told me.” I never did believ 'er, askin'..”How do you know? Those mountains are many days away and we've never parted for more than hours.” “Run like the wind and it'll take you anywhere.” They neva came....and I forgot about the questions my youth would bring up 'bout them. Dôn matta, I really didn't need them. Mother was young and strong. My learnin' curve with her was sharp n'she taught me all I needed to know...or so I thought.

Days went uncounted n'seasons...mais they went too. I was fixin' ta hunt on a day in the summer months when I caught wind a somethin' new. You'd be thinkin' 'bout them two leggers 'bout now...I know it. You'd not be far from the truth. Dis one...she might as well been on two legs 'cause the ones she was on wasn't doin' her no good. She was a fae n'she was up n' down, whimperin' up a storm a pain. She wasn't cut or bruised but I'd be damned if the earth hadn't reached up and grabbed hold of her by the hind leg. Where the earth bit, no blood came...no teeth like I later saw the earth use. She was trapped and had asked in ferva for my help...the little I could give.

What does a wolf know 'bout steel? I'll tell ya what I know now. It don't let go but for the touch of them two legged rats. What help I could, I gave...takin' meat and the like down the way ta her. It took a solid mornin's dig to get her free but the chain stayed to her leg. She was doomed from the start and it didn't help that her frame was as white as the high plains snow with the voice of an evenin's rain. What was a boy to do but to fall in love with a dream? .... mon chèr...

I had no earthly clue what ta do...she was the first soul I'd seen outside of my mother's. Ta my knowledge she'd traveled some ways from her family so I took her ta mine. Mother didn't shun her, said nothin' but nothin' needed sayin'. I saw in her eyes what she felt...like she was losin' a son ta a ghost. Time...they say it cures all, but I sensed my mother had lost a lot and felt she knew there wasn't 'nough time ta cure. Somehow, my mother knew what ta do with the steel bones of the earth around that white fae's leg and given a good night or two all four legs was workin' just fine.

It wasn't even a season before us three started ta gel like family. We hunted, slept, and traveled together. Them moments were all I have a what you might call pack life. I take what I get...Summer changed ta autumn and winter then ta spring. I didn't know a thing 'bout courtin' or a the sort. I didn't even know the proper way a doin' things like that. So, as the time we spent together grew more and more and the time with my mother got less and less...that white furred dream a mine became more like my heartbeat. Aimer...

Winter was cruel and when it changed to spring there wasn't 'nough prey ta do much with. My mother finally told us a things proper and that we had been courtin' for a long  time but no family could come with an empty pair a stomachs. That suited us...newly mates we had all we needed in the three of us.

A pair a empty stomachs...It flew over my head then but now I recall how she said that. The two a 'em were so anxious in the comin' weeks that I hadn't much time ta enjoy the ball n chain life. We moved quickly from spot to spot but stayed little in any. All I recall in those days was the smell of somethin' sickly sweet...like somethin' from memory. Whether they knew or didn't...I s'pose it dôn matta at all.

I was taken and they would have both too but for the stubbornly wild nature a my mother. What? Not a story for your likin'? Details...You want that I tell you 'bout the wound that fell my mother? The thunder without lightning that took her in one short moment? There were no passing remarks to be made from her...no final words a wisdom or insights on life. I watched the mask a brown grey color around her eyes form a saddened smile....leavin' me goin' ta them... She was dead and my mate was dead sometime later in the solitude of her transport...n'I sat in a cage a steel n' regret....Their names? They in my head where they still travel with me in the dreams they must'a been.

Sad story...I know, but thankfully I died too. See, a wolf without freedom is without a soul...without a soul a wolf is just a dog...a dead dog. That's just what those two legged rats wanted, a livin' trophy. But, I died in those unendin' days. I didn't eat and they barely fed me just the same. When they did, I was forced ta live. After a while I stopped cryin' and after a while more I forgot who I was. I rememba myself now through a veil a music n' a tongue I learned along the way...

C'est la vi...There's a million sad stories for a single happy endin'. I'll be takin my own when I find myself again.

I can't tell ya when and where it all happened but I was freed by thunder with lightnin'. That's a story in another...but I got out and I was far, so far from the desert home I was born in. The taste a freedom brought me back. I was angry at what they did and I was wantin' blood but I was the hunted now. They'd be after me and I'd be after myself in this new, strange land...

”Run like the wind and it'll take you anywhere...” I'm still runnin'.