10-05-2018, 06:56 PM
Tristan imagined himself picking carefully through brambles, coat snagging and needles scraping. The tangled barbs stretched to the horizon, he lost in the labyrinth. He’d be torn to shreds before escaping. Despair loomed until a shadow fell across his eyes. The shadow moved like a guide, ducking and seeking its way through nature’s dungeon. Tristan sniffed, and followed. The wolf was a guide through dangers; monstrous body holding back the teeth of bloodied brambles for the young to pass unscathed. Even if it meant a thorn in his own side, he took the brunt of it. A leader, an alpha. Thorn paw.
Tristan smiled as the great wolf sat close. The downy fur swept soft, yet contained great strength that might be roused for defense just as easily as for attack. The disunion of two such concepts split Tristan’s perceptions of the world vastly. A pack; companionship. He’d never realized before. In the epiphany, acceptance thinned to rejection. A hunger slid into the former warmth of a content belly. An awakening took him to his feet, and for the first time, when he ran, it wasn’t alone.
He raced up the beach, black sand dusting the air with their prints. The cliffs passed them by like blurs. Then slopes, upward, steep. Waters that narrowed and widened on enormous plains. Waterfalls crashing when their courses encountered rifts in the earth. Eyes watched; and he felt the urge to cheer. What was caged in the chest to burst forth like howling. For the first time, running was fun. Swiftness propelled him farther, faster. Each step greater leaps. Bounding unfettered. He laughed and howled and leaped like the chains holding him down were bit clean through.
The westfjords rolled familiar by. The inlet downslope yawning from the sea was still and gray. The small structure of his grandfather’s former home waited as it always did. The headstone was not here in this world, Tristan already checked. The basalt pillar remained, however. Like those piercing the ocean at Reynisfjara beach, grandfather’s tomb seemed to writhe like a mirage if he looked too closely at it.
Panting, he turned his back on the troll’s stone and smiled at Thorn Paw. “Home,” he said plainly, proud.
Tristan smiled as the great wolf sat close. The downy fur swept soft, yet contained great strength that might be roused for defense just as easily as for attack. The disunion of two such concepts split Tristan’s perceptions of the world vastly. A pack; companionship. He’d never realized before. In the epiphany, acceptance thinned to rejection. A hunger slid into the former warmth of a content belly. An awakening took him to his feet, and for the first time, when he ran, it wasn’t alone.
He raced up the beach, black sand dusting the air with their prints. The cliffs passed them by like blurs. Then slopes, upward, steep. Waters that narrowed and widened on enormous plains. Waterfalls crashing when their courses encountered rifts in the earth. Eyes watched; and he felt the urge to cheer. What was caged in the chest to burst forth like howling. For the first time, running was fun. Swiftness propelled him farther, faster. Each step greater leaps. Bounding unfettered. He laughed and howled and leaped like the chains holding him down were bit clean through.
The westfjords rolled familiar by. The inlet downslope yawning from the sea was still and gray. The small structure of his grandfather’s former home waited as it always did. The headstone was not here in this world, Tristan already checked. The basalt pillar remained, however. Like those piercing the ocean at Reynisfjara beach, grandfather’s tomb seemed to writhe like a mirage if he looked too closely at it.
Panting, he turned his back on the troll’s stone and smiled at Thorn Paw. “Home,” he said plainly, proud.