The Wolf King

Across the wildwoods and roaring rivers, from mountain to snow-capped mountain, the Wolf King reigned, and all the creatures that dwelled in the land, whether mighty elk or timid rabbit, swore fealty to him.

Upon his subjects, the Wolf King levied a heavy tax—an offering of kin from each clan, chosen on the eve of the new moon, to be consumed by the King and his pack.

Those who refused to pay the tax, as the badgers once did, were hunted to the last, torn limb from limb, and gobbled up.

Such was the immutable order of all things

It was early one morning, as the pale sun crept over the eastern peaks, when a deer mouse appeared in the Great Cave, the Court of the Wolf King, shivering with fright.

The Wolf King’s fangs, sharp and terrible, glistened as he yawned.

“The new moon is two days out,” he said from his bed of dried leaves. “Have the mice sent their offering early?”

The members of the court, who flanked the King on both sides, watched the rodent with cold blue eyes, a few licking their hungry lips.

The deer mouse bowed. “P-please spare this pitiful servant, my Lord, if only for a moment. I bring news of terror in your land.”

“I am the only terror in this land,” The Wolf King stated plainly. “Speak. Let us hear what troubles the rodents so. The eagles, I suspect.” He mused to his court members. “Or perhaps the owls?”

The deer mouse kept his head low. “Trouble has come for all the clans, my Lord—owl and mouse alike. Last night, under a sky of cloud and thunder, the bison were ambushed and slain.”

The Wolf King wrinkled his snout. “As usual, the mice stick their little noses where they don’t belong. The matters of each clan are their own, rodent. If the bison were in distress, their elders would send a messenger to petition for aid.”

“The bison elders are dead, my Lord.” Laughter and grunts of disbelief rose up in the court.

“Silence,” the King ordered, his lips curling in displeasure. “I do not know what passes for humor among the little vermin, but I am not amused.”

“It’s the truth,” the deer mouse said, his tiny voice trembling. “The bison are dead—every bull, cow, and calf. Their bodies lie broken in the tall grass.” He looked up, meeting the Wolf King’s gaze. “Consume me if you must, my King, but I beg you to believe. Or at least, go and see with your own eyes.”

The court fell silent, save for the sound of the King’s cubs suckling on the Queen.

“You would presume to command a king?”

Alarmed, the deer mouse shook his head. “Never my Lord.”

The Wolf King stood, his back arched, a shock of dark silver running the length of his spine. “I have grasped this land between my fangs. By my will, all things live and die.”

The Wolf King strode toward the mouse.

“If what you say is true, then tell me, who dares to kill the subjects of the king?” He snarled. “To steal my rightful prey?”

The deer mouse averted his eyes as the Wolf King’s shadow loomed. “M-monsters from beyond the mountains, my Lord. Strange Beasts who flay their prey and wear the flesh as their own.”

“There is no such creature,” the King’s attendants protested. “The mouse tells mad lies!”

“It’s true,” the mouse shouted.

“Liar! Liar! Liar!” the wolves chanted.

Overwhelmed by the jeers of the court, the Deer Mouse turned his head and clenched his eyes, certain he would be devoured in a single bite.

To his surprise, what he felt next was not the Wolf King’s s teeth, but the weight of his massive paw pressing lightly on his head.

“You have shown great bravery, little one. All the more for a feeble rodent.”

“You…believe me?”

The Wolf King nodded. “That you risk your life is proof enough. Today you will serve the court as my eyes in the fields and forests.”

An attendant whined. “But sire—”

“Should his words prove false,” The Wolf King snapped. “I will feast not only on his flesh, but the flesh of his people.” “I-it is an honor, my Lord,” the Deer Mouse stuttered, his tiny heart awash with a mix of relief and new-found terror. “I won’t let you down.”

“We shall repay the interlopers in kind.” The Wolf King turned to face his pack, pacing as he spoke. “With these noble fangs, I will slay the Strange Beasts. With these divine claws, I will peel their flesh. For I am the Wolf King.”

“His will be so!” All present shouted, the Deer Mouse included.

The Wolf King took five of his strongest warriors and went down into the valley, toward the Yawning Strath where the bison roamed.

The names of the warriors were Greysnout, Whitepaw, Blackmane, Silvertail, and One-Eye. He also brought the deer mouse.

“Is this where you last saw them?” The Wolf King asked, kneeling at the edge of the tall grass.

“Y-yes, my Lord,” the Deer Mouse said from his perch atop the King’s head. “They headed north into the woods.” The deer mouse pointed toward an opening in the glen.

“One way in and out.” The Wolf King mused. “How large are their claws?”

“They have none, my Lord.”

“Their fangs?”

“Flat like a grass eater,” the deer mouse said. “From what I could see.” He quickly added.

“Then they must have numbers alone. To think the bison would fall so easily.”

The Wolf King puzzled over this before turning to the warriors crouching behind him. “There is no escape. Take them from behind and spare none, not even the pups.”

“Yes, my Lord!” The warriors barked.

Striding across the open plain, the King and his warriors crossed the field and entered the forest, darting between the trees. The Deer Mouse, still riding atop the King’s head, clung desperately to an ear.

As they approached the glen, the intoxicating aroma of buffalo blood flooded the King’s nostrils.

“They’re up head!” He howled, gobs of saliva dripping from his fangs.

His noble warriors howled in kind.

Inside the glen, there awaited a sight never before seen in the valley—dismembered chunks of flayed meat impaled on sharpened branches jutting from the ground.

“How horrible,” the deer mouse squeaked.

Cautious, the King and his warriors circled the meat, sniffing the ground and air.

“There has been a fire. And a foul scent lingers heavy,” the King growled.

“The strange Beasts?” The deer mouse asked.

“It must be,” the King said. “And they are not long gone.”

While the King spoke with the Deer Mouse, one of his warriors, the male known as Greysnout, found himself overwhelmed by the succulent stench.

Unable to contain his hunger, he approached a freshly cooked chunk.

Only a bite, Greysnout thought to himself. What can it hurt.

As his great jaws reached for what had once been a thigh, there came a low noise, a sharp THWIP, that caused the wolves and mouse to startle.

“What was tha—” The Deer Mouse was cutoff by a gurgling howl.

Blood gushed from Greysnout’s face as his paws clawed desperately at the earth, unable to pull away.

“Silence,” The King hissed. But the warrior took no heed. “What’s wrong with him?”

The other warriors crept in for a closer look and found that some winged thing—anlong shaft of wood with goose feathers—had pierced the roof of Greysnout’s mouth, pinning him to the ground.

“What is it?” The King said, his eyes scanning the treeline.

But the warriors could not answer, for they had never seen anything like it before.

Worse still, they did not know there could be more.

It was the Deer Mouse who saw the swarm of winged things emerge from the high shadows of the trees. He watched in slow horror as they arced like peregrines and then, with the force and fury of a summer hail, rained down on Greysnout and the warriors.

The Deer Mouse clenched his eyes shut, clinging to the king’s head as their howls of torment filled his tiny ears.

When next he opened them, the Deer Mouse found the king charging for the exit. A short-haired wolf with a rope around his neck blocked their way.

The short-hair was foreign to the King and the mouse.

“Hold tight!” The King roared as he tackled and plunged his fangs into the short-hair’s jugular.

Tossed by the impact, the deer mouse sailed theough the air and crashed into a pile of dry twigs.

Dazed, the mouse shook his head and looked up to find the Strange Beasts standing over him in the bushes.

In their long strange paws, they held curved sticks with strings attached, and pulled tight against those strings were more of the terrible winged things.

“My king,” the deer mouse shouted, pushing through the foilage. “Run!”

The Deer Mouse turned just in time to see the King’s wide jaw snap tight on him.

A single trail of blood stained the high grass of the Yawning Strath, snaking its way up the mountain.

With three of the winged things sticking from his back, the Wolf King dashed through the trees as he traversed the mountainside.

And riding in his open mouth, standing on his tongue, was the deer mouse.

As hot, jagged breath bore down on his back, the deer mouse pressed his right paw against the inside of the King’s blood soaked fangs. How strange that these fangs, which he had so feared this very morning, which had killed so many of his kin, now provided sanctum.

An indescribable feeling welled up in the Deer Mouse, something that went beyond awe.

“Truly,” the deer mouse thought, “the King is a Marvel of Heaven.”

The King’s breathing grew labored and the deer mouse found himself sloshing back and forth in blood and spit.

“My lord, you must rest.” The deer mouse called out as he clung to the King’s upper gums.

His vision blurring, the Wolf King stumbled and crashed against the hard earth.

The deer mouse popped out, tumbled through leaves and dirt, and smacked upside down against a tree.

His head spinning, the Deer Mouse took a moment to recover before looking around.

A few feet away, the Wolf King lay beside a large stone, breathing heavily. Blood seeped from the winged things, darkening his fur with slow blooms.

“My Lord!” The rodent cried as he rushed to the king’s side.

“Water,” The king panted. “Bring me water.”

Spotting a small stream, the mouse grabbed a leaf, fashioned it into a bowl, and went to the water’s edge. Gently, he filled the bowl, careful not to spill a drop.

Darting back and forth, the Deer Mouse worked to quench to the king’s thirst with thimble-sized servings. For many minutes this went on.

“That’s enough,” the king finally said.

Immediately, the deer mouse went to work, gathering up mud and leaves.

“What are you doing?” The King asked.

“Your wounds must be tended, my Lord. You’ve lost too much blood.”

As the Deer Mouse labored to seal the cuts and gashes, many of which were far too deep, a cloud formed in his mind. How could he possible hope to get the Winged Things out?

As he wondered this, there arose a gutteral sound from deep within the King.

Frightened, it took a moment for the Deer Mouse to recognize it as laughter.

“You work hard to preserve my life, little one,” the King said, his eyes drifting out of focus.

“It is my duty,” the deer mouse said, returning to his work.

“How many of mice have I devoured?”

“My lord?”

“How many of your kin have I killed and eaten?”

The Deer Mouse hesitated before packing more leaves and dirt into a cut. “Countless, my Lord.”

“And what do you think of it?”

“It is the order of all things, as natural as the seasons themselves.

“So you don’t care?” The King asked.

The Deer Mouse shook his head. “Far from it, my Lord. The mice devour the bugs and everyone else devours the mice. Day and night my brothers and sisters are picked off.”

He picked a large, browning leaf off the ground. “Our elders are lucky if they live for three years. Truth told, that’s about the only thing that qualifies a mouse to be an elder.”

“A pitiful existence,” the King remarked. “Your days are filled with dread and despair, always ending in violent demise.”

“Dread and despair?” The deer mouse perked up. “Far from it, my Lord! Feeling down isn’t the mouse way at all.”

“Is that so?” The King said, raising a brow.

For a moment, it seemed there were two mice. Then three.

“We don’t have the time,” the deer mice exclaimed. “Each night is filled with song and revelry, and in the morning we thank the sun mother for the blessing of another day. That is how precious life is to a deer mouse!”

“I see.” The Wolf King weighed the rodent’s words in his mind. “And never once do you long to kill the eagles? Or a wolf?”

The deer mouse backed away, a single rodent once again. “N-never my lord. For something as small as mouse to even think about—”

“What if you weren’t small?” The King asked. “What if a mouse was as big as a wolf?”

The deer mouse was at a loss.

“Well?” The King prompted.

“Then he wouldn’t be a mouse at all, my Lord,” he finally said.

“True enough.” The Wolf King sat upright, sneering at the pain.

“Take care my Lord. Your wounds are deep.”

“A mouse is a mouse and a wolf is a wolf.” The Wolf King struggled to his feet. “One can never understand the mind of the other. But even so—”

“Even so?”

“Quiet,” the King hissed, his eyes fixed on the horizon.

Despite his diminished state, the Wolf King crouched low into a defensive posture.

The Deer Mouse hid behind a large stone.

The surrounding trees remained quiet and still. A gust of wind picked up three leaves and carried them into the sky.

“My Lor—”

“Make your way to the Court,” the King hissed in a voice bordering on whisper. “Ensure my Queen and sons live.”

“But I’m just a mouse…”

At that moment, three short-haired wolves appeared over a hill.

“I told you that you would be my eyes and ears this day. Now you must also be my voice. Tell my pack that they must fight to the last. The Strange Beasts must be driven from our valley. And we must be the avenged. For I am the Wolf King.”

“Your will be so,” The Deer Mouse said.

“Run and never look back.”

The Deer Mouse obeyed his King. He fled and never turned back.

Even when those terrible howls filled his ears.

Even when they stopped.

The sun was setting by the time the Deer Mouse reached the Great Cave. The Wolf King’s Court.

He had traveled as fast as his small legs could carry, until he was certain that his little lungs would pop and his chest would burst wide. And even then, he did not stop. He did not rest even once.

The Deer Mouse had ran faster and longer than any of his kind had ever run before. But it was not enough.

As soon as the cave was in sight, so too were the bodies.

The deer mouse went to the nearest tree and scurried upwards, to the very top. Perched on the highest branch, he witnessed horrors beyond murine imagination.

The deer mouse watched as the Strange Beasts dragged the Queen’s body out of the cave and dumped it into a pile of corpses. The pile was made up of the King’s closest attendants and most ardent supporters.

A smaller pile lay beside the first. It was for bodies that had already been flayed.

A sound to his left startled the Deer Mouse.

In the tree’s trunk, in a hollow, stood an owl.

Primal fear coursed through the Deer Mouse, but he stood an exposed branch with nowhere to go. There was no where to flee.

The owl looked passively at the mouse then back at the Great Cave. “Do not worry, little one. There is ittle room for appetite when the world is ending.”

“Ending?” The Deer Mouse followed his gaze.

“The Order of All Things is broken. Something grotesque is being born.

“Maybe we can help?”

The owl hooted in derision. “Who would we help? The courageously dead or the cowards who still live?”

The Deer Mouse looked closer and noticed that a handful of wolves, off to the right of the cave, had survived.

For the briefest of moments, hope sparked in his small heart. Then the Deer Mouse watched as the Strange Beasts shaved the wolves and tied ropes around their necks.

As this happened, the survivors hung their heads, refusing to look at their captors or one another other.

Most disturbing of all was a Strange Beast, smaller than all the rest, who held one of the Wolf King’s pups in one paw and fed it dried meat from a bag.

Grateful for the treat, the pup yapped and licked the Strange Beast’s round, hairless face.

The owl stepped out from the hollow and spread his wings.

“The Kingdom of Heaven has forsaken the wolves. Return to your people, little one. Each clan now fends for themselves.”

And with that, he took to the air and was gone.

The Deer Mouse worked his way down the tree and went a little ways before collapsing in tears.

“I tried,” he sobbed into the dirt. “I tried, my King, I tried. But I was born a pitiful mouse. If I had been born a deer, I could have made it in time. If I had been born a bear, I could have fought by your side. But God cursed me to be this. Hate me from Heaven, my King, for it will never match the loathing that poisons my heart.”

As the Deer Mouse released a series of wailing squeaks, some creature ran up and licked him in the face.

Startled, the mouse fell backwards, shielding his face with his arms.

The licking stopped. When he lowered his arms, he discovered before him a young Wolf pup—a son of the King.

“You live?” The Deer Mouse blinked before hopping to his feet. “You live!”

The Deer Mouse danced around the pup, who was quite entertained by the strange rodent.

The Deer Mouse took ahold of the pup’s face with both paws. “You are the son of the King. Yours is the Divine Right of Heaven! Today, a shadow is cast upon the valley, but the wolves will rise again and your father shall be avenged.”

The pup barked happily.

The Deer Mouse tilted his head. “You don’t know how to talk yet, do you?”

The pup barked again.

“No matter. It’s not like you can run in there and take them all by yourself. You will need time to grow. And to form a clan. There is work to be done.”

The pup barked and hopped around, ready to play.

“No, no, we don’t have time to, ah, hold on.”

The Deer Mouse went to a nearby tree and used his teeth to nibble loose the ends of a vine. Then he worked the vine into a loop and placed it round the pup’s neck.

“My apologies, my Lord, this is only temporary. Your enemies are everywhere and it is my duty to keep you safe. I promised your father that much.”

The Deer Mouse tugged on the rope and guided the Wolf King’s pup away from the Great Cave and the slaughter of his people.

“One day, I will teach you how to be a great Wolf, as your father once was. Today, however, I will teach you how to be a Deer Mouse, and that way, you will survive—for no matter who rules, my Lord, the mice have always survived!”

The pup yapped and, with a carefree trot, happily followed the strange rodent down the mountain. Ω