Chapter Four: Meanwhile, In Another Life

Leila eyed me curiously as I followed her, her mother, and the scent of chocolate chip cookies into the Nightshade residence's kitchen. "Why're you dressed like that?" She asked.

"Wasn't my idea," I answered annoyedly. "My mom said it looks 'dapper', whatever that means."

Mrs. Nightshade laughed. "'Dapper' means you look handsome. Like a real gentleman."

"If this is what 'gentlemen' wear, I don't wanna be one when I grow up."

"Don't be silly, Cedric, of course you do," Leila's mother replied as she pulled an oven mitt over her hand and reached for the door to the stove. "Now, who's ready for lunch?" The whole kitchen, already pervaded with the wafting, delicious odor of the fresh-baked cookies, was subjected to yet another wave of that amazing smell as the oven door swung down.

"ME!" Leila yelled, running over to the ice box and grabbing a pitcher of what I assumed was milk. She sat the pitcher on the counter, which she then clambered atop to reach the cupboard with the glasses. Without wasting a second, she grabbed four and poured a brimming cup full for each of us, which Mr. Nightshade grabbed and brought over to the table as Leila jumped down.

"How many cookies would you like, Cedric?" Mrs. Nightshade asked. I only stared, dumbfounded, at the cookie sheet with its piping-hot load of sweets. Cookies? For lunch? Was I in heaven?

"Honey, he's our guest!" Leila's father said with a broad smile. "Here!" Without hesitation, he took the spatula and shoveled a dozen cookies onto a plate, sliding them across the table to me.

"Tabor! That's a third of the sheet!"

"He's a growing young man! Needs his energy!"

I was too blown away to protest. Not that I would have anyway, though. The rest of the cookies were divided equally amongst the Nightshade family, and the three of them sat down around me at the table. Leila tore into her plate with surprising energy, and her mother and father watched and shared glowing parental grins as every cookie there disappeared in just a few moments. It was somewhere between impressive and scary to watch, actually. Once she'd finished, Leila stared at my plate as I tucked in with a little more self-control. I stared back, and her eyes looked up to meet mine as I ate, the awkward eye-contact not breaking until I was down to the last four cookies on my plate. She'd gotten eight, I'd gotten twelve… I took another swig of milk before handing her two of my remaining cookies, which she took after raising a surprised eyebrow and devoured with gusto.

"Well, that was nice of you, Cedric," Mrs. Nightshade said. "Sweetie, what do you say?"

Leila finished gulping down the last of her milk before grinning at me. "Thanks, Sailor-boy."

"Leila…"

"What?"

"Be nice."

"He doesn't think I was being mean." Leila looked back at me, like she was hoping I'd back her up after she'd just made fun of me. "You don't, right?"

I shook my head. "You're nicer than my stepbrothers. They're real mean, though, so that's not really saying much."

Leila looked back to her mother. "See?"

By the look she shot her daughter, Mrs. Nightshade wasn't convinced, but she shrugged after a moment. "Alright, munchkin. You two go out and play, okay? I'll call you both when it's time for supper."

"I need to take this stupid thing off," I said, fumbling with the gold buttons as I tried to undo the jacket. Mrs. Nightshade stood and helped me take the stifling and silly-looking coat, and I went ahead and kicked off the dumb patent-leather shoes too. Leila ran to the back door, pushing through it and out to that patio, and I followed after Mrs. Nightshade gave me a nod. As I opened the screen door and stepped out, I was surprised by sudden movement to my left. Whirling, I realized that a wooden object was sailing towards me. I didn't have time to avoid the projectile before it smacked into my face and thudded to the ground at my feet. I was dazed, and rubbed the spot it hit me before looking down to see what it was.

"Ow. What was… A sword?" I said aloud, looking at the child-sized wooden training weapon that lay on the fired-clay pavers in front of me.

"Come on, that was a perfect throw!" Leila said, walking up with a disappointed look on her face. In her hand, she held an identical sword to the one she'd thrown me. I looked from her, to the sword on the ground, and back, once again taken a little by surprise. "I thought all girls played with dolls and did dress-up and stuff.

"That's what lame girls do. I wanna be a warrior! Like my momma and papa! So, I've gotta train."

"Alright, I guess."

"What, have your parents not been teaching you to fight?"

"They keep saying that'll come later. I'm not really sure, though. I feel like my dad really doesn't want to train me, but my mom says it's really important, for me especially, to learn how. I don't know why, yet. She wouldn't say. But it makes my dad sad to see me actually practice. I think it scares him, really."

"Well, they're not here to be scared now. And my parents love to train with me. So, it's fine! Now come on, pick up your weapon, Mistral warrior!"

"Why do I gotta be the from Mistral? I'd rather be one of those guys from Mantle if I gotta be the bad guy. They had guns."

"Fine, fine. Whatever. Mantle—er… What's a person from Mantle called?"

"Uh… I dunno."

"Whatever. Prepare to meet your end, Mantle-warrior-guy!" Leila exclaimed.

Tentatively, I reached down to scoop up the sword, gripping the twine-wrapped handle and feeling the weight and surprisingly good balance of the toy weapon. "So what are the rules—"

"En garde!" Leila lunged in before I could finish speaking. I leapt back, but tripped over the wood pile and flopped to my back, hard. When I tried to stand, Leila leveled the tip of her weapon at my throat. "That's one for me! Watch your footing, clumsy!"

I scowled up at her playfully. "I am not clumsy." Lashing out with my sword, I knocked hers aside and scrambled back, looking for enough room to get to my feet. The fight was on in earnest after that. Neither of us had any real technique. It was just repeated slashes, stabs, maybe a poorly sold feint from time to time, punctuated again and again by the dull thunk, thunk, thunk of the two oaken swords clashing again and again as we each tried to land a hit on the other. Leila managed to tag my dominant arm with a glancing blow, and laughed gleefully.

"Haha! I got your arm! You can't use it now. Gotta pretend like you're wounded!"

"What? Since when is that the rules?"

"That's always been the rules! Don't you know anything? Come on, switch hands. Gotta act like your right arm isn't there anymore, like I just slashed it off." I growled my annoyance at the handicap, but did what she said. It felt weird, wielding the weapon in my off-hand, and it didn't take long before she was able to knock it away and 'stab' my ribs with a quick jab as I tried to recover the weight of my sword with my weak hand. "Two for me!" The girl exclaimed.

"What? That first one didn't count! You never actually hit me!"

"I had mercy. Made you my prisoner that time."

"Well, your 'prisoner' just escaped!" I lunged in, taking Leila off-guard and tapping her right arm and left leg before she knew what'd happened.

"That's cheating! I wasn't ready!"

"You think a prisoner would wait till his guard was ready to attack? If you can make up rules, I can too! Now, hop around on one leg and switch sword-hands!"

"Wh—Aggghhh. Fine." Leila lifted the leg I'd cut off and hopped towards me, flailing about with her own off-hand and trying desperately to land a hit as I danced around her, laughing and taunting. Just for good measure, I 'cut off' her other leg and arm, and she glared at me as she dropped to her knees before flopping to the ground like a quadruple battle amputee. Defiantly, she bit her sword-hilt and whipped her neck around in a vain hope to catch my leg with the blade, but it was for naught as I, in a role reversal from her initial attack, leveled my own sword at her neck.

"Now we're each other's prisoner. Guess it's a tie."

"Not if my arms grow back!" Leila grabbed her weapon and leapt up. She lunged, but missed as I dodged left and I took off running, around to the side of the house. I spied a plank of wood tied to a long rope hanging from one of the tree-limbs, and made a break for that at full tilt as Leila, with her slightly longer stride, began to catch up. Before she could quite reach me, though, I jumped for the rope swing. Planting my feet on either side of the plank and gripping the rope with my free hand, my momentum took me out of reach of Leila's desperate attempt to strike my leg as I retreated. I began to swing back, and Leila had to throw herself to the ground to avoid getting bowled over. I hopped off at the apex of the opposite swing and charged her as she stood. She still had to sidestep the chunk of wood at the end of the rope as it came back, and I used the opportunity to tap her left arm with my blade, rendering it 'useless'. I pressed the attack too heavily, however, and she was able to catch my left leg with her blade, which she still gripped in her uninjured dominant hand.

It was do or die now, as far as I was concerned. And I already knew I wouldn't hear the end of it if she beat me. "YAAAARRRGH! For MANTLE!" I shouted as I hopped forward and threw myself at her.

"Vale will not be defeated!" She roared back. "Die, you filthy Snowback!"

Our swords clashed as my bodyweight sailed forward, and I used my free-hand to grapple her to the ground with the full-force attack. We both ended up in the dirt, side-by-side, and neither of us attempted to parry the other as we both swung down for each other's throats. Our blades tapped our respective opponent's necks simultaneously, and we both shared a look as we realized that we'd only managed to come to a draw yet again.

"Well, I guess it's still a tie," Leila said with a grin.

I stood first and reached my hand out to help her up, hauling her to her feet and shrugging. "What else is there to do around here?"

"Hmm. Well, we could go down to the beach. Or we could climb the trees. Or… Oh!"

"What?"

"I never introduced you to Luna!"

"Who's Luna?"

"My dog!"

"You have a dog?" I asked. I felt a twinge of jealousy… I'd always wanted a dog. "Where is it?"

"She's resting in the dog house. She's gonna have puppies soon!" Leila grabbed my wrist and pulled me towards the side of the house, towards a shady spot beneath the largest of the five live oaks. "Come on!"

I saw the small red doghouse from around the corner. It looked like a small house of its own, almost large enough to be considered a shed if it weren't for the only entrance being relatively tiny door with a simple cloth flap over it, built onto the side of the Nightshade's residence on the back side of the stone chimney. The warmth from the stone when a fire burned in the hearth indoors probably warmed the doghouse on the cold winter nights in Vytal. As we trotted up, Leila knelt down and crawled right into the flap that covered the door. I followed behind after a moment. Before my eyes could adjust, I saw a gigantic, fuzzy outline that whimpered excitedly as its little human threw her arms around the dog and buried her face in the floof about her neck.

"Hey girl!" Leila said excitedly, grinning from ear to ear as the fluffy shape twice my size nuzzled and licked her repeatedly. "Awe doggy kissies! Here, give some to Cedric, girl. No, Cedric! Over there! Get him, girl!"

"What? Ack-pppbblltt—" The massive shape pulled itself over to me and began slobbering all over my face. "Hey-pwah—hey stop that!" My protests turned into laughter as Luna doggedly continued to show me just how excited she was to have visitors. Eventually, she quit licking and began sniffing me intently, like she was trying to memorize the scent of what she probably thought was another two-legged furless puppy of hers.

"My momma and papa found her during the war. Couldn't find her owners, and there were a lot of monsters around in this village they were in. She was just a puppy. So, they took her in and she became like their regi… Uh… Regi-men-nental mascot or something."

"Regimental," I corrected her. My dad had taught me and my stepbrothers a little about military units. I knew my parents and Leila's had been in the same battalion, which was a step below regiment. My mother and father had been in the cavalry company, though, and Mr. and Mrs. Nightshade were foot soldiers in one of the infantry cohorts. All I knew is that they'd met on the battlefield, but nothing else.

So, Luna had seen this 'war' thing that everyone always talked of. I wondered what she thought about it all, as I looked into her soulful blue eyes. I'd adjusted to the dimness of the doghouse by then, and could see her more clearly. She looked like a great white-and-grey wolf. I'd seen the breed before, pulling sleds in movies about the Dust Rush that was going on in Solitas, though I didn't know what they were called. She was heavy with puppy and sporting a thick winter coat. Two darker grey, crescent moon-like markings beneath her eyes accented them and made her stare seem all that much more piercing. I imagined that the markings were what she'd been named for. I scratched between and beneath her ears, wishing I could ask about the war that my parents wouldn't ever tell me about. She lay her muzzle on my forearm and licked at it, and I imagined then that she wanted to talk about it, but she was sad that I didn't speak her language and couldn't understand her. Naught but my imagination, that. Still, I wished someone would tell me about it someday.

"She's sleepy. I think she's always tired since she started making the puppies in there." Leila said as she softly pet Luna's swollen flank. "I can feel them moving around. I bet they'll be born soon. I hope they look just like her."

"What's the dad look like?"

"Dunno. Never saw him. Mom and dad didn't either."

"Huh. Kinda rude of him not to stick around."

"I know, right?" Leila said with a grin. "Come on. Let's go. Let her sleep for now." The two of us crawled out of the doghouse and stood. I walked over to the rope-swing and lazily hooked my legs over the suspended plank, swinging gently back and forth for a moment before Leila again spoke. "Wanna go down to the beach? There's some caves down there that I've always wanted to explore, but a Knight of Vale needs a loyal squire if she's going to be exploring a dungeon."

I looked around like I was searching for something. "Hm. Well, that's just too bad. I don't see any squires around at all."

"You, dummy!"

"Me?" I feigned offense. "I believe you have me confused with someone. I am General Arc, Hero of the Grand Army of Vale. I don't blame you for making the mistake. The light must've reflected off my sword and armor and blinded you." I puffed out my chest like I imagined the great hero-general I'd heard about in stories since I was little would.

"Only thing blinding here is your ego," Leila jabbed. "Now, if you're General Arc, I'm the Warrior Princess of Mistral."

"Too late. You already said you were just a knight. You can't change it now since I picked something better."

"Since when? You're just mad because the Warrior Princess was a better warrior than General Arc."

"No, she wasn't."

"She was! Her legions crossed Sanas and almost conquered Vale during the war. My parents told me the story!"

"Yeah, almost. Then General Arc stopped her! With like, half as many soldiers! The princess was wounded and captured by General Arc himself!"

"They wounded each other."

"I never heard that," I said. I could tell, though, that Leila wasn't gonna let this go unless I let her pretend to be the Warrior Princess. "Alright, fine. Whatever. You're the Warrior Princess of Mistral. You sure don't look like it."

"What do you mean by that, huh?"

"Well, my mother says the warrior princess was super, super beautiful. You're kinda just..."

"What? You tryna say I'm not super, super beautiful too!?" Leila interrupted, clearly incensed by the implication.

"Eh," I replied with a shrug.

"WHAT?" She shot back, outraged. "Well, y'know, General Arc was supposed be blonde and tall and handsome. Not a little shrimp like you."

"Little shrimp? You're barely two inches taller than me."

"Four, at least."

"Nuh-uhhh!" I shifted subtly onto the balls of my feet to gain an inch without being too obvious.

"You're on your tip-toes!"

"Am not, look!" I motioned for her to check for herself. She did, inspecting my heels closely. They still brushed against the ground, and with the grass in the field it really was hard to tell. The ploy worked, and she grumbled annoyedly.

"Whatever. Well, you're still shorter than me. And you're too young."

"Course I'm too young. I'm six! So are you!"

"Nuh-uh. I'm seven! And I'll have you know I've already started working on getting an aura!"

"So have I!" I insisted. I hadn't, really. I mean, I'd tried. My mother had helped me get it to flicker once or twice on my fingertips before, but It was too frustrating and exhausting to practice, but I didn't want to admit that she had something I didn't. "Oh alright. Fine, you can be the Warrior Princess. Come on, your highness. We've got grimm to kill," I said before the angry little girl popped a blood vessel. She was still steaming a little, but seemed to understand that I hadn't exactly been serious.

I grabbed my wooden sword and shoved the blade through one of the beltloops on the set of fancy trousers I had on, part of that stupid sailor's ensemble I'd been wearing. The beltloop ripped a little, but I didn't care, I hated the outfit anyway. The two of us set off past the house and down the gentle, grassy hill that ran all the way down to the main road and to the cliffs beyond. Before we got too far, I heard the front porch door swing open and turned to see Leila's mother sticking her head out.

"Don't go too far down the beach, kids!" She called. "If you can't hear me call you for dinner from the road, you're too far!"

"Got it, momma!" Leila shouted back. Turning to me, she grinned. "I'll race you."

"You'll lose," I replied smartly.

"Psh. Yeah, right. To the road, alright? Ready?"

"Set," I said crouching and readying my best sprinting stance.

"GO!" Leila yelled, and the two of us tore off down the field towards the road as fast as we could. She had a longer stride, but I was determined not to let a girl in a skirt beat me. In the downhill stretch, that advantage was enough to give her a several-meter lead. As the road grew closer, however, and the ground flattened out, I summoned as much of my reserve strength as I could to try and begin to close the gap.

"I'm gonna beat you!" She called back over her shoulder.

"No, you're not!" I grit my teeth and churned my legs even faster. Slowly, but surely, I was reeling her in, until we were neck and neck about three meters from the road. Just beyond was the sharp hill that led down to a cascading series of rocky cliffs… But I had no intention of putting on the brakes as we approached the finish. She did, cutting her speed and hitting the road about a half of a meter behind me because of it. "Yeah! WhoooHoo! I beat you-whoawhoaWHOAAAA!" I dug my heels, but my bare feet only skidded on the loose dirt and I careened right across the coastal path and over the embankment on the opposite side. Head over heels over elbows over knees I tumbled. There was nothing but grass to grab onto, and I was quickly rolling uncontrollably towards the first of several five to seven-meter drop offs, each amounting to a fall that could break bone.

"Cedric!" I heard Leila call after me.

I had to think of something to slow myself down, and fast, or I'd be taking the quickest route possible down to the rocky beach below. I had no idea what to do… Until I did. It was the strangest thing, an instinct I didn't know I had. The panic in my mind silenced, and I managed to orient myself feet-first as I continued to slide down the ever-steepening hill. My hand automatically found the wooden sword that I'd tumbled down with, still shoved into my beltloop. I drew it, and noticed a weird white glow ripple across my entire hand and forearm as I jammed the toy weapon blade-first into the dirt. Holding on with both hands clenched in a white-knuckle grip on the hilt, my momentum snapped to a halt, and I felt my elbows and shoulders pop from the strain of the sudden stop.

The bizarre white energy I'd seen on my arms abated with a crackling sound, and I had to ask myself twice about whether or not I'd imagined the sight of it or not. In the same line of thought, I puzzled over how in the world I'd actually managed to do what I'd just done… There was a five-foot gouge dug into the hill proceeding up from the blade of my toy sword, and the weapon itself was jammed up to the hilt in dirt and grass that were none-too-soft to the touch. It would've taken a lot more strength than I thought I had to do that. I looked around after I realized that no answers were presenting themselves, and sighed with relief. How I'd done it didn't matter. I was no longer tumbling down the cliffs.

Slowly, I pulled the sword from the hill and began inching my way back up, using short shrubs as foot and hand holds as I crawled up, ever careful not to slip and begin sliding down once again. Eventually, I reached a point where the slope was level enough to stand, and I did, jogging back up the hill once I had my feet under me. Leila raised an eyebrow at me as I made it back to the road. "Y'know, there's a way to get down to the beach without falling off the cliff."

"Har-har," I replied sarcastically. "I still beat you in the race."

"Please. I let you win and you know it."

"A win's a win."

Leila growled annoyedly. "Fine. Whatever. You won. Come on, this way." She led me down the road a bit to a branch-off path that followed a series of switchbacks all the way down to the cliffs. A stairway had been built into the cliffs themselves that we took the rest of the way to Vytal's pebble-strewn beach. The waves lapped against the shore with a soothing rhythm as the two of us made our way down towards a bend in the shoreline. I'd gotten a few nicks and bruises from the fall, but nothing serious. My navy-blue trousers had ripped, but I certainly didn't care about that.

"There," Leila said, pointing out the first sea-cave that was high and dry now at low-tide. "Draw swords, General. We don't know what we're getting into here."

I grinned, brandishing my wooden weapon. "With pleasure, Princess Yao. Don't worry, I'll protect you."

"As if I need protection," Leila replied in-character. The two of us entered the cave, whose rocky walls stretched back into utter darkness before us. Inside, the constant crashing of waves on the beach was muted, and the only sound was dripping water from somewhere deeper within.

"I can't see anything."

"Yeah, maybe we should've brought a light."

"Hang on, what's that?" I said, seeing a shape the looked like a weird rock of some kind lying on a ledge a little further in. I scrambled up to see what it was, but still couldn't quite tell in the dim of the cave. I grabbed it, sliding down the cave wall from the ledge and angling my find to catch more light from the cave entrance. "Oh, cool!"

"What is it?" Leila asked, walking up beside me.

"It's a skull!" I replied, triumphantly showing her the bleached-white remains.

She recoiled, but still stared with fascination at the morbid sight. "That's gross!"

"What do you think it was?"

"I don't know. Deer? Maybe? Or… Oh… Y'know what? It kinda looks like it coulda been a seal! It's the right size, anyway. My daddy showed me a bunch of 'em that were down here once."

"That's neat," I said, looking at it intently.

"I wonder how it got back there. Do you think it washed in here with the tide? Did you see any more bones up there?"

"Nope, just this. Weird. Hey look, I'm a grimm!" I exclaimed, holding the skull up in front of my own face and stepping threateningly towards Leila. "RrrraaAARRRR!"

"Is that so? Die, foul monster! YAH!" Leila rapped her sword on the skull, and I pretended to roar in pain.

"Argg—I mean, er… RAWWRRRR!"

"HyyyyyYYAHH!" Leila bounded away as I splayed the fingers of my free hand like claws and pawed at her. She kicked off the cave wall and lunged back, jabbing me in the shoulder, then following up with another stab that caught in the skull's eye-socket. "Ew! Get it off, get it off!" She exclaimed as she waved the toy weapon and its new decoration around. The skull was stuck fast, though, and wouldn't come off from her simply shaking her sword about. She slammed it against the cave wall, and it broke free, tumbling towards the cave entrance. "There, got it! Haha! I killed a grimm!" She turned back towards me gleefully, and neither of us noticed the skull roll past a black shape that now filled the entrance to the little grotto. I only noticed when a new growl, far more menacing than any I could muster in role-play, echoed around us.

"Rrrrrrrggghh…" The throaty, ragged sound rumbled from my left. The shadow cast by the creature darkened the cave even further, and I turned my head nervously.

"Hey, you're not a grimm anymore. I killed you, remember!" Leila said. Her voice was a little more on-edge, probably because she knew I hadn't made the sound. My mouth hadn't moved, and she'd been looking right at me.

I continued to turn my head slowly to the cave entrance. "That… Wasn't me." I saw the shape a moment before she did, and when she followed my gaze and saw the fearsome-looking black silhouette that was stalking towards us, she screamed.

"Grimm!" She shouted. The monster continued to walk forwards, calmly, one methodical step at a time. It knew we couldn't escape. Yellow eyes gleamed at us from its furry face. I realized after a moment that something was off about it, though. This grimm didn't have any bony faceplate, like I knew most, if not all of the other monsters had. Its eyes weren't what I imagined, either. My parents had made sure my brothers and I were well aware of how to tell a grimm from a distance. This creature's eyes weren't the color of fire, and definitely had pupils, like a dog or a person, or any other animal.

"Wait… That's not a grimm, Leila. It's a wolf!"

"A wolf? Are you sure?"

"If you don't believe me, why don't you ask it!? It's not a grimm! I'm sure of that! S-stay back, you!" I shouted, waving my sword as the creature got closer. It was three times my size, covered in dark fur. Who was I kidding? The creature wouldn't even be phased by some little stick. I backed up, but tripped over a low outcrop of the cave wall that I hadn't seen. The wolf now loomed over me, barely two meters away. "Leila, get back!"

"No way!" She took a rock from the cave floor and chucked it. It missed. Another one sailed over my shoulder, this one smacking into the ground at its feet. The monster stopped and stared intently at Leila and at each pebble she threw, holding position and dodging easily to its right to avoid the third. It let out a growl that became a bark. "Leave us alone!" Leila shouted, throwing another rock. I heard a weird crackle right then, and chanced a look back. A blueish ripple of energy surrounded her body as she spoke, and the creature's ears, that had been flat against its head as it'd approached, now perked up. It made no effort to dodge the fourth rock, which tagged it on the snout. It barely flinched, instead continuing to stare into Leila's eyes.

"I said… Get BACK!" She shouted again. The creature cocked its head, its expression morphing from threatening to inquisitive. Leila's expression changed too. "Wait… Did you…"

"Did I what?" I asked, scrambling back closer to her and standing.

"Not you," She replied to me. "You…" Leila said, meeting the wolf's gaze. "You can understand me? How?"

"Leila, are you… Talking to the wolf?"

"Shhh," She shushed to me. "I don't know either… I've never done this before, sir."

"Did you just call it sir?!"

"What'd I say? Shush!" Leila said, swatting at me. "I'm sorry. We were just exploring, we didn't know this was your cave, mister…" She paused, as if listening to a response, before shrugging. "I live up there, on the hill. I guess that means we're neighbors… And, well… Humans don't eat their neighbors. I don't know if wolves do or not, but… Plus, y'know… Well, I dunno, I'd kinda rather not get eaten. Pretty sure he wouldn't either."

At this point I still had no idea what was going on, but we weren't being eaten by a massive black wolf right then, so whatever was happening, it was working.

"I know you didn't ask if we'd rather not get eaten, but… One reason? Uh, okay, uh… Well, Luna would be really sad if I died… Oh, Luna? She's part of my family, but she's like you!" Leila listened for another moment, before a look of realization crossed her face. "Really? Oh, wow! Wait till my mom and dad find out about this! It's a pleasure to meet you!" I did a double take as Leila walked past me, right up to the wolf. It sat, towering over her, and raised a paw, which she shook. This was unbelievable. She just shook paws with a wild wolf.

After a moment, Leila frowned. "Oh, no… I'm so sorry to hear that, sir. At least you killed it for them, right?" Another few seconds passed as she once again heard his response. "That's amazing… We didn't know who their daddy was, and now we do! Great to have you in the family, mister!" Leila looked back over her shoulder and waved me forward before turning back to the wolf. "You know they'll be born soon! I bet they'll be as big as you, someday! Come on, Cedric. Mr. Akela said we looked too skinny to eat anyway, and I have nice manners."

"Uhh… Oh—Okay…" I replied, eyes glued on the wolf as it sat and allowed us to pass. The powerfully built predator held my eye contact as I passed, its face utterly neutral. Leila and I emerged from the cave and trotted a ways down the beach before I saw the blue energy that had activated across her body a minute before fizzle out. She caught her breath, beads of sweat forming on her face as she paused.

"That's the longest I've ever held my aura," she said. "I'm exhausted."

"That's what you're thinking about right now? What just happened in there!?"

"I don't know. I could understand him, he could understand me. He said that was his cave. He smelled us from up the beach, where he'd been hunting more seal, so he came to check it out."

"And how'd you convince him not to make us his lunch instead?"

"He asked me to give him one reason not to. I told him Luna would be sad, and he was all like, 'Who's Luna?' And I was like, 'She's part of my family, but she's like you,' which I'm pretty sure you heard. And then, guess what?"

"What?"

"He said he knew Luna. He's the puppies' father!"