The Wolf

In a dark forest, where no human has ever set foot, a wolf stalks a prey. His muscles tense and coil with each step ready to explode into action.

A wolverine scuttles about at the edge of its den, unaware of his predicament. A well-tuned hunter himself, his claws are just as sharp and teeth keen, but his lack of size and sluggish speed set the match in the wolf’s favour.

The morning brakes violently in a hail of dust and debris as the wolf charges. With only a flicker to react the wolverine flings a desperate paw in the direction of his attacker catching him on the side of his endlessly gaping jaw, saving himself from its fatal snap.

The pair circle, each baring teeth and flashing steel but secretly regretting their misfortune. Blood drips from the wolf, his cuts are penetrating and pieces of hide hang unseemly from his face exposing the sticky red flesh.

The wolf attacks. This time the wolverine only manages a glancing blow as the teeth sink into his ribs, it’s enough to surprise the wolf once more who withdraws. Gifted with unexpected opportunity the injured wolverine bolts.

The chase through the under growth sends small creatures burrowing for their very lives. Only terror keeps the wolverine from the beast’s determination, and guile from the maw of death.

A hole appears, mercifully, in a rocky out crop and the wolverine dives head first for safety with the wolf all but upon him.

Unable to reach its quarry the wolf paces in defeat, mouth growling and cursing his wretched foe. Inside and secure the wolverine realizes that he is now trapped in what is little more than a rock rabbits burrow with a prowler at the only exit. He tends his wound, an ugly gash to the bone, and contemplates his next move in the dark.

   

The wolf settles down at the entrance and waits.

A day sets and another rises, a second, a third, till a week passes. The wolverine, starving and dying from his injury, can make out the wolf still lying at the opening and smell his deadly intentions. However he decides not to leave this world at the bottom of a dank pit, so gathering his last wits and with all his final strength, leaps for the breach.

Expecting a fight that would end him he stands in the sunlight back arched and weapons at the ready. What he finds instead chills him to his failing heart. There is no wolf. Only a small heap of fur the cunning beast has left at the entrance to fool him.

In desperation he eats the wolf’s wool, which nourishes and gives him the stamina needed to find real food and life giving water. Time passes and the wolverine grows angry at how easily he’d been tricked, he reflects on the fear he felt of nothing and his anger turns to rage. So he stalks the woodlands with a new found hunger and a taste for wolf meat.