- Aug 4, 2024
- 73
- 15
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Howlpaw sits alone, its amber eyes half-lidded as it watches the last light of the day fade into a fiery haze over the horizon. The world feels distant in moments like this, muffled and far away, as though it's caught between two lives, neither of which feels quite real. Its thoughts circle around the same jagged, painful axis they often do when it's left to itself too long. They settle, inevitably, on her. Fallowbite. The name feels sharp in its mind, a splinter it can't quite pry out no matter how hard it tries. She killed Baying Hound. A brutal fight that left its mother—a figure of control, cunning, and survival—dead, felled like prey before her fangs. Howlpaw knows what she is capable of, watched as she tore its mother's throat out in one swift movement. Its hatred for her sits cold and heavy in its chest, as if carved from ice.
And yet.
It swallows hard, its ears twitching backward. There's something else there, buried beneath the resentment and anger. Respect. It's faint, just a flicker, but it's undeniable. Fallowbite is strong—unshakably, undeniably strong in a way Howlpaw knows few others to be. She fought Baying Hound and won. It can't deny that her power demands acknowledgement, no matter how much it loathes what she took from it. Power is survival, and Fallowbite wields hers like a sharpened blade. She's a warrior in every sense of the word, a force that Howlpaw would admire in another life, if only her teeth weren't stained with the blood of the one that raised it. What makes it worse—what knots the confusion tighter into its chest—is the way she looks at it. Or rather, how she doesn't. She doesn't flinch when it passes, doesn't narrow her eyes or bare her teeth as some of the others do. She doesn't glance over her shoulder like she's expecting it to pounce or growl. She speaks to it like it's a cat.
That shouldn't unsettle it the way it does, but it does. Because Howlpaw isn't a cat—not like the rest of them. Its claws curl into the dirt, its mind spinning with self-recrimination. It doesn't feel like them. It feels more like a wild thing caught in their ranks by accident. A wolf wearing cat skin. "Pup," it recalls Gentlestorm saying, recalls the way that had settled something in it, an acknowledgement of its otherness without the usual bite attached. Fallowbite's acceptance of it—her refusal to see it as other—feels wrong. Almost like she's lying to herself. How can she see a cat when it knows she must see the beast beneath? It doesn't know how to feel about her refusal to treat it like the monster it sometimes feels it is. Her gaze, calm and steady, doesn't dismiss or fear it, and that lack of fear needles something deep inside its chest. Does it want her fear? Does it crave her rejection so it can hate her without this unbearable confusion? Or does it fear her gaze for what it reveals about itself, about what it might become, if it lets itself be what she seems to believe it is?
The sun dips below the horizon, and the chill of the evening seeps into its fur. Howlpaw exhales sharply, rising to its paws and shaking out its coat. It doesn't know what to do with these feelings—this tangled mess of anger and reluctant respect, of hatred and something else it can't quite name. It doubts it ever will. It's easier to hate her. It's simpler that way.
And yet.
[ @FALLOWBITE ]
And yet.
It swallows hard, its ears twitching backward. There's something else there, buried beneath the resentment and anger. Respect. It's faint, just a flicker, but it's undeniable. Fallowbite is strong—unshakably, undeniably strong in a way Howlpaw knows few others to be. She fought Baying Hound and won. It can't deny that her power demands acknowledgement, no matter how much it loathes what she took from it. Power is survival, and Fallowbite wields hers like a sharpened blade. She's a warrior in every sense of the word, a force that Howlpaw would admire in another life, if only her teeth weren't stained with the blood of the one that raised it. What makes it worse—what knots the confusion tighter into its chest—is the way she looks at it. Or rather, how she doesn't. She doesn't flinch when it passes, doesn't narrow her eyes or bare her teeth as some of the others do. She doesn't glance over her shoulder like she's expecting it to pounce or growl. She speaks to it like it's a cat.
That shouldn't unsettle it the way it does, but it does. Because Howlpaw isn't a cat—not like the rest of them. Its claws curl into the dirt, its mind spinning with self-recrimination. It doesn't feel like them. It feels more like a wild thing caught in their ranks by accident. A wolf wearing cat skin. "Pup," it recalls Gentlestorm saying, recalls the way that had settled something in it, an acknowledgement of its otherness without the usual bite attached. Fallowbite's acceptance of it—her refusal to see it as other—feels wrong. Almost like she's lying to herself. How can she see a cat when it knows she must see the beast beneath? It doesn't know how to feel about her refusal to treat it like the monster it sometimes feels it is. Her gaze, calm and steady, doesn't dismiss or fear it, and that lack of fear needles something deep inside its chest. Does it want her fear? Does it crave her rejection so it can hate her without this unbearable confusion? Or does it fear her gaze for what it reveals about itself, about what it might become, if it lets itself be what she seems to believe it is?
The sun dips below the horizon, and the chill of the evening seeps into its fur. Howlpaw exhales sharply, rising to its paws and shaking out its coat. It doesn't know what to do with these feelings—this tangled mess of anger and reluctant respect, of hatred and something else it can't quite name. It doubts it ever will. It's easier to hate her. It's simpler that way.
And yet.
[ @FALLOWBITE ]