[Interia_Discordius]

Threas, Novlar 12, 1440
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Horrid was a King of Dogs. Not a king as you and I might see one, wearing a crown and sitting upon a throne, but a king nonetheless.

Of rulers, it could not be said that he was a wise king, nor an especially brave one. It could be said that he was much like any or all dogs. He enjoyed sleeping lazily amongst dandelions on a hot evening. He favoured those that offered him scraps no more really than those who gave him the sole of their boot. He would wag his tail and dance about the Krandor woods snapping his jaws at butterflies. He had fleas. Most that knew him had fleas also, at one point or another. This was his youth and the sunshine days, and they blurred from one into the next. His majesty was never enough majestic, but he was not crowned as such just yet.

And it was one autumn morning that the dog enjoyed a rabbit chase through the deep woods. His bounding heartbeat and gasping sprint closed him to the terrified creature so near that Horrid's bite seized him a lucky charm.

Misfortune was taken with fortune. Such is the way of all canine.

His ears raised as his head lifted. He had heard the encroaching steps before the rabbit's paw rolled from the tongue to the crunching leaves. The dog yelped and startled as something bit his ear. His snout bared teeth as he winced backward. Then two somethings bit the tree beside him - and he yipped. He turned to see the tall creatures which he did not understand. Horrid knew they were the biters, but they were so far away...and it is near impossible for a dog to understand that something from further away than his snout can hurt him.

Another arrow struck the beast's flank, and he stumbled to run. Wounded as he was and unwise, though not entirely brave... he was fleet. His paws carried him straight into a stinger's shadow, and he buried his teeth deep into the soft part below the mouth where the blood is. Among dogs, the phrase 'Bit off' is more appropriate than 'bit', but dogs tend to exaggerate.

Horrid was brought down. He panted in the woods, breathing heavily and rasping. He was riven with shafts. He tumbled down a leafy embankment and lay near a whispering stream. His pursuers dashed away suddenly at the thunderous Hoot of an owl.

Horrid wondered if he could eat the stinging arrow that protruded from his snout, for he was famished and tired. He whimpered as he lapped his bloody fur. It was not until she kissed him that he understood death and the life it risks. He comprehended dying.

Horrid beheld before him the dew glisten morning, the rays between the trees. She was all things that are beautiful in nature. Flowers and bees tuned the green air around her, and honeysuckles assailed his nostrils.

No longer would anything be the same, for he knew now that it was as if he had been asleep, and just awoken a child.

The dog was before his mother. He fulfilled one thing that all other of his species could not claim: He became aware - aware of his capability to learn....


~ Llane S. Anetheron
Of a story far from finished.