One With the Pack

Ember woke early the next morning, which was rare as he was usually the last one to wake up out of the whole pack. Quetzal turned her head to look at him as he walked past the Den to the cave’s entrance. “You're up early,” she noted, following him.

“Never as early as you,” he murmured, his voice still low and raspy from sleep.

The dragon hybrid chuckled a little. “Too bad Speckle isn't here, she'd probably love to hear how you sound right now.”

He scoffed. “Of course she would. Not to mention her Heat is coming up in a couple of weeks. Which brings me to what I wanted to talk to you about, Beta. I feel like this place is starting to get a little too small for the lot of us. It was fine for the seven of us before, but now we've grown by five. A large pack in a small area is not good in the case of intruders. Not saying that Mark is a bad Scout, mind you.”

Quetzal nodded. “I understand your concern, Sir. But may I bring up that we have two injured members now? They are certainly not fit for traveling long distances.”

“Well, we'll see what they think. Go wake the others. We're going to have a meeting.”

“Is everyone here?” Ember asked. Quetzal nodded, stating that she had done a head count after waking each member of the pack and going to get Mark. “Good. Sorry to have you wake up so early, everyone.”

“I'll say.”, Collin muttered, clearly not in the best of moods.

“Anyways, Quetzal and I have noticed that our pack has gotten bigger in the past few moons. And this cave is not going to stretch itself to meet our needs. So, I have decided that it is time for us to find someplace else.” Light chatter ensued as the others wrapped their heads around the situation. When Ember cleared his throat, all was silent again. “Does anyone have any questions? Or shall we go straight into a vote?”

Firefly raised a hoof.

“Go ahead, Omega.”

“What about Mist Rise and I? The both of us won't be able to walk very far with our legs.”

“Quetzal already mentioned that. Mist can be carried by one of the Alphas. As for you, Firefly, I guess you can stay in your pony form and fly above us.”

She nodded.

“Any other questions?”

Sirena then spoke. “Do you know where we're going? And how long it's going to take?”

Ember racked his brain for a second, then his eyes flashed with an idea. “I was thinking we travel north. Towards the Saddle Horn Peaks. It should be less populated there. As for time, three days at the least.”

Quetzal took a moment to process this information, and then she agreed. “Nicky, how are we looking on food?”, she asked.

The sky blue earth pony turned and walked to the Den. After a while, she returned.

“At least four days, if we ration it well.”

“All right, now that that is settled, are we clear for a decision?”

They all nodded. “We’re all fine with leaving, Sir.”, Speckle said.

“Wonderful. Everyone stretch your legs, because we'll be walking for a while.”

The air was warm, yet humid as the pack followed their leader. Quetzal was lined up behind Ember, followed by Sirena and Speckle, who carried the pups on their backs, Collin and Mark on either side of them, and Nicky behind them. Firefly took the rear, flying about five feet above the others. Suddenly Ember stopped, signaling everyone else to stop. Firefly landed, quickly transforming into a wolf to hear the mental conversation. “Why'd we stop, Alpha?”

“I smell wolves up ahead. And they don't smell very friendly.”

“So what do we do? We've come too far to just turn around,” Nicky pointed out.

“We continue forward. I'll do the talking, and if anything happens, I need you all to run.”

Firefly spoke up then. “But what about you, Alpha? We can't just leave you.”

“I'll be fine. Now everyone keep calm.”

Just then, a series of howls rang across the field, and a decent sized group of wolves appeared. The dark brown wolf stepped forward, changing himself before speaking. “Good afternoon. If you are all part of a pack, I apologize for passing into your territory. Me and my pack are just trying to get to the Snakebite River. So if you would be so kind as to let us through, we would most definitely appreciate it.” One wolf transformed and laughed at him.

“Pack? Ha! We ain't no pack. We're all just Rogues. And don't even think about trying to sweet talk your way into having us let you through. The river is our turf.”

Another wolf stepped forward, one that looked very familiar. Collin immediately started growling at him, eyes instantly turning blue. The wolf turned out to be none other than Grassblade, a wide smile on his face. “Well hello again, Ember. Fancy meeting you here.” The red stallion raised an eyebrow at him, clearly not amused to see him again.

“Hi, Grassblade. I thought you were a loner.”

The dark green unicorn shook his head. “Of course not. I probably wouldn't have lasted this long without being in group of some kind.”

“I see. Well since we've already met, I figure we'll just chat for a little bit, and then we can go through and be out of your way.”

Grassblade snorted, narrowing his eyes. “Not going to happen, buddy. Not unless we have a trade.”

“Ok, fine. What do you want?”

“Well, me and the boys have been awful hungry, and that doe that mare is carrying smells delicious.”

“You're not getting it. It's the only food source we have until we find another one.”

The unicorn pouted, then smiled wickedly after smelling the air. “My, I just realized what a big pack you have. I'm sure it would be so nice to catch a break once in while, wouldn't it? Tell you what. We'll let you through, only if you hand over the Omegas and Unranked.”

At this, Ember crouched low, his eyes almost completely white from how pale blue they were. An earth-shaking growl rumbled from his chest, and some of the Rogues ran off, clearly intimated. About a hoofful of them remained now, Grassblade one of them.

“Do with me what you want, but if you so dare to lay a hoof on my girls, I swear I will rip that smug little smile off your face, and then some.”

Quetzal backed up a little, never seeing the Alpha this mad, and hoping she never would have to again. Grassblade seemed unfazed, though, as if the threat was petty to him.

“Fine. How about a good old fashioned standoff, then? Just you and me. Winner takes all. ”

Quetzal almost transformed herself to protest on how unfair that was, but Ember turned his head to look at her. Turning back, he smiled slightly.

“I'll play your little game, Grassblade. Only so I can whoop your tail.”

Grassblade laughed. “On the contrary, I will be the one to whoop tail.”

They both began to circle each other, watching each other's movements carefully. Grassblade then lunged forward, trying to land a bite into the other stallion, but Ember jumped out of the way, rolling onto the ground before launching himself into the unicorn's side. A crack was heard, and the two fell into the snow. The earth pony placed his front hooves on either side of Grassblade’s head, looking down at him with a smirk. “Guess this ended faster than you thought, huh?”

The unicorn's eyes went red, and his teeth were bared. “It hasn't ended. It's only just begun.”, he growled, firing a beam of magic into his face.

The other Alpha howled in pain as he backed up, pressing a hoof against his nose, which had blood oozing from it. Speckle gasped, wanting to run over and see if he was ok, but she knew better not to. Two Alpha males fighting with each other usually results in injury, and in some cases, death. A female coming in between them in such an aggravated state would get her hurt for sure.

Ember’s eyes turned back to that almost white blue, and he walked over to the unicorn who was still laying on ground. He reached down and grabbed one of his forelegs, digging his sharp teeth into the flesh. Grassblade yelped, trying to kick him away, only to yelp louder as he felt a bone snap. Ember flung him towards a tree, his back slamming into its trunk, more cracks heard in the process. The other Rogues looked at him with wide eyes, then looked to the other stallion. He smiled. “You want to mess with me? Fine.” He then gestured to his pack. “But you got a lot more where that came from.” The Rogues looked at each other, then turned tail and disappeared, splashing could be heard in the distance as they swam as fast as they could across the river. Quetzal walked over to the Alpha to check on him. “I'm fine, Quetzal. Although my sense of smell will be impaired for a few hours, he hit me pretty good.” He then turned to Collin. “Care to do the honors before we leave?”, he asked.

“Gladly.”, the pegasus answered.

Turning into a wolf, he made his way towards Grassblade, who lay limp in the snow. The unicorn's head lifted slightly.

“Have you come to finish me off?”, he asked weakly.

Collin shook his head, turning sideways and lifting one of his hind legs, sighing as he relieved himself. When he finished, he ran back to the others. They all then continued forward, towards the river’s bank.