The Golden One pt2
Matthias finished feeding the livestock, his stomach growled viciously from lack of food for nearly eight days now. He took a paw full of the feed and crunched it down. The hunger pangs faded away after the second paw full of feed. 'That will keep me going I guess...' He grabbed his ax and started walking down the path that lead into the woods where he chopped wood. He began to look around, gazing at the wonders of nature's natural beauty. To him being in the forest made him feel safe, away from the horrible lonely life that he was put in after his aunt passed away. He would often look up in the sky, wondering if her soul was finally out of the Red Meadow, finally up in paradise looking down on him. He sighed and continued toward the tree that he chopped down yesterday. He had managed to cut half of it as fire wood & take it to the cabin. He prayed to mother nature, Tor & Fenris to forgive him for harming nature and for destroying the home to many of the creatures he loved so much in the forest.
A gentle breeze blew in response to his prayer, he could've sworn he saw Tor, Wolf God of the Sun & Fenris, Tor's lovely mate, Goddess of the Moon. He may have been a Foxan in appearance but he had the strength and cunning of a powerful Wolfan, flowing through his veins. The wind seemed to sound like a voice, "Be strong Matthias... Your true calling... Will soon begin..." That voice would always say that.
"Maybe I'm just... Paranoid..." he would tell himself. He was probably just hearing things as he often did.
However something inside him was telling him that there was a force at work, something that he could not understand. He began to chop the whole second half of the tree trunk into two and a half foot long sections, the tree was a whole twenty feet tall and nearly 3 feet wide. He found that his heart lightened as he chopped into the fallen tree. How he wished that this was his uncle at the end of the ax. He stopped and padded over to the small river nearby for a drink.
What he saw made him freeze, in the water he saw not his own reflection but, images of a girl stumbling through the forests. 'She's so beautiful...' Her fur as white as the snow that laid around on the ground. She had ear tips of midnight blue, her paws held the same coloring as well as her tail. She was dressed in royal armor to the King of Carlag. She was a tamer with a pack of 5 large timber wolves running through the woods beside her. 'Such magnificent Vargs...' He noticed that they were a range of color from black as coal to white as ice. Not once did he stop to think of how he could even see these images in the water before him, only how beautiful the wolves were. The image changed into something else, it was him with the girl, holding her in his arms she seemed very ill. Just as the image began to change again a voice called out to him, "Oi! Matthias!"
He jumped and the images broke, he stood up, grabbed his ax and went back to chopping wedges from the large disks of wood he cut cleanly from the tree. He didn't realize that it wasn't his uncle, but the kind Blacksmith that always came to help him out whenever he could. "Got more choppin' to do I see? Allow me to be of assistance." The large Grey Wolfan said with a hearty laugh.
"Thank you Mister Skra." Matthias said letting out a sigh of relief.
"So after this would you like it if I pulled you from your uncle to teach you more of the Blacksmith, maybe even more lessons in using a sword perhaps?"
Matthias's eyes glittered brightly, "Oh yes sir I would very much love that!"The blacksmith was his aunt's cousin. He knew of the harsh treatment that Bran would put him through each day and would try to take him every now and then to feed him, teach him of the world and how to defend himself should he decide to leave his uncle's farm for good.
"Right then. Lets hurry and get this bothersome chore done. I will talk to your uncle of this once we're done."
With renewed vigor, Matthias finished his chore in no time at all. He rode back in the cart with the wood to the cabin. He began piling up the wood against the side of the cabin as Skra went in to discuss his plan with Bran. Excitement welling up in the young Foxan's heart, he rushed to put the wood away. Meanwhile inside, Bran talked with Skra of the matter.
"Well... I guess that would be useful... He does need the training so to defend this farm of attackers..." Bran said mostly to himself, pondering out loud. "But then while he's gone, who will do the chores around here... Certainly not I, Lest I want to send myself to the Red Meadow with a split spine."
"We can come back each day and take care of the chores. I made a promise to Hikari before she passed on to train him so that he could be safe from harm."
The Red Foxan cringed as his heart stirred for his long since gone mate Hikari, with the memory of his mate in his mind and of how much she loved the boy... He nodded and agreed to allow Skra take him to live with him and train. Matthias, over heard the decision and ran to the barn where he slept. He jumped around with glee and grabbed his pack and clothes. Skra laughed as he saw the excited Foxan run to him with a wide smile. "It appears your already prepared my boy."
Matthias nodded, his tail wagging vehemently. "Well let's be off. We start today." Skra said, climbing onto his horse drawn cart. Matthias jumped into the back and watched as the distance between him and his awful uncle grew. 'Finally... My life will get better!' He then began to think of the images he saw in the river once again. What will happen to that girl if, he doesn't find her soon?