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The elements are.... Distraction A Broken Weapon A New Home Confusion A Thief schizophrenic Foxhair’s trembling hand was on Shadow’s shoulder. Her voice was quivering. Her shaky voice had nothing to do with the chilling snow that whipped around them all. She was shaking because of the devastation the Frost Men had brought to their holt. “We need to leave Stonehowl. We must find a new home, or at least find some place to stay until the Frost Men leave.” Even the stone shaped wolf head, at the top of the caverns, seemed to howl mournfully, as the wind passed through the vacant eyes and left it’s gaping maw, creating the haunting sounds of the wolf howl. Shadow’s gaze became vacant, glazed, staring out into nothing. Spearclaw, one of the members of the Priderwalkers who had come with Shadow and his tribe, stood next to him. Spearclaw had great admiration for Shadow and how he had successfully led his tribe for so long; choosing to communicate with those that were different than him; fighting only when there was no other choice. He could see that look in Shadow’s eyes; as if he believed, at this very moment, there was indeed, no other choice than to fight the Frost Men. Spearclaw added his concern to Foxhair’s, “Chief, I would have to agree with Foxhair. We must go before the Frost Men return. We will come back for the dead.” Shadow shook his head, though he spoke no words. His mind was still reeling from what had happened, attempting to process and conceive the loss of life. He looked around and saw that the white snow was stained with blood. Bodies of his tribe lay in the snow, slowly being buried by the still falling frost. “I will make them pay,” Shadow finally spoke. “We will make them pay,” Spearclaw assured Shadow. “For now, we should retreat through the mountains. Perhaps find a cavern we can take shelter in. If we cannot find any caverns to take shelter, we can always go to my people in the plains.” Shadow kneeled down and picked up a broken sword, whose tip was still stained with blood. He stared at his reflection, shining in both the metal, and the bright, crimson blood. He snarled and tossed the weapon aside. “They think they can come here. Kill my tribe. Steal our home. Steal our food. They’re wrong. They may have won, for now. But, we will come back. And when we do, this land will drink the blood of all the Frost Men.” Foxhair, though deeply mourning the loss of her cub with Shadow, somehow found herself also mourning the loss of Shadow. Though he stood there before her, this war had changed him. Like a thief in the night, it took away everything that was different about him. She whispered, “Yes, we will have our revenge.” Once again, even the stone shaped wolf head, seemed to howl, as the wind blew through the eyes, and exited the mouth, mourning the loss of those who once called it home. They gathered a few leathers to keep them warm and began their trek through the mountain pass. Shadow never stopped looking over his shoulder. He was not fearful that they were being followed; instead, his eyes burned with seething hatred for those who destroyed his family, his holt and his friends. He hated running away. Even for just a moment. None of them spoke a single word as they made their way through the rocky, snow covered path. Most nights, they huddled close to one another, using their body heat to keep one another warm; the youngest of them in the center, protected by their elders. Shadow however, stood off to the side; staring back at the path. Staring back at the way home, his expression vacant and as chilling as the freshly fallen snow around them. They traveled through the mountain pass for three long days and nights. On the fourth night, a portion of the path that had been snowed in completely from the unusually long whitefall. Shadow cursed and screamed furiously, even as the cold winds whipped about him. “I’m going to kill those humans. I am going to kill them all!” Foxhair watched, concerned. The tears that fell from her eyes, were almost instantly frozen on her rosy cheeks. Vineweaver came to stand next to her, placing his supportive hand on her shoulder, able to hear her thoughts, though she was not sending. “{He’s acting like Wildthorn,}” Vineweaver sent to Foxhair. “{That is why I am worried,}” Foxhair sent back. “{We know how Wildthorn’s hatred towards humans ended…}” Vineweaver nodded. Wildthorn had been Shadow’s closest friend, and the Chief before him. When Purespring, Shadow’s own sister had accidentally been killed by humans who were hunting for food; Wildthorn became obsessed with taking the lives of every human in the offending tribe. That obsession with revenge, had led to his own death. In less than one week, Shadow had lost his sister, his closest friend, and had become chief of the tribe. Still, he refused to follow Wildthorn’s path – he continued to try and work peacefully with the humans. Now Foxhair was watching Shadow’s uncontrollable fury. She had never seen such darkness in her love mate. The wide variety of emotions that spilled across his fragile features. His rage. His laughter, which was riddled with madness. His sorrow. Then back to uncontainable wrath. His schizophrenic behavior worried Foxhair; she feared that his anger would lead to his own demise, and soon, she would not only have lost her cub, but her love mate as well. Stream sensed Foxhair’s tension, and sent to her, “{I wish my healing could take away his pain.}” “{Some wounds,}” Foxhair sent back, “{cannot be healed by the healer’s touch. I only pray this this pain does not scar him so deep that he becomes something else.}” Snowcloud, whose white hair made it almost impossible to see when she stood against the snow, looked back at the others, her green eyes illuminated, blooming like the plains that both she and Spearclaw had come from. “Over here, there’s a small cave. We can seek shelter there for the night.” Shadow turned, and for a moment, his rage subsided. Foxhair was thankful for this brief moment’s distraction, where she could see in Shadow’s eyes, the need to be the chief he was expected to be; and focus less on his anger. Shadow approached the cavern and kneeled down. “It’s small, but it looks like it would hold us all. Everyone, in here for the night.” The wind howled furiously between the small, stone passage, as its prey escaped into the small cavern. Inside the small cave, the surviving members of the Stonehowl Holt cuddled close to share their body heat. Stillbreeze extended her hand to Spearclaw, to welcome him closer. There had been an undeniable attraction between the two of them. It was not Recognition; rather a simple, basic, physical attraction to one another. Vineweaver, Stillbreeze’s Recognized mate had initially been furious, threatened, by Spearclaw, but soon let it go. Spearclaw smiled and Stillbreeze, but kept his distance – as far as he could within the small hollow, at any rate. He had wanted to go to her side. There was nothing more he wanted to be there, to be pulled close next to her. But this was not the time. They needed their time to mend. Their families had just been slaughtered by the Frost Men. In this time of confusion, pain and suffering, it was not the time to be a distraction. This was a time for their family to be together; he did not need to steal some of her time or affection, when her cubs and her lifemate needed it more than him. His mind was a chaotic storm, trying to sort together all the broken images in his mind of the last few hours; the attack came so quickly, so quietly – unlike any humans he, or the rest of the Stonehowl had ever encountered. Their attack was concise, thought out, planned to perfection. That morning, when the attack came – Spearclaw could hardly recollect everything as it had happened. Everything in his memory seemed like broken shards scattered all across the floor; each of them coated in blood. As he sat alone, the cold wiping around him, his mind drifted back to his own family – the Pridewalkers. Unlike the Wolfriders of Stonehowl, the Pridewalkers were not bound to lions. They did not share a bloodline, a bond. Long ago, when the Elves first came to the plains, escaping humans who had been hunting them down; the Elves observed the lions in the plains. These feline creatures were magnificent and powerful. They ruled the plains through might and strength. The first Elves shaped their flesh, changed themselves to be more like the lions. Fingernails became strong, massive claws. Eyes were shaped so that they could see in the night flawless. Legs and arms were shaped to achieve perfect muscle mass. The Elves grew out their hair, and face fur, resembling the lion’s mane. The First Elves adapted to the ways of the lions; initially hunting in the plains, as the lions did, but keeping their distance from the large felines. Eventually, mutual respect developed between the two – and soon, the pack merged. The first Elves were welcomed into the Lion’s pride, and together they hunted, and shared their kills. When a lion’s claw or tooth was damaged, one of the First Elves could heal the claw and tooth. With magic, the lives of these magnificent beasts were extended, a perpetual youthfulness bestowed upon the pride. Though, most of his memories with his people were good ones – there were some that were not, much like the nature of lions. The First Elves had been a witness to a behavior within the lion’s pride that they could not believe. When a male sought to take over a pride, it would kill all the cubs to avoid any potential competition. Something, their latest Sire had done, when Lionheart had killed his own child, Talon, as well as his mate, Rainbringer. Spearclaw sunk into a moment of deep, dark, depression. Most of his life, all he had known, even during the good times, was violence. Most of it, senseless. His eyes drifted over to Shadow, who still seemed to be muttering to himself, and like him, sat apart from the others. He needed Shadow to find himself again. To become the sensible chief he once was. But after the loss of several members of his tribe, including his own cubling, Snowspring, there was little doubt that the Chief would ever be the leader he once was. As Foxhair had said earlier; tonight, she mourns the loss of her friends, her family, her son, and even her lovemate, for even he died the day the Frost Men came. The person that walked with them was no longer Shadow, but strangely, a dark, hollow comparison of the great chief that once was. The cold wind whipped around the young human who gazed forward, eyes vacant of any joy. Around him, the other humans celebrated their victory. The young human walked among the dead, most of them “demons” as his father had called them. Buren walked up to the first body he saw; a young demon; only just an infant. He turned the body over, a female, black hair and green eyes. But the eyes were now vacant. How could this young, human looking thing be the dangerous demon that his father claimed them to be? The young human could feel his eyes brimming with tears, as he looked deeper into the cave. He saw two males, one female, all whom were huddled around two young, now dead; one girl, one a boy, nearly the same age, by the looks of it, as himself. He turned around and began to walk out of the cave, and saw another young infant, auburn hair and brown eyes, vacantly gazing towards the heavens, an arrow in its chest. The young human kneeled down and picked up a sword, the blade smashed to pieces. These demons never had a chance. The attack came as a surprise. Where was their powerful magic that his father claimed these demons possessed? So many lives, so needlessly taken, Buren thought. Buren approached his father, still holding the shattered blade. “Will you pursue the survivors?” He looked over his shoulder, “And kill them as you did these ‘demons’?” Buren’s father, Balgar, Chief of the Frost Men, looked down at his son. “Do not be fooled by what you see here. These demons would have grown up strong. We were fortunate. Kuraul, God of the North Wind, guided out hand; blinded the demons to us, weakened their magic, allowing us to fight them fairly.” “So Kuraul condones the murder of even infants?” Buren questioned, clenching the hilt of the sword in his hand. “Do not let the bodies of the young demons distract you from the glory that is ours, son,” Balgar growled, growing irritated with his own son. “Kuraul has seen to our victory. Do not question the ways of the North Wind, or you will bring ill fortune upon us. For now, we will stay here and not worry about the demons who have fled. They have food supplies in their cave, and that’s all we need for now.” That night, at the celebration, Buren still held onto the blade that he had picked up. It had been one of the weapons that belonged to one of the demons that had tried to defend their home. Balgar, his father, was at the center of the gathering, just outside the mouth of the cave, retelling one of the stories about a past battle with the demons – but these had been “sea demons.” “I, Balgar, son of Trigon, blood of Yureel, blood of Grenbar, remember the sea demons of The Crimson Reef,” he began. Several of the Frost Men cheered. Some had actually been there. “The Sea Demons made hunting for fish nearly impossible,” Balgar recalled. “The Sea Giants slammed our ships, while the Sea Demons used weapons to spear us and pull us off the ships, so that the razor-fins could devour us. My father made war with the Sea Demons, and in one of those battles, he lost his life – speared like a fish, and pulled from his ship.” Balgar still remembered the visage of his father, pulled from the ship, bleeding from the wound through his chest; then the razor-fins in a frenzied, chaotic feast of madness, ripped his father from limb to limb, leaving only a crimson pool in the ocean that quickly dissipated, leaving only the scar of a memory that Balgar would never forget. “Sherala,” he gestured to his right, a woman, whose eyes were ice white, “had a vision of a distant land; one where it was not always frost. But the land changed; and that there was more game than just fishing. With her guidance, I turned to Kuraul, god of the North Wind, and asked for his guidance as well. A strong wind blew just as I finished my prayer; and on it, I could smell change. The Sea Demons were too strong. So we set sail away from the Crimson Reef one day, and the Sea Demons attacked – some of the ships fell to the Sea Demons – a handful of us escaped, and managed to sail through. I know that most of you hated fleeing our homes, giving into the Sea Demons as we did. But I knew that if we continued the war my father began, we would all soon suffer the fate that my father had.” Balgar held a torch and threw it onto the corpses of the demons whom they had killed in Stonehowl. “Now,” he said firmly as the bodies began to burn, “we have the strength and guidance of Balgar with us, and we will see every demon burn, just as we burn these demons.” The Frost Men cheered, but Buren clenched the weapon harder, his tears freezing in the cold, chilling night…