Mura wrote:[[Can you guess what story this is based off? You can have a virtual cookie if you can! ;D]]
{ ;HoshiyoxXxCyan; }
{ ;&;}
{ ;BeatricexXxRune of Romance; }
What kinds of dirty tricks do you think you'd fall to if you realised that your biggest goal was out of reach via fair play? Would you risk it all and turn to foul play? What do those tricks bring you in the end? How do you even answer these questions without having a big impact on everyone else?
This story I am about to tell can be summed up in a variety of different ways. You could describe every single thing in detail. You could say that some people fell in love. Or, you can say that there was a big fuss over absolutely nothing. For in the end, everyone was exactly the same as when the story started...
The sun beat down upon a long, green valley of grass. Wolves milled about in all directions, going about their buisness. At one end of the valley, there was a hill, from where you could watch everything that went on, and what was more, the sun shone there strongest in the noontime. On the hill lay at least twelve wolves, all vibrant colours. Some slept, some ate, and some just lay and chatted. For this was the reunion gathering held by the current alpha of the valley, Nalle. The big wolf himself lay sunning himself next to his brother, waited on by small golden she-wolves carrying freshkill and grapes and other exotic berries. He laughed and joked with his brother for a few minutes more before turning his head lazily to a pretty pink she-wolf sitting under the shade of a single apple tree. She wore roses behind her ears, and more were being added to her tail by another she-wolf with a beautiful coffee brown coat with golden markings. The pink wolf was Nalle's niece, Beatrice, and the other wolf his own daughter, Hoshiyo. The two were very close, and loved to play with eachother as friends do. Their innocence alone was simply beautiful. The chatting stopped abruptly as Beatrice started talking to Hoshiyo; their conversations often tended to be interesting, and the other family members made no secret of the fact they liked to listen.
This time, the topic seemed to be about marriage.
"So who is it you love, Hoshiyo?" Beatrice asked her cousin slyly.
"What do you mean?" Hoshiyo smiled back, oblivious.
"You've had that innocent look plastered on your face all day!" snapped Beatrice. "Your head has been in the clouds! You were hardly listening to everyone's conversations at all!"
"Oh, really?" Hoshiyo blinked, as if coming back to reality. "I-I'm sorry..."
"We all know who she likes!" her father belowed with laughter. "She's been making eyes at my young new warrior, Cyan!"
"The one that finished his training last moon?" chipped in his brother. "A fine young wolf! Very worthy."
Hoshiyo blushed a deep red. She was very shy and hated being put on the spot, but at the sam time she had the guilty smile of defeat playing on her lips.
"Well, I will admit I like him," she gave in. "But Beatrice definately has a thing for Rune!" she countered. "The head of your guard, daddy - you know, Rune!" Everyone burst out laughing. Rune and Beatrice were like fire and ice together; they were always sarcastic to one another, like a love-hate relationship. To even hear speak of them as a pair set the wolves off laughing. Beatrice huffed haughtily.
"He is nothing more than a lot of talk. He talks the talk, but he can't walk the walk. He sickens me, Hoshiyo! You know that."
Hoshiyo and her father both opened their mouths to reply, but before they could say anything, there came the sound of somebody trotting up the hill.
As the family waited expectantly, a small brown wolf leapt up to th top of the hill and onto a large, jutting rock.
"Family of Nalle!" he cried. "The battle with the trespassers is over. We have won the battle!"
A great cheer went up from everyone. Their warriors had won them another great victory. In the morning, a pack of trespassers has tried to attack, but Nalle's group of warriors had gone to face them, and now they were coming back, and according to this message-bringer, they were victorious!
"Sir, has good Rune returned alive from the battles or not?" Beatrice asked him, raising an eyebrow.
"Oh, he is returned!" cried the little wolf. "He fought like a lion, so I heard say!"
"Any others worth mentioning?" Nalle asked, glancing at Hoshiyo.
"Aparently, head warrior Oblivion gave much honour to the wolf, Cyan." continued the wolf. "He fought incredibly for a new warrior and has been promoted from junior warrior to a full-fledged warrior!"
A few wolves giggled and Beatrice and one of the servingwolves nudged Hoshiyo, who blushed and smiled with pleasure.
There came the sound of more paws padding up the hill.
"They're coming!" squealed the message-bringing wolf. "They're coming up now!"
At once, everyone leapt to their paws and gathered together; Nalle, his brother, his niece and his daughter at the front. Everyone was eager to see the return of the head warrior. At the top arrived a huge black and red wolf with three tails; the head warrior, Oblivion. Behind him leapt two young wolves, Cyan and Rune, and at least eight other warriors came behind them. Last came three huge warriors, guarding between them the head of the enemy pack, a large grey wolf, and two of his warriors - now prisoners of Nalle's family.
When they came to a halt, another cheer went up from the gathered wolves. Nalle stepped forward to greet Oblivion.
"Welcome back, brave ones!" he smiled, and Oblivion returned the warm welcome with a few words of grateful thanks.
"It is nice to be back!" he smiled. "We have brought with us the only three of the enemy pack still alive. The rest have all been killed."
"A job well done!" congratulated Nalle, glancing at the prisoners.
"Take them away and guard them well," he instructed the warriors surrounding them. "The rest of you, we must celebrate this occasion! We have loads of fresh prey, so the valley shall feast tonight!"
At this announcement, there was a final cheer from everyone, and all the wolves, warriors and family, began heading back down to the valley to let the other valley wolves know of this intended celebration. The only people that stayed on the hill were Rune and Cyan, who were holding back.
"Rune... I have something to tell you." Cyan told his warrior companion urgently. "Please hear me out! I feel I have to tell someone..."
He was interrupted by paws padding back up the hill. It was Beatrice, come to find out why they had not gone down with everyone else.
"Hello, noble Cyan. Hello, fatty." she greeted them with a dip of her head to Cyan only.
"It's too bad you got back alive," she told Rune sarcastically, and he glared.
"This is why I don't love any she-wolves." he snapped to Cyan, who smiled helplessly.
"How happy that must make all the she-wolves!" cried Beatrice, at once. "I pity anyone who you fall in love with. I would rather hear the sounds of war than a wolf tell me that he loves me."
"You have such a sharp tongue." Rune snapped. "You're like a parrot or something - too clever for your own good."
"I'd rather have the voice of a bird than the voice of a beast," retorted Beatrice, at once. Not to be outdone, Rune turned to face her again.
"I wish I could run as fast as your tongue can spit out those awful things you say," he told her, and she merely laughed mockingly.
"Forget it, fatty." she told him. "I came to see why you two had not come, but on second thought, take your time." and with that, she stalked back off down the hill.
"All she-wolves are pests!" spat Rune with contempt.
"T-this may be a bad time to tell you what I wanted to tell you..." smiled Cyan, almost guiltily.
"Oh, don't tell me you're in love." Rune snapped, sarcastically. It turned into an expression of surprise when Cyan nodded.
"Well, yeah... I am..." he smiled helplessly. "I like... I like Hoshiy-"
"What kept you here, so that you didn't follow us down the hill?" interrupted the friendly voice of Obivion, as he, like Beatrice, came back up to see why two of his best warriors had not come with his to start celebrating.
"He is in love!" laughed Rune, scornfully. "With who? Think of how stupid this is! With Hoshiyo, Nalle's shy little daughter!"
"Really? Well, that's great!" Oblivion smiled, turning to Cyan, who had blushed a deep red. "Congratulations, if you love her! The wolf is very worthy - you are a strong warrior, and your heart's in the right place; she's lucky to have an admirer like you."
"Whatever." Rune sighed, giving up. "Everyone's falling in love, these days. Well, I intend to stay single for the rest of my life." and with that, he marched off down the hill to join the celebrations. Cyan and Oblivion smiled and nodded to eachother.
"I'll see what I can do, I'll talk to Nalle for you." Oblivion told Cyan. "Maybe you could really end up as mates!"
Cyan nodded eagerly and thanked the senior warrior, before the two of them followed Rune.
The fire burned bright and warm orange in the night. The celebrations had begun and all of the valley wolves were eating and chatting around the fire, having a good time. There must have been almost one hundred wolves there, all celebrating the return of the brave warriors. In one corner, Beatrice was chatting with Hoshiyo again, being watched by the interested eyes of Nalle. He was interrupted suddenly by Oblivion, who was standing next to him with Cyan.
"Good Nalle, I wish to talk to you." Oblivion addressed the alpha, winking to Cyan. "May we go somewhere private?"
"Of course," smiled down Nalle. He turned briefly to the rest of the wolves. "I will be back soon, my friends!" he called, before going into one of the valley dens with Oblivion and Cyan.
Meanwhile, Nalle's brother watched as Rune approached Hoshiyo and Beatrice. Immeadietly, an arguement flared up between the pink wolf and the young warrior. Other serving wolves and young mother wolves came up with their pups. Nalle's brother grinned to them.
"Shall we try and get Rune and Beatrice to fall in love with eachother?" he laughed quietly, and the other wolves nodded their approval and smiled. This would be a fun new game to play.
"I have news, everyone!" came a sudden bark from Nalle, who emerged from the den. "We will hold a ceremony in three days time in which my Hoshiyo will become mates with young Cyan!"
There was a happy cheer from the audience, and Hoshiyo ran and licked her father in wordless happiness. Truely, it was turning out to be a great celebration that day - it seemed like nothing could go wrong.
The sound of cheering echoed through the corridors as the two guards came back from their break to guard the prisoners.
"What's all that noise?" growled one of the prisoners, one of the smaller two wolves, subordinates of the leader.
"Our alpha, Nalle, has announced a ceremoney for three days time in which his daughter Hoshiyo and young warrior Cyan will become mates." the guard nformed him. "It will be another blow to your pack! You keep suffering losses, while we get happy occasion after happy occasion to celebrate!" the guard smiled pitifully at the prisoners. "Too bad you have to stay here for a lonnnng time." the guard drew away from the angry prisoners and the guard marched on.
"Is there no way for me to take my revenge on Nalle and his family?" cursed the leader of the prisoners when the guards were out of earshot. "I would give anything, ANYTHING TO SEE THEM ALL DEAD!"
"Sir, I think there is a way for us to achieve your goal. Not honestly, my lord, of course." one of his wolves spoke up with a sly smile.
"What is it? Tell me!" raged the leader, turning to the wolf that spoke.
"I have managed to capture the heart of one of the serving-wolves who bring us meals. I know that I can bribe her to let us out - escape is the easy part. But if you can get Oblivion and Nalle to be standing outside Hoshiyo's den in the pitch black night, I can be there with the serving-wolf and we'll lick eachother's fur. Under the shadows, it'll look like little Hoshiyo mating with one of the rebel wolves; she'll be disgraced and exiled, and the Nalle family thrown into shame!"
"It sounds dangerous. What if they don't believe that Hoshiyo is unfaithful and just throw us back into prison?" the leader questioned, raising an eyebrow.
"If we pull this off, though, we might be able to take the valley under our posession. Let's at least attempt it!" urged the other wolf.
As the cheers of the celebration died down, the only sound floating on the night air was the sound of cruel laughter.
[[More to come ^^ I don't have time to finish it right now. Comments are appreciated~]]
Rune padded slowly through the large den, looking for Cyan. He wanted to go hunting with him. He stopped abruptly at the entrance as he saw Cyan walking with Nalle and Oblivion. They were talking in low tones. Rune, however, caught his name mentioned. Curiosity getting the better of him, he hid in the shadows of the den as the three stopped conveniently outside the den, and carried on talking.
"You say Beatrice says she loves Rune?" exclaimed Oblivion, in a surprised voice.
"It's true! Down to the ground, she falls and cries, 'Oh Rune! I love you so much! Why must you cruelly taunt me like this?'" Cyan exclaimed, using elaborate paw and tail gestures to make his point absolutely clear.
"I heard my niece telling Hoshiyo earlier," put in Nalle, loudly. "She's so tormented, not being able to confess, having to live with the fact that if she told him, Rune would just laugh and taunt her!"
The three started padding off again, towards the hunting grounds. Rune stood stock-still in the shadows, taking in everything he had just heard.
In actual fact, this was Nalle's brother's plan in action to trick Rune and Beatrice into loving eachother. As the trio reached the edge of the hunting grounds, out of Rune's earshot, they all fell about laughing.
"I could see his face in the shadows - it looked so shocked!" laughed Cyan, and the other two agreed.
"I'm... tormenting... Beatrice? This cannot be!" exclaimed Rune, his eyes closed in confusion as he tried desperately to make sense of it all. "She loves me? She loves me that much, deep inside? What do I do..." he paced back and forth for a good few minutes before pausing. "Maybe... I should try loving her back..."
Beatrice headed through the hunting grounds near the valley, thoroughly bored. With no celebrations to go to, she had only two options - hunt or sun herself. She didn't let on, but she felt a little lonely, trotting aimlessly through the long grass. She was unaware, however, that three pairs of eyes were watching her. A little way off sat Hoshiyo and two serving-wolves, sitting very still, their eyes fixed on Beatrice.
"Operation pair-Beatrice-with-Rune is about to commence!" giggled Hoshiyo quietly. "Do we all know the plan?"
The two serving-wolves nodded eagerly. As Beatrice changed direction to head back down, the started talking loudly.
"No TRUELY Hoshiyo, she is TOO stubborn!" one of the serving-wolves began, making sure Beatrice could hear them.
"But are you SURE you heard Rune say he LOVED her?" put in the other, hiding her smiles. The trio were, of course, planning to trick Beatrice into loving Rune, via carefully-placed gossip that Beatrice would be able to hear.
"He is in such pain!" Hoshiyo started her part dramatically. "He wishes he could tell Beatrice, but he would rather die heartbroken than die with her moks and jeers ringing in his ears."
Beatrice had taken the bait. Interested in the conversation about herself, she crept behind a nearby tree to eavesdrop on the conversation - exactly what the other wolves wanted.
"Beatrice is so stubborn, she would never listen to the poor wolf's pleas, even if he was near death!" continued a serving-wolf.
"Yes," Hoshiyo pretended to agree. "She wouldn't even be sad if he died, I'd reckon. It's so sad, but what can we do? The poor wolf will just gradually fade away before our eyes..."
Beatrice stood, shocked, behind the tree, stock still. All her fur prickled with guilt. Hoshiyo winked and nudged the wolves she was with.
"She's taken the bait! Let's get out of here!" she muttered under her breath, and the three wolves rose, and padded off slowly.
Beatrice emerged from the tree.
"How can this be?" she muttered. "He will die... because I am so stubborn?" she let herself leave a long pause before speaking to herself again.
"Maybe... just maybe... I could try loving him back..."
Cyan, Nalle and Oblivion were still rolling around on the grass of the hunting ground, laughing loudly to one another about their prank. A dark shape suddenly loomed up from behind a boulder, looking big and dangerous in the setting sun. The three stopped joking around abruptly and leapt to their feet.
"Who's there?" Oblivion growled warningly.
The shadow emerged without a word - it was the leader of the three prisoners from the enemy pack.
"How did you escape?" threatened Oblivion, taking a step towards the hulking silohette.
"I have risked my life to bring you a great, tragic secret." the wolf whispered, obviously in pain. "Your young daughter, Nalle... she is unfaithful."
"Why would we believe you?" spat Nalle, with contempt.
"Fine, don't. But if you go to Hoshiyo's den tonight, you'll see tha I am telling the whole truth." the silohette slunk off, and Oblivion made a move as if to follow. Nalle touched his shoulder and he abruptly stopped.
"Let him go. I want to see if these rumours are true." he growled, though it was unclear who his growl was directed at.
"If she is unfaithful, there is no way I can become her mate." muttered Cyan. "I swear, if she's unfaithful, I'll wait until the day of the mate ceremony and shame her in front of every single one of this valley pack."
"You're crazy!" exclaimed Oblivion. "How can you believe those lies?"
"Well, we'll see, won't we?" growled Nalle, before padding off, flanked by Cyan.
"Oblivion, Cyan, meet me at midnight. We will then see if my Hoshiyo really would do such a terrible thing."
