These days, the forest looks less and less scary, and less and less dark. I can still remember, though those memories are getting vague and foggy now, how the trees and the shadows looked when we last sang. Back then, I stayed in the den and played with my brothers and sisters while all the parents went out to hunt. I was afraid of the woods then, so I didn’t even want to come along.

Today, though, I’m old enough to tag along. The forest isn’t so scary anymore. Maybe I’m putting on a brave face for my siblings here with me; not all of them look as confident as I feel. Maybe it’s for the sake of the parents guiding us; these are my parents after all. Still, I’m taking charge of this group of pups and marching right behind my mother.

She’s called She-with-the-best-nose. She is small for a mother, with a coat like old snow with irregular streaks of the night sky. Her eyes are like tree bark or fallen leaves, but with light behind them. There’s no wind, so her nose is close to the ground right now because she’s trying to find the colour of walking meat. Every wolf has a nose that can pick up that colour, but hers can follow it further than anyone else in the family.

I imitate her and agitate my nostrils to find the right colour, but I quickly get distracted by the other pups running around. Father calls to us to stop being a nuisance, but that only gets me thinking about him.

He’s called He-who-pays-most-attention; his coat is like bare summer dirt, but the fur around his nose and the tip of his tail are like fresh snow. His eyes have a lot of light in them, but they almost never look at us pups, or at mother. They look this way and that, both around us and far away. His ears turn about even more, and never to where he’s looking. He isn’t big either, but he’s bigger than mother. Unlike her, he’s old. Old enough to take his meal right after He-who-guides-all, the leader of our family, and He-who-knows-best, the eldest of the family.

All this thinking of names makes me think it’s time I have a name too! When a mother or a father want my attention from far away, they just call me Pup. They call every pup that. When I’m not paying attention or if I’m being stupid, they call me Pup-who-knows-nothing. They call every pup that too, when they deserve it. And I don’t want to end up with a stupid name like He-who-walks-slow. That name is probably why he gets his meal after everyone else. So, I need to come up with my own name; I think.

What about… He-who-is-most-brave? That’s certainly how I feel right now, so I sound it out. She-with-the-best-nose turns towards me, and her eyes are full of amusement and laughter. Did somebody say something funny? He-who-pays-most-attention still doesn’t look at me, but he growls a disapproving sound. It’s clear to me he doesn’t think I’m brave enough to merit the name.

“Pup-who-hunts-alone perhaps,” my mother proposes in impish tones. That stings more than if she had called me Pup-who-knows-nothing again. Hunting alone is something no one does; you would have to be the most stupid wolf that has ever been born to do something like that!

I lower my head and flatten my ears. “I’m sorry.”

She licks me once and says, “For today, try to be He-who-learns-best. Tomorrow, we can see about He-who-is-most-brave.” She goes back to sniffing out colours, and I go back to imitating her.

Not too long later and not too far away, she finds a colour she likes and quickens her pace. He-who-pays-most-attention howls in the still wind to tell the other groups which way we’re going and what we’re following. The other groups answer him, and I recognize the voices of He-who-leads-all and She-with-the-best-song.

I run after my mother, my tongue hanging to the side of my jaws, and I pant heavily. My legs are short; I’m slower than her. But that doesn’t stop me from noticing none of the other pups pass me. Maybe I’ll be He-who-runs-fastest when my time comes. But we already have someone with a similar name. He-who-runs-longest then. Because right now, I feel like I could run forever.

I… think I know which colour we’re following. It has to be the one that’s going where we’re going. But I get knocked to the side when father rushes past me, as I didn’t realize we caught up with the walking meat already. My siblings, who didn’t realize it either, are off their paws as well. My attention is on them for only a brief moment.

I can still see the parents from where I am, and I relish this spectacle I’m seeing for the first time. From every direction, parents leap from the bushes and the snow, and crash into the walking meat. This one is a very large Walking-meat-with-head-claws, so every parent sinks their fangs into its legs and neck. The walking meat’s eyes roll, and it makes sounds I don’t know the meaning of, but they send shivers of excitement and anticipation down my spine.

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Some pups rush forward, clearly filled with the same feelings I’m experiencing. I scramble to my paws to follow them. In the time it takes for us pups to reach the walking meat, it’s down in the snow and on its side; She-with-the-strongest-fangs has her jaws wrapped around its throat. Its legs flail intermittently, but each outburst is weaker than the last. Before long, the Walking-meat-with-head-claws wouldn’t be walking meat anymore, it would just be meat.

The other parents turn towards us and stop our enthusiastic charge. I know they mean well by this; they want to make sure we don’t eat out of turn. But it takes a long time for the emotions to die down within me.

After everyone’s taken their turn eating the meat—including He-who-walks-slow, who eats after even the pups—the parents tell us we have to make our way back to the den on our own. Some of my brothers and sisters whimper quiet, shrill cries at the news. I try to look brave and keep quiet, but I’m scared of the forest again.

He-who-leads-all gives us some advice, and She-with-the-best-nose shows us which colours will lead our noses back to the den. Then, they and all the parents leave. The quicker-witted pups follow after them almost immediately. Even if the parents run faster, following them even a short way will get us that much closer to the den.

The quick-witted follow the parents, the normal-witted and I follow after them, and the slow-witted eventually follow us. Because none of us run at the same speed, we spread out and get separated. It’s clear that the parents pace themselves to stay grouped, but this is our first hunt. We just don’t know how to yet.

I don’t know if I end up towards the front or the back of the pups. I lose the colour I’m tracking sometimes, so I follow another I remember my mother pointed out earlier. Thankfully, I’m not alone; there are five other pups in my group. I’m the one leading them most of the time, even if one of my brothers is better at staying focused on the right colour.

I find a colour I’ve never smelled before. It’s like the colour of the parents, but it’s strange and complex in ways I don’t understand. I ask the pup with the better nose if he knows what that colour is, but he doesn’t know either.

“You follow the colours,” I tell him, “I will pay attention.” He does as instructed, and I do my best impression of He-who-pays-most-attention as I take up the rear.

The colour flows over a nearby hill. Straining my hearing as best I can, I also hear padded footsteps coming from the other side. They sound heavier than a pup’s, but lighter than a parent’s.

I stand there paralyzed by the sight of it when it crests over the hill moments later. In shape and size, it looks like a parent, like one of us. Its coat is like freshly fallen snow, or like the beautiful and song-worthy Sky-Light of the night sky. But it’s too long on the belly, and too soft all over. It’s unlike any fur I’ve seen.

It lowers its head and looks straight at me. Any thoughts of beauty the coat could’ve inspired leave me when I lock eyes with it. They’re small and they have no light in them. Staring into them is like staring into the darkest of nights. They’re too far from the nose, because its whole head is longer and thinner than it should be. It looks like a parent, but with jaws long like a tree limb. It looks gross.

I jump in surprise when it barks. It doesn’t bark at me, rather it breaks eye contact to bark back the way it came. This too reminds me of wolves, but I can’t understand what it barked. Its words are garbled and singsong; unintelligible. I hear other voices like it answer from far away. This can’t be an animal; this has to be a monster. What else would look like a wolf and still not be a wolf?

The other pups have noticed it too; I can hear them whining behind me, crying for help. Somehow, this fills me with a measure of courage. I stand my ground, no longer paralyzed, but I’m still trembling in all my limbs. The monster’s lips curl back, unveiling all the sharp wolf teeth that fill its too-long jaws. With a wicked snarl, it charges at us. The other pups flee in panic, but I stand my ground and growl back defiantly.

All of my attention is focused on the monster, so I never heard He-who-walks-slow approaching. The monster tumbles when he crashes into it. He-who-pays-most-attention follows only a moment after, and the two of them wrestle with the monster.

“Run Away, Pup-who-knows-nothing!” shouts my father. “Run to the den!”

I obey.

When my father finally arrives, the shadows of the pines are already three paws longer than when the last pup found the den. He-who-walks-slow is not with him. The hot water of living meat and wolves stains his fur and drips down his legs. He lays down clumsily, and She-with-the-most-tender-touch comes to him and licks at his side.

That night, He-who-knows-best tells me that my father, if he lives long enough to sing the next song, will be known as He-who-has-defied-Death. This is because Death-that-stalks-Wolves is the proper name of the monster. When the next song comes, the family will sing in remembrance of He-who-protects-pups, formerly He-who-walks-slow, because his death under the jaws of Death-that-stalks-Wolves is something song-worthy that should be remembered. To my greatest surprise, he even tells me I have a name now: He-who-leads-pups.