Lone Wolf Cry

Sitka forged her way through the dense snow that had been getting deeper and deeper as she approached the mountain pass. Large flakes of snow clung to her chocolate brown pelt and threatened to form a frozen helmet over her head and muzzle. Sitka periodically shook off to rid herself of the snow that could ultimately be her death. She was the last of her pack and the bitch wolf was running for her life and the lives of her unborn pups.

She had been the alpha female, a five-year-old matriarch who had earned that position when she faced off with the former reigning she-wolf, Calla. Only the alpha female was allowed to breed, assuring the fittest and strongest progeny to continue the line of the pack. When one of the rogue males that had been run out of the pack after impregnating her, she knew that her pups were at risk as much as she knew her own life was. Sitka was alive and still with the pack only because she was an asset to the pack with her uncanny hunting abilities. An undeniable ferocity had overcome her when she found Calla standing over the five slaughtered pups of Sitka’s first litter.

The battle of dominance raged for over an hour. At first, it had looked bleak for Sitka when some of the lesser pack-mates would interfere with nips and bites on her unprotected hindquarters. Grendahl, the alpha male, would menacingly bare his fangs at the interlopers, sending them off to the sidelines with their tails tucked between their legs. He then sat at a safe distance to watch the two females fight with his large amber eyes fixed on them.

Sitka won the battle with a final lunge, catching Calla by the throat and clamping down until the grey female no longer moved. Releasing her dead foe, Sitka raised her head and howled her victory. The rest of the pack joined in, including Grendahl who was now at her side.

However, three years later, that was all gone. In those three years, the encroachment of men who were in search of new homesteading areas came in a mass exodus. A town was established in this new territory, well enough to support the people of the town and the ranches and farms on its outskirts. Hunting this winter was lean with men hunting too and the balance was in favor of the men getting the majority of the kills.

It was not long before the wolves were reduced to making raids on the farms and ranches established in what was once their fifty-mile radius hunting territory. However, the killing of a single cow was more then the ranchers and farmers would brook. The men had a skewed vision of wolves; they thought of them as mindless killers and were afraid the wolves would decimate their livestock in a matter of days. Actually, wolves only killed what they needed to survive and it was rare that a lone wolf, let alone a pack, would kill for the sheer pleasure of killing. It was, in all actuality, man who killed without thought of how they were affecting the balance of nature.

None-the-less, the homesteaders had hired a bounty hunter, Randall Hutchins, to eliminate the pack of “rogues”. Moreover, he did so with the efficiency of the seasoned hunter that he was, killing eight of the nine wolves, which included Grendahl. Now, it was down to Sitka and she was proving to be a dynamic challenge to Randall. The she-wolf had managed to evade every tactic he used. From the poisoned bait, to the traps and his shooting abilities, Sitka escaped them all; she had the innate sense to dodge every bullet fired at her. Randall was now obsessed with the hunt for this wily adversary and he tracked her relentlessly. The hunt was taking the two further and further into a remote mountain range. For three days and two long winter nights, man and beast would soon find themselves at the mercy of the elements.

Sitka was already beginning to feel the ravages of her predicament. Hunger and the lack of rest were sapping her of the strength she needed to wade through the three feet of snow to escape Randall. She was able to slake her thirst with occasional mouthfuls of snow, but she risked lowering her core body temperature if she over did it. That could be deadly to her and the unborn pups. It was only by chance that she came across a cougar’s fresh kill of a yearling mule deer. Apparently, the large cat was unable to drag the carcass away in the deep snow and attempted to bury it. Sitka was able to tear away a large piece of a haunch before the angry yowl of the cougar sent her off at a run. A confrontation would serve no purpose and would only be another risk for Sitka.

Randall was fairing only slightly better than Sitka. His rations of jerky, hardtack and water were dwindling. His only redeeming feature was the snowshoes that made his progress through the deepening snow easier, but he still needed sleep. Sleep could be a dangerous thing in snowstorms. A man could freeze to death and never know he was once sleep overcame him. He stopped in his tracks when he heard the cougar’s yowl echo in the snow stilled air. It was difficult to judge how far away the cat was, but Randall was not going to take a chance. Unslinging his rifle, he flicked the safety off and chambered a round. He did not know what had set the cougar off, but he had an idea that it was his prey’s doing. With his pulse racing from the adrenaline rush, he hurried onward, certain now that he was closing in on the she-wolf.

The third night was falling into a black and white tapestry, interspersed with the dark green of coniferous trees. Both man and beast were exhausted with the on-going hunt as they came into the rugged terrain that herald the mountain range. Randall was the first to call the chase off for the night, he could go on no longer. He needed rest and it would be folly to attempt to maneuver through the snow-covered detritus. The last thing Randall needed was to break a leg so far away from any civilization or assistance.

Randall cleared an area of ground of snow before pulling twigs and small bits of branches from within the deep confines of his heavy wool coat. He knew he would eventually have to start a fire and had been gathering wood along the way. Stowing them in his coat assured him that they would be dry by the time he needed them. With the aid of piled snow acting like a windbreak, he was able to start a small fire. He added some of the scrub brush he found in the near vicinity. The damp wood crackled and popped, but soon succumbed to the hungry fire.

Sitka, in the meantime, had found sanctuary in a shallow cave on the leeward side of the pass. She had only been asleep a few minutes when her keen nose caught a whiff of smoke. Silently, she left the protection of the cave and followed the smoke scent. From an outcropping above Randall’s camp, she was able to watch the man who sought her out. Randall hunched over next to his blazing but small fire. His head nodded as sleep swiftly overcame him.

Sitka could have easily attacked him, ripped his throat out and put an end to the life of the hunter. Something inside this wild beast prevented her from doing so. Her primal instincts were to kill only what she needed to survive and men had not yet entered into that long-standing equation. Instead, she stepped into the dim light of the fire, a whine emitted from deep within her chest. It was loud enough to make Randall jump, coming wide-awake and send him scrambling for his rifle. He brought it up and scanned along the overhang. Finding Sitka, he centered the bead on the chest of the she-wolf. Sitka stood still, but whined again. It was at that point that it occurred to Randall the she-wolf could have over powered him, but had not and this bothered him.

He noticed the bulge of her flanks that bespoke of her pregnancy and knew then that she was only trying to survive. What right did he have to take that away from her? He knew in his heart that she and her pack only killed in their instincts to survive. The farmers and ranchers had taken their survival away when they moved in. They killed the game animals, all the wolves had to them for sustenance, to stock their larders and for the hides until what was left of the herd animals had moved to other, safer grazing areas.

The man lowered the rifle, compassion suddenly coming over him in a wash of warmth for this beautiful beast standing above him. For Randall, it was the large bounty and his greediness that had made him more of a ruthless killer than the wolves. Compassion soon turned to bitter shame and guilt with this realization.

Wiping away the tears that were already starting to freeze in his grizzled beard, the humbled man reached into his rucksack and drew out the last of the jerky. He chewed on one small piece as he stood up and tossed the remainder up to the wolf.

Sitka flinched, but still did nothing more than to sniff at the dried beef. Her hunger finally overwhelmed her and she quickly chewed down the jerky. Licking her chops, she once more looked down upon the man. For several moments, man and beast communed, before Sitka turned with a yip and disappeared beyond the fire’s glow.

Randall added more of the scrub branches he had found to his fire. This built up the blaze enough for it to last throughout the night. In the morning, he would head back home. He would tell the farmers and ranchers he had killed the entire pack, collect his bounty and never hunt again.

When morning arrived, he threw snow on the ebbing fire, slung his rucksack over his shoulder, cradled his rifle in his arms and began to retrace his steps. His snowshoes found easy purchase in the snow.

From behind him came the haunting howl of Sitka. Randall paused and looked back.

“Good-bye old girl, I hope you can rebuild what I so thoughtlessly destroyed. Godspeed,” he spoke out-loud, then resumed his trek homeward.

Sitka would travel to the far side of the mountain pass. It would be there that she would have her pups and, eventually team up with a lone male wolf and live out her life as, once again, alpha female in the pack.