Haja’s mother let out a long piercing cry as the wolves came into view. Their large, fatal canines jutted from their black, hungry lips, ready to sink into the soft flesh of their victims. The Alpha, tall and mighty, was first, his fur silver and ominously glowing in the harsh winter moonlight. His pack followed silently, obedient and hungry; some wolves’ thick rib bones stuck out horribly from the plush fur.
Haja, young and oblivious to the imminent danger, raised her chubby hands over her red, numb ears and frowned in protest at the noise. Her mother, called Naem, stopped her violent scream at once, looking down at her small daughter. Her eyes glazed over instinctively with calm, doing anything to protect her only daughter from the terror of the wild beasts attacking the village. No, her daughter must live. Naem jerked her head about, searching for her sons, Allo and Mehn. She spotted them with their father, searching through a disheveled pile of spears and bows and arrows.
“Sons!” She called out, desperation and determination both weaving through her melodic low voice, “There is no time for that. You know there is nothing you can do. Nothing except to save your sister”
Confusion clouded over the young men’s faces, but they knew there was no time to do much explaining. They dropped the spearheads they were holding and ran over to their mother and sister, who were standing in front of the feeble shelter they called home.
“You must take furs. Allo run and get as many as will fit in your pack.”
The boy ran into the shelter and started packing immediately, cramming furs into his large back pack.
“And Mehn, you pack some food and your ice tools. Anything you might need. Hurry!”
The boys’ hands were clumsy with cold, hurry, and fear, but they did as their fierce-eyed mother instructed. They paused for a millisecond when they had finally finished cramming all they could into their packs. Their identical gleaming black eyes met, reading the mirrored fright in each other’s. But there was something else there, too. It was the need to survive, the strong, overpowering, demanding need that coursed through them both, through all humans on this earth. It pounded through the body, surfing down the bloodstreams, tossed about by the triumphant beating of the heart.
Mehn and Allo were pulled out of their stupor by the spine-chilling call of the wolves, as they reached the bottom of the rocky mountain side, ready to prey on the villagers.
“Hurry, sons!” Naem cried desperately, clutching her Haja close.
They rose nimbly and stood before the woman, who was now shaking in anger at the beasts who threatened to take away her life, her children’s lives.
“Take Haja. Run to the old cave that lies above the fishing holes. Your father has taught you how to make a wall of ice, to shelter yourself in case of blizzard. Do this, hide yourselves.”
Then, pulling them close to her warm body for the last time on this earth, she whispered “Save yourselves. Save Haja.”
Pregnant tears fell from her eyes and froze to her eyelashes and cheeks as she watched her children run into the frosty night.
The wolves came then. And as they sunk their terrible teeth into the flesh of Naem, her only solace, her only hope was that her children would live on.
Somewhere in the freezing darkness, a toddler cried, mourning her mother’s death, rejoicing of her own life.