"Song of the Wolf" by Mikaela Ellwood
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"Song of the Wolf" by Mikaela Ellwood
The following story has been selected as a featured runner-up in our 2015 short story contest (Contest Theme - "The Self-Destructiveness of Vengeance and Hate")
"Song of the Wolf" by Mikaela Ellwood
Way out on the edge of everything, where no creature should have been able to survive, there lived a wolf. He walked alone on the phosphorescent waters, seeing no one, revelling in his solitude. Here he could howl at the sky without interruption, could walk where he chose, could do what he liked. He believed he had found true independence, true freedom, true escape. But it was not so.
In the corner of the universe, there was no night and no day. Twilight stretched to eternity and the waters sparkled and glittered beneath his feet. He walked on and on, never sinking, never eating, never feeling. His shaggy coat was wet with the ever-falling dew, his claws left indents on the gluggy, solid phosphorescence and he howled at the moon.
“A-woooooooooooooooo!” he cried again and again. But no one answered . Only the sound of his own question bounced back across the vast, seamless ocean. He sighed again, neither sad nor happy, a memory floating on the outskirts of his brain. He wandered on.
Oneday, if you can call it a day, he stopped puzzled. There was an unusual taste on the stagnant air. Something sharp and tingly. Something a little like sherbet, a little like licorice, and he was puzzled. In his freedom, the whole time he had existed on the phosphorescent water he had never seen nor heard another creature. He put the incident from his mind and wandered on. There was no explanation. It was probably a taste of sea-salt blown from far away.
There was a shape on the water ahead of him. It made slight shadows in the dusky light, and intrigued him. He wandered towards it, not in a hurry. A rose. A wind-blown rose with a few faded petals strewn behind it. The wolf looked up in surprise, his eyes searching the horizon for the creature who had dropped the rose. And as he looked a memory rose up inside him. A squashed, beaten, terrifying memory which could no longer be ignored.
He saw a fire, bright orange, red, tongues of yellow blazing before his eyes. A fire of vengeance. A fire of destruction. And a sound, a high piercing shriek and the guttering cry of a child. Why had he allowed himself to turn from the soft grey eyes, the wide, trusting eyes, the slender hand with it's golden ring? Why had he listened to the darkness he wished to hear? Why had he not put his family first? His fur was singed, his eyes reflected his fear of the fire, the hatred infused in the blaze and the utter hopelessness in which he was drowning. He left. He turned his back on those he loved. He wept as he ran, the burn of coals under his paws, but he could not go back. He could not see what he had done.
Fear and hatred. The emotions of an animal. So he had run away from his feelings hardly noticing as the once powerful creature became a twisted and blackened shell. Hardly caring as he punished himself, hated himself, hurt himself, until he reached the wastelands on the boundaries of the universe where the phosphorescence was enough to hold up a shrunken soul, the shadow of a wolf he had become. But it was alright. This was how it should be. He had done the unthinkable, he had listened to his darkness and he had to pay. This was meant to happen.
A musical, magical sound caught the outer edge of his hearing. A tinkling sound, like the laugh of a young and innocent creature. He thought he recognised it. And there was a memory of a child in floating clothes dancing on a lawn like a fairy and a woman with grey eyes on the deck chair with a book in her hand. He turned. And there behind him, not too far in the distance, nudging aside the sparkling phosphorescence with its prow, was a boat. A golden bubble of curiosity and hope rose inside the blackness. The wolf moved towards the ship with its large white sails, back the way he had come.
It was a mystery to him why that boat was here. It was far too light, moved far too quickly and seemed to contain a brightness unparalleled in the wastelands at the edge of the universe. The people could not then be searching as he was for the emptiness and freedom of silence – then why were they here? The wolf's curiosity grew and grew until he broke into a loping run, his footprints pressing through the phosphorescence to the swirling dark waters beneath.
The rose. Roses were her favourite flowers. She used to pick them by hand, pricking her little fingers, but she didn't feel it. She only wanted to sit and look at them in their ceramic vase, studying their detail, learning their secrets as her mother bandaged her bleeding hands. The child. The child with sparkling blue eyes. The sound of pealing laughter broke from the boat again and the wolf could now distinguish a small figure leaning over the prow and the slender form of a woman behind it.
…... Alive?......
Did he dream?
How could it be so? Why had they come?
Unless...
He stopped. The happiness on the verge of taking over his soul died and was replaced by utter sorrow.
Unless they were ghosts, come to haunt him and plague him with what he had done. He wished to sink gently through the phosphorescence down into the swirling dark water.
It could not be true.
But the sorrow.... he felt it. The near elation of a few moments before, he had felt that. The curiosity was real, the emotions were back, he had allowed himself to feel again. The boat and its occupants were not come like ashes to taunt him. They were come to heal. To forgive. To offer him back his life.
As he realised this, he felt his heart shift and his vision change. Somehow his world began to feel more real. He could feel the cool of the dark water on his paws and the gluggy phosphorescence between his toes in more detail than he ever had before. His sharp nose began to detect hints of cigarette smoke and rain, and the air began to taste of coffee. It felt new and electric, but at the same time, so familiar, as if it always had this sensation, but he had never noticed. All at once the water nearby began to shimmer and ripple and a building rose out of it like a volcano. It shed its glittery phosphorescence off its sides in shards like ice, a giant's finger jabbing into the twilit sky. And there were more – seven storey towers, post offices, cafes, skyscrapers, apartments. All around the wolf the city was coming to life. There was a man on a park bench reading a newspaper, shopping women, a celebrating family. There were trees on the corners, traffic lights and rubbish in the hedges. There were kids on all manner of vehicles – bikes, scooters, rollerblades. There were pigeons by the dozen, bobbing their speckled heads and all at once the wolf was surrounded by the glorious mess of life.
The slender woman and the child with sparkling eyes grinned at him, calling him forward, beckoning him to join them. He looked up, a new expression on his face and knew that they had come to bring him back from the twilit land in their little boat with its large white sails. To rescue him from the corner of the universe, from the edge of everything, from his numb freedom so that he could once again be truly happy.
"Song of the Wolf" by Mikaela Ellwood
Way out on the edge of everything, where no creature should have been able to survive, there lived a wolf. He walked alone on the phosphorescent waters, seeing no one, revelling in his solitude. Here he could howl at the sky without interruption, could walk where he chose, could do what he liked. He believed he had found true independence, true freedom, true escape. But it was not so.
In the corner of the universe, there was no night and no day. Twilight stretched to eternity and the waters sparkled and glittered beneath his feet. He walked on and on, never sinking, never eating, never feeling. His shaggy coat was wet with the ever-falling dew, his claws left indents on the gluggy, solid phosphorescence and he howled at the moon.
“A-woooooooooooooooo!” he cried again and again. But no one answered . Only the sound of his own question bounced back across the vast, seamless ocean. He sighed again, neither sad nor happy, a memory floating on the outskirts of his brain. He wandered on.
Oneday, if you can call it a day, he stopped puzzled. There was an unusual taste on the stagnant air. Something sharp and tingly. Something a little like sherbet, a little like licorice, and he was puzzled. In his freedom, the whole time he had existed on the phosphorescent water he had never seen nor heard another creature. He put the incident from his mind and wandered on. There was no explanation. It was probably a taste of sea-salt blown from far away.
There was a shape on the water ahead of him. It made slight shadows in the dusky light, and intrigued him. He wandered towards it, not in a hurry. A rose. A wind-blown rose with a few faded petals strewn behind it. The wolf looked up in surprise, his eyes searching the horizon for the creature who had dropped the rose. And as he looked a memory rose up inside him. A squashed, beaten, terrifying memory which could no longer be ignored.
He saw a fire, bright orange, red, tongues of yellow blazing before his eyes. A fire of vengeance. A fire of destruction. And a sound, a high piercing shriek and the guttering cry of a child. Why had he allowed himself to turn from the soft grey eyes, the wide, trusting eyes, the slender hand with it's golden ring? Why had he listened to the darkness he wished to hear? Why had he not put his family first? His fur was singed, his eyes reflected his fear of the fire, the hatred infused in the blaze and the utter hopelessness in which he was drowning. He left. He turned his back on those he loved. He wept as he ran, the burn of coals under his paws, but he could not go back. He could not see what he had done.
Fear and hatred. The emotions of an animal. So he had run away from his feelings hardly noticing as the once powerful creature became a twisted and blackened shell. Hardly caring as he punished himself, hated himself, hurt himself, until he reached the wastelands on the boundaries of the universe where the phosphorescence was enough to hold up a shrunken soul, the shadow of a wolf he had become. But it was alright. This was how it should be. He had done the unthinkable, he had listened to his darkness and he had to pay. This was meant to happen.
A musical, magical sound caught the outer edge of his hearing. A tinkling sound, like the laugh of a young and innocent creature. He thought he recognised it. And there was a memory of a child in floating clothes dancing on a lawn like a fairy and a woman with grey eyes on the deck chair with a book in her hand. He turned. And there behind him, not too far in the distance, nudging aside the sparkling phosphorescence with its prow, was a boat. A golden bubble of curiosity and hope rose inside the blackness. The wolf moved towards the ship with its large white sails, back the way he had come.
It was a mystery to him why that boat was here. It was far too light, moved far too quickly and seemed to contain a brightness unparalleled in the wastelands at the edge of the universe. The people could not then be searching as he was for the emptiness and freedom of silence – then why were they here? The wolf's curiosity grew and grew until he broke into a loping run, his footprints pressing through the phosphorescence to the swirling dark waters beneath.
The rose. Roses were her favourite flowers. She used to pick them by hand, pricking her little fingers, but she didn't feel it. She only wanted to sit and look at them in their ceramic vase, studying their detail, learning their secrets as her mother bandaged her bleeding hands. The child. The child with sparkling blue eyes. The sound of pealing laughter broke from the boat again and the wolf could now distinguish a small figure leaning over the prow and the slender form of a woman behind it.
…... Alive?......
Did he dream?
How could it be so? Why had they come?
Unless...
He stopped. The happiness on the verge of taking over his soul died and was replaced by utter sorrow.
Unless they were ghosts, come to haunt him and plague him with what he had done. He wished to sink gently through the phosphorescence down into the swirling dark water.
It could not be true.
But the sorrow.... he felt it. The near elation of a few moments before, he had felt that. The curiosity was real, the emotions were back, he had allowed himself to feel again. The boat and its occupants were not come like ashes to taunt him. They were come to heal. To forgive. To offer him back his life.
As he realised this, he felt his heart shift and his vision change. Somehow his world began to feel more real. He could feel the cool of the dark water on his paws and the gluggy phosphorescence between his toes in more detail than he ever had before. His sharp nose began to detect hints of cigarette smoke and rain, and the air began to taste of coffee. It felt new and electric, but at the same time, so familiar, as if it always had this sensation, but he had never noticed. All at once the water nearby began to shimmer and ripple and a building rose out of it like a volcano. It shed its glittery phosphorescence off its sides in shards like ice, a giant's finger jabbing into the twilit sky. And there were more – seven storey towers, post offices, cafes, skyscrapers, apartments. All around the wolf the city was coming to life. There was a man on a park bench reading a newspaper, shopping women, a celebrating family. There were trees on the corners, traffic lights and rubbish in the hedges. There were kids on all manner of vehicles – bikes, scooters, rollerblades. There were pigeons by the dozen, bobbing their speckled heads and all at once the wolf was surrounded by the glorious mess of life.
The slender woman and the child with sparkling eyes grinned at him, calling him forward, beckoning him to join them. He looked up, a new expression on his face and knew that they had come to bring him back from the twilit land in their little boat with its large white sails. To rescue him from the corner of the universe, from the edge of everything, from his numb freedom so that he could once again be truly happy.
