Injured

Willow stood at the edge of her garden, staring at the new arrival. Rocky stood behind her, clutching her leg. While he had promised that he and his clan would not allow any harm to come to Will while she lived in Hidden Shores, she really couldn’t blame him for hiding right now. Even with a clearly injured leg, the wolf standing where the back of the garden met the tree line was still very large and very scary.

“Um, hi. Do you need help?” Willow asked. “What am I saying, of course you need help. Um, just don’t uh, attack me or my friend here, okay?”

The wolf tilted its head, tongue lolling out in the canid version of a laugh. Will couldn’t help but smile in return. When had she become so certain that animals could understand what she was saying? Oh, yeah, probably right after Rocky showed up in her kitchen and answered her.

“Okay, fine. I’ll help you,” she told the wolf.

“What are you doing?” Rocky hissed in a panicked whisper.

“I’m trying to help a wounded visitor,” Will responded, never taking her eyes off the large, gray wolf.

“Can you get over the fence?” she asked the wolf.

In response, the wolf sprang off its back legs, and touching the good front leg on top of one of the posts for balance, vaulted over the fence. It landed delicately among her newly sprouted vegetables and picked its way over to where Will stood with Rocky still clinging to her leg.

“Dude. This is so not a good idea,” Rocky muttered, letting go of her pants and shuffling backwards.

The wolf cocked its head sideways at the raccoon before turning its eyes back to Will and nodding.

Will returned the nod and headed back to the house. Rocky scampered ahead of her and dashed through the doggy door she’d installed in the kitchen door. Will figured he was heading upstairs to hide under her bed. She trotted up the steps to the back porch and opened the kitchen door. The wolf limped up behind her, faltering a bit on the steps.

“Stay here for a second,” Willow said to the wolf. She dashed into the living room and grabbed her big fuzzy blanket off the back of the sofa. Laying the blanket on the kitchen floor, she gestured to the wolf.

“Lie down here so I can get a look at that injured leg,” she said.

Willow settled herself on the floor next to the wolf. She gently ran her hand down the injured leg, feeling for anything out of place. The wolf growled quietly when she touched a spot just above the foot. The fur was sticky and felt stiff. When she pulled her hand away, a faint red sheen showed on the pads of her fingers.

“Okay. I know that hurts, but if you let me check it out, I’ll have a better idea of what’s wrong. I’m assuming you don’t want me taking you to a regular vet? No, that’s not really a good idea… how do I explain I have a wolf?” she murmured to herself.

“Trap,” the wolf growled.

Willow looked at it in surprise. “Well, that changes everything! Are you a shifter or are you like Rocky and a normal wolf who can talk?”

“Wolf, not raccoon,” the wolf said.

“I know. I meant that you can talk. What’s your name?” Willow replied.

“Myst,” the wolf said with another low growl.

“Okay, okay. Let me just get the blood cleaned off, and we can see how bad this is.” She looked into the pain-filled yellow eyes. “Remember, you promised not to bite me.”

Myst bowed her head. “I remember.”

Biting her lip, Willow began to gently clean the wound.

******

This week I spaced on sending in a prompt, so I grabbed one of the spares: This changes everything! I went back to the adventures of Willow Delaney and her new home in the apparently magic-filled town of Hidden Shores. This is just a snippet of something… I’m not exactly sure what. As I try to figure that out, you should mosey on over to More Odds Than Ends and see what the others have come up with for their prompt challenges.