Wolfsong

          Book 1: Moonlight

                    Prologue

        The night was cool, with a just a small hint of rain floating on the breeze.                                                                                                                                   The moon was full, and not a single star was missing from the dark blue sky. Not even so much as a thin cloud shielded the dark and wild sky from view.                                                                                                                          Far below the stars, a small clearing lay in the middle of the great Alaskan forest. And in that clearing, a dark shadow shifted suddenly. It was the only movement that could be seen.                                                             A large roan wolf was sitting just outside a small cave in that clearing, waiting anxiously, twitching and jumping at the slightest sounds.                                                                                                                                        He knew that his mate, Leaf, the alpha female of the Blue River pack, would be giving birth soon. She had been in the den all night, and Oak was beginning to wonder if something had gone wrong.                                                                                                             The whole pack was anticipating this birth. There had been no pups for months, and the pack was smaller than it ever had been before. Though there weren’t many other packs in that area, Oak knew that a small pack couldn’t survive very long, especially with the fact that winter was approaching. Already, parts of the camp were scattered with orange and red leaves that had fallen from the trees above.                                            Oak’s ear twitched involuntarily. Patience does not come easily for alphas, even experienced ones.                                                                              The worried wolf tried to wait, but he didn’t know how much longer he could sit there, motionless, just waiting for something to happen. It wasn’t natural for an alpha of his experience…                                                He thought about just heading into the cave uninvited.

No, he thought, Leaf told me to stay out here and wait. She said something about “not being able to concentrate”. And because it was her first litter, she would need to concentrate a lot.                                         He resisted the urge. But how much longer could he sit there?                       Just as he was about to give up and go to one of the other dens to go to sleep, there was a cry from the cave.                                                                                                                                Oak pricked his ears. What was going onin there?                                   Frantic with worry, he nervously got to his paws and raced inside, quite scared by now.                                                                                                And then, just in the entrance to the cave, he stopped.                                                                                                     There before him, curled up on a bed of leaves, lay Leaf, barely visible through the darkness of the night, her breathing steady and her eyes closed. She was as still as a rock and for one horrible moment Oak thought she was dead. But then she moved, and he decided that everything was going well after all.