For anyone who read Fateful Hunt (yeah, yeah, probably no one cause it was damn long and m/f), you’ll recognize the two names mentioned below in this letter. I wrote Fateful Hunt for fun back when I was knee-deep in editing The Wilds Duology. That story was about the day when De’vii’s parents first met, De’vii being one of the two leads in my upcoming novel Haunt of the Wilds.

So for E in my A-Z Challenge, I give you Echoes from the Past, a letter from De’vii’s dam to his sire, sent a long time before the duology begins.

ECHOES FROM THE PAST

Me’nor,

Remember last time we hunted in the Braken? When you became angry all over again because I started without you? I remember. My pack showed yours up in that hunt and you complained like the city dog you are, whining and carrying on about rules. Ha! As if the wilds respect your pitiful rules.

Remember afterward, when you climbed on top of me because you had something to prove? I was more than accommodating. Aren’t I always? Any wild dog would be happy to have my time and attention. As a tame creature, you should be slobbering your thankfulness.

And then! You had the gall to leave me wanting, thinking it hilarious to rut and run like the incapable dog’s method of revenge. I have never been so disappointed in you.

That was why I didn’t return the last few times we agreed. I sent Yal later to see if you came into the Braken for me, and you had, your scent and your pack’s scent spread all across the Braken as if searching for me. Yes, I found your little presents and attempts at apologies. Dark’s honest truth, I was surprised you kept coming after I didn’t show. Then I remembered how much of a stickler you are on your promises.

I admit…your persistence enthralled me. No wild dog has ever remained so interested even after my apathy has been made known.

I made the decision then to cease my fury over your cruelness, deciding I would meet you once more on the Braken to give us another chance. But directly afterward, I found myself in a position to make a different sort of choice. This one wasn’t so easy. I had family insisting on one thing, my pack insisting on another and my own mind torn over the subject because I didn’t know whether your dislike of all things wild would keep you from understanding.

That was last skyclad.

I planned on meeting you today instead of writing this letter, but something came up so I’m sending Yal with this note instead. I want you to know that what I referred to will always take precedence over you because I trust you and your pack to be able to take care of yourselves—though that might be overestimating your abilities since half your pack are still pups. And you can tell Nat and Alo I said that.

Regardless, the choice I made last skyclad is an overreaching one that will effect that future you talked about. The future you actually believed in when I didn’t, the reason you still keep to that promise you made me.

So before I make the run into the Braken to see you again, I have to ask, Me’nor, do you think you can handle being the sire to a half-wild child? Or should your pup never set foot in the Braken?

-Da’lil