Chapter 41

As she rejoined with her two lookouts, she quickly gave their head a scratch as thanks for the help they gave. As they left the backyard and continued to follow the highway, Natalie could not help but smile as Bryden tried to act serious and concentrated in front of her while his tail moved a mile a minute. Apparently he really enjoyed either the feeling of attention or the feeling of the scratches so much that he could not stop his true feelings coming through. As they left Leavitt, the road went northeast. However, they never deviated from the path it led them on, as just after they had departed the hamlet did they come across a road sign. On it had three different towns and how far it was to them. Cardston was sitting at and even ten kilometers away, while Magrath was fifty three and Lethbridge was eighty five.

Passing the info that they were on the right track and how far away they were proved to be more trouble than it was worth. First the wolves asked how she knew this. Then they questioned what a kilometer even was. The entire conversation spiraled out of control, causing Nat to spend a solid half hour while they were walking trying to explain how long a meter was and why it was. Fun fact, she had no idea why, but that answer did not fly with the wolves and sounded like she was evading the question. So to appease the curiosity of every wolf except Kali, as she told her that she believed that Nat did not actually know, Natalie made up a story. All about a guy who was named Meter, and how his speech impediment made everyone think that a certain distance was a kilo instead of colossal. The misunderstanding then became fact and it became an almost universal form of measurement.

Another half hour passed while they traveled, with Nat having to come up with another fake history lesson. The tale of Foote and his son Inch and how this second misunderstanding was seen by some as a predominant unit of measurement was taken as yet another hard truth by most of the canines. How they were in a family of midgets, and that they always described things according to their height. Kali was doing her best to hold back laughing, and when Maia came over to check if she was okay, was joined. Silently Kali filled her in that all of it was made up because of Bryden's stupidity, and Maia fought to hold back her laughter so that the other wolves would not suspect anything. They just sat together and looked like they were shaking for some reason, but none of the others noticed. Even the pups were too enthralled with the epic tales that Natalie was telling them, excited to be learning more and more. Natalie was doing her best to hold her laughter back with them, the feeling the two gave off was infectious and great.

The rest of their travels passed smoothly. The pair of mothers finally lost it near the end of the story of Foote, and told everyone in between their laughter that it was all made up. That because they did not believe that Nat could not know something, that they pressed her for an answer. They immediately felt foolish, until Shadow started to laugh himself. The chain reactions of laughter filled the Soulscape and even left the mouths of the three travelling. By this point, the coyotes had been up for a little while already and were laughing with them. The shepherd however was so asleep that not even a foghorn could rouse him from his sleep. Despite the ruckus of the laughter and howls that sounded out from the nearby canines, not one move aside from the steady breathing of sleep came from the dog. Nat did not expect much from him for the next while. It normally took a minimum of steady eating and taking care of oneself to recover from the state of starvation he was in.

Thinking back to how she found him in that garage, Natalie regained a little fury and anger. The malnourishment and starvation that he had gone through could not have been from just the past five days. It would have to have taken around twice that long to be at the point it was at. Someone had locked that dog in the garage and starved it, for most likely some stupid and inane reason. She hoped she ran into the fucks who mistreated him. Not to give him the chance to go back to them, but so she could beat the ever loving crap out of the sycophants who could do that to such a cute and fluffy dog. It was funny to Natalie, she could see people dead in the dozens, people who she had lived beside for three years, and not be angry. But as soon as one dog that she had never met before was mistreated, immediately rage filled her entire being.

Feeling a massive font of anger coming from behind him, Bryden turned around to find out what it was. What he found was that it was all coming off of Nat. When asked what was wrong, she unloaded how she felt, and shared it with all of the mature canines. The pups were still young and did not need to hear her anger or her ferocity at this point. The wolves listened to her ranting with rapt attention, and slowly started to adopt similar feelings. Someone had done this, and the victim of all of this was now part of their pack. As her ranting came to an end and Cardston came into view, all of the canines agreed with her. Should they ever meet this fucking prick who would do such a thing to a family member, all bets were off. They agreed to make sure that he would suffer and be in pain, forever regretting that he had crossed this pack full of predators.

Huge thanks to my Elder Wolves Jake, Viktor, Nikolas, Saganatsu, Lachlan, Coen, Adam, John, and Kevin for supporting me and my writing! Remember that I keep Patreon ten chapters ahead at all times. Our next goal on Patreon will be getting up to 25 patrons, which I will then open up an official discord for everyone to come and discuss the story in and hang out!