HUNTED HOME
Chapter One
Hated
Blood dripped out of Dingo’s side, staining his brown fur crimson as it spilled onto the sand beneath him. Lying on the ground panting, he tried not to look up to see his attackers, knowing the anguish it would bring, but he couldn’t block out their cruel jeers: two low growls and one hyena-like laugh.
“What’s the matter, Dingo? Too scared to fight back?” a low, gruff voice taunted. Dingo knew that voice well; it belonged to Bone. “That’s right—whimper on the ground, freak.”
He winced and gritted his teeth to stop from howling in pain when something stung the numerous wounds on his side. He knew one of the dingoes must have kicked sand into his wounds. A moment later, the voice of Rock revealed it was he who had done it. “Does it hurt, Dingo? You deserve that and worse.”
“Pathetic,” Bone growled. This time Dingo did let out a loud howl as strong fangs tore into his shoulder. He shuddered in disgust when he felt the sticky blood flow down his leg and seep into his fur.
“You’re such a loser, Dingo!” another voice chortled, forcing Dingo to squeeze his eyes shut tighter against the rush of pain. The voice belonged to Rip, but hard as he tried, Dingo could never hate him the way he hated Bone and Rock.
“Open your eyes.” Bone’s dangerous growl sent shivers down his spine as he turned away from him, still with his eyes shut. He felt as if he was on fire from the burning anguish coursing through him after what Bone, Rock, and Rip had done to him.
Gasping, he finally dared to open his eyes, their light brown depths darkened with sadness. His breath caught in horror at the sight of Bone’s sadistic, sneering face staring down at him. The piercing desert sunlight made Bone’s amber eyes glint with bloodlust and his dark brown, almost black fur stood out against the endless yellow brown sand all around them. The muscles in his shoulders made him look like a lethal weapon as his tail flicked joyfully back and forth. Bone loved Dingo’s pain.
“Had enough, Dingo?” he snarled quietly.
Dingo turned his light brown eyes to him with a pleading expression. “Bone, enough. Just stop this!”
But a second later, he let out a howl of pain when Bone clawed him across his face. His dark, quiet laughter floated over to Dingo’s bloody ears as Dingo fought to stop tears from pricking his eyes. Dingoes weren’t supposed to cry.
“Leave me alone,” he growled through gritted teeth.
Bone just laughed as another dingo stepped forward to stand beside him. The other dingo, Rock, with his long, dusty brown fur and dark brown eyes, smirked down at him like Bone. Dingo felt his body tense with anger and sadness; it was one thing for Bone, his own brother, to torture him, but did he have to get his friend in on it, too? He looked up at his brother, but Bone’s eyes glinted dangerously, as if to warn him against protesting. And of course he didn’t even as a third dingo named Rip crept forward to stand on Bone’s left.
Dingo turned to look at his other brother, Rip, with sad eyes. Rip carefully avoided his gaze. He was grinning like the other two, but his yellow eyes looked very uneasy. Rip wasn’t evil; he just followed Bone’s evil crowd. Dingo could never hate him for that, considering Bone sometimes treated his followers just as bad as his enemies. Rip’s unkempt, reddish fur was standing a bit on end, an obvious sign of his unease.
“Rip,” Dingo sighed, “why are you doing this?”
His brother’s yellow eyes were suddenly flaming. “Shut up! You deserve it.”
“Well said, Rip,” Bone chuckled. “You and Rock can go back to camp now, though. I’ll finish up here.”
Dingo felt the urge to beg them not to leave him alone with Bone, especially Rip, but he didn’t dare. Rip was rather quick to leave while Rock just shrugged and turned around to lumber apathetical-ly back to camp. Dingo cast a glance back at his lacerated body and could barely make out the shaggy, brown fur beneath the blood. His scruffy tail flicked back and forth in distress as he looked back up at Bone, who was sneering at him with an evil glint in his eyes.
“Bone,” he said hoarsely, “you’ve already done enough. Let’s just go back to camp.”
He laughed. “No, I don’t think so.”
Dingo sighed, wanting to bury his face in the sand. “Why do you do this to me?”
That was probably a dumb question; Bone did it because he hated Dingo and because he could get away with it. Dingo was hated by the other evil dingoes in his pack, after all, so they wouldn’t punish Bone if he attacked him.
“Why do you and the others hate me so much?” Dingo asked another pointless question, not really expecting an answer.
Bone just shook his head and as Dingo had anticipated offered no real response. “We hate you because you’re weak, because you don’t fight,” he growled. He chuckled darkly. “You are so pathetic, Dingo. You wouldn’t even defend yourself.”
“What exactly was I supposed to do? There were three of you!” Dingo shouted, his temper rising as it always did when he was alone with his oldest brother.
“Fight back,” Bone replied.
“Oh, and then what? You’d just use that as an excuse to kill me?”
“That’s the plan.” When Dingo growled furi-ously, Bone just laughed. “You know I’m out to get you, Dingo, and that’s ruining your life.”
Dingo looked away.
“Well?” Bone prompted. “Isn’t it?”
“My life’s already been ruined, Bone,” Dingo muttered, his gaze automatically turning to the stars twinkling above them in the night sky. As his thoughts turned again to his sister an anguish far stronger than that he would ever feel from anything Bone and his minions did to him burned through his body. He nearly let out a howl and just barely managed to hold it in as fierce grief, sorrow, and guilt clouded his mind.
He suddenly noticed the satisfied look on Bone’s face as his brother realized what he must be thinking about; Bone knew that his sister’s fate had hurt him most of all.
Dingo felt sick. “You don’t even care about what happened to Claw.”
Bone shrugged. “I never have. I got over her death like everyone else, when you should have.”
“She was all I had.”
Bone’s eyes gleamed. “I know.” He glanced behind him. “I’m going back to camp now and you can crawl back, too, or just lay out here and die; I don’t really care which. If you do come back, try to wash the blood off of you first so the rest of us back at camp don’t have to look at it.”
As Bone turned to walk away, Dingo gritted his teeth. “‘Wash the blood off…’” He growled furiously to himself and dug his claws into the sand, trying to ease his fury. Struggling to his paws, he looked out at the desert around him that was his home, his ears drooping with misery. He didn’t want to go back to the dingo camp, but that would just mean Bone had won. Sighing, he started forward with his head down and his tail dragging, trying to ignore the pain shooting up his legs and down his spine every time he put a paw down.
It hurt, but Dingo was used to Bone’s torture by that point in his life; his older brother had hated him since they were pups. He wasn’t the only one either. Dingo had tried not to let it get to him and had even tried to get along with Bone at first, but he had found out long ago that that was an impossibility.
He looked ahead and unconsciously slowed down when he saw the dingo camp, his eyes narrowing with defeat. He really didn’t want to go in there and put up with the other dingoes’ taunting, but he had no choice.
The entrance to the dingoes’ camp was marked by two piles of bones left over from the prey they hunted. The sandy ground dipped down into a sort of valley surrounded by sandy hills. On the side of each hill was a dark, rocky den partially hidden from view by the sand covering it. All the dens were formed within the larger surrounding sand dunes, but the two largest dens sat at the back of the valley. There was a large water trough made of rock in the center of the camp, but otherwise the place was very bare like the desert itself. Around the camp, all of the dingoes were going about their normal activities and Dingo dared to hope that they wouldn’t bother him much.
As he stepped into his camp, Dingo was sure he must look pretty bad. To confirm his thoughts, Tear, his other brother, crawled out of the den, looked at him, and raised his eyebrows. His yellow eyes were filled with a mixture of surprise and perhaps amusement.
“What happened to you?” he asked, proving it to be mostly amusement.
Dingo flattened his ears. “Thanks for the concern, Tear.”
Tear just shrugged with a stupid grin. “Did you get attacked again?”
Dingo sighed and stepped into camp, heading for the den that he shared with two of his three brothers. “Yes, Tear, I got attacked again.”
“By Bone?”
“Of course.”
Tear just chuckled to which Dingo shot him an annoyed glance. “You know, this might be funny to you, but you’re not the one bleeding and suffering. You’re not the one everybody hates.”
“Oh, lighten up,” Tear said. “So everybody hates you. So what? I would have thought you’d be used to it by now.”
Dingo gave him a dry look. “Yes, Tear, I’ve certainly come to love their hatred. It’s simply heartwarming.”
“Well, you know, if you just changed, you wouldn’t be hated.”
“Change into what? A battle-hungry, murder-ous hound? Thanks, but no thanks.”
Tear just rolled his eyes. “Whatever, Dingo. I really don’t know why you haven’t been exiled yet, but if you don’t change, it’ll happen.”
Dingo sighed; everybody was always telling him he’d be exiled, sent away to live on his own far away from the pack. It really didn’t seem so bad unless he counted the fact that most outcasts starved to death and the fact that the pack hunted them down like prey. If he could ignore those little details, it would seem like a vacation. “At this point, Tear, I really wouldn’t mind being an out-cast,” Dingo muttered.
Tear looked at him like he was insane. “If you like dying then go ahead.” He paused and seemed to think for a moment. “Wait, I think I know why you haven’t been exiled yet. You are the son of the Leader of the pack, so it would probably make him look bad if his own son was an outcast. That is, it would make him look even worse since you’ve already embarrassed him by being so weak.”
“Wow, I feel so ashamed,” Dingo muttered sarcastically. He rolled his eyes. “Listen, Tear, it’s been fun discussing how much I’m hated around here, but I just got mauled by our brothers and I’m not in a great mood for talking.”
Tear shrugged. “Fine. I’ll go see what Rip is doing.”
“Probably laughing at me,” Dingo growled as they parted ways.
Dingo thought about simply hiding in his den for the rest of the day, but the sticky blood was starting to make him feel incredibly uncomfortable. With a sigh, he started off toward the water trough in the center of the camp to wash it off. As he walked, he glanced up ahead at the largest den sitting at the very back of the camp on the side of the largest sand dune. The land sloped upward toward the large den, giving it the appearance of towering over everyone else. It was the Leader’s den where Dingo’s father would be resting. Dingo tried not to look that way since he didn’t particularly like his father who had never had anything to do with him.
Right beside the huge den was another large den that was exclusive to another dingo who had control over the pack: the Second in Command. Who happened to be Bone. When Dingo spared a glance in that direction, he saw Bone sitting outside his large den, talking to Rock with his typical cocky grin. Bone was the second most powerful dingo in the pack after their father and he made sure everyone knew that.
Ignoring the sudden dark stare of his older brother, Dingo stalked over to the water trough. He dipped his tail in to flick the water over the rest of his body and wash the sticky blood off, trying not to wince when the gritty water splashed against his wounds. When at last he was relatively clean, he tried to avoid looking at his ragged, scarred reflection in the water. With a sigh, he turned to walk away then stopped and pricked his ears when he heard the sound of Rip’s rough voice.
When Dingo looked around to spot him, he noticed Rip sitting next to Tear, their yellow eyes glowing with dark amusement. While Rip was fairly skinny with dark red fur, Tear was slightly heavier with lighter orange fur. Obviously Bone had grown tired of Rip’s company and sent him to go hang out with Tear. Since Rip was more like Bone’s minion than his friend, he only got to hang around with him when Bone felt like it; the rest of the time he spent with Tear.
Unable to drown out the incessant noise of Rip bragging to Tear about what he, Bone, and Rock had done to him, Dingo growled and stalked into the den that he shared with Rip and Tear. Had Bone not been Second in Command, he would have shared the den with his brothers, as well, but thankfully Dingo could usually escape him there.
When he glanced over his shoulder Bone appeared to be recounting the tale to everyone. Bone caught his eye and sneered at him, his creepy amber eyes glowing with whatever dark thoughts were going through his mind, all of them most likely involving Dingo dying in some way or another. Turning bitterly away from his brother’s sneer, Dingo crouched down and slipped into his small rock den where he slumped down on the sandy floor. Once again he found himself longing for his sister’s comfort and kind words.
For several moments, he lay there in the painful aftermath of the brutal attack, filled with misery as he thought about the pack’s cruel ways. Closing his eyes in sorrow, he relived his past, how the dingoes had always been cruel and how they had always hated him.
The dingoes of the pack fought and sometimes killed for fun and always got away with it. The pack only liked evil, bloodthirsty animals who killed and were willing to do anything to get what they wanted, not dingoes like him who actually cared about them and wanted the violence to stop. They didn’t like dingoes who thought for them-selves instead of obeying everything the Leader and Second in Command said. They called those dingoes ‘different’ and usually exiled them from the pack to live alone in the desert. From then on, they were only known as outcasts and were treated horribly by the pack. The pack loved to kill things, especially outcasts, because it was easy to get away with; the pack actually praised the killers.
It was only because of luck, either good or bad, that Dingo wasn’t dead or an outcast yet, although Bone was always trying to find a reason to exile him. But even though he stayed in the pack he was constantly ridiculed and harassed by the others for being ‘different’.
His sister had been different, too, but nobody knew and now she was gone.
He jumped when his dark thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the shuffling of claws against sand. Slowly he raised his eyes to see Rip and Tear enter the den, still laughing and chatting about what a wimp he was.
“You should have seen him!” Rip snickered. “He was terrified, as always! Stupid Dingo! Bone and I tore him apart!”
“I wish I’d been there!” Tear exclaimed.
Rip laughed. “Yeah, you should have been! We really ripped Dingo to shreds!”
Dingo looked up in mingled sadness and irritation, knowing it was useless to try to block them out. “Do you two mind?” he growled. “I came in here to escape your annoying voices.”
Rip glared at him. “Well, you can leave again. And you can never come back for all I care! Just stop bothering me!”
Dingo simply turned away with a low growl.
“Anyway, where were we before the freak interrupted us?” Rip growled, turning back to Tear and muttering, “I can’t believe we still have to share a den with him!”
“Yeah, Bone’s lucky,” Tear agreed. “He gets that cool Second in Command den.” He curled his lip in jealously.
Rip rolled his eyes, suddenly annoyed. “I know. But Bone’s the oldest of us, so he’s always going to be better off.” Casting an evil glance at Dingo, he added mockingly, “Whereas the young-est over here is destined to be a failure for the rest of his life.”
Dingo rolled his eyes and curled himself up tighter even though he was used to the taunts. “You’ve been spending too much time with Bone,” he muttered to Rip. “But I guess he needs a good little slave like you.”
Tear snickered while Rip narrowed his yellow eyes in anger. “I’m no slave!” he snarled. “That’s your job.”
“I don’t cater to you!” Dingo retorted.
Rip growled in annoyance and turned away from him. “Maybe I can find a way to move in with Bone and away from Dingo,” he muttered to himself before flopping down in his usual spot in the small, rocky den, the old scars on his red face oddly illuminated by the moonlight streaming through the entrance. With a snort, Tear padded forward to lie down next to him, falling asleep the instant his orange head hit the ground.
Sighing, Dingo laid his head down on his brown paws, his long brown fur feeling uncomfort-ably cold without the presence of Claw sleeping beside him, something he still remembered and missed. Wincing, he curled up even tighter in the dark, silent den. He had tried to tell himself to get over his sister’s death—it had been a year—but he never could and each night he hoped to see her light brown body lying peacefully beside him. He still woke up expecting to see her smiling face first thing in the morning; he could still picture the kindness in her light brown eyes.
Flinching with grief, Dingo pushed those images from his mind and tried to force himself to sleep, wishing he would never have to wake up to face the pack and endure another horrible day. There seemed to be no end to the agonizing cycle. With all the taunts and attacks he suffered every day, Dingo would have given up and let one of the pack members kill him if not for the promise he had made to Claw to keep going even when it got difficult.
Letting out a sigh, Dingo tried not to think about Claw or the promise, but sadly he couldn’t stop himself from thinking about how she would never smile at him ever again. Dingo felt only pain where his heart was supposed to be when he reminded himself once again that Claw was gone. He knew he had taken all of his time with her for granted and he knew he should have valued her eleven years of life much more than he had. A flash of deep pain and guilt made him wince when he remembered that it was all his fault Claw was dead.
Copyrighted Material. Copyright © 2011 Sarah Renee
“What’s the matter, Dingo? Too scared to fight back?” a low, gruff voice taunted. Dingo knew that voice well; it belonged to Bone. “That’s right—whimper on the ground, freak.”
He winced and gritted his teeth to stop from howling in pain when something stung the numerous wounds on his side. He knew one of the dingoes must have kicked sand into his wounds. A moment later, the voice of Rock revealed it was he who had done it. “Does it hurt, Dingo? You deserve that and worse.”
“Pathetic,” Bone growled. This time Dingo did let out a loud howl as strong fangs tore into his shoulder. He shuddered in disgust when he felt the sticky blood flow down his leg and seep into his fur.
“You’re such a loser, Dingo!” another voice chortled, forcing Dingo to squeeze his eyes shut tighter against the rush of pain. The voice belonged to Rip, but hard as he tried, Dingo could never hate him the way he hated Bone and Rock.
“Open your eyes.” Bone’s dangerous growl sent shivers down his spine as he turned away from him, still with his eyes shut. He felt as if he was on fire from the burning anguish coursing through him after what Bone, Rock, and Rip had done to him.
Gasping, he finally dared to open his eyes, their light brown depths darkened with sadness. His breath caught in horror at the sight of Bone’s sadistic, sneering face staring down at him. The piercing desert sunlight made Bone’s amber eyes glint with bloodlust and his dark brown, almost black fur stood out against the endless yellow brown sand all around them. The muscles in his shoulders made him look like a lethal weapon as his tail flicked joyfully back and forth. Bone loved Dingo’s pain.
“Had enough, Dingo?” he snarled quietly.
Dingo turned his light brown eyes to him with a pleading expression. “Bone, enough. Just stop this!”
But a second later, he let out a howl of pain when Bone clawed him across his face. His dark, quiet laughter floated over to Dingo’s bloody ears as Dingo fought to stop tears from pricking his eyes. Dingoes weren’t supposed to cry.
“Leave me alone,” he growled through gritted teeth.
Bone just laughed as another dingo stepped forward to stand beside him. The other dingo, Rock, with his long, dusty brown fur and dark brown eyes, smirked down at him like Bone. Dingo felt his body tense with anger and sadness; it was one thing for Bone, his own brother, to torture him, but did he have to get his friend in on it, too? He looked up at his brother, but Bone’s eyes glinted dangerously, as if to warn him against protesting. And of course he didn’t even as a third dingo named Rip crept forward to stand on Bone’s left.
Dingo turned to look at his other brother, Rip, with sad eyes. Rip carefully avoided his gaze. He was grinning like the other two, but his yellow eyes looked very uneasy. Rip wasn’t evil; he just followed Bone’s evil crowd. Dingo could never hate him for that, considering Bone sometimes treated his followers just as bad as his enemies. Rip’s unkempt, reddish fur was standing a bit on end, an obvious sign of his unease.
“Rip,” Dingo sighed, “why are you doing this?”
His brother’s yellow eyes were suddenly flaming. “Shut up! You deserve it.”
“Well said, Rip,” Bone chuckled. “You and Rock can go back to camp now, though. I’ll finish up here.”
Dingo felt the urge to beg them not to leave him alone with Bone, especially Rip, but he didn’t dare. Rip was rather quick to leave while Rock just shrugged and turned around to lumber apathetical-ly back to camp. Dingo cast a glance back at his lacerated body and could barely make out the shaggy, brown fur beneath the blood. His scruffy tail flicked back and forth in distress as he looked back up at Bone, who was sneering at him with an evil glint in his eyes.
“Bone,” he said hoarsely, “you’ve already done enough. Let’s just go back to camp.”
He laughed. “No, I don’t think so.”
Dingo sighed, wanting to bury his face in the sand. “Why do you do this to me?”
That was probably a dumb question; Bone did it because he hated Dingo and because he could get away with it. Dingo was hated by the other evil dingoes in his pack, after all, so they wouldn’t punish Bone if he attacked him.
“Why do you and the others hate me so much?” Dingo asked another pointless question, not really expecting an answer.
Bone just shook his head and as Dingo had anticipated offered no real response. “We hate you because you’re weak, because you don’t fight,” he growled. He chuckled darkly. “You are so pathetic, Dingo. You wouldn’t even defend yourself.”
“What exactly was I supposed to do? There were three of you!” Dingo shouted, his temper rising as it always did when he was alone with his oldest brother.
“Fight back,” Bone replied.
“Oh, and then what? You’d just use that as an excuse to kill me?”
“That’s the plan.” When Dingo growled furi-ously, Bone just laughed. “You know I’m out to get you, Dingo, and that’s ruining your life.”
Dingo looked away.
“Well?” Bone prompted. “Isn’t it?”
“My life’s already been ruined, Bone,” Dingo muttered, his gaze automatically turning to the stars twinkling above them in the night sky. As his thoughts turned again to his sister an anguish far stronger than that he would ever feel from anything Bone and his minions did to him burned through his body. He nearly let out a howl and just barely managed to hold it in as fierce grief, sorrow, and guilt clouded his mind.
He suddenly noticed the satisfied look on Bone’s face as his brother realized what he must be thinking about; Bone knew that his sister’s fate had hurt him most of all.
Dingo felt sick. “You don’t even care about what happened to Claw.”
Bone shrugged. “I never have. I got over her death like everyone else, when you should have.”
“She was all I had.”
Bone’s eyes gleamed. “I know.” He glanced behind him. “I’m going back to camp now and you can crawl back, too, or just lay out here and die; I don’t really care which. If you do come back, try to wash the blood off of you first so the rest of us back at camp don’t have to look at it.”
As Bone turned to walk away, Dingo gritted his teeth. “‘Wash the blood off…’” He growled furiously to himself and dug his claws into the sand, trying to ease his fury. Struggling to his paws, he looked out at the desert around him that was his home, his ears drooping with misery. He didn’t want to go back to the dingo camp, but that would just mean Bone had won. Sighing, he started forward with his head down and his tail dragging, trying to ignore the pain shooting up his legs and down his spine every time he put a paw down.
It hurt, but Dingo was used to Bone’s torture by that point in his life; his older brother had hated him since they were pups. He wasn’t the only one either. Dingo had tried not to let it get to him and had even tried to get along with Bone at first, but he had found out long ago that that was an impossibility.
He looked ahead and unconsciously slowed down when he saw the dingo camp, his eyes narrowing with defeat. He really didn’t want to go in there and put up with the other dingoes’ taunting, but he had no choice.
The entrance to the dingoes’ camp was marked by two piles of bones left over from the prey they hunted. The sandy ground dipped down into a sort of valley surrounded by sandy hills. On the side of each hill was a dark, rocky den partially hidden from view by the sand covering it. All the dens were formed within the larger surrounding sand dunes, but the two largest dens sat at the back of the valley. There was a large water trough made of rock in the center of the camp, but otherwise the place was very bare like the desert itself. Around the camp, all of the dingoes were going about their normal activities and Dingo dared to hope that they wouldn’t bother him much.
As he stepped into his camp, Dingo was sure he must look pretty bad. To confirm his thoughts, Tear, his other brother, crawled out of the den, looked at him, and raised his eyebrows. His yellow eyes were filled with a mixture of surprise and perhaps amusement.
“What happened to you?” he asked, proving it to be mostly amusement.
Dingo flattened his ears. “Thanks for the concern, Tear.”
Tear just shrugged with a stupid grin. “Did you get attacked again?”
Dingo sighed and stepped into camp, heading for the den that he shared with two of his three brothers. “Yes, Tear, I got attacked again.”
“By Bone?”
“Of course.”
Tear just chuckled to which Dingo shot him an annoyed glance. “You know, this might be funny to you, but you’re not the one bleeding and suffering. You’re not the one everybody hates.”
“Oh, lighten up,” Tear said. “So everybody hates you. So what? I would have thought you’d be used to it by now.”
Dingo gave him a dry look. “Yes, Tear, I’ve certainly come to love their hatred. It’s simply heartwarming.”
“Well, you know, if you just changed, you wouldn’t be hated.”
“Change into what? A battle-hungry, murder-ous hound? Thanks, but no thanks.”
Tear just rolled his eyes. “Whatever, Dingo. I really don’t know why you haven’t been exiled yet, but if you don’t change, it’ll happen.”
Dingo sighed; everybody was always telling him he’d be exiled, sent away to live on his own far away from the pack. It really didn’t seem so bad unless he counted the fact that most outcasts starved to death and the fact that the pack hunted them down like prey. If he could ignore those little details, it would seem like a vacation. “At this point, Tear, I really wouldn’t mind being an out-cast,” Dingo muttered.
Tear looked at him like he was insane. “If you like dying then go ahead.” He paused and seemed to think for a moment. “Wait, I think I know why you haven’t been exiled yet. You are the son of the Leader of the pack, so it would probably make him look bad if his own son was an outcast. That is, it would make him look even worse since you’ve already embarrassed him by being so weak.”
“Wow, I feel so ashamed,” Dingo muttered sarcastically. He rolled his eyes. “Listen, Tear, it’s been fun discussing how much I’m hated around here, but I just got mauled by our brothers and I’m not in a great mood for talking.”
Tear shrugged. “Fine. I’ll go see what Rip is doing.”
“Probably laughing at me,” Dingo growled as they parted ways.
Dingo thought about simply hiding in his den for the rest of the day, but the sticky blood was starting to make him feel incredibly uncomfortable. With a sigh, he started off toward the water trough in the center of the camp to wash it off. As he walked, he glanced up ahead at the largest den sitting at the very back of the camp on the side of the largest sand dune. The land sloped upward toward the large den, giving it the appearance of towering over everyone else. It was the Leader’s den where Dingo’s father would be resting. Dingo tried not to look that way since he didn’t particularly like his father who had never had anything to do with him.
Right beside the huge den was another large den that was exclusive to another dingo who had control over the pack: the Second in Command. Who happened to be Bone. When Dingo spared a glance in that direction, he saw Bone sitting outside his large den, talking to Rock with his typical cocky grin. Bone was the second most powerful dingo in the pack after their father and he made sure everyone knew that.
Ignoring the sudden dark stare of his older brother, Dingo stalked over to the water trough. He dipped his tail in to flick the water over the rest of his body and wash the sticky blood off, trying not to wince when the gritty water splashed against his wounds. When at last he was relatively clean, he tried to avoid looking at his ragged, scarred reflection in the water. With a sigh, he turned to walk away then stopped and pricked his ears when he heard the sound of Rip’s rough voice.
When Dingo looked around to spot him, he noticed Rip sitting next to Tear, their yellow eyes glowing with dark amusement. While Rip was fairly skinny with dark red fur, Tear was slightly heavier with lighter orange fur. Obviously Bone had grown tired of Rip’s company and sent him to go hang out with Tear. Since Rip was more like Bone’s minion than his friend, he only got to hang around with him when Bone felt like it; the rest of the time he spent with Tear.
Unable to drown out the incessant noise of Rip bragging to Tear about what he, Bone, and Rock had done to him, Dingo growled and stalked into the den that he shared with Rip and Tear. Had Bone not been Second in Command, he would have shared the den with his brothers, as well, but thankfully Dingo could usually escape him there.
When he glanced over his shoulder Bone appeared to be recounting the tale to everyone. Bone caught his eye and sneered at him, his creepy amber eyes glowing with whatever dark thoughts were going through his mind, all of them most likely involving Dingo dying in some way or another. Turning bitterly away from his brother’s sneer, Dingo crouched down and slipped into his small rock den where he slumped down on the sandy floor. Once again he found himself longing for his sister’s comfort and kind words.
For several moments, he lay there in the painful aftermath of the brutal attack, filled with misery as he thought about the pack’s cruel ways. Closing his eyes in sorrow, he relived his past, how the dingoes had always been cruel and how they had always hated him.
The dingoes of the pack fought and sometimes killed for fun and always got away with it. The pack only liked evil, bloodthirsty animals who killed and were willing to do anything to get what they wanted, not dingoes like him who actually cared about them and wanted the violence to stop. They didn’t like dingoes who thought for them-selves instead of obeying everything the Leader and Second in Command said. They called those dingoes ‘different’ and usually exiled them from the pack to live alone in the desert. From then on, they were only known as outcasts and were treated horribly by the pack. The pack loved to kill things, especially outcasts, because it was easy to get away with; the pack actually praised the killers.
It was only because of luck, either good or bad, that Dingo wasn’t dead or an outcast yet, although Bone was always trying to find a reason to exile him. But even though he stayed in the pack he was constantly ridiculed and harassed by the others for being ‘different’.
His sister had been different, too, but nobody knew and now she was gone.
He jumped when his dark thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the shuffling of claws against sand. Slowly he raised his eyes to see Rip and Tear enter the den, still laughing and chatting about what a wimp he was.
“You should have seen him!” Rip snickered. “He was terrified, as always! Stupid Dingo! Bone and I tore him apart!”
“I wish I’d been there!” Tear exclaimed.
Rip laughed. “Yeah, you should have been! We really ripped Dingo to shreds!”
Dingo looked up in mingled sadness and irritation, knowing it was useless to try to block them out. “Do you two mind?” he growled. “I came in here to escape your annoying voices.”
Rip glared at him. “Well, you can leave again. And you can never come back for all I care! Just stop bothering me!”
Dingo simply turned away with a low growl.
“Anyway, where were we before the freak interrupted us?” Rip growled, turning back to Tear and muttering, “I can’t believe we still have to share a den with him!”
“Yeah, Bone’s lucky,” Tear agreed. “He gets that cool Second in Command den.” He curled his lip in jealously.
Rip rolled his eyes, suddenly annoyed. “I know. But Bone’s the oldest of us, so he’s always going to be better off.” Casting an evil glance at Dingo, he added mockingly, “Whereas the young-est over here is destined to be a failure for the rest of his life.”
Dingo rolled his eyes and curled himself up tighter even though he was used to the taunts. “You’ve been spending too much time with Bone,” he muttered to Rip. “But I guess he needs a good little slave like you.”
Tear snickered while Rip narrowed his yellow eyes in anger. “I’m no slave!” he snarled. “That’s your job.”
“I don’t cater to you!” Dingo retorted.
Rip growled in annoyance and turned away from him. “Maybe I can find a way to move in with Bone and away from Dingo,” he muttered to himself before flopping down in his usual spot in the small, rocky den, the old scars on his red face oddly illuminated by the moonlight streaming through the entrance. With a snort, Tear padded forward to lie down next to him, falling asleep the instant his orange head hit the ground.
Sighing, Dingo laid his head down on his brown paws, his long brown fur feeling uncomfort-ably cold without the presence of Claw sleeping beside him, something he still remembered and missed. Wincing, he curled up even tighter in the dark, silent den. He had tried to tell himself to get over his sister’s death—it had been a year—but he never could and each night he hoped to see her light brown body lying peacefully beside him. He still woke up expecting to see her smiling face first thing in the morning; he could still picture the kindness in her light brown eyes.
Flinching with grief, Dingo pushed those images from his mind and tried to force himself to sleep, wishing he would never have to wake up to face the pack and endure another horrible day. There seemed to be no end to the agonizing cycle. With all the taunts and attacks he suffered every day, Dingo would have given up and let one of the pack members kill him if not for the promise he had made to Claw to keep going even when it got difficult.
Letting out a sigh, Dingo tried not to think about Claw or the promise, but sadly he couldn’t stop himself from thinking about how she would never smile at him ever again. Dingo felt only pain where his heart was supposed to be when he reminded himself once again that Claw was gone. He knew he had taken all of his time with her for granted and he knew he should have valued her eleven years of life much more than he had. A flash of deep pain and guilt made him wince when he remembered that it was all his fault Claw was dead.
Copyrighted Material. Copyright © 2011 Sarah Renee
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