Solo Hunt!

[Shem]

1 Summer, 516 Summer! Shem snuffled happily, his nose twitching, inhaling the thousand and one scents of the forest and sorting through them with his amazing, lupine olfactory abilities. Paws planting down silently in the moist leaf litter, his tail wagged slightly as he sussed out the scent that most intrigued him. Hopping about with excitement, he took off with a leap, loping along – still silent – moving through the trees and undergrowth with the ease and grace of a seal slipping through the ocean waves. Hunting through the summer months was a somewhat tricky endeavor. After the long, lean months of winter and spring, when animals were scarce, or thin, or both, it was tempting to gorge on the newly fattening mothers and their young. However, decimating local populations of the next generation of prey wasn’t a wise move. Discretion must be used to overcome the lust for fresh meat – elsewise the hunter would go even more hungry in the coming seasons. Life – and death – must be held in a precarious balance. His wild brethren were not so consciously in tune with what the Kelvic could understand. They feasted when they could, and their populations might suffer, or prosper, accordingly. But Shem, who hunted both for himself and for the market in the city, had to each day determine what was allowable, so as to not deplete the stocks of wild game. At the moment, such restraint was going to be hard – given his empty stomach. But he had caught the scent of a buck, as he cast about on the wooded lower slopes of the mountains. A buck was fair game. With no new fawn by its side, is he was successful in taking it down, the local deer population would not suffer unduly from its loss. Mouth salivating, Shem bounded ahead, closing the gap between himself and his as yet unsuspecting prey.