The Children of Destiny

Chapter 6 - Great, Just What I Needed...

That night, I was looking for a place to set up camp when I found a cozy looking cave. I'd already known from personal experience that waltzing right into a random cave was a terrible idea and was going to try to steer clear of it, but it just looked so welcoming. So, I walked over to the entrance to the cave and peered inside. It seemed vacant, and I couldn't find any signs of life when I went inside, so I gathered some grass and nettles and made a makeshift nest out of it. I put my backpack down next to the nest, curled up in the nest, and shut my eyes. Sure, it may sound uncomfortable, but I kid you not, that was the comfiest thing I've ever laid down in.

Suddenly, a loud scream in the distance woke me up, and I knew immediately what it was: foxenas. Just what I'd feared. They always preyed on weak, gullible, or delirious creatures dumb enough to fall for their tricks, and I was not getting anywhere near them if it was the last thing I did. Foxenas mean nothing but trouble and the chance of suffering a very slow and painful death. Foxenas love to play with their food before killing it, so you'd be very unlucky to find yourself in the jaws of one of the savage creatures.

I stupidly decided that I wanted to see this thing for myself to make sure I wasn't just hearing things and scrambled to my feet. As I was heading towards where I'd heard the scream, it sounded again, but this time, it was in a different place. So, I turned around and went in that direction until another scream sounded somewhere else. At this point, I'd stopped walking around aimlessly, searching for something that I didn't even know the definite location of, and just started looking around to see if I could spot one of the things that had woken me up. I heard hysterical laughter behind me and immediately turned around.

Crap, they've got me right where they want me.

It was at that moment, I knew I'd fallen into a trap. There was definitely more than one foxena, that was for sure, and they had surrounded me. The laughter was a signal that the trap had been set and the skulk was ready to catch their prey. I looked around and saw glowing eyes of many different colors; green, yellow, blue, you name it; staring right at me from all sides.

I'm so dead...

I grabbed my knife and raised it up in the air threateningly.

"Which one of you wants to fight first?" I yelled, knowing full well that the creatures couldn't understand a word I'd just said.

Suddenly, a thought came to mind and I picked up two sticks.

What if foxenas have something not even they would poke with a seven foot pole? Like fire...

I set fire to both sticks and heard rustling and silent whimpering pass through the group of foxenas. Finally, one of them was brave enough to leap out of its hiding spot and rush straight at me. I turned to look at it and held out my new torches in front of me.

The ugly thing had orange fur from its head to the middle of its torso, where the orange faded to a mottled grey-brown pelt. Its underbelly was white, stained brown from the sand, and its paws were brown like its muzzle. It had savage amber eyes, one of which looked a different way than the other which made me think it had a lazy eye, or something, and a muddy brown mane like a horse's, except it was much shorter. Its hind legs were noticeably longer than its forelegs, which gave it this strange limp, and it had the narrow face of a fox.

The foxena backed away the moment it saw the fire and ran off with its long, black tail between its legs.

Is this all I need to do to keep these things away from me?

One after another, each foxena lept out of the shadows and bounded towards me only to turn tail when it saw my torches. Finally, the foxenas had all gone and there were no more predators in sight, so I walked back towards the cave I'd be sleeping in that night. As I was walking away, I heard something following me and turned around. There were amber eyes, glowing in the moonlight, staring directly at me. I aimed my torch at where the eyes were, but the creature didn't move. So, I put out the fire, pulled out my knife, and walked over to where the foxena was.

I was about to kill the foxena with a single stab to the neck, but I realized that the creature didn't seem hostile anymore. It was the first foxena that tried to attack me, lazy eye and all, and it was staring hungrily at me like it really wanted to make me its next meal, but it just couldn't bring itself to do anything to me. For the first time, I noticed how starved the foxena looked. I could see its ribs through its pelt and even its gaze looked weakened by hunger.

"Are you hungry?" I asked it.

The foxena's tail wagged slightly and I knew it had understood me.

"Come on, then," I said gently. "Follow me and I can get you some of my food."

The foxena hesitated, but then raised its tail in the air happily and followed me with its head held high. When we reached the cave, I dug in my backpack and pulled out a raw piece of meat. The foxena looked happy to finally get something to eat and snatched the food from me immediately. It looked up at me and then bit off a part of the meat and shoved the rest over to me.

"Oh, I'm not hungry," I said. "You can have the whole thing."

The foxena pulled the meat back over eagerly and continued eating. When it finished, it knelt down and bowed to me as if I was some sort of king.

A sign of respect...

"Well, I suppose you can travel with me," I muttered. "But I'll have to give you a name..." -I paused to think for a moment- "How about... Roxanne? Only if you're a girl, of course."

The foxena laid down on its back and started panting.

"Alright, you're a girl," I said, staring at the foxena's belly, which had six places where a pup would get milk from. "Got it. Roxanne it is. But, how about we shorten it to Roxie instead?"

The foxena sprang to her paws and yipped excitedly, so I took that as a "yes."

"Roxie it is," I said, scratching the foxena behind her ear.

At this moment, I knew that Roxie and I would be friends forever. She was my foxena, and no one would ever be able to take her away from me. I'd make sure she'd never go hungry or get hurt ever again. I knew that she was probably thinking the same thing about me, that I was just someone who desperately needed her protection, and I was okay with it. We needed each other, and that was all that mattered.