A small farm near the beautiful Misty Mountains is a wonderful place to grow up and enjoy a lifetime in Middle Earth. Not for all....not for all.

When the first rooster stirred and was beginning to work up his first crow, Everanda was already dressed and peering out the kitchen window. Her excitement driven on by possibly new puppies out in the barn. As a breeze gently blew through the open window, she leaned further forward and looked up at the dark sky, and she thought to herself, 'I will name the first one 'Starwind' and the second one 'Mistymane', and so on, until she was swimming in names in her mind.

The crow stepped ever closer to the fence post and he eyed it, trying to gauge its height. He started to flap his wings, and suck in extra air to prepare himself for his second position in life. Meanwhile Everanda rushed around and prepared several things for the newborns. Something started to bother her though. She couldn't put her finger on it, yet it was just a feeling in her mind. Her mother and father would be up soon, and her love for them kept her comfortable, as the simple life was good enough for her.

She was sitting now by the window when the first rays of the sun began to stream through the small curtains. Her apprehension began to build, and her thoughts ran back and forth about the new born pups.. She still could not get her mind wrapped around this new feeling that bothered her. What was it, she thought to herself? She began to hear her mother and father stir. Soon enough she thought, and opened the back door of the small cottage and made her way over to the barn and the chicken coop.

She threw some feed into the feed bin for the chickens, but they still were in the shed. She stopped for a moment as this was a strange thing. She quietly walked over to the dark shed and slowly opened the creaky sounding door. Inside was all the hens still nestled in their little cups of hay on each roost log. They were wide awake staring back at her in complete silence. The feeling that had been disturbing her thoughts was now coming forward in leaps and bounds. She started to become afraid for some reason or another. She slowly backed away from the shed, and then walked out of the pen.

Heading towards the barn, her spirit lifted somewhat as her thoughts returned to the new little critters inside. She stopped though suddenly in her tracks. Something is wrong she thought. The door to the barn was wide open, and it had been securely shut the evening before. Everanda stiffened and now forced herself to walk slowly up to the door. The barn was still very dark inside as the smell of fresh straw seemed so pleasant to her. She waited until her eyes adjusted to the dark, and it was then that she heard the first mewlings of newborn pups.

By the sound she could easily tell where the mother had taken them after their birth. It was an instinctive thing done very rarely by a mother, and only if she had sensed danger. Then one of the puppies made a snarling sound. It was much louder than the rest. It sounded to her as though the pup was struggling with something. So immediately, she ran to the furthest back stall. She threw both hands to her mouth in horror, as she realized what it had been that had bothered her thoughts all morning. Five new puppies laid in a pile of soft fur and warmth. Next to it sat a sixth.

The sixth pup was misshapened and his head was much larger than normal. In fact his whole body was twice the size of the other puppies. He was shaking his head back and forth violently. In his mouth was the dead and bloody rooster. That’s what had been bothering her. The rooster had never crowed. She stepped back in total fear, as something about the pup was just not right. She ran out of the barn and began crying as the scene had wounded her mind. Standing in the farms center courtyard, she could only cry and her thoughts started to wonder.

It then came to her. Where is the mother? She had not seen the big mut of a mother dog around any at all. She crept back to the barn, and looked at the soft powdery dirt for tracks. She discovered a lone set of large dog paw prints leading away from the barn and towards the southern ridge below the farm. She followed them, because they were easy to see in the morning dew. It wasn't long until she came to the ridge, and she had to take great care. The ridge was a flat long out-cropping of rock that overlooked a deep gorge below. Up ahead she saw movement.

The mother dog was not her favorite and she had been a stray that had wandered in the summer before. She had been starving for food, but was never a very loving dog. So the farmer had taken her in and fed her only because he loved animals. He had taught his daughter this same love for them. Yet they never really cared for the mother much as she would snarl and bite if they ever came near. As Everanda approached her now she had to stop, because she could hear the mother growling at her.

The big dog now stepped out from a bush nearby and she walked slowly to the ledge and looked over the side. She turned and looked at Everanda, and a sadness was deep set into her eyes. Everanda stooped down and whispered to her, 'Come girl, come on and see your new puppies.' The mother dog just lowered her head and with a sort of a moaning sound she jumped off the cliff to her death below.

Everanda screamed loudly, as the horror of the scene sunk into her mind. It was so bizarre and eerie, that she stood, turned, and ran back to the farm. Her father hearing her scream had come running out of the home and towards her. She ran up and hugged him in a fit of crying hysterically and trying to tell him what had just happened. He took her back into the cottage and tried to settle her down.

Later that day the local veterinarian showed up as he had been summoned right away. He climbed off his small pony and the farmer showed him to the barn. The farmer never went in and paced back and forth outside. Even Everanda stayed glued to the kitchen window as she wondered what the old vet would say. After about a half of hour, the veterinarian came out. He pulled out a handkerchief and wiped the sweat from his brow as he shook his head.

"Mr. Butterbaker, you have six very healthy puppies. I know what you are going to ask me, and I'm going to be quite frank with you. The sixth is a warg sir." The old farmer took a step backwards, and he felt a pang of fear shoot through his heart.

'Are you sure Doc?'

The vet just climbed his pony and as he looked over his shoulder back towards the barn, he said, 'Separate him from the others as their young lives are in danger, if he should get hungry.'

THE END