Myco

Myco (pronounced MY-ko)
Named for the quiet strength of fungus, Myco thrives where others overlook—steady, strange, and vital.

—————

Myco did not cry when he was born.
He simply blinked—slowly, as though he were waking from some ancient sleep.

His fur was strange: green-gray, with black blotches like spreading rot. His eyes were pale blue and unnervingly calm, like distant skies above a frozen lake. Some wolves whispered that he looked more like mold than flesh. But when he was left behind—rejected before he could even grow into the oddness—Lillemore found him.

The old mother bear had made her name not with roars, but with kindness. Her enclave in the foothills was a sanctuary for the unwanted: pups cast aside for weakness, for difference, or for nothing at all. She wrapped him in her massive limbs and called him Myco, after the fungus that flourishes unseen and unpraised—necessary, resilient, strange.

She raised him gently, but she knew the truth: wolves need wolves. And so, when the time came, she sent him to the only place she trusted—the pack led by Shadow.

⸻

In Shadow's pack, Myco grew under the care of Noct, a male pupsitter as lively and loving as the spring wind. Noct sang nonsense songs, tussled with the pups, and filled their days with warmth and chaos. He adored Myco and never pushed him to change, but even Noct had trouble reaching past the young wolf's distant silence.

Myco watched.
He learned.
He said little.

When he was old enough for serious training, he was passed to Lilura, a fierce and fire-eyed huntress with no tolerance for slowness. She tried to stoke intensity in him, to carve urgency into his bones. And still, he watched.

She thought he was indifferent.

He wasn't.

He absorbed everything—from Noct's affection, from Lilura's steel, and from Honor's stone.

Honor, the elder mentor and former pupsitter, was the first to understand that Myco wasn't empty. He was deep. His lessons were delivered slowly, with pauses like falling leaves. Myco seemed to appreciate them, and yet—even with Honor—there was always a slight sense of distance.

He didn't quite belong anywhere.
Not among the boisterous pups.
Not among the hunters with fire in their veins.
Not even among the quiet teachers.

Myco was not soft.
He was not sharp.
He was still.

⸻

That changed when Shadow placed him with the Stone Breakers.

They were known for their brutal discipline—stoic, merciless, efficient. They didn't jest or boast. They didn't explain themselves. Their leader, Ollerton, was a solid wall of a wolf: silent, unreadable, methodical.

The first time Myco hunted with them, no one said a word. Instructions were gestures. Movement was instinct. And for the first time in his life… it worked.

Myco didn't stand out.
He fit.

He moved as if he had always belonged there—striking only when needed, ending what others began. The chaos of the chase didn't reach him. He was the finisher. The calm after the storm. The cold certainty.

And when they returned that night—bloodied, bruised, and victorious—Ollerton met his eyes across the firelight. Neither spoke.

But something passed between them.
A quiet, mutual understanding.
A recognition not born of words—but of rhythm.

⸻

Myco was never the loudest. Never the fastest. Never the most favored.

But he was inevitable.

Lillemore had seen life in rot.
Noct had given him affection without condition.
Lilura had taught him the hunt.
Honor had whispered the wisdom of stone.

But it was with the Stone Breakers, and under Ollerton's silent approval, that Myco finally stopped standing outside of something—and became part of it.

Not all wolves howl.

Some just finish what needs finishing.