Illuusioni

Illuusioni got new name from his mother after returning suddenly from a scouting trip even though he had been thought to have perished. His fur had turned from black and gray to chilling blue, skin like ice. Weary and whimpering he begged his pack to believe it really was him and something had happened at the glaciers.

Blizzard had forced him to take shelter inside an ice cave. And during night he had woken up to a different world, the Dreamlands. Bones of old surrounded him, some trapped in the tall ice walls others frozen to the ground. There was no blizzard raging outside. Illuusioni took few hesitant steps out of the cave and gasped in awe of the barren beauty of windswept snow crust that covered the earth. The snow was so hardened that it supported him easily. He looked around but could see nothing standing out of the whiteness, at first. When turning to look again towards the sea - or direction where sea would have been in the real world - he noticed a dark, wispy mass. Wary yet curious he tilted his head and tried to listen. But though the mass seemed to be moving it didn't make any noise on the snow.

He should try waking up and head home, he thought just as the wisps swayed, turning towards him. Illuusioni could see tens, maybe hundreds, of pitch black eyes looking right at him. Raising his hackles he snarled at the eyes in the wisp. They were far but seemed to be moving closer, ignoring his efforts of intimidation. The eyes just stared at him with cold, unmoving yearning in them, like they wanted something from him.

When close enough with the mass to distinguishing faint silhouettes of various canids in the wisp, Illuusioni lost his courage and in fear leaped back in the cave. Same time the wispy shadows set off after him, galloping across the snowy plain as one unbreakable wave of darkness.

Steps echoed from the cave walls as Illuusioni ran deeper inside, chilling air burning his lungs but hoping to loose his chasers or finding a hiding spot. He knew they were already in the cave with him as light behind him vanished and walls turned into color of frigid sea. He could now hear their whispering footsteps, weak howls of the wolves and chilly chittering of the foxes. They wanted to tell him something but he wasn't going to stop and listen.

Suddenly, Illuusioni saw a fissure ahead in the floor and felt his heart lurch. He tried to break but it was too late. His paws skidded on the ice, claws leaving long, desperate marks on it. As he fell into the freezing darkness he saw the eyes looking at him from the above.

After waking up it had taken him days to return. Disoriented and barely capable standing Illuusioni had persuaded his way past the guards and rest of the pack to talk to with his parents. He couldn't tell them when his fur had changed it's color or what happened to his eyes and skin. But he could tell things that only he would know and in shock but relieved of his return his mother welcomed him back.

"Varjo no longer fits you, my son. Your new name shall be Illuusioni. Because when you walked past the trees I had been sure you were a trick of the moonlight."