First Night in My House
Every wolf remembers the first night in a den of her own. Mine came with creaking floors, cold stone, and a silence so complete I could hear my own heart deciding to stay.
I walked every room the way my kind has always walked new ground — slowly, twice, nose first. A territory is not yours because someone hands you the keys. It is yours the night you stop feeling like a guest in it. By the third round, the corners had my scent. By dawn, they had my name.
People imagine a house is walls. It is not. A house is a promise you make to yourself in the dark: here, I decide. Here, I rest without asking. Here, the pack eats first and the world waits outside the door.
My pack is not large, but it is mine — every soul in it chosen, none of them kept. That is the law I laid on the threshold stone the first night: whoever crosses it stays free, and whoever stays, stays loyal. Freedom and loyalty. Most creatures think you must pick one. A she-wolf builds her house on both.
There will be storms. There will be lean winters and long hunts and nights when the moon hides her face. Let them come. The fire is lit, the door is barred from the inside, and the howl that answers the dark from this hill is mine.
Home is not where you were born. Home is where you chose to stand.