Chapter Text
The fox doesn’t remember what happened to bring it to this house—huge, huger than any other that it and its human had been to before, full of animals both like and unlike itself. It’s been here for a long time, it thinks, darting from corner to branch to corner in an attempt to hide from the others and from the humans that sometimes walked around to fill up their food bowls or to play with the animals that wanted to be played with. It’s been here long enough to lose the last of its pup’s fur.
Sometimes the regular humans bring in a new human or two, and show them to one of its friendlier kin. Sometimes, those new humans leave with their new pet.
The fox watches this and wants to leave, too. Its human, it remembers, liked to hold it under one arm, or keep it balanced atop one of their broad shoulders. The memory is enough to bring the fox to its feet, then running across the wide-open main room back and forth and back and forth until one of the regular humans cleaning the big stream that cuts through the main room stops to look at it, raising a hand to their small human mouth in a laugh.
The fox remembers that its human is no longer here and it stops running to slink to its favorite spot, half-hidden by shrubs and circled on all sides with the running water that cuts through the house. It hopes that some day its human will come back and bring it home and love it forever and ever. Until then, it knows, it can’t let any other humans take it.
It stays like that until the human watching it leaves. But foxes cannot hold sadness for long. The memory of its sadness about its human slips from its mind, and the fox returns to its usual routine of running and skulking and hiding.
Seasons pass like this, apparent in the way the fox’s fur changes from cooling grey to warm white to grey to white. It remembers its human, and doesn’t know to worry about its human recognising it in its full-grown body. But it does know that it cannot leave, that its human won’t know to come for it if it’s no longer at the house.
And then a new human comes to the house, taller and stronger than the other humans and smelling of illness and stress. They talk, and the fox dares to creep closer to listen in.
It doesn’t understand all of the noises these humans say, not like the way it could understand its human. But the regular humans have talked around it enough for it to understand the most important ones.
"Wɪl ði ˈænɪmᵊlz hæv ɪˈnʌf food ænd water? ˈʃɔːli wiː kæn brɪŋ ðɛm əˈlɒŋ, raɪt?" The regular human in charge says. The fox likes her well enough; she always has left it alone.
”Ðeəz no time, wiː hæv tuː ɡɛt ɔːl ðə ˈhjuːmənz hɪə tuː safety. Ðeəz nəʊ ruːm fɔː ðɛm ɪn ðə ˈkærəvæn. Juː kæn liːv ðɛm food, ɔː ðeɪ kæn hunt fɔː ðəmˈsɛlvz ˈɑːftə wiː lɛt ðɛm luːs,” the tall human replies, their tone grave.
One of the younger regular humans stamps xer feet.”ɪts ˈɡɛtɪŋ cold ˌaʊtˈsaɪd! There’s no food ɪn ðə fiːldz ˌɛniˈmɔː, ænd ˈaʊə stɔːd miːlz wɪl ˈəʊnli lɑːst fɔː səʊ lɒŋ ɪf wiː lɛt ðɛm friː-fiːd. Ðɪs ɪz ˈkruːəl, dɪˈfɛndə. Ðeɪl daɪ. Ðeər ɑːr ˈɛldəli ˈænɪmᵊlz hɪə, wʌnz ðæt kɑːnt aʊtˈrʌn the Curse ˈiːvᵊn ɪf ðeɪ traɪd.” The fox recognises that last word, Curse, from somewhere, although it doesn’t remember from where.
”ɪts ðeər ˈəʊnli ʧɑːns æt səˈvaɪvᵊl. aɪm sorry. Ði ˈænɪmᵊlz ɑːnt ˈkʌmɪŋ.” The human’s voice is sharp enough that all the others go quiet.
It doesn’t understand why the humans smell so upset. It’s always cold here. But, the fox reasons, humans aren’t smart enough to grow their fur thick and beautiful like foxes do. They’re not even smart enough to grow thin fur like a dog. Instead, they use fake furs, and those fake furs can get wet and destroyed. So it makes sense that they would be scared of the cold.
The fox wishes that the humans knew that the inside of the house was warm. They didn’t need to leave it every night to go to wherever the humans went to, there were plenty of animals that would love for them to stay the night. Maybe, if they stayed the night, the fox would creep up to them and curl at their feet and pretend they were its human, just for the night. It likes the thought of that.
The tall human pauses and looks up, their gaze landing on the fox where it’s skulking on the rafters. They look sad. They shake their head. The conversation ends.
That night, the regular humans give more food than they ever have before, heaps upon heaps of pellets and vegetables. The fox, like all of its fellow animals, is delighted at the feast.
Then they open the doors.
The animals don’t understand what is going on, not at first. Maybe the humans had made a mistake? Some of the more impulsive ones, the ones that can remember a time before the home, run outside and spin in circles in the snow outside and wait for the humans to gather them back inside.
Some of the humans are crying and the fox doesn’t understand that, either.
The wind outside is cold enough to burn the fox’s nose. It shies away from the open door and follows some long-forgotten instinct to curl itself into a little ball, its tail wrapping warmly over where the wind bites it. The wind smells strange, it thinks, sour and wet like rotting wood. It waits patiently for the humans to stop crying and remember that the doors are open and some of the other animals have escaped.
The fox thinks that if the humans don’t act soon, some of the animals will get lost.
The fox waits. It’s used to waiting. It remains curled up in its favourite spot until its stomach growls, then it eats some food from the pile. Most of the animals are gone, now, only a few of the older ones remaining along with the fox. The humans left that evening without closing the doors or bringing any of the other animals back.
The fox waits. Sometimes the escaped animals come back to eat from the pile. The pile is much smaller, and the fox wonders when the humans will refill it.
The sour-wet-rot smell grows stronger, despite there being no wind to carry it. The pile is gone. There’s something coming, something that makes the older animals bay and cower.
The fox wakes up five mornings after the doors were opened to find that there’s something dark on the ground that covers everything except for the fox’s little hidden spot. Nothing at all moves, not even the old dog that’s always yapping and howling at the closed door to the inner rooms. Sharp little shadow teeth nip at the edges of the streams that separate the fox’s hideout from the rest of the house.
The fox isn’t a stranger to death. It’s a predator, and before the house it and its human used to hunt together. It knows the scent of blood and fear. This isn’t death. This is something worse.
It shivers and whines. The shadow is slowly creeping closer, and the fox knows with a bone-deep certainty that the running water will not hold the shadow back for long if the walls of the house couldn’t stop it. There’s nowhere to run and nowhere else to hide. Maybe if the fox had fled like the other young animals when the humans left the doors open, it would have been safe, but what if it had run and its human came back to save it? They would have been so sad to be abandoned again.
It couldn’t do that to its human.
It’s hungry. The air is still, heavy, and cold, and smells so strongly of sour-wet-rot that the fox can’t smell any trace of the other humans or animals.
Maybe its human will come back for it and find it, frozen in this hungry shadow and say, “Oh, little fox, you’ve been so brave and loyal, and I will save you and you’ll never be alone again.” And then the fox’s human will reach out one of their hands and pet the fox on its face just the way they always did, and pick it up in their big, warm arms, and take them both home.
The fox just has to wait.