The smell of his musky urine on the wind, we looked over the escarpment cover in thick grass. We found our prey. A tall, mature buck. Late into this season his velvet horns sheding their soft encasement. He bellows, summoning all would be suitors, bucks and late adolesants. His cry is both melancholic and rage filled. As if he knows his time is almost up but his nature is to persist, fight, fuck and feed until death.

We shuffle forward on our bellies, to reach the crest of our hill, bearing down on the forest. Tall pines bask the ground in cold shade, winter clings to the earth for a little while longer. Motes of grass emerge through the snow, just audible is the sound of running water.

As the ice melts, the rivers bulge. Life moves in cycle unbothered by the petty concerns of man.

Our buck steps lightly, nibbling on the fresh pine shoots. Senses alert, he awaits his next challenger.

My father insisted we hunt this year, laying beside me. Rifle in hand. His meaty paws engulf the barel of his rifle. The one he brought back from the great war. He said this was about the hunter and the hunted. Now it seems, this is what he was waiting for. 

Whispering in disjointed words as to not be heard." You see it? his pride... his strength. His majesty. He calls out for the challenge that will bring his death"

"yes, are you going to shoot him?"  reply in almost inaudible breathless whisper. I raise my own rifle in offer of a back up shot, Locthar my father. Brings his hand down to bear and pushes my rifle down and away.

" No son, we will wait" he says with finality. As if on que, the master of the forest. This magnificent Elk smells the aroma of a younger buck approaching. With something like a sneeze mixed with a bellow he acknowledges his yet unseen adversary.

The sun hangs low in the sky and is almost gone behind the forest, from a dark shadow we see a single slim hoof plant itself firmly in the waning light. He takes one step, and another, and another. Smelling the air. a magnificant young buck has answered the call. We wait, with baited breath as to what will unfold. He rests a hand on my right shoulder and mouths the words " wait, watch". We sit in absolute silence between us, the rushing rapids 2 miles away all the more clear. The vapour of our breaths the only sign we exist.

Deep snorts and bellows the alpha has spotted his adversary. They step toward each other, heads lowered in fatal posture. " Watch as the king is dethroned, watch as the the world changes for these two infront of us" he says to me. And with a rush, with inhuman speed they set upon each other. The clash of bone on bone rings through the trees.  What happened next was an interlocking of horns and a brutal war for survival and the chance for immortality. I don't remember most of it, the sounds they made and the horrifying tearing of flesh as the king himself lost his crown from the neck down to his successor.

Some hours later he looked at me in expectation. " Shoot him" he says. " But why, he won?" was my reply.

" You can't go to war unless you can see all that's around you. You cannot fight unless you know your true enemy. There's no doubt in my mind they both smelled us and knew we were around and yet they fought and now one is dead. Shoot that buck and let this be a lesson. You don't fight, you don't kill unless you see all the pieces on the board and know their place. I'm willing to bet king went to war with this buck knowing we would avenge him, So do it. Avenge him"

Looking down the iron sights, I take a breath and hold it like he taught me. I squeeze. The recoil hits me, the buck bellows. Blood exploding from his neck. He falls. We ate well that spring.

It's been 9 years. My father is long gone. But his lesson prevails. I walk these streets seeing Bucks and juniors all around me. Seeing the ladder we all want to climb but few ever will. I need that edge. I need that wariness. Like the king burdened with his crown, the weight of betrayal ever on his shoulder. I need something to make me raw. 

If I was pursued and chased like the king, what a man I could be. If I'm not caught and killed, robbed and broken I could see with true eyes those who mean me harm and those I can work with. I need to be chased. I need to be prey.