Even after his eyes had opened wide and he had found his legs so that he could stumble about a little in the darkness, nothing existed for Baree but his mother.

When he was old enough to be playing with sticks and moss out in the sunlight, he still did not know what she looked like.

But to him she was big and soft and warm, and she licked his face with her tongue, and talked to him in a gentle, whimpering way that at last made him find his own voice in a faint, squeaky yap.
And then came that wonderful day when the greenish balls of fire that were Kazan's eyes came nearer and nearer, a little at a time, and very cautiously.

Heretofore Gray Wolf had warned him back.

To be alone was the first law of her wild breed during mothering time.