Young Writers Society

This makes me want to read more. The only nit-pick I have is that a few times you used it's instead of its.

ayden's heart, pounding in his ears, was the only thing he could hear as he slunk through the silent forest. The evening light barely leaked through the dense canopy of ash and maple leaves, splattering the forest floor with sun in only a few places. Even with the dim lighting and the thick brush covering the ground, he could make still make out the familiar shape of a bobcat. The feline was stalking its prey carefully, padding as quietly as if it were walking on the air itself. Suddenly the cat stopped, tilting his disc-like ears forward. Jayden froze on the spot, not even daring to breathe. He watched as the bobcat tensed, preparing itself for the kill. Also becoming tense, Jayden carefully measured the distance between himself and the bobcat. He prepared himself to capture the squirrel if the bobcat failed to. As the bobcat leaped through the air, landing neatly on the fuzzy rodent, Jayden let out a pleased sigh. He shouldn't have underestimated the natural born predator so easily.

The bobcat swung its' huge head around, the squirrel dangling limply from it's mouth. Jayden chuckled as it ran eagerly towards him. The proud bobcat carefully set the lifeless animal at his feet. Purring loudly, the cat placed a muddy paw on the boy's deerskin leather pants. 

“All right, all right!” Jayden laughed, pushing the clawed foot off him, “So what did we catch today, Bob?” he asked the bobcat, bending over and picking up the squirrel's body. He opened up a pouch that was on his belt, dropping the squirrel inside. “Looks like two grouse, three -I mean- four squirrels, and a mouse.”

Jayden looked at Bob playfully, whipped the mouse out of the pack, and tossed it high in the air. Giving an excited yelp, Bob leapt up and swatted at the mouse. He played with the cat like this for a while, until it got bored and ate the little animal. Then the bobcat looked at him with it's large green eyes, which reflected Jayden's own violet-gray eyes. Jayden sighed and tapped his friend's muzzle, reluctantly letting him know it was okay if he left. Giving a grunt, the bobcat turned and bounded into the foliage.

Jayden turned in the opposite direction, moving south. He walked through the trees alone, peacefully listening to the chide of birds or the occasional chatter of an angry squirrel as he passed under it's home. The wind gently flowed through the forest, blowing his shaggy black hair into his face. He reached a small brook that was filled with clear, untainted water and stooped to fill his water pouch. Afterwards, he turned and walked a few feet to an old, weathered looking oak. He placed both hands on the tree's rough bark, found the usual hand holds, and started the familiar climb to the top of the ancient tree. It only was a matter of seconds before Jayden reached the large branch near the top of the tree that he called home.

The branch was at least five feet thick and as wide as he was tall. It reached out fifteen feet or so to the east. A rough, hand-made blanket lay in the midst of the branch. He stepped onto the branch and went over to sit down on the blanket. There he emptied out his pouch and sorted through the animal's bodies. Jayden slipped out a rusted knife from his belt. He took the first grouse he and the bobcat had caught that morning and started to pluck it. He hummed a tune he had learned when he was little softly as he got into the rhythm of preparing food. As the day wore on, he finished skinning, gutting, and setting out the meats to smoke on a spit over a small fire he had made. The fire was inside a medium sized pit that he had carved out of the tree limb and lined with stones, to make sure the tree wouldn't burn. The rest of the animal carcasses were used for fish bait or to make water pouches like the one he carried on his waist.

As the sun began to set, Jayden put out his fire and started on a meal he had prepared the day before. Like always, he started to think about his plans for the next day until his mind drifted off to some deeper thoughts. Jayden rarely thought about his life before he came to the forest, but today something sparked a feeling he hadn't felt for a while. Loneliness. He remembered the day when his father left him in the woods. He was only six then, so small and defenseless. Why had his father left him like that? Did he not want him anymore, was there something wrong with him? Shaking his head of the thoughts, Jayden forced himself to move his mind on other things. 

"I told you we should have camped back there! Now what do we do?" a deep, husky voice bellowed below the tree. Jayden literally jumped up and almost yelled, but covered his mouth in time. His heart started to race and he could feel the adrenaline rise up in him. Humans! How had they gotten so close to his home without him noticing? Jayden blamed himself for zoning out on pointless things, and told himself to calm down.

Jayden wasn't unfamiliar with other humans. They occasionally passed by on the outskirts of the forest, and he only ever saw them when he was on a long hunting trip, about once every three months. He only got close to one once, when a man had camped near a river bank and left his knife outside his tent. That's where Jayden got his cleaning knife. Never, though had another human come this far into the forest. He had no choice but to stay as still and quiet as possible and hope they didn't notice his presence.

"Well, I didn't think we'd be tracking this jip-thing for so long!" came another, higher voice in reply to the first.

The first voice rang out, "Don't try to put this on me, I'm not the one with the super-brain!"

"Apparently NOT!" said the high voice angrily. Jayden wondered what they were talking about. Tracking? Super-brain? Jayden dared to creep to the edge of the branch, peering cautiously over the edge. He forced back a gasp as he saw four humans were stopped right below his tree, two carrying some serious looking weapons. He cursed the weather for being rainy the day before, and hoped they wouldn't go to the other side of the tree and find his footprints in the mud. Fro what he could tell, they were all around his age, and among them, two out of the four were girls. They all wore clothes that looked like they were one piece, closely fitted black things that covered them from the neck down. He looked down at his own clothes, a loosely worn leather tunic, with baggy leather pants underneath it. 

"Not only what they say, but what they wear is weird." He thought to himself. Curiosity pricked at him and he had the urge to go down and talk to them, but he knew better. All other humans had ever done for him was bring him pain. But fate had another plan, for what they said next changed his decision. 

"Whatever," said the first voice, which belonged to a tall, muscular boy, "The sooner we find that bobcat the better. I just want to get out of this jip-pit and go get an upgrade." He kicked the side of the oak impatiently.

"Is it really worth that much, Doris?" asked the other boy, who was shorter and thinner. He looked weak and was very pale with thick, black framed glasses and neatly cut brown hair.

"Since it's a male, at least eighty, if not a hundred. We went over this, Lakota!" announced Doris, a small girl with short blonde hair. The other girl, with ginger hair and probably as tall as Jayden was, stayed silent.

"Just shuddup already. We should keep going until dark, then set up, since it's pretty pointless to backtrack now." growled the tall boy. With that they fell silent and kept going on into the forest.

After they had went aways, Jayden let out a breath and tried to process what they had said. He didn't want to believe it because he absolutely did not want to follow them, but there was only one male bobcat on this side of the forest. He rubbed his right temple, as he did whenever he felt angry, and knew what he had to do. He had to save his hunting partner and friend, Bob.