Aki ran into the woods as soon as a guy on the next beach opened up with a small caliber weapon. She entreats me to join her in the forest’s safety as the gun’s “pop, pop, pop, pop, pop” reaches us over the sound of surf. Is that is why the crows settled so near our trail on that rocky point? A murder of the birds were squatting just above the surf line when we broke onto the beach. Others were migrating to Shaman Island after rising from the rocks like Tolkien’s wraighs.

Ignorant of Hobbits and rings, Aki could ignore the crows but not the shots. I don’t know when she first connected danger with gunshots. She does have a cautious nature. Early in the walk she refused to leave the trail to follow me onto the frozen beaver pond. Did she know that beavers chew away at the under portions of the ice covering their pond so they can always reach their den after the pond ice thickens. A Yup’ik elder told me that years ago in another part of Alaska, but that was long before Aki arrived in my life. Maybe she intuits it.

I hadn’t planned on walking down beach to the shooter’s position so I muttered the bird hunting season ended a month ago you Yahoo and joined the little dog in the woods.