They say the woods behind our house are old—older than the town, older than the roads, older even than the stories that swirl through our valley like morning mist. I never believed in those stories. Not until the day I found my son, barefoot in the fog, flanked by two wild bobcats.
It began with a scream. Mine. My baby was gone. I tore through the house, doors locked, windows shut, his crib empty, panic clawing at my chest. I burst barefoot into the chill, breath burning, heart pounding. And there, beneath the old swing, I saw them: two great bobcats, Ash and Ember, crouched on either side of my son. He sat between them, perfectly calm, a smile on his lips.
I froze. The bobcats weren’t attacking. They weren’t playing. They were guarding him, one paw on each side as if he were their own. Ash leaned in and licked my baby’s cheek. My son laughed, delighted. I couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. These were the same bobcats we’d rescued after the wildfire, years before. We’d nursed them as kittens, but they’d vanished the week I learned I was pregnant. I never thought I’d see them again, and certainly not like this.
I scooped up my son, heart still racing, and hurried inside. Every lock checked, every window latched. That night, I watched the baby monitor like a hawk. At 3:28 a.m., the crib shook. Two glowing eyes appeared behind my sleeping child. I ran to his room, but found nothing—just my son, sound asleep, and a damp feather tucked beneath his blanket.
The days became stranger. The bobcats returned, always near my son, always gentle. They brought him gifts: a pine cone, a bird’s nest, a squirrel tail. I no longer felt fear. Confusion, awe, then a dangerous sort of trust replaced it. They never hurt him. They seemed to believe he was theirs.
Then came the morning that changed everything. I left my son playing in the living room for just five minutes. When I returned, he was gone. I found him in the den, curled between Ash and Ember. At their feet, a dead copperhead snake, its head crushed. Blood on the rug, but none on my son. The bobcats had killed it for him. They were not just companions—they were protectors.
How did they know the snake was there? How did they enter without a sound? No broken screens, no open doors, no paw prints. They moved through the house like smoke. That night, I sat by the nursery door, flashlight in hand. At 4:11 a.m., I woke to a soft thump. Ash and Ember lay outside, eyes fixed on the door, unmoving, silent sentinels.
My husband listened to my story, his face pale. “I don’t know if this is beautiful or terrifying,” he whispered. The next day, we found paw prints in the snow—bobcat, coyote, and something else. Something that had come to the window and turned away.
The camera footage glitched every night. Motion sensors flickered, then went black. The company blamed animals, trees, faulty circuits. But I knew better. The bobcats’ presence was not a coincidence.
My son began to change. He stopped reacting to loud noises unless Ash or Ember did. He started crawling low, smooth, almost gliding like them. He made a low, rumbling trill from the back of his throat—a sound the bobcats used. One day, I played a recording of a bobcat call. My son froze, looked at the door, and moments later, Ember appeared outside, summoned by the sound.
My sister visited and saw Ash curled at the foot of the crib, Ember perched on the dresser. She panicked, called them predators. But when my son reached out to feed Ember a banana through the screen, she accepted it gently and walked away.
The pediatrician came, checked my son, watched as the bobcats licked his fingers, curled protectively around him. “They’re not acting like animals,” he said quietly.
One night, I left the nursery door open. Ash entered first, silent as shadow, and lay beside the crib. Ember followed, curling at the foot. They stayed until sunrise, guardians from another world.
The next morning, I found a shredded piece of cloth outside the nursery—familiar, from my son’s jacket. Blood on the fence, coyote prints circling, but no sign of a fight. The bobcats had driven something away.
Then came the men in black jackets, wildlife control. They asked about the bobcats. I lied, said I hadn’t seen them. That night, the bobcats circled the porch, muscles tense, eyes scanning. My son pressed his face to the glass, whispering the low trill. The wind rattled the trees. The power flickered and died. I ran to his room. Ash stood before the crib, a dead blackbird on the pillow—a message, not a gift.
The next morning, Ember nudged a wolf’s paw onto our welcome mat. The bobcats were not just protecting my son from animals. Something else was out there—something hunting him.
My husband wanted to call for help, to send the bobcats away. But Ash growled, deep and threatening, at us. That night, something crashed against the back door. Claw marks, muddy footprints—human, not animal—trailed away into the woods.
The next day, my son fell ill. Fever, vomiting, no diagnosis. In the hospital, Ash appeared on the window ledge, pressed a bone to the glass. Minutes later, my son’s fever broke. We returned home. Ash and Ember waited, ever watchful.
A week later, my husband found an old stone structure buried in the field—bones, animal and human, inside. The historian called it a watcher’s altar, built by a tribe who believed in guardian spirits that protected chosen children.
On my son’s second birthday, Ash and Ember appeared beneath the oak. My son walked barefoot to them, sat between them, and closed his eyes. They stayed for an hour, silent, sacred, guardians claimed and claiming.
Now, every evening, my son sits by the door, waiting. Sometimes they come, sometimes not. But always, he waits in trust. Some bonds are older than words, older than blood. Some wild things are not wild at all. They are ancient, chosen, and watching.
And in our home, at the edge of the woods, my son sleeps peacefully, guarded by the watchers of Wildwood.
