Totem Animals: Porcupine

Porcupine

Porcupine's trail through the woods leads straight to his feeding tree: a giant, solitary hemlock growing out of the shallow depression of an old moraine. Porcupine feeds on the tree's pinecones, bark, and needles high up in the crown at night, and at the morning's first rays, he climbs down and enters his underground den, whose chambers wind among the hemlock's ancient root system.

Today is an unusual day for porcupine because he must replace his lost quills. There are only two ways a porcupine can lose its quills: through battle or by by dark deed. The reason porcupine now shivers unprotected as a rat under his tree is that he has killed his brother in cold blood and stolen his beautiful wife. She is kept now in his dankest cavern, unfed until she submits to his will, which she has not.

Porcupine decides to replace his lost quills with sea urchin needles, since the beach is not very far. In the tidal pools there are many shiny black sea urchins. Their inky spikes sparkle in the misted light. Porcupine collects and glues the urchin spikes to his hide, and soon he is resplendent in borrowed black needles. Satisfied with his new armor, he makes the hike back to his home tree.

Eager to impress his captive, he unlocks the dungeon door to show his brother's wife his resurfaced exterior. But before he can complete a single twirl, she attack, ripping out the narrow quills. Naked and bleeding to death, she buries him alive inside her once prison.

If porcupine is your totem animal, commit no dark deeds and you will be fine.