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An indie fantasy comic book, a Xenofiction of animals of the prehistoric Pleistocene epoch by Kay Fedewa.

In the era where great mammoths roam the earth, and true civilization has yet to be born, a wolf named Swiftkill has long eked out a solitary life on the edges of the land of Inaria after the death of her mother. Said life is interrupted by a run-in with two hyenas about to eat a young Inarian wolf named Cricket, whom Swiftkill saves from them.

Because of Swiftkill's infamous reputation as the "green-eyed devil", she's soon captured by the Inarians and sentenced to death in their tar pits before the intervention of their leader, Zephyr. When she runs off upon release and gets followed by Cricket, who seeks to help Inaria, the two of them end up going on a journey that leads them first to the deserts of the Shadeless pack, and eventually the territory of the notorious Rubicund faction, where a past that Swiftkill would prefer to leave behind lies in wait...

The current story is a reboot of the original comic. The reboot can be read here. The original comic (which had a different storyline) can be read here.

Not to be confused with Blackblood Brothers.

Now has a character page!


The reboot provides examples of:

  • Action Girl: Swiftkill is an active fighter capable of effortlessly beating two hyenas at once. Bloodspill also counts, being able to take down two saber-toothed tigers.
  • Adapted Out: Nightrun, a main character in the old comic, is not in the reboot (and replaced in role by Cricket). Word of God states this is due to Nightrun being The Generic Guy.
  • Adaptation Species Change: All non-Rubicund characters are grey wolves rather than dire wolves like in the old comic. Downplayed with Swiftkill, who's a hybrid.
  • Amazing Technicolor Wildlife:
    • Apparently, the wilds of prehistoric America were filled with bright red, yellow and orange dire wolves. Some Inarian gray wolves have tints of even stranger colors like purple. It works, as the style and art is very beautiful and professional, and resembles an animated film.
    • Swiftkill somehow manages to combine red and greyish-cream and still look nice despite (or maybe because of) the unusual color combo.
  • Animal Religion: In the prologue, Swiftkill tells her dying mother that she prayed like she showed her to and asks if God is with her now. "God" then shows up, but it's a hellish hyena that eats her mother offscreen (and threatens to kill her as well unless she watches him do it.) It's not clear whether the hyena really is something supernatural or if it's just a normal hyena that only appears demonic because we're seeing it through Swiftkill's perspective and is calling itself "god" to further break her.
  • Art Evolution: The new comic has a bit of a Don Bluth film feel to it compared to the old comic. The art quality also has improved greatly, though the original is still very beautiful.
  • Big Brother Bully: A female version. Bloodspill was this to her half-sister Swiftkill when they were pups.
  • Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: Cricket tries to warn Swiftkill not to go into Shadeless territory by saying, "They're legendary bandits! Cannibals! Cannibal bandits!"
  • Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": Rhinos are "Broadhorn," horses are "Equus." There's also "Fastcats," which appears to be serval-like cats.
  • Canine Confusion: Most of the wolves have body proportions that look too thin for gray wolves, let alone dire wolves.
  • Cartoony Tail: Of the common, taper off-to-a-point variety.
  • Cruel and Unusual Death: The Inarians execute criminals by throwing them into tar pits. Swiftkill nearly suffers this fate before Zephyr intervenes.
  • Dire Beast: Naturally, as it does take place in Prehistoric America. Dire Wolves are a race in this setting, known as the Rubicund. There are also prehistoric hyenas (even bigger than Swiftkill), Broadhorns (Giant rhinos), and a prehistoric horse is seen.
  • Feminist Fantasy: Both versions of the comic are very good about having powerful, well-developed female characters, and most of the characters driving the plot (in both versions) thus far are female.
  • Funny Background Event: When Cricket frees Swiftkill, Swiftkill makes her getaway and runs past the elders and Zephyr. All of them have a reaction, and one of them can be seen taking the time to save the bone she had been chewing on.
  • Gory Discretion Shot: We're not actually shown Swiftkill's mother getting eaten.
  • Heinous Hyena: Swiftkill's mother was eaten by a hyena years prior when she was still a puppy, and two hyenas attempt to eat Cricket in the beginning before Swiftkill interferes. Their leader, the Queen of Thorns, sends her male harem after Swiftkill to kill her in revenge, and she only escapes by trespassing into Inaria.
  • Intergenerational Friendship: Swiftkill is a loner and isn't exactly fond of Cricket at first, but Cricket immediately latches on to her like she's a cool big sister, and Swiftkill is concerned enough about her safety to look for her after she wanders into very dangerous Rubicund territory.
  • Luke Nounverber: Swiftkill, Sunstride, Bloodspill, etc. Seems to be a common wolven name style.
  • Mythology Gag:
    • Swiftkill biting into a butterfly out of the air is highly reminiscent of how she and some of the other Blackbloods caught bats in the old comic. The bat-eating returns when the Shadeless decide to share dinner with Swiftkill.
    • The character Heatstroke may have been inspired by Yuff, a coyote character that never got to appear in the original comic. They even have the Shared Unusual Trait of mismatched eyes.
  • Noble Wolf: Most of the wolves are good.
  • Obviously Evil: The brown hyena who forces Swiftkill to watch him scavenge her mother gives off a nasty impression even before he actually does anything, thanks to his glowing red eyes, torn ear, constant grinning with jagged teeth, and ragged-looking appearance.
  • People of Hair Color: Animal version. Each pack roughly has its own typical coat color, though there are wolves who don't follow this pattern. Inarians tend to have gray fur, the Rubicund have red fur, the Shadeless used to have a brownish color, but their descendants tend to have yellow on them now (Anyway is an exception with their dark fur). The hyenas also follow this trope. They tend to be a hard to describe brownish-yellowish color.
  • Proud Warrior Race: Implied to be the case with the Rubicund.
  • Related in the Adaptation:
    • Greyback and Whitewind/Zephyr are mates in the original, but are uncle and niece in the reboot instead.
    • Swiftkill and Bloodspill are now half-sisters. They were full-blooded sisters in the original.
  • Retcon: The story of the reboot was changed so that Swiftkill rips a male hyena's eye out in the beginning, but the relevant pages haven't been remade to reflect this yet.
  • Savage Wolves: The Rubicund are very warlike, and they kill intruders on sight.
  • Scenery Porn: The backgrounds of the forests, mountains, and deserts are very detailed.
  • Science Marches On: Unfortunately, recent DNA evidence has indicated that despite their very strong skeletal similarities, dire wolves were actually not true wolves at all and belong to their own genus, which in real-life has brought into question whether they could breed with gray wolves, like Swiftkill's mother did.
  • Shown Their Work:
    • The hyenas are based on a real, obscure] hyena genus (Chasmaporthetes, also known as running hyenas) that actually lived in America alongside wolves at the time. Their designs are appropriately more doglike compared to living hyenas, as the genus is known as the "dog-like" hyenas. Their designs also resemble striped hyenas and brown hyenas, two real and still living hyena species that are only a tad less obscure.
    • The "Equus" appears to be a Equus occidentalis, also known as the Western horse. It was one of the animals dire wolves actually preyed upon.
  • Talking Animal: The characters are mostly talking wolves, with some hyenas and saber-toothed tigers thrown in.
  • Unrelated in the Adaptation: The appendix of the original comic listed Riptide (the old version of Sunstride) as Swiftkill and Bloodspill's cousin. In the reboot, he's part of a different pack called the Shadeless and doesn't seem to be related to either of them.
  • What the Hell, Hero?: Sunstride calls Swiftkill out after she insists on letting the Inarians starve.
    Sunstride: I live with a whole pack of jerks, and I gotta say... You're a pretty big jerk.

The old comic provides examples of:

  • Aerith and Bob: Most of the wolves have Luke Nounverber-type names like Swiftkill and Whitewind, but unusual names like Imek and Avie appear sporadically as well.
  • All There in the Manual: There are some things in the character refs that have not been revealed in the comic yet, like Bloodspill will have a child with Blade, for example.
  • Art Evolution: Just compare the old version with the new.
  • Artistic License – Biology: A real Saber-toothed cat probably would have broken its sabers off if it tried to use them the way the ones in the comic do, but that's just Rule of Cool in action.
  • Big "NO!": Swiftkill, once she realizes what she's done.
  • Black Blood: Averted, despite the name.
  • The Cameo: Some of the wolves in the background belong to other people, like the tan wolf with white legs and hair that appears in the background of this page and this page came from this comic
  • Cats Are Mean: The main antagonists are saber-toothed tigers.
  • Circling Monologue: Rapier does this to Swiftkill.
  • Double Entendre: "Tseck out mer bats."
  • Everyone Is Related: The Blackblood wolves are a result of inbreeding. Also, Rapier is the half-sister of Bloodspill and Swiftkill through their father, Banehallow.
  • The Exile: All of the blackbloods.
  • Facial Markings: Blackbloods have this. The amount indicates their rank.
  • Gambit Pileup: The saberteeth are trying to conquer the wolves of Inaria, who seek help from the Blackblood wolves, who Blade's faction are plotting against. But only some Blackbloods want to help Inaria, so the Blackblood group quickly splits in two. Also, there is a secret group of malcontents within Inaria's pack who want to usurp the current alpha(s), so they orchestrated the Blackblood wolves' exile years before. Now, the Blackblood wolves actually know about this faction and what it did to them, but the Inarian pack refuses to believe them, partly because the malcontents are led by one of the alphas' daughters. All this is established in one issue.
  • Glowing Eyes of Doom: Swiftkill during "the Fury", see below
  • Just Between You and Me: Rapier does this to Swiftkill.
  • Licensed Game: Used to be in development, but the creator states it fell through.
  • Mix-and-Match Critters: Subtle example: The moth in issue 2 is a mix of several different moth species.
  • Mook Chivalry: The wolves with Rapier take Swiftkill on one by one, instead of doing the sensible thing and ganging up on her.
  • Obviously Evil: Rapier. Black fur? Jagged markings? Red eyes? It would be impossible to not think she wasn't going to be the villain when she first appeared!
    • A parody comic Lampshaded this by naming Rapier "Evilsoul."
  • Paid Harem: Blade is first introduced lounging with two female wolves, one of whom he immediately shoves aside while berating some messengers reporting to him.
  • Panthera Awesome: The saber-toothed cats.
  • Parental Favoritism: Blade is more highly regarded by his mother Rapier than his two siblings, Claymore and Scythe, and thus gets to boss them around.
  • Red and Black and Evil All Over: Rapier, a villain, is black and white with red eyes. However, this was supposed to be averted later with Bloodspill's son, a mostly black, somewhat evil looking wolf with red eyes.
  • Refusal of the Call: When Inaria sends for the Blackbloods to help them fight the Sabres, Swiftkill refuses to go, as does Bloodspill. The rest of the wolves, on the other hand, choose to go in the hope of regaining their honor and proving their loyalty to Inaria.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning: Rapier has these.
  • Take a Third Option: Played in a far darker way then usual. In an attempt to remove all her rivals for the Inarian throne, Rapier tries to kill her two younger siblings. They scatter in different directions, forcing Swiftkill to chose which pup to save. Swiftkill goes into "The Fury" and mauls Rapier, and for a moment it looks like she took a third option and saved both pups. In her rage, she unintentionally killed BOTH pups herself.
  • Unstoppable Rage: "The Fury", an inherent flaw of the Blackbloods.
  • Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Rapier pulls one of these.
  • You No Take Candle:
    • The birds.
    • Bloodspill starts speaking like that, too, when she is hunting lizards with Swiftkill.

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