The Dog Master: A Novel of the First Dog

by W. Bruce Cameron

  Silex abruptly stood, gesturing for everyone else to remain seated. “Be silent,” he urged. He stepped away from the fire. “You are starving,” he called to the huge wolf. Time had not been good to her—he could see her ribs, and her skin hung loosely from them. There was no mistaking the handprint-shaped mark between her eyes, though: this was the same she-wolf who had taken tribute from him earlier that summer. “Where is your pack? You are too young to be on your own.”

  Silex looked back to his tribesmen, who were frozen in place, both awed and frightened. “She is not eating. She is too young and inexperienced to hunt successfully,” he told his men. Moving decisively, he bent and picked up the haunch of one of the reindeer. When he glanced at Duro, he saw confusion, though the rest of the Wolfen were gazing at Silex in disbelief.

  “Here,” Silex offered. He advanced slowly and the large she-wolf tensed. He was unnerved by the way her eyes locked on his, her ears up inquisitively, but he had gone too far with this to turn around. “All is good. This is for you.”

  Her lips drew back from her teeth. All right, far enough. Silex halted, still holding eye contact. He swung his arm and the meat arced toward the large female and she recoiled, scrambling backward.

  The men behind him all began speaking at once and Silex viciously chopped the air without looking at them, signaling for silence. He got it. Silex waited, now—he could see the female twenty paces away. She was yawning with tension, unsure.

  When she started forward again, Silex nodded encouragement. “For you,” he repeated.

  The large female managed to close her jaws around the offering without ever breaking eye contact with Silex, appearing ready to flee if he so much as twitched. But when she had it, when she held the meat in her mouth, she gave the Wolfen leader a frank, almost appraising look before turning and dragging the haunch into the darkness.

  Silex forced himself to inhale several times, willing his hands to stop trembling. He affected nonchalance as he turned back to the fireside, pretending not to notice the reverential stares from his men. This night would be legend.

  “Now, Duro, what were we talking about?” Silex asked lightly.

  Assessing Duro’s scowl, Silex realized the next challenge would not be verbal.

  TWELVE

  Year Nineteen

  The mother-wolf heard the man leaving through the hole that went to the sky. His scent carried with it some of the marmot meat he had recently eaten, and for a moment there was a slight increase in the smoky odors always present in the downdraft—she couldn’t know that as he scaled upward, the man was dislodging soot left from his cave fires, sending a fine black powder wafting on the air.

  Usually the man’s scent faded entirely on days such as these, but she was drowsily aware that he was still up there, somewhere, close enough for his smell to come to her in a steady flow.

  She was now so accustomed to his presence that she easily fell back to sleep, but her eyes jerked open when she heard him making noises. “Run! Wolves! Run!” There was an alarm in his sounds, and the fur on the back of her neck rose, her body stiffening. Though slumbering, her pups reacted, instinctively moving closer to her with soft peeps.

  “No!”

  The mother-wolf remained on uneasy alert, tense, wondering what was happening.

  Year One

  Albi determinedly strode toward Urs, her stick thumping audibly. His stomach felt as if he were digesting bad meat when he saw her. Now what? He had to brace himself against the impulse to flee to the protection of the men’s side of camp.

  “Hunt Master,” she greeted evenly.

  He nodded warily.

  “The weather is turning dry and cold. Though it would be somewhat early, I believe it is time to prepare for our move to winter quarters. We do not want to be caught in the snows, and it would seem they want to descend upon the Kindred hastily this year. We should leave in just one handful of days.”

  He was surprised. In his opinion, it was really the women who decided when they were to move, as the men instinctively knew that if their wives were not ready to go, the husbands could not make them. The women did all the labor anyway, hauling children and the animal skins, as well as dried berries and roots. The men carried their weapons. But such an important decision was obviously best made with the hunt and the council working together. Hunt master was a job he needed to learn while simultaneously doing it.

  “You are right,” he grunted.

  She eyed him. “So what are you going to do, Hunt Master?” she asked.

  Calli and Bellu, walking together, strode by on the other side of the camp, both of them staring at him. Suddenly the question What are you going to do? carried more than one meaning. His whole life was teetering on that question. It was too much and he turned away from the two women even as Bellu raised her hand and smiled. “It is time to hunt,” Urs said decisively. “We go tomorrow.”

  Out on the hunt, away from Kindred, he could contemplate, figure things out.

  What are you going to do?

  Year Nineteen

  Gya’s family stayed behind because his woman was set to give birth. None of his children were old enough to hunt with him on their own. So, though it was unusual for him to hunt without his mate and her brothers, Gya was by himself, tracking reindeer through a treed area near a small stream. He held a spear and was advancing steadily toward his prey—a young reindeer who had strayed just a few paces away from its mother, munching steadily on new spring grasses.

  When Gya sensed he was being watched, he looked up and saw someone standing on the top of a small rock bluff, many paces distant. It was a member of what Gya’s creed called the Horde—the tribes of smaller, odd-looking beings who moved in such large numbers, unlike Gya’s people, who formed units based on family and rarely comingled with others of their kind. Gya had never seen a lone Horde before, and stared. The Horde-man stared back.

  There was no threat, so, after a moment, Gya turned back to the task before him. He crept slowly forward, hiding in the grasses, until he was well within spear range. When he stood, it was in a smooth, unhurried motion that caught the herd’s attention but did not scatter them.

  He heaved his weapon and followed through on his throw by picking up a rock all in one movement, launching himself at his target, which had frozen in shock when the spear caught it in the neck. Now it turned away but Gya was on it, seizing the reindeer by the antler and clubbing at it with the rock. The reindeer bucked wildly, trying to shake the hunter off, but Gya’s hold was fiercely strong. The wound bled hot and in profusion, and the blows to its head stunned the animal. After dragging Gya twenty paces its knees buckled and hunter and prey fell to the ground together.

  Gya grunted but held on, evading the reindeer’s kicking hooves. When the animal halted its struggle, he leaped to his feet, withdrew his spear, and finished the kill.

  Gya rubbed his shoulder. A pain had flashed through him when the reindeer fell on him, and now his right arm moved stiffly, something grating inside. Still, he would feed his family.

  When he had caught his breath, Gya seized the back legs of the dead reindeer and began dragging it away. He had not gone far at all when he heard a noise—a human shout.

  He had forgotten about the Horde-man. Gya looked up. The small man was still on the rock, but was waving his arms now, waving them at Gya, his yelling barely audible across the distance. “Run! Wolves! Run!”

  Gya stared. The Horde did not speak the Language, so there was no sense to what was being said, nor really anything Gya would call “words.” Just sounds, but they nonetheless seemed to convey alarm, somehow. The Horde-man was still gesturing wildly.

  Gya could make no sense of any of it. It was strange enough that a member of the Horde would be alone, but that he was trying to communicate with Gya was unprecedented. Was he angry that Gya had taken prey so close to where he stood? Did the Horde-man live in the rocks? The Hordes were hostile people who attacked without provocation.

  Gya was s
till pondering this and the Horde-man was still shouting when a ghost of movement caught his eye. He whirled, sucking in a breath.

  Six grey wolves, coming straight at him, moving fast. Gya gripped his spear and shouted, baring his teeth, full of fear and rage. His first impulse, that he could not abandon his kill, that he needed the meat for his family, froze him in place, which gave the wolves time to close the distance. By the time he decided to run the wolves had committed to taking him.

  The injury in his shoulder caused his throw to go wide and Gya was unable to spear a single wolf before they caught him, hitting him high and low. He fought them but they were savagely strong, their jaws crunching his bones, and Gya’s screams were quickly extinguished.

  Gya was still struggling when he lost consciousness. His last thought, oddly, was for the lone Horde-man still shouting up on the rocks—could he have been trying to warn Gya about the wolves?

  Year One

  The Kindred migrated by following their stream as it meandered south, but their path was never precisely the same from year to year because they also tracked migrating herds of ungulates. At about midpoint, they came to the place where their tribal stream joined the much larger river. The confluence held grave significance—their territory lay between their stream and this river, so now it was as if they had run out of land.

  From here the waters turned and flowed into a wide, fertile valley. The herds of deer and elk might follow the river but the Kindred could not—that land belonged to the Cohort. And now, at the rim of the river valley, the tribe moved silently, carefully placing their footsteps. Mothers held their babies to their breasts—older children who were too small to understand found a parent’s hand clamped over their mouths. The hunt stayed close and alert, clutching their spears. The slightest sound from anyone drew angry glances.

  No one knew what would happen if their trespass was detected by the Cohort.

  Calli carried her burdens without complaint, her eyes on Urs’s back as he led the Kindred. She was so proud to see him in front and in command. He had managed to avoid her during the entire trek, but he had not spoken to Bellu, either—Bellu was both vocal and bitter about that.

  “Perhaps,” Calli had suggested to her friend a few days before, “he does not want to spend time conversing because he has many important decisions to make.”

  “The most important decision has already been made,” Bellu had pointed out loftily.

  Bellu’s brothers had the honor of guarding the rear, though it seemed something of a challenge to be walking backward. Vent, in particular, could not seem to master the technique. They were a full two days past the river junction when Vent tripped over a root and went sprawling. Nix, Bellu’s youngest brother, was next to him, and began giggling, unable to stop even when he jammed his own fist into his mouth. Soon all of Bellu’s brothers were snorting, trying to hold it in, and then laughter swept through the Kindred. No one had ever seen sign of the Valley Cohort this far south. They were safe.

  Bellu ran to Urs and threw her arms around him, and he hugged her back. Calli approached, hands spread, and first hugged Bellu, and then Urs, and then nearly everyone in the tribe—but it was the feel of Urs’s strong body pressed up against her that she remembered.

  That night, Pex, Bellu’s father, invited Urs to their family fire. The Kindred had fresh reindeer meat from a recent kill, and the good feeling of having eluded the Cohort made them merry.

  Calli helped her mother prepare the communal meal for the widows and orphans who did not have a man involved in the hunt. When a roar of approving laughter rose behind her, she turned and saw Urs kissing Bellu—or at least, she was kissing him, leaning far forward on her hands and knees, thrusting her face at him. From Calli’s position, Urs looked trapped. Yet the kiss went on, Bellu’s brothers all yelling, long after Urs should have broken it off.

  Calli gasped in a breath. She had not realized she was weeping.

  “Let go of this,” Coco murmured beside her. Calli turned and cried harder when she saw the sympathy in her mother’s eyes.

  “He is promised to marry Bellu. It is settled,” Coco said.

  “He is promised to me,” Calli corrected fiercely. But even as she said it, Urs pulled his lips away from Bellu and stared into his betrothed’s beautiful face, his eyes shining, an expression Calli had seen many times, always directed at her. He reached for Bellu and they kissed again, to much hooting from her brothers. Finally, Ador, Bellu’s mother, reached out and good-naturedly broke the couple apart, shaking a mock-warning finger at Urs, clearly telling him to wait until after the wedding.

  Coco seized Calli’s shoulders. “Calli, what did you think, that the two of you could do whatever you want? That is not the way.”

  “Why not?” Calli grated. “What would be the harm?”

  “It just is not the way.”

  Calli looked back at Urs. He and Bellu were kissing again.

  Year Nineteen

  The mother-wolf’s vision swam in a thick blur when she opened her eyes. She felt and smelled, rather than saw, her pups, who though blind were now able to move around in the den and did so with great enthusiasm, squeaking as they bumped into each other.

  They drew back in alarm from unexpected noises, such as the man’s feet landing on the floor of the crevice when he returned to the cave, but his touch and smell alleviated their fear—the mother-wolf could feel them take comfort when he held them.

  He was there. She smelled him, and could make out his shadow as he crouched over her head. He had a tension about him, and she could smell a change in his sweat. She twitched her tail in greeting, her ears back.

  “I saw something just now. A Frightened One—they are the strange clan who look like us but who are not human. They speak, but do not voice intelligible words.” He audibly inhaled. “The Frightened was hunting alone and he charged a herd of reindeer and speared one and then jumped on it and clubbed it. One Frightened, on his own, took down a reindeer.”

  The mother-wolf, blinking, could see the man more clearly. He was not looking at her; he had picked up one of the pups—the largest one, the female—and was staring at the puppy intently. So comfortable was the little wolf that she fell asleep in his hands.

  “I could never do that; I am not fast enough, not strong enough. And then … and then some wolves caught him. I saw them coming and tried to warn him, but I do not believe he understood. He died with courage: he was resolute. But it was horrible to watch.”

  He made a shuddering noise. “I cannot lose sight of what you are. I must accept what is true. It is a human’s way to kill animals, and it is the wolf’s way to kill humans. Nothing can change that. I do not want to die like the Frightened.”

  THIRTEEN

  Year One

  The turning point in the Kindred migration was marked by their arrival at the Blanc Tribe settlement. These were people who never went north in the summer nor south in the winter, but seemed content to remain camped on the shore of an enormous lake. Like the River Fish Clan, they used nets to pull fish from the waters, but they also hunted whenever the beasts of the plains were nearby.

  They were also very odd looking. Their eyes were pale, their hair and skin yellowish. They had been asked many times why they appeared so abnormal, but they did not know. They were like Palloc and his mother, Albi, in that way—no one could explain it. The Blanc did have a few children with normal dark eyes and brown skin, and no one could explain that, either.

  Urs, as hunt master, offered some reindeer meat to the Blanc, and they, in turn, proffered fish—the only time the Kindred ever sampled such odd flesh was on these migrations. Some claimed to like it, but most of the Kindred thought the stuff tasted strange. The Blanc also ate the green plants from their lake, which as far as the Kindred were concerned were bitter tasting, and hunted birds that floated on the water.

  Long ago, before Albi was born, her mother had broken her leg on the trek south. Albi’s mother was tended to by the Blanc Tribe and ultima
tely had spent the winter with them, while her husband went on with the rest of the Kindred. When they returned the woman’s leg had set, though she never walked without a limp after that. Soon after returning to the summer settlement, Albi was born. Perhaps, it was speculated, all the fish her mother had eaten that winter was what turned her baby’s hair and skin so white. At age three, during her naming ceremony, Albi’s mother-in-law, the oldest woman in the family, gave the child the formal name of Albine Pallus, “Her Colors Are the Palest Shade of White.” The short form, Albi, was the only name of its kind.

  No one knew why the Kindred always came to the Blanc, whose settlement was a little out of the direct path to the winter quarters—it was just done. And no one knew why the tribes were so friendly, or why they offered food to each other. Out on the plains, tribes did their best to avoid one another. But here with the Blanc, their children mingled and played, the men threw their spears at a tree and boasted over who could impale the wood from the farthest distance, and the women complimented each other on their babies. Of particular interest were the shiny shells the Blanc traded for food, bear teeth, and other Kindred wares. They were fragile and beautiful and highly prized by everyone in both tribes. Both the men and women of the Blanc tribe wore small shells in their hair, making them appear even more exotic.

  Calli had spoken little to anyone since her mother confronted her, and now, instead of joining the social interactions, she withdrew to a place where she could watch moodily.

  After a time, she concluded that the Blanc did not know how strange they looked because no person ever really contemplated how they themselves appeared—they only saw other people in their tribe, catching a glimpse of their own faces when they bent over still water. In the Kindred, only Bellu thought it necessary to gaze at herself in reflecting pools every day. So, while the Blanc must think that the others in their tribe were odd looking, they probably thought of themselves personally as normal, forgetting that they did not have dark eyes.