Spirit of the Wolves

by Dorothy Hearst

  “Ours,” the black-eared cub said again, and both cubs took off after Ázzuen, leaving the rest of the meat unguarded. Then Marra streaked onto the plain. Tlitoo had indeed found her. She dashed to the cubs, tripping them up. She moved so quickly that they couldn’t respond fast enough to right themselves before she tripped them again.

  I snatched up the larger piece of meat just as Ázzuen tossed his smaller piece of elk into the grass. The cubs followed, pouncing on the bit of meat as it fell. By then, Marra and I had made it more than halfway back to the humans with the larger piece of elk.

  Gasping, I plunked the meat down by the humans. The cubs were running toward us, but TaLi, BreLan, and HesMi all stepped forward and raised their sharpsticks. The cubs stopped, staring at the weapons. Ázzuen helped me pull the elk into the woods.

  HesMi grinned. TaLi watched the human leader, a gleam of triumph in her eye.

  “Can they do this again?” HesMi asked.

  “Yes,” BreLan said. “Whenever we want them to.” Ázzuen growled softly at him, and BreLan laughed. “Or whenever they want us to.”

  HesMi looked from BreLan to Ázzuen, confused, then laughed as well, as if just getting a joke. She picked up the meat and strode off toward the village. DavRian hissed like an angry raven and looked at me with such malice, I took a step back. Then he stalked after HesMi.

  That was when I heard the desperate mewling sound. I looked at Ázzuen, wondering if he was hurt, but he was looking out toward the plain. It was the longfang cubs, crying to their mother, who had returned empty-jawed from the carcass, a freely bleeding wound across her side. They watched us, and their whimpering grew louder.

  I knew that sound. I knew it from when I was not yet out of the den. It was the sound of hunger and desperation. I looked again at the cubs, remembered the sharp ribs of the one I had tackled. Even from the edge of the woods, I could see the panic and despair in their mother’s eyes. They were starving. And we had taken their food from them.

  I didn’t know why I cared. They were not wolf. They weren’t pack. But when I followed the humans into the woods, my tail fell between my legs and my ears folded flat with shame.

  13

  After the humans returned to Kaar, Ázzuen and I found a shady clearing amid elm trees and sage bushes and sank down in a soft patch of cool dirt. Marra had gone in search of MikLan, leaving the two of us to relax in the evening air. Within a few breaths, Ázzuen was snoring. I rolled onto my side and then onto my belly, but I was too restless to join him in sleep. I was pleased, both with our salmon hunt and with HesMi’s reaction on the longfang plain, but Even Night was less than seventeen days away, and it would take more than a few hunts and prey thefts to win the humans. I shifted restlessly.

  “You are fretting again, wolflet.” I hadn’t seen Tlitoo land on the branch above me. He dropped down with an inelegant thump and stalked toward me. The glint in his eye made me very nervous. He pushed in between me and Ázzuen.

  “What are you doing?”

  “You need to remember that not everything is duty and strife.”

  “I don’t think everything’s duty and strife,” I protested. “You ravens are the ones who yelled at me for not taking on the task.” They hadn’t actually yelled at me. They had clouted me with their wings and threatened me with sharp beaks and called me a coward when, back in the Wide Valley, I had been hesitant to take on so daunting a task.

  “And you must complete it, wolflet. It is what the Neja and the Moonwolf—the drelwolf—must do together.” He cocked his head to the left and then to the right, and the look in his eyes was as gentle as I’d ever seen it. “But you must remember why.”

  Before I could stop him, he placed his back against Ázzuen and his chest against me. I felt the sensation of falling. The aromas of mud and wolf and elm faded to nothingness.

  Flank by flank they ran, chasing the fear-blinded deer. Ázzuen scented the hunt-thrill rising from Kaala and heard the rapid beat of her heart. Each time her paws hit the earth, his slapped down beside them, each time she drew breath, his own breath . . .

  I yanked myself from Ázzuen’s thoughts.

  “No,” I gasped to Tlitoo, “it isn’t right.” I couldn’t ask TaLi’s permission to go inside her mind, because she didn’t understand me, but it was wrong to invade Ázzuen’s thoughts without asking. I had gone into his mind once before and still felt ashamed.

  Tlitoo regarded me curiously. “I had forgotten you could do that, wolf. I did not remember that you could make us leave.”

  I glared at him.

  “Very well, wolf,” he quorked. “I will not take you there if you do not wish to go. I just wanted you to see that there are days to come that will be good.”

  He settled next to me. Then he gave a startled croak and I was falling again, more quickly this time. Scent and sound flew from me. This time, though, they were replaced with a deep and painful chill.

  “I did not mean to bring us here, wolf,” he quorked.

  We were surrounded by what appeared to be the tall rocks of the Stone Circle of the Wide Valley. That plus the terrible cold told me where we were. The Inejalun was a place between the worlds. Tlitoo and I had been there before. He could not always find the place and sometimes it came to us unbidden. From there we had met the Greatwolf Indru, who, in the time before time, spoke to the Ancients to save wolfkind, and from there we had spoken to my ancestress Lydda, who had kept the Promise before me. I couldn’t stay there. The Inejalun was not safe for any living creature except for Tlitoo. If I stayed too long, the Inejalun would steal the warmth, and the life, from my body.

  “Get me out of here,” I said through a muzzle that was quickly freezing.

  “What do you think I am trying to do, wolf?” Tlitoo rasped, annoyed.

  We both saw something move across the Stone Circle at the same time. The shadow of a huge wolf fell upon the rocks, but there was no wolf to cast it. The Shadow Wolf turned his huge head, and I knew he was looking at me. We failed and we gave up, I thought I heard him say. We hid in a cave and forfeited the Promise and would not admit our shame. It is time to make amends. You are the one who will help us.

  My chest grew cold.

  “Go,” the Shadow Wolf said aloud. “You must not die here. I will find a way to come to you. I have been waiting for you to find me. There are things I must tell you. Go.”

  Then, as if someone had grabbed me by the scruff and hurled me across the Stone Circle, I awoke, back in the clearing next to Ázzuen.

  I gasped. Exhaustion overwhelmed me. Every time I went to the Inejalun, I was as tired as if I had run for three days straight without sleeping. That was another danger of the place. The longer I stayed, the worse it was. This time I had been there only a few moments.

  “I’m sorry, wolflet.” Tlitoo peered down at me. “I do not yet know all of the ways of the Inejalun. It has its own will.” His head sank down between his wings. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes,” I said, my eyes drooping. “I just need to rest.” That was all I was able to say before my eyes closed and I fell into a deep sleep.

  I awoke to the sounds of human and wolf laughter and opened my eyes to the bright light of high sun. Marra and MikLan were wrestling in the dirt, tumbling over each other. Marra stood atop MikLan’s chest, grabbed his spear, and pelted across the clearing. MikLan followed and snatched it back. Marra chased after him, letting him stay ahead of her. They were having so much fun that my own tail began to wave. Next to me, Ázzuen yipped at them.

  “You slept for almost a full day, Kaala!” he said. “I was going to drag you into the river if you hadn’t woken up soon!”

  I wished he had. I was so thirsty I could’ve swallowed an entire lake. I found a puddle of stagnant water and lapped it up. I’d lost a day. I tried to figure out how much time we had until Even Night, but my head ached from going to the Inejalun. I looked for Tlitoo. The branches above me were empty.

  MikLan lowered the stick just enough for Marra to g
rab it in her teeth. She pulled it from his grasp. Then it was his turn to chase her. She was faster than he was, of course, but she let him get just close enough to her that he almost caught her. Then she darted away. MikLan whooped at her as Ázzuen and I barked in encouragement. It felt so good, just for a moment, not to be worried about DavRian or Kaar or the fate of wolfkind.

  MikLan snatched the stick and pulled. Marra dug her paws into the dirt. The boy tried to drag her forward, and Marra stood on her hind legs and pushed her front paws into his chest, toppling him. Shouting with laughter, he shoved her back, and the two of them rolled over each other again and again in the dirt.

  They were making so much noise that I didn’t hear the other humans approaching. Three of them, led by DavRian, ran into the clearing, spears raised. I leapt to my feet and whoofed a warning to Marra.

  “Get it away from him!” DavRian yelled, running toward Marra. He slammed the point of his sharpstick down fast. She dodged out of the way.

  “She’s not hurting me!” MikLan shouted.

  The humans were too agitated to hear him. They had decided that Marra was a threat and were advancing on her, spears raised. MikLan put himself between Marra and DavRian, who shoved him away. The boy fell into the dirt.

  “Go!” MikLan shouted to Marra. She sneezed in protest and pawed at him. MikLan shoved her with his leg. “They won’t hurt me,” he said, his voice frantic as DavRian lunged again for Marra.

  Marra dodged. She looked at MikLan and then at me.

  “What are you waiting for?” I said. “MikLan will get hurt trying to protect you!”

  She bolted into the woods. Ázzuen and I followed her. We found her just a wolflength from the clearing, watching the humans from behind the cover of a laurel bush.

  “They won’t hurt him,” I said. She ignored me. She continued to watch the humans, her haunches tensed to leap.

  DavRian had slung an arm over MikLan’s shoulders. “You think the wolves are your friends but they aren’t,” he was saying. He ruffled MikLan’s hair. The younger boy tried to pull away and DavRian’s grip tightened around his shoulders. To the other humans it might have looked like DavRian was being friendly. I knew better.

  “Do you really want to be with those false krianans?” He said the word as if it were something disgusting. “I’m taking some of Kaar’s hunters to the Far Plain to hunt some aurochs I found on the way from the valley. Come with us.”

  MikLan just glared up at him and tried to pull away again, then seemed to think the better of it. He looked toward the bush we hid behind as if he could actually see Marra there. Maybe he could. She was quivering so violently, the bushes trembled.

  “I’m going back to Kaar,” he said, trying once more to pull away from DavRian.

  “We should all go back,” one of DavRian’s companions said. “Tell them about that wolf attacking him.”

  DavRian smiled. The three humans surrounded MikLan and hustled him from the clearing.

  Marra lunged. Ázzuen and I tackled her. I lay across her shoulders, Ázzuen across her rump.

  “They won’t hurt him,” I said again. “DavRian’s not that stupid.”

  “I shouldn’t have left him,” she said.

  “You had to,” I said, though I knew how she felt. I would have hated to leave TaLi alone with DavRian. I twisted to touch my nose to her face and felt her relax beneath me. Ázzuen and I stood, letting her up. Instead of following the humans back to Kaar, as I expected her to, she looked down at the dirt between her paws.

  “What is it?” I asked. It wasn’t like Marra to hesitate to speak.

  She shifted from paw to paw, and when she lifted her head to meet my gaze, there was a challenge in her eyes.

  “MikLan wants to go back to the valley to tell the krianans there what’s happening here,” she said.

  A hollow spot opened in my chest. He had said as much when we’d first brought TaLi to RalZun. It hadn’t bothered me then. Now, with such a huge task before us, I needed all the help I could get. And I knew what she wasn’t saying.

  “You want to go with him.”

  “It’s not safe for him to go alone”—she looked down again—“and I don’t want to be away from him so long.”

  It was something we’d never talked about. The love between human and wolf was so strong that being apart from them was as painful as a spear through the chest. When I was away from TaLi for too long, I felt as if part of myself was missing. It sometimes made me wonder if I was truly loyal to my pack.

  I wanted so much to ask Marra to stay. I couldn’t imagine winning Kaar over without her. Yet I knew I couldn’t. Not only would it be unfair to ask her to be apart from MikLan, but I knew she was right. The trip back could be hazardous. I would never let TaLi travel back to the valley alone. That was the thing about loving a human. They always seemed to walk into danger and it was our duty to protect them.

  Besides, if the humans thought Marra was dangerous, it was no longer safe for her in Kaar.

  “Yes,” I said. “You should go.”

  She lowered her ears just a little. “I’ll come back,” she offered, “once MikLan is safe.”

  I looked at my paws. “Tell the pack what’s going on here. I was going to ask Jlela to, but they’ll trust you more than a raven. Come back and tell us what they say. Tell us if they’re all right.”

  She swung her head back and forth a few times, and licked my cheek. Then she shook herself and trotted toward the village.

  I worried all the way back to Kaar. The humans didn’t trust DavRian, but there had been other humans with him when he saw MikLan and Marra playing. He would tell the others that Marra had been hurting MikLan, and his friends would support him.

  “Will you wait outside the village for now?” I asked Marra as we neared the human dwellings.

  “As long as I can see MikLan,” she answered. She settled down among the thick spruce trees as I walked into the large clearing. MikLan crouched with TaLi and BreLan, speaking urgently to them. Marra didn’t take her gaze from her human. I hid behind shelters and stacks of preyskins so the other humans wouldn’t see me. DavRian and his friends stood with HesMi, and I listened as they told their lies. I grew more and more nervous as they talked.

  Ázzuen slammed his shoulder into mine. I hadn’t heard him slip up next to me. “You knew it wouldn’t be easy, Kaala.” He looked across the clearing. “We’re smarter than DavRian. We just have to find a way to show HesMi that we’re the ones she should trust.”

  It wouldn’t be easy to convince the human leader to trust a wolf over one of her own kind. I could only hope Ázzuen would come up with one of his clever ideas in time.

  Marra and MikLan left for the Wide Valley before darkfall. Ázzuen, Pell, and I followed them as far as the edge of the pine and cypress woods, then watched them walk at the slow human pace across the grassland. I knew it was right for them to go. MikLan needed to take word back to the Wide Valley krianans, and Marra would be safe from any further harm DavRian’s accusations might cause. She could also help Rissa and Ruuqo with the new pups when they came. And she had promised to come back if I needed her. The ravens could find her quickly, and she was fast enough to make it from Swift River lands to Kaar in a day or so, but it wasn’t the same as having her with us. It wasn’t the same as having my pack with me.

  They looked so small leaving us, vulnerable to Greatwolves, humans, and whatever dangers these strange lands held. Marra’s fleetness would do her no good when she had to protect a slow-moving human. My concern must have been obvious, because Pell leaned down and touched his nose to my face.

  “I’ll go with them as far as the hills,” he said.

  Pell was our best fighter, and large enough to look intimidating. They would be much safer with him.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  He rested his head on my neck, and the rush of warmth and excitement I’d felt after the elk hunt threatened to engulf me. I stiffened.

  Pell stepped away, looking c
onfused. He stared at me for a long, uncomfortable moment, then shook himself and loped after Marra and MikLan. Ázzuen and I watched them until they climbed a low hill and disappeared over the other side. Then we headed back to Kaar.

  We slunk into the village, making sure no one panicked when they saw us. TaLi and BreLan were sitting next to an herb-scented den and we made our way to them. DavRian’s lies had made the other humans wary. Several humans looked up suspiciously when we came in and a few picked up sharpsticks.

  We had almost reached our humans when I heard a child’s boisterous laughter. My tail wagged before I could tell where the sound was coming from. I heard the slap of human footsteps and the whuffling of a wolf at play.

  JaliMin, the speechless, fear-wounded human child, was running in circles around Prannan, who was lying on his back waving his paws in the air while several adult humans watched. JaliMin’s eyes were bright and his smile wide. When Prannan stopped waving his legs, JaliMin stopped, too, and stomped one of his feet.

  “Play!” he said imperiously, pointing a bit of antler bone at Prannan. Prannan rolled onto his belly and then onto his back again and wriggled as if he had an itch. The boy ran a few more circles around Prannan, then flopped down next to him.

  Prannan stood and ran to the edge of a fire pit and picked up a cooked root that was cooling by the fireside. He ran back to JaliMin and dropped the root at his feet. The boy picked it up and took a bite, grinning hugely. I watched the surrounding humans carefully, concerned that they might be afraid Prannan would attack, but some were looking on with smiles, some with looks of astonishment. The fear I’d first sensed in the village was rapidly fading.

  “He hasn’t laughed since his brother PavMin died,” a half-grown male said. “He hasn’t said a word in more than twelve moons!”

  “I didn’t think he could.” That was HesMi. I remembered that RalZun had said that PavMin and JaliMin were her grandsons. Her voice sounded strange, harsh and choked.