Wolf Brother

by Michelle Paver

  Torak was mystified. Why would a hunter-want so much color? And that necklace clinked, which was the last thing you needed.

  Renn resembled Hord in feature, and Torak wondered if they were brother and sister, although Renn was younger by four or five summers. Her clan-tattoos - three fine blue-black bars on her cheekbones - showed clearly on her pale skin, giving her a sharp, mistrustful look. Torak didn’t think he’d be asking her for help.

  Her buckskin jerkin and leggings were scruffy, but her bow and quiver were beautiful, the arrows deftly fletched with owl feathers for silent flight. On the first two fingers of her left hand, she wore leather finger-guards, and strapped to her right forearm was a wrist-guard of polished green slate. Torak guessed that such wrist-guards were worn by people who lived for their bows. That’s what matters to her, he thought. Not fine clothes, like Hord.

  But what clan was she? Sewn to the left side of her jerkin - and those of Hord and Oslak - was their clan-creature skin: a strip of black feathers. Swan? Eagle? The feathers were too tattered. Torak couldn’t tell.

  They walked all morning without stopping for food or water: crossing boggy valleys choked with chattering aspen; climbing hills darkened by ever-wakeful pines. As Torak passed beneath, the trees sighed mournfully, as if already lamenting his death.

  Clouds obscured the sun, and he lost his bearings. They came to a slope where the Forest floor was bumpy with the waist-high nests of wood-ants. As wood-ants only build by the south side of trees, Torak worked out that they were heading west.

  At last they paused at a brook to drink.

  ‘We’re much too slow,’ growled Hord. ‘We’ve got a whole valley to cross before we reach the Windriver.’

  Torak pricked up his ears. Maybe he’d overhear something useful…

  Renn sensed he was listening. The Windriver,’ she told him slowly, as if talking to a baby, ‘is to the west, in the next valley. It’s where we camp in autumn. And a couple of daywalks to the north is the Widewater, where we camp in summer. For the salmon. They’re fish. Maybe you’ve heard of them.’

  Torak felt himself reddening. But he knew now where they were heading: his captors’ autumn camp. It sounded bad. A camp would mean more people, and less chance of escape.

  As they walked, the sun sank lower, and Torak’s captors became edgy, pausing often to listen and look about them. He guessed that they knew about the bear. Maybe that was why they’d adopted the unheard-of measure of ‘owning’ prey. Because it was getting scarce; the bear was frightening it away.

  They descended into a big valley of oak, ash and pine, and soon reached a wide silver river. This must be the Windriver.

  Suddenly Torak smelt wood smoke. They were nearing the camp.

  As the four of them crossed the river by a wooden walkway, Torak stared down at the sliding water and thought about jumping in. His hands were tied. He’d drown. Besides, he couldn’t leave Wolf.

  About ten paces downstream, the trees opened into a clearing. Torak smelt pine-smoke and fresh blood. He saw four big reindeer-hide shelters unlike any he’d ever seen, and a bewildering number of people: all hard at work, and as yet unaware of him. With a clarity born of fear, he took in every detail.

  On the riverbank two men were skinning a boar strung from a tree. Having already slit the belly, they’d sheathed their knives and were peeling off the hide by hand, to avoid tearing it. Both were bare-chested, and wore fish-skin aprons over their leggings. T hey looked terrifyingly strong, with raised zigzag scars on their muscled arms. From the carcass, blood dripped slowly into a birch-bark pail.

  In the shallows, two girls in buckskin tunics giggled as they rinsed the boar’s guts, while three small children solemnly made mud-cakes and studded them with sycamore wings. Two sleek hide canoes were drawn up out of the water. T he ground around them glittered with fish scales. A couple of large dogs prowled for scraps.

  In the middle of the clearing, near a pinewood long-fire, s group of women sat on willow-branch mats, talking quietly as they shelled hazelnuts and picked over a basket of juniper berries. None of them looked anything like Hord or Renn; Torak wondered briefly if, like him, they’d lost their parents.

  A little apart from them, an old woman was heading arrows: slotting needle-fine flakes of flint into the shafts, then gluing them in place with a paste of pine-blood and beeswax. A round bone amulet etched with a spiral was sewn to the breast of her jerkin. From the amulet, Torak knew she must be the clan Mage. Fa had told him about Mages: people who can heal sickness, and dream where the prey is and what the weather will do. T his old woman looked as if she could do far more dangerous things than that.

  By the fire, a pretty girl leaned over a cooking-skin. Steam crinkled her hair as she used a forked stick to drop in red-hot stones. T he meaty smell of whatever was cooking made Torak’s mouth water.

  Near her, an older man knelt to spit a couple of hares. like Hord, he had reddish-brown hair and a short red beard, but there the resemblance ended. His face had an arresting stillness, and a strength that made Torak think of carved sandstone. Torak forgot about the cooking smell. He knew, without being told, that this man wielded power.

  Oslak untied the bindings and pushed Torak into the clearing. T he dogs leapt up, barking ferociously. The old woman made a slicing motion with her palm, and they subsided into growls. Everyone stared at Torak. Everyone except the man by the fire, who went on calmly spitting the hares. Only when he’d finished did he rub off his hands in the dust and rise to his feet, waiting in silence for them to approach.

  The pretty girl glanced at Hord and smiled shyly. ‘We saved you some broth,’ she said. Torak guessed that either she was his mate, or wanted to be.

  Renn turned and rolled her eyes at Hord. ‘Dyrati saved you some broth,’ she mocked.

  Definitely his sister, thought Torak.

  Hord ignored them both, and went to talk to the man by the fire. Quickly, he related what had happened. Torak noticed that he made it sound as if he, not Oslak had caught ‘the thief’. Oslak didn’t seem to mind, but Renn flashed her brother a sour glance.

  Meanwhile, the dogs had scented Wolf. Hackles bristling, they advanced on Renn.

  ‘Back!’ she ordered. They obeyed. Renn ducked into the nearest shelter and emerged with a coil of woven bark rope. She tied one end round the neck of the bag containing Wolf, tossed the other over the branch of an oak tree, and hoisted the bag high: well out of the dogs’ reach.

  And out of mine, realized Torak. Now even if he got the chance to escape, he couldn’t. Not without Wolf.

  Renn caught his eye and gave him a wry grin.

  He scowled back. Inside, he was sick with fear.

  Hord had finished talking. The man by the fire nodded once, and waited for Oslak to push Torak towards him. His eyes were an intense, unblinking blue: vividly alive in that impenetrable face. Torak found it hard to look into them for long -and even harder to look away.

  ‘What is your name?’ said the man in a voice that was somehow more frightening for being so quiet.

  Torak licked his lips. ‘Torak. - What’s yours?’ But he thought he already knew.

  It was Hord who answered. ‘He is Fin-Kedinn. Leader of the Raven Clan. And you, you miserable little runt, should learn more respect-’

  Fin-Kedinn silenced Hord with a look, then turned to Torak. ‘What clan are you?’

  Torak raised his chin. ‘Wolf.’

  ‘Well there’s a surprise,’ remarked Renn, and several people laughed.

  Fin-Kedinn wasn’t one of them. His burning blue eyes never left Torak’s face. ‘What are you doing in this part of the Forest?’

  ‘Heading north,’ said Torak.

  ‘I told him it belongs to us now,’ Hord put in quickly.

  ‘How could I know that?’ said Torak. ‘I wasn’t at the clan meet.’<
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  ‘Why not?’ said Fin-Kedinn.

  Torak did not reply.

  The Raven Leader’s eyes drilled into his. ‘Where are the rest of your clan?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Torak truthfully. ‘I’ve never lived with them. I live -lived-with my father.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Dead. He was -killed by a bear.’

  A hiss ran through the watchers. Some glanced fearfully over their shoulders; others touched their clan-creature skins, or made the sign of the hand to ward off evil. The old woman left her arrows and came towards them.

  No emotion showed in Fin-Kedinn’s face. ‘Who was your father?’

  Torak swallowed. He knew - and so must Fin-Kedinn that it is forbidden to speak a dead person’s name for five summers after they die. Instead they can only be referred to by naming their parents. Fa had hardly ever talked about his family, but Torak knew their names, and where they’d come from. Fa’s mother had been Seal Clan; his father had been Wolf Clan. Torak named them both.

  Recognition is one of the hardest expressions to conceal.

  Not even Fin-Kedinn could hide it completely.

  He knew Fa, thought Torak, aghast. But how? Fa never mentioned him, or the Raven Clan. What does this mean? ,

  He watched Fin-Kedinn run his thumb slowly across his bottom lip. It was impossible to tell whether Torak’s father had been his best friend or his deadliest enemy.

  At last Fin-Kedinn spoke. ‘Share out the boy’s things between everyone,’ he told Oslak. Then take him downstream and kill him.’

  Torak’s knees buckled.

  ‘Wh - at?’ he gasped. ‘I didn’t even know the buck was y ours! How can I be guilty if I didn’t know?’

  ‘It’s the law,’ said Fin-Kedinn.

  ‘Why? Why? Because you say so?’

  ‘Because the clans say so.’

  Oslak put a heavy hand on Torak’s shoulder.

  ‘No!’ cried Torak. ‘Listen! You say it’s the law, but - there’s another law, isn’t there?’ He caught his breath. Trial by combat. We - we fight for it.’ He wasn’t sure if he’d got that right - Fa had only mentioned it once, when he was teaching him the law of the clans - but Fin-Kedinn’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘I’m right, aren’t I?’ Torak insisted, forcing himself to give the Raven Leader stare for stare. ‘You don’t know for sure if I’m guilty, because you don’t know whether I actually knew the buck was yours. So we fight. You and me.’ He swallowed. ‘If I win, I’m innocent. I live. I mean, me and the wolf. If I lose - we die.’

  Some of the men were chuckling. A woman tapped her brow, shaking her head.

  ‘I don’t fight boys,’ said Fin-Kedinn.

  ‘But he’s right, isn’t he?’ said Renn. ‘It’s the oldest law of all. He has the right to fight.’

  Hord stepped forward. ‘I’ll fight him. I’m closer to him in age. It’ll be fairer.’

  ‘Not by much,’ Renn said drily.

  She was leaning against the tree from which Wolf was suspended. Torak saw that she’d loosened the neck of the bag a little, so that Wolf’s head was poking out. He looked bedraggled, but was gazing curiously down at the two dogs slavering beneath him.

  ‘What do you say, Fin-Kedinn?’ said the Mage. The boy’s right. Let them fight.’

  Fin-Kedinn met the old woman’s eyes, and for a moment there seemed to be a battle of wills between them. Slowly, he nodded.

  Relief washed over Torak.

  Everyone seemed to be excited by the prospect of a fight. They talked in huddles, stamping their feet, their breath steaming in the chill evening air.

  Oslak tossed Torak his father’s knife. ‘You’ll need that. And a spear and an arm-guard.’

  ‘A what?’ asked Torak.

  The big man scratched the scar where his ear had been.

  ‘You know how to fight, don’t you?’

  ‘No,’ said Torak.

  Oslak rolled his eyes. He went off to the nearest shelter, and returned with an ashwood spear tipped with a vicious basalt point, and what seemed to be a length of triple-thickness reindeer hide.

  Torak took the spear uncertainly, and watched in puzzlement as Oslak strapped the toughened hide round his right forearm for him. It felt as heavy and unwieldy as a haunch of deer meat. He wondered what he was supposed to do with it.

  Oslak nodded at the bandage on Torak’s other arm, and grimaced. ‘Seems like the odds are against you.’

  Just a bit, thought Torak.

  When he’d suggested a fight, he’d had in mind a wrestling-bout, with maybe some knife-play thrown in: the sort of thing he and Fa used to practice quite often, but just for fun. Clearly, to the Ravens, a fight meant something else. Torak wondered if there were special rules, and whether it would look weak to ask.

  Fin-Kedinn prodded the fire, making sparks fly. Torak watched him through a shimmer of heat haze.

  There’s only one rule,’ said Fin-Kedinn, as if he’d guessed Torak’s thoughts. ‘You can’t use fire. Do you understand?’ His eyes caught and held Torak’s.

  Torak nodded distractedly. Not using fire was the least of his worries. Behind Fin-Kedinn, he could see Hord having his arm-guard strapped on. He had taken off his jerkin. He looked enormous, and frighteningly strong. Torak decided against taking off his own jerkin. No need to emphasize the contrast.

  He untied everything from his belt and laid it in a pile on the ground. Then he wound a length of wovengrass twine round his forehead to keep his hair out of his eyes. His hands were slippery with sweat. He stooped and rubbed them in the dust.

  Someone touched his shoulder, making him jump.

  It was Renn. She was holding out a birch-bark beaker.

  He took it gratefully and drank. To his surprise, it was elderberry juice: tart and strengthening.

  Renn saw his surprise and shrugged. ‘Hord’s had a drink. It’s only fair.’ She pointed to a pail by the fire. There’s water when you need it.’

  Torak handed back the beaker. ‘I don’t think it’ll last that I long.’

  She hesitated. ‘Who knows?’

  A hush fell. The watchers formed a ring round the edge of the clearing, with Torak and Hord in the middle, near the fire. There were no formalities. The fight was on.

  Warily, they circled each other.

  For all his size, Hord moved with the grace of a lynx, flexing his knees and repositioning his fingers on knife and spear. His face was taut, but a small smile played about his lips. He loved being the centre of attention.

  Torak didn’t. His heart was hammering against his ribs. Dimly, he could hear the watchers shouting encouragement to Hord, but their voices were muffled, as if he were underwater.

  Hord’s spear lunged for his chest, and he dodged just in time. He felt the sweat start out on his forehead.

  Torak tried the same move, hoping it didn’t look like copying.

  ‘Copying won’t get you very far,’ called Renn.

  Torak’s face burned.

  He and Hord were moving faster now. In places, the ground was slimy with boar’s blood. Torak slipped and nearly went down.

  He knew he couldn’t hope to win by force. He’d have to use his wits. The trouble was, he only knew two fighting tricks, and he hadn’t practiced them more than a few times.

  Here goes, he thought recklessly. He jabbed his spear at Hord’s throat. As expected, Hord’s hide-arm rose to block it. Torak tried a quick undercut to the belly, but Hord parried it with alarming ease, and Torak’s spear slid harmlessly off his arm-guard.

  He knew that one, thought Torak. With every move, it was becoming obvious that Hord was a seasoned fighter.

  ‘Come on, Hord,’ yelled a man. ‘Give him a red skin!’

  ‘Give me time,’ H
ord called back with a curl of his lip. A ripple of laughter.

  Torak tried his second trick. Feigning total incompetence, which wasn’t hard, he hit out wildly, tempting Hord with a glimpse of his unprotected chest. Hord took the bait, but as his spear came in to strike, Torak’s guard-arm swung across to meet it. Hord’s spearpoint sank into the thick hide guard, nearly knocking Torak off his feet, but Torak managed to keep to his plan by twisting his guard-arm sharply upwards. Hord’s spear-shaft snapped in two. The watchers groaned. Hord staggered back without a spear.

  Torak was astonished. He hadn’t expected it to work.

  Hord recovered swiftly. Lunging forwards, he jabbed his knife into Torak’s spear-hand. Torak cried out as the flint bit between finger and thumb. He lost his footing and dropped his spear. Hord lunged again. Torak only just managed to roll away in time and scramble to his feet.

  Now they were both spearless. Both down to knives.

  To gain some breathing space, Torak dodged behind the fire. His chest was heaving, and his wounded hand throbbed. Sweat was pouring down his sides. He bitterly regretted not copying Hord and taking off his jerkin.

  ‘Hurry up, Hord,’ yelled a woman. ‘Finish him off!’

  ‘Come on, Hord!’ shouted a man. ‘Is this what they taught you in the Deep Forest?’

  Hord snorted his contempt.

  By now, though, not all shouts were for Hord. There was a smattering of encouragement for Torak, although he guessed it was less genuine support than pleased surprise that he was lasting longer than expected.

  He knew it wouldn’t be much longer. He was tiring rapidly, and he’d run out of tricks. Hord was taking control.

  Sorry, Wolf, he told the cub silently. I don’t think we’re going to get out of this.