Sisters of the Wolf

by Patricia Miller-Schroeder

  As she and Keena settle close to the fire, Shinoni repeats her question. “How did you come by the lion claw?”

  “My mother gave it to me. She cut it from the paw of a dead lion that had stalked and killed my people.” Keena chokes back tears. “She wanted it to protect me when Haken took me away. She said the lion hated Haken because he killed it.”

  “Your mother sounds like a brave woman.”

  “She’s brave. It’ll be good to see her again when I return to my hearth.” Keena hesitates. “You think each animal has a spirit?”

  “Of course. You really don’t know this, Krag?”

  “You can talk to them, get them to help you?” Keena persists.

  “It’s easy if you know how,” Shinoni says.

  “You’re strange, Kula.” Keena rolls up in her cloak and turns her back. The girl reminds her of Sabra when he brags about Kula ways. She closes her eyes and falls asleep.

  Shinoni sits watching the young Krag hunter through the smoky haze of the fire as the animal spirits battle for his life. The call of a lion echoes faintly in the distance.

  Reza always did the healing in their camp. This is the first time Shinoni has attempted it alone. This time, she is the medicine woman. Grandmother would be proud.

  Finally, exhausted by the events of the day, Shinoni can stay awake no longer. She lies down next to Keena and falls instantly to sleep.

  Early morning mist is rising over the Krags’ camp when Shinoni awakes to excited shouts. She bolts upright, confused at where she is. Keena is shaking her by the shoulder.

  “Look, Shinoni! The lion spirit won.”

  Shinoni rubs the sleep fog from her eyes and looks around the rock shelter. The injured Krag is sitting up, smiling with the others gathered around him. They gabble excitedly and point to her.

  Gandar leaves the group and hurries over to Keena and Shinoni. He brings the lion claw and squats beside them, smiling from ear to ear. His words tumble out in a relieved torrent as he points from Shinoni to the injured hunter and back to her.

  “He says you look like a skinny Kula girl, but you’re a great healer. He thanks you for saving his brother’s life.”

  “Tell him I’m glad his brother’s better. His spirit must be strong, or the lion spirit wouldn’t have helped him.”

  Keena translates for Gandar, and he holds out the claw.

  Shinoni makes no move to take the claw. “He can keep it, in case they need its help again.” She looks at Keena. “Unless you want it back, Keena? It’s yours.”

  “The claw already kept me safe by helping the hunter survive. It’s done what my mother wanted. I will tell him he can keep it.” She turns to Gandar.

  He beams, then hands Shinoni a deerskin pouch. She opens it and finds it’s filled with strips of dried deer meat. Then he hands her two hide bags filled with water and secured with wooden plugs to keep the water inside. Gandar makes a sweeping gesture toward the open plains beyond the rock overhang as he speaks.

  “He’s happy about the claw and he wants us to take this meat to help us on our journey,” Keena translates, although the meaning’s clear. “He says we’re free to leave if we want — or we can travel with them.”

  “The less time I spend with Krags the better,” Shinoni says. She looks at Keena closely. “Perhaps you should go with them.”

  “I suppose you’d like that, but I think I’ll stay with you.” Keena chuckles. “Someone has to keep you out of trouble.”

  “That’s your choice,” Shinoni says, but a pleasant warmth spreads through her body at Keena’s words.

  Keena picks up her fur cape from the ground, where it served as her sleeping mat. She takes the precious pouch of dried meat and the water bags from Shinoni and secures them in a fold of the cape close to her body. Then Shinoni and Keena plunge out into the tall grasses to continue their journey.

  18

  THE SUN RIDES LOW in the sky when Shinoni and Keena carry brush up a rocky slope to a small cave. Their perch overlooks the surrounding plains and hills. They stack the brush waist high in a semicircle around the opening. Once the kindling’s in place, Keena settles wearily inside their shelter.

  Shinoni lingers by the entrance, testing the wind for danger. The undulating grasslands sprawl below their shelter in every direction. Clusters of woodland dot the plains, good hiding places for predators. Hills rise in the distance at the foot of the glacier. That’s where the Krag girl says she lived with her family. What family would send her so far away with such a dangerous man as Haken?

  Sunset turns the sky to crimson and violet as the cool evening breeze shakes the bushes below them. Keena joins Shinoni at the entrance and peers into the dusk creeping over the land. It sneaks up the hillside to the open mouth of their refuge.

  “Hurry and light the fire, Kula. It’s getting dark.”

  “You know Haken can see the fire. And so can the beasts.”

  “If you don’t light it soon, they’ll only find our bones in the morning.”

  “You really don’t know how to start fire?” Shinoni teases, but she hurries to unpack her flints and firestones.

  Keena chafes at Shinoni’s words. “I can move flames from one fire to start another. I just can’t start a flame where there isn’t one burning nearby.”

  “What happens if your people travel, as we’re doing?” Shinoni asks.

  “Krag women don’t often travel without males. With my people, men start new fires and women tend them. We’re the protectors of fire.” Keena fidgets in the deepening gloom.

  “I can do both.” Shinoni puffs up her chest proudly and takes Keena’s arm. “Come here. You’ll be the first Krag female to learn to make fire.”

  Keena moves slowly toward Shinoni. Her breath catches in her throat and she gasps. Is Leeswi warning me that I must not do this? What if the temperamental Earth Mother snatches away my breath? No! If a Kula girl can do this, so can she. Keena sits beside Shinoni.

  Shinoni positions Keena’s hands on the flint and firestone and shows her how to strike sparks into the dry tinder grass. “Now you try,” Shinoni says.

  Keena fumbles with the flint and firestone. Nothing happens. But she is determined. She thinks of her mother cutting the lion claw in the dark and tries again. Finally, after several tries, a tiny flame sparks in the hearth.

  “I did it,” Keena gasps. The spark grows as she and Shinoni gently fan it. Keena’s cheeks redden and her eyes grow wide. She made this fire where there was none before.

  “Don’t spend all night admiring your fire. Spread it around.” Shinoni chuckles. They put branches into the flame and spread it along the brush pile until they have a glowing barrier to protect them from the terrors of the night.

  Keena’s stomach rumbles. “Let’s eat,” she says.

  Shinoni and Keena finish eating most of the meat Gandar gave them, then spread their cloaks on the ground to sleep.

  Suddenly, Keena dives behind Shinoni, digging her fingers deep into Shinoni’s shoulder. “Look. Something’s coming,” she whispers. She peeks over Shinoni’s shoulder. A glowing pair of eyes reflects eerily from the bushes at the base of the rock slope.

  “Whatever it is, it won’t come through the fire.” Shinoni’s words are brave, but her voice shakes. She picks up a burning stick and stares out of their shelter warily.

  “It’s coming closer. It is!” Keena screams.

  A grey shape hurtles over the flames and knocks Shinoni to the ground, causing her to drop the burning torch. Tewa licks her face. Shinoni sits up and retrieves the torch, laughing with relief.

  Keena slips out of the crevice where she’d crammed her body. “Can’t you stop her from jumping at people?”

  “You were happy when she jumped Haken.” Shinoni rumples the wolf’s thick fur.

  “I thought you said beasts wouldn’t come over the flames.” Keena creeps closer and cautiously strokes Tewa’s fur.

  “Tewa isn’t like other beasts.”

  The girls lie down w
ith the large wolf between them and drop into a deep sleep, feeling a little safer in the night.

  19

  “OW, KULA, WHAT’RE YOU DOING?” Keena shouts as a stone thuds off her head. “That’s not funny. See how you like it.” She scoops up a rock to retaliate, but Shinoni lies snoring on her sleeping mat.

  Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. Keena scrambles to her feet as more stones land beside her. She shakes Shinoni. “The Earth Mother’s angry. We can’t stay here.”

  “What? Stop it, Krag, I’m getting up.” Shinoni coughs as dust swirls in the early morning half-light. Tewa sinks her teeth into Shinoni’s tunic and pulls her off her sleeping mat.

  Shinoni’s fully awake now. “Come on, let’s go!” She scrambles to pack her firestones and throw her cape over her shoulders.

  “It’s getting worse. Leeswi will take our breath.” Keena stamps out the dying embers of the fire.

  The roof of the cave starts to crack as Shinoni, Keena, and Tewa slide down the loose shale on the slope outside the entrance. A herd of horses gallops across the plains below. They snort and neigh in terror as the ground under their hooves shudders and groans.

  A short distance away from their shelter, Keena turns and faces the rock slope. She takes the remaining meat from the pouch and lays it on a flat rock. She touches her forehead to the earth and shouts in the Krag tongue, “Ka-kwa-rau-set, Leeswi. Leeswi. Krag-nu-kik-kwac.”

  “Come on, Krag. What’re you doing?” Shinoni screams.

  A deafening boom rips through the air, and an avalanche of rocks and boulders thunders down the hillside. The cave where they just slept disappears in a hail of debris.

  Keena ignores Shinoni and shrieks above the din. “Ka-kwa-rau-set, Leeswi. Leeswi. Krag-nu-kik-kwac.”

  Tewa cocks her head and whines, then steps over Keena’s prostrated form. She snaps the meat off the rock and chews it with relish. Keena leaps to her feet, her face twisted in horror, as Shinoni laughs out loud.

  “Eeeeee-yaaaaa!” Keena’s wail echoes over the sound of the earth’s rampage. “Fool! Don’t laugh. That was an offering to Leeswi, the Earth Mother, so she’ll spare us.”

  “Sorry, Krag.” Shinoni chokes back her laughter. “Your face is as red as your hair.”

  “Stupid wolf. We’re doomed,” Keena moans. “It was too small an offering, anyway. Atuk would’ve given an ibex or a deer.”

  “Come on.” Shinoni tugs on Keena’s arm. Dust and debris fall around them. “If this Lee Swee, or whatever her name is, is so powerful, she’ll know you tried. That was tonight’s food, by the way.”

  “You don’t understand. Leeswi will be very angry.”

  Tewa hightails it into the grass. A large rock crashes beside Shinoni and she follows the wolf, dragging Keena with her. “Calm down, Krag. If she’s mad at anyone, it’s me, right? I’m the one who laughed.”

  Suddenly the ground around them buckles and groans with the force of an earthquake. A split yawns open in front of them. Keena is flung backward, but Shinoni is sucked into the rent in the earth. She frantically claws at branches and rocks to break her slide, but she disappears over the edge of the jagged hole.

  “Aaaaaaeeeee!” The earth’s rumble drowns out Shinoni’s scream.

  “Shinoni, nooo!” Keena shouts. Leeswi has devoured the foolish Kula. Keena crawls on her stomach to the edge of the pit. A steamy sulphur odour, like a thousand stink winds, billows up, making her roll backward, gagging.

  “Help, I can’t hold on. Keena, help me!” Shinoni shrieks from below.

  Keena forces herself back to the edge and peers over the rim. Shinoni dangles precariously, clinging to roots in the crumbling soil. She kicks her feet, trying to get a toehold.

  Keena reaches down and grasps Shinoni’s wrists. “Come on, Kula. Don’t give up. Fight!” She inches backward, flat on her stomach. Her muscles are straining and sweat runs from her brow. Her arms are too short and she’s losing her grip. But she has to keep trying. She pulls harder, hauling Shinoni closer to the surface. Shinoni finally reaches the top, where she’s able to throw her elbows over the edge and drag herself out.

  The earth shudders one more time, and with a dull belch the crevice closes. Shinoni and Keena lie on the still-moving ground, clinging to each other, dirt-smeared and exhausted. They stare at each other in horror.

  “You Krags have a pretty mean earth mother.”

  “I thought you were really gone, Kula.”

  “I would’ve been, if you hadn’t come.” Shinoni manages a wobbly grin.

  “Leeswi spared you,” Keena says. “Don’t laugh again.”

  “I don’t feel much like laughing.”

  The girls get to their feet, nerves still jangling. Their legs wobble as they set off to continue their journey across the quake-ravaged plain. Evidence of the disaster is everywhere: rock slides, uprooted trees, boulders strewn about. They walk gingerly, expecting the earth to heave up again.

  Shinoni stops and turns in a circle, scanning their surroundings. “It’s too quiet, Krag. Where are the birds and animals?”

  “They’re smarter than you,” Keena replies. “They know the Earth Mother’s still angry.” She jumps at an ominous rumbling in the earth. In the distance, a horse neighs frantically.

  Shinoni swivels her head, trying to locate the sound. “It’s over there.” She leaps up and down, pointing to a distant rock outcropping sticking above the grass. “Come on.”

  “We’ve got to keep going.” Keena points in the opposite direction, toward the line of hills. “My people are that way, in the high country.”

  “Aren’t you curious? It sounds like it’s in trouble,” Shinoni wheedles.

  “We’ve enough trouble of our own.” Keena digs her heels into the earth and refuses to budge.

  “My people call them ulu, wind runners. I’d like to see a live one up close. Wouldn’t you?” Shinoni coaxes.

  Keena shakes her head. “If it’s injured, it’ll attract predators.” Why does this Kula girl have to be so curious all the time? Who cares about a horse? Keena just wants to find her family — and Kreel.

  “Perhaps your Leeswi wants us to go that way. Maybe she doesn’t want the ulu’s breath and is sending us a message to go there.”

  Keena ponders this unlikely possibility as Shinoni watches her closely. “We eat horses. Leeswi wouldn’t send us to help one.” She frowns at Shinoni. “You’re not Krag. Why would Leeswi send you a message?”

  “Perhaps the message is for you,” Shinoni says. “Since Leeswi spared me, perhaps she wants us both to go to the horse.”

  Keena sits on the ground, torn between her desire to return home and the need to listen to the bidding of the unpredictable Earth Mother. “Maybe Leeswi wants to provide us with food.” She turns toward the neighing. “I’ll go with you, but we must be quick.”

  20

  SHINONI’S LONG LEGS clamber up the rock out-cropping, sending loose shale raining down on Keena, who is struggling up the slope behind her. When Shinoni reaches the top, she looks down on a young horse, alone and trapped in a tangle of willows that toppled in the earthquake. Clumps of branches and roots pin the little filly against a pile of fallen rocks. Her sharp-edged hooves scrabble and slip on the rubble as she works to free her legs. Her barrel-shaped chest and rib cage heave with exertion, and sweaty white foam lathers her reddish-brown coat and the black stripe down her back. Her soft brown eyes are glazed with fear.

  “She’s not full grown. She’s calling for her family,” Shinoni says.

  “Families don’t always help you,” Keena says, her voice tight.

  “She won’t last long making such a racket. Something will kill her.”

  “We could kill her while she’s trapped. We need food.”

  “Look, Krag, she’s a wind runner. I saw a hunter ride one once.”

  “You were in the dream world, surely.”

  “No, it’s true,” Shinoni says. “Let’s see if we can free her.”

  She slides down the rest of
the hill without waiting for Keena but slows as she nears the trapped horse. The filly trembles, eyes wild with fear, as Shinoni pushes aside some of the tangled branches. Shinoni reaches past an upturned tree root to touch the velvety nose. The horse snorts at the human scent, laying back her ears, squealing and clapping her teeth.

  “Hey, Ulu, little sister. I want to help you.” Shinoni stands very still and speaks softly. She takes off her cloak and covers the horse’s eyes. Ulu calms down immediately. Shinoni sings her soothing chant as she takes the rope from her pouch and slips it around the wind runner’s neck.

  Keena keeps her distance from the horse. “Be careful,” she says. “She’s so big, even if she’s young. Why are you covering her head?”

  “Maybe if she can’t see the ugly Krag, she won’t be so frightened.” Shinoni grasps a branch and works it out of the tangle. “Can you help me?”

  “If that wolf comes now, she’ll make a meal of her.” Keena tugs a twisted tree root from the pile.

  “Tewa won’t bother her if she’s mine,” Shinoni says. She scans the surrounding plain. The wolf’s nowhere in sight.

  “The horse isn’t yours, and the wolf only knows she’s hungry,” Keena says.

  “It’s no use arguing with a Krag. You know so little about animals.”

  “You think you know animals, Kula, but I know how to use them to feed myself.” Keena sits down, arms folded, as Shinoni pulls away more of the branches. At last there’s just one large tree root blocking the horse’s path, and Keena joins Shinoni in hauling it away.

  Ulu, her eyes still covered, turns and lashes out with her hind legs.

  “Duck, Krag!” Shinoni grabs Keena’s arm and yanks her down as a hoof whizzes past her ear. Shinoni gets up, dusting herself off. “You should be more careful. You almost had your head knocked off.” She pulls Keena to her feet, then moves closer to the horse. “She doesn’t seem to be too badly injured. Just some scratches.”

  “She almost injured us, Kula.” Keena hangs back, anxiously eyeing the horse. “Why doesn’t she run?”