Spirit of the Wolves (30 page)

The sun began its descent, and the humans picked up their bundles and sharpsticks and walked away. The streckwolves stood and stretched as they watched the humans go. My tense muscles loosened. The little wolves were safe.

That was when the Sentinels attacked. They had been downwind of me and I hadn't smelled them. At least eight of them, including Milsindra, Navdru, and Yildra, pounded out into the grassless plain, pounced on the smaller wolves, and began to rip them apart. The streckwolves were no match for the Sentinels. They died like prey.

Lallna leapt over me to land on the plain. She joined the fight. I watched in horror as Greatwolves tore the little wolves apart.

“I cannot help them, wolf,” Tlitoo said. “The Grumpwolves know you and I are pack.” He hunched his head down between his wings.

Telling Lallna about the streckwolves had been a terrible mistake. I should not have been so eager to gain the Sentinels' approval.

Two streckwolves ran straight at me. When they saw me, they skidded to a halt, their eyes wide, their ears flat.

“This way,” I said. They just stared. I made my voice strong and stern, like a leaderwolf. “Follow me. Now.” I turned without waiting for a response and strode away from them. I heard frantic pawsteps behind me. I found a strong-smelling dream-sage bush and crawled into it. The two streckwolves followed.

I looked them over. They blinked back, waiting for me to tell them what to do.

“Why were you with the humans?” I asked them. The sounds of fighting wolves forced me to raise my voice.

“Because it's where we're supposed to be,” one of them answered. “It's our role to be with them.” She spoke with dignity. “They need us, and they're our pack.” There was no doubt in her, no sense of the conflict I often felt. And she didn't seem weak or foolish. She was proud and steadfast.

Like Gaanin, she seemed halfway between an ordinary wolf and the completely deformed wolves Tlitoo had shown me in the Inejalun. I remembered how peaceful that village from the past had been. But it had been destroyed because of the loss of the wild. It had become the Barrens.

“You can't just be with them,” I said, swallowing against my horror at the sounds of dying wolves. Both of the streckwolves
were trembling. Again, I felt the urge to protect them as I would pups. “You have to keep the wild as well. It's part of the Promise. Otherwise the humans will keep destroying things.”

They both looked perplexed. They had no idea what I was talking about.

I heard a wolf slipping toward us and crouched down. Gaanin poked his nose under the bush, then crawled in with us.

“Thank you for sheltering Whitefur and Short Tail, Kaala,” he said, touching his nose to my cheek. I wrinkled my muzzle. Those were the sorts of names a pack might call smallpups, and the two streckwolves were at least my age. A wolf's scream tore the air. Gaanin winced.

“They shouldn't be with the humans!” I said. “You should keep them away or the Sentinels will kill your whole pack.”

“I can't keep them away, Kaala, any more than your leaderwolves could keep you from your humans in the Wide Valley. We are even more drawn to them than you are.”

I didn't see how that could be. “But they don't understand about keeping the wild, or about the Promise.”

Gaanin licked his muzzle. He seemed to be deciding whether or not to tell me something. Tlitoo krawked a warning from the other side of the bush. Gaanin lifted his ears.

“They're coming. You should have returned to me, Kaala, as I asked you to. You think you know what you're doing, but there is so much you don't understand.” He whuffed in frustration. “And there is no time now.”

The heavy pawsteps of Greatwolves approached. The Sentinels wouldn't only kill the streckwolves if they saw them, they'd kill me for helping them. Gaanin listened hard for a moment, then barked an order at the two other streckwolves.

“Attack!” Gaanin shouted. Then all three streckwolves leapt at me. Whitefur bit my shoulder and Short Tail ripped into my haunch. Gaanin scraped his claws along my belly. Then all three pelted from the bushes, bolting past Lallna and Navdru. I crawled out after them.

Lallna looked at my bleeding face and haunch.

“You tried to fight three of them?” she said. “You can't take on three alone. They fight well for all they look like pups.”

“Thank you for leading us to them,” Navdru said. He looked down at my horrified expression and whuffed kindly. “I know it's hard to see even such wolves as these die, and you're a youngwolf yet, but we have no choice, Kaala. It's us or them.” He gave me an approving look and licked the top of my head. Then he and Lallna loped back toward Sentinel lands.

Shaking, I looked out on the plain. Some of the streckwolves had escaped, but most had not, and I counted at least ten bodies lying unmoving in the grass. Prey died so we could live. Weak wolves died so that the strong lived. This should have been no different. But it was. I remembered my brother and sisters, killed by Ruuqo when we were four weeks old. The streckwolves on the plain didn't seem so different from them, and they were dead because of me. Tlitoo bobbed up and down in front of me, waiting for me to say something.

I shook myself. Navdru had said it was us or them. And it couldn't be us.

The sun was more than halfway down the sky when I returned to the lake. I wanted to tell Ázzuen what had happened, but when TaLi called me, I went to her.

“HesMi says that you wolves are the best thing that's ever happened to the village,” she whispered. “She said if I can bring more of you, I'm an asset to the village, and she can't imagine why we shouldn't keep to the old ways.” She hugged me close and ran back to help the humans gather their packs and sacks together.

I saw RalZun watching me. I knew I should tell him about the streckwolves, but I didn't want him to know what I'd done. I didn't want him to know that I was no better than a Greatwolf, letting wolves die so I could get what I wanted. I looked away from him and ran after TaLi instead.

It was full dark when we returned to the village. The humans clustered around their fires. I'd learned that if I wanted to see well at such times, I had to avoid looking directly into painfully bright flames. HesMi was sitting comfortably, eating cooked rhino meat. RalZun sat next to her, gnawing on a bone. DavRian and IniMin crouched to one side.

“The decision isn't made yet, DavRian,” HesMi said, “but the girl is proving herself well. I don't see any cause to change the way we're doing things. We can always change our minds next year.”

RalZun smiled at DavRian but kept silent.

“There is cause!” DavRian said. “TaLi's entranced you just like her grandmother entranced some in the Wide Valley before the wolves started killing people. Next year will be too late.”

It would be too late for him, at least. Once TaLi was krianan, we would have time to win the humans completely over to our side.

“So you say,” HesMi grumbled, “but you haven't shown us any proof.”

“What proof do you need?” IniMin asked. “Everyone in the village dead from their treachery?”

“We have six days until the festival,” DavRian said, his voice suddenly reasonable. “We can show you why they're dangerous.”

My ears twitched. DavRian was usually the one who lost his temper. His self-control worried me. I wondered what he was plotting.

“Do so, then,” HesMi said, losing patience. “But stop prattling at me and leave me to my meal.”

IniMin frowned and opened his mouth, but DavRian whispered to him and pulled him away, guiding him into the woods. I followed the two males as they stomped into the forest. They stopped at a moss-covered rock and sat on it. I hid behind the nearby yew tree, close enough to hear them but hidden from view.

“They're going to keep the old ways.” IniMin's voice shook. “I can tell. Once the girl is krianan, it will be too hard to change things.”

“We've been too timid,” DavRian said.

He rose to a crouch on his rock and looked over his shoulder. As if his weak human eyes could see anything in the dark. He whispered to IniMin, “First we have to get rid of some of the wolves. I'll tell you how. Then we need to convince HesMi how dangerous they really are. But we'll need help if we're to do so in time.”

He grinned at IniMin. “Who do you trust?”

D
ense clouds hid the half-moon, darkening the night. I had watched DavRian carefully over the two days since I'd seen him plotting with IniMin. Several times I came upon one or the other talking to a cluster of humans, telling them that TaLi and RalZun were under our spell and that they would run mad because of us, that our teeth were poisoned like the crazed wolf's, or that we could drive a person mad with our nighttime gaze. Some humans listened to them, but many laughed at them. If that was DavRian's plan, I thought, I had very little to worry about. Two nights after we had retrieved the sack, I'd relaxed enough to stop watching him so closely.

So had RalZun. The old krianan came to me, a smile on his wrinkled face.

“I had no idea you would do so well so quickly,” he said. He cocked his head. “I expected you would need more help.”

Pleased at what passed for praise from the old man, I licked his hand.

“I am going to the krianan village,” he said. “It is time for us to come out of hiding. We will prepare to come to Kaar after the festival.” His smile broadened. “It will please me to be the one to tell IniMin he has lost.”

He bent his head in one of his jerky bows, and loped from the village.

We'd both underestimated the power of the humans' fear. The dark night made them wary. I'd noticed that they were more watchful at such times, when their night-weak eyes made them more vulnerable. DavRian and IniMin knew it, too.

All Ázzuen did was to walk into the village looking for me. He caught sight of me lying next to a fire, and ambled over.

DavRian shouted a warning, then stood and hurled his spear at Ázzuen, who just managed to dodge out of the way. DavRian and three other humans ran straight at the two of us, spears raised. We didn't wait to find out what was going on. We pelted into the thickest part of the woods around Kaar. Once we realized that no one was following us, we doubled back and hid in the bushes to watch the village.

DavRian stood with his arms crossed over his chest. IniMin, poised next to him, held out his spear as if guarding him.

HesMi stalked over to them, dragging TaLi by the arm. “What was that about?” she demanded, releasing TaLi.

DavRian's voice was low and frightened, but he smelled of excitement and spite.

“It was a yil-wolf,” he said in a whisper.

“A what?” HesMi was mystified.

“A yil-wolf. It can change from wolf to human and back again. Like I told you when we saw the mad wolf. BreLan and
his wolf have become one creature. Soon they'll become like the mad wolf that almost attacked us.”

“That's ridiculous!” TaLi said, lifting her lip in derision. A ripple of laughter ran through the village.

“If it's so ridiculous,” IniMin said, “where's BreLan? If he isn't the same as the wolf, where is he?”

“I don't know,” TaLi said. “Probably hunting.”

“At night?” IniMin challenged.

“It happened once before in the Wide Valley,” DavRian added. “If a yil-wolf bites you, one of three things happens: you'll go mad, turn into a yil-wolf, or die.”

HesMi shook her head. “I've never heard of such a thing.” But her voice was uncertain.

I couldn't believe she'd even consider it true. RalZun had said that the dark was fearsome to the humans who could not see well in it. Perhaps that was all it took to imagine monsters. I looked for the old man, but then remembered that he'd gone to the krianan village. I realized that many of the humans who favored us were also gone. DavRian had picked his time well.

Prannan and Amma chose that moment to dart into the clearing. I tensed my haunches, ready to run to their aid. But JaliMin gave a squeal of pleasure and ran to them. Prannan was carrying some cooked meat in his jaws, and JaliMin took it from him. Several humans had raised their spears when Prannan and Amma ran into the village, but now most of them were smiling.