Spirit Wolf (13 page)

THE PATH INTO THE CAVE HAD
altered. It twisted and turned, then pitched quite steeply. Faolan proceeded cautiously. He was sure this was the Cave Before Time, but the quake must have rearranged its interior as it had the rest of the world outside. He wondered what had happened to the beautiful pictures.

He stepped into a cavern, and though it was black as night, a filament of moonlight fell down upon him from above.
The moon crack!
Faolan thought. He had seen this crack before, so he now knew exactly where he was in the Cave. But how strange that the moon crack had remained just as it always was, no wider than before despite the two earthquakes.

On his first visit to the cave, Faolan had thought he was entering a cavern of impenetrable darkness, but there
had been a tiny fissure in the ceiling no bigger then the thread of a spiderweb. And through it fell a silken strand of moonlight. For most creatures this would not provide enough light to see, but a wolf's night vision was truly extraordinary and the thin beam of moonlight offered just enough illumination. Now it caught the wolves' eye-shine, first from Faolan's eyes, and then those of the other wolves. Suddenly, the cave flickered with green light. The pictures loomed up on the mica-flecked walls, undamaged even in the latest convulsions of the earth. In a far corner, Faolan spied a mound of pure white fur. The mound stirred. The cave flashed as four eyes met in a lock of green shine.

“Airmead!” Edme yelped. “Katria!”

Airmead and Katria had belonged to the MacHeath clan, the only two noble wolves in a clan so heinous it had been expelled from the Beyond more than four hunger moons ago. Airmead had been the Obea of the clan and Katria the former mate of Donaidh, a high-ranking lieutenant. Before the clan's expulsion, both Airmead and Katria had escaped the MacHeaths to join the MacNamara clan, where they had proven themselves invaluable. They had been
dispatched to serve on the Blood Watch by the MacNamara chief and arrived soon after Faolan and Edme had left.

The Whistler now stepped forward. “But the rest, the rest of the Blood Watch? Where are they?”

Katria and Airmead looked at each other and Airmead tried to stand. It was then they noticed the huge streak of blood on her flank.

“Down, Airmead!” Katria ordered. She turned to Faolan and Edme. “Airmead was wounded in a skirmish with the last rout.”

“The last rout?” Faolan said. “You mean there are no more outclanner packs?”

“Just the remnants of one. Lupus knows where they went.”

“There were twelve in the rout. Now there are perhaps five — six at the most. Vicious! You can't believe how vicious.” Airmead shook her head. She winced and Edme noticed that there was blood leaking from her neck as well.

“Stay quiet, Airmead. Your wound is in a dangerous place.”

“Don't worry. It was worse last night and it's getting better every day. I'm gaining strength. There is actually plenty to eat in this cave — mice, voles, even bats if you're desperate enough.”

“What about Brygeen?” the Whistler asked.

“Brygeen and the Namara — they're both gone,” Airmead whispered.

They all gasped. Airmead seemed to know what passed through the wolves' minds. It was unthinkable that Galana the Namara, the chieftain of the MacNamara clan, leader of the greatest fighting force in the Beyond, had been killed by a rout of outclanners.

“It wasn't the rout that killed the Namara,” Katria replied. “She had arrived to help out on the Blood Watch just before the first quake. She had hardly been here a day when it happened.” Katria closed her eyes and recalled the scene.

First came the terrible growling that rose up from the earth as if a maddened beast had been set loose. The Namara was thrown from the cairn on which she stood watch, flung out into the air to land on a jagged rock. The tip of the rock impaled her, piercing right through her chest and into her heart.

“What is it, Katria?” Edme asked as she saw the she-wolf's hackles had risen and her legs were shaking.

“She can't stand to think about it,” Airmead whispered. “She is the one who saw the Namara's death. She didn't die at the fangs of the outclanners, but her death caused the skirmish in which I was injured and Brygeen and Alastrine were killed.”

“Alastrine, too?” Mhairie moaned. Alastrine was the
skreeleen
and point wolf from the Blue Rock Pack of the MacDuncan clan. Both Mhairie and Dearlea revered her. There were very few she-wolves who had the lungs to run as fast as a point wolf needed to, and also serve as the
skreeleen
, the lead howler in a pack.

“I don't understand,” Edme said. “How could the death of the Namara cause a battle between the Blood Watch and an outclanners' rout?”

“Heart's blood,” Airmead said softly.

“What are you talking about?” Faolan asked.

“When the first earthquake came and the Namara was thrown from her cairn, she landed on a splinter of rock that pierced her heart. There's that stupid old superstition about the blood that comes from the heart of a chieftain. Some believe that if one drinks it, they become invincible. The Namara was the most powerful of all wolves. So the outclanners raced in to lap up her blood. It was an abomination! They were tearing at her pelt, going wild trying to devour her heart.”

“But it's
cag mag
,” Edme whispered. “She was powerful because she was intelligent, unlike any outclanner in any rout. She was of strong marrow. That same marrow that made her fight so well and inspired her as a leader
also made her compassionate. So they tear out her heart, drink her heart's blood to make them strong? They don't even know what real strength is. Stupid, stupid superstitious wolves!”

Faolan cocked his head toward Edme. She sounded exactly like the Sark, who had nothing but contempt for the old wolf superstitions. How often had he heard the Sark carry on about the submission rituals or the silly necklaces that the chieftains wore? But at the same time, the speech was pure Edme. He recalled vividly how Edme had defended him at the
gaddergnaw
against the loathsome yellow wolf Heep when they were in a gnaw circle honing their bone-carving skills for the final contest. Faolan had gnawed a picture of a constellation that Heep had said was blasphemous, for it resembled the Great Bear constellation more than the Great Wolf one. The conversation came back to him as if it were yesterday.

It looks like a bear and not a wolf
. Heep had scowled. But Edme had come to Faolan's defense. Her voice so soft but her words so incisive they cut like fangs to bone.

It's beautiful, Heep
, she had said.
What difference does it make what one calls it? Stars all have different meaning for different animals, and heavens have different names.
Her words had been so simple and yet so powerful.

Then a terrible thought raced through Faolan's mind.

“Airmead, Katria, was there a yellow wolf in that rout?” Faolan asked suddenly.

“Why, yes. Yes, there was.”

“Was he tailless?” Faolan asked. Edme turned to him quickly, horrified understanding in her eyes.

“But, Faolan, Heep was a
malcadh
— a true
malcadh
. He would have been mended.”

“True,” Faolan said.

How unfair. Here is Edme still with just one eye, and Heep's tail has been restored.
He turned again to Katria and Airmead. “It is also true that this yellow wolf was a murderer. He murdered a
malcadh
!”

“What?” the two wolves gasped.

“Yes, and he was a MacDuncan wolf, not a MacHeath. Tell me, was he one of the ones who survived? Does Heep still live?”

Airmead and Katria both nodded. “He was the one who wounded me, Faolan. Of course it was Heep! I should have remembered him, but with his tail he looked so different. But yes, Faolan, he still lives.”

HE STILL LIVES.
THE WORDS ECHOED
in Faolan's mind, shivered through his marrow. The wolves had all settled down in the spacious first
heal
, or chamber, of the Cave. Although Faolan was exhausted, he knew sleep would not come easily. He looked up at the moon crack.

Faolan realized that he had become so distracted by the story of Heep and the outclanners' greed for heart's blood, that he had completely forgotten about the third
gyre
of his soul — his brethren through time, through the centuries. He needed Fionula, the Snowy Owl, and Eo, the grizzly, and whomever the third
gyre
creature was, if he was going to attempt to leave the Beyond and find a new land to the west. The Distant Blue, past the farthest edges of the outclanners' territory, where the western sea began.

The Distant Blue loomed azure and cloudless like another sky. It had always been unreachable because of that western sea that was too vast to swim, but through his
gyres
, Faolan sensed that there might be a way. Was this not how the first wolves of the Beyond had arrived out of the Long Cold on the Ice March?

It came to him then as he thought about the Distant Blue that his third soul was a wolf. He was not sure how he knew this, but the knowledge struck him with such conviction that it was impossible to doubt.

He was sure his wolf
gyre
soul was needed to lead them out of the Beyond to this new place, the Distant Blue. And of course it wasn't a truly new place. It was the place from which they had all come — the place the wolves had left when they had arrived in the Beyond on the Ice March, more than a thousand years ago. Once there had been a wolf, an old wolf, who had led them. Faolan must meet that wolf tonight, right now while his companions slept.

He looked over at Edme before he stood up. She was lovely in her sleep, lovely in her bones. It was as if that shimmering spirit of hers shone through from her marrow to her pelt. She was the best of all things a wolf could be, a container for all grace. Despite her missing eye, she
was a wolf so lovely in her marrow that she made the rest of the world seem dim and shadowed by comparison.

Faolan raised up onto his legs. They felt slightly wobbly, as if he were much older and weaker than his age. He limped off to follow the moon crack. He knew it ran all through the winding tunnels and
heals
of the Cave, this Cave Before Time. And he knew that when he came to the end of the last passage, he would meet his final
gyre
soul — the frost wolf.

As he walked, Faolan felt his two other
gyre
souls fall in on either side of him and thought what fine company they were. Though they didn't speak a word, there was a kind of communion between them that made talking unnecessary. They would pause to gaze at the drawings in the flickering thread of the moon's silvery light. Here and there, Faolan spotted a swirl of spiraling lines, just like the marks on his paw. But it was the other drawings that fascinated him the most. The rock seemed to breathe with the panting of animals and the stamp of their footsteps. Their wing beats made gusty sounds that echoed from the stone walls. Faolan stopped in front of what had always been his favorite picture in the Cave — a flowing
line of wolves on the hunt. He had been mesmerized by the image as a yearling. He had not known then that a hunting formation was called a
byrrgis
. At the time, all he wanted was to join in that flowing line of wolves, to belong, to be a part of something larger than himself.

And now a truth broke upon him as he stood closer. The point wolf in the painting! His stride was so familiar.
I know a wolf who runs like that!
He inhaled sharply as recognition exploded in his head.
I am that wolf!
He blinked. It was as if he were standing with one paw in the now and another in the before, where he was leading a
byrrgis
. He could hear the pounding of the feet of hundreds upon hundreds of wolves behind him. He was the leader. This was the third
gyre
! Beneath the drawing was the spiraling mark from his paw. It had been placed with a deliberation, unlike the others which had been randomly scattered throughout the cave. He realized what that placement in this particular spot meant. It was his signature, his sign. He had been the one to make this drawing!

Faolan continued down a winding, sloping incline and came to another drawing with bold marks made by a black rock. He recognized it immediately.
Ah, yes
, he thought. The picture showed the first night he had seen an
outclanner come feed on a wolf who had collapsed into unconsciousness from famine. The spirit of Eo, the grizzly
gyre
soul, had risen within Faolan and struck the outclanner dead with one blow of his paw. Beneath the drawing was a bear claw, the swirling marks on its pad. He felt the thunderous heart of the grizzly rumbling within his own chest.

Faolan squeezed through the narrow passageways and channels of the Cave that opened on to new
heals
with drawings he had never before seen, all rendered by his
gyre
souls, some with the mark of the bear claw, some with Fionula's mark, the claws of her talons twisting into a swirl. But it was the oldest pictures, the ones made by the wolf, that were the most mysterious to him and somehow the most familiar. He stopped in front of one that depicted a wolf on a well-known ridge near the ring of Sacred Volcanoes. It showed a wolf whom he knew to be a Fengo in an intimate conversation with an owl — a Spotted Owl that must have been a collier, for a bucket of embers rested next to him. Faolan had dreamed about just this scene half a moon before, on the night that he had slept at the cairn of the Fengos. It was Grank the first collier, and the first Fengo. They had been best friends.

A light breeze seemed to stir Fionula's feathers, as if to confirm the answer to the question. The
gyres
moved through a narrow passageway where there was barely a trickle of moonlight.
To what depths does the cave plunge?
Faolan was not sure which of his
gyres
asked the question, but they all moved forward. There was still the last
gyre
to meet and it was waiting — waiting for them.

They passed into a very small
heal
. Faolan stared at the wall ahead, which was covered by the most beautiful of all the drawings in the Cave. The wall curved as if it were made for just this story.
But it cannot be!
Faolan thought.
No! No one would dare make a picture of the moment of death, the moment of separation from clan, from pack, from one's own body. The sacred act of
cleave hwyln!

And yet the picture showed a wolf lying on the ground, so limp that he seemed almost boneless. His pelt looked like a discarded piece of fur. A starry ladder hung down from the Great Wolf constellation and the dim figure of an ancient wolf, a chieftain, was climbing up with the help of Skaarsgard, the Star Wolf guide to the Cave of Souls. The old wolf was clinging to the ladder as if he could barely hang on — or as if he didn't want to leave his pelt behind.

Faolan began to shiver and he felt the air beside him turn tremulous with the shuddering
gyre
souls of Eo and
Fionula.
The third
gyre
awaits us.
The words quivered in the air. The thread of light through the moon crack brightened, illuminating the base of the wall. Faolan gasped as his eyes fell upon a bone — the loveliest of bones polished by a thousand years or more of time. It was a femur, a twisted femur.