Spirit Wolf (14 page)

IN A SPIKE OF MOONLIGHT THE
twisted femur beckoned Faolan. He walked forward, yet his own legs felt boneless. His heart hammered and the pounding of Eo's heart nearly deafened him. Fionula had
wilfed
until she was thinner than a filament of moonlight. The carving on the bone was more beautiful than any Faolan had ever seen. It began to tell a story, but Faolan knew instinctively that unless he picked up this bone, the story would never be complete, nor would he have the courage to continue through the stone passage following the curved wall.
I am about to meet the frost wolf.
And yet something seemed slightly wrong with those words — “frost wolf.” He picked up the bone and crept close to the wall to follow its curve.

It was a continuation of the story of
cleave hwlyn
, but
where it would end he was unsure. He had heard this story before, when he was just a yearling, on a stormy night streaked with lightning. A
skreeleen
had begun to howl the tale of a dying chieftain from the time of the Long Cold. Slipping his pelt, his bones lying silent and cold in the moon's pale light, the chieftain had begun to climb the star ladder to the Cave of Souls.

The next picture on the wall showed a silent howl and a look of complete confusion on Skaarsgard's face as the old chieftain began falling, falling, his paws scratching the air as he tried to grab the rungs of the star ladder. And there the story appeared to end. But in a sense, the story was simply beginning anew, for now Faolan understood that the chieftain was reborn as the first Fengo, the wolf who led them out of the Long Cold and into the Beyond.

Around the final bend of the wall, Faolan would meet the third
gyre
. He clenched the femur tighter in his jaws, feeling the carvings on that lovely bone caress his tongue. There was something familiar about the lines in his mouth.
This is a story older than time
, they seemed to say.
Written in bone, a story of a journey and a love lost, a spirit forgotten and then met again and again. Your story, your story, all of your stories. Wolf, owl, bear, and wolf again. Now and forever.

Faolan felt himself growing older, his heart slowing.
Cleave hwlyn
awaited him, but there was no turning back now. He was too curious. He must meet the last of his
gyres
and the first of his souls.

The moon crack suddenly widened into an immense aperture. White light poured through it and ahead a glistening figure appeared. It spoke and yet the voice seemed to be Faolan's own, to come from within his own throat.

Faolan felt as if he were looking in a mirror and the mirror image spoke back to him with his words, his voice. His body began to merge with another being much older than himself.

“I am Fengo! Fengo is my name and always has been. I am the Fengo of Fengos — the first Fengo!”

The frost wolf was unsure how long he had stood beneath the cataract of moonlight that poured down upon him. But something strange had begun to happen, as if time were curling back on itself. The light slid from black, to the glare of day, to First Lavender, followed by the Deep Purple before First Black. It was as if the frost wolf were
accustoming himself to an old pelt he had forgotten.
I'll get used to it
, he told himself.
I'll gain strength, too.
For he knew he had done it before and would do it again.

He felt the
gyres
gather around him and press closely. The feathery touch of Fionula grazed his withers. The thunderous pumping from Eo's chest wrapped him in a cocoon as Faolan had once been wrapped up in the rhythms of his second Milk Giver's heart. Faolan felt the spirit of the frost wolf press in upon him, as did Fionula's and that of Eo. Three spirits to guide him to the Distant Blue.

There was no mystery now as to why he had been granted these extra lives, these
gyres
of his soul. It was his due as well as his choice. Once, he had slipped off the star ladder, picked up his pelt, and gone on to save the clans and lead them on the Ice March out of the Long Cold to somewhere safe for them. He had picked up the spirits of animals he had come to know or to admire — not only their souls, but their kind. He had been Fionula, a Snowy Owl, with the lovely voice of a gadfeather, and Eo, the largest of all the animals in the Beyond. And finally he once again became a wolf — a wolf named Faolan.

He had been blessed as no other creature on earth. He had felt the marrow of a wolf, the gizzard of an owl,
and the heart of a grizzly. The frost wolf who was Fengo closed his eyes and saw all that he had been. He saw the
gyres
of his soul coming and going through the centuries that stretched over a millenium. And now it was time for farewell as the darkness dropped and the beginning of First Lavender settled a light mist in the air. Wind shadows shuddered through the
heal
. It was time to move out of this stony place. For Faolan to move on with the spirits of Fengo the frost wolf, Fionula the Snowy Owl, and Eo the grizzly at his side.

“FAOLAN?” MYRRGLOSCH SAID IN
a tiny voice and blinked up at the silver wolf. Faolan looked larger and brighter than before, his luminous pelt glistening like ice. He had never seemed more powerful.

The other wolves were startled as well. They knew the wolf before them was Faolan, but he had changed in some inexplicable way. Edme took a step forward, and began to tremble as she saw the bone near Faolan's paws. She sensed in Faolan a spirit that seemed to shine through him. Something familiar that had been lost to her through the millenium. There was a tingling of excitement in her marrow, the feeling of old souls reunited.

Faolan felt Edme's eye pierce through the ghosts of his many hearts, of the marrow and gizzard of all the creatures he had been.
She sees what she cannot quite understand
, he thought.

A word bloomed in Edme's head like an ice flower.
Fengo!
Fengo was what she had always called him — not the title of Fengo, but simply Fengo, for that had been her mate's name.

A calm had stolen into the
heal
. “It's time for us to go now,” Faolan said. In his head he heard Fionula.
You must leave immediately. Leave now when the Deep Purple hinges on the First Black of night.

It was a fair jump out from the Cave and through the wide opening of the moon crack. Myrr scrambled onto Faolan's back. Gwynneth gently took Maudie in her talons, but just before Edme was about to make her jump, Faolan called down to her. “Bring the bone, dear. It's time we returned it.”

AFTER LEAVING THE CAVE BEFORE
Time, the animals spent nearly half a moon before they emerged on a high plain of sparkling snow. Under the dome of a star-scattered night it seemed as if millions of the stars had fallen about them into the snow. They felt engulfed in a tumult of starlight and began to nervously scratch the ground.

“Is this a frozen sea, the western sea?” the Whistler asked.

“No,” Faolan replied. “We still have a fair trek to the western sea.”

“A glacier — is this what we are on?” Banja asked fearfully, pulling her pup close to her.

“No.” Faolan planted his forepaw firmly in the snow and lifted it, making a mark of shimmering swirled lines,
like a comet come to earth. “This is the Crystal Plain. Each flake of snow is so dry that it is a perfect prism for the light. During the day it will be too bright to travel across so we must make our way by night, or else be blinded like Beezar, the stumbling wolf of the night sky. So let us begin now and at dawn we'll stop and dig in. It will take us several days to cross the plain, but we must never travel in daylight. It is simply too dangerous.”

A question hung in everyone's minds, but they dared not utter it. How would they ever cross the western sea? If they could not cross the sea, how would they ever reach the Distant Blue?

They had just taken their first steps onto the Crystal Plain. It was windless and an astonishing silence fell on the world. A blanket of stars billowed in the darkness and the creatures felt themselves wrapped in the pelt of the night. Suddenly, their hackles bristled and they each tipped their head up as mist swept down onto the high plain. From the youngest to the oldest, they all sensed that spirits moved among them.

Narrowing their eyes until they were slits of green, amber, or coal black, they spied the familiars of their hearts and gizzards and marrows. There was the Namara, and beside her Oona and then Brygeen. Katria and
Airmead began the howling known as
glaffling
, the howls of mourning. Gwynneth pressed her wings above her head and she bowed down midair to the scroom of King Soren in the owl gesture of mourning known as Glaux griven. “Mum!” The two cubs reached out into the spangled night to touch the
lochin
of their mother, Bronka. The feathers fixed in their withers quivered. Edme threw back her head, jewel-like tears weeping from her eye as she glimpsed her old
taiga
, Winks.

The gathering of
lochin
sparkled in the night so brightly that it made the Crystal Plain seem dim in comparison. And soon there came a starry wolf with the powerful shoulders of an outflanker. Beside her strode a huge grizzly. They were creatures so different, yet they shared a precious bond. Both had offered their milk to sustain a pup, a
malcadh
who grew up strong, a
malcadh
who would lead the living out of the Beyond.

“Mum! Thunderheart!” Faolan exclaimed. Mhairie and Dearlea pressed close to Faolan and together they sunk down on their knees for this last good-bye.

But where is the Sark?
Gwynneth swiveled her head, flipped it forward then back and swiveled it again.
Oh, Sark, where are you?
And then she recalled the Sark did not believe in
lochin
or scrooms. “Stuff and nonsense” she
had called them more than once. The Masked Owl wept as if her heart were broken.

As quickly as the spirits had come, they melted into the blackness of the night and were gone. The eight wolves, the two pups, the cubs, and the owl began their journey again in complete silence, for this was the end of the world as they knew it.

The Beyond was behind them. Ahead was the Distant Blue.

An hour before dawn, as the last evening star, known as Hilgeen, began to slip down in the dome of the night and the blackness shredded to gray, Faolan called a halt. “We must stop now. Soon the sun will come up and we must not see it!”

“But there are no caves here, no dens,” the Whistler said, looking about.

“We must build one.”

“Build?” Airmead asked and all the wolves looked at one another in complete bewilderment. Even the word “build” was an unfamiliar one to them. Birds built nests, but wolves — what could wolves build?

“I'll show you, and you shall soon be experts, I promise you.”

Faolan began digging furiously with his paws. Snow flew up into the air, landing behind him. Soon there was a small pile. “Come on now, you see how I've done it. Start digging. Make sure all the snow goes into that pile.”

“How much snow do we need?” Mhairie asked. Faolan stopped. He looked at the two bear cubs. “Stand up tall, Toby and Burney.” He looked at them. “The pile should be as tall as the withers on the cubs. For we must all fit in.”

When they had amassed a big enough pile of snow, Faolan said, “Now we must pack it tightly. Cubs, your paws are the broadest. So begin to press the snow so it is firm. We shall help you. And, Gwynneth, your wings should be useful in patting the snow down so the walls are firm.”

It did not take long. Faolan tested the mound. “The snow must bind before we make a tunnel.”

“A tunnel?” Myrr asked.

“Yes, of course. We have to hollow out the mound so there is room for us.”

When the snow firmed, Faolan began the tunnel. “Myrrglosch and Maudie, you can help. This is where we need little wolves to squeeze in alongside me to make the opening wider.”

By dawn the snow cave was complete. It was a peculiar structure like none they had ever slept in before, but it was snug. It protected them against the wind and most important, against the glare of the sun.

The creatures soon became proficient in building the curious domed caves. Toby and Burney became skillful snow packers and Myrr and Maudie were excellent at squeezing in on either side of whoever was the “tunneler.” Gwynneth, too, with her long, sharp talons, became an excellent excavator.

“And to think,” she said one dawn as she furiously flung back talonfuls of snow, “that burrowing owls used to be the only ones trusted with digging. What would they say if they saw me now!”

All day, the companions slept in the snow caves and then, when the sun dropped down below the horizon, they crawled out and began their nightly trek across the Crystal Plain. Faolan took the lead, leaving his clear swirling print in the sparkling snow.

Edme, who had known Faolan better than any of the other wolves, felt a myriad of sometimes confusing feelings and emotions as they traveled farther and farther
west. She sensed spirits that seemed to stir in the radiance that emanated from Faolan. And the bone that she carried with her both troubled and comforted her. The incisions in it were beautiful, but she could barely understand them. They were incised in Old Wolf, a language of which she only knew a few expressions that had lingered on among the wolves. However, she sensed that it was part of a very old story that had been left untold. Edme slid her eyes toward Faolan as she trotted alongside him. He often blurted out Old Wolf phrases, phrases that no wolf of their time should have known.

Although the mysterious pain in her hind leg still troubled her, Edme was walking better. She sensed the pain was connected with the bone she carried.
If I set it down, would I begin to limp again?
she wondered.

They were nearly across the Crystal Plain. The snow became coarser as they approached the western sea, and building the snow caves was trickier.

One evening, soon after they had left what was to be their last snow cave, Gwynneth was flying above the somewhat straggling line of creatures. Banja was carrying her own pup and helping Myrr along as well, entertaining
him with some of the lively shanties that the Watch wolves used to sing when the She-Winds blew and all the colliers and Rogue smiths would come to collect bonk coals from the surge of erupting volcanoes. For some reason, these old shanties made Gwynneth think of her earliest days in the Beyond, when she had first come there with her father, Gwyndor, and met the Sark.

The Sark! How Gwynneth missed her and with each league away from the Beyond and toward the Distant Blue, the more keen the feeling. If the Sark could have only held on, perhaps they could have gotten her well enough for this journey.
If only …
Gwynneth supposed that life was filled with regrets and if onlys.

More than once, Gwynneth's auntie had said that the world is not fair. Certainly it had not been fair that the MacHeath clan had tried to start a war between the wolves and the bears. It wasn't fair that Edme was a
malcadh
made and not born. If fairness were the rule, the good would not die young, as Coryn, the king of the Great Tree, had. The vicious and the depraved would be immediately swept away to the eternal flames of the Dim World.

The world was not fair. However, on this cloudless night of crisp, clear air high above the Crystal Plain, it
was beautiful. And Gwynneth, who could travel so much faster than the wolves, decided to take a moment to trace a constellation. This was how all young owlets learned to navigate, by tracing the season's constellations. She did a banking turn and flew off toward the east — the hatching sky as the owls called it. This was where the constellations were born each night, just as the Deep Purple began to settle and the stars began to rise. Like chicks clambering over the edge of a nest to explore what was out there, like wolf pups impatient to see the white light at the opening of a whelping den, stars, too, scrambled over the rim of the new night to take their place in the big world.

“Ah!” Gwynneth exclaimed as she saw the first claw of the Little Raccoon. “But, Beezar!” she said suddenly. “Beezar, what are you doing here?” She addressed the first stars of the constellation as if they could hear her.

Gwynneth realized they were Beyond the Beyond, beyond the Outermost. She was the farthest west she had ever been, and the farthest south. And now the poor staggering blind wolf Beezar had left the Beyond and was following them toward the Distant Blue.

New land, new territory!
the Masked Owl thought.
But the things we leave behind!

The thought was as sharp as a blade hot from the forge. She could not help but think of the Sark, her bones now mingled with the shards of pottery on the floor of her cave.

At just that moment, Gwynneth spied the top of a new constellation that seemed to be clawing its way over the dark edge of the eastern night in a most determined manner.

What could that be?
she wondered. It looked vaguely familiar, but she was sure she had never seen it before.