The Wolf Tree (35 page)

They climbed and leaped across the chasms, up and up. There were sections where the pathway ran almost horizontally, and other times the way was so steep that Conker had to climb with his hands. He was surprised at the ease with which Mangoron could scale the nearly vertical faces. The rougarou understood where to position his hind legs and how to pull himself with his front claws, or teeth even, when the need arose.

In the dark of night, the Wolf Tree seemed to absorb the moon and starlight, so that the Tree itself looked luminous. Soon the night sky began to tint with the first wash of gray and deep blues of dawn’s arrival. Conker could see how truly high they had risen.

As they rounded once more to the side facing the rougarou’s camp, Conker paused to look out at the world below. How far up were they? A mile now? He could see the pack below. He could make out Jolie and even the two girls, rousing from their sleep. How strange it was to look down on them, as if he were a bird. How small they were. Then a wave of vertigo struck him, and he fell back against the Tree.

“Best not to look back,” Mangoron said. “It will get easier the higher we go. I know that sounds illogical, but you’ll see. That’s why I like to leave before daybreak. I’ve found that most are more fearful when they can still see the earth clearly. The first hours are the hardest. Look ahead. Look up. You won’t fall.”

They went on, higher and higher. Conker’s thighs burned with exertion. He was sweating, even though the wind was getting cool the farther they climbed. They stopped and ate,
resting for a time on a wide ledge. Birds flew past below them. At the horizon, the curvature of the earth was visible. They continued on.

Conker did peer back on occasion. He could no longer see the pack or Jolie or the girls. Or were those tiny specks them? Mangoron had been right. It was less dizzying to look down now. Maybe it was that the distance was more abstract because of the tremendous height. How far had they climbed? Several miles surely. Conker found it harder to breathe. The air was much colder, and he draped the blanket over his shoulders.

What was most peculiar was that when Conker looked down, the trunk became semi-transparent closer to the ground, just as the top of the Wolf Tree was fading into the sky. It was as if the portion where Conker and Mangoron climbed was solid and substantial, but from a distance, the Wolf Tree could be seen for what it truly was. But what was that? What was it made of? Light? Spirit, maybe? Nothing material, he reckoned.

After a while, the lowest branches begin to appear. They were still a long way off, but the branches seemed to coalesce from the sky itself, stretching out horizontally farther than they had climbed up.

“How long will it take us to reach those branches?” Conker asked Mangoron.

The rougarou looked out at the sun, gauging its position. “After dark, I think.”

They rose to such a height that clouds drifted past below them, casting enormous shadows like black sailing ships
across the surface of the prairie. Conker had to stop more frequently, not so much because his muscles were weary, but because he was short of breath. Mangoron waited patiently, urging him to drink more water, explaining that this would help.

By nightfall, they were just below the lowest branches. Conker could see the trunk continuing up, seemingly infinitely, with more branches stretching out as it rose. They wound their way up until at last they stood atop a branch nearly a hundred feet thick. Mangoron suggested that they rest, even try to sleep for several hours before going on. Conker agreed, and although the air was growing bitterly cold, he covered himself in the blanket and slept a heavy, dreamless sleep.

When they woke, it was still night, although Conker could not tell how late. They began their journey along the branch. This was much easier than the climb had been. The branch slowly narrowed, and after several hours, they came to the first split.

“Which way do we go?” Conker asked.

“It makes little difference as you are not crossing the pathway to reach the other world. We’ll take the narrower of the branches.”

They went on like this: coming to where the branch divided and taking whichever branch seemed the smaller. A branch forty feet in width divided into two branches, each twenty-five feet in width. Soon the branch they were crossing was little more than eight feet across.

Mangoron began to move more quickly, sniffing rapidly
at the bark and growling with agitation. As Conker hurried after him, there was a great crack. The limb broke away beneath Mangoron’s feet. He would have plunged to his death had Conker not leaped to the edge, snatching Mangoron by the back leg. The rougarou yipped as his hip caught the brunt of his weight. Leaning over the edge, Conker watched as the enormous broken bough dropped into the howling wind and disappeared in the dark.

Conker heaved Mangoron back onto the limb. The rougarou lay panting, his eyes wild and deeply troubled. “The Tree! How could this have happened? I’ve led countless across its passway and never has a branch broken.”

Charged with fright-filled energy, Mangoron investigated the broken limb and others around it. “The branches, they are weak. They are cracking all around. What has happened to the Great Tree?” Distress filled his voice as Mangoron barked. “The Tree is dying!”

“No,” Conker said, disbelieving. “How can it die? It’s not an actual tree.”

“It can die. I would never have imagined this before, but now, in witnessing it, I can see with certainty that the Great Tree is dying. These branches. They’ve become brittle. The bark is peeling. The wood beneath is dry and dead. That Machine! It is killing it.”

Mangoron turned this way and that at the broken branch’s edge, like a fox cornered by hounds and desperate for escape.

“What about the handle?” Conker asked. “Can it still be made?”

Mangoron stopped his frantic pacing, breathing in shallow gasps until he gathered himself. “Yes. Yes, I don’t think all the branches are dead. We will have to find one still living. Follow me.”

Mangoron led Conker back along the branch, taking careful steps and often testing the limb to make sure it would support them. When they reached where another, larger limb spread out from the branch, Conker followed Mangoron along it.

“Here,” Mangoron said after they reached an area where several smaller branches grew from the one they had been following. “This limb we are on is still healthy. And look. Out there. See that branch, the one with leaves still on it. That is it. Cut that branch. Go now.”

Conker had to climb out. He was glad that it was night, glad that he could not see the great distance below him. He moved slowly up the limb, taking solid holds. The limb groaned under his weight. This was dangerous work, risky, like walking out on a frozen pond, not knowing if his next move would send him plunging to his death.

But Conker was not afraid of dying, not anymore, and he was surprised as this fact dawned on him. He had died once already. He would do it again one day.

Conker eased his way out further and when he reached the limb, he could see that it was the perfect thickness. Taking the shell knife from his belt, he sawed first at the narrow end, cutting the leaves and thinnest twigs away. The limb swayed beneath him as he worked, but there was no keeping it from moving.

“Be careful,” Mangoron growled.

Conker measured off a length a little longer than his arm. He took a deep breath. Leveling the knife on the bark, Conker sawed through the dense wood.

When he had finished, he secured the branch in his belt and crawled back. He had done it. He had the branch that would restore the Nine Pound Hammer.

Mangoron inspected it when Conker returned. “Yes. This is good. This wood contains the power of the Great Tree. There is life left in it yet. But I fear that if my pack does not find a way to save the Great Tree, it will die and crumble away into oblivion. What will become of the rougarou then? What will become of the world?”

22
GUNSHOTS

S
ALLY
? W
HAT COULD SHE POSSIBLY BE DOING OUT
here?

Ray had sent B’hoy scanning wide, ahead and across the prairie to look for her, but each time he returned, he had seen no one.

As they stopped at a creek to water the horses, Ray got down and walked out, inspecting the ground. The treads of the steamcoach had cut parallel swaths across the prairie.

“What are you doing?” Redfeather called, getting down from Atsila and handing the reins to Marisol.

“There are more of those footprints,” Ray said.

Redfeather came over to Ray. “They’re small. Two pairs,” he said, touching a finger to them. “Do you think one of them could be Sally’s?”

“It must be,” Ray said. “But who’s she with?”

Redfeather pointed. “Look, there’s that wolf print again.”

Ray followed the tracks out, kicking aside the grass to find the prints in the soft earth. “This doesn’t make any sense!”

Marisol rode up from the creek, pulling Atsila along by her reins. “Ray, we don’t know for sure that it’s Sally.”

“It has to be her!” Ray shouted. “Don’t you understand? No one else could possibly have the rabbit’s foot!”

Redfeather and Marisol flinched. Ray’s nerves were on edge. He knew he had spoken too harshly, but he could not help himself from snapping. And to make matters worse, they had not slept the night before. The Bowlers were quickening their hunt, having only stopped for an hour to eat and fill the steamcoach’s water tank. The agents continued their pursuit through the night. The four Bowlers on horseback rode ahead, spread out in a wide fan.

“Ray,” Marisol said as they rode on.

“What?”

She pushed aside her hair to say over her shoulder, “What if that’s not a wolf?”

“What else could it be?” Ray asked.

Redfeather gave Marisol a curious look as he brought Atsila next to Unole.

Marisol glanced at him before saying, “Remember what Water Spider said about the guardians of the Wolf Tree.”

“The rougarou?” Redfeather asked.

Marisol nodded and shook Unole’s reins.

Redfeather’s eyes remained wide as he rode after her.

The sun had already set, and darkness was falling fast. A mile ahead, they could see the black tendril of the steamcoach’s smoke. Redfeather shook Atsila’s reins to quicken her. “What will happen to Gigi and the other workers when they go to Chicago? Won’t they all get sick?”

“No, don’t you see?” Ray explained. “This is how the Gog plans on enslaving mankind. This is all part of his design. The Machine will make it so nobody who enters the Darkness can ever leave. They’ll be trapped—all those workers, everyone who goes to the Expo, and after that …”

Redfeather grunted, a frown darkening his eyes. “I don’t think they’ll stop again tonight. Our horses are weary. How much longer can we keep up this pace?”

“Look.” Marisol pointed. “The ground seems to fall away just up there.”

Ray narrowed his eyes but could not make out what they were approaching. He closed his eyes and looked from B’hoy’s perspective high above. “It’s some sort of bluff, but it drops more gradually than we can see from here. And below, there’s a maze of strange spikes of earth and twisting cliffs. It’s an odd country.”

“The steamcoach is headed that way,” Redfeather said. “We don’t want to lose it in the dark. Let’s hurry to stay close.”

The wind rattled the prairie grass. The moon rose. They kicked the tired horses into a faster gait. Marisol took the last of the salted meat from her bag and handed some to Ray and Redfeather. They ate as the sky transitioned from twilight to
night, and soon they were nearly to the badland buttes and canyons.

“Maybe we should try to get ahead of the Bowlers,” Ray said. “The way they’re driving that steamcoach, they must think they’ve nearly caught Sally. If we use the dark as cover, maybe we can get ahead of them and look for her before—”

A gunshot rang out. The bullet whined past them, and Unole reared, throwing Ray from her back.

“What was that?” Redfeather shouted, trying to brace Atsila.

But Unole was startled, and Marisol could not stop him from running. Ray was on his feet, watching as Redfeather galloped after her.