Spirit of the Wolves Page 6

  “They’ll kill us,” Marra wheezed. And I knew with sudden, sure intensity that I didn’t want to die. Even though my mother had chased me. Even though I was failing in the Promise and might be the wolf destined to destroy wolfkind. I felt a surge of hunger that had nothing to do with my full belly. Strength returned to my legs and I tried to think of something to say to the approaching wolves—if they let us speak before they attacked.

  They didn’t attack. They began to herd us, as we might herd elk, to the far side of the plain. As silent as prowling rock lions, they closed in on us, giving us no choice but to run in the direction they took us. Tlitoo dipped and dove at the wolves, grabbing tufts of fur and probably bits of skin, but they ignored him. They ran so quickly, it was all I could do to keep up. I could hear Ázzuen gasping beside me. Even Marra was panting.

  They drove us at their unrelenting pace until we reached a small pond. I tried to lap up some water to ease my parched throat, but the wolves growled and snapped at us, forcing us to go on.

  A few minutes beyond the pond, we crested a low hill. Below us stretched the dense line of pines that marked the forest’s edge. The wolves around us picked up their pace and I was sure I would stumble and be trampled. At last they slowed as we reached a thick grove of birch, pine, and spruce. The trees stood close together, and I expected that we would wend through them to get to a clearing of some sort. Instead we stopped beneath a single oak surrounded by smaller trees. I smelled still more wolves. The wolves guarding us spread out among the trees, and for the first time, I had a clear view of my surroundings.

  I looked up to see Greatwolves everywhere. Standing on rocks and sitting upright on the ground, they watched us. I didn’t know that there were so many of them in the world. A familiar bitter spruce scent wafted toward me. Some of the wolves who had brought us there pushed Ázzuen, Marra, and Pell to one side, leaving me to stand alone. Then they crouched low in deference to the Greatwolves. As I dropped to my belly, I heard a contemptuous laugh, a sound I knew almost as well as TaLi’s voice or Ázzuen’s howl. I hoped I had mistaken the sound, but knew I wouldn’t be so lucky. I lifted my head to gaze into the cold, scornful eyes of the Greatwolf Milsindra.

  The Sentinel pack was led by Greatwolves, and Milsindra was one of them.

  7

  In the time I had known her, Milsindra had lied about the duty of wolfkind and the Promise, had tried to kill me, and had killed a packmate I loved. She had done everything she could to sabotage our efforts to live peacefully with the humans. Now she had tricked me into leaving the valley and delivered me to a packful of Greatwolves.

  “You pups are so easy to manipulate,” she whispered to me. “Did you really think I would just let you destroy us?”

  She lowered her head to a large dark-coated Greatwolf male. He had a patch of pale fur between his eyes and the bearing of a leaderwolf.

  “This is the one, Navdru,” she smirked. “The drelshik. I told you I’d bring her to you.”

  “We’re the ones who brought her,” Lallna grumbled from just behind me, but she kept her voice a whisper. It was as much defiance as she was willing to show Greatwolves.

  The Greatwolf that Milsindra had called Navdru strode toward me, flanked by a light gray female as dominant as he was. There was nowhere to run. Milsindra had trapped us neatly. I’d have thought that if I ever found myself surrounded by Greatwolves planning to kill me, I would be frozen in terror. Instead, I felt my legs straighten under me as I stood. Tlitoo rasped challenge from an oak branch just above me. My lips peeled back and a growl rose in my throat. I wouldn’t just lie there to be killed.

  Navdru moved forward in the Greatwolves’ long, stalking stride until he was just a wolflength from me.

  “I am Navdru,” he rumbled, ignoring my lack of respect, “leaderwolf of the Sentinel Pack. This is my mate, Yildra”—he nodded to the pale Greatwolf on his right—“and this is Hidden Grove Gathering Place.” He looked at me as if I were somehow a disappointment, then sighed and dipped his head in greeting. “You took long enough to get here.”

  I fell silent in mid-growl and stared at him like a stunned deer. He wasn’t going to kill me, at least not yet, and he had been waiting for me to come. I swayed, my mind understanding that I wasn’t in immediate danger, but my body was still tensed to fight. I couldn’t gather the words to return his greeting.

  Milsindra growled in fury.

  Navdru’s teeth showed between his lips in the barest of smiles. “Youngwolves are not the only ones easy to manipulate, Milsindra. Your hunger for power makes you foolish. I needed you to allow her to leave the Wide Valley without a fight.”

  I found my voice. “I’m just here to see my mother,” I whispered. My mother, who didn’t want me and who wouldn’t help me with the Promise. “My packmates and I will leave your territory if you let us go.” I didn’t know what I’d do after that. I just wanted to retrieve our humans and get someplace safe.

  Navdru looked down his long muzzle at me.

  “You will not go anywhere,” he said. “You are Kaala, late of the Swift River pack of the Wide Valley, born of mixed blood when your mother, Neesa, bred outside the valley in defiance of our laws. You have brought with you your packmates, Ázzuen and Marra, as well as Pell, heir to the leadership of the Stone Peak pack, who has chosen to follow you rather than accept his birthright. When you were a smallpup, you saved the human girl TaLi, and hunted with the humans, also in defiance of wolf law. In doing so, you and your packmates became the first wolves in generations to live peacefully with humans without either fighting with them or giving up the wildness of the wolf. Which means you are, most likely, the drelwolf, the wolf of legend, and our last chance.”

  He knew TaLi’s name. That was the first thought that came to me. He knew who she was. That meant he could find her and he could kill her. I wanted to ask him how he knew so much about us and why, and what he intended to do with us. I wanted to ask him if he was going to hurt TaLi.

  “What does drelwolf mean? I know drelshan and drelshik, but not drelwolf.” I sounded so calm, as if I were discussing the next hunt or a new den site.

  “No one has told you.” Navdru frowned. He lifted a lip to Milsindra, who averted her gaze. “We believe that the drelshan, the savior wolf, and the drelshik, the destroyer, are one and the same, and that what she does or does not do will determine the fate of wolfkind. We believe you may be that wolf. It is why we considered killing you when you saved the human pup. Your mother, and the Greatwolf Zorindru of the Wide Valley, convinced us to give you a chance. When some of us saw you stop the battle between wolves and humans four moons ago, we believed we had made the right choice.” He frowned again. “The drelwolf is supposed to be a wolf of great power.” He looked me over from nose to tail. “You are young, yet.”

  “She has already caused destruction and the death of a packmate!” Milsindra said. She strode up to Navdru. “She could mean the end of all wolfkind.”

  Navdru growled. “This is not the Wide Valley, Milsindra, and you do not rule here.”

  “She does not rule in the Wide Valley, either,” Tlitoo quorked from his branch.

  Milsindra gave Navdru a long, measuring look and lowered one ear. I remembered her giving in just as easily to Zorindru back in the Wide Valley. I realized, then, that she was frightened of Navdru just as she’d been of Zorindru, but was standing up to him because she believed in what she was doing. She was convinced that only Greatwolves had the strength to control humans and that if we smallwolves tried, disaster would follow. She really thought my existence threatened wolfkind.

  “My offer stands,” Navdru said to her. “If the youngwolf fails, leadership of the Wide Valley is yours, and we will have no more to do with the humans. For now, however, you will not disrupt my pack.”

  Milsindra lowered the other ear. She started to speak, but behind her another wolf growled a warning. I heard running pawsteps.

  A moment later, Neesa bolted into the clearing and hurled her
self at Navdru. He was so much bigger than she was that she didn’t even make him stagger. She fell to the ground, got to her paws, and leapt again.

  “Get out of here, Kaala!” she gasped. “Why didn’t you escape when you could?”

  I could only stare at her, baffled. I’d thought she hated me. Now she’d trespassed into a Greatwolf gathering place to find me.

  Navdru swung his great head, knocking my mother across the copse and into the trunk of a pine. She fell, her legs splayed on the hard ground. I yelped, and before I knew what I was doing, I was standing in front of her. She had chased me away. She had told me to leave my home and then rejected me, but she was my mother and I wouldn’t let Navdru kill her. Ázzuen, Pell, and Marra burst through the line of Greatwolves guarding them and scrambled to my side. Pell bore a fresh wound on his neck. I heard a croaking above me and darted a glance up to see that Tlitoo had flown to a branch of the pine we now stood beneath.

  “You should have run when I told you to, Kaala,” Neesa gasped, struggling to her paws. “They mean to use you like the humans use their tools.”

  Navdru strode forward, his backfur raised, his teeth bared. “You should not have told her to run, Neesa. It was a betrayal of the Sentinel pack.”

  “You lied to me,” she retorted, as if a wolf half again her size were not glowering down at her. She lowered her head to whisper to me. “I came out of hiding because they promised you could come to me unharmed. They told me they needed you. But they didn’t say you would be in danger. I tried to warn you before you left the valley but I was too late. I would never have called you in the first place if I’d known. You’re the only pup I have left.”

  I could only stare at her. I knew I could be killed at any moment by the Greatwolves surrounding me, but all I could think of was that my mother hadn’t chased me away because she didn’t want me. She’d been trying to save my life.

  “We’re all in danger, Neesa, you know that,” Navdru snapped.

  He lowered his head and swung it back and forth, looking from Neesa to me, and then to Ázzuen, Pell, and Marra, anger rising off him like mist. Then he sighed, settled the fur along his back, and closed his eyes. Ruuqo did that, too, when he was trying to control his temper. When the Greatwolf leaderwolf opened his eyes, he seemed to be speaking to himself as much as to us.

  “I should have remembered the reckless courage of the Wide Valley wolves,” Navdru said. “It is, I suppose, the reason you have all survived.” He turned his gaze to me. “I need you to listen to me, youngwolf. Stop snarling at me and listen.”

  “The drelwolf,” someone whispered. “No other wolf would stand against Greatwolves.”

  “I heard she is not a true wolf,” another Greatwolf murmured. “That she is part human.”

  “Leave us!” Navdru ordered, glaring around the clearing. “I cannot speak to the youngwolves with all of you panting at the backs of our necks.”

  One by one, Greatwolf and smallwolf alike began to leave the copse. About ten Greatwolves stayed, including Yildra and Milsindra. At the very edge of the woods, Lallna paused, looking back at Navdru, her face pinched in anxiety. He followed my gaze and watched her for a moment, then trotted across the copse. He took her muzzle in his jaws.

  “You have done well, youngwolf,” he said. “Thank you for bringing the drelwolf to us.”

  Lallna lowered her ears to Navdru, but her tail wagged. Her status in the pack would almost certainly rise considerably. When Navdru released her, she grinned at me and bounded into the woods.

  The copse was almost silent. I could hear Tlitoo’s low quorking and the heavy breathing of my mother and my packmates. I tried to loosen the muscles in my chest.

  “I cannot fault a mother for wishing to protect her pup,” Navdru said, inclining his head to Neesa. “As for you, youngwolves, I admire your willingness to fight for yourselves.” He nodded to me and my packmates. His manner had changed and he spoke to me kindly but firmly, with the assurance of a leaderwolf addressing a member of his pack.

  “I did not begin well. We have been waiting a long time for the drelwolf.” He softened his muzzle. “We waited for you because if we cannot fulfill the Promise now, we may have no other chance.” He let that sink in. “There is a human village twenty minutes’ lope from here, and what happens there may very well determine whether we succeed or fail.”

  His mate, Yildra, spoke for the first time, her voice deep and rumbling. “The humans of Kaar are making a choice between two ways of being, youngwolves. Some think that humans are one creature among many. Others believe that humans are different, that the Ancients have given them the task of ruling every creature, every forest, every plain. They believe that the larger their village grows, the more power they have. And they have taken over many villages as proof.”

  “It was starting to be that way at home, too,” I said. The humans were so arrogant. A wolf feels responsible for her territory. She must ensure that prey is not hunted so much that entire herds flee, and has the right to fight any wolves who try to invade the pack’s territory. But she does not stray beyond the confines of her own land, and if she does, she does so with deference to the wolves who guard that territory. To think oneself the leaderwolf of all creatures seemed like the ravings of a mad wolf.

  “The decisions are being made everywhere humans live,” Navdru said. “But Kaar holds great influence. It’s the most powerful village for as far as any wolf has run or raven has flown. As goes Kaar, so will go the other humans. And if the humans choose to be rulers of all creatures, we will lose our chance to sway them, for they will see no wisdom outside their own thoughts and beliefs. They will see other creatures only as either enemies or tools.”

  “Which is why you should not have run away like a skittering mouse, youngwolf.” The harsh, rasping voice came from above. The old human krianan, RalZun, was perched on the pine branch next to Tlitoo. A rustling drew my gaze to the higher branches of the trees, where several more ravens stood, warbling softly.

  RalZun jumped down and gave Navdru a jerky bow. The Greatwolf dipped his head to the old human. The human krianans and the Greatwolves of the Wide Valley had once worked together toward the Promise. The ones in Sentinel lands evidently still did.

  “I would have brought her to you, Navdru, but she ran off.” He glared at me. “You are no longer a pup, free to be concerned only with herself,” he snapped.

  I lifted my lip to him. He wasn’t my leaderwolf.

  “The humans at the big village like wolves, don’t they?” Ázzuen blurted, his ears twitching. “It makes sense, Kaala.” His silvery eyes met mine. “TaLi’s village wanted to use us to steal territory from other villages. That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?” he challenged Navdru.

  Navdru looked disconcerted.

  “They like wolves,” he confirmed. “Or, rather, they like what we can do for them. Wolves have lived with them before, helping them hunt and protecting their lands. It is one of the reasons they have grown so strong.”

  “They see us as tools,” Yildra said, “and if they find us to be useful enough tools, they will do a great deal to keep us. Once they have welcomed us—welcomed you—as pack, we can help them understand that they are creatures of the wild like we are, and that they are no different from the world around them.”

  “But we will not allow any wolf to go to them unless we can be assured that the humans will not stray farther from the Balance as a result,” Navdru rumbled.

  “How is Kaala supposed to do that?” Pell rumbled back. Marra growled softly.

  It was RalZun who answered, looking pleased with himself. “I have told the leaders of Kaar that wolves will only come back to the village if a krianan brings them. They are choosing a new krianan at their Spring Festival on Even Night.”

  “They care about Even Night?” Ázzuen asked. It intrigued me, too, that the humans sometimes marked time the same way we did.

  RalZun dipped his head. “It is how they celebrate the beginning of spring and autu
mn. They used to understand that they shared traditions with other creatures. Now they imagine that only they have such ceremonies. There are those among them who believe that the krianan’s role is to lead humans away from the natural world, to set them as far apart from other beasts as possible.” He waved his arms at Navdru and Yildra. “That is why my friends here will allow you to go to the human village to try one more time.” Then the old man grinned. “If the humans wish to have you wolves help them in their hunts and in guarding their homes, they must choose the krianan I recommend, and thus follow the old ways.”

  “TaLi,” I said. “You want TaLi to be their krianan. You told NiaLi to send her here without saying why.” I didn’t like that he was putting TaLi in danger.

  “I called her to her duty as you are called to yours.”

  I growled at him. He was as manipulative as a Greatwolf.

  Navdru poked me in the chest with his nose. I coughed.

  “Do you accept this duty, youngwolf?” he demanded.

  I’d thought that once I found my mother, she would tell me what to do, and I could go home and let grown wolves take responsibility for what came next. Now a pack of Greatwolves who had tried for generations to control the humans wanted me to do what they could not.

  Ázzuen whuffed to me. I met his eyes. They were warm with encouragement.

  “Yes, I accept,” I said to Navdru. It wasn’t as if I had a choice. The alternative was to be killed, along with those I loved.

  “Good,” the Sentinel leader said. “But, listen to me. You must not be submissive to the humans. Have you been so with your human girl? Ever? Even to keep her from becoming angry?”