14,000 YEARS AGO
I could not stop thinking about the human child. I was so preoccupied with thoughts of her that I did not notice at first when Trevegg walked slowly into the clearing, his eyes creased with concern. Minn followed a few steps behind, looking perplexed, and a little frightened.
“I can’t find her, leaderwolf,” Trevegg said to Rissa, who looked up sleepily from a nap beside the fallen spruce. The rain had stopped at last, and three days of sun had dried out all but the soggiest parts of the gathering place. All of us were looking forward to a rest in the sun before the evening hunt.
The oldwolf shook his head. “I followed her trail to Wood’s Edge and then partway out onto the field, and then her scent just disappeared. I don’t understand it.”
“Perhaps she stopped to rest and has not yet woken?” Rissa said, rising, all signs of sleep gone.
“Borlla’s missing,” Marra said, bounding up to me. She had run to meet Trevegg and Minn as they returned from the Tall Grass plain. Ázzuen trotted over from the watch rock, ears cocked to listen.
“She’s always missing,” I said, feeling a little guilty. I had all but forgotten about Borlla in my fascination with the human child.
“But this time they can’t find her. At all. And Trevegg is upset. Listen.” She nodded toward the oldwolf.
“Her scent just vanishes, Rissa,” Trevegg was saying. I had never seen him frightened or at a loss, but he seemed to be both.
Ruuqo, Werrna, and Yllin hurried over from across the clearing.
“It’s not possible,” Werrna said, almost angrily. “Even if she was taken by a hunter, there would be a smell of it. I’m sorry, Rissa,” she said to the leaderwolf, who growled at the mention of a hunter. “She keeps wandering off on her own, too distracted to be aware of danger and too weak from hunger to run or fight. It was only a matter of time before something got her.”
“I am not so old,” Trevegg snapped, “that I wouldn’t know if something had taken her! She’s just gone.”
“Her scent was there and then it wasn’t,” Minn said, sounding spooked. “Trevegg’s right. There’s no smell of a recent hunter. Her trail just vanishes.”
“It’s not possible,” Werrna repeated stubbornly.
I was shocked to realize that Werrna was afraid, too. I didn’t think she was afraid of anything.
“If the Ancients are angry with us,” Ruuqo interrupted Werrna, with a glare, “we must determine why.”
“We will make sure first,” Rissa said, her voice barely a whisper. “I trust you, elderwolf, but we must be certain.”
“I would feel better if others looked for her, too,” Trevegg admitted.
Rissa touched her nose to his cheek and, without a word, without our usual leaving ceremonies, led the pack out of the gathering place.
“Why are they acting so strangely?” Ázzuen asked Yllin as we ran along the deerpath, gasping a little to keep up. “She’s gone missing lots of times before.”
Yllin paused a moment by a starflower bush to let us catch up. She glanced up the path to make sure the others were not in earshot.
“It is normal,” she said, “for wolves to die—to be carried off by hunters, or to be injured by prey, or to grow ill. All wolves die. But it’s unnatural for a wolf to disappear. It’s bad luck. The worst luck. The legends tell us that the Ancients send such luck when wolves break the rules of the covenant. Two generations ago three Stone Peaks disappeared when their leaderwolf accidentally injured a human.”
Ázzuen and I looked guiltily at each other. Surely, I thought, pulling a human from the river wasn’t as bad as hurting one.
“And I’ve heard,” Yllin said, her eyes resting on the mark on my chest, “that Tree Line once lost a wolf when they allowed a mixed-blood litter to live.”
I blinked at her. Why had no one told me this?
“There’s something else you should know, Kaala,” she said, speaking quickly. “Rissa and Trevegg didn’t tell you pups everything when they told you of the legends. It’s not just that mixed-bloods might be crazy, or that they might act inappropriately around humans. They’re considered bad luck for the pack. And,” she said, lowering her voice, “wolves with moon markings can be either good or bad luck for a pack, and you never know which until they are grown.”
Ruuqo’s angry bark interrupted her. “Don’t fall behind, wolves!” he shouted. “We will not wait for you!”
“We aren’t supposed to talk about it,” she whispered. “But it’s not fair for you not to know.”
“We won’t tell anyone you told us,” I promised.
She dipped her head and sprinted off to join the others. We pelted after her. My mind worked furiously. “What am I supposed to do if the pack thinks I’m unlucky?” I gasped to Ázzuen, but he was running too hard to answer.
Borlla’s scent was clear at first. She’d followed the path we had taken the first time we went to the horse plain, and had been back and forth along it every time she went in search of Reel. The most recent scent was from early morning, before the dew had dried, which meant she had probably passed this way shortly before sunrise. We followed her scent through Wood’s Edge Gathering Place to the place where the trees ended and the plain began, and about eight wolflengths onto the plain. Then, just as Trevegg said, her scent disappeared. To my relief the horses were also gone.
“Stay out of the way, pups,” Rissa ordered.
Werrna was the best tracker among us, and so she led the search. She lowered her scar-covered nose all the way to the ground and walked in a tight circle, starting where Borlla’s scent vanished. When she was satisfied that she had sniffed every stone, every bit of earth and blade of grass, she turned her back on the first circle and paced out another one in the opposite direction. Ruuqo and Rissa followed her, tracing out circles that overlapped with hers. Yllin and Minn carried out a similar search close to the place where Reel’s body had lain.
“They want to make sure they don’t miss the slightest drop of scent,” Trevegg said wearily, always teaching us, even in the midst of his anxiety and fatigue. “Werrna sets the first circles, Rissa walks within them, and Ruuqo walks within hers. The rest of us will stay away so as not to confuse the scent.”
It took them all of the hot afternoon and part of the cooler night to look. Trevegg and the others joined the search, which expanded to encompass the entire plain. They wouldn’t let us near the searching place. We were only allowed to search a patch of dry grass far from where the horses had been. I think they mostly sent us there to keep us out of the way, but it was good to have something to do. Marra, Ázzuen, and I did our best to pick up some scent, some clue to where Borlla might have gone, but it seemed hopeless. Unnan stood apart, staring across the plain as Werrna searched the spot where Borlla had last been.
“I’m going to talk to Unnan,” I said to Ázzuen and Marra.
“Are you crazy?” Ázzuen asked. “He’ll just try to fight you.”
“He’s alone,” I said. “Maybe he doesn’t want to be.”
I walked cautiously over to him. He must have heard me but did not turn around.
“You can search with us,” I said. “It’s better than doing nothing.”
Unnan turned then and pulled his lips back in a tight snarl.
“Why should I? So you can kill me, too? Is that what you’re good at? Causing other pups to die? They should have killed you when you were born. You’re nothing but bad luck.” He leaned in close to me. “If she is dead, I will find a way to kill you, I promise.”
My goodwill deserted me.
“Maybe if you were smarter, your friends wouldn’t die,” I snapped. I knew as the words left my mouth that I should shut up. “Maybe there’s a reason your friends are the ones who die and disappear. I didn’t notice you helping anyone during the stampede.”
Unnan yowled and leapt at me. Unlike Borlla, he had not stopped eating after Reel’s death and was large and strong. Bigger than I was. But I was mad and my anger made up for my lack of size. I easily threw Unnan from me and pinned him to the ground. Anger clouded my vision, and I bent over his throat.
“Kaala!” Ázzuen shouted to be heard over my growls. He and Marra had rushed over to help me when Unnan attacked, and then to stop me when it looked like I might really hurt him. I came back to myself and stepped off Unnan. I was ashamed. I had meant to comfort him and had only made things worse. And I had let my temper get the better of me again.
“Ilshik!” Unnan hissed at me. I cringed at the word. It meant wolf-killer. An ilshik was not fit to be in the company of other wolves and was destined to forever walk alone. I did not turn to face him, but returned to Ázzuen and Marra as we continued to search. Soon we all grew weary and sank tiredly into the grass.
I was almost asleep when Ázzuen’s sharp whisper startled me to wakefulness.
“Greatwolves!” he hissed.
Frandra and Jandru strode onto the field. The adults of the pack had moved the search for Borlla to the edge of the field nearest to the humans’ territory and were huddled together, speaking in agitated whispers. I wondered what they had found. Ruuqo and Rissa went to greet Frandra and Jandru. I was surprised to see the Greatwolves after they’d said they would not be around, and even more surprised at the anger in Ruuqo’s gait as he approached them. I was too far away to hear what he said to the Greatwolves, but Jandru leapt upon him, pinning him to the ground. The Greatwolf spoke a few words and let Ruuqo up. They argued fiercely for several moments. Then Frandra and Jandru stalked away from the plain. I was afraid they had returned to berate me for my contact with the human girl again, but they did not even look in my direction. Ruuqo did, though. He gave me a furious look from across the plain. I stepped back. He gave his command bark and led the pack from the fields.
Ruuqo took us back to Fallen Tree. He would not let any of us discuss Borlla or her disappearance. Nor would Rissa. They would not let Minn travel the territories to look for her. And they wouldn’t tell us what they’d found at the far side of the field.
“The hunt continues” is all they would say. “We will discuss this no more.”
I waited until the pack was asleep and then quietly started toward the Tall Grass plain. If the pack believed that bad luck had come, and if they thought I had caused it, I had to find out as much as I could. And I wanted to know why they wouldn’t let us pups near the spot where they’d found something. I did not object when Ázzuen followed me.
It had been a long day and night, and I was exhausted by the time we reached the spot where the pack had last searched. Ruuqo had led us away so quickly after the Greatwolves’ arrival that I had not had a chance to investigate it. I lowered my nose to the ground.
The scent of our pack was there, of course, as well as those of Frandra and Jandru. And then, fainter than the others, the smell of Borlla. But what stopped me, and made my heart race in my chest, was a scent so faint I almost didn’t find it. I checked again to make sure I was not mistaken. It was acrid and meaty. A scent of salt and sweat. The scent of humans. Ázzuen had picked it up, too.
“The Greatwolves told us to stay away from the humans,” I said to Ázzuen, “but their scent is here, with the scent of humans. What are they doing?”
“I don’t know, Kaala,” Ázzuen said, “but I don’t think you should try to find out.”
“I need to find out, Ázzuen. The Greatwolves saved my life and then disappeared for four moons. Then they come to us twice in a few days. Ruuqo is angry with me again, and Yllin says the pack might think I’m bad luck. Everything seems to come back to the humans. I have to find out why. I have to find out why I am different.”
He listened to me, his eyes worried. “Then find the Greatwolves and ask them. But don’t go to the humans. I know you are thinking of it.” I was a little annoyed that he could read me so easily. He stepped closer to me, his breath warm. “You heard what Yllin said. You can’t risk it.”
“I know,” I said softly, taking some of the pack-Borlla-Greatwolf-human-scented grass in my mouth. “I won’t go back. I promise.”
I didn’t want to lie to Ázzuen, but I had to know what was really going on. I had to know what the Greatwolves were doing and what it had to do with Borlla’s disappearance and my place in the pack. And it all had to do with the humans. Besides, I wanted to see the human girl again.
The name her people gave her was TaLi, though I still thought of her as Girl. I heard one of the females of her pack call her by her name more than once during the time I spent watching them. Their grown females were called “women,” and their males “men.” In addition to calling their front paws “hands” they called their rear paws “feet,” and their fur “hair.” Their pack was called a “tribe.” They were more active in the daytime than at night, and as the weather cooled they wore the skins of hunters as well as prey. I had not yet seen them wear the skin of a wolf and wondered if they did. The thought made me shudder.
A breeze blew across my ears and through my thickening undercoat. The hot summer days had turned cooler, making my long vigils by the human gathering place more comfortable. I settled more deeply into the soft dirt of the watching hill. Next to me, Tlitoo rustled his wings impatiently.
“How much longer are you just going to watch, wolf?” he demanded. “You have been coming here for a moon and done nothing but watch. Cowardwolf.”
I ignored him, straining my nose and ears to find my girl. It always took me a while to sort her scent from the others. It was daylight, and the human homesite was a flurry of activity. Several humans, male and female, scraped prey hides with sharp rocks. Others fastened what seemed like bones to the ends of short, thick wooden sticks. Many of the humans of all ages clustered around fires. I hadn’t been sure, at first, why they kept the fires going in the warmth and light of midday, but when I smelled the distinctive burnt-meat smell I understood. They were cooking their prey. Two males held deer meat over the fire at the end of long sticks. My mouth watered. A loud noise startled me and a group of four small males ran through the gathering place wielding sharpened sticks and jabbing them at invisible prey. I wanted to run to join them. I knew play when I saw it.
Tlitoo buried his beak in a pile of leaves, sticks, and fox dung, pretending to look for bugs, and then threw the mess into my face.
“You have learned everything you can by watching, dullwolf,” he said. “It is time to do more than watch. Soon the winter travels will come and you will not be able to sneak away so easily.”
I sneezed the dirt out of my nose, and shook a leaf and a clump of fox dung from my ear. Tlitoo was the only one who knew I watched the humans. And that was only because I couldn’t escape him. I was able, just barely, to sneak away from Ázzuen and Marra, who had followed me everywhere since the stampede. But losing a raven was like trying to get the stink of skunk from your pelt. It was hardly worth trying.
“You’re not the one the Greatwolves will come after,” I said. “You aren’t the one who will be exiled.”
In the moon that had passed since I rescued the human child from the river and since Borlla disappeared, I had been tempted to venture into the human homesite many times. But, although it was impossible for me to stay away from the humans entirely, I hadn’t gone completely crazy. I wasn’t about to wander into the middle of the human gathering place in the bright sunlight. I had no intention of getting banished from the valley before I was made wolf.
“There is something the Bigwolves are not telling us, wolflet,” Tlitoo rasped. His voice was unusually serious.
I looked at him and saw worry in his eyes.
“They are keeping secrets, and the secrets are about the humans,” he said.
“I’ll think about going to humans when I have hunted and when I’m accepted as wolf.”
Tlitoo gurgled skeptically. He didn’t believe Ruuqo would accept me even once I had hunted and taken part in the winter travels. But I didn’t want to think about that. If I hunted successfully and traveled the winter, Ruuqo would have to grant me romma, even if he did not want me in the Swift River pack. It was wolf law.
At last I sorted out Girl’s scent from those of the other humans. She sat with several females in the shade of a small shelter. In front of her she held a hollow, gourd-shaped half rock. Another, narrower stone fit in her hand and she was using the slimmer stone to crush something in the gourd rock. The smell of yarrow and a plant I did not recognize floated on the air each time she struck the stones against each other. Her face was peaceful and intent and I could hear her making a soft humming noise as she worked. More than anything else, I wanted to go to her. The earth under my belly grew uncomfortably warm and my skin began to itch.
I felt a familiar warmth beside me. I turned, expecting to see the young spiritwolf, but there was no one there. Wonderful, I thought. Now I really am going crazy. But a powerful juniper-acrid scent seemed to gather in the air and a strong breeze sent it drifting into the human gathering place.
Girl looked up. I knew she couldn’t possibly see me, but it seemed to me that she stared right at me as prey does when it knows you crouch nearby. I could not see the expression on her face from where I lay, but her body stretched toward me and she leaned forward. She lifted her head as if sniffing the air. She began to rise.
I stood up. The mark on my chest pulled me, and, try as I might, I could not stop myself from creeping closer to the girl. I stopped smelling the plants around me, stopped hearing Tlitoo’s impatient rustling. Even the humans seemed to blend into one scent, their voices into a blur of sound. Only Girl remained distinct. I heard a distant howl—Ruuqo’s voice—calling the pack together and shook the sound from my ears. I tensed my legs, and prepared to leap down the hillside.
Tlitoo pecked me sharply on the rump. I swallowed a yelp and glared at him.
“Wake up, wolflet. Now is not the time to go. The leaderwolves call you to the hunt.”
I heard Rissa’s voice mingling with Ruuqo’s. I could not ignore their summons. Regaining my breath, I shook myself, and backed away from the humans’ clearing.
“Stupidwolf,” Tlitoo said, kindly. I thought about biting at his tail feathers but knew he would only fly away.
Released from the power the humans held over me, I ran all the way back to the river, dove in, and swam across. I rolled in the river mud to cover the human scent, waded into the river again, emerged, and shook myself. But before I could start toward home, I heard leaves rustle, and smelled Ázzuen’s familiar scent. He poked his head out from the tartberry bushes that lined the riverbank.
“So much for wolves having good ears,” Tlitoo chuckled from above me. He had flown to a branch of a willow tree to avoid getting wet when I shook the water from my fur. “Night comes,” he said. He gave his raucous raven laugh.
Uh oh, wolf is caught!
Raven might help stupidwolf.
No. It is time to roost.
He paused a moment and opened his beak again.
Now wolf is too late
To find out more. Now wolf knows:
Listen to raven.
With that, Tlitoo flew off and left me to deal with Ázzuen. I thought I had managed to discourage him from following me, but apparently I had been mistaken. I glared at him.
“You’ve been to see the humans,” he accused without even greeting me. “You’ve been going to see them all along. For a whole moon.”
I could smell that Marra, too, was somewhere near. I tried to figure out exactly where. In the bushes to my right, I thought.
“Why can’t you mind your own business?” I said to Ázzuen.
“Because you promised not to go. And because you could have told me. You should have told me. We’re supposed to be friends.”
I felt a little guilty. And surprised. Ázzuen hadn’t argued with me before. He usually just did what I told him to do.
“I didn’t want to get you in trouble,” I said weakly. “And you told me you didn’t want me to go.” I turned to my right and spoke to the bushes where I figured Marra was hiding. “You may as well come out.”
I heard a soft padding to my left and Marra trotted out. She licked my muzzle in greeting and bent to lap from the river.
Ázzuen snorted. “I can take care of myself. And if you are going to go, you should take someone with you.”
“She wants to keep the humans to herself,” Marra said, when she was done drinking. “You should let us come along,” she said to me, “to keep you from doing anything dumb.”
“How did you know where I was going?”
“We’ve been following you,” Ázzuen said. “And the raven. He makes a lot of noise.”
Marra sat down and regarded me.
“We wanted to know where you kept disappearing to,” she said.
“Well stop following me.” I was grumpy and short-tempered from having to leave the humans. “Can’t you find something to do on your own?”
Ázzuen and Marra lowered their tails and ears a little, making me feel guiltier. They had both stood up for me after the stampede. And if it weren’t for them, Borlla and Unnan probably would have killed me when I was still a weakpup. I owed them better. I sighed.
“I’ll let you know if I go again,” I said ungraciously.
Their ears and tails lifted.
“We’d better go watch the adults hunt again,” I said, hearing Ruuqo howl once more.
“Maybe they’ll let us join this time,” Ázzuen said hopefully.
“Maybe the ravens will grow fur and kill aurochs,” Marra snorted.
I had to laugh. I touched my nose to Marra’s cheek and then to Ázzuen’s. The last of my frustration with them lifted and I gave a howl to answer Ruuqo’s. Ázzuen and Marra joined in and I led my packmates toward home.