Sheets of white billowed into the crisp air when Thunder leaned sharply to the side, and set his feet. The plume of snow hadn’t even begun its downward fall to the desert floor, when . . .
He spun and charged! Chances were that neither coyote had ever been charged by a roadrunner. Fact is, they’d probably never seen a roadrunner from this angle before—only from behind while chasing it. The sight of one racing toward him like an angry hornet must have startled and confused Scruffy. He slowed and veered off to the left.
Winterfat, on the other hand, was closer to Speedette than Scruffy had been to Brisk. She was so intent on a plump, juicy roadrunner for breakfast that she didn’t even see Thunder coming.
When he darted between Speedette and Brisk, they didn’t slow down, they didn’t look at him, they didn’t so much as blink. Eyes wide with the panic of imminent death, they just ran.
Winterfat didn’t look at him, either. Her eyes were focused only on the tail feathers that were almost within reach. When the sharp, hard beak stabbed her right behind her ear, she did yelp, though. Angry and hurt, she snarled and snapped. As fast as Thunder ran on the soft powder, he was past her tail before she even felt the pain, much less turned to bite at whatever had caused it. From the corner of his left eye, he could see her reel to the side, stumble, and plow head over heels into the snow. Her speed rolled her a couple of times before she staggered to her feet again and shook the snow off.
From the other eye, Thunder saw Scruffy. Finally recognizing the strange thing as prey, the coyote snarled, licked his lips, and leaped. Thunder dodged and ran—not very fast at first, not until he was sure Winterfat was after him, too.
Once certain that both coyotes were after him and no longer chasing his friends, Thunder took off! His strong legs . . . his wide feet . . . the soft powder . . . it was as if he was running on the very air itself.
Trouble was, he ran too fast. A crow’s caw made him glance back. When he realized the coyotes were no longer following, he slowed, then turned to look. Two crows sat at the very top of an old cottonwood tree. Brisk and Speedette were halfway up the canyon wall to his right. Using their wings, they leaped and hopped from one boulder to the next, working their way up the sheer rock face toward the safety of the ridge.
Deciding they had no chance of catching something that ran so fast they could barely see it, Scruffy and Winterfat had turned back to go after easier prey. Thunder could see them running toward the lake. They had spotted the preening lovebirds!
But Agile’eka and Rocket had seen them, too. They were already on the move, running for the big rocks that held the lake.
Agile’eka reached the dam first. She hopped and scampered across the rocks. Rocket hopped, but he didn’t scamper. His feet slipped on the first boulder. He fell, hitting with such a thud that Thunder could almost feel it halfway up the canyon.
Rocket staggered to his feet and ran. But he didn’t follow Agile’eka across the dam. He ran to the right. At the canyon wall, he turned and ran left. At the lake he turned and ran again, but this time, confused and disoriented, he ran back straight toward the two coyotes.
“I got this one,” Scruffy yelped. He pointed his sharp nose at the streambed. “Head that one off at the pass.”
Winterfat crossed the dry creek bed and headed to the far side of the cattails. Thunder took off, even faster than he had when the coyotes were after him. The long, green leaves of the cattails were brown and limp with the winter cold. Scruffy was almost to them, headed east. From the other direction, and headed west, Rocket was just about to the place where the cattails stopped in the deep water. Even as fast as he was, Thunder knew he couldn’t get there in time. So . . . he took to the air.
Mouth open, slobber dripping in anticipation of the meal he was about to catch, Scruffy was less than ten yards from Rocket when Thunder landed and trotted up beside him. The coyote spotted him out of the corner of his eye and reached to snap.
Thunder took one stride to the side—just enough to escape the sharp teeth. Two more strides moved him ahead of the big coyote. Once there he cut right in front of him and darted toward the cattails. Scruffy was the biggest coyote Thunder had ever seen. He also had to be the dumbest. Darned if that old coyote didn’t follow him right into the cattails, just like he’d done the last time they met.
Behind him Thunder heard the squishing, sloshing sound of wet mud. Then the yelp when Scruffy’s paws sank and he realized he was stuck. Finally there was the snarling and lunging and splashing as the coyote struggled to yank himself free.
At the far edge of the cattails, Thunder paused. Not long enough to sink in the mud, just long enough to look before he leaped. Winterfat wasn’t waiting for him there. She was still after Agile’eka, who ran near the wall of the canyon, trying to skirt around the coyote and make it to the wide part of the valley.
Once outside the cattails and away from the soft mud, Thunder could see that the coyote had the angle on Agile’eka. She would cut her off near the straight, flat cliffs, just before the valley widened. The rocks there were tall—taller than a roadrunner could fly. They also sloped back into the base of the ridge, forming a box canyon. There would be no place for Agile’eka to run.
Thunder sprinted toward her. Winterfat was only a few yards from Agile’eka when he sprang into the air. Just above and a little behind, he folded his wings tight against his side, aimed his huge feet right at the back of Winterfat’s skull, and . . .