Chronicles of Ancient Darkness Part 34

To cheer herself up, she took out the little grouse-bone whistle which Torak had given her the previous autumn. It didn't make any sound that she could hear, but she always kept it with her. Wolf seemed to hear it well enough, and once she'd used it to summon him, and it had saved her life.

Now she gave it a tentative blow.

Nothing happened.

Of course, she hadn't expected that it would. Wolf was far away on the Mountain.

Feeling lonely, she unrolled her sleeping-sack and curled up by the fire.

She awoke to the p.r.i.c.kling certainty that she was not alone.

The storm had pa.s.sed, but the rain was still coming down in torrents, gurgling through secret channels in the cave walls. The fire had sunk to a smouldering glow. Beyond it in the dark at the mouth of the cave something was watching her.

She struggled upright and groped for her axe.

The thing in the cave mouth was big: too big for a tokoroth. A lynx? A bear?

But if it was a bear, she would hear it breathing. And it wouldn't stay outside.

Somehow that didn't make her feel any better.

'Who's there?' she said.

She sensed rather than heard the creature come forwards. Whatever it was, it moved as silently as breath.

Then she saw the gleam of eyes.

She cried out.

The creature backed away. Then it edged once more into the light.

Renn gasped.

It was a wolf. A big one, with a heavy coat of sodden grey fur. Its head was lowered to catch her scent, and it didn't look threatening or afraid. Just wary.

Renn took in the thick mantle of black fur across its shoulders. The great amber eyes.

Those eyes . . . It couldn't be. Slowly she put down her axe. 'Wolf?'

FOURTEEN.

'Wolf?' Renn said again. The wolf's tail was down but faintly wagging, his ears rammed forwards. He was watching her intently, but not meeting her eyes and he was shivering, although whether from cold, fear or eagerness, she couldn't tell.

She leapt to her feet. 'Wolf! It's me, Renn! Oh Wolf, it is you, isn't it?'

At her outburst the wolf backed away, giving short little grunt-whines that sounded aggrieved.

She couldn't remember how Torak had said 'h.e.l.lo' in wolf talk, so she got down on her hands and knees, grinning and trying to catch the wolf's eye.

That didn't seem right either. The wolf turned his head and backed even further away.

But was it really Wolf? When she'd known him he'd been a cub but he'd grown so much! From nose to tail he was almost longer than she was; and if they'd stood side by side, his head would have reached her waist.

As a cub his fur had been a fluffy light grey, with a sprinkling of black across the shoulders. Now it was rich and thick, the grey subtly blended with white, black, silver and foxy red. But he still had that black mantle across the shoulders; and those extraordinary amber eyes.

Thunder crashed directly overhead.

Renn ducked.

The wolf yelped and shot to the back of the cave. His ears were flattened, and he was trembling violently.

Whoever he is, thought Renn, he's not yet full-grown, even if he looks it. Inside, he's still part cub.

Out loud she said gently, 'It's all right. You're safe here.' The wolf's ears flicked forward to listen.

'Wolf? It is you, isn't it?'

He put his head on one side.

She had an idea. From her food pouch she shook a handful of dried lingonberries into her palm. As a cub, Wolf had adored lingonberries.

The wolf drew close to her outstretched hand, and his black nose twitched. Then he delicately snuffled up the berries.

'Oh, Wolf,' cried Renn, 'it is you!'

He darted back into the shadows. She'd startled him.

She shook more lingonberries into her palm; and after some cajoling, he came forward and snuffled them up. Then he tried to nibble her finger-guards. To distract him, she put a salmon cake on the ground. Wolf patted it with one forepaw in a gesture she remembered then gulped it down without even chewing.

Four more went the same way, and now Renn was sure. The Wolf she'd known had loved salmon cakes.

On hands and knees, she crawled towards him. 'It's me,' she said, reaching out and stroking the pale fur on his throat.

Wolf leapt up and raced to the mouth of the cave, where he ran in circles, whining. She'd done something wrong. Again.

In dismay she retreated to the fire and sat down. 'Wolf, why are you here?' she said, although she knew he wouldn't understand. 'Are you trying to find Torak, too?'

Wolf licked crumbs of salmon off his chops, then trotted to the back of the cave and lay down with his muzzle between his paws.

Outside, the thunder faded into the north as the World Spirit strode back to its Mountain. The cave filled with the gurgle of rain, and the pungent smell of wet wolf.

Renn longed to tell Wolf how glad she was to see him, to ask if he'd found Torak; but she didn't know how. She'd never paid much attention when Torak spoke wolf, because she'd found it disturbing; it had made her feel as if she didn't really know him. Now she searched her memory.

Wolves, Torak had said once, don't talk with their voices as much as we do, but more with their paws and tails, and ears and fur, and um, with their whole bodies.

But you haven't got a tail, Renn had pointed out. Or fur. And you can't move your ears. So how do you do it?

I leave bits out. It's not easy, but we get by.

If it was hard for Torak, how was she going to manage? How was Wolf going to help her find Torak if they couldn't even talk to each other?

Wolf did not at all understand the female tailless.

Her yip-and-yowls told him she was being friendly, but the rest of her was all chewed up: sometimes threatening, sometimes saying sorry, and sometimes just unsure.

At first she'd seemed glad to see him, although he'd sensed a lot of mistrust. Then she'd stared at him rudely, and made it worse by rearing on her hind legs. Then she'd tried to apologise. Then she'd given him lingonberries and the flat fish without eyes that smelt of juniper. Then she'd apologised again by scratching his throat. Wolf had been so confused that he'd run in circles.

Now the Dark was over, and he was bored with waiting for her to wake up, so he pounced on her and asked her to play.

She pushed him off, saying something in tailless talk that sounded like 'Way! Way!' Wolf remembered Tall Tailless doing that. It seemed to be tailless for a growl.

Leaving the female to get up and stumble out into the Light, he bounded off to explore the Den, and was soon digging a hole, enjoying the power of his paws and the feel of the earth against his pads.

He heard a mouse scurrying in a tunnel. He stomped on the earth and seized the mouse in his jaws, tossed it high, then crunched it in two. He ate some beetles and a worm, then trotted out to find the female.

The Hot Bright Eye was shining in the Up, and he smelt that the Thunderer was gone. Greatly relieved, he raced through the ferns, relishing their wetness on his fur. He heard a fledgling magpie exploring its nest, and a forest horse in the next valley, scratching its belly on a fallen spruce. He smelt the female down by the Fast Wet, and found her standing with the Long Claw-that-Flies in her forepaws, pointing it at the ducks.

Scaring ducks was one of Wolf's favourite games. It was how he'd learned to swim, when he'd leapt into what he'd thought was a little Wet covered in leaves, and gone under instead. Now he longed to crash into the Wet and send the ducks hurtling into the Up. Not to hunt them; only for fun.

First, though, he must check with the female.

Politely he waited, asking her with a flick of his ears if she was hunting the ducks.

She ignored him.

Wolf waited some more, knowing that taillesses hear and smell so poorly that you can be right in front of them and they don't know you're there.

At length he decided it must be all right, and crept through the ferns to where the ducks paddled, unaware.

He pounced. The ducks shot into the Up in a satisfying spray of indignant squawks.

To Wolf's astonishment, the female yowled at him angrily. 'Woof! Woof!' she howled, waving the Long Claw at him.

Offended, Wolf trotted away. She should have told him she was hunting. He had asked.

But he wasn't offended for long. And as he ran off to explore, he reflected that in some strange way, he needed the female to help him find Tall Tailless.

Wolf didn't know how he knew this; it was simply the sureness that came to him sometimes. And now it was telling him that he needed to stay close to the female.

The Hot Bright Eye rose in the Up, and at last she started along a deer trail to seek Tall Tailless. Being the leader, she went ahead and Wolf trotted behind which was an effort, because she was as slow as a newborn cub.

After a while, they stopped at a little Wet, and the female shared some of the juniper fish. But when Wolf licked her muzzle and whined for more, she laughed and pushed him away.

He was still wondering why she'd laughed when the wind curled round, and the scent hit him full on the nose.

He stopped. He raised his muzzle and took long, deep sniffs. Yes! The best scent in the Forest! The scent of Tall Tailless!

Wolf turned and ran back to follow the scent trail, all the way to a pine tree where, some Lights before, Tall Tailless had rested his forepaw. Wolf raised his head to smell where the scent trail led.

Back there! They were going the wrong way! Tall Tailless wasn't heading for the deep Forest he was heading back, to where the Hot Bright Eye sinks down to sleep!

The female was too far off for Wolf to see, but he could hear her crashing through the bracken, heading the wrong way.

He barked at her. Wrong way! Back back back!

He was frantic to follow his pack-brother, for he felt in his fur that Tall Tailless was many lopes away. But still the female refused to understand.

Snarling with frustration, Wolf ran to fetch her.

She stared at him.

He leapt at her, knocking her to the ground and standing on her chest, barking.

She was frightened. And she seemed to be finding it hard to breathe.

Leave her, then.

Wolf spun round on one forepaw and raced off to find Tall Tailless.

Winded, Renn got up and brushed herself off.

The Forest felt empty after Wolf had gone, but she was too proud to use the grouse-bone whistle to call for him. He had left her. That was that.

In low spirits, she reached a fork in the trail, and stopped. She searched for some sign that Torak had come this way. Nothing. Just impenetrable holly trees and dripping bracken.

Wolf had been so excited. And he'd been heading west . . . West? But that would lead to the Sea. Why would Torak have turned away from the Deep Forest and headed for the Sea?

Suddenly, Wolf appeared on the trail before her.

Joy surged through her but she repressed a cry of welcome. She'd made mistakes before. She wasn't going to repeat them.

Squatting on her haunches, she told him in a soft voice how pleased she was to see him: keeping her eyes averted, and only now and then letting her gaze graze his.

Wolf trotted up to her, wagging his tail. He nosed her cheek and gave her a ticklish grooming-nibble, followed by a lick.

Gently she scratched behind his ears, and he licked her hand, this time refraining from trying to eat her finger-guards.

Then he turned and trotted west.

'West,' she said. 'You're sure?'