Wolves of the Beyond: Watch Wolf (6 page)

“I FOLLOWED THEM FOR A DAY
and a night, until they came to rest on a cliff just above the river. There was a moose carcass on the sandbar in the shallow part of the river. A grizzly and a
byrrgis
from the Watch were sharing the kill.”

“What!” The wolves who had gathered in the MacHeath
gadderheal
gasped. There was a flurry of exclamation
s.

“Shut up!” the chieftain ordered. “They do that sort of thing — the wolves of the Watch and the bears have a close bond. Go on, Fretta, this is getting interesting, very interesting!”

“The grizzly’s cubs were on the banks and she was bringing the meat back to them. When they had all had their fill and the wolves had left, the mother bear napped. The cubs were not a bit tired.”

“Of course, the mother did all the work.” Katria, a she-wolf with a pelt black as a moonless night, spoke softly. But not softly enough. The chieftain leaped upon her and sank his fangs into her haunch. Blood spritzed out of his muzzle from a small cut made by the Litha thorns, which made him even angrier. So he swatted Katria and she skidded across the floor of the
gadderheal.
“No more from you!” Katria slunk off to a corner. Lying as flat as she could, with her muzzle buried in her paws, she wished herself invisible. How much more could she take of this clan? Kyran had been her daughter — her foolish, foolish daughter. Katria’s mate had not even been that disturbed when Dunbar MacHeath dispatched the
slink melf
to kill Kyran and Ingliss. All that mattered to her mate, Donaidh, was rising in the ranks of the lords.

In Old Wolf, the word
donaidh
meant “ruler of the world,” and Katria’s mate seemed to feel that this alone gave him the right to succeed the chieftain Dunbar, who was growing older and meaner by the day.

Katria returned her attention to the scout’s report on the wolves and the bears.

“Edme and Faolan had been watching from on top of a bluff. It was the hot, lazy time of the day and
soon Faolan was sleeping soundly. But not Edme. She got up
and went over to play with the cubs, until
Faolan awakened, darted out, and shooed her away.”

The chieftain chuckled. “If the bear
had awakened, she would have made short work of the two.”

“Too bad,” Blyden said.

“No, not at all,” Dunbar countered. “I want more out of this than the death of a stupid little she-wolf like
Edme. There is more to be gained than you might suspect.”

“He’s a wily one, our chief,” someone murmured.

“There is one more thing, sir,” Fretta said.

“And what is that?”

Fretta appeared suddenly very nervous. She shifted her eyes away from the chieftain and took a step backward. “There is a rumor … just a rumor, mind you.”

“What kind of a rumor?” Dunbar MacHeath’s voice dropped.

“I heard some owls discussing it, but the rumor is that the Fengo is calling our clan to the Supreme
Raghnaid
for a Court of
Crait.”

“A Court of
Crait!”
Dunbar MacHeath shot into the air so high he scraped the stone ceiling of the
gadderheal
cave. A wailing rose from the assembled wolves.

“Silence,” he roared. An immediate hush fell upon the
gadderheal.
Dunbar MacHeath began to pace up and
down the length of the cavern. He stopped and rolled his eyes up toward the ceiling, then regained his composure.
“Crait,
they say!
Crait!
Well, we’ll show them who’s
crait
and who isn’t.

“The little she-wolf lassie has a fondness for grizzly cubs, eh?” he spoke reflectively. “That could get her into a lot of trouble if it were to be found out. For too long, the clans of the Beyond have been beholden to the Watch. And now they call a Court of
Crait
to judge us! This is nonsense. It is time to restore honor and power to the clans and their chieftains.”

This,
thought Katria,
has nothing to do with honor and everything to do with power. Raw power.

Dunbar MacHeath regarded the wolves around him. “What is honor? Honor is doing the right thing. For years now, the wolves at the Watch have determined our clan territories, our hunting grounds. It was the wolves of the Watch and the first Fengo who decided this. Why are we a Fengo-centered land? The center of the Beyond is not the Ring, but Great Lupus! We shall ask what would Lupus do to restore our honor. We have been shackled to the Ring of Sacred Volcanoes for too long. Our duty is to restore honor!”

There were loud growls and barks of approval until
the chieftain snapped the command for quiet. A thick silence settled upon the gathered wolves as their cunning chieftain spun his net of promises. “This wolf Edme could have offered us a chance for power at the Ring, but she betrayed us. Your first thought is ‘Let the grizzly mother take her retribution on the faithless Edme.’ But what does one wolf killed by a grizzly amount to? Not much. Instead, we’ll use this idiot wolf’s behavior to spark a war that will restore our honor.”

Oh, so that is what Lupus would do?
Katria thought.
Start a war?

“What kind of a war?” Blyden asked.

Dunbar MacHeath’s paw flashed out and slammed Blyden sideways. “Do not interrupt! I am speaking of a war between the wolves of the Watch and the bears. There are many bears in the valley near the Sacred Ring. If they rose up, it would be the end of the Watch as we know it.”

“And then what?” the chieftain’s mate asked.

“And then, finally, it will be our turn.”

“Our turn!” There was a low murmuring of agreement, which began to swell among the wolves. “Our turn! Our turn!” The words flowed through the
gadderheal
like a chant.

Resentment festered like a canker within the MacHeaths, carefully cultivated and nurtured by their twisted minds.

“So what is your” — It was Malan, the second-highest-ranking wolf next to the chieftain. He hesitated slightly before completing his thought — “your design, Lord Chieftain?”

“Simply this: We need a hostage. I think the cub — the cub Edme played with.”

“And where will we keep this hostage?” Malan asked.

“The Pit with Old Cags,” Dunbar said with a low snarl.

Katria’s blood froze. Did this chieftain’s depravity know no bounds?

“Aaaah!” The exclamation rippled through the
gadderheal.

“Yes, your old chieftain still has a few tricks up his ruff.” Dunbar’s hackles stood up rigidly, and he gave a quick venomous glance at Donaidh.

The Pit was patrolled by Old Cags, a MacHeath wolf with the foaming-mouth disease. When a young pup was disobedient, the most effective threat was “I’ll sen
d you to Old Cags in the Pit. He’ll learn you a thing or two — if
you survive.” Very few pups ever died in the Pit. Old Cags had barely a tooth left in his head to bite with. It was just that when a pup returned, it was changed. Pups came back in a perpetual daze, frozen into permanent postures of submission. They did not have the foaming-mouth disease, but it was as if they were in a state of brain fever and they tended to die young. Katria’s mind swirled, and her gut wrenched with revulsion at the idea of condemning an innocent cub to hellfire on earth, a dim world created by her own despicable clan.

A wave of nausea washed over Katria. This would indeed spark a war between the bears and the wolves and even the owls. Total chaos! It was precisely what the MacHeaths wanted, for if they were to be declared
crait,
they were determined to bring the entire Beyond down with them.

“HURRY ALONG NOW. NO TIME
to waste! You can’t be late for your first night of training.” Twist and Winks had scrambled down the steep sloping entrance of the den.

“I don’t suppose you’ve slept a wink, or should I say a Winks?” The brown wolf squinted with her good eye.

“Probably not,” Twist said. “I remember how excited I was on my first night here. But you don’t want to be late. Snowdon gets incredibly cranky if he has to stay on even a second beyond his shift, and Colleen, too.”

“Colleen? Snowdon? Are they our
taigas,
too?”

“Oh, no, dear,” Winks replied. “We are your
taigas.
They are just the Watch wolves for Morgan and Stormfast this cycle. The moon claw will be up soon.”

“Moon claw?” Faolan asked.

“That’s the first phase of the newing,” Edme said quickly. “Because it looks like a wolf’s claw.”

“Yes, indeed,” Winks replied. “You must have been studying the Bone of Bones.”

Faolan and Edme followed their two
taigas
out of the den and began trotting at a brisk pace toward the easternmost side of the Ring. It was a strange and wondrous landscape. There was a brittle crunching sound beneath their feet as they crossed the rivers of lava that had flowed down the slopes and solidified into sheets of black glass. Flames licked the night like tongues of fire. The wolves on watch seemed determined to touch the sky as they sprang into the air to look for graymalkins.

The volcanoes were becoming slightly more active. The moonless night was scored by the tracery of red sparks. High arcing streams of embers mingled with the ice-bright stars in an astral dance through the darkness. And in the background came the wild music of the Watch wolves baying. Never had Faolan and Edme heard such howling. Each cry, each voice enlarged by the other, gaining a deep resonance. It was as if Faolan’s and Edme’s ears were being opened to a new universe of sound. Oddly enough, the howling was not nearly as loud as what they’d heard living with their packs. It was of a lo
wer volume but
a more powerful intensity, as if these Watch wolves had discovered a voice composed only of the strongest chords.

Both Edme and Faolan felt their throats open up. They longed to howl and yet felt it would not be right. As if reading their minds, Twist turned to them. “Your turn to howl will come when you mount the cairns. I know it’s almost irresistible.”

“But will we ever howl as beautifully?” Edme asked.

“You will,” Winks said softly. “It takes time, but you will. The music seeps into you and settl
es in your marrow.”

“Well, it’s about time!” Snowdon, an ash-color
ed wolf, leaped down from the cairn that rose directly in front of Stormfast. At first, Snowdon appeared to be an ordinary wolf with no obvious deformity. All of his legs were straight, no paws were turned, he wasn’t missing his eyes, ears, or tail. Faolan and Edme couldn’t conceal their curiosity that this perfectly formed wolf was a member of the Watch. “Can’t figure it out, can you?” Snowdon barked in a harsh voice quite different from his howling. Then he stuck his tongue out. Edme and Faolan both jumped back. It was forked, like a snake’s. Snowdon laughed.

“He’s all about shock,” Winks muttered. “
Loves shocking newcomers.”

“Snowdon’s going back to his den, and do you know the first thing he’ll do before he sleeps?” Twist said.

“What?” asked Faolan.

“He will gnaw a log to record what he observed on his watch — any owls coming for coals, any possible graymalkins. And he will also report on the activity of the volcano. But up you go now, Faolan. This is your cairn, and your watch is Stormfast. Winks will lead Edme to the cairn for Morgan. Scramble up, and I will join you shortly.”

There was much to learn that first night.

“I am your
taiga,”
Twistling said, “but so is Stormfast.” He nodded toward the volcano, whose crater was belching great rolling plumes of steam that unfurled and stretched across the night. “You’ll learn how the scent of the sulfurous steams varies through the seasons.

“Lava flows are rare,” Twist continued, “but you will learn the difference between flows from Stormfast or from Kiel on the opposite side of the Ring.”

In the eastern sky, the first bright shadow of the moon clawed its way over the horizon and began to climb. It was then that Faolan spotted the owl
s. Their broad wings printed against the dark, their tip feathers silvered
by the moon’s light, the owls of Ga’Hoole came silently through the night — ghostly and majestic.

“They usually arrive when the moon is rising. And from the cairns of Stormfast and Morgan, you have the best view of them. On the Bone of Bones, you will learn about the truly great owls, beginning with the first more than a thousand years ago.” Faolan felt something in his marrow. His eyes widened and he shoved his ears forward. He, as all wolves in the Beyond, knew of the ember that lay buried in the volcanoes and how it often traveled through the lava tunnels from one crater to another. He had been told the legends of the Ring and was aware that the first King Hoole had k
nown about the ember’s strange power before he retrieved it. The King named it the Ember of Hoole and warned the first collier
that this ember was not for any Rogue smith’s fires.

“I know,” Faolan said quietly.

“You know.” Twist cocked his head and looked at Faolan with curiosity. “You’ve already read that part of the Bone.”

“No. Not yet.”

“Then how do you know?”

Faolan looked at Twist. There was confusion in his eyes. “I’m not sure. I just know.”

Something stirred in Twist. It wasn’
t a feeling so much in his marrow as in his heart. He continued, “As I said, you’ll learn about the Fengos as well as the great colliers — like Grank, the first collier.”

Faolan gave a start as he heard the name.

“Are you all right?” Twist asked.

“I’m fine. Please go on.” When Twist had said that name — Grank — there was a shiver deep in Faolan’s marrow. The kind of shiver that wolves felt when another wolf walked over the place where they would take their last breath.

“Let’s begin with the scanning leaps.”

“Scanning leaps?”

To answer the question, Twist shot up as fast as any burning ember and spun around at the highest point of his leap. He did a forward somersault and landed neatly back on the cairn. Faolan blinked in astonishment.

“That was a full gainer with a double spiral and a little something of my own devising at the end. But the real point is not how fancy you can get but how much yo
u can see while you’re up there. How much you can scan in the
shortest amount of time. We can’t fly like owls, but …” Twist chuckled a bit. “Well, we try!

“Right now, your job is to learn about the good owls, not the graymalkins yet — how to recognize them, who they are.

“And now,” Twist said. “Time for your first jump. The trick is to spring from your back legs and immediately tuck your front legs under. Don’t try anything fancy on this first one. Just up and down and land on your hind legs.”

On the count of three, Faolan sprang. Burning embers whizzed by him and he could feel the heat of the flames from the volcano and smell the lava thick and boiling in the crater. Hot gusts brushed his pelt, and for a few seconds, he felt as if he were one with the sky — the stars, the moon, the racing clouds — until he saw an owl high above him.
What a world they live in!
he thought. Before he knew it, he was back on top of the cairn.

“Your jump was very high and that is good. But for now, I would sacrifice a bit of height so you ca
n better master the flips and twists.”

Meanwhile, atop the cairn on Morgan, Edme was also concentrating hard on her jumps. She did not attain the height she desired, but her form was good, even excellent,
until she caught sight of Banja below, sneering at her. She came down hard on her rump.

“Ouch!”

“Ah, you were distracted!” Winks said. “Can’t let that happen. What pulled your attention away?”

Edme was reluctant to say that it was Banja. She didn’t want to sound as if she were complaining, blaming someone else for her mistakes. But inside her head, she was cursing the wolf who had lodged like a burr inside her brain ever since the meeting with the Fengo.
I am not going to let her do this to me,
Edme silently vowed.
She wants to get at me and she won’t!

Edme squared up for her next jump. She took off beautifully, tucked her legs just as instructed to reduce the wind, soared as high as she had yet, then rounded down for what would have been a perfect landing, until a loud cackling burst out below her. Once more, she landed on her rump.

“Hey, quiet down there!” Winks shouted.

“Oh, we didn’t realize we were so loud,” Banja said. “Sorry, Winks. I was just telling Paddy that joke you told me the other night about the caribou who tried to play
biliboo.”

“First of all, it was a limerick, not a joke. And
secondly, with the wind in this direction, your words carry and I am trying to do some serious instruction up here.”

“Yes, I see she does need it. So sor
ry. My apologies to both of you,” Banja answered. Winks l
ooked at Edme, a perplexed expression shining in the
taiga’s
single eye.

“Hmmm” was all she said.

Did that apology sound as phony to Winks as it did to me?
Edme wondered.

Back atop Stormfast, Faolan worked hard on
his jumps until the very end of the watch. Twist led him on a much longer trail back to the den so Faolan could see the changing of the Watch shifts at the other volcanoes.

“We’re coming up on Kiel now. That’s Leitha j
ust going up to the cairn.”

Faolan saw a black wolf with a glossy pelt and three legs nimbly make her way up the cairn. When she reached the top, she sprang into the air, executing a dazzling backward somersault. Faolan gasped. “She did that on only three legs!”

“Yes, indeed,” Twist replied. “Some think that Leith
a is the best jumper of the Watch.”

Faolan could not help being ashamed that he’d once felt so special because of his jumps.

They had almost completed the circle and were approaching the volcano Dunmore when Twist stopped. Directly ahead was a cairn, but no wolf stood atop it. It was not as tall as the other cairns, but as Faolan looked at it, he felt a shudder pass through him. His hackles rose.

“The cairn of the Fengos,” Twist said quietly. “This is where their bones rest and many of the bones they carved. When their time is near, when
cleave hwlyn
is approaching, they begin to carve their final bone, their Bone of Passage. It’s their last thoughts before they leave this world and begin their climb up the star ladder to the Cave of Souls. That bone is buried with them deep in the cairn. The Fengos carve in a code understood only by them.”

Faolan cocked his head to one side and stared at the cairn. The voice of Twist ebbed away, the baying of the wolves faded as well, and it was as if he had been transported to a moment outside of time. He felt as though he were standing next to his own pelt, looking at himself.
I know the code.

“Faolan! Are you all right?” Twist asked.

Instantly, Faolan was back in his own skin. “Fine, good!” And he did feel good, as if he’d had a long, restful sleep.

“Look, Dunmore is awakening.” The two wolves turned their heads toward the volcano, which had suddenly begun to spew geysers of hot coals into the black folds of the night. The sky was spangled with burning embers. For the first time since Thunderheart had died, Faolan felt at peace, content.
I am happy,
Faolan thought.
I am truly happy.