11 - The Red Girl
‘In the beginning was the Word.’ John, Chapter 1, Verse 1
‘Palla. Listen to me, Palla. You’ve got to try and escape.’ The returning storm had at least brought one blessing. In the blizzard Huttser was able to creep unseen through dark and find Palla. She growled coldly as he approached, but as soon as Huttser told her what had he had learnt, Palla’s expression turned to amazement. Palla wanted to howl to the heavens, but her terror for her daughter had followed as swiftly as her joy.
‘What do you mean I’ve got to escape, Huttser?’
‘Slavka wants me at her side almost all the time now,’ said Huttser angrily, ‘you have more chance of slipping away unnoticed. Find Larka and this human. Warn her.’
‘Huttser, I am your mate and if I escape, we shall escape together.’
The fur on the back of Huttser’s neck bristled furiously. He suddenly remembered that first sun when he had fought off her other suitors and begun to court her, the bravest and most beautiful she-wolf he had ever known.
‘No. You must look to the children, I order it, Palla.’
‘Order it?’ growled Palla, beginning to show her teeth, but more in a smile than a show of anger. ‘Since when do you order me to do anything? Do we not run as equals, do I not hunt as well as you and did I not bear the litter? That takes more strength than a Dragga could ever know, Huttser. Or ever really understand.’
Huttser dropped his gaze.
‘Palla,’ he whispered, ‘can you ever forgive me... for what happened?’
Palla whined quietly.
‘Oh, Huttser, there is nothing to forgive.’
‘How I have missed you, Palla.’
Palla stepped gently forward. Their muzzles came together and their tails began to wag as they whined in the cold and licked each other’s faces. Months of anguish welled out of the wolves. Months of sorrow and guilt for Fell and their pack and their own separation.
‘Huttser,’ cried Palla, ‘we will find Larka again and never leave her side until this is finished. I fear this legend, but if she is already with the human perhaps Tor and Fenris meant it all to be.’
‘And I shall not be sorry to leave,’ said Huttser, looking up at the high mountains, ‘I’ve discovered something else. The citadel, Palla, it lies above us.’
Suddenly they heard a furious growl. Huttser and Palla swung round together. Angry muzzles shivered in the blizzard as Slavka stepped from the storm. Gart was at her side and they were completely surrounded by rebels. Slavka’s eyes were burning with a fury that seemed to melt the icy air. But she kept blinking almost stupidly as the snow swirled in her face. Slavka could hardly believe what she had overheard.
‘Traitors,’ she seethed. ‘Traitors in my own camp.’
But as she looked at Huttser her anger was as much at the fact that she had been so mistaken about the Dragga she hadn’t been able to see his secret after all.
‘No, Slavka,’ said Huttser, ‘we are not traitors.’
‘Silence. It was you, Huttser, you that sired this she-wolf below the Stone Spores. This is your loyalty. I let you into my confidence and I find I have been nursing treachery in the very bosom of my den. Tell me, Huttser, did Morgra send you to spy on me?’
‘No, Slavka,’ cried Palla desperately, stung by the raw injustice of the thought. ‘We loathe Morgra as much as you, and we will help you to fight her. She cursed our pack and when we found that Larka had the Sight—’
Slavka snarled.
‘The Sight,’ she spat, ‘if your daughter claims to have the Sight, she must die for her lies. As this human must die.’ Huttser growled and sprang at her but the rebels barred his way.
‘Gart,’ whispered Slavka suddenly. ‘Go, Gart, find them.’ Gart hesitated. He was filled with sudden apprehension.
Slavka saw it immediately.
‘Gart,’ she growled, ‘why do you delay?’
‘Slavka, what if we can’t get to it? The human and this she-wolf. The legend does tell of them both, and if the Sight really brings with it powers, they may be powers that I can’t—’
Slavka rounded on Gart.
‘There are no powers of the Sight,’ she snarled. ‘And Gart, where is your loyalty?’ But as Slavka looked at him something glinted in her eyes. ‘Very well. If you cannot kill it then give this Larka a message, Gart,’ she hissed, ‘from the rebel leader. From all the free Varg. Tell her that if she does not deliver the human up to me by the time the summer touches the land and the free packs arrive in the valley of Kosov, then Huttser and Palla shall fight, just as they claim they want to.’
Huttser turned nervously towards Palla as the snow went on tumbling about their ears.
‘But her parents shall not have the privilege of fighting
Morgra or the Night Hunters, of fighting for freedom and justice for the wolf,’ hissed Slavka, and around her the snow seemed to swell. ‘No. They shall fight each other. To the death.’
Larka looked down at the baby in their snow den. Its little hands were squeezed up on to its chest. She was fascinated by those strange paws and the tiny pink claws. In the past few suns whenever the cub had tugged at her fur, somehow Larka sensed that as the child stroked or prodded her, some mysterious intelligence was travelling from its paws up to the creature’s mind. That it was always learning.
‘Jarla,’ said Larka suddenly, ‘when the snows stop, we must find it meat.’
‘If it lasts till then.’
As the wolves huddled together, they all felt the same
bitter determination. Yet there was a fear in their breaths too. The wolves lay there and began to doze and when Larka woke she saw that Jarla was gazing at the baby. Outside, the moaning of the storm came to them like the howling of a hundred wolf packs.
‘Tsarr,’ shuddered Jarla, ‘can it really be true? Wolfbane’s winter?’
Tsarr growled but shook his head.
‘No, Jarla, we mustn’t believe that. It’s a story.’
‘Why is there so much anger in the world?’ whispered
Jarla sadly. ‘Even the stories are filled with darkness.’
Larka shuddered as the storm howled outside.
‘Jarla,’ she said, looking kindly at the she-wolf, ‘when I was a cub and Brassa and Bran used to tell us stories of the castle, they filled me with fear. Darkness too. But I know they were false. Just as the stories about Tsinga’s valley, the Vale of Shadows, were false. We are not children any more. We must live free from fear, Jarla. Nothing can grow in fear, but hate.’
Tsarr looked at Larka with a sudden admiration.
‘But is it surprising the stories are filled with darkness?’ he growled as they listened to the storm. ‘What should we tell our children? Tales of happy families, fluffy cubs and furry friends?’
Jarla shook her muzzle, but at Larka’s stomach a little hand suddenly tugged at her fur.
‘Tsarr,’ growled Larka quietly, trying to think of a way to take their minds off their plight, ‘will you tell us a story. But a different kind of story?’
‘What do you mean, Larka?’
‘Of Man,’ whispered Larka, ‘what you said, Tsarr, about a different law. When Man and the wolf lived together.’
The child stirred in the ice cave and Tsarr thought for a while before he nodded slowly.
‘Well, there is the story of Fren and the red girl.’
‘Tell us, Tsarr.’
As the child lay pressed against Larka’s fur and Tsarr began, she suddenly felt like a cub again herself, safe and warm and happy at her parents’ side.
‘Let me see,’ growled Tsarr. ‘It was after the beginning when Tor and Fenris brought light out of darkness. In the suns when they had first made Man, the humans, in their cleverness, had began to spread across the face of the world and learnt to control it with their hands and their strange tools. In those times the humans still worshipped Tor and Fenris, and treated the wolf with great respect. If a man killed a Varg they would feel it as
a great misfortune and even hold special gatherings where they would bury the wolf in the ground themselves and water would flow from their eyes. For then the humans knew the wonder of the wilderness.’
Larka looked down at the baby and there was a wonder in her own eyes.
‘The humans admired the Varg as a great hunter,’ Tsarr went on quietly, ‘and they would take their cubs and leave them in the forests to be suckled by a she-wolf, for they knew our milk would give them strength. The strength of the hunter.’
Jarla growled proudly and licked the baby.
‘In this way some of the wolves tended to human cubs and for a time there was friendship between wolves and the two-feet. The stories say Va herself even suckled a pair of human pups who grew into brave and strong fighters and came to lead their pack, throwing up a huge forest of stone dens that was known throughout the world. The same humans that built Harja, the gateway to heaven.’
Larka suddenly thought of what Tsinga had said of the altar and the statue of the she-wolf.
‘But of all the humans Tor had a favourite. It was a she- child whose skin was red like an autumn leaf, for Tor had fashioned her from the red clay on the banks of the great river that circles the world. Whenever she looked into the girl’s eyes Tor knew she loved her, for love enters through the eyes. She clothed her, too, in the pelt of the Herla, the red deer, to keep her warm, and the she-child lived in the middle of a mighty forest in a den fashioned from the trees.’
The child stirred between the wolves in the snow den.
‘The red girl lived alone, but although she was nearing her time when loneliness and desire would stir in her and her body would change and she would seek a mate among her own, her greatest friend was the young grey wolf, Fren. Together they would pad through the trees and the flowers and share the wonder of creation. There were many dangers for the she-child in the forest, from the wild boar and the weaving snake to the black bears that roamed the trees, but the grey wolf would protect his friend from harm, especially when she made her long journeys through the forest to visit an old she-human.’
‘But Fenris grew jealous of Tor’s love for the red girl, so he took one of Fren’s brothers, the Chanco wolf Barl, and set him prowling through the forests. He knew that Barl hated Tor, for though he had always been loyal and true to her, she couldn’t bring herself to love him. Barl was so enamoured of the world that he had asked Tor if he could live for ever, which made her so angry that as a punishment Tor made him lame and weakened his eyesight, so he found it hard to hunt and grew hungrier and hungrier.
‘Barl wanted revenge on Tor, and Fenris prowled into his dreams and whispered to him of how the she-goddess loved the red girl, so Barl determined to steal her away and eat her up. One night, though, Tor met Fenris by moonlight and they quarrelled so furiously that Fenris let slip what he had done, so Tor rushed to Fren. She warned him that his lame brother was in the forest, too, and might try to gobble up the girl she loved.’
Larka whimpered softly.
‘But one sun, when Fren had agreed to accompany the red girl through the woods, he was delayed, and when he reached her den was distraught to find that she had already set off. He was frantic when he discovered wolf tracks outside and recognized the spores of his brother Barl. When Fren reached the den belonging to the old she-human he rushed inside and was aghast to see blood on the ground and the red child’s deer skin lying discarded nearby. At first Fren thought his friend had been eaten, but as he scented the place he realized that it must have been the old she-human that was dead. Then he heard a lovely sound drifting through the trees.
‘As Fren looked back through the entrance to the den,’ Tsarr went on, ‘he caught sight of his friend in the distance. She was perfectly safe and had abandoned her red pelt to go down to the stream to wash. She was quite beautiful as she stood there in her nakedness, singing happily in the sunlight, completely unaware that the lame wolf Barl had already stolen into the den and killed her human friend.
‘But as Fren watched, mesmerized, and the red girl dived into the sparkling water, he growled. He had scented his brother coming back towards the river. Fren was desperate that the child should not be discovered and he looked around frantically. But as the lame wolf got nearer and nearer to the river, Fren suddenly had an idea. He rushed over to the deer pelt lying on the ground and, tossing up his muzzle, he threw it on his own back. Then he called softly outside, ‘Is that you, my friend? I’m in here, do come and see me.’
‘Barl thought the red girl was calling and had mistaken him for Fren, for with his bad eyes he was always mistaking things himself. Barl leapt towards the wooden den and when he ran inside he found Fren standing on his back legs, draped in the girl’s pelt. There was the humans’ burning air in the den, that gives off warmth and light, and as it flickered across the wolf’s fur it made his coat look red too. Barl squinted, but he still mistook Fren for the she-human and his jaws began to slaver. Fren readied, but he wanted to get nearer to his enemy’s throat, so he whispered in a little voice, ‘Come closer, my friend.’
‘Barl limped forward and, as he looked, he found something strangely troubling about the sight. Fren hesitated, too, as he glared at his brother and in that moment he feared to kill him, but as he remembered the red girl in the stream and the beauty of her nakedness he knew that he had the courage.
‘But your eyes,’ Barl growled, ‘they’re so big. And your nose. It’s so long.’
‘Yes, brother,’ cried Fren, throwing off the deer skin, ‘and my teeth. They’re so sharp. For I am a wolf, like you.’
He leapt at his brother’s throat and though the fight was furious, surprise had given Fren the advantage and soon Barl was lying dead on the ground. Fren stood there shaking guiltily as he looked down on his own dead brother. But when the little human returned from the river and found out what had happened she hugged her friend and stroked Fren’s fur in gratitude.
But Fenris came too to the den and when he saw what Fren had done he growled angrily.
‘Fren,’ he cried in a terrible, booming voice, ‘you have killed your brother wolf and now you are a hunter. And so you must go from here, and I shall take away your memory of the red girl, and you shall search through the world for ever, until you remember what you really are. And since I am a vengeful god your sin shall pass down to your children, even to the tenth generation, and I shall give you a commandment Fren, in words of blood. And my commandment is this:
Thou Shalt Kill.
The wolf nodded sadly, but now the goddess Tor came to the den. As she looked between the wolf and the girl and heard what her mate Fenris had decreed, her heart was so wounded she could not tell which she loved more, the wolf or the girl.
‘Fren,’ Tor whispered, ‘Fenris is a god, too, and I cannot overturn his commandment. But since you did this thing for the red girl whom I love, I will sharpen your claws and polish your cunning and strengthen your instincts. In memory of the pelt that you used in your deception, I shall find you herds of deer to hunt to your heart’s content. And since Fenris has decreed you shall forget the red girl, I shall take memory from all the Lera, too, and I shall set a mark on you, to aid you in the darkness of your search.’
With that Tor placed her paw in the middle of Fren’s forehead and when she withdrew it the red girl strained forward to see what was there. But there was nothing, nothing at all. But Fenris knew what Tor had done as soon as Tor touched Fren. In that same moment she had given the wolf both a curse and a gift, and that curse and that gift was the Sight.’
As Tsarr finished his story in the snow den Larka growled with confusion, for though this tale of the Sight and of a friendship with humans did whisper of a world far away from the fear and loneliness that had stalked her for so long, Fenris’s commandment had sounded like a warning note in her mind too. Strangely she also remembered the question Fell had once asked at the Meeting Place: ‘Am I my sister’s keeper?’.
‘So the story means we should be friends with a
ll the humans?’ she asked quietly, staring down at the child in the fragile cave. ‘As once we were.’
‘It can’t,’ growled Jarla, ‘nor all the Lera. If that were so, what could we hunt and how could we survive?’
‘Perhaps it is just there to make us think,’ whispered Tsarr, ‘and to see more clearly.’
Larka was suddenly reminded of something Palla had told her once in the den, of Tor and Fenris putting Man in the world so they might one sun understand where they themselves came from.
‘Man can see further than the Lera, then, Tsarr?’ she asked thoughtfully as she licked the baby. ‘Further than the Varg?’
‘Not the kind of sight that spies a Herla from the mountaintop even in the dark,’ said Tsarr, ‘or smells a wounded fox across a distant valley. But the wolves say that Man’s first gift is imagination. And that is a kind of sight. They say that some of the humans have even flown with the birds of the air and dived with the mighty blue whale to the very depths of the deepest seas. But it is at the altar that you could find out.’
But Larka was shaking her head.
‘What happened to Fren?’ she whispered.
‘Many things, Larka. But then the stories run out. The story of another wolf became popular among the Varg. The story of Sita.’
‘Tell us,’ said Jarla.
‘It was when Tor and Fenris had quarrelled again and Fenris was so angry that he had made the wolves fight bitterly among themselves. So bitterly that it seemed there could never be peace. Tor’s heart grew sick and, at last, she sent down her own daughter Sita to stop them. The daughter she loved above all else, for Sita was gentle and kind.’
‘How did Sita stop them?’ growled Larka, and the baby stirred and rolled over.
Tsarr paused.
‘First she went through the world healing the Varg and telling them stories and spending her time even among the lowliest of the Siklas. She told them, too, that they mustn’t be afraid and that there was no death but only joy and that love was the greatest courage. She said that they should send her their children, for she knew that children can really see the truth and she loved children above all things.’
The Sight Page 27
