Snarls erupted, and Casseomae looked up in time to see a blur of fur rush out from the grass. Pang, caught by surprise, was knocked over by the furious creature. He leaped to his feet, and the two tangled and snapped and yipped.
With a quick bite and a twist, Pang freed himself and stood facing another dog. “Hold off! I mean you no harm,” he barked. “We didn’t know this was your territory.”
The dog was smaller than Pang, a hound of some sort with long dangling ears and protruding ribs. Her coat was speckled gray and black, and heavy teats hung from her underside.
“Why are you traveling with a bear?” she snarled.
Pang sniffed her. “You have a litter nearby, sister? She won’t hurt your pups.”
The hound eyed Casseomae and then she cocked her head as she caught sight of the child hiding behind Casseomae. “What is that? What strange creature travels with you?”
“Come see, sister,” Pang said, grinning. “You won’t believe what we’ve found.”
The hound took a step forward, and Casseomae growled. “You don’t know this cur,” she said to Pang. “How do we know we can trust her?”
“She’s a Faithful,” Pang said. Then, looking back at the hound, he asked, “You are, aren’t you?”
“Of course I am,” she replied. “Why else would I be hiding out in this marsh? Think I want my pups killed by wolves?”
Pang circled around to the child and beat his tail against his leg, urging the child to follow him. “See. We have been rewarded, sister. Look what has returned!”
The hound flinched, lowering her head deferentially. Then she edged closer to the child, who was petting Pang’s head. She sniffed. “No. Is that … can that be a Companion?”
“It is,” Pang said, running up to lick the hound’s nose and then leaping back to the child. “This is a Companion pup! The bear found him in the Forest.”
“Bless my sniffer,” the hound said, grinning up at the child and nearing so he could pet her speckled coat. “I never thought I would see one. Do you know what this means?”
“Of course! Of course!” Pang barked.
Dumpster slipped out from the grass and muttered, “Scratch me bald. Another cur?”
The hound stiffened when she saw him, but Pang quickly snapped at her. “The rat is with us. Don’t eat him.”
“That’s a warning, not a request,” Dumpster said from behind Casseomae’s front paw, “if you know what’s good for you.”
The hound looked back up, mesmerized by the child. “Come with me. We must get back to my pups. I want them to see the Companion.”
They followed her to a metal container hidden in the weeds. Whimpers and whines greeted the hound as she returned. She slumped down inside as her litter of pups scrambled onto her stomach to nurse. Casseomae felt they couldn’t be more than a week old. The child got down on his knees to crawl toward the pups, and Pang nipped at his shoulder.
“No, he’s fine,” the hound said. “Let him touch my pups. Let the Companion bless my children.” She watched with pleasure as the child gently stroked the cooing, suckling pups.
Casseomae asked, “Do you have a pack?”
“Sometimes,” she said. “There are others I’ve traveled with. But it’s too dangerous these days to keep pups with a pack. I discovered this marsh when I had my first litter. Wolves and coyotes rarely hunt here. Tell me, where are the other Companions? Has the war begun?”
“The war?” Dumpster squeaked.
The hound glanced at Pang, who slunk a little lower. “Have you not told them?”
“Told us what?” Dumpster squeaked. “Oh, I knew we couldn’t trust that scratchin’ cur, Cass! Told you the day we first sniffed his traitorous hide.”
“I’m no traitor,” Pang yapped.
The pups whimpered, and the child hissed at Pang, batting him on the nose. The hound soothed her pups with licks as she coaxed them back to nursing.
“Then what’s she talking about?” Casseomae asked. “What’s this about a war?”
Pang eyed her apprehensively. “It’s what we’ve been promised. For being Faithful.”
The hound said, “They say the day will come when the Companions will return and wage a war against the wolves to reclaim the Forest.”
Casseomae said, “And this will be your reward?”
“To live again safely in the dens of our Companions,” the hound said. “No longer having to hide in swamps to deliver our young. No longer being hunted and killed by the wolves.”
“But,” Casseomae said slowly, “what will become of the Forest?”
The hound and Pang exchanged a glance.
A sickening feeling came over Casseomae. She had heard all her life of what it was like before the Turning, how the Forest had once been cut down, how the Skinless Ones had driven the voras nearly into extinction. She looked at Dumpster. “What will become of my clan?”
The rat flicked his tail. “You know as well as I do, Cass.”
Confusion and anger rose in Casseomae. She backed away from the den and paced out into the marsh. When she was away from the others, she swiped her claws against the ground and looked around at the desolate expanse of water and reeds. Garbage and rusting relics were everywhere. There was hardly a place in the Forest without the ruins of the Skinless Ones.
She thought of the Ogeema and his army of wolves. Was he searching for her cub in order to protect his authority? She had always despised the Ogeema as a ruler full of cruelty and vanity. But what if he was motivated by something else, something she had not considered until now? What if he was trying to protect the Forest?
She suddenly thought of what the cub had done to the buck. His thunderous weapon had been brutal, more devastating than any claw or tooth that the voras of the Forest possessed.
As she slumped to the ground, the child came out from the hound’s den. He gave her a questioning whine, then slowly crept over and put his hands on her snout. She licked him, scraping the mud from his arms.
“Are you letting those stupid curs upset you?” Dumpster emerged from the grass, wagging his whiskers at her. “You don’t really believe their nonsense?”
“What do you mean?” Casseomae said.
“That the Companions will take the Forest back from the wolves.”
She lifted her head as he circled around to a new spot, where he sniffed up at the child. “He’s only one Old Devil,” Dumpster said, “and he’s hardly that anymore. He’s your cub. You’re teaching him how to live with the Forest. You’ve protected him as well as that hound has protected her litter. Don’t listen to them, Cass. There won’t be any war. There are no other Companions. He’s your cub, and you’ll raise him to be a mushroom-headed bear just like you.”
She snorted. The child laughed as the air from her nose blew back his hair. She nudged him with her snout. With a chirp, he dug his fingers into her fur, squeezing her as tightly as he could.
“You’re right,” she said to Dumpster. “But first we have to find the island.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“I wish you could come with us, sister,” Pang said to the hound the following morning.
“Me too,” she said. “But I will tell the packs the good news when I see them again. I will tell them to be ready.”
Dumpster lashed his tail irritably, but Casseomae gave him a grunt to stay quiet.
As they set off, the hound followed them a few steps, her eyes locked on the child. “My pups will grow up in a better world,” she barked. “The end of the wolves’ reign is near. Travel upwind. Travel safely.”
Once they were out of earshot of the hound, Dumpster said, “Are you really so superstitious as to believe all that nonsense, cur?”
“Is it wrong to have hope?” Pang said, leading the way through the maze of high ground that crisscrossed the marsh.
“Hope is one thing,” Dumpster said. “Survival is another.”
“Hope is how our kind has survived,” the dog said. “It’s how we all survive. Your
mischief set off in search of a land without voras. You scoffed at them. And now we’ve heard from the Auspectres that the Havenlands exist. Your mischief might be living free in those happy lands right now.”
“I’ll believe in the Havenlands when we see them,” the rat said. “Until then I’ll just hope I don’t wind up in the bottom of the Ogeema’s belly.”
As they foraged midday by a deeper creek, Pang wandered off to investigate the terrain ahead. “The Forest is nearby,” he told them when he returned, “but there’s no way to know if the local pack has joined the Ogeema. I think we should stay in the marsh. It’s slow going, but it’s safer.”
They all agreed. The marsh ahead had less high ground and they were forced to wade through reedy water that made Casseomae nervous. It would be hard to defend themselves or escape if they were attacked, but fortunately they smelled nothing more than otters as they traveled. By nightfall, they were glad to find a highway that cut through the marsh. Exhausted from all the slogging, they sank to the broken concrete and slept.
At dawn, Pang said, “The sun rises from down this highway trail. It won’t be entirely out of the water, but I think we’ll have an easier time this way.”
“Do you know how much farther we have to go to reach the city?” Casseomae asked.
“Another sleep or two, I suspect,” Pang said. “We’re nearly out of the marsh.”
But as the sun reached its highest point that afternoon, enormous towers could be seen in the distance.
“Look,” Dumpster squeaked. “Skyscrapers!”
“Is that the city?” Casseomae asked.
“Pluck my whiskers if it isn’t,” the rat replied.
The skyscrapers looked to Casseomae like the broken trunks of trees, thick and dark, ascending straight up and snapped at the tops as if by a windstorm. The highway soon joined others at the end of the marsh. Without the Forest to bury the trails beneath vegetation, Casseomae could see how numerous the Skinless Ones’ paths could be. She would never have known which one to take had it not been for Pang, and even he seemed to select the best one based purely on guesswork and by aiming their noses for the growing skyscrapers.
Although they got closer by sunset, the city was still far off. Pang stopped them at an overpass. “Like I told you before, strange tribes live around this city. It will be dark soon, and I don’t like the idea of being too close when we sleep.”
“We should stay here for the night, then?” Casseomae asked.
“It would be best,” the dog said.
Pang trotted off in search of puddles and the child followed him, climbing on cars and poking branches through their shattered windows. Casseomae loped after them and paused at the crest of the overpass. She could see the city better now, rising from the far side of a river. Trees grew thickly like underbrush beneath the towering skyscrapers. The highway ahead cut through a swath of smaller buildings, broken and collapsed ruins of concrete and glass.
Dumpster was eating a beetle nearby when Casseomae heard him say, “Where’s the pup?”
She swung around and nearly hit Pang as he passed by. The dog circled and looked back the way he’d come. “He’s playing down there.”
A toppled car was in her way, and as she came around it, she saw the cub at the bottom of the concrete trail, squatting in front of a large vehicle, chirping to himself.
“You left him alone?” Casseomae woofed.
“He’s just down there,” Pang said. “He’s fine. He’s—”
From around the vehicle, Rend and her rout emerged and surrounded the child.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Casseomae unleashed a full-throated roar as she charged down the trail.
Rend signaled with a glance, and two of the coyotes descended on the child, one grabbing his ankle, the other locking his jaws onto his wrist. The child screamed in pain. They pulled him off his feet and began tugging him toward the tree line. The cub fought, kicking his feet and swinging his fists.
Casseomae barreled toward them, strings of saliva slinging from her teeth. “Let go of him!”
“Stop where you are,” Rend called, “or I’ll have them go for his throat.”
Casseomae bounced angrily on locked front legs. Rend yipped at her rout, and the two coyotes let go of the cub, forming a tight circle around him with the others.
Pang stepped in front of Casseomae. “Wait, Cass, we can do this smart.”
“Yes, you can,” Rend said. She kept her head low and her ears back, calm and cold. “First, do you understand what hunts you?”
Casseomae’s breathing came in heavy, furious snorts.
Rend went on. “The Ogeema has packs searching all over the Forest. He himself is not far behind you, leading a charge of wolves of a size not seen since Taka-Dirge’s army. All for your … abhorrent cub.”
The slender coyote paced back and forth, her bushy tail making deliberate swipes. “I have borne many litters, Casseomae. I know what it means to protect a pup. When your den is found by a wolf pack and you are forced to choose between losing your pups and losing your own life … well, I know what it’s like to be in that position also. It’s a painful choice but hardly a choice at all if you think about it. It’s simply the way of the Forest.”
She looked back at the cub with her yellow eyes. “He doesn’t belong here, bear,” she said. “This is no longer his world. He’ll never survive, and I’m afraid there’s nowhere—”
“There is,” Casseomae growled. “There is, and I’m taking him there. And you and those wolves will never find him.”
Rend turned up her snout and gave several high yips. “You sound like you’ve been talking to the Auspectres,” she laughed. “Have they sent you to this city? Let me caution you against heeding those vulture witches too closely. They crave a meal. Nothing would please them more than to have a fine, fat bear carcass, not to mention a tasty Skinless One and his cur Companion.”
Pang snarled. “Don’t listen to her lies.”
“The Auspectres are more likely than not sending you to your slaughter for their own feasting pleasure,” Rend said.
Casseomae could not help but think how the Auspectres had told her she would have to walk over the water to reach the island where the cub would be safe. No bridge that large could remain. Were the Auspectres leading her to a trap?
She shook off the doubt. She knew she couldn’t trust anything Rend told her.
The cub was no longer whimpering. He didn’t look frightened. His skin streaked with mud and his hair tangled with burrs and leaves, he sat in the middle of the circling coyotes licking his bleeding wrist. His eyes were narrowed as he searched for something.
“You won’t leave here with my cub,” Casseomae growled.
“As I said before,” Rend said, “there’s hardly a choice at all. Attack us and we’ll kill him. We can lead the Ogeema back here later to show him the carcass. Or you and the cur can let us take him alive. You may leave unharmed, knowing you did your best but that you had no other choice.”
Casseomae popped her jaws angrily. The other four in Rend’s rout flinched, watching her with unblinking yellow eyes. The child slid a hand slowly to one side.
Rend flattened her ears at Casseomae. “Stay where you are. Don’t make a mis—”
The child lunged for a stick on the ground and snapped it in half beneath his foot. Before the coyotes could react, the child drove the sharp end of the stick into the hip of the nearest coyote, who yowled and twisted. With a swing, the child cracked the heavy end of the stick against another coyote’s head.
Casseomae charged. Rend cast a quick glance at her and then retreated with the rest of her rout. The coyote with the bleeding leg barely made it back to the Forest before Pang caught up, barking and snapping at his tail. Pang circled back to where Casseomae was sniffing the cub’s wounds and licking the blood from his ankle.
“Is he hurt?” Pang asked.
“They didn’t bite him deep,” she said, “but we can’t stay here. She�
�ll go straight to the Ogeema. We’ve got to get into that city tonight.”
Dumpster had emerged from where he’d been hiding and sprang around in frantic circles. “You can’t roam a city at night! It’s not like the Forest. The smells aren’t the same, and the terrain’s all different. You’ll never know a hunter is tracking you until his teeth clamp into your neck.”
“What else are we supposed to do?” Casseomae asked.
Pang was staring at the city, the last of the sun’s setting rays illuminating the top of a particularly tall skyscraper. “We just have to reach that den there. And then we’ll know where the Havenlands are. Then we’ll know where to go.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
They raced past the ruins of the Skinless Ones’ buildings lining the highway. Casseomae was uncomfortable with their quick pace. Charging into unfamiliar terrain chafed against her instincts. The cub ran, not with the frightful jitteriness he once had and not with a carefree sense of play either. He had already learned a great deal on their journey. He growled and held his stick at the ready like a fighter, and she was proud of her cub for it.
But it made her no less nervous.
The highway regularly split off in a number of directions. Pang was having trouble finding which route was the best to follow.
“This can’t be right,” Dumpster squeaked as the night darkened around them.
The wide double path of the highway had disappeared, and they were now among ruined buildings on a narrow path cluttered with relics.
Pang sniffed side to side. “We’ve got to reach the river. The city lies on the other bank. From what I remember, the Companion paths that cross over the river are all collapsed.”
“If there aren’t bridges,” Dumpster asked, “how are we supposed to get across? Swim?”
“No,” he said. “Not with what lives in the water.”
“Then what do we do?” Casseomae asked.
“There’s a narrow metal passage,” Pang said, “like one of the lick-trick city towers. It’s fallen over the river. It’s somewhere nearby. We can go over that, I think.”
The Prince Who Fell from the Sky Page 12
