Under the Wolf's Shadow

by A. Katie Rose

  “My neck is sore,” he answered. “Yet, I feel quite good, actually.”

  While the bugs no longer sped at high speed under my skin, the memory of it bothered me. I felt, not exactly strange as it were, but different. Something in me had changed, but I’d no idea what. I remembered how, in the room of the Royal Crown Inn, Rygel and I cut each other and became ehlu’braud, blood brothers. Then I sensed a change in me, just as I did now. I also knew that nothing at all had changed. I was still gai-tan, still had Darius’s obnoxious voice in my head–

  “You are growing tiresome.”

  And it all confused the hell out of me. I was different, yet still the same wolf.

  Darkhan suddenly cocked his head, considering. “While I don’t feel strange,” he said slowly. “I do feel–”

  “What?”

  “Happy.”

  “So?”

  He glanced at me sidelong. “Only a few days ago I wanted to die, my heart in agony. Yet, now, when I think of Arianne, I don’t–hurt.”

  His surprise showed in his confused yellow eyes, his brow furrowing. “I can think of her with fondness, not desperate need.”

  “Your heart has healed,” Tashira commented, still grazing.

  “How’d that happen?”

  “The unicorn is a very powerful creature,” Tashira replied.

  “Are you saying she healed his broken heart?” I demanded.

  Tashira flicked his ears toward me. “I didn’t. He did.”

  “All I know is that I haven’t felt this happy, this content, in a long while,” Darkhan mused, staring at the distant mountains. “I still love her, but I am filled with joy without her.”

  “What do you know about unicorns?” I asked Tashira.

  “Precious little,” Tashira answered, still munching. “I doubt anyone knows much about them. They are rare, seldom seen, even more seldom killed by hunters. That we stumbled across one in dire need, well, that in itself is very weird.”

  I sighed. “Just a coincidence. Even powerful unicorns can have accidents, I suppose.”

  “I told you before, coincidence is a goddess I don’t take much stock in.”

  I shut my eyes. “You’re giving me a headache.”

  “Just ask your friend.”

  “Even I don’t know much about them,” Darius admitted. “The unicorn goddess likes her solitude.”

  “What did he say?” Tashira asked.

  “What makes you so sure he said anything?” I snapped. “My eyes were shut.”

  “Your ears twitched.”

  “Gods above and below,” I muttered.

  “Well?” Darkhan asked.

  I lifted my head and sighed. “He doesn’t know anything either. Even their goddess is mysterious.”

  “Oh, well,” Darkhan said cheerfully. “Someday I can tell my whelps I saw a unicorn.”

  “Don’t forget,” Tashira warned. “You didn’t just see one, you saved a unicorn’s life.”

  “No one likes a braggart, Blackie.”

  “You don’t have to brag, per se, just–”

  “I did enjoy that damsel in distress thing, however. Am I not the perfect picture of a hero?”

  Tashira’s eyes rolled. “Of course you are.” Under his breath, he muttered, “Imbecile.”

  “I heard that, you–”

  Struck by a sudden memory, I swung my head between the two of them. “Just how did you, both of you, know she was female?”

  Tashira lifted his face from the snowy grass and stared at me as though I was a lunatic. Darkhan also eyed me as though I had just grown a single horn from my between my eyes.

  “Gor, mate,” Darkhan said. “Are you stone blind? How could you not know?”

  “What do male unicorns look like then?” I asked, defensive. “Wouldn’t they also be white and with red eyes? She certainly looked feminine enough, but why couldn’t a male look just the same?”

  Tashira offered the Tarbane version of a human shrug: a shaking of his ears. “I just knew. As you should’ve.”

  He grazed again. Darkhan shut his teeth on his tongue, his expression sorrowful. “I can’t explain it. I looked and I knew. How could you not have seen it? The purity, the wonder, the–”

  “Enough already.” I jumped down off the boulder. “I’m hitting the road. Feel free to remain here and discuss unicorn biology to your heart’s content.”

  Hitting a fast lope, I didn’t look back. My ears heard, however, as Darkhan also hit the ground running. “Dammit, Big Dog, I didn’t mean–”

  Tashira’s voice followed before the thudding of his great hooves resounded across the meadow. “Don’t apologize to him when he’s in a snit.”

  “But–”

  “He’s just mad we saw what he couldn’t.”

  “Big Dog, wait up.”

  I didn’t slow down. The meadow rapidly fell behind as I reentered the pine, fir and scrub oak forest, ducking under low hanging branches, dodging boulders, scattering forest creatures before me. Startling a family of feral pigs, I sent them scattering in all directions, squealing in panic. A falcon, a rodent in its talons, rose on ponderous wings to fly desperately out of my way. Grounded birds rose in chirping clusters into the trees above me. Three leagues or more I ran, my pursuers still far behind. While Tashira could have caught up easily, he hadn’t. I didn’t pause to wonder why.

  The ground steadily rose, the forest falling, at least temporarily, away. I loped over mossy tundra and rock, my paws flinging up snow in my wake. Here, the sun’s bright rays hadn’t melted the snow by very much. The air, colder than what I’d felt previously, held the deadly chill of winter. Up here, autumn had fled and the long icy months had arrived. Soon, the snow would pile up higher than my head and remain until spring.

  “Winter has come,” Darius said.

  Halted at the edge of a cliff, I stared down, perplexed.

  Leaving the forest behind for the most part, we three travelled across the high pass above the timberline where only the constant wind blew and small, stunted trees grew limbs on the south side of their trunks. Tashira found little forage and nibbled on moss and tree bark for sustenance. Darkhan and I, working as a team, brought down an old elk cow. Too crippled to keep up with the herd, she fed us for a day before my errand urgently called me ever northward.

  I knew we needed to climb down the edge of the cliff. Far below, the forest reemerged where game abounded and tough grass, poking through the snow, rapidly turned brown. That wouldn’t deter Tashira, however. He’d eat it, green or brown. I failed to see a safe pass down for Tashira, however. Darkhan and I could traverse its steep slope with ease, but Tashira’s hooves might not find purchase and send him sliding, ass over ears, down into the canyon below. A tremendously large river roared through it, slashing across boulders and dead trees as white foam splashed high. To add to the treacherous rapids, ice formed at the edges.

  “Raine,” Tashira said from behind me. “That snow bank is looking at you.”

  “Hmmm?”

  I spied a likely path, no doubt created by deer and elk, meandering down the brushy cliff face. If he were careful, Tashira might successfully walk down it and arrive safely at the river’s edge. Getting us all across that deluge was a different matter altogether.

  “Have you been snacking on Nazka’s weed again?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  I retreated a space, not liking what I saw. If Tashira misplaced even one hoof–

  Darkhan growled, a deep ripping sound that emerged from deep within his chest. Wheeling about, my hackles rising on their own, I searched with sight, scent and hearing for the threat Darkhan discovered. As we stood on a high mountain edge, a steep slope rising above and the canyon below, only scrub trees, snow-covered boulders and a few tough bushes buried in snow greeted my eyes. The jagged mountain, broken with snarls of tangled scrub and outcroppings of rock upon faced north, we’d no interest in climbing it. The snow lying on its face was laced with the tracks of rabbits, deer, bir
ds, and elk. I scented the wild odor of an ermine nearby, caught the sound of a hawk screaming in the canyon below, muted by the roar of the river. Yet, I found no enemy, no attack and no reason for alarm.

  “What–”

  I saw them then.

  A pair of brown eyes near the foot of a snow-bound bush watched me with calm interest. Unlike the unicorn, these eyes didn’t glow, nor did they seem to offer any kind of threat. Yet, while my instincts were quiet, my hackles didn’t lie back down. I, too, growled low in my throat. Bushes with eyes couldn’t possibly mean anything good. What in the name of hell could that thing be? Some new deviltry of Ja’Teel’s perhaps? Could he have followed me after all and planted a daemon here to capture me?

  Darkhan planted his body squarely in front of mine, his head low, his spine ridged and ears flat against his skull. He never ceased his guttural growl, only pausing long enough to take a quick breath. Beyond him, the eyes flicked from me to Darkhan.

  The bush behind and above the eyes shook lightly. Snow fell in a cascading shower as stiff branches swung steadily, yet quickly, back and forth. The eyes rose, lifted to hang midway up the shaking bush, then rose still higher.

  What in the blazes–

  I stepped forward, shoulder to shoulder with Darkhan, my teeth bared. Whatever it was, it would have to fight us both.

  “I think you boys can chill now,” Tashira said from behind us, his voice amused.

  Not on your life, I thought, stunned as the snow came alive.

  Snow walked.

  Brown eyes lit from deep within paced forward and slowly advanced. The bush ceased it shivering quake.

  Darkhan’s growl cut off, and his lips slid down to cover his fangs. His ears came up, as did his head.

  “It’s–” Darkhan began, his own voice awed.

  Cease, I thought, it’s come to slay us–

  “It’s–” Darkhan said, his voice choked.

  What the hell is that thing?

  I sucked in my breath, stunned.

  A wolf, whiter than the snow around her, stepped forward on light paws. I gaped. Like the pieces of a puzzle, she came together in a sharp click in my head.

  Her fur, so perfectly melded into the buried bush, seemed a part of it. Now as she moved and all of her emerged from under the snow, I clearly observed a wolf, not walking snow. Her tail, still wagging from side to side, had created the bush’s shaking. Her muzzle, resting on the ground and between her snowy paws, had hidden most adroitly her black nose. Still and silent, she waited her time to emerge from her perfect camouflage.

  “It’s–”

  “Greetings, Chosen One,” she said, her voice as light as her coat.

  She lowered her head in respect, her tail flitting between her hind legs. She licked her lips in a fearful grin, yet I scented only a small amount of fear on her.

  “Greetings, fair one,” I replied courteously. “Come here.”

  She waggled closer, her muzzle pointed toward me, yet her eyes ever flicked toward Darkhan.

  “It’s–it’s–,” Darkhan stammered.

  “A what?” Tashira asked.

  “A girl.”

  “His powers of observation are phenomenal,” Tashira commented dryly.

  The white wolf’s eyes found mine, and she bowed low.

  “I am Winter’s Ghost,” she said, introducing herself, her voice soft and timid.

  “Of course you are,” Tashira replied.

  Amused, I sat down, my own tail sweeping from side to side. “Call me Raine,” I said. “Or Big Dog, but I prefer Raine.”

  Her head dropped even more. “Big Dog.”

  “The mouth behind us is Tashira,” I went on. “This is Darkhan.”

  At the sound of his name, Darkhan advanced on her, his own heavy tail wagging, to touch noses with her. He dwarfed her, for she was perhaps half his size. Yet, Winter’s Ghost stood firm and proud, not giving way an inch. His delight obvious, he raked her shoulder fur with his front paw before burying his nose in her neck. She answered his playful advance with a half-crouch and a sharp nip to his chin.

  “Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” Tashira asked me, his voice low and in my ear.

  “I am,” I replied, grinning. “I think Darkhan just found himself a girlfriend.”

  “She is beautiful,” Tashira said.

  “And his kind of girl.”

  “How do you figure?”

  I tossed my muzzle toward where the pair feinted with playful lunges and wagging tails. “Outside the color, who does she remind you of?”

  “Arianne,” Tashira breathed. “Small, shy, quiet, retiring.”

  “Exactly.”

  Darkhan nibbled her ear as Winter’s Ghost jumped backward, feigning annoyance, before lunging forward in wolfish challenge. Darkhan melted out of her path, retreating, laughing, as the white wolf followed him up and attacked, fangs bared. Ever the gentleman, Darkhan retreated, gave ground, enticed her forward with muzzle-licking grins and lowered tail. Once she committed herself, Darkhan attacked, brought her down and kissed her with a loving tongue and wagging tail.

  Shocked at his behavior, the white wolf leaped up and back. She glanced from me to him and back again, horrified. Her muzzle dropped as her ears flattened in chagrin. She’d travelled far to find me, yet ignored me as she might disdain a local cur. Remembering her manners at last, Winter’s Ghost pushed past a delighted Darkhan to greet me formally. When she would have lowered herself to grovel, I stopped her with a quick jerk of my head.

  “Don’t bother,” I said. “I care little for that. Why are you here?”

  She dropped her muzzle, yet her eyes, never still, wavered between me and Darkhan. He sat, a respectful distance away, his eyes adoring and his jaws parted in a happy grin. “I sensed you nearby,” she said, her voice tiny. “I followed you.”

  “Where’s your pack?”

  “I left with my father’s approval,” she answered. “I wished to find a mate and I knew, where you were–”

  Her quickly diverted eyes told me what her voice didn’t. She hoped to find a mate among my followers. For those who followed me would be big, strong, brave fighters, loyal to their Chosen One, excellent potential mates. Obviously, she didn’t know I’d left most of them behind.

  I finished as though I didn’t see that quick, lightning glance. “There’d be bachelor males.”

  Her rapid wag and downcast brown eyes confirmed what she didn’t say aloud.

  “They’re far away,” I said quietly, catching her gaze and holding it. “Only this disobedient miscreant, this brainless twit, followed me after disavowing his loyalty. He’s hardly a fit mate for a fine girl like you. Perhaps you should keep looking for that one, true love.”

  I might have spoken to the bush she emerged from for all the heed she paid me. Her muzzle turned toward Darkhan and failed to return. My words hadn’t fazed Darkhan at all. His tail still wagged and he all but devoured her with his eyes.

  “Nice try,” Tashira muttered in my ear.

  “Darkhan, do you think Arianne would like her?” I asked.

  “Who?” Darkhan replied absently.

  “Stick a fork in him and turn him over,” Tashira sighed. “He’s done.”

  My neck itched. I sat back and dug my left hind foot into my ruff, scratching hard. I squinted up at Tashira. “Now what?” I complained. “I planned to go north alone, and now I have your black ass and two love doves cooing and clucking over one another.”

  “Get used to it.”

  “You’re all useless.”

  “Only one who doesn’t have the brains the gods gave a goat would think so.”

  “Winter’s Ghost is a mouthful.”

  “Ghost,” I called.

  She turned to me immediately, attentive, her ears up and tail wagging.

  “I reckon she doesn’t mind the spooky nickname,” Tashira muttered.

  “Do you know the area?” I asked.

  “Indeed,” she answered. “I saw you looking below. T
here’s a track that guides you to the river.”

  “I saw it.”

  Her tail dropped. “Not that one. I know another trail that yon Tashira can navigate easily. And a pathway across the river.”

  “Useless did you say?” Tashira asked.

  “Shut up.” I stood up, my tail waving. “Then lead on, girl, we’re in your paws.”

  Happy, Ghost bounded ahead, her white tail high. Darkhan leaped after, shoulder to shoulder with her, his laughing face turned down as her own gaping muzzle, tongue lolling, tilted up. How did one fall in love so fast? Did I fall for Ly’Tana that quickly, that easily?

  Ghost led us along the mountain’s edge Ghost, the hurrying river below and the jagged mountain rearing high above. Snow fell lightly, swirling gently within a grey mist as the tall peaks above vanished. Ghostly rabbits flitted into the shelter of the nearby scrub, fleeing our presence. A hawk screeched from above, calling its mate to the hunt with a sharp series of cries, eeek-eeek-eeek. It soared high over the snow-trimmed pines and scrub trees of the mountain opposite and below before dropping into the canyon.

  I followed in the tracks of Ghost and Darkhan, Tashira’s black hooves crunched the snow beside me. “You know,” he said thoughtfully. “Maybe that unicorn set this up.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “She touched him with her horn,” he answered. “It’s the source of all her power, you know. He saves her baby, and within a few days he finds the mate he’s always dreamed of.”

  “Coincidence–” I began.

  “Cut the crap.” Tashira aimed a short kick at my head. “Unicorns are extremely puissant. That’s why men hunt them. Their horns retain their magic even after their death.”

  “I thought you didn’t know much about them.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Well then–”

  He glared down at me. “I know more than you, obviously. And remember, old son, you made her shit list.”

  Unicorn shit list or not, Ghost showed us a path down into the treacherous canyon, easily navigated by Tashira. While steep and slippery, it held few traps to trip up a heavy Tarbane hoof or leg. Planting each hoof with care, Tashira walked behind us, often treading on his own mane and yanking out long streams of black hair to lie dead on the icy rocks. Though he didn’t complain about the loss, his dark eyes held a glint of outrage every time he left a souvenir gleaming black against white ice on the stony path.