UPON WAKING THE next morning, Derian was pleased to find that the blisters on his feet had ceased to throb. Still, he was relieved to learn that he had drawn camp duty and so would be able to trade riding boots for soft leather slippers.
“Did you hear those wolves howling last night?” he asked as he stirred the morning porridge, adding bits of dried apple and peach to the glutinous mass.
“Who couldn't? None of us are deaf,” replied Race sarcastically. “The monsters must have been readying themselves for a slaughter. I'll bet Prince Barden lost his flocks within the first winter. These woods are full of the thieving brutes.”
“My brother was given to the Wolf Society when he was born,” commented Ox, “but even he prefers to appreciate wolves from a distance. Such cunning and ferocity is admirable in symbols perhaps, but I don't want to find them on my doorstep.”
Over oat porridge and strong mint tea, they traded tales of wolf predation. Race began with the story of the Mad Wolf of Garwood. Doc countered with the story of a wolf pack that wiped out a village one winter when Hawk Haven was but a portion of the larger colony of Gildcrest. Everyone had at least one such story to relate and the tellingfireddie blood for the day's work.
Eventually, however, Earl Kestrel began briefing them on the activities planned for the day.
“We will search in two teams. I will take Ox. Race, you will take Jared. As we have seen no sign of Prince Barden and his people to the east, I will go further north; you shall go to the west. Based on your report yestere'en, there is a river to the south. Let us wait to ford that until we must.”
Race nodded and the earl continued:
“Derian and Valet will mind the camp. This is a good time to attend to the minor repairs we have been postponing. Furthermore, the horses can use a rest.”
“How far from this base camp do you want us t6 go, my lord?” asked Race.
“You must return here by evening. We will each carry hunting horns. Three short blasts will signal a return to camp. Two a request for aid. Remember, if at all possible, save first contact for me. Are there any questions?”
Five heads shook a negative.
“Get ready, then. Valet has made up packets of cold food for the midday meal. If you have anything to be repaired, give it to Derian.”
A few moments later, in their shared tent, Derian accepted from Ox some leggings that needed mending.
“Earl Kestrel isn't wasting any time, is he?” he commented. “Yesterday we slogged across a pass still spotted with snow. Today he orders a full day's search, even though a holiday would be a fair reward.”
“You forget,” Ox replied, checking the edge on the axe he carried with him as both weapon and tool, “that our time here is limited. Even if Race succeeds in augmenting our supplies by hunting and fishing, we need fodder for the horses. It's too early in the year for them to do much grazmg.
“I haven't forgotten,” Derian protested. “Remember, my folks own stables in three towns!”
“I know,” Ox said mildly. “I simply didn't know that you did.”
When the others had departed, leaving behind enough chores to occupy Derian and Valet for a week, Derian sighed, regretting now that his blistered feet kept him out of the adventure. Then, sitting cross-legged on the ground, he took a torn shirt into his lap and doggedly began to sew.
FROM THE CONCEALMENT of thick shrub growth atop a rise overlooking the two-legs’ camp, Firekeeper studied the occupants. The animals amazed her, but her response to their keepers mingled astonishment and admiration.
“They are so noisy,” she said to Blind Seer, watching one of their number go to a stream for water. “Yet so bold!”
Blind Seer snorted. “What do they know to fear? The red-spotted white animal sees more than any of them, but they ignore her. Did you see their One kick at her when she tried to tell him we were watching?”
“I did,” Firekeeper agreed. “I am not certain, though, that he is the One. The other one, smaller, with the hooked nose and silver-shot black hair, they all seem to defer to him.”
“True,” Blind Seer admitted, “but how could he defeat even the next smallest in afight? Certainly he couldn't defeat the huge one.”
“Maybe they are not a full pack,” Firekeeper speculated. “They are all males and how could a pack survive without females?”
“All male?” asked the wolf in astonishment. “How can you tell? They smell of smoke and sweat to me.”
“Not by scent,” the woman admitted. “I could be wrong, but it seems that I remember ways of telling.”
“She is right,” came a shrill voice from above them. “Males all.”
The speaker was the peregrine falcon, Elation, who had been introduced to Firekeeper soon after sunrise. Elation was a beautiful example of her kind, compact of body, with plumage of a deep blue-grey. Her head was capped with feathers the color of slate and her white throat and underbody were marked with darker bars. Brown eyes ringed with bright yellow missed nothing.
“If you say so,” Blind Seer said, immediately deferring to the bird's greater experience, “then it must be so, but I'd prefer to be able to trust my nose.”
Ignoring the conversation between falcon and wolf, Fire-keeper studied the six gathered below, feeling memories stirring and teasing just beyond what she could grasp.
The men possessed a certain degree of grace, neither toppling over nor lumbering like bears as they made their way about on two legs. Firekeeper knew this was how she herself moved, had even glimpsed her reflection and studied the distorted image of her shadow, but seeing others move this way was a revelation. Before she had always felt vaguely like a freak. Now she felt justified in her choice.
Already Firekeeper had observed many things she planned to adapt to her use. All of the men wore their hair caught behind their heads with a thong—a thing much more convenient than her own short cropping with its heritage of odd-length ends that dangled in her eyes.
The hides they wore were different, too. She didn't think that all their clothing was made from leather, though leather was amply represented. Magpie-like, she wanted to steal some for her own use.
When four of the two-legs left the camp, Blind Seer and Elation followed to learn where they went. Firekeeper remained behind, studying the two remaining.
One was quite tall, the other among the smallest of the group. Neither openly deferred to the other, so she guessed that they were of similar rank within their pack. Wolf-like, she dismissed the smaller one as less important and gave most of her attention to the bigger and stronger.
This one was the second largest of the two-legs, smaller only than the one who towered over the rest as the Royal Wolves did over the Cousins.
A passing thought distracted Firekeeper. Could the two-legs be like the forest-dwellers, each with two kinds? Could the huge man be, in fact, the master of the rest?
After some consideration, she dismissed the idea. The big man had deferred quite openly to several of the others. A Royal Wolf, even a lesser one like herself, would never do so before even the strongest of Cousins. If the two-legs had a Royal kind, it was not represented among those here.
Or they all could be of the Royal kind…
She shook her head as if chasing a fly from her ear. Too much guessing. Too little that was certain. As the Ones taught the pups when hunting, guesses were no replacement for knowledge.
Firekeeper returned her unruly attention to the man below.
He was tall enough to reach effortlessly into the lower limbs of the tree from which the two-legs had hung their food. He was strong enough to control the elk-with-long-hair, even though they outmassed him. After a time, she sorted his attire from himself and could better see what he looked like.
His hair was reddish, the color of a fox's pelt or an oak leaf in autumn. Loosed from its thong, it hung straight, going past his shoulders by perhaps the breadth of two fingers. It was cut so neatly that when it was tied back not a strand strayed from its bonds.
What she could see of Fox Hair's skin seemed lighter than her own, redder as well. His eyes were light, but not blue. At this distance she could not tell precisely what color they were. From the way he moved, the little extra motions he made, the fluidity of his limbs, she guessed that he was young compared with some of the others.
Fox Hair was injured as well, walking as if he had thorns in his feet but not the wit to pull them out.
The smaller man was colored in shades of brown like a rabbit or a deer. Unlike the red-haired man, he had a thin strip of hair growing between his nose and his upper lip. It seemed to bother him, for as he went about the camp doing incomprehensible things with other incomprehensible things, he often pulled at it with his fingers.
So much! And so much unknowable! Firekeeper watched, fascination turning intofrustration.In the late afternoon, the other four two-legs returned and more than ever she was certain that the little hawk-nosed man with black and white hair was the One among them.
Blind Seer came andfloppedbeside her, hisflanksheaving with laughter.
“They went hither and yon, over hills and around trees. I'll give it to the tawny-furred one. He knows something of the forest, but he'd know more if he'd heed his red-and-white spotted pack mate. She saw me time and again—when I let her! From her scent, she's of our kind in the same way the foxes are and she had wit enough to stay clear of me!”
Firekeeper listened patiently to her brother's boasting. “Did they find what they seek?”
“No, but Tawny came close. If he goes west again tomorrow, he will find it.”
“Hawk Nose is their leader,” Firekeeper said. “I am certain of it now. Elation, what did he find?”
“Less than he knew,'? came the screeched reply. “Time and again, he stopped to study the trunk of a tree or a stump or a pile of rocks. He had the giant collect some things that interested him.”
“My two looked at such things as well,” Blind Seer admitted. “I think they look for sign of their missing kin. Tell me, falcon, do two-legs do things to trees?”
“Even as your sister does,” Elation agreed, “though she is less obvious about her comings and goings. Two-legs cut down trees, pile up stones, make lairs from these things or feed wood to their hungry fires.”
“Then these two-legs should be able to find sign of where my ancestors found Firekeeper.”
“If the signs are not too old.”
Blind Seer turned to Firekeeper. “Will you talk with them tonight?”
“No!” the young woman replied, suddenly panicked. “They are still too strange. Let me follow their movements for a bit longer.”
“Well enough,” he soothed. “I have not had this much fun since we raced with the young bucks of the Royal Elk for sport.”
Firekeeper rose to her feet, aware that she was hungry and very bored from a day spent mostly sitting still.
“Come, dear heart. Hunt with me. Dusk is falling and I have no desire to watch shadows by firelight.”
Blind Seer howled in anticipation. “And you, falcon?”
“I have dined on mice and young rabbits, today,” Elation said, preening her wing feathers. “I will watch the two-legs until darkness falls. Then I will sleep.”
Firekeeper stretched, shaking the numbness from her limbs. Growling low in her throat, she flung herself on Blind Seer. They wrestled for a brief time; then, wild-eyed and excited, they chased each other down the hill.
“Wolves!” said the falcon to herself. “May as well try to understand a storm cloud.”
WHEN MORNING CAME, the two-legs began taking down their dens and loading things onto their animals.
“Perhaps Tawny is more clever than I thought,” Blind Seer admitted. “Look, he goes ahead with Spots and Mountain to mark a trail.”
“He marks it,” Firekeeper said when they had followed Tawny for a ways, “as a bear or mountain lion does, by stripping the good bark from a tree.”
“Such marks do last,” Blind Seer said, “longer than our scent posts, especially when the rain comes. I wonder if he found such marks during yesterday's hunt?”
“He did! Look!” Firekeeper exclaimed, moving to investigate a tree trunk when Tawny and Mountain were safely past. “Here is such a mark, greyed now by weather, but clear.”
“Then he reads a trail,” Blind Seer said, “and the others will follow his marking. Why doesn't he trust them to see the old trail or the marks of his passage? The last alone would sing to me at least until the next rain.”
Firekeeper shrugged. “They are deaf and blind and dead of nose as you have said many times before.”
She didn't add that she had long been aware that her senses were less keen than those of the wolves. Her upright manner of travel and a sharper sense for color had provided her with some compensation. Now she was beginning to wonder if her senses were to those of the two-legs as the wolves’ were to hers.
Her head hurt a little at the consideration and she distracted herself by concentrating on the problem at hand.
“Do we follow the larger pack,” she said, “or these two?”
“Why not both?” Blind Seer laughed. “Elation has stayed with the larger pack, but she can come ahead if we go back. At the pace these move, you and I can dance around them as we dance around a crippled doe.”
“True,” she admitted. “First then, let us go with these. I wish to see if I can learn more of these signs they are using to find their way.”
They did so, learning of piled cairns of rock, appreciating Tawny's skill when he located a pouch of slim sticks with sharp points where it had been cached in a tree.
“He is not such a fool as I thought,” Blind Seer said again. “Without scent or sight to guide him, he found that thing.”
Firekeeper nodded. “He is searching for things he knows may be,” she hazarded, “the way in winter we know that fish sleep beneath the ice or deer hide in their secret yards. He seeks a possibility and sometimes he finds it.”
“It excites him,” Blind Seer said. “Look how he marks that tree with his scent and cuts the bark awayfromanother.”
“At this pace, they will reach the Burnt Place when the sun is at peak or soon after,” Firekeeper said. “Let us go back and watch the others.”
Blind Seer agreed and they ran swiftly, ignoring the scolding of squirrels and the frightened flight of a doe and fawn. Wolves needed to eat either frequently or heavily, but when something interested them, they could forget hunger. Fire-keeper possessed less stamina than her kin, but she had long ago learned to ignore her belly's plaints.
They found the larger, slower-moving group by following the reek of the not-quite-elk. As the wolves slowed, so as not to startle their subjects, the falcon called greeting.
“How goes it with Tawny and Mountain?”
“Well enough,” Firekeeper answered. “And these?”
“Slow! So slow!” the great bird shrieked. “These men are like ants though, steady.”
“We will watch here if you wish to hunt.”
“Good! Then I fly ahead to see what the others do.”
Firekeeper was far less bored by the two-legs’ slow progress than Elation had been. Other than young possums clinging to their mothers, she had never seen one creature riding another.
“Most other animals,” she commented to Blind Seer, “carry their babies in their mouths. Two-legs sit on these elk as if on a rock.”
“They go more slowly than they would on their own feet,” Blind Seer added. “I wonder why they bother?”
Firekeeper shrugged. “Another mystery.”
The sun was slightly past midday when a bleating bellow, rather like that of a moose but not quite so, called out from the west. The sound stirred great excitement among the two-legs, who had persisted in their steady progress, even eating their food while perched upon the backs of the not-elks.
Hawk Nose, the One of the two-legs, took a curving thing the color of antler from where it had hung on his belt and, putting it to his li
ps, made an answering sound.
“He blows into it!” Firekeeper said, amazed and laughing. “Look how his cheeks round out beneath their hair! He looks like a bullfrog courting in the spring!”
Blind Seer laughed with her, then added, “So these two-legs howl, too, in their fashion. The thing he puts to his mouth makes a fair cry.”
“Just as the Fang gives me teeth like a wolf,” Firekeeper thought aloud, “this thing gives Hawk Nose the lungs of a moose. Are all their things ways of being more than they could be alone?”
“Two-legs,” her brother replied teasingly, “are weak, hairless creatures with flat teeth, no strength, and little wit. This, though, I have known long before seeing these, eh, Firekeeper?”
Accustomed to such jests, Firekeeper sprang on him, forgetting stealth in the joy of the puppy game. Only when they heard the shrill huffs and screams of the not-elk, the shouts of the two-legs, did they think about the consequences of their actions.
“Oh, well,” said Blind Seer, mouthing her arm affectionately as they isat up on the leafy ground. “We have frightened them. Let us hunt, then go ahead to where they go. There is no need for this slow progress when we know the trail's end.”
“I agree,” Firekeeper said. “The not-elk have our scent now and the two-legs will move more slowly if their pack mates are afraid. I want to see what will happen when they find the Burnt Place.”
“The beasts are quiet now,” Blind Seer observed.
“Then away with us.”
They melted silently into the brush and were well away before Jared Surcliffe, coming with great trepidation to investigate the commotion, found their watching place and gathered from a low-slung briar a grey hank of wolf's fur.
DERIAN CARTER WAS IRRATIONALLY RELIEVED when they caught up with Ox and Race. Irrational because this glade was no safer than any other place, but relieved nonetheless because his nerves were Still on edge from the ferocious snarling and growling that had broken the wood-land peace a few hours before.
Not that he was afraid of the wolves—or whatever the noise had been. In fact, he'd been amusing himself by imagining his return home wearing a wolf-skin cloak. “This?” he'd say to Heather, the baker's daughter. “Oh, I slew it when it attacked the horses. Mad as the Ravening Beast of Garwood, so our guide said It had been trailing us for days. We'd hear it howling at night, slavering for our flesh …”
Wolf's Eyes Page 4
