Watch Wolf

yourself at the
gaddergnaw.
You are as true as any gnaw wolf, Edme.”
    “Perhaps he will think that accepting me will encourage others to maim pups.”
    “Never!” Faolan was shocked. “No clan is as savage as the MacHeaths. Don’t say it. Do not even think it. Now come on; we have to get on our way.”
    Edme felt that she should have asked Faolan more about his
tummfraw,
but what seemed almost more important to Faolan was the return to the place where Thunderheart had first found him. Edme was sure the
drumlyn
Faolan had built to Thunderheart was beautiful, for no wolf carved bones as magnificently as Faolan did. She supposed her own mother’s bones were long gone. It would have been nice, though, to make such a
drumlyn
for Akira.
    Akira.
She said the name softly in her head. It was a lovely sound and kept running through Edme’s mind as the two wolves made their way toward the Ring of Sacred Volcanoes.
    They had been traveling east, skirting thefar edges of a territory in which the MacHeaths often hunted during the summer. Faolan was about to comment on how odd it was to see snow on the ground, when suddenly they came across a snow patch streaked with blood. Both wolves stopped, their hackles raised, their eyes narrowed to slitsof green. A breeze caught the scent of slaughter and pushed it toward them.
    Wolf blood! Edme felt a sudden chill in her marrow.
Great Lupus, let it not be her,
she prayed. Airmead’s words coursed through her.
If they find out, they’ll set a
byrrgis
on me and kill me. Tear me apart.
    “What has happened here?” Faolan said. It was a gruesome scene, with wolf parts scattered all over.
    “Ingliss,” Edme said.
    “What?” Faolan asked.
    “Ingliss and Kyran. I recognize their pelts.” She was relieved that Airmead wasn’t one of the dead wolves, but this seemed wrong, terribly wrong, even though she had loathed the sniping taunts of the young she-wolves.
    “But why?”
    “They are the ones who told me that I was made a
malcadh.
Dunbar MacHeath must have found out.” She took a deep breath and then softly continued, “They always do. But this … why this? Why not the Pit?”
    “The Pit?” Faolan asked. “What is the Pit?”
    “Never mind,” Edme replied grimly.
    The two wolves gave a wide margin to the bloodied patch of snow and tried not to look at the scattered piecesof what had been silly young she-wolves whose worst crime was teasing and taunting. With each step Edme took, she felt reassured in her decision to reject her clan. At the same time, she felt she was taking a step closer toward her mother, Akira. She knew now that she came from a brave she-wolf, and this to her was as meaningful as discovering a
tummfraw.
Her journey had been exactly what the Fengo predicted — a journey toward truth, understanding, and reconciliation with her fate. Edme felt blessed to have had such a mother.
Mum,
she thought.
I found a mum!
    As Faolan and Edme walked on in silence, the snow patches appeared with less frequency. The weather evened out and started to feel as it normally did in the Moon of the Shedding Antlers, though they found fewer antlers. It was as if the migratory herds were not returning in the great numbers they usually did. The thought gave Faolan pause. Had he seen this sparseness of antlers before? There was a haunting familiarity in the scarcity. But how could this be? It was only the third summer he had ever known — only the third Moon of the Shedding Antlers he had ever experienced. Once again something rustled in Faolan, like a distant wind blowing tatters of memory from an ancient place.
    He turned to Edme. “When you were in the
gadderheal
of the MacHeaths, you mentioned the Long Cold and the Ice March and it … it …”
    “Disturbed them, I think.”
    It disturbs me as well,
Faolan thought.
    They were within a day’s run to the region of the Ring of Sacred Volcanoes. In spite of their excitement, they decided not to push on. They had heard that the most spectacular time to arrive at the Ring was near twilight when the volcanoes often erupted, painting the fiery swathes of flame and plumes of ash against the purpling sky. So they found a mountain cat’s abandoned den and settled in for the night. There was no moon, but the stars were rising and seemed brighter than ever. An icy drizzle began to fall. Again they shook their heads in wonder at the oddities of the season. But they were too tired to speculate on the whimsies of nature and soon