Watch Wolf

learned. So he drew up his hind legs for a backward walkover.
    “Faolan! Welcome to the sky!”
    “Gwynneth!”
    She waggled her wings and flew off.
    “Very nice, very nice indeed!” Twist said when Faolan landed back on the top of the cairn. “But you nearly forgot your scanning maneuvers.”
    “I know! I know!”
    “Don’t worry. It’s a common thing for young Watch wolves when they first discover thermals. Look over there at Edme on Morgan. She’s getting a lot of bounce out of them.”
    Yes,
Faolan thought,
and she is managing several scanning moves — a double twist linked to a backflip.
Edme was not nearly as easily distracted as Faolan.
    “What a jumper you are!” Gwynneth exclaimed as she alighted on the cairn. “A natural if I ever saw one.” Faolan felt a surge of happiness stream through him.
    “Well, I forgot to do any real scanning moves. It was just so … so … wonderful.”
    “You looked like you belonged up there with us.”
    “Really!” Faolan tipped his head to one side and looked deeply into Gwynneth’s shiny dark eyes.
    “Yes, really, Faolan. I never saw anything like it!”
    After his shift was over, Faolan trotted happily back to the den. “Wasn’t it fantastic, Edme?” he said, sliding downthe slope into the den. “I mean, those drafts lift you right up. I felt it was as close as I’d ever come to flying like an owl —” He broke off mid-speech. “Edme?”
    Edme was curled into a ball in a far corner with her muzzle buried between her paws. Absolute silence as loud as any noise engulfed the den.
    “Edme, what is it?”
    Without looking at him and with her muzzle still buried, Edme mumbled something in a muffled voice that Faolan had to strain to hear.
    “You’ve been what?”
    “Dalach’d,”
Edme said again.
    “Dalach’d?
No!”
    “Yes. I can’t jump for three nights.”
    “But why? What did you do?” Faolan asked.
    “You know that arrangement of bones that they make so you can grip better?”
    “Yes.”
    “I didn’t show the proper reverence for the keybone.”
    “And so you got
dalach’d?
I mean, Twist never said anything about proper reverence. Did Winks tell you that?” Faolan asked, totally bewildered.
    “It wasn’t Winks. It was Banja. Winks wasn’t feeling well.”
    “Banja — that old she-bag of a wolf!”
    “She hates me, Faolan. I don’t know why. I mean, she’s missing one eye. If anything, she should understand me better, like Winks does. I’m not allowed on the cairn for the next three nights. How will I everlearn to navigate the She-Winds?”
    “It’s wrong. Completely wrong.Winks would never have done such a thing. I think we should protest,” Faolan said staunchly.
    “No, no. And it’s my problem, not yours. I’m just going to try and forget about it.” Edme circled her caribou pelt before she settled down again to try to sleep.
    Neither wolf could close their eyes. They were both thinking about Banja and her unrelenting criticism of Edme. It was a mystery. Although Banja’s constant harping didn’t qualify as abuse, it was damaging.
    “Faolan, you asleep yet?”
    “No.”
    “Do you ever miss them?”
    “Miss what?”
    “The old days.”
    Faolan was on his feet in no time. “Edme, have you gone
cags?
Miss being a gnaw wolf? Miss the MacHeaths and the delightful time you had in that lovely clan!”
    “No, not that. But you know, when we were all at the
gaddergnaw.
I think that was the best time of my life. Except for Heep, I really liked those other gnaw wolves — Creakle, Tearlach, the Whistler.”
    “I do miss the Whistler. He was —” Faolan paused. “He was something special, I think. I loved his voice. It was almost as if that hole in his throat … I don’t know, drew in a special kind of air that made his howls so much more beautiful even though he kind of croaked when he talked.”
    Imagine,
Faolan thought.
Banja has driven us to long for the awful old days when we were gnaw wolves.
And then he remembered two other wolves — Mhairie and her sister, Dearlea. By this time, Mhairie was probably a lead outflanker for the MacDuncans. Both of these sisters had come to his defense when he was wrongly accused of murdering a
malcadh
on the ridge, and then both of them cried with relief when he was exonerated of the crime and selected for the Watch. He was caught between the poles of two emotions — the sadness that comes when missing old friends, and anger at Banja that he was looking back with such