Wolves of the Beyond 02 - Shadow Wolf

certain that the little pup was done with her terrible agony, although it pained him to think of the violence of her end. But surely with the Star Wolf returning, the pup could climb the ladder to the Cave of Souls. And Faolan vowed that he would return to the slope beneath the ridge to find more of her bones— her bones. Faolan refused to think of the pup as an it , the way the Sark always spoke of malcadhs .
    The following evening, he returned to the ridge. When he first arrived, he experienced a vague sensation that there might be another animal nearby. He lifted his nose to the wind but could not detect a scent. It was verypossible that other wolves were around, for he was not that far from the Fire Grass Pack. There might be hunters out tracking the other half of the red deer herd.
    The evening was dark and moonless. There was no light for casting shadows, and yet Faolan felt shadows all about him. He scolded himself for being so jumpy. I’m becoming as superstitious as these clan wolves, he thought, and set himself to his task.
    He found several more bones from the little pup, all with deep gashes. Despite terrible lacerations, one in particular had a lovely shape and seemed almost to beg to have the pup’s short little life recorded on it. So Faolan began to gnaw on it. He had not been carving for long before he felt for the first time ever a discomfort with incising a story on bone.
    I can’t do this yet, he thought. The little pup’s story is not complete . It seemed wrong to carve it, almost as if the violence that had been wreaked on this bone tangled the poetry of his marking. He had to stop.
    Faolan found several more bones, too many to be carried in one trip to Thunderheart’s paw. He would go now with the first load, and by the time he came back for the second, perhaps he would feel differently and finish the carving.
    But when he came back, the partially carved bone had disappeared. An uneasy feeling swept through him. Had another animal seen him here? And why would it take that bone and not any of the others he had left behind?
    When Faolan returned to the clan, merriment was still swirling from the hunt two days before. The smell of the blood had receded somewhat. There were piles of bones to be gnawed by the three gnaw wolves. Faolan turned his attention to the femur that Mhairie had presented.
    The Moon of the Frost Stars had slipped away now for good. The first thin wisp of the Cracking Ice Moon was rising. Alastrine joined Greer, the skreeleen of the River Pack, in baying to the rise of the first spring moon and celebrating the end of the hunger moons of winter. And then, at the height of the night, a torrential rain began, and the sky crackled with lightning that looked like the splinters of hundreds of tiny white bones.
    The two skreeleens began to howl the ceilidh fyre , or the sky dance of fire. Tonight, they cried out the story of Skaarsgard, the leaping wolf who helps little ones up the star ladder. Was this not a sign that indeed the tiny pup was on her way? Faolan hoped it was an omenthat all would be well and he could sleep peacefully, lulled by the little pup playing with her mates in the Cave of Souls.
    But the skreeleens told the story of a stubborn little wolf pup who kept scampering down the star ladder. It was an old favorite, a call-and-response tale in which the little pup was not a malcadh but one who had simply died. Alastrine sang the part of Skaarsgard, and Greer the part of the little pup.
    Skaarsgard calls: “Why do you go, little pup, little pup?”
    Little pup responds: “I go to eat the meat of the fox my mum will catch come spring.”
    Skaarsgard calls: “But you need no meat in the soul cave, little pup, little pup.”
    Little pup responds: “But I have not tasted the salmon that swim in the river.”
    Skaarsgard calls: “But you have left your teeth behind, little pup, little pup. You are a spirit so free, your soul has risen, little pup, little pup. Leave your meat dreams behind, little pup, little pup.”
    Little pup responds: “I can have no dreams because I have not tasted meat. Let me eat. Let me eat.”
    Skaarsgard calls: “But you cannot be starving, for youhave no hunger. You have no teeth. You have no stomach. You are a soul on the star ladder.”
    Little pup responds: “But I am hungry.”
    Skaarsgard calls: “For what can you hunger?”
    Little pup responds: “For dreams I’ll never have. For meat I’ll never eat. For rivers I’ll never