When Ayla had accumulated a pile of satisfactory missiles and put them in a pouch, which was attached to her belt, she picked up her haversack, and slung it over her left shoulder. Then she stopped and studied the landscape, looking for the best place to begin. Deegie stood beside her and just a step behind, waiting for her to take the lead. Almost as though she was thinking out loud, Ayla began speaking to her in a quiet voice.
“Weasels do not make dens. They use whatever they find, even a rabbit’s burrow—after they kill the rabbits. Sometimes I think they would not need a den, if they did not have young. They are always moving: hunting, running, climbing, standing up and looking, and they are always killing, day and night, even after they have just eaten, though they might leave it. They eat everything, squirrels, rabbits, birds, eggs, insects, even dead and rotten meat, but most meat they kill and eat fresh. They make stinky musk when they are cornered, not to squirt like a skunk, but smells as bad, and they make sound like this …” Ayla uttered a cry that was half-strangled scream and half-grunt. “In the season of their Pleasures, they whistle.”
Deegie was utterly astonished. She had just learned more about weasels and ermine than she had learned in her entire life. She didn’t even know they made a sound at all.
“They are good mothers, have many babies, two hands …” Ayla stopped to think of the name of the counting word. “Ten, more sometimes. Other times, only few. Young stay with mother until almost grown.” She stopped again to eye the landscape critically. “This time of year, litter might still be with mother. We look for track … I think near cane-brake.” She started toward the mound of snow that covered, more or less, the tangled mass of stems and runners that had been growing from the same place for many years.
Deegie followed her, wondering how she could have learned so much, when Ayla wasn’t much older than she was. Deegie had noticed that Ayla’s speech had lapsed just slightly—it was the only sign of her excitement—but it made her realize how well Ayla did speak now. She seldom spoke fast, but her Mamutoi was close to perfect, except for the way she said certain sounds. Deegie thought she might never lose that speech mannerism, and rather hoped she wouldn’t. It made her distinctive … and more human.
“Look for small tracks with five toes, sometimes only four show, they make the smallest tracks of any meat eater, and the back paws go in the same tracks that front feet paws were in.”
Deegie hung back, not wanting to trample delicate spoor, watching. Ayla slowly and carefully scanned each area of the space around her with every step she took, the snow-covered ground and each fallen log, each twig on each bush, the slender boles of bare birches and the weighted boughs of dark-needled pines. Suddenly her eyes stopped their constant vigilance, stilled by a sight that caught her breath. She lowered her foot slowly while reaching into the haversack for a large piece of rare roast bison, and laid it on the ground in front of her. Then she backed off carefully, and reached into the pouch of stones.
Deegie looked beyond Ayla without moving, trying to see what she saw. Finally she noticed movement, and then focused on several small white shapes sinuously moving toward them. They raced with surprising speed though they were climbing over deadfall, up and down trees, through brush, in and around small pockets and cracks, and devouring everything they found in their path. Deegie had never taken the time to notice the small voracious carnivores before, and she watched in rapt fascination. They stood up occasionally, shiny black eyes alert, ears cocked for every sound, but drawn unerringly by scent to their hapless prey.
Squirming through nests of voles and mice, under tree roots for hibernating newts and frogs, and darting after small birds too chilled and hungry to flee, the ravaging horde of eight or ten small white weasels closed in. Heads weaving back and forth, black little beads of eyes eager, they pounced with deadly accuracy at the brain, the nape of the neck, the jugular vein. Striking without compunction, they were the most efficient, bloodthirsty killers of the animal world, and Deegie was suddenly very glad they were small. There seemed no reason for such wanton destruction but a lust to kill—except the need to keep a continuously active body fueled in the way they were intended and ordained by nature to do.
The ermine were drawn to the slab of rare meat, and without hesitation began to make short work of it. Suddenly there was confusion, hard-flung stones landed among the feeding weasels, striking some down, and the unmistakable scent of weasel musk choked the air. Deegie had been so absorbed in watching the animals she had missed Ayla’s carefully controlled preparations and swift casts.
Then, out of nowhere, a large black animal bounded among the white weasels, and Ayla was stunned to hear a menacing growl. The wolf went after the slab of bison, but was held off by two bold and fearless ermine. Backing off only a bit, the black carnivore spied an ermine recently made harmless, and grabbed for it instead.
But Ayla was not about to let the black wolf steal her ermine; she had put in too much effort to get them. They were her kills and she wanted them for the white tunic. As the wolf was trotting away with the small white weasel in its mouth, Ayla went after it. Wolves were also meat eaters. She had studied them just as closely as weasels when she was teaching herself to use a sling. She understood them, too. She picked up a fallen branch as she ran after the animal. A single wolf usually gave way in the face of a determined charge and might drop the ermine.
If it had been a pack, or even just two wolves, she would not have tried such a reckless assault, but when the black wolf paused to reposition the ermine in its mouth, Ayla went after it with the branch, hauling back to give it a solid blow. She didn’t think of the branch as much of a weapon, but she planned only to scare the wolf off, and startle it into dropping the small furry animal it held. But Ayla was the one who was startled. The wolf dropped the ermine at its feet, and with a mean and ugly snarl, sprang straight for her.
Her instant reaction was to throw the branch across her as a defense, to hold off the attacking wolf, and her quick surge of energy said run. But in the wooded copse, the cold and brittle branch broke as she pulled it around and hit a tree. She was left holding a rotten stump, but the broken end flew into the wolf’s face. It was enough to hold it off. The wolf had been bluffing, too, and wasn’t very eager to attack. Stopping to pick up the dead ermine, the wolf climbed out of the wooded glen.
Ayla was frightened, but angry, and in shock, too. She couldn’t just let that ermine go like that. She chased after the wolf once more.
“Let it go!” Deegie shouted. “You’ve got enough! Let the wolf have it.”
But Ayla didn’t hear; she wasn’t paying attention. The wolf was heading for open ground and she was close behind. Reaching for another stone, and finding only two left, Ayla ran after the wolf. Though she expected that the large carnivore would soon outdistance her, she had to give it one more try. She loaded a stone in her sling and hurled it after the fleeing canine. The second stone that followed soon afterward finished what the first had begun. Both found their mark.
She felt a sense of satisfaction when the wolf dropped. That was one animal that would not be stealing anything from her again. As she ran to get the ermine, she decided she might as well take the wolf pelt, too, but when Deegie found her, Ayla was sitting beside the dead black wolf, and the white ermine, and hadn’t moved. The expression on her face gave Deegie cause for concern.
“What’s wrong, Ayla?”
“I should have let her have it. I should have known she had a reason for going after that roast meat, even though the ermine wanted it. Wolves know how vicious weasels are, and usually a lone wolf will back down without attacking in an unfamiliar place. I should have let her have that ermine.”
“I don’t understand. You got your ermine back, and a black wolf pelt besides. What do you mean you should have let her have it?”
“Look,” Ayla said, pointing to the black wolf’s underbelly. “She’s nursing. She’s got pups.”
“Isn’t it early for wolves to whelp?” D
eegie asked.
“Yes. She’s out of season. And she’s a loner. That is why she was having so much trouble finding enough to eat. And why she came for the roast meat, and wanted the ermine so much. Look at her ribs. The pups have been taking a lot out of her. She’s hardly more than bones and fur. If she lived with a pack, they’d be helping her feed those pups, but if she lived with a pack, she would not have had pups. Only the female leader of a pack has pups, usually, and this wolf is the wrong color. Wolves get used to certain colors and marks. She’s like that white wolf I used to watch when I was learning about them. They didn’t like her either. She was always trying to make up to the female leader and the male leader, but they didn’t want her around. After the pack got so big, she left. Maybe she got tired of no one liking her.”
Ayla looked down at the black wolf. “Like this one did. Maybe that’s why she wanted to have pups, because she was lonely. But she shouldn’t have had them so early. I think this is the same black wolf I saw when we hunted bison, Deegie. She must have left her pack to look for a lone male to start her own pack, new packs get started that way. But it’s always hard on the loners. Wolves like to hunt together, and they take care of each other. The male leader always helps the female leader with her pups. You should see them sometimes, they like to play with the babies. But where is her male? Did she ever find one? Did he die?”
Deegie was surprised to see that Ayla was fighting tears, over a dead wolf. “They all die some time, Ayla. We all go back to the Mother.”
“I know, Deegie, but first she was different, and then she was alone. She should have had something while she lived, a mate, a pack to belong to, at least some babies.”
Deegie thought she was beginning to understand why Ayla was feeling so strongly about a scrawny old black wolf. She was putting herself in the wolf’s place. “She did have pups, Ayla.”
“And now they are going to die, too. They don’t have a pack. Not even a male leader. Without a mother, they will die.” Suddenly Avla jumped up. “I’m not going to let them die!”
“What do you mean? Where are you going?”
“I’m going to go find them. I’m going to track the black wolf back to her den.”
“That could be dangerous. Maybe there are other wolves around. How can you be sure?”
“I’m sure, Deegie. I just have to look at her.”
“Well, if I can’t change your mind, I only have one thing to say, Avla.”
“What?”
“If you expect me to tramp all over the place chasing after wolf tracks with you, you can carry your own ermine,” Deegie said, dumping out five white weasel carcasses from her haversack. “I’ve got enough to carry with my foxes!” Deegie was grinning with delight.
“Oh, Deegie, Ayla said, smiling back with warmth and affection. “You brought them!” The two young women hugged each other out of their fullness of love and friendship.
“One thing is certain, Ayla. Nothing is ever dull around you!” Deegie helped load Ayla’s haversack with the ermine. “What are you going to do about the wolf? If we don’t take her, something else will, and a black wolf pelt is not too common.”
“I’d like to take her, but I want to find her pups, first.”
“All right, I’ll carry her,” Deegie said, hoisting the limp carcass over her shoulder. “If we have time later, I’ll skin it out.” She started to ask one more question, then changed her mind. She’d find out soon enough exactly what Ayla planned to do if she found any wolf pups left alive.
They had to go back to the vale to pick up the correct set of tracks. The wolf had done a good job of covering her trail, knowing how precarious was the life she was leaving untended. Several times, Deegie was sure they’d lost it and she was a good tracker herself, but Ayla was motivated to persist until she found it again. By the time they had found the place that Ayla was sure was the den, the sun was showing late afternoon.
“I have to be honest, Ayla. I don’t see any signs of life.”
“That’s the way it should be if they are alone. If there were signs of life, it would just invite trouble.”
“You might be right, but if there are pups in there, how are you going to get them to come out?”
“I guess there is only one way. I’ll have to go in after them.”
“You can’t do that, Ayla! It’s one thing to watch wolves from a distance, but you can’t go into their dens. What if there are more than pups? There could be another adult wolf around.”
“Have you seen any other adult tracks besides the black’s?”
“No, but I still don’t like the idea of you going into a wolf’s den.”
“I haven’t come this far to go away without finding out if there are any wolf pups around. I have to go in, Deegie.”
Ayla put down her haversack and headed for the small dark hole in the ground. It was dug out of an old lair, abandoned long before because it was not the most favorable location, but it was the best the black wolf could find after her mate, an old lone wolf drawn to her too-early heat, died in a fight. Ayla got down on her belly, and started to wriggle in.
“Ayla, wait!” Deegie called. “Here, take my knife.”
Ayla nodded, put the knife in her teeth, and started into the dark hole. It sloped downward at first, and the passage was narrow. Suddenly she found herself stuck and had to back out.
“We better go, Ayla. It’s getting late, and if you can’t get in, you can’t get in.”
“No,” she said, pulling her parka off over her head. “I’ll get in.”
She shivered with the cold until she was inside the den, but it was a tight fit through the first tunnel section, where it sloped down. Near the bottom, where it leveled out, there was more room, but the den seemed deserted. With her own body still blocking the light, it took awhile for her eyes to become accustomed to the darkness, but it wasn’t until she started to back out that she thought she heard a sound.
“Wolf, little wolf, are you here?” she called, then remembering the many times she had watched and listened to wolves, she voiced a pleading whine. Then she listened. A tiny soft whimper came from the deepest, dark recess of the den, and Ayla felt like shouting for joy.
She wormed her way closer to the sound, and whined again. The whimper was closer, and then she saw two shining eyes, but when she reached for the pup, he backed up and hissed a little snarl, and she felt sharp needle teeth bite her hand.
“Ow! You’ve got some fight in you,” Ayla said, and then smiled; “some life in you, yet. Come on now, little wolf. It’s going to be all right. Come on.” She reached for the wolf pup again, making her pleading whine, and felt a fuzzy ball of fur. Getting a good hold, she pulled the pup, spitting and fighting all the way, toward her. Then she backed up out of the den.
“Look what I found, Deegie!” Ayla said, grinning triumphantly as she held up a little gray fuzzy wolf puppy.
23
Jondalar was outside the lodge, pacing back and forth between the main entrance and the horse annex. Even in the warm parka he wore, an old one of Talut’s, he was feeling the drop in temperature as the sun closed with the horizon. Several times he had climbed the slope in the direction Ayla and Deegie had taken, and was considering climbing it again.
He had been trying to quell his anxiety ever since the two young women left that morning, and when he first began his worried pacing early in the afternoon, others in the earthlodge smiled condescendingly, but he was no longer alone in his concern. Tulie had hiked up the slope a few times herself, and Talut was talking about getting a group together to go look for them with torches. Even Whinney and Racer seemed nervous.
As the brilliant fire in the west slid behind a bank of clouds hanging near the edge of the earth, it emerged as a sharply defined bright red circle of light; an otherworldly circle without depth or dimension, too perfect, too symmetrical to belong to the natural environment. But the glowing red orb lent color to clouds and a tinge of health to the pale partial face of the other u
nearthly companion, which was low in the eastern sky.
Just as Jondalar was about to climb up the slope again, two figures appeared at the top, silhouetted against a vivid lavender background that shaded into deep indigo. A single star glinted overhead. He breathed a great sigh and slumped against the arched tusks, feeling light-headed with the sudden release of tension. They were safe. Ayla was safe.
But why were they gone so long? They should know better than to make everyone worry so much. What could have kept them out so long? Maybe they were in trouble. He should have followed them.
“They’re here! They’re here!” Latie was shouting.
People ran out of the earthlodge half-clothed; those that were out and dressed raced up to meet them.
“What took you so long? It’s almost dark. Where were you?” Jondalar demanded as soon as Ayla reached the lodge.
She looked at him in astonishment.
“Let’s get them inside first,” Tulie said. Deegie knew her mother was not pleased, but they had been out all day, they were tired, and it was getting colder fast. Recriminations could come later, after Tulie made sure they were all right. They were hustled in, straight through the foyer and into the cooking hearth.
Deegie, grateful to unload, lifted off the carcass of the black wolf, which had stiffened to the shape of her shoulder. When she dropped it on a mat, there were exclamations of surprise, and Jondalar blanched. There had been trouble.
“That’s a wolf!” Druwez said, eying his sister with awe. “Where did you get that wolf?”
“Wait until you see what Ayla has,” Deegie said, taking the white foxes out of her haversack.
Ayla was dumping frozen ermine out of her carrier with one hand, holding the other carefully against her midriff on top of her warm, hooded fur tunic.
“Those are very nice ermine,” Druwez said, not nearly as impressed with the small white weasels as he was with the black wolf, but not wanting to offend.
Ayla smiled at the boy, then she untied the thong she had belted around her parka, and reaching under, withdrew a small gray ball of fur. Everyone looked to see what she had. Suddenly it moved.