The badness in his tail wouldn't let him rest. He circled until his hind legs shook so much that he had to lie down. His pelt felt hot and tight, and there was a buzzing in his ears. The black fog was hurting his head.
From above him came the yip-and-yowl of the strange taillesses. He twitched his ears in bewilderment. He knew those voices. Or he thought he did. But although these taillesses sounded familiar, they smelt all wrong. The female smelt of fish-dog and eagle, and the male who sounded so like Tall Tailless stank of the bad ones and of the great white bear. Was it Tall Tailless, or wasn't it? Wolf didn't know. He couldn't untangle it in his head.
And yet, not long ago, he had caught the scent of his pack-brother, he was sure of it. He'd caught it on the overpelt of the Viper-tongued female; and even though she'd wound the hated deerhide about his muzzle, he had howled for his pack-brother, howled for him inside his head. And for a moment the swiftest of snaps he'd heard an answer; and the sound of his pack-brother's rough, beautiful howls had been like gentle breath whiffling through his fur.
Then the black fog had closed in again, and the beautiful howls had changed to the dull roar of a bear. I am angry! the bear had roared. Angry! Angry! Like all bears, this one was no good at talking, so it just kept saying the same thing over and over.
A scraping above him. Light stung his eyes. Then the lump of birch bark dangled before his nose, and came to rest. Listlessly, he lapped up the wet.
The strange taillesses were peering in at him. He smelt their confusion and fear. Now the half-grown male was leaning down almost within snapping range, giving soft grunt-whines. 'Pack-brother! It's me!'
That voice . . . so familiar. So soothing to Wolf's aching head, like the feel of cool mud on sore pads.
But maybe Wolf was in the other Now, the one he went to in his sleeps. Maybe when he woke up, he would be alone again in this stinking Den.
Or maybe it was another trick of the bad taillesses.
Again the male was leaning in. Wolf saw the short fur on his head: much shorter than Tall Tailless. But he also saw a beloved, flat face, and bright wolf eyes.
Confused, Wolf sniffed the furless paw which reached towards him. It smelt a little like Tall Tailless but was it? Should Wolf lick it? Or snap?
Wolf gave a warning growl, and Torak withdrew his hand.
'He doesn't recognize you,' said Renn.
Torak's fists clenched. 'But he will.' He stared into the tiny, squalid hole. The Soul-Eaters would pay for this. He didn't care if it took him the rest of his life, he would hunt them down and make them pay for what they'd done to Wolf.
'How much time do we have?' said Renn, wrenching him back to the present. 'Where are the Soul-Eaters?'
He shook his head. 'We're well out of earshot from the forest of stone; and from what Seshru said, they'll be resting. I don't think they'll come up here until until tomorrow, when they open the Door. But that's just a guess.'
Renn nodded grimly. 'One thing's for sure. We won't get far with Wolf like this. He needs food and medicine. Fast.'
Opening her food pouch, she withdrew a slab of blubber, and dropped it into the pit. Wolf fell on it and gulped it down without even chewing.
'Good that you thought to bring food,' said Torak.
'I haven't finished,' muttered Renn. She pulled up the birchbark bowl on its cord, filled it with small, dark pellets from her food pouch, and lowered it into the pit. Wolf's black nose twitched. He heaved himself to his feet, and snuffled them up.
'Lingonberries,' said Renn.
For the first time in days, Torak grinned. Then his gaze returned to Wolf, and his grin faded. 'He will get better. Won't he?'
He saw her struggling to compose her face in an encouraging smile.
'But Renn,' he faltered, 'it can't be that bad.'
Taking the sputtering torch, she held it over the pit. 'Look at his tail!'
Wolf gave a fierce growl. Stay away!
Torak went cold. The tip of Wolf's bushy silver tail was matted with dried blood; but it wasn't that which turned him ill with fear. It was the slimy greenish-black flesh which showed through in patches. Flesh which stank of rottenness.
'It's the blackening sickness,' said Renn. 'It's poisoning him. The worms of sickness are eating him up from inside.'
'But once we get him out into the snow, he'll be better '
'No, Torak, no. We've got to stop this now, or it'll be too late.'
He knew what she meant, but he couldn't face it. 'There must be something you can do! After all, you know Magecraft!'
'If there was, don't you think I'd have done it? Torak, it's killing him! You know this!' She met his eyes. 'There's only one thing to do. We've got to cut it off.'
'You know I'm right,' Renn said again, but she could see that Torak wasn't listening.
Fearfully, she glanced over her shoulder. So far, there had been no sign of the Soul-Eaters.
She turned back to him. 'Do you trust me?' she said.
'What?'
'Do you trust me?'
'Of course I do!'
'Then you must know that I'm telling the truth! Now tell him. Tell Wolf what we have to do to make him better.'
He hesitated; then, slowly, he lowered himself into the pit, talking quietly in wolf talk.
Wolf raised his head and gave a warning growl. To Renn's horror, Torak ignored it. He crouched, keeping his eyes steady but his gaze soft.
Wolf's hackles were stiff, his ears flat back.
Suddenly he lunged, snapping the air a hand's breadth from Torak's face. The clash of the great jaws rang through the cave.
Torak put his head still closer, and snuffled at the black lips.
Wolf went on growling, staring at Torak with eyes grown dark and threatening.
Torak drew back, and rose to his feet. 'He didn't understand,' he said dully.
'Why not?'
'I I couldn't find a way to say it; to tell him this will make him better. Because in wolf talk there is no future.'
'Oh,' said Renn.
Slowly, she drew the axe from her belt: the axe she had known with the knowledge which came to her sometimes that she would need. 'Take it.'
Torak didn't answer. He was staring at the axe.
'We'll only cut off the tip,' she said. 'About the length of your thumb.' She swallowed. 'Torak. You've got to. He's your pack-brother.'
He took the axe. Weighed it in his hand.
Wolf raised his head, then slumped onto his side, his flanks heaving.
Torak braced his legs and raised the axe.
Renn felt sick. It was the vision of the White Fox elder.
Slowly, Torak lowered the axe. 'I can't,' he whispered. He glanced up at her, his eyes glistening. 'I can't.'
After a moment's hesitation, Renn let herself down into the pit. There was just enough room for her to stand beside him. She took the axe from his hand.
Wolf cast her a narrow glance, and drew back his lips to show his fearsome teeth.
'We should bind up his muzzle,' she breathed.
'No,' said Torak.
'He'll bite!'
'No!' he said fiercely. 'If I bind his muzzle now, he'll think I'm no better than the Soul-Eaters! If I don't if I trust him not to hurt me then maybe maybe he'll trust me to let us help him.'
For a moment they stared at one another. She saw the conviction in his face, and knew his mind was made up.
'I won't let him bite you,' he said, placing himself between her and Wolf's jaws. As he went down on his knees, Wolf raised his head and sniffed his fingers, then lay back again.
With his left hand, Torak stroked the fluffy fur behind Wolf's ears, whiffling and grunt-whining under his breath. His right hand passed gently over Wolf's flank, then over the haunch. When he reached the base of the tail, Wolf's muzzle wrinkled in a snarl.
Torak's hand continued slowly down the tail.
Wolf growled until his whole body shook.
Torak froze.
Then his fingers moved a little further, till they'd nearly reached the rottenness at the tip. His hand closed over the tail, holding it down.
With blinding speed, Wolf lunged and seized Torak's other wrist in his jaws.His teeth clamped tight around the bone, denting the skin but not piercing it: poised to crush.
Renn held her breath. She'd once seen Wolf crack the thighbone of an elk. He could sever Torak's wrist as easily as snapping a twig.
Wolf's great amber eyes fixed on Torak's: waiting to see what he would do.
Torak's face glistened with sweat as he met Wolf's gaze. 'Get ready,' he told Renn.
She rearranged her icy fingers on the axe-hilt.
Torak never took his eyes from Wolf's. 'Do it,' he said.
TWENTY-EIGHT.
Wolf's tail still hurt, but it was a clean hurt, and the badness was gone.
The black fog was gone too, and with it the last of his doubts. This half-grown male really was Tall Tailless.
It was the black fog which had made him glare at his pack-brother, and take his forepaw in his jaws. If you harm me, Wolf had told him with his eyes, I bite. But the gaze of Tall Tailless had been steady and true; and suddenly Wolf had remembered the time when he was a cub, and was choking on a duck bone, and Tall Tailless had grabbed his belly and squeezed. Wolf had been so outraged that he'd twisted round to bite, but Tall Tailless had kept squeezing, and the duck bone had shot out of Wolf's muzzle and he'd understood. Tall Tailless had been helping him.
This was why Wolf had let the pack-sister cut his tail with the big stone claw. This was why he hadn't bitten his pack-brother's forepaw. Because they were helping him.
Now it was over, and the pack-sister was leaning against the side of the Den, panting, while Tall Tailless sat with his head in his forepaws, shaking all over.
Wolf went to sniff the bit of tail which lay upon the stone: the bit of tail which had been Wolf, but was now just a scrap of bad meat, not worth eating. Then he nose-nudged Tall Tailless under the chin to say sorry for glaring at him, and Tall Tailless made an odd gulping noise, and buried his muzzle in Wolf's scruff.
After that, things got better. The pack-sister gave Wolf more lingonberries, and delicious slithery chunks of fish-dog fat, and he felt his strength racing back. Tall Tailless sat beside him, scratching his flank, and the pack-sister dipped the bitten end of his tail in a thin mud that smelt of honey and wet ferns. Wolf let her do this, because he knew that she was making him better.
Putting his muzzle between his paws, he shut his eyes, and gave himself up to the scratching of his pack-brother, and the wonderful cool mud that was chasing away the last of the badness.
Wolf recovered with a speed that astonished and gratified Renn.
Already his fur seemed sleeker, and his nose had lost that dull, hot look. At the end of his tail now a thumblength shorter than before the wound smelt clean and fresh. To her surprise, Wolf had let her dress it with a salve of elder and meadowsweet in chewed blubber. He'd even let her bind it in wovenbark, which he'd made only a half-hearted attempt to eat.
It was Torak who couldn't watch; who seemed unable to bear the sight of the wound, as if he felt the pain more than Wolf himself.
'He really is getting better,' said Renn, to reassure him. 'I think wolves heal faster than we do. Do you remember last autumn in the Moon of Roaring Stags, when he went after blackberries and tore his ear? Three days later, there wasn't even a scab.'
'I'd forgotten that.' He forced a smile. 'And your salve is helping, too.'
'He's getting stronger all the time,' she said, drawing her medicine pouch shut. 'I think we should '
A bat fluttered overhead, and of one accord they paused to listen.
Nothing.
Three times during the day this strange underground day that felt more like night Torak had made his way back to the forest of stone, and stolen a freshly dipped torch, and checked that the Soul-Eaters were still sleeping off their trance. But they couldn't count on that for much longer.
'We should get him out of this pit,' said Renn. 'We can make a sling of our belts, and haul him out. If he'll let us.'
'He'll let us. You said Thiazzi's blocked the cave mouth?'