I finally ran out of steam a hundred yards or less from the first trees of the forest. I knew in my heart, as I lay panting in the snow, that I'd reached the end of my strength. All the same, I rested a few minutes, as I had before, then tried to rise — no good. I made it as far as my knees, then dropped. Another long rest. Again I tried to rise. Again I fell, this time face first into the snow, where I lay, shivering, unable to roll over.
The cold was unbearable. A human would have died from it long ago. Only the vampire blood in my veins had kept me going. But even the powerful blood of the vampires had its limits. I'd pushed to the very end of mine. I had no strength left, not even the tiniest morsel.
I was finished.
I wept pitifully as I lay there, tears turning to ice on my cheeks. Snowflakes drifted onto my eyelashes. I tried lifting a hand to brush them away, but couldn't. Even that small gesture was beyond me. "What an awful way to die," I moaned. Another hundred yards and I would have been safe. To collapse and die this close to the end was a shame. Maybe if I'd rested more in the cave in the mountain, I'd have had the energy to continue. Or if I'd—
A sharp, yapping sound jolted me out of my reverie. I'd closed my eyes and been drifting off to sleep/death. At the sound, I cracked them open. I couldn't move my head, and the flakes of snow clouded my vision, but I was staring in the general direction of the forest and could see a vague shape making its way toward me, tumbling through the snow. Oh, great, I thought. As if things weren't bad enough — now something's going to come along and eat me before I'm dead! Could things get any worse? Judging by what had happened to me recently — yes!
I shut my eyes as the creature came nearer and hoped I'd be too numb to feel its teeth and claws as it devoured me. Fighting back was out of the question — a squirrel could have knocked me out, in my condition.
Hot breath clouded my face. A long tongue licked around my nose. I shivered. It licked again, this time my cheeks and ears. Then it licked the snowflakes from my eyelashes.
I opened my eyes and blinked. What was going on? Was it cleaning me up before it killed me? That seemed unlikely. Yet what other explanation could there be? As I adjusted my vision, the animal nudged back a bit and came into focus. My jaw dropped. My lips quivered. And in a pained, shaky voice, I mumbled incredulously, "Rudi?"
CHAPTER FIVE
Rudi was the wolf cub who'd accompanied Mr. Crepsley, Harkat, Gavner, and me on part of the journey to Vampire Mountain. He'd been in a small pack that included two she-wolves and a large male whom I'd christened Streak. They'd left us to unite with other wolf packs close to Vampire Mountain.
Rudi leapt around me, barking with excitement. He'd grown since I'd last seen him: his fangs were longer and his fur was even thicker. I managed to lift my head and smile weakly. "I'm in big trouble, Rudi," I muttered as the cub licked my fingers. He cocked his ears and gazed at me seriously, as though he understood. "Big trouble," I repeated softly, then collapsed again.
Rudi rubbed his nose against my right cheek. It was wet and warm. He licked around my eyes and ears, then pressed his body against mine, trying to warm me up. When he saw how helpless I was, he took a few paces back and howled. Moments later, a second wolf emerged from the forest, larger, sleeker, and every bit as familiar as Rudi.
"Streak," I whispered as the wolf advanced cautiously. His ears perked up when he heard my voice, then he bounded forward. Rudi kept yapping until Streak snapped at him. The adult wolf sniffed me from head to toe, then barked at Rudi. They lay out flat beside me, Streak behind, Rudi in front, covering most of my body with theirs, transmitting their heat.
After a few minutes, warmth seeped through me. I flexed and unflexed my fingers and toes, working the worst of the chill out of them. I curled up into a ball, so the wolves could cover more of me, and buried my face between Rudi's hairy shoulders. We lay like that for hours, the wolves shifting position every so often to keep warm. Finally, Streak got to his feet and barked.
I tried getting up. Failed. Shook my head and groaned. "It's no use. I can't go on." The wolf studied me silently, then bent and bit my butt! I yelped and rolled away instinctively. Streak followed, and I leapt to my feet. "Stay back, you no-good —," I shouted, then stopped when I saw the look on his face.
I stared down at my body, then at Streak, and grinned sheepishly. "I'm standing," I whispered redundantly. Streak howled softly, then nipped my right leg lightly and faced the trees. Nodding wearily, I set off for the forest, and the wolves padded along beside me.
The going wasn't easy. I was cold and exhausted, and stumbled more times than I could keep track of. Streak and Rudi kept me going. Whenever I stalled, they pressed against me, or breathed warmly over me, or snapped to make me get up. At one stage, Streak let me grab the thick, long hair around his neck, and half-dragged me through the snow.
I'm not sure why they bothered with me — usually wild animals leave wounded companions behind if they can't keep up. Maybe they wanted to stay on the good side of the vampires, who gave them lots of scraps during Council. Or perhaps they sensed hidden resources within me and knew my cause wasn't hopeless.
After a long, hard walk, we entered a glade, where a large pack of wolves had gathered. There must have been twenty or thirty of them, lying about, eating, playing, and grooming themselves, all different colors, builds, and breeds. The wolves regarded me with suspicion. One, a dark, bulky male, padded over and sniffed me, then growled threateningly, raising its hackles. Streak met its challenge and growled back.
The two stood snarling at each other for a few seconds before the unwelcoming wolf turned its back on us and loped away.
Rudi ran after the dark wolf, yapping, but Streak barked angrily at the cub, and he returned, tail between his legs. As I blinked owlishly at the wolves, Streak nudged me forward to where a she-wolf was suckling three cubs. She laid a protective paw over her cubs and growled at us as we approached, but Streak whined and dropped to his belly to show he meant no harm.
When the she-wolf had relaxed, Streak stood and locked gazes with the female. The she-wolf snarled. Streak bared his fangs and snarled back, pawed at the snow in front of her, then locked gazes again. This time, she lowered her head and didn't respond. Streak struck the backs of my legs with his snout, and I dropped to the ground. As he nudged me on, I understood what he wanted me to do. "No!" I resisted, insides churning. "I can't!"
Streak growled and pushed me forward. I was too weak to argue. Besides, it made sense — I was cold and hungry, but too weak to eat. I needed to get something warm and nourishing into me, something that didn't need to be chewed.
I lay down and wriggled forward, gently shoving the three cubs to one side, making space. The cubs yapped suspiciously at me, then crowded around, sniffed me all over, and accepted me as one of their own. When my face was up close to the suckling she-wolf's belly, I took a deep breath, paused, then found a teat, closed my lips around it, and drank.
CHAPTER SIX
The she-wolf treated me the same as the three cubs, making sure I got enough milk, covering me with her paws to keep me warm, licking behind my ears and around my face to clean me (I crept away when I had to go to the bathroom!). I remained with her for a couple of days, slowly regaining my strength, cuddling up to her and the cubs for warmth, surviving on her warm milk. It didn't taste good, but I was in no position to complain.
Pain racked my body as I recovered. Bruises covered me like purple leeches. My cuts weren't too serious — the cold restricted the flow of blood — but they stung like crazy. I wished I had some of Seba's healing spider webs to apply to them.
The more I thought about my slide down the mountain stream, the more incredible it seemed. Had I really done it, or was this some crazy dream? If not for the pain, I might have believed it was the latter, but dreams are painless, so it had to be real.
More incredible still was that I hadn't broken any major bones. Three fingers on my left hand were broken, my right thumb was sticking out at an alarming
angle, and my left ankle had swollen up like a balloon, but otherwise I seemed to be OK. I could move my arms and legs, my skull hadn't been cracked open, my spine hadn't snapped in two. All things considered, I was in astonishingly good shape.
As the days passed, I stretched and tested myself. I still slept beside the she-wolf and drank from her, but I started getting up to take short walks, hobbling around the glade, exercising lightly. My left ankle hurt terribly, but the swelling went down, and it eventually returned to normal.
As my strength returned, Streak brought me meat and berries. I couldn't eat a lot in the beginning, but I sucked plenty of blood from the small animals he brought, and my appetite increased quickly.
Rudi spent a lot of time with me. He was fascinated by my bald head — I'd had to shave my hair off after it caught fire during one of my Trials of Initiation — and never tired of licking it and rubbing his chin and nose over it.
After four days (possibly five or six — I hadn't kept close track of time) the wolves moved on to a new patch. It was a long march — seven or eight miles — and I lagged behind most of the way, helped along by Streak, Rudi, and the she-wolf who'd been suckling me (she now regarded me as one of her cubs and mothered me the same as the others).
As hard as the trek was, it was beneficial, and when I awoke that night after a long, dreamless sleep, I felt almost as good as I had before my descent down the stream. The worst of the bruising had subsided, the cuts had healed, my ankle hardly bothered me, and I was able to eat normally.
That night, I went hunting with the pack. I couldn't move fast, but I kept up and helped bring down an old reindeer that several of the wolves were tracking. It felt good to be contributing to the pack after they'd done so much for me, and I gave most of my share of the meat to the she-wolf and cubs.
There was a nasty scene the next day. The dark wolf who'd objected to my presence when Streak brought me into the pack had never accepted me. He growled and barked whenever I came close and often snatched food from my hands while I was feeding. I avoided him as much as I could, but that day, when he saw me playing with the cubs and handing meat out to them, he snapped.
He charged at me, barking wildly, trying to drive me off. I backed away from him slowly, not showing any fear, but I didn't leave the pack — if I let him chase me out once, he'd never stop hounding me. I circled around the wolves, hoping he'd lose interest in me, but he followed, determined, snarling menacingly.
As I prepared to fight, Streak darted between us and faced the darker wolf. He bristled to make himself look big and growled deeply. It looked as though the dark wolf would back off, but then he lowered his head, bared his fangs, and lunged at Streak, claws extended.
Streak met the challenge, and the pair rolled away, biting and scratching at each other. The wolves around them hastily cleared out of their way. Some younger cubs yapped with excitement, but most of the older wolves ignored the fighting or looked on with only mild interest. They were used to fights like this.
It seemed to me as though the wolves were going to tear each other to pieces, and I ran around them, hoping to pull them apart. But as the fight progressed, I realized that, for all their barking, snapping, and clawing, they weren't doing a lot of actual damage. Streak's snout had been scratched, and the dark wolf was bleeding from a couple of bites, but they weren't out to really hurt each other. It was more like a wrestling match than anything else.
As the fight wore on, it became obvious that Streak was beating the other wolf. He wasn't as heavily built, but he was faster and sharper, and for every swipe to the head he took, he delivered two or three of his own.
All of a sudden, the dark wolf stopped, lay down, and rolled over, baring his throat and belly. Streak opened his mouth and clamped his teeth around the dark wolf's throat, then let go without breaking the skin and stood back. The dark wolf got to his feet and slunk away, tail between his legs.
I thought the wolf might have to leave the pack, but he didn't. Although he slept by himself that night, none of the wolves tried to chase him away, and he took his regular place in the hunting pack the next time they set out.
I thought about that a lot over the next day or two, comparing the way wolves handled their losers to how vampires handled theirs. In the world of vampires, defeat was a disgrace and more often than not ended with the death of the defeated. Wolves were more understanding. Honor mattered to them, but they wouldn't kill or shun a member of their pack just because it had lost face. Young wolf cubs had to endure tests of maturity, just as I'd endured the Trials of Initiation, but they weren't killed if they failed.
I wasn't an expert on the subject, but it seemed to me that vampires could learn a thing or two from wolves if they took the time to study their ways. It was possible to be both honorable and practical. Kurda Smahlt, for all his treacherous faults, got that much right at least.
CHAPTER SEVEN
A few more days slipped by. I was so glad to be alive, I was savoring every moment of it. My body had healed almost completely, though faint bruises lingered in certain places. My strength had returned. I was full of energy, ready to go.
I barely noticed the cold. I'd grown used to the nip of the wind and the chill of the snow. The occasional strong blast set me shivering, but most of the time I felt as natural wandering about naked as the wolves.
I'd been accepted as an equal member of the pack now that I was back on my feet, and I was constantly out hunting — since I was able to run faster than the wolves, my services were in great demand. I was gradually coming to terms with the way they thought and communicated. I couldn't read their thoughts, but most of the time I had a good idea what they were thinking — I could tell by the way they hunched their shoulders, widened or narrowed their eyes, perked or dropped their ears and tails, growled or barked or whined. On the hunt, if Streak or another wolf wanted me to go to the left or the right, he only had to look at me and twitch his head. If a she-wolf wanted me to play with her cubs, she howled in a certain soft way, and I knew she was calling me.
The wolves, for their part, seemed able to understand everything I said. I rarely spoke — there wasn't much need for words — but whenever I did, they'd cock their heads intently and listen, then reply with a yap or gesture.
We moved around a lot, as was the wolves' way. I kept an eye open for Vampire Mountain, but didn't see it. That puzzled me — the reason the wolves met out here in the wild was to converge on the mountain and eat the leftovers that the vampires threw to them. I decided to ask Streak about it, although I didn't think he'd be able to comprehend my question or fashion a reply. To my surprise, when I mentioned Vampire Mountain, the hairs rose on the back of his neck, and he growled.
"You don't want to go there?" I frowned. "Why not?" Streak's only reply was another growl. Thinking about it, I guessed it had to be the vampaneze. The wolves must know about the purple-skinned invaders, or else they'd simply sensed trouble and were steering clear of the mountain.
I had to do something about the vampaneze, but the thought of going back to Vampire Mountain scared me. I was afraid the vampires would kill me before I had a chance to explain about the vampaneze. Or they might think I was lying and take Kurda's word over mine. Eventually I'd have to return, but I was delaying as long as possible, pretending to myself that I was still recovering and not fit to make the trip.
My three broken fingers had healed. I'd set the bones as best I could — very painful! — and wrapped the fingers together using long reeds and leaves. The thumb on my right hand still stuck out at an angle and hurt when I moved it, but that was only a minor irritation.
When I wasn't hunting or playing with the cubs, I thought a lot about Gavner. I got a pain in my stomach whenever I recalled his death, but I couldn't stop thinking about him. The loss of a friend is a terrible, tragic thing, especially when it happens suddenly, without warning.
What really sickened me about Gavner's death was that it could have been avoided. If I hadn't run away, or if I had
n't trusted Kurda, or if I'd stayed and fought with Gavner — he'd still be alive. It wasn't fair. He didn't deserve to die. He'd been a brave, loyal, warmhearted vampire, a friend to all.
Sometimes when I thought about him, I was filled with hatred and wished I'd grabbed his knife and killed Kurda, even if it meant my own death at the hands of the vampaneze. Other times, a sweeping sadness would come over me, and I'd cover my face with my hands and cry, wondering what prompted Kurda to do such an awful thing.
The wolves were puzzled by my behavior. They didn't spend much time grieving for their dead. If they lost a partner or cub, they howled miserably for a while, then got on with their lives. They couldn't understand my mood swings.
To cheer me up, Streak took me out hunting with him late one evening. Normally, we never went hunting by ourselves, but the pack was settling in for the night, so we went without them.
It was nice to be on our own. A drawback to running with a pack is that you have to be very organized — if you make a wrong move that ruins the hunt, you're treated with disgust. Now that it was just Streak and me, we were free to lollop along as we pleased and make idle detours. It didn't matter whether we caught something or not — we were in search of sport, not prey.
We tracked a couple of young, frisky reindeer. We didn't expect to catch them, but it was fun to follow them. I think they sensed our harmless intentions because they kept turning back and running at us, then tossing their heads and fleeing. We'd been tracking them for almost fifteen minutes when the two reindeer reached the top of a small mound and paused to sniff the air. I started after them, but Streak growled and drew to a halt.
I stopped, wondering what was wrong. Streak was standing stock-still like the reindeer. Then, as the reindeer turned and bolted back toward us, he nudged my legs with his snout and took off for a clump of bushes to the side. I followed quickly, trusting his more highly developed senses. We found a thick bush that gave us a clear view of the mound and lay low behind it.