Read Online Wolves of the Beyond: Shadow Wolf by Kathryn Lasky - Free Book Online

didn’t get the pup, the moose surely would. It made him shudderto think of that pup squashed under giant hooves. He hoped it would be over shortly. But he could not help wondering how long the little pup would be left mewling into the vast nothingness, how lonely it must feel.
    Faolan’s own recollections of abandonment were vague. He knew only what Thunderheart had told him, what she had surmised. That he had been left on the big river’s edge during the time of the Moon of the Cracking Ice, and the fragment of ice on which he had been placed tore loose. He would have died had he not snagged on Thunderheart’s foot. He had gone from cold and nothingness to warmth and milk and that huge booming heart. His fear of the nothingness was only faintly remembered, but he would wish it on no living creature. And yet he knew the death of a pup was a small price to pay for the health of the clan. It must be done. It was the most sacred of all the laws in the gaddernock .
    He continued to watch the scene from the ridge. The Obea had set the pup down not just on top of the neighboring ridge but on a flat piece of table rock that looked as if it had been placed there for exactly this purpose. The perfect tummfraw ! Then, without giving a backward glance, the Obea turned and headed down the path she had come.
    Faolan was filled with an agonizing mixture of anxiety and curiosity. Did the little pup wonder what had happened to the milk scent of its mum? What was it feeling right now? Was it cold? A chill wind had blown up. Could he rescue this pup, as Thunderheart had done for him? But that was impossible for he had no milk, and it was most certainly against the codes of the wolves of the Beyond for another wolf to interfere with a malcadh .
    When the Obea had dissolved into the gathering mist of twilight, Faolan could stand it no longer and began to move out of the ditch and make his way to the tummfraw . When he was almost to the top, he could hear sporadic soft whimpers from the pup. The last part of his climb seemed endless. Every step he took felt like a betrayal of the most sacred codes of wolves. But he only wanted to look.
    No, this is a lie . A voice seemed to fill his head. You want to give comfort . By his marrow, it felt as if the mist of MacDuncan had followed him right to the top of this ridge. He looked across the starry indigo dome of the night sky. There was not a sign of the Great Wolf constellation, nor the star ladder, nor the Cave of Souls. Then why do I feel him?
    Faolan took one more step. There was the pup, tinier than he could have imagined. She was a tawny drop of gold and perfectly formed. He had never seen anything so perfect. But so tiny that every time her heart beat, it shook her entire body. How tempted he was to lick her, to give her a momentary bit of warmth before she died. He could tell she would not live long. The first snowflakes of the season began to fall. Perhaps she would be buried under them and fall into a frozen sleep. They said it was a good way to pass from life. Yes, he wished for a blanket of heavy snow. Perhaps it would camouflage her from the owls or the prowling land animals such as bobcats and cougars. And it was doubtful that moose would take this path if the snow was deep.
    He would not touch her, but from the top of the ridge, Faolan began to howl a prayer to Great Lupus, a prayer for snow.
    The night has come on, the stars walk the skies,
    now let the snow fall where a dying pup lies
    on this tummfraw, left with no mother, no milk,
    so cold in the night, so all alone,
    with only the nothingness to call its home,
    with only an emptiness as wide as the sea,
    with no place to go and nothing to be.
    Oh, where have you gone, Great Wolf of the night?
    Oh, where have you gone, as this pup fights for her life?
    Oh, what do you see from your den in the sky?
    Oh, what do you see where this sweet pup does lie?
    Like a tiny gold star her light grows dim,
    her breath grows shallow,
    her