Wolves of the Beyond 02 - Shadow Wolf

service.”
    Lord Claren walked away. As soon as he was out of earshot, Faolan said, “Heep.”
    “What is it now, gnaw wolf?” Heep replied.
    “Can’t you call me by my name—Faolan?”
    “You haven’t earned that name.” Heep’s nostrils pinched together and he spoke with obvious disdain.
    “It is the name given to me by my second Milk Giver.”
    “Oh!” Heep said. “That bear.”
    “Yes, that bear, the grizzly Thunderheart!”
    Heep took a step closer. “Let me explain something to you, gnaw wolf. There is no such thing as a Milk Giver, first, second, or third, for a malcadh . Whoever this so-called Milk Giver was, she is no better than an impostor. And you show only stupidity and arrogance in thinking otherwise.”
    Faolan growled and stepped closer, which seemed to surprise Heep. As a longer-serving gnaw wolf in a pack, Heep had seniority and had not expected to be approached in such a manner.
    “Urskadamus!” Faolan muttered the old bear curse he had learned from Thunderheart. He heard some she-wolves snicker, but he didn’t pay any attention and turned away from the gnaw wolf.
    Faolan realized that a wolf had been observing himfrom across the way. She was young, tawny colored, about his age, he thought, but smaller and certainly not a gnaw wolf. Not when she was so well fed and had no trace of a deformity.
    She was looking at him curiously. He could not return her gaze. It would be considered an affront for a gnaw wolf to look directly at another wolf, even if that wolf were the same age. But out of the corner of his eye, he could see that she was approaching him cautiously. He must sink lower, lay back his ears, and try as best he could to twist his neck and shove his face into the ground. Her words came softly and surprised him.
    “It’s hard for you, isn’t it?” Somehow he knew immediately what she meant. “You can’t pretend, can you? Not like Heep.”
    “Not like Heep. No wolf could be like him. He hardly seems a wolf to me.”
    “Maybe not, but sometimes you have to pretend. This is easy compared to—”
    “Compared to what?”
    “Shhh! Here he comes.”
    Heep came slithering on his belly back toward them. “Oh, my, that such a proud and noble young wolf should speak to humble creatures as ourselves. Such a giftedyoung she-wolf from the noble Carreg Gaer of our chieftain Duncan MacDuncan deigns to speak with the likes of us!”
    Carreg Gaer! So she was not from the River Pack , Faolan thought. Carreg Gaer was the term used for the pack of the chieftain. But why was she here? It seemed as if she was embarrassed by Heep’s lavish display of humiliation, and she turned away to join the gaddergludder . Soon the skreeleen ’s voice rose to a high pitch as she howled the final summoning call.
    “To the Marrow!”
    The two packs raced off to the north.
     
    There were always two flanks in a byrrgis formation, either east and west or north and south. If there was just one gnaw wolf, that wolf was required to cover both flanks. With two, Faolan had been assigned the eastern flank, considered the inferior flank because of an old superstition. Heep was the sweeper on the west, and together they were the very last in the line of the thirty-two wolves that comprised the byrrgis .
    The byrrgis stretched out over half a league as it climbed a steep incline. They were traveling at anexasperatingly slow speed. But Faolan knew he must stay in position. The first pile of droppings appeared and he diligently sniffed it. He was making his way up to report the scent to the sublieutenant, a large male named Donegal, when Heep appeared. “I’ll be obliged to report that.”
    “But why? I got the scent.” And before Faolan spoke next, he eyed Heep carefully. “Although I am even lower than you as a new gnaw wolf, I think that if you reported this, it would be considered most…most un-humble for the scent finder to have another report from the western flank.”
    Heep raised his yellow eyes. There seemed barely a trace of the luminous green that suffused the eyes of the wolves of the Beyond.
    “You don’t say,” he replied softly.
    “I do say. You might provoke the sublieutenant, for your nose is dry, and not damp with the steam of moose dung.”
    The yellow wolf began to walk away but turned once and gave Faolan a baleful look.
    After Faolan reported to the sublieutenant, he and Heep were the last to reach the top of a rise. This gave them a good view of the byrrgis on the flats as it