Soul Eater Read Free

Mountain clans. Nothing. The Soul-Eaters had gone to ground like a bear in winter.And yet--Wolf was still gone.Torak felt as if he were walking in a blizzard of ignorance and fear. Raising his head, he saw the great bull Auroch high in the sky. He felt the malice of its cold red eye, and fought a rising tide of panic. First he'd lost his father. Now Wolf. What if he never saw Wolf again? What if he was already dead?The trees thinned. Before them glimmered a frozen river, crisscrossed with hare tracks. On its banks, the25dead umbels of hemlock reached spiked fingers toward the stars.A herd of forest horses took fright and clattered off across the ice, then turned to stare. Their manes stood stiff as icicles, and in their moon-bright eyes Torak glimpsed an echo of his own fear.In his mind he saw Wolf as he'd looked before he vanished: magnificent and proud. Torak had known him since he was a cub. Most of the time he was simply Wolf: clever, inquisitive, and fiercely loyal. Sometimes he was the guide, with a mysterious certainty in his amber eyes. Always he was a pack-brother."What I don't understand," said Renn, cutting across his thoughts, "is why take Wolf at all?""Maybe it's a trap. Maybe they want me, not Wolf.""I thought of that too." Her voice dropped. "Maybe--whoever took Wolf is after you because ..." She hesitated. "Because you're a spirit walker, and they want your power."He flinched. He hated being a spirit walker. And he hated that she'd said it out loud. It felt like a scab being torn off."But if they were after you," she persisted, "why not just take you? Two big strong men, we'd have been no match for them. So why--""I don't know!" snapped Torak. "Why do you keep going on? What good does it do?"26Renn stared at him."I don't know why they took him!" he cried. "I don't care if it's a trap! I just want him back!"After that, they didn't speak at all. The forest horses had trampled the trail, and for a while it was lost, which at least gave them an excuse to split up. When Torak found it again, it had changed. For the worse."They've made a sled," he said. "No dogs to pull it, but even without, they'll be able to go much faster downhill."Renn glanced at the sky. "It's clouding over. We should build a shelter. Get some rest." "You can if you want. I'm going on." She put her hands on her hips. "On your own?" "If I have to.""Torak. He's my friend too.""He's not just my friend" he retorted. "He's my pack-brother!"He could see that he'd hurt her."And how," she said between her teeth, "is blundering about missing things going to help him?"He glared at her. "I haven't missed anything!""Oh no? A few paces back, one of them turned aside to follow those otter tracks--""What otter tracks?""That's what I mean! You're exhausted! So am I!"27He knew she was right. But he didn't want to admit it. In silence they found a storm-toppled spruce, and dug out the snow at its base to make a makeshift sleeping-space. They roofed it with spruce boughs, and used their snowshoes as shovels to pack on a thick layer of snow. Finally they dragged more boughs inside, and laid their reindeer-hide sleeping-sacks on top. When they'd finished, they were trembling with fatigue.From his tinder pouch Torak took his strike-fire and some shredded birch bark, and woke up a fire. The only deadwood he'd found was spruce, so it smoked and spat. He was too exhausted to care.Renn wrinkled her nose at the smoke, but didn't remark on it. She took a coil of elk-blood sausage from her pack and cut it in three, then put one piece on the roof of the shelter for the clan guardian, and tossed Torak another. Tucking her own share in her food pouch, she picked up her axe and waterskin. "I'm going to the river. There's more meat in my pack, but don't touch the dried lingonberries.""Why not?""Because," she said crossly, "I'm saving them for Wolf!"After she'd gone, Torak forced himself to eat. Then he crawled out of the shelter and made an offering. Cutting a lock of his long,