The Sight Read Free

and ears shrank and he stood up on his hind legs like the two-feet and instead of talking in the voice of howling song he began to voice in Man’s strange grunts and whines.  His tail shrivelled away and he could no longer run like the river, or scent for miles.  He lost the power to see in the dark and had to go down to live with the man pack, feeding on meat shrivelled by Man’s burning air.
    ‘You don’t mean the wolf man, Kipcha?’ whispered Bran, and he shuddered.
    ‘No, Bran, that’s just a cubs’ story,’ growled Kipcha, shaking her head scornfully, ‘the legend is no impossible transformation.  It tells of a time when a wolf with the Sight would steal a human child.’
    ‘A wolf steal a child,’ said Bran in astonishment.
    ‘And rear it as their own, to teach it the ways of the Sight,’ Kipcha went on.
    ‘Who ever heard of such a thing?’
    Kipcha had come to a stop below the looming castle.  There was an air of loneliness and violence about that craggy place, of some profound mystery too that even the bats wheeling above its battlements could not fathom with their piercing senses.  But Huttser was nosing the ice in front of Kipcha and in the snow there was a set of huge paw prints.
    ‘Bear,’ the Dragga grunted as they came up, sniffing the spores with distaste.  ‘It seems wolves are not the only Lera treading through the forest tonight.’
    Suddenly, ahead of them, Palla gave a delighted howl and led them up off the river.  She had remembered the way after all.  The she-wolf’s relief was plain as she spotted a small frozen waterfall and a birch tree, beyond which she knew lay the cave they were hunting for.  Soon they were standing outside a low entrance in the slope of the hill, below a great boulder above them.  The cave was partly shielded by a trailing willow, its mouth yawning into the blackness beyond.
    ‘Thank Fenris,’ cried Huttser, as the wind shook the branches.
    The cave was low-ceilinged, so that Huttser had to drop his head as Palla led him inside, but it stretched well back into the mountain and, despite its proximity to the stream, was also remarkably dry.  The air was fresh and cool, but the wolves found it far warmer than the world outside.
    ‘It’s good to be back,’ growled Palla with pleasure, and the she-wolf’s voice began to echo around the rock chamber.
    ‘This is where I was born, Huttser.  My birthing den.  We could fit the whole pack in here when we needed to.’
    ‘A perfect place to rear our pups in safety,’ sighed Huttser, nuzzling his mate tenderly.
    Palla lay down and Huttser licked her beautiful face in the den.  His heart was full of worry, but Palla could already begin to feel the numbness leaving her limbs as she lay in the warm, dark cave.  Yet the she-wolf was desperately hungry and her head felt light and dizzy.
    As Brassa prowled into the cave she began to look around her fondly.
    ‘Huttser, I nursed Palla here myself,’ she said proudly.  ‘It brings back such memories.’
    ‘Not all of them good,’ murmured Palla.  ‘You nursed Morgra here too, remember?’
    Brassa looked strangely wounded.  She fell silent as Kipcha settled on the edge of the chamber as well.  As Bran padded inside, he pushed accidentally against Huttser, who turned and snarled at him.  Bran jumped sideways, creeping back to the edge of the wall in submission and showing his throat to the Dragga.  They were all exhausted and hungry, and Huttser’s worry for Palla had strained his patience to breaking point.
    ‘Try and get some sleep, all of you,’ Huttser muttered sullenly, turning away from Bran.  ‘Without sleep how can a Varg go on?’
    Wolves spend something like a fifth of their lives asleep, but Bran whined miserably.
    ‘Sleep? How can I sleep with this ache eating at my gut? Besides, I’m bound to have nightmares about that Stone Den.  It’s horrid.’
    In the cave Palla looked up.
    ‘My parents said the castle was deserted, Bran,’