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He shoved my shoulder and sent me toppling in the snow. I rolled a few times, then got up, shook myself, and reminded myself to have a little decorum. I wagged my tail anyway—let the EarthSpine see I was pleased with my city-dwelling silver-marked dubiously-bred mate. In the starlight, his snout had old scars that carved hairless trails almost up to his eyes, down to his lips, and pale lines across his nose. I nuzzled him again.
Without a word to EarthSpine, I took the point and bounded out into the snow.
A werewolf is going to navigate in the night by three things: scent, sky, and large landmarks. It was extremely dark, especially scrambling through the trees, and the going was slow picking our way over rocky outcroppings and around large root networks, then we’d sprint across easier terrain to make up time. The four other wolves followed me in a single line, trusting that I knew the best places to put my paws.
Which I did, because I’d frozen my fur off on ass o’clock patrols and hunts dozens of times.
At 4:10 a.m., the trees opened up onto the wide, open spread of snow that crowned a soft ridgeline. The scent of another treeline sat half a mile across the snow. I sniffed the air: the due north breeze blew the scent of SilverPaw towards us.
“Jerron.” Sterling growled, scenting the wind. There was no direct translation for Jerron in our lupine language, so he went with the best phonetic approximation growls could produce.
It took a second, since I was used to my brother’s lupine name being translated differently. “My brother?”
“I smell her,” Charles said eagerly. “Her scent is much closer.”
My range with the prevailing winds was half a mile, but a male was upwards of two. Anais and SilverPaw were close. Not good news.
“Blood!” Charles’ posture went rigid. He and his scouts sniffed deeply of the breeze, and the scent of worry burst from their coats.
“Not much,” Sterling said, unmoved.
Charles clacked his teeth at him. “We care when a female bleeds even a bit!”
I pushed between them and demanded someone head off in the right direction towards Anais. Sterling shoved Charles aside and loped out in the direction of the female’s scent.
Half a mile later we scrambled up over a rocky ridge, and in the dim starlight, I could just make out Anais’ shadow picking its way through the snow. The wind smelled of weariness, pain, fear, blood.
EarthSpine sprinted for her.
“Jerron.” Sterling pointed his snout towards the treeline in the distance.
We bounded down the ridgeline after the EarthSpine.
They crowded around Anais, whining and licking her and sniffing her for injuries. She collapsed into the snow. The blood was from her paws tearing on the ice and rocks. The bloody trail would lead the SilverPaw right to us.
Crap.
Sterling flung his head back and howled a warning to the SilverPaw.
Well. And that.
A moment later, Jerron’s howl answered back.
Sterling bristled all over.
Anais hauled herself to her paws and limped to her packmates, who supported her with their shoulders.
The SilverPaw hunting party loped out of the shadows. Half a dozen of them, all familiar scents. They’d been my family and pack once, now they growled and yipped. One especially familiar shadow melted away from the others.
“Sterling.”
There is no word for Sterling in our lupine dialect. There is no approximation. The only word we have is silver. My brother could have chosen Alpha, or hybrid, any assortment of insults, even wolf or male.
Instead, he chose silver.
Silver was war. Silver was death.
Sterling snarled back, large fangs barred in the starlight, hackles raised.
