Chương 61: Chapter 46: Ironfang Winter (Part 1)

Nearly six weeks had passed since Dravak named Grub his third Lieutenant. Winter hadn't softened during that time. It had settled over the forest with the patient weight of something that knew it had nowhere else to be. Snow buried the ridge beyond the wall and pressed halfway up the trunks of fallen trees.

Wind carved the drifts into long white ridges, erased the paths whenever the tribe neglected them for more than a day, and hurled loose powder against the barricade hard enough to make the heavy door groan against its braces. The forest Grub had first entered no longer seemed to exist. Dark trunks rose from a world stripped of color. Bare branches creaked beneath ice, and the paths that Hunters once followed by root, stone, and familiar patches of moss now survived only through memory.

Inside, the cavern held steady. Cold entered whenever the door was opened, but it no longer swept unhindered across the floor and settled into every sleeping body. Over the past six weeks, Grub and the Builders had carved additional vents through the cavern ceiling, spreading them above the busiest hearths rather than forcing all the smoke toward a single opening.

Each had been capped with its own stone chimney, layered roof, and angled runoff, built from what they had learned when the first vent clogged during the storm. Smoke now rose through several openings instead of gathering beneath the ceiling. Even when every hearth burned at once, the haze remained thin, and none of the new chimneys had failed beneath the weight of snow. With the Medics and Builders no longer needing him to supervise their efforts, Grub was free to pay attention to other changes.

The children and their wolves had grown together. Six weeks wasn't long by human reckoning, but the young direwolves seemed to measure time differently. Their oversized paws had finally begun to almost fit the bodies above them. Their shoulders rose higher, their jaws thickened, and the loose softness beneath their fur had become dense muscle. Most of the wolves now stood nearly four feet at the shoulder, tall enough to look down upon the smaller goblins and meet the larger Warriors nearly chest to chest.

When they wrestled, the impacts carried enough force to knock over anyone foolish enough to remain nearby. The tribe no longer treated their play as harmless. Spears didn't rise whenever a wolf growled, but eyes still followed them. Children corrected roughness quickly, stepping between their wolves and whatever had drawn too much attention before teeth or claws could turn play into injury. Grub watched those corrections more carefully than the mistakes.

The children had learned where to place a hand beneath the jaw, how to use posture rather than strength, and when to command rather than pull. Their voices remained young, but there was greater certainty behind them now. The wolves listened. Not always immediately. Not always happily. But they listened. One wolf had grown larger than the rest. His fur was black, with ash-gray patches around his oversized paws, and his shoulders already stood close to five feet from the ground.

His neck had thickened until the girl who cared for him could barely wrap both arms around it, and he moved through the others with the unhurried confidence of a creature that expected space to open before him. The girl who had received him had named him Ashpaw. She announced it one morning without asking anyone's permission.

"His paws look like he stepped through old fire," she said. Ashpaw had flicked one gray-dusted ear and continued chewing a length of hide. The name stuck. The girl had changed along with him. She still moved near the front of every exercise, but the others no longer followed merely because she reached the position first. When she changed direction, the children watched. When she corrected Ashpaw, they copied her posture with their own wolves. She didn't demand their attention. She simply possessed it.

Sable meanwhile remained different from the rest of the pack. Where Ashpaw and the others had thickened into blunt strength, she had grown long and lean. Her chest was narrower, her legs proportionally longer, and the muscle beneath her dark fur lay close and tight instead of gathering heavily around her shoulders. She was still the smallest, but she was also the fastest. When the wolves ran through the snow, Ashpaw and the others broke through it with weight and power, scattering white around their broad chests.

Sable seemed to skim across the surface wherever it hardened enough to bear her, choosing each step before the others had finished forcing theirs downward. Grub had begun wondering how much farther that difference would carry. The answer started with the girl climbing onto Ashpaw's back. It happened during an afternoon exercise outside the cavern. The storm from the previous night had passed, leaving the clearing bright beneath a pale winter sun.

The children had led the wolves through turns, stops, and recall drills until even Ashpaw had begun showing signs of boredom. He lowered himself into the snow and rested his head across his paws. The girl looked at him for several breaths. Then she grabbed a fistful of fur, swung one leg over his back, and settled behind his shoulders. Ashpaw's head rose. The other children stopped what they were doing. Grub did too. Ashpaw looked back at the girl perched above him.

His ears turned sideways, and his brow wrinkled in visible confusion. The girl grinned.

"Up." Ashpaw didn't move. She leaned forward and repeated the command, pressing both knees into his sides.

"Up." The wolf rose slowly. The girl swayed, tightened her grip, and managed to remain on his back. A cheer burst from the other children. Ashpaw flinched at the noise, then stood taller, perhaps deciding that whatever strange thing had happened to him was now beneath his concern. The girl looked down from her new height with open triumph. Another child immediately tried to climb onto his wolf. Then another. Within moments, nearly every young direwolf had a goblin clinging to its back.

Grub opened his mouth to stop them. He closed it again. The wolves weren't snapping, bucking, or showing fear. They were confused by the unfamiliar weight, but they tolerated it because the children above them belonged there in every other sense that mattered. At a walk, the arrangement almost worked. The wolves moved carefully at first, turning their heads whenever the weight on their backs shifted. The children bounced awkwardly with each step, fingers buried in fur, knees pressed hard against ribs.

Then the girl urged Ashpaw to move faster. His walk lengthened into a trot. She lasted three strides. On the fourth, she slid sideways, lost her grip, and disappeared into the snow beneath a burst of white. The clearing erupted with laughter. Ashpaw stopped and looked back at the hole she had made. The girl emerged sputtering, snow clinging to her hair and furs.

"I'm fine." That declaration encouraged everyone else. Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. The wolves began moving faster. One child slid backward over a rump when his wolf sped up suddenly. Another remained mounted through a turn only to topple off when the animal shook snow from its fur. A boy clung to the side of his wolf for several desperate strides before being brushed away against a drift.

No one was hurt, which only made them more determined. Soon the clearing had dissolved into massive wolves bounding through snow while children shouted, laughed, fell, climbed back on, and tried again. Grub stood with his arms folded and watched. The wolves weren't rejecting their riders. They reacted only when weight shifted suddenly or pulled against them in ways they didn't understand. Fur and loose hide made poor handholds, and the children's legs were too short to grip securely around bodies that broad.

They needed something more stable. Old fantasy illustrations surfaced in Grub's thoughts. Goblins riding wolves beneath crooked spears and tattered banners, every animal fitted with crude saddles and reins as though the arrangement required no further explanation.

"Well," he muttered, "at least the stories got that part right." The boy who had been dragged into the drift looked toward him.

"What stories?"

"The kind where goblins ride wolves." The boy gestured at the snow packed beneath his clothes.

"Then why do I keep falling?"

"Because the stories left out the painful parts." The girl had already climbed back onto Ashpaw. She looked down at Grub.

"How did they stay on?"

"They used harnesses. Saddles, maybe."

"What are those?" Grub looked at the wolf beneath her. Ashpaw's shoulders rolled beneath his fur whenever he moved. His spine dipped slightly behind them, then rose again toward the hips. Any strap placed carelessly around that body would slide, twist, or bite into muscle. He sighed.

"Something we're going to have to make." He called the Builders to him before sunset. Grub scratched a rough outline into the dirt near the main hearth, showing broad straps around the chest and belly, with another section resting across the wolf's back. One of the Builders stared at it.

"That will slide."

"I know."

"Then why draw it?"

"So we know where to begin. We make these, see where they fail, and adjust." The Builder crouched beside him and moved one line with his finger.

"The front should pass here. Behind the forelegs, but not against them."

"It'll pull backward when the wolf runs."

"Then another piece holds it forward." Grub worked an eyebrow.

"Across the throat?" The Builder gave him a flat look.

"Unless you want to strangle them, no." Grub nodded and erased that line.

"Across the chest then." They used old hide for the first attempt, softening it near the fire before cutting broad strips. The Builders worked from opposite sides, checking the fit around Ashpaw while the girl kept one hand against his neck and fed him scraps whenever his patience began to thin. The finished harness wrapped around his chest and belly, with a padded strip across his back and loops for the rider's hands. It looked crude but promising. It also failed almost immediately.

Ashpaw bounded forward, the rear strap slid backward, and the entire harness twisted around his body. The girl went with it and vanished beneath him. Ashpaw stopped before stepping on her, though only barely. The Builders stared. Grub helped pull the girl free.

"Again," she said. The second design moved the weight farther forward. That kept it from sliding backward, but the chest strap pinched beneath Ashpaw's shoulder whenever he turned. He tolerated it for three passes before twisting around and biting through the strap. The girl looked at the severed hide, then up at Grub with a sheepish grin.

"He didn't like that one."

"We noticed," Grub said. Throk watched from near the wall, grinning each time a rider disappeared into the snow.

"If they learn this," he said after one especially violent fall, "no tribe in the forest will outrun us."

"First they have to stop falling off," Grub replied.

"Falling teaches." Grub glanced toward him.

"You're enjoying this far too much."

"Yes." Dravak stood farther back with his arms folded. Kesh remained beside him, watching the wolves rather than the riders.

"They turn faster than goblins can follow on foot," she said. Dravak nodded.

"And they cross deep snow without tiring as quickly."

"They could carry Scouts farther."

"Or Warriors," Throk said. Kesh looked at Ashpaw.

"Not Warriors your size." Throk grunted with amusement.

"Then smaller Warriors." Grub returned his attention to the harness. Over the following days, he and the Builders changed the design repeatedly. They widened the chest straps and separated them where the shoulders needed room to move. They added padding along the back, removed half of it when the material bunched beneath a rider, then shaped the remaining pieces around the natural hollow behind the wolf's shoulders. Hand loops became short grips. Belly straps were divided so they wouldn't twist together.

A second band prevented the harness from sliding backward without crossing the throat. The Builders did most of the actual work. Grub explained what he thought needed to happen, watched the wolves move, and pointed out places where pressure gathered badly. The Builders decided how to alter the hide. Their new instincts showed themselves in small ways. One would stop before cutting and change the angle slightly. Another would hold two straps together, frown, and add a third piece where Grub saw no obvious need.

More often than not, their adjustments worked. The children climbed onto their wolves every day, whether the harnesses were ready or not. They fell until bruises spread beneath their skin, laughed at one another, and climbed back on. The wolves learned as well. They stopped turning in alarm whenever weight shifted above them. They began adjusting their stride beneath the children, slowing when a rider leaned too far and bracing before sharp turns. Ashpaw adapted first. Sable adapted fastest.

Grub tested her harness himself. She was barely large enough to carry him comfortably, and he approached the attempt with more caution than the children had shown. He pressed his weight gradually across her back, watching for any stiffening through her shoulders. Sable looked behind her and huffed.

"I'm making sure I'm not hurting you." Her ears flattened briefly, communicating what she thought of the delay. Grub swung his leg over. From the ground, Sable seemed long and lean. From her back, she seemed alarmingly tall. He settled behind her shoulders and took hold of the grips. The harness held his weight without sliding.

"Walk." Sable walked. The movement rolled beneath him, smoother than he expected but less stable than standing on the ground had led him to imagine. Every step lifted and lowered him in a rhythm his body didn't yet understand. He adjusted. Sable increased her pace.

"Walk," Grub repeated. She trotted. His grip tightened.

"Walk," he pleaded. Sable broke into a run. The clearing vanished.

"Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!" His voice stretched out behind them as Sable became a blur across the snow. Cold air struck Grub's face hard enough to draw tears from his eyes. Snow sprayed behind them as she crossed the packed path, climbed the small hill effortlessly, and leapt the stream without warning. Grub's stomach remained about twenty paces behind him. They hit the ground on the other side with Grub still mounted, though only because both hands had locked around the grips and refused to open.

Sable accelerated even more. Terror and exhilaration rose together until Grub could no longer tell where one ended and the other began. He leaned into her movement, shifting when she turned and lowering himself when she stretched into a longer stride. The ride became smoother. As they flew through the forest, Grub became more comfortable with the movements. When Sable finally circled back toward the clearing, his legs trembled from gripping the harness, and his breath came in clouds that broke apart behind him.

She slowed reluctantly near the wall. Grub slid down from her back, landed badly, and had to catch himself against her side. Throk looked him over.

"You seem shorter."

"I'm considering throwing up." Throk pointed toward the forest.

"Do it over there." Grub gave him an unamused look. Throk just grinned. Kesh approached Sable and examined the harness.

"You two were gone nearly an hour. How far did she carry you?"

"Farther than I could run in a day."

"How quickly?" Grub glanced toward the forest.

"Much faster than I'd like." Dravak gave a single nod.

"This will be useful." The others began achieving stable rides soon afterward. The girl guided Ashpaw through the clearing at a trot, then a lope, leaning with him instead of pulling against every turn. When he shifted direction, she followed the movement rather than attempting to force him beneath her. She completed an entire circuit without falling. The other children answered with a cheer. Ashpaw slowed near the center of the clearing, snow scattering around his gray-dusted paws.

The girl straightened upon his back and threw one fist into the air. The cheering and laughing grew louder. Then Ashpaw lifted his head. The howl that left him was deeper than Grub expected, a great rolling sound that seemed too large for even his broad chest. It struck the wall, climbed the ridge, and carried into the forest until the bare branches trembled around it. Grub felt the sound vibrate through his ribs. For a heartbeat, the other wolves stood still. Then Sable raised her muzzle and answered.

One by one, the rest joined them. Their voices layered together until the clearing disappeared beneath the sound. Ashpaw's howl remained at the center, deep and commanding, while the others rose around it in sharper notes that overlapped, broke apart, and gathered again. The chorus rolled across the snow-covered ridge and poured into the cavern through every seam around the heavy door. The celebration among the children died beneath it. Even Grub found himself holding still.

This wasn't the uncertain crying of pups calling for warmth or food. It was the voice of a direwolf pack, loud enough to announce its presence across the forest and make anything listening reconsider the wisdom of coming closer. The heavy door shifted behind them. A brace struck the stone inside, followed by urgent shouting. The door was dragged aside, and Warriors surged through the opening with spears raised, searching the clearing for whatever had reached the den. They found no attackers.

Only eleven young direwolves standing beneath the pale winter sky, their heads lifted as their howls rolled together above the wall. The Warriors slowed, then stopped. One lowered his spear. Another looked from the wolves to the mounted children and then toward the empty forest beyond them, as though expecting an enemy to reveal itself out of embarrassment. Ashpaw's howl ended at last. Silence returned to the clearing, leaving the wind to move through the bare branches.

Throk stared at the wolves for a long moment before his grin spread wide across his face.

"That," he said, looking toward the forest, "will make other tribes nervous." Kesh's eyes remained fixed upon Ashpaw.

"It made us reach for weapons."

"Exactly." Behind them, the remaining goblins had crowded near the doorway. Their fear eased as they understood what they were seeing, replaced by something quieter and harder to name. Pride, perhaps. Or the first realization that the creatures sleeping beside their children no longer sounded like animals the Ironfang had captured. They sounded like something the forest would learn to fear. The exercises changed after that. Kesh placed markers along the clearing and had the riders weave between them.

Throk taught them to lower their bodies and cling close whenever the wolves accelerated. The Builders checked every strap after each run, searching for rubbing, stretching, or knots beginning to loosen. Grub focused on teaching signals. A whistle for slowing. Two clicks of the tongue for turning. A shouted command when the entire group needed to stop together. The girl learned to direct Ashpaw with voice, knees, and the shift of her weight. The others watched her, then tried the same.

Soon the wolves no longer moved as ten separate animals carrying frightened children. They began moving as a pack. The girl called a command from Ashpaw's back, and the wolves veered right almost together. Another call sent them spreading apart. A third brought them inward again. It was uneven, slow, and filled with mistakes. But the beginning was there. Grub stood near the wall with Sable resting beside him and watched them cross the snow in a broad arc. He saw what Dravak saw.

Speed through terrain that slowed every goblin tribe around them. Scouts ranging farther before darkness. Hunters cutting off prey that believed deep snow offered safety. Warriors arriving from a direction an enemy had thought impossible. He saw spring. He also saw blood.