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Chapter Nine - A Successful Hunt

We had moved from the bridge nearly an hour ago. Midnight and I stayed following behind Alec while he led us over the unfamiliar terrain. The roots of trees would sometimes trip us, or we'd step on something sharp that would cut the bottoms of our pads. Fortunately nothing exceptionally painful pierced through the thick skin on the pads of our hindpaws so we were able to keep up with the adult wolf.

The temperature stayed steadily warm, which was unnatural for this time of the year. It was slowly melting the snow and ice that had clung to the trees. When I glanced up, I could see that the ash wasn't falling so heavy anymore, not only because the trees sheltered us but also that there was just less ash falling from the sky. The sky was still as dark as night but the orange glow off the ash clouds offered some light to our well-adjusted eyes. The smell of the air was still stale with only small wisps of smoke detectable in the ash. The stale air almost gave me a suffocating sensation but I had learned to deal with it.

Even though the river was far in the distance, its roar could still be heard as it angrily consumed everything in its path. My hindpaw landed on a dry twig buried under the dead needles for the evergreen trees, causing it snap loudly. In response, the bush next to me suddenly rattled with the flutter of wings and loud squawking. A bird sprung out of the bush and flew at me. My heart stopped for a moment and I inhaled sharply as I ducked down to cover myself. The bird however just flew over me and fled from us.

"It's just a bird," Alec said, glancing back at me briefly before continuing hiking through the foliage. "You startled it. If you leave the animals alone they will leave you alone. We don't have a lot of meat on our bones so no predator bother trying to eat us. But if you scare an animal, it will often try to flee. If you hunt it down, then it will try to fight back which is why it's dangerous to hunt healthy animals. If you hunt too many of the same kind down, they might have known others who might try to retaliate." Alec's eyes were eyeing the ground when he slowed down. "Look here. A small animal came through here recently."

Alec stopped and knelt down to the ground. He showed us some of the ash that had fallen on the ground was slightly disturbed. With little ash having made it through the tree limbs, and the snow melting beneath the ash, it was difficult to see the difference between the disturbed area and the undisturbed part of the ground.

"You can see a few partial paw prints," Alec informed us. Midnight and I knelt down to get a better look at what Alec was showing us. We could see some partial prints but there were others signs of a pattern in the ground. Through the ash, mud and foliage there was also a feint hint of an animalistic scent, barely detectable over the other scents. "A few animals might have used this trail to get to the river."

From his bag, the adult wolf pulled out a roll of string and he cut off a large portion of it. Instructing and showing us, he made a snare by tying the string to a nearby sapling tree that he bent down toward the ground. The other end of the string was tied to a wooden stake in the ground, that prevented the sapling from springing back up.

"Normally when you bait a snare or trap the animal can tell it is suspicious," Alec informed us after he finished assembling the snare. "They will be more cautious when retrieving any bait which can set off the snare without catching anything. But with the volcano eruption, and it being winter, the animals might be a bit more desperate."

Alec retrieved some modestly scented bait from the bag and set it near the snare so that if anyone reached for it, they'd brush against the wooden stake. He set his paw on the ground and demonstrated to us how the snare would work. Moving his paw along, he lightly brushed the stake just enough that tension the sapling was creating ripped the stake out of the ground. The string ringed around the stake ensnared his wrist and hoisted it up into the air.

"The animal will be left hanging here," Alec said after the short demonstration. He removed his paw from the snare and carefully reassembled it again. "Some times when an animal doesn't panic, it can figure out the snare and chew threw the string. This snare doesn't always work but it is inexpensive to make and difficult to detect by animals. Come, we'll find another area to build one and you two can try to make it."

"How many can we make?" asked Midnight. Alec started to lead us away from the snare now, off to find a new location to make some more.

"We have enough string to make about twenty," answered the adult wolf. "We'll have to remember where we put each snare because it does no one any good if one catches an animal, and we forgot where we put that snare."

I glanced back behind us through the trees and had no idea where the snare was. The forest had very few significant landmarks, unlike the city, so it was difficult to distinguish one cluster of trees apart from another. I may have failed to remember where the last one was but I was determined to remember where we would place the next one.

The sound of the river faded, as we must have moved further from it; or it moved further from us. The scents remained the same stale smoky scent but every now and then a different earthen scent could be smelled, or an animalistic scent. The land we walked on sometimes rolled up making a steep climb; or it would roll down that was slippery and difficult to descend. I tried to memorize it all but it was difficult given the subtle differences from one place to another.

"Okay Midnight, Snowy," said Alec after we had nearly walked another three kilometers. "Keep an eye out for an animal trail then pick a place to set up a snare."

Alec let us take the lead and our gazes fell to the ground as we searched for a pattern in the ash and foliage that would suggest an animal has been through that area. I started to recognize the compacted ground that moved along a path but before I could declare I found one, Midnight had found it as well and pointed it out.

"Here's one," he claimed and pointed at it. "Can we build a snare here?"

"Is there a sapling that you can use nearby?" Alec asked.

I looked around but all the trees and bushes that were nearby didn't look like they were flexible enough to bend and spring back up. Most of the vegetation was dead anyway which made them far more brittle than they would be during the spring.

"No," admitted Midnight after searching as well.

Following the path with my eyes, I saw a sapling hidden among some of the bushes further ahead. "There's one," I said pointing at it.

"That one might work," said Alec. We followed the trail down to the sapling that I had spotted and stopped near it. Alec cut a meter long string for us and told us to assemble the snare. "Be careful to not break the tree or we can't build a snare here."

With a few failed attempts, I tied the string to the end of the sapling. I grabbed the top of the small tree and pulled it down toward the ground. It slipped from my paws and the tip of it whipped under my jaw painfully. Rubbing off the pain I tried again, making sure I had a better grip this time. Slowly the tree bent until the other end of the string was resting on the ground. Midnight spread out the string around on the ground and stakes a small part of it into the ground.

"Slowly let go of the sapling," Alec instructed me. He stood back from us about a meter but was keeping a watchful eye over what we did.

Following his instruction I slowly let my grip go of the sapling but it suddenly snapped up and slapped my paw painfully. Rubbing my paw, I started to hate this tree on a personal level.

We tried to assemble the snare again, being more delicate with our touch. I was also more cautious of the tree in case it decided to snap back at me again. When the snare failed again, the tree did snap back up and I nearly fell back as I tried to avoid its painful swat. Menacing tree was purposefully trying to hit me.

"Try tying it twice and hammer the stake down a little more so it'll stop being pulled out," Alec instructed Midnight while I tried to bend the tree down again. "Tie it tighter. Okay, Snowy, slowly let go again." I released my grip slowly again and this time when my paw left the sapling, the string held it down. "You two did it!"

We stepped back from the snare as Alec congratulated us but all I did was hold the tree down. I didn't feel as if I accomplished all that much; certainly not worth the exaggerated praise the adult gave us.

Alec started to lead us in a large circle around the area of where we built the first two snares and we continued to build them spaced far apart from each other. With each one Midnight and I tried to build them together and sometimes by ourselves. I was whipped a few more times by other saplings and flexible plants that we used, but after I completed a snare on my own and was congratulated, I felt prideful of my accomplishment. No longer feeling under accomplished, I held my head a little higher.

Keeping an eye out for any more signs of animals, I was surprised when Alec stopped suddenly at a very small clearing. There were no animal trails that I could see, and no decent vegetation to build a snare.

"We'll set up camp here," Alec said after looking around the clearing. "Tomorrow, or whenever we wake up, we'll check the snares and head back to the town."

I was so excited about all the snares we were building, and having a feeling of accomplishment that wasn't caused by stealing something, that I completely forgot about why we were out here.

"How are we going to sleep out here?" asked Midnight looking at the open and rough ground. The ground with the needles was probably softer than the compacted ground of the road or cities, but the needles and mud would be a great annoyance if we were to lie in it, and have it stuck in our fur.

"I'll show you two how to make a tent," Alec said and throwing off his pack. Inside was a thick sheet of leather and a thin cloth with a bunch of loops surrounding the edges. He tossed them in a dry patch nearby and started wandering around, picking up different sticks and fallen branches. He measured them to each other until he found two straight sticks about the same length. They were taller than me if he stood them up beside me. Alec then pushed the sticks into the ground about two meters apart so that they would stand on their own.

Grabbing the rolled up cloth, he used the loops on the edges to tie both ends to the sticks, affectively pitching up the tent. I watched him then pull on the sides and use smaller sticks to stake the loops in place. Finally he rolled out the thick leather underneath the tent, giving us a place to rest for the night.

"Now you two should go around and set up a few more snares," Alec said after the tent was up. He knelt pulled the string from his pack and started to cut snare-size string for us. He gave us each a pawful of the cut string. "Stay close and don't get lost. I'm going to go hunt us some dinner for tonight." The adult wolf unsheathed a slender piece of wood that he had carried with the pack. I didn't realize what it was until I saw him string it and turn it into a bow. "I'll be back in a few hours."

"We'll be here," Midnight said as the adult wolf looked down at us.

Armed with a quiver of arrows and the bow, Alec soon disappeared behind the tree line and left us at the pitched tent.

Midnight and I looked at each other. We had no idea where we were in this forest. The adult was the only thing that made us feel secure, and now without him, I could feel the weight of the forest close in around me. If Alec got lost, killed or simply abandoned us, we wouldn't survive very long out here. Alec did instruct us to set up more snares though, and I did not want to disappoint him.

"Should we go set up more snares?" I asked Midnight who was still looking at me with a gaze that suggested he too was thinking the same thing. He blinked a couple times when I asked him what we should do.

"Yes, let's try but we can't go far," Midnight said. He looked away from me and around the woods. "Let's go this way."

Midnight now led me out of the clearing and into the woods. I glanced back several times trying to memorize anything that stood out from the path we took. I started to grow more and more nervous the further away from the tent we got. What if we couldn't find our way back? I doubted that Alec would be able to find us if we did get lost. We can't even find ourselves out here.

Carelessly we assembled a few more snares on what we thought were animal pathways but some of them we knew that they weren't. Hurrying, I felt the painful sting of a few more sapling whips but before an hour was finished, we had used up the string Alec had given us, even if the snares were far too close to each other to be efficient.

"Let's go back now," Midnight said after hastily finishing the last snare. I watched him as he looked around as if choosing a direction to go.

I was worried but I suppressed the urge to panic and did my best to remember which way we came. Midnight backtracked, and I followed and was relieved to find that our pawprints in the soft ash were somewhat visible on the ground. Using our pawprints as our primary guide, I had started to recognize a large rock, or a twisted tree. Before long we had returned to the tent without having gotten lost.

"Alec won't be back for a while," I commented, looking around. "Should we just wait around for him?"

"I guess," answered Midnight. He was eyeing the trees. Neither of us said anything for a moment and I could hear strange distant calls of what I assumed were the animals. I could hear a light breeze blow through the air as well, but other than that the forest was silent.

Nothing else to do, I crawled under the tent and did my best to curl up. Lying down on the soft leather, I was surprised how soft the ground was due to all the dead needles beneath the leather. IT was the softest ground I have ever lied down on. Resting my body just for a second made me realize how tired I was. Hiking through the woods was hard, and it had revived the soreness that I had forgotten. The ache from the previous day of walking with the caravan of refugees had returned, but I was grateful it was not as painful as it was last time he had lied down to rest.

Midnight crawled in next to me underneath the tent and lied down. I sprawled out again so he'd have more room to lie under the tent. I stared up at the pitched tent, slowly breathing in and out. The darkness was still lingering overhead for what would be the third night in a row.

"Do you think the sun will ever rise again?" I asked the wolf lying next to me.

"You heard what Alec said," stated Midnight. He was staring up at the roof of the tent as well. Both of us were too deep in thought to look at the other. "The world always balances itself out so I'm sure the sun will return. Maybe the sun will shine for as many days as it has been dark. That would make it balanced."

Something about that sounded wrong to me but it was logical according to what Alec had told us so I ignored it. Besides, now that I was resting another uncomfortable sensations started to surface. The fact that we hadn't eaten all day was catching up to me, but I was familiar with the pain of hunger. I did my best to ignore that as well.

"How long do you think it'll take Alec to come back?" I remembered his promise of bring food back.

"Soon," muttered the wolf. His mind was obviously on other things. "He's teaching us to set up these snares, but why did he ignore us when we saw that foreigner following us?"

"Adults never believe us," I remarked. "Maybe one of the animals will kill him."

Midnight chuckled a bit. "They don't attack us unless they're protecting themselves, remember? Anyway, we should get some sleep. Alec will wake us when he comes back."

Sleep sounded like a good idea so I rolled over on my side and closed my eyes. Facing away from Midnight, I tucked my tail between my legs so that it wouldn't be an annoyance to Midnight, or so that he wouldn't roll over on it in a painful way.

Midnight and I were both under the tent, and it felt strange to be expecting food to be coming to us. I have been so used to one of us having to fight or steal for our food. My mind was so calm that I really didn't know what to think about. Laying there in the dark, all I could do was imagine what the new city would be like. Or what it would be like to be able to make snares, sell or eat our catches. Maybe that mountain blowing up was the best thing that had ever happened to us. We could save our money and maybe even buy us a lot of new things.

Snap!

Distant and soft was the sound but it pulled me from the dark embraces of my sleepy haze. Something else was nearby. My heart started to race as I raised my head from the ground. I looked over at Midnight who was also pushing himself up. His orange eyes looked into mine briefly before glancing out into the woods. My gaze was still on the wolf when I saw his reaction; fur bristled all over his body and his eyes grew wide.

I pushed myself up and turned to look behind me with the chilly sensation that I already knew who it was that had found us. Midnight was already jumping up.

"There you brats are," I heard the reptilian say. Without delaying, the reptilian unsheathed his sword and marched straight for us. The tip of the blade caught what little light there was and flashed toward us, declaring that it no longer wanted to waste time to taste our blood. The gap between the assassin and us closed quickly.

"Snowy!" yelled Midnight. The wolf stumbled to jump up and practically crawled to run away. I could hear the pace of the reptilian quicken; the weight of the reptilian crushing the needles, snow, ice and ash.

Crunch! Crunch!

Breath and heart in my throat, I willed my paws to get underneath me so I can sprint away but they would not move fast enough.

Crunch!

He was right behind me the moment I managed to get my hindpaws beneath me. I pushed off with all my strength.

The sharp sting of the blade's tip burned from the left flank of my back to my spine. Pain flamed out from the wound, crippling me for a moment and I stumbled to the ground. Landing hard I could feel something wet and warm leaking from the burning sensation across half my back.

Looking up I saw Midnight slow when he noticed I was not following. He pulled out his dagger and stepped toward me, and the reptilian. What was he doing? Why isn't he running?

I looked down at the ground as I tried to push myself up, but the pain flared at the slightest movement. I heard metal clash against metal, just before Midnight yelped. Looking up, I saw Midnight clutching his arm and I could smell his blood leaking from a wound there.

Thump!

Staring at the reptilian standing over Midnight, I could not understand what was happening. The reptilian was raising his blade to strike Midnight and finish the job but he had froze suddenly.

Thump!

The reptilian dropped his blade and fell to his knees in front of the reeling black wolf. His body twisted just enough for me to see the two feathered arrows protruding from his chest.

Alec came storming out of the woods, with another arrow notched in his bow and aimed directly at the reptilian. The adult wolf had a bandage wrapped around his neck and thigh. Relieved I rolled over painfully landing on my back and looked up at the adult wolf. With a sharp kick, the reptilian was thrown into the ground, gasping and hissing with gurgling sounds escaping from his throat.

"Thought you killed me, thought you could lose me?" Alec screamed. The ferocity the wolf showed surprised me. The kind wolf that had agreed to teach us to hunt and provide ourselves had now shot our assailant with every intent to kill him. He stepped on the reptilian with one hindpaw and pulled back the bowstring with the arrow aimed straight down at the reptilian's head. "Why are you hunting the orphan, assassin?!"

"All heathens will burn," spat the reptilian. "It is already coming."

"Can't even tell a volcanic eruption for what it is, so it must be the work of some deity," replied Alec somewhat sarcastically. "How does an orphan threaten your deity?"

"It is the will of Abishag," spat the reptilian. "All heathens will burn."

"It is the will of fools who wish to control our lives," growled Alec. His paw released the string.

Thump!

My eyes were glued on the two adults, one now pinned to the ground with three arrows protruding from his body. Alec reached down to the reptilian and threw back the outer layer of the reptilians garments.

"A Talon," he growled. He pulled on the shirt underneath and ripped it off of the pinned body, the shirt was black with five talons printed on it in a threatening pose, as if one of the clawed hands of the assassin was trying to reach out to me.

Alec seemed to be calming down as he stuffed the ripped shirt into one of his pockets. He looked at us with a gentler expression before limping over to us.

Blood belonging to four different beings now covered the snow and ash on the ground.

"He's no longer a threat to you two," he said, kneeling down next to Midnight.

Midnight's eyes leaked tears and he had trouble catching his breath through sobs. His paw held tightly to his arm where he was cut. Alec tore some cloth from his own shirt and bandaged the black wolf's arms, much to his wails and screams. I didn't even realize that I was crying myself until Alec came over to me.

"We'll have to clean the wounds, which will hurt," said Alec. He grabbed the borrowed shirt I wore and started to lift it over my torso. Stretching my back caused the pain to flare, making me flinch and cry out but Alec ignored my pain and forced the shirt off of me. He moved behind me and lightly touched around the wound. "It's a shallow cut but we have to bandage it. Your fur will grow back and cover the scar."

"How do we clean our cuts?" asked Midnight, trying to ignore the tight pressure of the bandage around his arm. "Why will it hurt?"

"Wounds are cleansed through fire," Alec remarked. He tore the borrowed shirt I was wearing into strips and started to wrap it around my torso, covering the cut. The idea of touching fire to my already-burning back did not sound appealing to me. "I'll have to build the fire first though so you two go inside the tent and rest. Don't look out."

Bandaged up, I followed Alec's orders and crawled over to the tent with slow movements. I avoided the body of the reptilian and joined Midnight underneath the tent cloth. We looked at each other, his tear glazed orange eyes staring back into my own brown eyes. Despite our wounds, I felt a tremendous relief that we no longer had to worry about the reptilian. I even dared to smile a little.

Midnight returned the smile and wrapped his arms around me. We both flinched and grunted as the jolt caused us both pain.

"He's gone, and Alec is teaching us to hunt, things will be better for us from now on Snowy," declared the black wolf optimistically. Our ears twitched at the sound of Alec moving something heavy, but we did not look as he ordered. Neither of us wanted to see that reptilian again, even if he was dead on the ground. "Mount Ignis blowing up was great!" I was certain there were many, many others who'd disagree but I didn't care.

"I know," I replied and laughed, which also hurt. It seems like the worries that had burdened me leaked out from the cut across my back. It also made me feel light headed but I could not rid myself of my smile. "I am sleepy though."

Regardless of how great I felt, the cut was consistently painful. Lying down on my side, I kept from rolling over onto my wound. Midnight rested next to me being careful to avoid causing more injury to himself as well. My head continued to swirl with my light-headedness until I passed out.

I woke up to the crackling sound of fire. With the sky still covered in darkness, I could not judge how long I slept since it felt like I had just fallen asleep. My ear twitched slightly when the burning wood popped and snapped. Raising my head to look at the fire, I felt the soreness of my entire lower left back where the blade had sliced through my fur and skin.

Alec was sitting next to a fire, feeding it with more logs. There was a small pot of water sitting on the fire, and a dagger hilt sticking into the flames. The wolf stared blankly at the fire though as he fed the last of the broken wood he had gathered.

The soreness felt across my back persisted and prevented me from falling back asleep easily. I crawled up to my hindpaws and slowly walked over to Alec. He didn't even notice me until I carefully sat down next to him.

"Hey Snowy," he greeted me with a brief glance. "How's the cut feeling?"

"It hurts," I whined. The small cut tingled whenever I even thought about it.

"Midnight can at least lick his wound clean but you can't lick yours," Alec told to me. "It is still best for both of you to get it cleaned quickly so that it doesn't get infected."

The adult wolf's words of cleaning the wound through fire echoed in my mind. I looked down at the flames licking up the fresh logs and flinched at the sight of them. I was no stranger to minor cuts and bruises, especially after how many times I have been beaten, but the cut caused by the assassin's sword was different than all those. I had to trust Alec knew what he was doing. If I didn't trust Alec then we would have never come out into this forest in the first place.

The wolf still had bandages around his neck and leg; I could see and smell the blood that had soaked through them. If our wounds had to be cleaned through fire, as he said, then his does as well so how bad could it be.

"Has Midnight ever mentioned anything from before he lived on the streets?" Alec asked me, his gaze having fallen back to the flames.

"He's always been an orphan, like me," I answered. Looking around the campsite, I realized that something was missing. I didn't even notice the absence of the reptilian's body. I was glad to have him out of my sight though.

"You both had parents at one point," stated Alec. "Who were his..." His words trailed off and he pondered over something but he did not share it with me.

We sat in silence for a few minutes. My eyes locked onto the dancing flames as well. I could feel their heat covering half of me in a blanket of warmth. The soft crackling and popping continued but it sounded almost pleasant to my ears. The smoke smelled like the bakery fires just before they would put in their bread to cook.

Thinking on bread made me hungry. Alec was supposed to bring back dinner but maybe he couldn't because of the reptilian.

"Lie on your front," Alec ordered me suddenly. "And close your eyes."

I looked at him confused briefly before doing as he commanded. I turned and lied on my stomach, facing away from the fire. Folding my arms under my head, I rested my head on the ground, exposing my back to the adult wolf. He unraveled the bandage around my back, that caused it to feel even sorer briefly but I gritted my teeth and suffered through it.

I could hear Alec handling a few things from near the fire, including the boiling water before kneeling down next to me.

"This might hurt a bit," was the biggest understatement I have ever heard. Every nerve on my back exploded in pain. The pain shot straight up my spine and overwhelmed every other thought in my brain other than to flee.

"Ahhh!" I screamed. I struggled to get up but put a knee on my shoulder and forced to me to stay down. "Stop it!" I cried and thrashed, trying to get away from the fire that touched my skin. All I had to do was to flee but I couldn't with Alec pinning me down. The blade followed the cut toward my spine, forcing sobs and tears to escape from me.

The blade stopped and left the wound but it left a hellish burning behind. I still crawled at the ground in an attempt to escape. The ground was cool and if I could roll in it, maybe the pain would fade.

Alec applied more heat, a wet kind of heat as he wiped the cut clean. It didn't hurt but it didn't relieve the pain either. The pain burned as if it was still on fire, until he applied something else that instantly felt cool. With some of the pain relieved, I stopped struggling but still let tears streak down my furry cheeks. I then felt myself being lifted slightly, to my paws and knees, and the bandaged being wrapped around me again. Now with the fire on the cut fading, I no longer felt the need to roll on my back and simply collapsed back on to the ground.

"Sorry Snowy," Alec said. He left me collapsed on the ground while I slowly recovered from the torture he administered to me. "It is clean now though. It won't be infected and it'll heal faster so that it won't hurt for as long either."

I never would have thought that healing would hurt so much. Surely Alec could have found a less painful way. Did he delight in causing me so much pain?

"Are you okay Snowy?" I heard Midnight ask. My screams and crying must have waked him, but I dared not move and risk more pain. I remained lying in the soft dry needles, leaving his question unanswered.

"He'll be fine," Alec answered for me after a moment of silence. "He had it worse because his cut was close to his spine. Yours won't hurt as much."

"You're going to do that to me?" I heard Midnight ask. His voice sounded strained, due to fear of hearing and seeing what I went through.

"If its not clean then you can die from an infection," insisted Alec.

I still did not move but I could hear the two wolves moving around. Midnight must have agreed, no matter how reluctantly, to accept the torture of healing. The sound of flesh and blood sizzling under a reheated blade could be heard. Midnight clamped his jaw shut but a loud and painful whine rolled out from his throat. After two seconds, he started to cry and sob as well, but he did not scream like I had.

Alec must have intentionally made the pain a surprise for me, which made it all the worse. If I had known how painful it would be then I wouldn't have agreed to it! But, maybe that's why he healed me first. Still, I hated him for it right now.

I slowly started to sit up with most of the pain fading into an annoying ache. I crossed my legs once I was sitting, and wrapped my tail around me while I watched Alec rewrap Midnight's arm. The wolf pup's eyes were glazed over and tears leaked down from him but his sobs have stopped and he was handling the pain much better than I had. Alec did say that I had it the worst for some reason after all.

"Are you feeling better Snowy?" the adult wolf asked me, noticing that I had gotten up now. I felt like glaring at the adult, but instead I nodded in answer. "Good. I managed to catch a small animal before the assassin... distracted me." The wolf's paw reflexively reached for his bandaged throat. "I have to clean my wounds now."

He grabbed the blade that he had heated up to use on Midnight and me from the fire. It was glowing red again, but this time he unraveled his own bandages and pressed the hot blade to his own wounds. He gritted his teeth and even he could not stop the tears from glazing over his eyes. However, he moved far quicker than he had when he pressed the fiery blade to my back and soon had all his heals cleaned by fire and with some sort of green paste on the cuts, and bandaged again.

"Now," he breathed out. His breath was heavy as he was fighting off the pain. "I'll show you two how to make use of every part of the animal." From his bag he pulled out a small animal that was about the length of my arm. It had a short tail about six centimeters long and its body was slender.

With the same knife, he instructed us where to cut open the animal, how to skin it, what was edible and what parts were best for stews instead. The bones can be sold or used to for creating nets or clothes even. Not any part of the animal was wasted. Spearing the cleaned carcass on a stick, Alec set it over the fire to have it start cooking.

We were told that we should rotate the animal at a slow but constant rate, to minimalize the fats from dropping off into the fire, and to evenly cook the whole carcass. After about half an hour, we removed the animal from over the fire and started to distribute the meat between the three of us.

"Let's get some sleep," Alec suggested after we had finished licking the bones clean. "Tomorrow we'll head back and check the snares. I'll to report to Lord Naali about the attack once we're back too."

With my belly supplied with some delicious meat, the pain caused by Alec's torture faded and the relief of having significantly less problems to worry about put me in a good mood again. With the other two wolves, I lied down under the tent and although it was a little cramped, it was warmer than I have ever been, especially with Midnight directly pressed up against me. Exhausted, none of us were awake more than a few minutes after we had lied down under the tent.