Julie of the Wolves (4 page)

Amaroq howled the long note to assemble. Silver and Nails barked a brief “Coming,” and it was the beginning of a new day for Miyax and the wolves. Although the clocks in Barrow would say it was time to get ready for bed, she was getting up, for she was on wolf time. Since there was no darkness to hamper her vision, night was as good a time to work as day, and much better if you were a wolf girl. Rehearsing whimpers and groveling positions as she climbed to her lookout, she got ready to tell Amaroq how helpless she was in his own language.

He was awake, lying on his side, watching Sister’s paw twitch as she slept. He got up and licked the restless sleeper as if to say “All’s well.” The paw relaxed.

Miyax whimpered and twisted her head appealingly. Amaroq shot her a glance and wagged his tail as if she had said “Hello,” not “I’m helpless.”

Suddenly his head lifted, his ears went up, and Amaroq sniffed the wind. Miyax sniffed the wind and smelled nothing, although Amaroq was on his feet now, electric with the airborne message. He snapped his hunters to attention and led them down the slope and off across the tundra. Jello stayed home with the pups.

The pack moved in single file almost to the horizon, then swerved and came back. Shading her eyes, Miyax finally saw what the wind had told Amaroq. A herd of caribou was passing through. She held her breath as the hunters sped toward a large buck. The animal opened his stride and gracefully gained ground. He could so easily outrun the wolves that Amaroq let him go and trotted toward another. This one, too, outdistanced the pack and Amaroq swerved and tested another. Just as Miyax was wondering how the wolves ever caught anything, Amaroq put on full speed and bore down on a third.

This animal could not outrun him, and when Amaroq attacked he turned and struck with his powerful hoofs. Like a bouncing ball the leader sprang away. Nails and Silver fanned out to either side of the beast, then veered and closed in. The caribou bellowed, pressed back his ears, zigzagged over a frost heave, and disappeared from sight.

“They’re chasing the weakest,” Miyax said in astonishment. “It’s just like Kapugen said—wolves take the old and sick.”

She looked from the empty tundra to the busy den site. Kapu was staring at her, his eyes narrowed, his ears thrown forward aggressively.

“Now why are you so hostile?” she asked, then looked at her feet and legs. “Ee-lie, Ee-lie.” She dropped to all fours and smiled apologetically.

“
Ayi
, Kapu. You’ve never seen a man in all your life. What is it that tells you to beware? Some spirit of your ancestors that still dwells in your body?”

She gave the grunt-whine and Kapu pressed down his ears, snatched up a bone and brought it over to her. She grabbed it, he tugged, she pulled, he growled, she giggled, and Jello called Kapu home. He cocked an ear, rolled his eyes, and ignored the baby-sitter.

“You’re naughty,” she said and covered a grin with her hand. “Martha would scold me for that.”

Kapu dropped the bone. She leaned down, picked it up in her teeth, and tried to run on all fours. She had barely begun to move away when Kapu leaped on her back and took her bare neck in his teeth. She started to scream, checked herself and, closing her eyes, waited for the teeth to pierce her skin. They did not even bruise, so controlled was this grip that said “Drop the bone.” She let it go, and in one swish Kapu leaped to the ground and snatched it.

As she started after him something struck her boot and she looked around to see Zit, Zat, and Sister at her heels. Zing charged up the knoll, hit her arm with great force, and knocked her to the ground. She growled, flashed her teeth, and narrowed her eyes. Kapu dropped the bone and lay down. Zing backed up, and for a moment not a puppy moved.

“Phew.” She smiled. “That did it.”

Too late she remembered that such a smile was an apology, a sort of “I didn’t mean it,” and before she could growl all five little wolves jumped on her again.

“Stop!” She was angry. They sensed it and backed away. “Shoo! Go!” She waved her arm above her head and the threatening pose spoke louder than all her words. Drooping their tails, glancing warily at her, they trotted away—all but Kapu. He licked her cheek.

“Dear Kapu.” She was about to stroke his head, when he picked up the bone and carried it back to the den. But he was not done with play. He never was. Kapu was tireless. Diving into a tunnel, he came out on the other side and landed on Jello’s tail.

When Miyax saw this she sat back on her heels. Open-ended tunnels reminded her of something. In the spring, wolf packs stay at a nursery den where the pups are born deep in the earth at the end of long tunnels. When the pups are about six weeks old and big enough to walk and run, the leaders move the entire group to a summer den. These are mere shelters for the pups and are open at two ends. For a few weeks the packs stay at this den; then they leave and take up the nomadic winter life of the wolf.

The cold chill of fear ran up Miyax’s spine—the wolves would soon depart! Then what would she do? She could not follow them; they often ran fifty miles in a night and slept in different spots each day.

Her hands trembled and she pressed them together to make them stop, for Kapugen had taught her that fear can so cripple a person that he cannot think or act. Already she was too scared to crawl.

“Change your ways when fear seizes,” he had said, “for it usually means you are doing something wrong.”

She knew what it was—she should not depend upon the wolves for survival. She must go on her own. Instantly she felt relieved, her legs moved, her hands stopped shaking, and she remembered that when Kapugen was a boy, he had told her, he made snares of rawhide and caught little birds.

“Buntings, beware!” she shouted and slid down to her camp. Stepping out of her pants, she slipped off her tights and cut a swath of cloth from the hip with her ulo. She tore the cloth into small strips, then ate some stew, and started off to hunt birds. Every so often she tied a bit of red cloth to a clump of grass or around a conspicuous stone. If she was going to hunt in this confusing land, she must leave a trail to lead her home. She could not smell her way back as the wolves did.

As she tied the first piece of cloth to a bent sedge, she looked down on a small pile of droppings. “Ee-lie,” she said. “A bird roost. Someone sleeps here every night.” Quickly she took the thongs from her boots, made a noose, and placed it under the sedge. Holding the pull-rope, she moved back as far as she could and lay down to await the return of the bird.

The sun slid slowly down the sky, hung still for a moment, then started up again. It was midnight. A flock of swift-flying Arctic terns darted overhead, and one by one dropped into the grasses. Ruddy turn-stones called sleepily from their scattered roosts, and sandpipers whistled. The creatures of the tundra were going to sleep, as they did also at noon in the constant daylight. Each called from his roost—all but the little bird of the sedge. It had not come back.

A bird chirped three feet from her face, and Miyax rolled her eyes to the left. A bunting on a grass blade tucked its bill into the feathers on its back, fluffed, and went to sleep. Where, she asked, was the bird of the sedge? Had it been killed by a fox or a weasel?

She was about to get to her feet and hunt elsewhere, but she remembered that Kapugen never gave up. Sometimes he would stand motionless for five hours at a seal breathing hole in the ice waiting for a seal to come up for a breath. She must wait, too.

The sun moved on around the sky and, when it was directly behind her, the sleeping bunting lifted its head and chirped. It hopped to a higher blade of grass, preened, and sang its morning song. The sleep was over. Her bird had not come back.

Suddenly a shadow passed. A snowy owl, white wings folded in a plummeting dive, threw out his feathered feet and struck the little gray bunting. The owl bounced up, and came down almost on Miyax’s outstretched hand, the bird caught in his foot. Her first instinct was to pounce on the owl, but she instantly thought better of that. Even if she could catch him, she would have his powerful claws and beak to contend with, and she knew what damage they could do. Besides, she had a better idea—to lie still and watch where he flew. Perhaps he had owlets in the nest, for these little birds took almost six weeks to get on their wings. If there were owlets, there would also be food, lots of it, for the male owls are constantly bringing food to the young. Once, she had counted eighty lemmings piled at the nest of a snowy owl.

So close was the
ookpick
, the white owl of the north, that she could see the clove markings on his wings and the dense white feathers that covered his legs and feet. His large yellow eyes were pixieish, and he looked like a funny little Eskimo in white parka and mukluks. The wind stirred the wolverine trim on Miyax’s hood and the owl turned his gleaming eyes upon her. She tried not to blink and belie the life in her stone-still body, but he was suspicious. He turned his head almost upside down to get a more acute focus on her; then unwinding swiftly, he lifted his body and sped off. His wings arched deeply as he steered into a wind and shot like a bullet toward the sun. As Miyax rolled to a sitting position, the owl scooped his wings up, braked, and dropped onto an exceptionally large frost heave. He left the bird and flew out over the tundra, screaming the demonic call of the hunting ookpick.

Miyax tied another red patch on the sedge, rounded a boggy pond, and climbed the heave where the owl lived. There lay an almost dead owlet, its big beak resting on the edge of the stone-lined nest. It lifted its head, laboriously hissed, and collapsed. The owlet was starving, for there was only the bunting, when there should have been dozens of lemmings. It would not live, in this time of no lemmings.

She picked up the bunting and owlet, regretting that she had found a provider only to lose him again. The male owl would not bring food to an empty nest.

Collecting her red markers as she walked home, she kicked open old lemming nests in the hope of finding baby weasels. These small relatives of the mink, with their valuable fur that turns white in winter, enter lemming nests and kill and eat the young. Then they move into the round grassy structures to give birth to their own young. Although Miyax kicked seven nests, there were no weasels—for there were no lemmings to eat.

When in sight of her house she took a shortcut and came upon a pile of old caribou droppings—fuel for her fire! Gleefully, she stuffed her pockets, tied a marker at the site for later use, and skipped home dreaming of owlet stew.

She plucked the birds, laid them on the ground, and skillfully cut them open with her ulo. Lifting out the warm viscera, she tipped back her head and popped them into her mouth. They were delicious— the nuts and candy of the Arctic. She had forgotten how good they tasted. They were rich in vitamins and minerals and her starving body welcomed them.

Treats over, she sliced her birds into delicate strips and simmered them slowly and not too long.

“Chicken of the North,” Miyax gave a toast to the birds. Then she drank the rich juices and popped the tender meat in her mouth. Had she been a boy this day would be one to celebrate. When a boy caught his first bird in Nunivak, he was supposed to fast for a day, then celebrate the Feast of the Bird. When he killed his first seal his mother took off her rings, for he was a man, and this was her way of bragging without saying a word.

Silly, she said to herself, but nevertheless she sang Kapugen’s song of the Bird Feast.

Tornait, tornait,

Spirit of the bird,

Fly into my body

And bring me

The power of the sun.

Kapu yapped to say that the hunters were coming home, and Miyax washed out her pot and went to her lookout to tell them goodnight. Amaroq and Jello were facing each other, ruffs up, ready to fight. Before Jello could attack, Amaroq lifted his head and Jello bowed before him. The dispute was over. No blood was shed. The difference had been settled with the pose of leadership.

Miyax wondered what had happened to put them at odds with each other. Whatever the problem, Jello had surrendered. He was on his back flashing the white fur on his belly that signaled “I give up!”—and no one, not even the pups, could strike him.

“The white flag of surrender,” she murmured. “Jello lost.” Amaroq walked gracefully away.

He was not done with what he had to say, however. With a dash, he picked up her mitten and tore it to shreds, then rolled in its many pieces and stood up. Nails, Silver, and the pups sniffed him and wagged their tails in great excitement. Then Amaroq narrowed his eyes and glanced her way. With a chill she realized he was going to attack. She flattened herself like an obedient pup as he glided down his slope and up hers. Her breathing quickened, her heart raced.

When Amaroq was but five feet away and she could see each hair on his long fine nose, he gave the grunt-whine. He was calling her! Cautiously she crawled toward him. He wagged his tail and led her down the hill, through the sedges, and up the long slope to the wolf den. Patiently adjusting his stride to her clumsy crawl he brought her home to the pack, perhaps against Jello’s will—she would never know.

At the den site he promptly ignored her and went to his bed, a dish-like scoop in the soil on the highest point. Circling three or four times, scratching the earth to prepare it for sleep, he lay down.

Miyax glanced out of the corner of her eyes to see Nails preparing his bed also with scratches and turns. Silver was already in her scoop, snapping at the nursing Zing. Jello was off by himself.

Now it was Miyax’s turn to say she was home. Patting the ground, circling first to the left and then to the right, she lay down and pulled her knees up to her chin. She closed her eyes, but not completely. Through her lashes she peeked at Amaroq for reassurance, just as she had seen the other wolves do. The wind played across his black ruff and his ears twitched from time to time as he listened to the birds and winds in his sleep. All was well with the world, and apparently with her, for Amaroq rested in peace.