Midnight's Sun

Book 338: Gateway Essentials

by Garry Kilworth

Genres: Horror; Science Fiction; Sci-fi Action & Adventure

Synopsis

'The wolf Meshiska gave birth to five cubs on the night before full moon. Outside the den a storm was lashing the spruce trees. The sky and the land had become part of each other: a scatterwind night swirling with fragments of black and white. Snow became darkness and darkness snow, and any creature lost between the two found a rock or a tree and lay down beside it, to wait until the world had formed again.' Into this bleak landscape, Athaba is born, a young wolf destined for great adventure. Exiled from his pack for breaking its rigid codes of behaviour and showing too much imagination, Athaba becomes a 'raven wolf', a lonely scavenger living on scraps and his wits. Survival in the icy wastes is hard and dangerous without the comfort and protection of the pack. Injured, and stranded far from home, Athaba is forced to strike up an uneasy alliance with his natural enemy: a man. Together, but ever wary of each other, the wolf and the solitary hunter start their long walk home across the wilderness. It soon becomes clear that the man must learn to be a wolf if he is to survive in the wolf's world. And Athaba has to use all his imagination to learn new skills and strategies to fend for himself and his new pack member: for he discovers that men are frail, and often very ignorant!

Release date: February 25, 2013

Publisher: Gateway

Print pages: 315

Sample

The wolf Meshiska gave birth to five pups on the night before the full moon. Outside the den a storm was lashing the spruce trees. The sky and the land had become part of each other: a scatter-wind night swirling with fragments of white and;; black. There were walls of snow piled against rock-faces and deep pits where seconds before there had been flat land. Snow became darkness and the darkness snow, and any creature lost between the two found a rock or tree and lay down beside it to wait until the world had formed again.

Inside the den the pups whimpered and nuzzled close to their warm mother, blindly seeking milk. They could not hear the storm, but they could sense it, beyond the dog-leg tunnel that led to their hollow. Curled in the safe world of fur they either slept or fed according to their needs and dispositions: no feelings of fear stirred in their breasts. The world outside might rage and tear itself apart but mother was there to keep them from harm.

Meshiska was also warm with maternal feelings. She licked the pups continually as they rolled and slithered over each other in a tangled heap in her belly fur. They were hers. Hers! She would kill in defence of them, die in defence of them. No mother ever had such beautiful mewling puppies as she had at that moment. Each one of them was as precious to her as her own life. She was even glad that Aksishem was out hunting for food so she did not have to share this moment, even with her he-wolf. She lay with her muzzle on the ground and smelled the earth of her ancestors.

There were three female pups and two male.

Meshiska was a headwolf, as was her mate. Together they led the pack in most enterprises. They were mainly headwolves for hunting and choosing the place for the den. Since she was the dominant partner of the two it could be said that she led the pack, but not in all things. The pack’s pecking order was not rigid; it changed to suit circumstances and situations, and Meshiska was its leader only by the agreement of the others. At certain times, skills others than those she possessed might be needed and she would defer to one of the shoulderwolves in the pack. Leadership was also subject to alternation in the seasons. What was necessary in the pack was that they worked as a team. The pack that was not fluid, with members that fought amongst themselves over such petty issues as who was going to make the decision to stand or run, was a pack that did not survive.

In Meshiska’s pack there were those whose senses were primed for the scent of man, there were those whose knowledge of water-holes surpassed her own, there were those who knew the weather and its ways, who saw the coming of the storm, who sensed a long drought in the air. To these she and Aksishem deferred when necessary.

Each pack had a hierarchy of females and a separate hierarchy of males. Each hierarchy had its own head and these two heads became the breeding pair. One of the two, either male or female, would be the dominant headwolf. There was also an interwoven tribal structure to the pack, consisting of pups, undermegas (yearlings to three year olds) and megas, who were wolves that had undergone an initiation at the age of three years.

There were packs that were skewed in some way, either in part or completely. Meshiska had come across those that were wild and undisciplined, recognising in them a sense of doom. She had heard of packs that had spawned megalomaniacs: tyrants who were strong enough to brook any opposition and did so out of pure pride. Such packs had been wiped out in a single day. Packs, like wolves, were subject to personalities. To survive, a pack had to subject itself to controlled change. She was the dominant headwolf of such a pack.

One of the small privileges of such a position was that she could name her own pups.

Meshiska called the females Tesha, Kinska and Koska.

She named the two males Athaba and Okrino.

The first two weeks were tumbledown time when the pups crawled all over each other and Meshiska, and rolled, and flopped, and gradually grew in strength. They developed hearing and sight, though neither sense was of much interest to them in the darkness and peace of the den. Grey shapes moved around them, silver-hazy and indistinct, and the murmurings of their father, or the occasional protests from their mother when her teats became too sore, these were the sights and sounds from their closed world. Koska was the strongest of the five and consequently grew even stronger since she was first at the teat, shouldering her weaker siblings aside. There was no brotherly or sisterly love when it came to food: survival took precedence over all emotions.

Okrino was the clown of the group, his floppings and sprawlings more pronounced than those of the rest of the litter. The markings on his face gave him a permanently earnest expression, as if he were either in a mood of constant concern for the welfare of the world or in an uncomfortable state of constipation. His parents thought him a strange little pup, though not unusual enough to cause them undue worry. Meshiska just hoped he would not grow into one of those wolves that irritate the rest of the pack by unwittingly acting the fool. Such wolves were dangerous, accident prone and apt to lose concentration at crucial times. To be a clever clown was something else entirely; that sort of wolf kept the pack amused during hard times. Even at this early age, though, Okrino appeared to enjoy being the centre of attention, and sometimes repeated a roll or flip which had brought forth a wry comment from his father. No doubt he would be a clever clown.

Kinska was the smallest of the pups, the runt, and though there were only four siblings to contend with she had to battle hard to get her share of the milk. During the first few days of life she hardly put on any weight at all.

Tesha was the next smallest, but this cub had a determination which Kinska seemed to lack. You could see by her expression that she was ready to take on a bear if she had to in order to get her milk. There was a haughty little tilt to her jaw and a gritty look in her eyes. When Koska shouldered her out of the way sometimes, Tesha would throw herself right back at the bigger cub time and time again in an attempt to remove her big sister from the teat. Koska often looked very puzzled by this behaviour. She knew she was the strongest and couldn’t understand why Tesha took no notice of that fact. Sometimes, after Tesha had come back at her for about the fifth time, Koska would look up at one of her parents with an exasperated expression, as if to say, ‘What is it with this half-pint? Why isn’t she afraid of me? What do I have to do to teach Tesha her place?’ But Tesha didn’t recognise places. She only knew she became furious when thwarted at the teat and size didn’t mean a diddle in the den when she had her hackles up.

Finally, there was Athaba, who though he put on weight tended to be much more wiry than the other four. Quiet and thoughtful looking, he had a far deeper curiosity than his siblings. The dog-leg tunnel interested him, especially when he got to the curve and could see the silver-grey light at the end, before his mother jerked him back again. He sensed there was a much larger world beyond that hole, a place full of happenings. Out there were monsters and fiends, but great wonders also. He wanted to be the first to investigate this mystery before his brothers and sisters. Unlike them he could not believe this was all there was to life: milk and sleep and an occasional tumble. The world could not just consist of a hollow of earth and two giant slaves that catered for your every need. There had to be more beyond that hazy bright stuff than a few smells where one of his brothers or sisters had urinated. After all, his father and mother occasionally went along that tunnel and disappeared for long periods of time – so long sometimes the youngsters thought them dead. Often Athaba would take himself off into a remote corner of the den to consider these happenings. The others, especially Koska, did not like this behaviour. There was something not quite right about one of them thinking he was better than the rest of his family. She would waddle over to him sometimes and grip him by the jaw to pull him back into the group. Athaba only half resisted this because, though he preferred to be alone, he also liked to please. He was not a pup to court rejection.

Two weeks after the birth Kinska died from hypothermia, despite the efforts of Meshiska and Aksishem to keep her alive.

At four weeks the pups’ ears became erect, standing up from their heads like arrowheads. It was at this time that Okrino let out his first howl. He not only startled his brother and sisters, he also made himself jump. The little pup looked around him nervously, then glared, as if it were one of the others that had made the sound and he was not too happy about it.

‘Did you see that?’ said Aksishem to his mate. ‘Okrino was the first. He almost hit the ceiling.’

Meshiska replied, ‘I saw. Wonder which one will be next …’

It was Tesha. She let out a long thin note which had Athaba cowering in the corner of the den. Then the he-pup tried himself, and found his own voice. Finally, Koska joined them.

Aksishem buried his head between his front paws.

‘There’ll be no peace in the den tonight,’ he grumbled. ‘I only hope they get tired quickly, so we can get some rest. Listen to it!’

By seven weeks they had been weaned and were mauling each other in the entrance to the den. They were now seriously into mock combat which sometimes left one of them with wounds. There was no organisation to their fights at that point, they just threw themselves at each other and tried to gnaw a leg or a tail, or they would battle jaw to jaw, trying to grip their opponent and force him or her to the ground. Naturally, Koska won most of the fights she had with her brothers and sister.

They were in the middle of such play one day when something happened which would haunt Athaba’s dreams for many nights and days to come. Their mother was down in the den, their father out on a hunt. As they fought each other, they gradually worked themselves some distance from the opening to the den. In a short while Meshiska would be out to herd them back inside again, but on this particular day she was unwell and her reactions somewhat slower than normal. Suddenly, a creature with a flat face and terrible narrow eyes dropped from a nearby fir tree and ran across to the pups. Its legs were stumpy and its body thick and round, but its movements were fast, agile. Athaba saw some vicious claws spring magically from previously innocent-looking soft paws. They were quite unlike his own scratchers, being long, curved and extremely sharp, resembling large thorns. The marauder’s flat face opened to reveal many pointed teeth and the jaws snatched a pup. The beast ran off, leaving the other pups startled for a moment. Then they set up a wailing which brought their mother out immediately. A swift assessment told her that Tesha was missing. She then called for assistance from the pack. A team of four set out in pursuit of the predator, but returned a day later without having caught it. Tesha was gone forever.

Meshiska’s pups were down to three.

The incident disturbed Athaba more than the other pups. Koska and Okrino soon forgot about their sister and the monster that snatched her away to oblivion. Athaba, however, missed Tesha quite a lot. He was closer to her than the other two and had been very fond of the stubborn, determined pup who refused to acknowledge the fact that she was smaller than her siblings. There was something to admire in such feisty behaviour, though Koska had continually tried to put her sister down. Athaba, in his way, had recognised that physical prowess, strength alone, was not the end of all achievements. Spirit, too, was important. In fact he had seen in Tesha that no matter what the state of the body, the spirit could enable one to triumph. He himself had mock-battled for hours with Tesha, finally becoming disheartened because his sister just would not give in. Wherever she was, he thought, she was giving somebody a puzzling time with her pugnacious will.

The beast that had stolen his sister was also much in his thoughts, both sleeping and waking. He had guessed there were monstrous creatures in the world, but never did his imagination produce a furry fiend such as this robber of siblings. It had come out of nowhere fast, and went back there even quicker. It was all yellow eyes, teeth, claws and wild fur. Even its ears had wispy hair going up into little curled points. Such a demon had been spewed by the dark rocks and swallowed again by the trees. It surely had not come from the wholesome world of wolves? Not from the forests or the tundra? Not from the mountains? The boggy muskegs with their gaseous smells must have spawned such a devil.

It was a long time before he thought to ask the creature’s name and learned that it was called a lynx.

Koska, Okrino and Athaba grew strong and healthy until the summer season was upon them. The still mock-fought each other and their parents, improving their skills by the day. Koska was the natural leader and something of a bully. Once she wounded Athaba quite badly and the he-pup had to lie up for a few days until the gash in his rump healed.

Aksishem would arrive home after a hunt with a slab of meat and eat it in front of the pups. Then all of them would begin a strange writhing dance, their supple bodies twisting. The pups would squeak and jab at Aksishem’s muzzle in impatience, trying to get him to regurgitate the food so that they could eat sooner rather than later. Occasionally, Okrino would go for the meat before one of his parents had devoured it, only to be knocked firmly away. Koska was even bolder and would try to growl the adult away from the raw food like a fully initiated mega, which amused both Meshiska and Aksishem.

‘You’ll be a great hunter, one day,’ said Meshiska to her daughter. ‘That growl’s coming on nicely. I shouldn’t be surprised if your teeth are growing too.’

One time Meshiska went off hunting, as usual, leaving the pups in the entrance to the den. Koska said to the other two, ‘I’m going to follow her. See where she goes. Anyone coming?’

The other two shook their heads. They had been told to stay in the den. Their mother’s anger was not a thing they witnessed very often, but when it came it was decidedly unpleasant.

‘Cowards,’ said the she-pup. ‘I’m going anyway.’

She went trotting down the trail after her parent.

As she rounded a rock, she came slap up against a large ochre-coloured lump of fur. Koska was slightly annoyed for a moment, wondering who or what was blocking the trail when it should be an open road, for the use of all. Then she looked up.

It was her mother.

Meshiska was sitting in the middle of the track, obviously waiting for her.

‘Yes?’ said her mother. ‘Did you want something?’

Koska nosed around the pine needles, as if looking for something, then gradually made her way back to the den. Mother followed behind and gave her rump a sharp nip just before they got back to where the other pups were waiting.

Then without another word, the adult went off down the trail again.

‘I bet she’s not there a second time,’ said Koska, after licking the sore patch on her bottom.

‘You want to test it?’ asked Okrino.

‘Not today,’ replied his sister. ‘But I bet she’s not, all the same …’

The incident was never forgotten, by any of the three pups. Despite Koska’s bravado, she never tried the same trick again.

That was not to say they respected the grown wolves so much that they were afraid of them. They loved to sneak up on one of the adult wolves and grip it by the ruff, hanging on while the adult shook them around trying to loosen their hold. Their father was a particular favourite, he would allow himself to be gripped by three pups simultaneously and would rise with them dangling from his fur like cones from a pine. Once or twice they chose the wrong adult, of course, and were firmly held by the muzzle and pinned to the ground for a moment or two to teach them a lesson. They learned which of the pack were to be avoided.

Athaba was feeling frisky one morning and was, as usual, engaging in mock-combat with his siblings. They were belly crawling through the grasses, stalking each other and pouncing when they came within range. Though some of the adult wolves were busy at small tasks, most of them were sprawled around the entrance to the den, watching the pups indulgently. It was a fine day, full of butterflies and birds, which often distracted the fickle pups.

Athaba was by this time a slate-blue coloured wolf with blond and grey hairs flecking his pelt. His eyes were bright, searching, though the inherent curiosity in them was not too obvious now. He had learned to hide what others might think to be a flaw in his character. His jaw was strong and firm and his brow deep. A handsome wolf, some said. He had a pleasant disposition and was not too cocky, and was therefore well liked by most other members of the pack.

At one point in the game, Koska was stalking Athaba, and the he-pup was waiting for her, hidden by the tall wispy foliage. He was watching, as he had been taught, for movement amongst the grasses. Then he saw it, a twitching of some stems, and when he thought the time was right, he leapt.

Even before he hit the wolf he knew it was not Koska, but an undermega whom the youngsters never played with simply because he always looked so serious. Athaba, now in mid-leap, went in anyway, full of bravado.

The wolf he had unfortunately jumped at was a yearling called Skassi, a very ambitious young male who seemed eternally preoccupied with something very important. Athaba gripped this undermega by the ruff and attempted to pull him to the ground. Ordinarily such play was encouraged by adults, but this occasion was not one of them. Skassi rolled and flipped, sending Athaba flying through the air. The pup landed heavily and had the wind knocked out of him. Before Athaba could get to his feet, Skassi was standing over him, and the yearling’s eyes were hot with anger. He administered a savage bite to Athaba’s rump.

The pup squealed and took up the submissive position as his only line of defence. He raised one paw, curled his tail under, lowered his body and flattened his ears. As Skassi stood over him, he flashed the whites of his eyes and produced his most submissive ‘grin’.

The yearling’s ears were forward, his tail erect and his hackles raised. His lips were retracted, up and down, so that his front teeth were revealed. He looked what he was, a ferocious killer who could tear the throat from the he-pup in an instant.

Meshiska came running and confronted the undermega.

‘That was unnecessary,’ she snapped. ‘Get away from my pup. He’s not old enough to understand yet.’

For a moment the three wolves formed a tableau as they stood there in the soft light of the forest, each caught in a dramatic pose. Everything was still.

The first movement came from Skassi. Athaba saw a gradual change come over the male yearling. In seconds, he went from a dominant posture to a submissive one.

Skassi went forward on his belly and licked Meshiska’s muzzle, nipping it lightly. Then he tried to slink away, but as he moved off Meshiska stepped forward and body-slammed the young male, knocking him over.

Skassi recovered his feet and said, ‘I wasn’t ready for him. I just reacted.’ He then slunk away, but not without a malevolent glance at Athaba, who knew he had somehow made an enemy. It was an incident that was going to have a strong effect on the rest of the pup’s life. He scratched his fleas out of nervousness. An undermega was not a very important member of the pack, especially a yearling, but to a pup such a wolf was more dangerous than an adult. Yearlings had everything to prove, especially to their peers.

Later Meshiska spoke to Athaba.

‘I was nearby this time, but there will come a time when you’ll need to fight wolves like Skassi. I can’t be a mother to you forever. You’re very young yet and I will protect you throughout the summer, but eat well and grow strong. The yearling may not let it rest at this. One day it might be between you and him and I might not be around to intervene. Even if I were, the pack might not let me. You’re my pup and I don’t want to see you hurt. Attend to me and your father and we’ll teach you all we know – after that, you’ll have to find your own place in the hierarchy of the pack. Do you understand?’

Her words were firm but her eyes were soft. There was a torment in her breast which a young pup could not hope to understand. It was a mother’s knowledge that however hard she tried she could not keep the world from her young ones and eventually they would have to be able to fend for themselves. All she could hope to do was prepare them to withstand the onslaught. There would be harsh conditions, starvation, storms and enemies to contend with and a mother could not hope to live forever, nor could she expect to ignore the laws of the pack. When her pup was a year old he would be outside the protection of his parents. That did not mean Meshiska would not go to his defence, but she would risk a great deal by doing so. Many a headwolf has become a tailwolf overnight. The tailwolf is the lowest member of a pack, despised by all, chased and bitten, tormented and left only the barest scraps of meat. Only the utlahs, those that have been banished from the pack forever, are lower than the tailwolves. The utlah, or outsider, is not even considered to be a wolf any more, but becomes a raven. The outsider eats with the parasites, the black scavengers that follow the pack, contending with these crazy birds for carrion.

‘One day,’ said Athaba, stoutly, ‘I shall become a mega like you and Aksishem – once I reach three years and go through initiation. Then I’ll be able to fight Skassi and …’

‘And Skassi will be a mega too, long before you are. Don’t dream too much of revenge, little one. Try to think about getting around Skassi, getting him to accept you. It’ll be a long time before you’re strong enough to tackle him in the way that you’re talking about.’

‘But you said I had to learn to fight!’

‘So you must, but you must also learn to wait. If you start nurturing thoughts of revenge now, you’ll become too impatient and he’ll be the one to choose the time. The wolf who chooses the time and place is most often the victor. You must be submissive until you are strong and ready, and thhe time is right. It may be that you will make friends anddd therefore such a fight will not be necessary. It happens, more often than not. Skassi’s a young wolf, wanting to make his mark early and like many ambitious undermega he’s becoming frustrated with having to wait two more years for his mega. By the time he gets it, his personality will have matured and I doubt he will be concerned with you any longer.

‘For the moment, he’s chosen you as a target, which is foolish of him. You’re not even an undermega yet, and no credit would come of him harming you. We’ll see. Just don’t show any hate too early, my son. It may yet all melt away like the winter snows.’

For his part, Athaba hoped it would.

Fortunately for Athaba, as they moved into summer the pack became looser and covered a wider area. The pups hardly saw their father and mother together, let alone other members of the pack. Each wolf, or sometimes pair, went off in search of the plentiful game. There was less need for group concentration during the summer and privacy could be had. Athaba was safe until the autumn, when the pack began to pull together again into the tight knot that would take it through winter.

The summer was a good one. Voles and lemmings were plentiful and the pups developed, learned their hunting skills, and stayed away from other predators like the lynx and the bear. They found birds’ eggs and feasted until they were fat, then lay around for days until the feeling of fullness wore off and they needed food again. They played in the sedge and amongst the stunted larch, spruce and alder. There were hot springs to watch bubble and hiss. The light was strong, glancing off shallow pools and scattering itself amongst the rocks. Sometimes it was a blinding gold that hurt the eyes and the pups had to turn their heads. Out on the tundra, where the permafrost still lay beneath layers of ground water and mosses, herbs gave the air a rich fragrance – saxifrages, bluebells, campions, shinleaf and poppies. There were dwarf willows out there, and flowering shrubs, but every step was a disgusting squelch and the wolves soon went back to the high country where it was dry.

Athaba saw the mighty moose and the formidable caribou, and wondered how a wolf could ever bring one these creatures down. He chased hares, and lost the race. He crept up on lakes of geese and jumped them, just to see them rise in the air like a single cloud of feathers, making a noise to wake his ancestors from their long sleep. He fed on the brilliant coloured bearberries which grew on the moorlands.

One day Aksishem found Athaba alone and told him a riddle which he said must remain a secret between the two of them. It went like this:

I am –

the stone that floats,

the wood that sinks,

the rock that runs,

the air that stinks.

What am I?

No matter how Athaba pleaded, his father would not tell him the answer.

‘One day you’ll work it out for yourself,’ he said. ‘It’s more satisfying that way. If I tell you, you’ll just say, “Oh no, I would have guessed that, if you gave me more time” and you’ll get nothing satisfying out of it at all. You wait and see. I know I’m right.’

Even though his father had said it was a secret, Athaba mentioned it to his mother. The she-wolf looked shocked and told Athaba not to repeat the riddle to anyone, to forget about it altogether. Later Athaba heard her remonstrating with his father, though he could not understand what anyone had done wrong.

When they were a few months old, the pups underwent a rigorous programme of indoctrination. Play time was over. The serious stuff of life began.

‘Repeat after me,’ said their father. ‘Every action, every thought, every word, must be for the good of the pack.’

’… for the good of the pack,’ they chorused.

And this was to be their watchword until they died. For the individual was unimportant, except as a member of the whole. Only by ensuring the safety of the pack could the individual hope to survive. Teamwork. Cohesiveness. The pack worked together, ate together, slept together. They did not watch over each other, each watched over the pack. No wolf was expected to lay down his life for his brother or sister, but he was bound, if required, to give up his life for the pack. Their songs were of comradeship but not of individual friendships. Unity. The good of the pack.

When he was four months old Okrino had an epileptic fit. Two months later he had a second fit. Such an affliction made a wolf a liability to the pack.

The other megas heard about these fits. A midsummer meeting took place by Waterfall Rock. Were he a fully grown wolf, Okrino might have been banished, but as a pup and not yet an undermega a more definite and immediate fate was in store for him. Two days later two large shoulderwolves came to collect Okrino. He was taken away into the darkness of the trees and Athaba never saw his brother again. When he asked his parents what had happened to him, they told him Okrino had gone to the Far Forests.

Why? he asked.

For the good of the pack, they replied.

During the summer human hunters pushed the loosely formed pack northeastwards. Under the guidance of the two headwolves, their efforts to stay out of range of those that hunted on foot were successful. Shoulderwolves and flankwolves led the pack over rugged ground to make it difficult for pursuers. Tailwolves laid false trails with their droppings, trying to confuse the men and send them in the wrong direction. The narrow-eyed native hunters, usually on foot, were good at tracking and excellent marksmen, but their weapons were not as powerful as the wide-eyed southern hunters. Those that travelled the land in noisy machines were an unavoidable phenomenon. This second group, however, were not such good shots, and you could smell them from the far side of a mountain.

On the other hand, avoiding the native trackers was a matter of technique, learned from centuries of such lessons in survival. As soon as one trick had been used a couple of times it had to be discarded because the native men soon devised counter-moves, no matter how ingenious it seemed at first.

That season only one wolf was killed by the guns, an elderly male called Rikkva.

The pack at this time numbered about sixteen, not counting the pups. They studiously avoided areas marked by other packs in their search for new territory. Man is enough of an enemy for a wolf without antagonising his own kind.

The time of the light was drawing in, and darkness drawing out, especially since they had moved farther north than they had been before. Summers are swiftly over in the land of midnight suns. Autumn brought cutting winds and coats thickened in preparation for the coming of the deep cold. The landscape took on a russet hue in forest and on tundra. Skies and surface waters were inseparable in their weak colours. Once more the pack became a tight-knit group, moving and workin