Wolf's Bane

by Tara K. Harper

Genres: Fantasy action & adventure; Epic Fantasy; Paranormal

Synopsis

TO TOUCH THE STARS

She was Dion the Wolfwalker, and through her telepathic bond with the Gray Ones, she could hear the packsong and run with the wolves. And now, as fate ripped from her almost everything she held dear, her wolfbond became her only reason to live, for she could not  deny the Call of the wolves to help them. Driven by the need of the Gray Ones, she would seek out and confront the mysterious beings of the sky--the ones who had once brought death to the world. In eight hundred years, no human had survived that contact. But Dion could not avoid it.  Only by facing the aliens could she save herself . . . and the future of the wolves!

Release date: January 27, 2010

Publisher: Del Rey

Print pages: 352

Sample

I
 
In the night, the roads are different. The roots stretch out like white-skinned amis; the moons are eyes that do not blink. The air is thick with sounds that gather silently to watch you pass. And you kick your dnu to a faster gait, while fear hangs on your back like a worlag clawing at your courage. But you ride, because the lives of your family ride with you. You ride the black road, because your speed is the difference between life and death.
—From Riding the Black Road, by Merai Karrliamo maKaira
 
 
She came out of the night like a wraith. One moment, there had been only darkness, with six of the nine moons waning and the woods sounds quavering like ghosts in the wind. Then a wisp of movement breathed in the trees. Brush snapped. Something large and menacing leaped the barrier bushes. His heart jerked. The next instant, a whirlwind struck the road.
 
He shouted, kicking his riding beast into a charge. From the side of her vision, she caught the dark movement. One fluid, half-rearing motion, and she twisted her six-legged dnu midrush. Then she spurred the beast back at him.
 
Black hair whipped around her face in a halo of urgent violence. Her dark eyes gleamed with the light of the yellow-white moons. The gray shadow on the ground—the wolf with its yellow eyes—bunched its body to fling itself after the woman.
 
The dnu thundered straight for him, its six hooves frantic with speed. Too fast! By the moons, she would kill them both. He should turn—she should turn—but she didn’t slacken her pace. Desperately, he leaned out, away from his own riding beast. The dark woman leaned in. Her face, a blur in the night, was hollowed out by shadow. A howling seemed to hit him. Then his arm slapped hers, and their hands dug into each other’s musculature. Her body came free of the saddle. She snapped like a rope across the gap of pounding hooves, letting her dnu race free in the night. Then her body struck him.
 
One leg caught against his dnu; her chest hit his ribs. Her weight, slight as it was, nearly lost him his seat even with his heavy grip on the double pommel. Then her other leg was over, and her body melted against his broad back as she slid into the rhythm of riding, her free arm seeking his waist.
 
“On?” he shouted.
 
“Set,” she shouted back. She was grinning, but beneath the six moons that hung in the sky, the expression was feral and sharp.
 
He threw his right leg over the pommel. For a moment, he hung on the saddle and the strength of her arms. Then he hit the road running. Hooves pounded as she picked up speed. The gray wolf flashed beside her. She was gone, and only the scent of her hair and the sweat of her ride remained for him to taste.
 
He walked, limping, after the other dnu, which had finally stopped on the road. The sides of its bloated, segmented belly heaved with breathlessness, and its eyes rolled in its head. The odor of fear was upon it. There was a dark patch on its flanks, but he couldn’t tell what it was. Then the creature shifted nervously out from under the rootroad trees and into the white-bright moonlight. He stepped closer, and the riding beast grunted its warning, stamping its middle legs. No wonder the wolfwalker had not simply moved away from him like a relay runner and slowed to let him catch up. She must have barely been able to control the beast, frightened as it was. Had he tried to ride up from behind, the dnu would have panicked into the barrier bushes like a hare from a hungry worlag.
 
He moved again, slowly soothing the creature until he could get his hands on the reins and examine the patch more clearly. The ragged gashes that had bled out on its flanks were deep and dark. He felt their warmth—they were hardly clotted yet—and rubbed his fingers together. The scent of the blood mixed with the beast’s sweat, and again he heard the howling. His voice was low as he looked after her. “Ride with the moons, Dione.”
 
* * *
 
Menedi heard the hooves of the riding beast first. “Quick now. Look sharp,” she snapped at the two youths. She was already half out the door.
 
“Is she here—the healer?” The younger boy’s voice was thin with excitement.
 
Menedi didn’t bother to nod back over her shoulder. The boy would hear for himself in the next few seconds. “Get the dnu loose and ready. Culli, make sure the reins of the two trailing beasts won’t tangle.”
 
Hurrying to the woman’s side, the tall youth cocked his head. “She’s coming in fast.”
 
“And be glad that she is. It’s your uncle who’s out on that venge.”
 
“I know it, ma’am.” He checked the reins of the dnu, then glanced back through the doorway to the table where his second meatroll lay untouched. Another glance up the road told him the rider was not yet in sight. He thrust the reins of the relay dnu at the younger boy and dashed inside, grabbing up the food. There was no napkin to wrap it in. Running back out, he yanked a bandanna from his pocket and slapped it around the meatroll. He had time only to thrust the small bundle in the saddlebag before Menedi swung up on the lead dnu and started the other two relay beasts out at a slow trot.
 
Menedi’s three dnu—the one she rode and the two relay beasts she led—strung out like a crude chain. Gradually, they picked up their pace. Then, from the road behind them the incoming rider’s shadow separated itself from the night. The wolfwalker was hunched low over her dnu’s neck, rolling with its six-legged gait as if she were part of its muscles, not simply a rider racing the dark. Culli caught his breath as he glimpsed the smaller loping shape—the wolf that sped before Dione as she urged her riding beast to catch up to Menedi. Maybe this time he’d be close enough to catch that yellow gaze. Perhaps this once he’d hear the packsong himself. But the wolf flashed by, and an instant later, Dione pounded past.
 
Involuntarily, Culli stepped out after the racing pair, nearly tripping on the other boy. He steadied his friend and stared after the wolfwalker. She had caught up with Menedi now, and her switch from one saddle to the next was so smooth in the dark that it took him a moment to realize it was done. Menedi dropped back with the single, exhausted dnu, letting the tired animal slow itself. With a flash of steel-white hooves, the extra beast reined to Dione’s new mount trailed her into the dark.
 
The smaller boy stared after the rider. “She didn’t even slow down.”
 
Culli’s voice was superior. “She’s a wolfwalker.” But he too stared down the road. The gray wolf had barely turned its head when it had passed him, but the wet-musk scent it left behind seemed thick in the cold night air. Culli sucked it in. Then he vaulted into his own dnu’s saddle and raced for the relay tower.
 
* * *
 
Ember Dione’s thighs were numb. Her fingers were dull and cramped around the reins, and the thin, spring mist that rose from the draws climbed through her skin like venom. In spite of the effort it took to ride, her sweat had chilled and her skin was cold. The brief respite of switching saddles merely made her aware of the ache she’d soon feel in her buttocks. She had almost missed that last switch, and the adrenaline rush of her mistake had snapped her awake far better than any sweet-sharp mug of rou. Even at that, it took her a moment to realize that something was flapping with the dnu’s smoothed-out stride; the saddlebag was loose. She put her hand down to the latchflap and felt the faint heat of the bag.
 
She pulled out a steaming bundle, wrapped in a bandanna. “Bless Menedi,” she murmured. The meatrolls were small, but she didn’t care. She had barely come in from the Black Gullies when the venge request hit her scouting station, and she’d had no time for dinner. She could have refused the call—there were two other healers who could have taken the ride—but this ride was not just for the venge, but for herself as well: It would bring her home to Aranur four days early. If the scouting went quickly and the raiders were close, she’d have extra time with her sons.
 
She almost sighed with the first bite she took from the meat-roll. There would be a trail meal on the dnu that waited for her at Kitman, but that was six relay switches away. This simple snack, with its heat and energy, brought for the first time that night a smile to her dark, tired face.