Chapter 9
By the time Mika had to head back home, the friends still hadn't come up with a plan.
"I thought Mei was going to be more angry to see me," Mika admitted as her and Gabu carefully made their way down the pile of rocks to the sand.
"Why would Mei be mad at you?" Gabu asked, jumping off the last rock.
"Because I almost ate his friend yesterday," she reminded him.
Gabu turned around to send her a smile. "That's one of the great things about Mei. He never holds a grudge."
"You know . . ." Mika started slowly, as they headed closer to the stream and sat down next to each other. "You never told me how you two met. How did this friendship of yours start in the first place?"
"That's an interesting story," he stated. Staring off into the distance, he smiled to himself as he thought back to that day so many months ago. "It all started one stormy night . . ."
As Mika slowly made her way through the Black Forest, she thought about the story that Gabu had just told her.
When Gabu and Mei had first met in that rundown barn, they had no idea who they were talking to. They had learned about everything they had in common before discovering their differences. No wonder they had decided to give the friendship a try. If the goat and wolf had met under any other circumstances, they probably wouldn't be friends today.
Her mind was still wheeling from the story when Mika entered the open field that lay in front of the separate cave entrances that the pack used as their dens.
"There she is!" shouted Tora, causing Mika to stop in shock.
Mika hadn't realized at first that the whole pack was gathered in the open space. She had just walked into the middle of a pack meeting that was currently in progress, and thanks to Tora, they were now all staring at her.
"Traitor!" someone in the crowd shouted at her, and she back up a step at the hostility in the voice.
Everyone was staring back at her in either confusion or consumed anger. Scanning the crowd, Mika saw nostrils flaring, eyes flashing and closing into slits, and mouths were quivering and drooling in their displeasure.
Unsure of what was going on, Mika looked away from her furious pack mates and glanced up at Daichi, who was standing on top of a rock so the whole group could see him. He was staring back at her with disappointment written all over his face.
Confusion continued to spin in Mika's head until the wolves parted, so a path could be made for her to walk straight up to stand before her leader.
Hesitantly, Mika walked through her infuriated pack mates. Halfway towards her destination, she spotted a wolf sitting by Daichi's right, next to the rock.
Rin.
Suddenly, the "traitor" comment that someone had thrown at her made sense. Her best friend had told on her . . . on her and Gabu.
"Mika!"
The wolf jumped at the booming sound of her name coming from her usually lay back leader. Her eyes widened in fear as she waited for what was going to happen next.
"Rin has told me that you have become friendly with a goat . . . Is this true?"
Mika turned her gaze towards the ground as an excuse to not have to look at the disappointment in Daichi's eyes.
"Well . . ." Mika paused, trying to think of something she could say to get herself out of trouble.
She could attempt to deny the whole thing, but then Daichi would probably ask Rin to take them to where Gabu had the goat, to prove rather or not her friend had been telling the truth. That would lead to Gabu taking the blame for everything . . . and Mei. The pack might kill Mei!
Deciding that it would be best to go with the truth, and take on some of the blame in the process, Mika forced herself to meet her leader's eyes again. Nodding slowly in agreement, she said, "Yes, it's true."
She heard the gasping and snarling from the wolves behind her, and she flinched as the sounds reached her ears.
"How did this happen, Mika?" Daichi demanded, looking down at her.
Mika took a deep breath to try and steady herself before coming clean. "Gabu and the goat, Mei, traveled over the mountains together after their family's found out about their friendship. Rin and I got curious as to why Gabu insisted on going back over to Lush Wood every afternoon after hunting with us, so one night we followed him."
Daichi turned his head to look down at Rin beside him. "How long have you known about this?"
"A couple of days," Rin admitted. "I wanted to tell you about it when I first discovered what was going on, but Mika convinced me to wait. She wanted to try and talk Gabu into breaking his friendship with the goat, before getting him into trouble." Facing Mika, she let out a disapproving snarl before continuing. "It wasn't until today that I learned that Mika had started hanging out with it too."
"This is unacceptable," Daichi growled between his teeth. "You know this can no longer continue. You, Mika, have been a respected member of this pack for years, but this kind of betrayal can not go unpunished."
This was followed by yowls of agreement from behind her, and Mika did her best to curl into a ball.
"Gabu is hereby banished from our pack," Daichi howled, so that the wolves in the very back would be sure to hear him, "and as for that goat . . . he must be taken care of at once!"
The pack yowled again in approval.
"Prepare for attack! We'll be leaving shortly," Daichi said, wrapping up the meeting before jumping down off of her pedestal, and he pulled Rin aside in order to talk to her in private.
As the party broke up, the wolves turned to discuss the latest events between themselves. Nothing like this had happened among their pack before, and everyone was getting hyped up for the coming attack.
Mika couldn't believe how fast her whole world had turned upside down.
Daichi had said she was going to be punished for her betrayal, but he neglected to drop any farther details at the moment. Was she going to be banished too? Having to stay in the pack with wolves that knew that she had become friends with a goat . . . that would probably turn out to be an even worse punishment than banishment. Her pack mates would never let her hear the end of it.
And Gabu and Mei! They were in trouble too. Huge trouble, and they weren't even aware of the danger that was coming their way! She had to get back to Full Moon Burrow. She had to try and warn them before it was to late.
Looking around at the wolves that were scattered everywhere, Mika realized that no one was watching her. They were all so hounded in on the idea of the future hunt that they had seemed to have forgotten about her for the moment.
Knowing that this opportunity wasn't going to last long, Mika pushed herself up onto her shaking limbs, and made a mad dash back in the direction of Silver Sand Beach.
