Chapter 9

Agrona sat atop the hill, there was snow blowing all around him and the intangible cold bighting at him through his fur. He was cold and shivered slightly from the wind which curled the snow off the hill into great large plums of it flowing out over the valley and vanishing with the snow falling all around. But Agrona was hardly concerned with the weather; he was more concerned with the battle going on down river.

Agrona had already assumed that the humans would have sent out a search and rescue party for there missing human. He knew that no matter how much the dogs would have refused, if any at all, they still would have been pushed into it no matter what. So Agrona sent out twenty four wolves to greet the search party when they arrived.

They hadn't been gone more then twenty minutes when he heard the call then the first gunshots rang out. Agrona listened painfully as gunshot after gunshot rang out. Then the shots quieted down for a while and Agrona thought that maybe the humans had been killed. Agrona had thought by the gunshots that there must be two or three mushers shooting. He thought of the humans rifles he had seen before, and could only think of the bolt action rifles, where a bullet had to be put in for every shot. But then after a minute the shots began again, with much more force and speed. Agrona flinched and bit his lower lip with each shot. Then as suddenly as the shots had started, they stopped.

Agrona looked down at the river, at the place in the river where it curved around and vanished into the trees. Right next to the river ran there main trail that they used to go in or out of there valley. It ran out from the trees then turned left up a small creek, which provided cover from animals or wind. Agrona stared at the point, his focus becoming incredibly small on that one spot. Any minute now they would send a runner with the news of victory, with the news of how many losses. Agrona stared, his eyes bulging nearly out of his head. Then a wolf came.

Agrona was nearly taken aback. The wolf came out of the trees with snow flying up behind him. He ran along next to the river, ignoring the trail, and began to ascend the steep snow covered hill. Agrona smiled for a second, the wolf was so happy for his victory that he would run straight up the hill to tell him, Agrona smiled more. Then four more wolves came running out of the trees and fallowed in the firsts tracks. They were quickly fallowed by four more racing with great haste. Agrona watched the trees, waiting for more to come running. One more came out from the trees, he wasn't running but hobbling along, his front left foot was blown nearly clean off. A thin piece of skin held the leg, still dragging under his body, as he hobbled along. Agrona knew that he would die within hours.

But Agrona had to know what happened? He had to know how many were there. How many could still be alive? And how many dogs did they kill? Was there still a chance that the human was sitting out there in the snow, and that they could run him down and finish the job?

Agrona bounded off his perch and ran down the hill, his feet crunching under the snow and making small avalanches as he went. The snow whipped and curled out over his head as he ran. He finally slid to a stop just above the wolves.

"What happened?" Agrona said in shock. He hadn't noticed the frozen blood covering there fur, there cuts and scrapes, the bewildered look in there eyes. Agrona brought himself together then spoke on. "How many men were in the search party?"

The wolves remained silent, there fears of being killed or maimed further by Agrona racing through there minds. They didn't want to fail in the quest that they had begged Agrona to start, but it had happened.

Agrona gave a sigh, which soon grew into a growl. He growled at the thought of there stupidity, just running down the hill hoping that the humans wouldn't put up a fight. "Let me guess…" he began in a mocking fashion. "You charged in hoping the humans wouldn't shoot you, then you were shot up and beat up by twenty dogs. Huh?" Agrona waited for an answer but still none came. Agrona was just about to turn and leave them their on that hill when a small meek wolf in the back spoke up.

"one." he said without fear. "It was one musher."

Agrona stared at the young wolf; his jaw about to drop and rip the young wolfs head off. "You mean to tell me that one musher did this, killed fourteen wolves."

"yes." yet another unafraid and blunt answer that almost left Agrona's mouth ajar.

"How many dogs were there? How many did you kill?" Agrona asked waiting, and hoping, for him to tell something like forty dogs with one musher, but knew it was a pipe dream.

"There were eight dogs we killed five." Agrona's mouth now hung ajar.

Fourteen wolves had died at the hands of one musher eight dogs. But what was worse is that twenty four, well built and strong wolves, died at the hands, and teeth, of nine.

Agrona stared at them, letting his anger bubble up, "you all deserve to die, you can't even carry out a simple task of killing one dog sled team. How do you expect me to lead you when you can't fallow a simple order through?" Agrona turned to begin the walk up the hill, his mind spewing over with hate and disgust.

"But it wasn't our fault," the young wolf in the back protested. "There was a half wolf that had distracted us."

Agrona stopped walked and turned, letting some snow fall down in a small avalanche, he stared at the young wolf, why would a half breed be out here fighting for the dogs and humans. Half wolves were hated by both, they were hated by dogs and by wolves, so what would he be doing out here, unless he was accepted by the dogs and humans. But still he must have been out here for something, or someone.

"I don't know who he was, but after we started our run down the hill, he ran out from behind the team. He ran up and started growling. Then we noticed that he was a half wolf so we attacked him, but our attack didn't even seem to harm him. He got right up and began to fight us. By that time the musher had set the team loose, who started to fight us. We tried to stop him before he could start shooting but the half wolf stopped us and it was just a massacre." The young wolf stated, now for the first time looking Agrona in the eyes.

Agrona caught out of the corner of his eye two figures moving up the creek bed to his right. Agrona turned to look at them and instantly knew who they were, they were the young one eye, and the elder coming back from there search of the first battle zone. The way they ran Agrona knew that it wasn't good news they were brining, they ran very fast and careless tripping every third or fourth step in an effort to get to Agrona as fast as they could.

Once they were within hearing range the young one, who was running in front yelled out. "Another dog from the first battle has escaped. We fallowed his tracks and came to the field where we watched a wolf help him to the sled."

Agrona now knew that the battle wasn't going as it should; they should have killed both those teams' dead and be preparing to face more. Agrona raised his head and cleared his throat, ready to speak.

"Why did you want me to start this war? I remember, I remember some of your comments. The humans are stealing our food. The humans are wasting our food. I agreed to lead this fight, but what was the number one rule I stated." Agrona waited for an answer, but when nothing but silence took them he continued "I said that no dog, or human, shall leave this valley alive. Now look, we haven't kept to our promise. Now, it must be amended."

The wolves all gave out a cheer, then quieted down to listen to more of Agrona's words.

"We will call out the half wolf first. He dares go against his blood and spill ours. We will call him out, and spill his"

"How" came several of the wolves at once.

"By taking the one he came looking for, his son." the wolves all looked at each other wondering who the half wolfs son could be.

"How do we know who the half wolfs son his?" the young wolf yelled out over the wolves muttering.

"The red leader of the first sled, he obviously is something important to the half breed. We will take him"

The group of wolves gave out another cheer and bounded around a little bit.

"Tonight," Agrona began. "We shall rest, and tomorrow night we will take the young red one."

The wolves cheered more, snow and bloody ice crystals flying off of there bodies. Agrona smiled at them and turned to begin his accent of the hill, when the young one eye butted in. "but Agrona, are you going to send all of these wolves out into a town they don't know, where there are hundreds of dogs to each of us, and expect them to go unnoticed."

Agrona turned and looked at the young one eye with a smile. "No I don't intend to send out all of them, I intend to send out three, including you." Agrona turned to walk away again.

"but what if we cant find him, or he puts up a fight and gets away, or we cant carry him with enough speed?" one eye waited patently for an answer as Agrona lowered his head down to his chest and began to think deep.

Agrona turned with a large smile going across his face, snow falling at an angle to it. "Then bring me the blood of someone close to him."