CHAPTER 56
Paw stands up, turns around, and clumsily falls over. He can't seem to coordinate his legs. "Don't just stand there; follow them!" he orders the monstrous man-wolf.
Makes Trouble runs off and scans the brush. His hearing is superior to the other wolves and catches the voice saying, "Kill you! I hate you!" But he can't understand who would be this far from the tribe and why they would want to do harm. He grows angry and lashes out in a roar that sends a colony of bats soaring.
"Do you hear that high-pitched noise?" Walpi asks, sprinting toward Makes Trouble. "I can hear the bats chirping like they are in my ears." He runs with his sidekick.
I hear a different song and I recognize it. Makes Trouble motions with terrifying claws and human-like hands
"What song is that?"
Makes Trouble holds out two long gnarled fingers and draws them behind his towering pointed wolf ears. Kiowa. He holds his other gruesome hand up and pats his mouth, signing, War song.
The two stop and look at each other. With a nod, they tear off down the trail, catching glimpses of two yellow eyes and a white fanged grin vanishing among the shadows.
"Whoever you are, you cannot run and hide. We track you as you track them," Walpi shouts.
The uncanny duo follows the trail out into an open prairie.
"Look there!" Walpi says, spotting a red wolf in full sprint.
Makes Trouble growls and races after the beast.
Walpi easily forgets his peaceful upbringing and caves to his new carnal instinct. He leads the chase since Makes Trouble can run only on two immense, lumbering legs. Their thudding paws shake the moist grass.
Walpi closes the distance quickly.
"You have nowhere to run or hide!" Makes Trouble shouts to himself, only a hundred feet away.
As the red wolf scales a hill, Walpi presses the charge. He uses his newfound muscles and seemingly inexhaustible energy to close on this intruder. Instead of sending her tumbling as he had Makes Trouble, he stops short, awkwardly finding himself in the middle of his sister's honeymoon. The red wolf is moving fast toward her and Kiowa, so he presses on. Yet his hesitation has cost him.
Anoki sees fiery red eyes leap for her. The impact pushes her and Kiowa over.
Completely surprised, Kiowa scrambles to his feet in time to see a red wolf thrashing its ivory fangs. He watches its reddish-gray snout snap down on her neck and devilishly try to tear at her life-supporting veins.
He locks his yellow eyes with the furious red-eyed beast.
"RELEASE HER!"
Anoki cries out. He swiftly springs into action. His attention is momentarily diverted by a flash of gold. A large golden-brown wolf is racing toward them, and it appears to him that a wolf pack is closing in.
Is our bud of love stomped out before our vows are fulfilled? he wonders.
White and red fur fills the air and float around the action. Sharp claws tear up the earth as the two fight for their lives.
Adrenaline explodes a fire in Kiowa's heart and propels him to attack. He catches the red wolf by her side and bites so hard she has no choice but to release.
With a flip of his neck and a thrust of his legs, Kiowa hurls the red wolf a good distance past the nearing gold wolf.
The red wolf rolls around in the dust, then leaps to its feet and resumes its feral attack. Again it pursues Anoki and finds the thunderous growls of the impressive gray wolf protecting his mate.
Anoki lowers her head and growls, standing behind Kiowa, whose incredible size is easily double both female wolves. His long slate mane bristles. His black lips curl back. His curved fangs are immense, and he wields them as an Indian wields a tomahawk.
He gets as low as he can and prepares to disembowel his red enemy. For a brief moment, he wonders how hard he will have to thrash in order to spill its guts.
But something halts the attack.
"Enough, Kida!" Paw shouts, just now breaching the hill.
Her red eyes turn from Kiowa to Paw. "It is enough when I say it is enough!"
"What is this?" Kiowa asks, keeping his yellow glowing eyes on the pacing red wolf. He recognizes his uncle's voice, but he doesn't recognize the pack of wolves he sees around him. His instincts take control. He lowers his head and glares at each one, readying for the next fight.
Instinctively, the closest wolves snarl back, even though they don't intend to.
Paw wobbles down the hill. "Your fight is not with us. It is not even with the red wolf."
Seeing her chance, Kida, the red wolf, lunges for Anoki.
Her attack initiates a fierce defense. Like a primed bullet, Kiowa's legs explode and shoot his two hundred pounds of imposing muscle. In seconds he is upon her. The impact of his large frame knocks Kida to the ground. He circles her and strikes. She tries to scramble to her feet but can't. She can't even catch her breath.
With his powerful gaping jaws nearing her stomach, she sees that she has no choice. She rolls over and submits. Although most wolves would cease at submission, this wolf persists. His agonizing mauling bites sap her energy. She feels her life slipping from her body and can't summon the strength to fight back. When he clenches down on her hundred-and-twenty-pound body, he thrashes her so viciously, she looks like a rag in his terrible mouth.
A gurgling growl chokes in his throat as he sees a monster that's part man, part wolf running toward him. His ears flatten.
Releasing Kida's limp body, he charges Makes Trouble and moves the hundred-and-eighty-pound man beast with ease. A fierce fight ensues. Makes Trouble roars more like a lion than a wolf. He swipes with his powerful hands, but proves too slow. Neither sounds like a man now, only beast.
Both are precise with their agonizing bites, and both use their claws on each other's snouts and eyes, but Kiowa proves the quickest and strongest. He pushes Makes Trouble back several feet and tears up flesh with each bite. His long snout overcomes his distorted friend by landing so many bites in so many places, it is as though Makes Trouble is in a fight with a pack of wolves instead of just one. An ocean of pain overwhelms the whimpering reddish-brown monster, who lowers his ears and bows his head.
Walpi, the gold wolf, comes toward him. "It is us, Kiowa," Walpi tries to explain, but when Kiowa turns on him, his face has not even an ounce of recognition. It is as though Kiowa the man is gone and now a terrible wolf with an insane temper has been unleashed. His eyes are like glass, with a pure, evil intent. No humanity lurks in those halos, only the remains of a ruthless killer, forged in the fires of survival for thousands of years.
Kiowa tilts his bloodstained snout and snarls. Saliva and blood drip down his jaw. He charges Walpi with his beastly muscles flexed to fight. Without even so much as an ounce of fight, the gold wolf instinctively rolls over and submits. His submission only lightens Kiowa's bites but does not stop them.
"Ah! Ah! Anoki, help me!" Walpi cries out.
Anoki, the powder-white she-wolf, calmly rests on her back haunches and watches the fighting. She smiles. It pleases her tremendously that Kiowa is able to subdue so many intruders on this, her wedding night.
"ENOUGH!" Paw shouts.
"Yes, enough…" Walpi whimpers, covering his face with his burning paws.
Kiowa steps over Walpi like the hundred-and-seventy-pound wolf is sand.
"It is enough when I say it is enough!" are the first words Kiowa speaks. He charges Paw, and a brutal fight ensues that does not end quickly. They both push each other back and forth, slashing with their fangs and tearing with their claws. The battle for dominance has begun.
When a victor is not so quickly established, Kiowa nips here and there, but the black wolf bares his fangs, which are equally brutal, though Kiowa's are longer and he wields them better. Besides, youth is on his side.
Between growls and high-pitched whimpering cries, fur and patches of flesh are torn from each wolf's hide, escalating the battle to a life-and-death fight. Paw manages to bite down so hard on Kiowa's back leg that Kiowa believes it may be soon ripped off.
With a deep rallying cry, Kiowa turns on the black wolf. He bites his uncle on top of his head, quickly readjusting his grip until he has half of the black wolf's face in his deadly jaws. With lethal crushing pressure, the two lock up in a fight it seems neither can win. Finally, Kiowa lunges forward, causing Paw's weaker back legs to fold, and he falls over.
Now in the superior position, Kiowa clamps down on his uncle's neck so tight he can feel him struggling for air. With what little effort he has left, Paw bites back, but his power is fading. The two wolves tug at each other, neither willing to give. Eventually Paw's jaw spasms to the point he can no longer hold his grip. He releases his bite. Before he passes out, he's forced onto his back.
Had Paw mastered the use of his new legs, he might have beaten Kiowa and he could have been the pack's leader. As it is, Kiowa subdued every wolf and has plenty of fight left to take on another. Oh yes, he was power. He was fear. He was death!