The Third Book of the Dun Cow: Peace at the Last by Walter Wangerin Jr. Read Free Book Online Page B

Fly to be seen. Not a Bat either, all of them having gone home to hang upside down and sleep.
    In the weeks thereafter, through nights of good dreams and mornings refreshed by autumn breezes, Pertelote becomes aware that she is listening to a music, a melodic line composed of the lowest notes of an organ.
    The Animals travel west, always westward with the sun. Imperceptibly they’ve begun to ascend from the prairies to the high plains. Though the days are shortening, life is sunny. No one’s in a hurry. Everyone loves the company.
    As always, the White Wolf trots ahead to reconnoiter. On a particular evening Pertelote attends him, flying overhead, sometimes soaring aloft for the pure pleasure of the flight.
    It is at the zenith of one of one such flight that the deep music blooms into words. It is as if the setting sun itself were singing to her, to her directly:
Before the morning, midnight.
    Before the sun, the storms.
    Before the last age, sacrifice,
    Apocalyptic wars.
Arise, arise and go,
    Arise and come by roads
    Unknown.

[Nine] In Which Eurus Howls a Confrontation
[Nine] In Which Eurus Howls a Confrontation
    Eurus has been leading his pack in ever-widening circles. Through summer and into the fall he’s been intent on claiming new territory for himself. He dribbles urine where he goes. He drops scats and scratches the ground to keep and release the scent as a warning to any who would dare cross his increasing borders. There are glands under his tail. He sits and scoots forward, dragging the glands’ oils over the soil. The scent says more than “Beware.” It contains information. It announces what he has eaten. It trumpets his size, his force, and his health. The scent fairly shouts the kind of mood that drives him.
    Eurus’s pack has grown to five: Crook, Rutt, Hati, himself, and the daughter born to him last spring. At seven months the child has gained her mature height and has already begun to reveal her nascent temperament. She may never hunt. She would rather preen than lunge. She has her mother’s pale eyes, but not their penetration. Her eyes merely skim the Creatures around her. Often they gaze at the grey sky as if it were a mirror of her own eyes. She has her father’s arrogance but not his force. She has no care nor need for force. She can dominate in other ways.
    Eurus named his daughter “Freya.” Lady. Royalty.
    Since she was but a female, he let Rutt raise her. But as soon as she shed puppyhood, Freya shed her mother’s training as well. She took to raising herself.
    The Wolf-pack’s travel has taken them in round rim west by southwest through ever-diminishing forests, southwest into the tall grass of the prairies. Eurus has been marking a very broad territory, yet is no less hungry than when he began. He strides on long legs like an emperor.
    There comes the morning when Rutt wakes to find frost on the ground and the blades of grass around her. Some memory deep in her soul is thrilled by the sensation. Something, something long ago, when she was young and delighted in sweet experiences.
    The sun melts the frost, and Eurus is again on the move.
    Suddenly he stops and stands stock-still. He drops his nose to the root of a juniper, then claws at it furiously, throwing up clots of earth. A growl starts its motor in his throat.
    He recognizes the scent of Coyote, the sort of Beast he despises. Would kill it, but would not eat it. He detects the scent of Deer. At this his stomach rumbles.
    Still clawing the duff at the juniper root, Eurus barks. He leans back on his haunches. His yellow eye narrows to a slant of malice.
    “I know this one,” he hisses. “I know his name! The upright! The righteous! The God- damn ably sanctimonious bastard! The White Wolf! Boreas,” he spits, “has passed this way.”
    Now Eurus raises his snout to a heaven of hatred and howls.

[Ten] In Which Wachanga Remembers Mercy
[Ten] In Which Wachanga Remembers Mercy
    Wachanga and Kangi Sapa are resting on a knoll under