pregnant??”

Tovah laughed nervously. “Well, yeah, I guess you could say that.” She looked up at him with a worried expression. “You aren’t angry about it, are you? I know it’s a little soon after being mates, but we could raise a family together now! I know that we’ll-“

Sitka laughed out loud, making her stop her flow of words. “Angry? Why would I of all canines be angry? I’m the happiest wolf alive!”

Had Tovah been feeling better, Sitka would have pulled her into his crazy dance of joy, but instead he settled for rushing out into the snowy trees outside the den and uttering a howl of joy. Tovah laughed even though it made her stomach sore. She had never seen Sitka act so much like a pup before!

He dashed in and grinned. “It’s a good thing that we’re so close to your family. They can hear the news a lot faster then my family will.” He smiled ruefully for a moment, and then he curled up by Tovah again. “Maybe once they’re born, we can go and visit my Father’s pack. They don’t even know that I have you yet, so I bet they’ll be shocked.” 

Tovah sighed and looked away towards the wall. “Do you suppose they will even like me at all? After all, I’m over 2/3 dog.”

Sitka sighed as he remembered. His parents would indeed be highly prejudiced against her and the pups. He would never be able to show off his new family to his relatives. “I forgot. Don’t worry about it. I’m sure that everyone else won’t mind, just rest for now.” He laid his head on her, and waited for her breathing to slow down until he was sure she was asleep. He stayed up a bit longer however. His feelings inside were a confusing mass of fright, worry, joy, and contentment. I’m going to be a father! I never thought I would be one, but here I am with my mate, and now I’m not sure what to think of it.

Chapter 4

Some time later

Kodi shifted around on his paws while Tovah came for a visit during an early evening. She was back to her normal self, completly fine and now completly happy. She chattered on to Balto about the big news.

“Oh, now you’ve done it.” Balto moaned with a mock scowl on his face. “You just had to make me older then I feel, didn’t you?” His eyes sparkled with the same look he always held about him, making him seem too young to be a grandfather. He had come back from an adventure that had taken him away from home for a while, so he had only just found out about Tovah’s big news.

Tovah giggled. “You can blame it on Sitka. It’s all his doing.”

Kodi’s eyes narrowed a tiny bit. You are so right. It is all his fault.

“I just wonder why everyone is looking at me so strangely when I pass through town. Dixie shook her head and left as soon as I walked by her!” Tovah looked unhappily at her paws. Balto and Jenna frowned at this while Kodi looked up sharply. “Did she say anything?” He asked, afraid of the answer he suddenly knew would be coming.

Tovah frowned as well. “Actually, she did. She murmured something to the effect of ‘you poor thing’. I wonder what she thought to make her say that? It’s not like I was kidnapped and taken against my will.”

Kodi suddenly had an enormous desire to find Kirby and tighten his collar about ten notches and watch his face turn blue. Kirby must have told the gossips a lie about Sitka and Tovah! But why?

“Kodi?” Balto looked at his son with a concerned look. “What’s wrong?” Suddenly Balto’s gold and brown eyes grew suspicious. “Out with it. What’s up? You have that look again.”

Kodi knew he couldn’t keep the secret forever, but he knew he couldn’t tell them just yet. Tovah would never speak to him again! “I have to go. I just remembered that I had to go and talk to Kirby.”

As Kodi dashed off, Tovah and Jenna were confused, but Balto was worried. He had seen Kodi’s reaction as a warning of something that could be very bad. “I’m going after him. I have a bad feeling about this.”

“What do you think is wrong with him?” Jenna asked worriedly. “He’s not like this usually.”

Balto’s expression was grim. “I’m not sure. I would feel better if you both went home until I can discover what is up with him.” Tovah nodded and left, while Jenna watched Balto stalk into town. His words had left a cold feeling inside her. What ever Balto sensed, it was something that was bigger then they thought.

Chapter 5

It wasn’t the first time that Balto was grateful for his wolfish ability to slip into town and sneak around unnoticed. He had come into town countless times following whoever he was after, whether it was for food, or discovering things. The only thing that was wrong was that he should never have to be following his own son. What was Kodi up to?

He stopped a little distance away once Kodi paused by his kennel. His son’s voice was a little hard to hear, but Balto managed to catch most of the words.

“Where’s Kirby?”

“I dunno. I think he went out to look for someone. He had some business to do he said.” Ralph.

Balto could hear the irritated sigh Kodi huffed. “I don’t have time for this! I have a feeling Kirby’s stirring up trouble, and I gotta get the facts straight right now. I have the feeling that it involves my sister and her mate.” Kodi started to walk off again. “Anyway, thanks.”

Kodi hurried away, and Balto began to try to figure out what he heard as he followed him. Well, he knew the who to this mystery, but not the why. Why would it involve Kirby of all dogs? And why would it be about Tovah and Sitka?

He inwardly sighed as Kodi wandered around for a long while, then at last they both spotted Kirby in an alleyway. Balto could feel the sudden anger roll off his son in waves. “Kirby! What in the world did you say?!”

No pretense at lowering his voice. This wasn’t good. Balto inched closer to hear Kirby better.

Kirby backed away from his teammate. “Sheesh, what got you so hot under the collar? I already told you what I said. I just told some buddies of mine about your problem and they said they would fix it. What’s so wrong about that?”

“What’s wrong about that is I think I know who your ‘buddies’ are. They’re the local alley dogs who happen to be the local wolf haters. What’s more you spread a lie about Sitka abducting and hurting my sister when that wasn’t true at all! What in the world are you up to? I know whatever it is it’s something bad!”

Kirby’s voice became a hurried tone of panic. “Ok, so I had the idea that if I could get enough dogs to think that your sister was taken against her will, everyone would be feeling sorry for her. My buddies said that if I do that, they’ll go and make sure your sister will have to come back to Nome. You’ll have your sister back, and you can stop being so hard to be with. See?”

“So what is it they’re planning?” Balto could hear the worry in Kodi’s tone.

Kirby shrugged. “I don’t know. They already left to do whatever it was they were planning to do.” He finally grasped the gravity of the situation. “You think that they’ll kill Sitka?”

Kodi was already running. “I hope not. If they do, I’m blaming you!”

Chapter 6

Kodi’s mind was a swirl of pure panic as he sped away from town and into the forest. How could things have happened this way? One little seed of jealousy on his part and some wrong things said had created a monster of a problem, one he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to stop. His thoughts went in rapid succession, with no way of stopping it.

What if the dogs do kill Sitka? What if they decided to harm Tovah as well? Everyone would eventually find out that I was the one who had complained about her choice of mates. I’ll probably be an outcast most likely, and my Family wouldn’t want anything to do with me!

“Kodi, stop!”

The voice halted Kodi in his tracks, and he turned to see Balto run up to him. He looked at him, and suddenly Kodi knew by the expression that his Father knew everything. How could this get any worse?

“No time for this Dad, I gotta go and"-

“Kodi, I already know what’s wrong.” Balto growled. “I had to follow you to get to the bottom of this. I’m not going to tell you right now how I wish you had talked to me about this in the very beginning, I’m going to tell you to stop acting on your own, and to let me help you stop this before things get out of paw. If those dogs already left, we’ll have to go as fast as we can before they reach Tovah’s den. Now let’s move!”

*********************************************

To be Contiued...