moment the Bone was out of ear-shot, Vale asked Falcon abruptly, “Can I trust you?”

Falcon looked slightly confused.  “What about, Vale?”

She sighed, then whispered impatiently, “Listen, I’ve got plans, and I need you to help me carry them out.  I know for a fact that Bone is a traitor who purposely got Owl to lure that little pup into this territory so that he could pick the Forest Pack off search party by search party.  I need you to help me return the pup and save Blaze.”

Falcon nodded.  He was still a bit bewildered, and he didn’t like the idea of working against his Alpha, but he knew that Bone was a bad leader and was up to no good.  “What do I need to do?”

“Well, here’s how the plan goes…”

*   *   *   *   *

Cattail groaned.  She slowly, painstakingly opened her eyes. The smell of Stone Pack assaulted her nostrils, and she sat up.  Blaze was staring curiously at her.

“Uhh, where am I?” Cattail asked groggily.

“You are in the main cave of the Stone Pack camp,” Blaze replied.  “What are you called, pup?”

“I’m Cattail.”

Blaze nodded courteously.  “I am called Blaze, the Beta of the Stone Pack.”

Cattail nodded in reply.  Her head was pounding, and she wanted to go home.  She would never leave camp again, if only she could return to it.

“Who brought you here, Cattail?”

“Thunder grounded me, so Owl helped me escape.”  She frowned.  “I think.  I don’t know if this is escaping or what.  Did the big wolves hurt him too?”

“Hurt Owl?  I doubt it.  He is in league with them.”

Cattail’s voice went shrill with surprise.  “You mean Owl is a traitor?”

“Him and Bone, and who knows who else is in on their little scheme.  Probably Hawk, maybe Shard or Burn.  More than likely there’s nobody else from the Forest Pack though.”

“Bone the Alpha?”

“Yes.”

“What’s going on?  Why am I here?  When can I go home?”  Tears started to form in Cattail’s brownish eyes.

Blaze looked at her kindly.  “I’m not sure exactly what Bone is up to, but I do know that he plans to attack your Pack as they send out search parties for you.  I will do the best I can to get you home as soon as possible.”  Blaze frowned.  “It won’t be easy though.”

A few moments after Blaze finished speaking, a little black nose poked it’s way into the cave, soon followed by the rest of Pond.  Cattail jumped up and raced over to her sister.

“Pond, what are you doing here?”  Cattail asked anxiously.  “They didn’t catch you too, did they?”

Pond shook her head, saying, “No, I followed you here.  Are you all right?”  She nodded shyly to Blaze.  “Hello, and thank you for offering to help my sister.”

Blaze’s eyes widened.  “You followed your sister all the way from Forest Pack territory without Bone noticing you?”

Pond blushed beneath her fur and shuffled her paws, nodding.

“Well, well, well, what have we here?”  Blaze’s hackles went up at the familiar, expressionless voice.  Owl and two other males, Hawk and an evil-looking wolf named Burn, blocked the entrance to the cave.  “Two runaway pups and a traitorous Beta who supposed to be guarding them!”

“You are the traitors!”  Blaze growled.

“Temper, temper, little Blaze,” Hawk growled teasingly.

Pond began to whimper in fear.

“Now, now, there’s no need for that, Miss Pond.”  Owl’s voice was deceptively soothing.  “We’re not here to hurt you.”

Cattail stood boldly before the three wolves, drawing back her black lips to expose tiny baby teeth.  Her brown puppy fuzz puffed up.  She let loose a small, high-pitched growl, followed by several loud yips.

The three males thought that this was the funniest thing they had ever seen.  Hawk and Burn were almost rolling on the ground.  Owl’s dry laughter filled the small cave.  Hawk and Burn slowly trailed off, but Owl just kept laughing.  His two companions shuffled their feet.  Blaze shivered.  Owl’s laughter was like a piece of rough granite being scraped across slate.  Expressionless.  Humorless.  Grating.

Owl stopped laughing abruptly, then started yowling.  Cattail, furious at being laughed at, had bitten Owl’s leg, and refused to let go.  Her baby teeth were sharp like needles and her jaws were strong.  Owl tried in vain to fling her off his paw, but she just bit harder.  Blaze stood stunned for a moment, then joined the attack.

“Don’t just stand there, you idiots!” Owl yelled furiously.  “Help me!”

Owl finally succeeded in flinging Cattail off his paw.  She landed outside the cave by pure luck, and she started running toward Forest Pack territory as fast as she could.  Pond slipped between Hawk’s legs and ran after her sister.

Hawk ran after the two pups, leaving Burn and Owl to take care of Blaze.  Blaze fought furiously, but he was outnumbered two-to-one.  They backed him against the back of the cave, snapping as if he were the deer, and they, the hunters.

*   *   *   *   *

Cattail ran, her heart pounding, her breath coming in short gasps.  She could hear her sister’s labored breathing behind her, and the pounding of a larger wolf, far away but gaining on the sisters, getting closer, and closer.

Cattail’s ears went up.  Was that voices she could hear ahead?  A familiar smell entered her nostrils, a scent of shadows slipping between trees, a smell of pine, oak, birch, and ash.  The mustiness of raw meat and the fragrance of battles won.  The rotting smell of the hot spring.  Her home, and her family.  She picked out one smell in particular, one that was familiar and was adored by her entire Pack.  Thunder was coming to rescue her.

Cattail did a small leap in the middle of a step and tripped.  She ploughed into the undergrowth and settled to a stop just barely before she slid into a pile of fresh moose droppings.  Pond grabbed the scruff of her sister’s neck and pulled her upright.

“Get up, Cattail!”  Pond whispered fiercely.  “Owl will take us back to the Stone Pack camp and we’ll never see our home again!”

“Pond, take a sniff!  Thunder isn’t far ahead.  He’ll save us!”

“Not if that Stone Pack wolf gets to us first,” Pond said grimly.

Cattail started to run, but when she heard a growl she looked over her shoulder to see Hawk catapulting himself at her, eyes wild, mouth open, teeth bared in a horrifying grimace.  Cattail scrambled out of the way.  He landed heavily, and suddenly, there was a loud crack, and he collapsed.  Pond suddenly recognized their surroundings.  They were by the shore of Cattail’s favorite pond, the one where she and her sister had almost been trapped in one of the metal traps set by Strangers.  The metal thing that was now clamped around Hawk’s leg.