Free Zan-Gah and the Beautiful Country by Allan Richard Shickman

After the chilly day’s trek, they took shelter by a stream in an area overgrown with brush—which contrasted with the rising and falling prairie. Suddenly Chul stopped to listen. His mouth always dropped open when he did, and he stared straight into empty space. He was hearing the shrill, whimpering sound of a small animal and he tried to locate its source. Dael happened to be nearby when, stepping into a cache of dry leaves, he was startled by a high-pitched yelp and a sharp pain on his shin. Dael reached down reflexively and discovered something warm and furry—two wolf cubs, one of which still had its small teeth in his leg.
    These were probably the babies of one of the wolves he had killed. Dael picked a cub up with each hand by the scruff of the neck. They were weak with hunger and whining continuously. On the spot Dael adopted them and resolved to restore them. He brought them to vigorous health in a few days with water and prechewed bits of meat transferred from his mouth to theirs with careful fingers.
    Zan and Pax noted with some curiosity and no little surprise the care and tenderness Dael lavished on the cubs. Zan’s violent brother had always hated the species, dreaming sometimes at night in fitful sleep that whole wolf packs were surrounding and attacking him, while he tried in vain to fight them off. Horrid dreams! Besides, these were the offspring of animals he had recently slain simply for the fun and adventure of it. Yet Dael formed a sudden and strongattachment to them. They became his children and the focus of the little love that was still in him. Thereafter, wherever Dael went with his energetic and determined strides, the wolves would be behind. He would strike or even kick them when they displeased him, threatening to make a meal of them if meat should be in short supply; and yet they fawned on him and followed at his heels. By the time the clans reached their destination several months later, they were full-grown young wolves, as tame as their owner.
    Dael trained them in toughness, tugging at toys in their mouths and fighting with them for their food. He sometimes amused himself by teaching his pets to howl. Sitting with them and holding one under each of his strong arms so that their heads were close together, he would begin to bark and keen in a way that drew a howling response from the animals. Then Dael, imitating them, would wail at the top of his lungs,
“arroo-roo-roo!”
causing them to howl even more. Perhaps it was the affect of their kinship, or maybe the noise just hurt their sensitive ears, but it was a strange concert. The three wailing together drew the laughter of all who saw them, and excited a good deal of admiration as well. Dael was already known for his fierceness and courage, and the company of his wild pets, forming something like a family, made him remarkable and respected by many, feared by some. Dael would leap with the animals, play with them, wrestle with them. And he began to seem like one of them. He enjoyed no one’s company but theirs.

 
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10
THE GREAT
SPLIT
    Possibly the most difficult part of the journey would be crossing the great split in the earth. It had been one thing for a small party of intrepid youths to traverse the harrowing, wind-swept expanse; it was quite another to expect women, children, and the aged to scamper fearlessly across the gulf as Rydl might! The depth of the gorge was absolutely terrifying, and the bridge built some years before by the wasp men was slender and unsteady.
    Chul, who was a good parent, understood the need to prepare the children. Well before they came to the bridge he would lead a group of them around in single file, as a gigantic mother duck might walk its ducklings to water—to everybody’s mirthful entertainment. It seemed to be a game, and the children enjoyed it, but it was really an exercise in trusting and following their leader. Yet when the time to cross the abyss