One of the wolves, taking advantage of the slowing thrusts of the old buck’s antlers, dodged in and slashed the tendons of a hind leg. Slowly, with antlers still lashing, the old monarch settled down into the snow and lay beating with his forelegs and jerking his head. Instantly every wolf was on him and their howls were more savage than before.
The end of the monarch was the destined end of all wild dwellers. The end of a life of struggle and constant alertness. The law of the wild was fulfilled. While youth and vigor gave him power and speed the buck lived and went his way, but when that strength slipped from him he went down before the gray killers.
Under the big spruce Midnight stood listening to the growling and snarling of the pack as they tore the warm flesh from the bones of the old buck. He watched and waited, expecting the pack to come leaping down the ledge trail and across the slide-filled fissure. But they did not scent him because the wind always blew off the high mesa and seldom came up out of the canyon except in the spring. When the killers had stripped the bones and cracked the ones their powerful jaws could break they left the mangled carcass and raced away through the moonlight, seeking another victim.
Then the little fox came out of his den and a pair of coyotes trotted up from the shadows under the spruce at the lower end of the mesa. The little fox and the coyotes fought over the bones, dragging them away to spots where they could lie down and gnaw them or crack them and lick the still warm marrow fat from their centers.
11. New Trails
Spring came with a chinook and a sudden thaw which broke a week of bitter weather. The transformation was in the nature of a miracle. Soft breezes blew up from the valleys, warm winds which settled the snow and filled it with water. Midnight smelled the earthiness of the wind from the lowlands and pranced eagerly. A change as sudden as the change in the weather had come over him. For months he had given all his attention to the gnawing hunger which was always demanding more dry grass; now he was stirred by another urge. He wanted to be free to run, to seek something he did not understand.
Shaking his head he galloped through the slush and mud to the ledge trail. The dirty ice filling the crevice had not settled. The force of the slide had packed it so hard that it melted only a little on the surface. Midnight walked across the fissure and up the ledge trail. He stood on the edge of the meadow and looked across its gleaming surface. With an eager nicker he plowed through the wet snow. The old timber-line buck was not there to greet him and the only answer to his call was the harsh and irritated chatter of a crested jay in the timber.
Midnight moved out on the mesa and began pawing for grass. He was hungry and now that he was in the open he did not know what he desired or where he wanted to go, so he set to feeding. After a time he moved down beside the castle rocks and stood staring into the smoky haze of the valley country.
Toward evening he went to the castle rocks and climbed up to the shelter he had shared with Lady Ebony. He sniffed about, pawing and snorting as he smelled cougar scent. The cat smell mingled with the pungent odor coming from the pack rat’s nest in the corner. The cat smell was cold but it stirred him to uneasy anger. He tore to bits the bed of sticks where the king cat had slept, scattering them about on the rocky floor.