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Frost Wolf
Wolves Of The Beyond book 4 Frost Wolf
Author Kathryn Lasky
Publication date December 1, 2011
Publication Order
Preceded by
Watch Wolf
Followed by
Spirit Wolf

Frost Wolf is the fourth book in the Wolves of the Beyond series, written by Kathryn Lasky. The hardcover was released on December 1st, 2011.

Preview

An unseen enemy.

The winds have shifted in the Beyond. It's summer, and that should mean warmth, fish, and meat, but blizzards rake the land and the caribou and moose that the wolves hunt are vanishing. Famine has arrived in the Beyond, and the strict order among the wolf clans is starting to break down.

Worse, there's one wolf thriving on the chaos. He wears a stolen owl battle mask and calls himself the Prophet. There are horrible rumors that instead of helping the wolves survive, he's leading hundreds of them to their deaths. The elite wolves of the Watch send young Faolan and his friend Edme on a desperate mission to bring down the Prophet. But how can two wolves stop an enemy they can't even find?

Plot

The story begins when an old buck caribou leads his herd to the summer feeding grounds in the Beyond. They keep going in circles because the winter blizzards are still around and the old buck questions his leadership for the herd. Meanwhile, Edme is on a scouting mission to hunt for herds, resting and thinking about the absence of herds in the snowy summer, and the threat of famine. Suddenly, she is startled by a large wolf with ice in his fur, radiant and old-looking, believing him to be a lochin. It turns out to be Faolan, but the impression remains. Faolan brings Edme back out to show her something that confuses him. He leads her to the tracks of the caribou herd going in circles, but neither of them are able to find the animals.

Faolan and Edme continue their search for food, and stumble upon a young moose. Edme loses her head and begins to press in on it, resulting in it escaping. Edme discovers the smell of old milk on it, indicating that no female was available to nurse it. 

Once Faolan and Edme return to the Watch, Banja complains that there are too few wolves at the Ring at any time. Finbar immediately calls them to report, and Edme tells him about the caribou herd tracks and the moose. Finbar informs both wolves that Liam MacDuncan has wandered off after the death of his mother, Cathmor, and allowed the MacDuncan clan to fall into chaos. He adds that some wolves of the Blood Watch have gone missing. Finbar sends Faolan and Edme to scout out the MacDuncans and fix the situation with the Blood Watch any way they can. He finishes by advising Edme to visit the ailing Winks. 

During the visit, Winks tells Edme about her inner eye, a peculiar inner knowing possessed by certain one-eyed wolves. The sight of Winks reminds Edme of the vision of Faolan covered in ice, and Winks notices her shock. She advises Edme to think about whatever it was that Winks looked like to her, citing her faith in her own inner eye. Edme and her taiga share a goodbye, with Winks telling her "slaan boladh, until the next scent post". That night, the young she-wolf dreams about the frost wolf she saw telling her she has two eyes, but he sees only one. She tells him she can see through his pelt to another creature. The wolf appears to be Faolan, but states that he is not. Edme realizes he is right, and watches him transform into an owl, asking who he is. 

The Sark of the Slough, unable to find the herds, is forced to eat two rotten Slough tern eggs. She recalls that earlier in the season, she ran a byrrgis led by Liam MacDuncan, but he had so little control that the byrrgis fell apart. Sometime after eating the eggs and discovering that they were not the best food, the Sark observes several wolves dancing in a strange manner and calling for "the Prophet". Among them, she spies a wolf with an owl's helmet and mask on its head, but cannot figure out who it is. 

Back at the MacDuncan gadderheal, Liam becomes flustered with his new leadership after the death of his mother and unable to control his clan. As a result, arguments break out frequently and Liam is unable to muster enough courage to stop them. Mhairie and Dearlea, eavesdropping outside, are disgusted with Liam's failure and saddened by their mother's long absence at the Blood Watch. Faolan and Edme stumble upon them, and the sisters explain that he does wander off and that the Blood Watch has not been changed. The two Watch wolves form a plan to find Caila and the rest of the absent MacDuncan Blood Watch wolves. When they enter the gadderheal, they discover that everything looks careless and unattended, as if the order among the clans is breaking down. Liam is horrified to discover the intrusion of the Watch wolves, and his lords are furious. The newcomers explain their mission, which makes the chaos even worse. Faolan and Edme quiet them and Faolan orders Liam to show some dignity and tell them when the Blood Watch was last changed. Liam is unsure, and Alastrine arrives in time to explain that the rotation is late and Caila is still away. The Watch wolves quickly leave, accompanied by Mhairie and Dearlea.

While the group travels in search of Caila, Faolan realizes that their old gnaw wolf friends will starve in the famine first. Shortly after making a plan to bring the gnaw wolves to the Blood Watch, they find the dead body of Tearlach. They notice that his head is pressed to the ground where his ear would have been, and wonder what he was listening to. Faolan and Edme howl a song to help him ascend the star ladder, claiming it "just came to them". The Whistler, painfully thin, appears close by and collapses. The four travelers drag him to a cave and revive him with bits of small game. The Whistler awakens, though he is still very weak. He begins to report that he was sent out to find Tamsen, but stumbled upon Tearlach, whom he believes was listening to something odd: desperate wolves sending secret messages to "the Prophet". The exhausted gnaw wolf tells them all about how groups of wolves styling themselves Skaars Dancers have started dancing themselves to exhaustion and calling for Skaarsgard to take them to the Cave of Souls, taking directions from the Prophet to do so. The travelers are horrified by not only the macabre practice, but the dancers' beliefs in the Prophet's special powers, which breaks The Great Chain. The Whistler goes on to tell them that he knows only that the Prophet wears an owl's mask. The travelers decide to bring the Whistler with them once he recovers.

Gwynneth is forced to leave the frozen Beyond to the old forge of her auntie, the Rogue Smith of Silverveil. On one particular night, she receives a visit from her auntie's scroom. The old Snowy Owl tells her foster daughter that there has been a disturbance, which Gwynneth works out is about Gwyndor's battle helmet. The scroom adds that he had a hero mark that was disturbed, but vanishes before she can finish giving the message. Gwynneth is aware that no one knows where her father died, nor where his helmet rests, but she realizes she must try to find them.

Faolan and his friends are on the move again, nearing the Blood Watch, and nearing starvation. Mhairie and Dearlea begin to reminisce about Caila as they draw near. Soon enough, they come upon paw prints which show that a group of wolves were dancing there. They also detect a horrible stink, which Faolan realizes is from a rout of cannibalistic outclanners, who must have breached the border undetected and are now seeking Skaars dancers to eat. As they move on, Faolan secretly tells Edme that tracks of clan wolves were in the circle as well. The two wolves realize that the order of the clans is truly eroding, letting hunger rule.

Later in the summer, the wolves are forced to eat vegetation under Faolan's guidance. The Whistler spots a ringing rock, which is useful in sending the messages to the Prophet, and tries scratching on it himself. He realizes he can feel the ice vibrate under his feet, channeling the sound, and he believes Tearlach had been able to hear the messages coming from the ice. The Whistler tries to use his twisted throat to find out where the messages are coming from. Faolan catches him engaging in this peculiar behavior, and the Whistler explains that he was using it to communicate with someone else and he found out where it was coming from. He expects them to look for a Skaars circle, but Faolan is reluctant to reveal that clan wolves were dancing. The Whistler reports that the circle is near the Blood Watch, asking if all the tracks were truly outclanners.

Gwynneth flies to the Sark's cave to bring her cooked rodents and enlist her in finding Gwyndor's hero mark. The Sark eats gratefully but orders Gwynneth to tell her the reason she came. Gwynneth confides in the Sark, who reminds her that they made a previous expedition to find Gwyndor's grave but failed. Gwynneth reluctantly tells the Sark about the scroom, which she laughs at. Gwynneth indignantly snaps at her, and the Sark apologizes and asks what happened. Gwynneth reports the disturbance, and the Sark realizes that the wolf in the center of the dance circle was wearing the same kind of mask. She hurries to the back of her cave to consult her memory jugs. Suddenly, she draws in the smell of rabbit-ear moss, realizing it is connected to the masked wolf, and faints. Gwynneth revives the old wolf, who blurts out the rabbit-ear moss connection that triggered her memory of Gwyndor. The Sark explains to the confused Gwynneth that Gwyndor's helmet was stolen by the masked wolf.

The five travelers finally draw near the Blood Watch when they smell a Skaars circle. They investigate and find a group of weakened wolves dancing as if in a trance, howling to Skaarsgard to take them. The travelers find a strange allurement in the song, fighting to resist. As some of them begin to collapse, Dearlea suddenly spots Caila and runs up to her with Mhairie. Caila, dramatically changed and in a state of confusion, growls and rejects her daughters. The young she-wolves desperately plead with her, but Caila tells them that she was not their real mother and they had a third littermate who was a malcadh. Caila denies the sisters while they beg her to return to her senses. An outclanner suddenly appears and attacks her. Faolan leaps to her defense in a state of rage, and all at once, he turns into a grizzly bear, breaking the outclanner's neck with a blow of his paw. Edme is deeply shocked to witness this, even more when she realizes she was the only one who could see it. Caila becomes dazed and wanders into a blizzard, which also forces Faolan and the travelers to seek shelter in The Cave Before Time.

That night in the cave, Edme wonders about Faolan's transformation, and once again thinks about the vision of him as a frost wolf, as if he were from another time. While Faolan sleeps, a part of his spirit slips out and decides to draw the Skaars circle on the wall. As he does, he notices that this part of him is a grizzly bear, the same bear that rose within him and killed the outclanner. Just as Faolan wakes up, he becomes aware that Mhairie and Dearlea must be his sisters. He tells them as they are waking up, shocking them. He reassures them that Caila loved them and was not right in the head at the moment. Faolan also realizes that he lived a past life as a grizzly bear.

Gwynneth and the Sark begin their search for Gwyndor's helmet by following a weak trace of scent. The Sark further explains that the scents in her memory helped her realize that the masked wolf carried smells of starvation, owl bones, and Gwyndor's forge. They continue to follow the vague trail. One day, a sudden warm day arrives, though the Sark can tell it will get cold again, making her sad to realize the ruin of the Beyond. However, a stroke of luck soon brings them to a cache, which also hides a bone carved with an image of a helmet and visor.

The day after finding Caila, the travelers reach the Blood Watch and begin volunteering. Faolan notices that the Blood Watch has not yet tried to stop the Skaars dancing, so he hatches a plan. With Tamsen's permission, the group approaches the nearest Skaars circle, hoping to give them food and remind them of the Great Chain and the blasphemy of their actions. Despite their best efforts, the dancers are frightened to eat, believing it will drive Skaarsgard off and leave them stranded on earth. The desperate wolves resist to the point that one of them dies and the rest walk off.

The Sark and Gwynneth carry on traveling, finding signs of Skaars dancers themselves, as well as horrible news of the clans beginning to die off. In an isolated part of the Beyond, the scent trail leads the two straight to an Obea Tree. The Sark explains that the tree is where Gwyndor's helmet must be hidden because of the accompanying superstitions. The old wolf lays out a plot to stake out the tree to confront the thief. Gwynneth dares to ask where his grave might be, and the Sark thinks he died on a bed of rabbit-ear moss. That night while an ice storm rages, the Sark wonders about the Prophet and his strange dancing practice.

As the snowy summer turns to fall, Faolan and his friends find their way back to the Blood Watch and hear the skreeleens howling about mysterious colored lights appearing in the sky. As they have not had any luck breaking up any Skaars circles, Tamsen decides that the dancing will only stop if the Prophet is captured. Even so, the Skaars dancers redouble their efforts under the strange lights. While Faolan watches them from a mountain cairn, his sisters arrive to spend time with him, and he reflects on his joy at finding his siblings. Meanwhile, several wolves from the MacNamara clan, including Airmead and Katria, arrive to relieve the worn-out blooders.

Tully flies into the Beyond from the Great Ga'Hoole Tree to help the wolves of the Beyond and find Gwynneth. A difficult flight brings him into an encounter with a Skaars circle. Noticing how weak they are, he tries to feed them and get answers out of them, but none of them are in their right mind to tell him. After his work is done, Creakle shows up and helps explain what is going on in the Beyond. Tully asks about Gwynneth, and Creakle is little help but agrees to join the owl.

While camping at the Obea tree, Gwynneth goes out flying when Tully and Creakle encounter her, telling her the great tree needs her to help the wolves. Gwynneth explains that she must stay to complete her own hunt for the Prophet, but offers to send them to the Blood Watch. Tully returns to the Great Tree to fetch more help, while Creakle goes on alone. He soon arrives to find Faolan and Edme and explains his story. Faolan immediately decides to leave to aid the Sark in the stakeout, accompanied by Edme. On the journey, Faolan stumbles upon a lava bed, which he remembers as his winter den with Thunderheart. The silver wolf fears that inside the bed, bears are in danger without knowing why. They dig their way inside, and find two outclanners threatening a grizzly cub and her sleeping mother. Once again, Faolan transforms into a bear and slays the outclanners, then even more confusing for Edme, he turns back into himself but calms the cub, acting perfectly like a bear. Edme is left wondering what her best friend really is.

When the two arrive at the Obea tree, the Sark immediately picks up the smell of the outclanners and bears. Edme explains, while Faolan keeps his mysterious abilities a secret. The two wolves join in the plan. Meanwhile, the Skaars dancing becomes still more widespread, but the two young wolves can do no more than chase away outclanners and attempt to feed the weakened dancers, who still refuse. One day, while they try to get information out of a dancer, Faolan tries to feed the group a mouse. The dancer is still horrified by the food, but explains that if left for the Prophet, it will become spirit food. Edme quickly hatches a plan to bring him there and leaves it for him, and the dancers send a message with a ringing rock. When the Watch wolves return to the Obea tree, the Sark smells the mouse and is eager for the food, but horrified by their report of the scam.

The Prophet hears the message, but decides to stop at the Obea tree first. His visor reflects the rising sun as he approaches. The Sark sees him first and the group wait in hiding until he draws near, then ambush him. The Prophet flees, leaving Faolan trapped against the wind. The silver wolf uses his splayed paw to help claw through the wind, and spots Edme heading off the Prophet's escape attempt, continuing the chase. Once Faolan is able to pin him down and Gwynneth lifts his visor, he is revealed to be the disgraced Liam MacDuncan. Desperate, he claims that he only meant to bring hope to the wolves. The other creatures are enraged, and the Sark threatens to drive him out to die alone, but Gwynneth asks them to spare him, for only he knows the location of her father's resting place. The Sark agrees, but demands that Liam stop the dancing. Once Liam is brought back to the Blood Watch and confesses his crimes, Tamsen orders that he be unmasked before as many Skaars dancers as possible. The plan fails, with the dancers remaining trapped in their delusions of the Prophet. One pup begs his parents to see sense, but they ignore him and Faolan is forced to carry him away to the Ring to save him. 

While the group returns to the Ring, the Whistler leaves to rejoin the Blood Watch, where he is now a respected skreeleen and no longer wishes to return to his clan. The rest of the group report back to Finbar. The Fengo is shocked to hear the truth behind the Skaars dancing and the near extinction of the clans, and calls the rescued pup "a bit of a miracle". He stops Edme and Faolan to tell them each something; he tells Faolan that his sisters have nowhere to go and might be able to join the MacNamaras. Faolan asks permission to continue building Morag's drumlyn and show it to his sisters. Finbar grants him permission, and tells Edme that Winks died peacefully after she left.

Once the three siblings draw near MacNamara territory, they find a dead musk ox and eat from it. Faolan notices how cold the wind is, and suggests they sleep inside the body. His sisters agree to the strange shelter, but at Dearlea's suggestion, they give lochinvyrr to the animal first. The next day, Faolan tells his sisters about their mother's drumlyn. They stop at the MacNamara Carreg Gaer to give the news of the musk ox before continuing to the drumlyn. Meanwhile, the Sark and Gwynneth force Liam to return Gwyndor's helmet to his hero mark. He guides them to a tall spruce tree deep in the Shadow Forest, where Gwynneth finds her father's bones on a bed of rabbit-ear moss. As she replaces his bones and helmet, Auntie's scroom appears and thanks her for a job well done.

Faolan, Mhairie, and Dearlea finally arrive at their mother's drumlyn. Faolan offers his sisters to carve a bone for Morag. He leaves to sleep while they carve. Nervously, they begin, telling Morag their life stories on their bones, and how good a mother Caila was until the Skaars madness took her. Faolan falls asleep and has a dream about carving a wolf's twisted femur, which he seems to know. He knows that he was a bear in the past, but not the full extent of his secret, which he feels he is close to finding out. He thinks that he has died many times and was now born again, a message which is suddenly echoed by an ancient wolf. Faolan wakes up, wondering about his dream and thinking that he is in his first pelt of a new season, at which the book ends abruptly.

Release Date

Frost Wolf's hardcover was released on December 1, 2011.

Excerpt

(Excerpt from Chapter 8: A Raghnaid In Shambles)

It took several seconds for the wolves in the gadderheal to realize that Faolan and Edme had entered. But when they did, an immediate hush fell in the cave.

“What are you doing here?” Lord Jarne roared. His ears had not lain back or even twitched. Such insolence to a Watch wolf from the Ring of Sacred Volcanoes was unheard of.

Faolan and Edme shoved their ears up and walked forward on stiff legs with their tails raised and their hackles bristling. Faolan came so close to the insolent Lord Jarne that their noses almost touched.

“I come by direct command of the Fengo of the Watch at the Ring of Sacred Volcanoes.” It was as if every wolf in the cave were holding its breath. “We have come to inquire about the rotations of the Blood Watch.”

Liam felt his knees grow weak.

“Why didn’t you tell us that the Fengo was sending Watch wolves, Liam?” someone barked from the back. Edme and Faolan were shocked. The wolves were not even using the proper form of address for their chieftain. This was another appalling breach of etiquette.

“Yes, why not?”

“Why not?”

Soon there was a chorus of howling wolves, and the cave teetered on the brink of chaos. Edme shot Faolan a desperate glance.

As if lifted up by his own anger, Faolan rose on his hind legs and began to walk above the crowd. Thunderheart had taught him to do this. When Faolan had jumped the wall of fire as a yearling, wolves had been stunned, but this was entirely different. Jumping, even jumping high, was in the range of moves of a wolf, but walking on hind legs was an extraordinary endeavor, a feat. The light from the small fire burning in the pit in the middle of the gadderheal cast Faolan’s shadow against the rock walls of the cave, and his dark profile seemed to stretch endlessly. All the wolves began to cower, and even Jarne and Adair assumed the most extreme of submission postures. Good! Faolan always knew those two lords were idiots and decided not to waste another second with them. But then another wolf rose and began to snarl.

“You know nothing! And how do we know you have been officially sent by the Fengo? If our chieftain didn’t tell us, perhaps it was because your visit is not sanctioned at all.”

The two lords whom Faolan had just decided not to waste time on began to rise up. Faolan’s and Edme’s instincts were perfectly in sync. In tandem, they leaped forward, Edme body-checking the wolf who had snarled, and Faolan kicking down Jarne and Adair. But it was the cold hard look in Faolan’s eyes more than anything else that vanquished the two lords. Their marrow froze.

“It matters not what the chieftain did or did not tell you,” Faolan roared. He turned again to Liam. “What matters now is for you stand forward, Liam MacDuncan, son of Duncan MacDuncan, great chieftain of the MacDuncan clan, and son of Cathmor, noble she-wolf, renowned turning guard. You are the grandson of Dunforth MacDuncan, great-grandson of the first Liam MacDuncan, and descended from MacDuncans stretching back to the time of first Fengo of the Beyond!”

With each name that was called out, Liam shrank farther into his pelt until he seemed as small, insubstantial, and frail as a wolf four times his age. An immutable silence suffused the cave. Every wolf had its eyes fastened on their chieftain as if trying to imagine his illustrious predecessors. Yes, thought Faolan, think of your history. Think of the honor of this clan since the time the first Fengo arrived in the Beyond. If we forget, we shall fall, and if we fall, then the whole Beyond will fall as well, and we shall sink into an abyss of darkness.

The words came to Faolan, but he did not know from where. He dared not speak them aloud. It was as if he were in a byrrgis and the signals all had been passed in silence until the barks of cease chase were howled. He looked hard at the wolves assembled around him and hoped they saw something in his eyes that was more urgent than words.

“As chieftain of this clan,” Faolan continued, “you need to answer an important question. When was your last rotation of the Blood Watch?”

“I… I… I’m not sure.”

“Not sure?” Edme stepped forward. The chieftain was trembling so hard he could barely answer. “Try to remember.”

“Maybe at the beginning of the New Antlers’ Moon?”

“Maybe, just maybe?” Edme asked. Faolan and Edme looked at each other in dismay.

There was a disturbance at the mouth of the cave. Alastrine, the skreeleen of the Carreg Gaer, made her way in.

“The Blood Watch wolves have not been rotated for almost two moons. Some have come back, such as Stellan, though they were not called. We thank Lupus she did come back, for she is our best outflanker. But Caila has not returned.”

“She ain’t been much of a point wolf since her mate jumped the star ladder,” someone called out from the back of the cave.

“Shame on you!” Alastrine charged the wolf. “Is that the way to speak of a wolf’s passing? This is profane!”

Faolan and Edme were shocked as well, but Alastrine kindled a spark of hope within them. At last a rational wolf with a sense of dignity!

But their question had been answered- answered in a way that they dreaded reporting to the Fengo. They must leave immediately to follow the command and shore up the Blood Watch. Faolan decided to take Mhairie and Dearlea with them. The thought of leaving the two sisters with the MacDuncan clan in its present state was abhorrent. They would all travel together to the Blood Watch and find the sisters’ mother, Caila. But, before they left, Faolan announced to the wolves assembled in the gadderheal that, by the full authority granted him by the Fengo, he was appointing Alastrine first lieutenant to the chieftain in place of Lord Adair. Liam MacDuncan looked profoundly relieved.    

Chapters

  • The Old Buck
  1. Frost Wolf
  2. Tracks to Nowhere
  3. The Last Moose
  4. Secrets of the Gadderheal
  5. The Inner Eye
  6. Most Foul!
  7. Frayed Tempers
  8. A Raghnaid in Shambles
  9. The First Sign
  10. The Whistler
  11. A Hero Mark Disturbed
  12. "How Has It Come to This?"
  13. The Whisper of Rocks
  14. Rabbit-Ear Moss
  15. Dance Interrupted
  16. The Cave Before Time
  17. A Sudden Summer
  18. The Broken Chain
  19. The Obea Tree
  20. Strange Lights
  21. An Owl on a Mission
  22. The Owl and the Gnaw Wolf
  23. A Significant Encounter
  24. The Bear's Den
  25. "The Prophet Shall Reward You!"
  26. The Prophet Comes
  27. The Visor's Glint
  28. Too Late
  29. Good-bye to Friends
  30. Back at the Ring
  31. The Musk Ox
  32. The Drumlyn of Morag
Aurora IV

The strange lights that appear at the end of the book.

Characters

Sequel

The next book, the fifth, is called "Spirit Wolf".

Trivia

  • This is the first book in which we get hints of Faolan's past lives; namely, Edme seeing visions of a frost wolf (Fengo) and an owl, and Faolan realizing he once lived as a grizzly bear.
    • Edme dreams of Fengo (unnamed) turning into a Spotted Owl, yet in Spirit Wolf Fengo was revealed to have been reborn as a Snowy Owl.
  • It is stated that Faolan was the only malcadh born to the MacDuncan clan in the year he was born, but Heep is the same age as him and belonged to the same clan.
  • Faolan mistakenly says that only the sisters of a malcadh are given to a second Milk Giver when in reality, all siblings are given away.

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