Part 5
“Then we take him home,” Maddie said.
Her voice sounded steadier than the rest of her felt. Leah’s fingers tightened on her shoulder once, not to stop her, just to let her know she was there. That helped more than Maddie would have admitted the week before.
The day became a set of careful preparations. Jonah moved the trail cameras so they covered the meadow from three angles. Dr. Warren fitted Cinder with a light temporary marker that would fall away as he grew, then checked his leg one last time. Deputy McBride parked near the turnoff to Helen’s driveway and spoke to the closest ranchers so no one wandered onto the property before the release.
Helen closed the curtains facing the county road. “Nobody needs to watch this from a truck bed,” she said.
Maddie spent most of the afternoon beside the mudroom barrier. She did not put her fingers through the wire. She did not feed Cinder from her hand. She did not make the little clicking sound that usually brought his ears forward, though wanting to make it sat in her chest like a held breath.
Cinder paced when the pack called. He was stronger now, restless and sharp, no longer the half-cold bundle she had carried against her shirt. Once, he stopped in front of her and looked straight at her. Then the scarred female called from the trees, and he turned away.
“You know,” Maddie whispered. “Don’t you?”
He pressed his nose to the bottom of the mudroom door.
That night, the wolves came earlier than they had before. One pale shape appeared in the grass before the last light had left the ridge. Another crossed behind the woodpile near nine. By midnight, all nine were on camera, spread through the meadow and the trees.
The scarred female lay beneath the black pines facing the house. A large dark male moved in slow lines near the road, stopping now and then with his head lifted. Jonah watched the feed from the kitchen table with coffee growing cold beside him.
“They know he’s stronger,” he said.
Leah stood behind Maddie’s chair. “Does that make tomorrow more dangerous?”
“It makes them less likely to leave without him.”
Nobody said much after that.
At 5:18 a.m., Cinder began throwing himself against the crate door.
The sound brought everyone awake. Maddie pulled on jeans that would not rub against her stitches and tried to tie her hiking shoes, but her fingers shook so badly that she knotted one lace into a hard little mess. Leah knelt without a word and untangled it.
“Do you want me next to you?” Leah asked.
Maddie looked at her mother’s bent head, at the careful way she worked the lace loose instead of taking over everything. A week ago, Maddie would have said no because no felt stronger.
“Yes,” she said.
Leah tied the shoe properly. “Then I’m next to you.”
Jonah reviewed the plan in the mudroom. He would open the outside door and check the porch. Maddie and Leah would carry the crate only as far as the marked place near the bottom of the steps. Jonah would remain close enough to intervene but far enough not to crowd the wolves. Helen and Dr. Warren would watch from inside.
“You open the crate and come back,” Jonah told Maddie. “You do not wait for him. You do not call him. If he stays inside, we give him time from the house.”
Maddie repeated every step until he nodded.
When Jonah opened the mudroom door, cold air spilled across the floor, carrying pine, damp grass, and something wilder beneath it. Cinder stopped fighting the crate. His nose lifted toward the morning.
Maddie took one handle. Leah took the other.
“Together,” Leah said.
They stepped onto the porch.
Without the glass between them and the meadow, the wolves seemed less like shapes and more like bodies, breathing and watching. The scarred female stood about seventy yards away, motionless except for the twitch of one ear. Two younger wolves waited behind her. The dark male stood near the trees.
No wolf moved toward the porch.
Jonah went down first. Maddie and Leah followed with the crate between them. It was heavier than Maddie expected, not because Cinder weighed much, but because every step carried the weight of not turning around.
They set the crate on the flattened grass marked by two smooth stones. Leah backed away first. Jonah moved with her.
Maddie crouched in front of the crate.
Cinder turned inside and looked at her through the wire. His eyes were no longer cloudy. They were bright, frightened, and alive.
For one wild second, Maddie wanted to slam the latch shut, carry him back inside, and say he needed one more day. One more night. One more chance for her to be necessary. Then the scarred female gave the three-note call. Cinder faced the meadow. Maddie opened the latch…
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