Part 4
“Put it down, Dale.” Eli moved beside Ranger, close enough to feel the dog’s flank shaking. He did not touch either animal. “This is my land, and they’re my family. You don’t fire across my yard or shoot through my dog to prove you’re right.”
Dale’s cheek remained against the stock. Behind him, one of the men whispered his name. Ranger held his ground, growling with the old full-bodied authority he had once used to keep frightened strangers from blundering into search sites.
Will went quiet. He stood directly behind the shepherd, waiting rather than advancing.
That, more than Eli’s words, seemed to reach Dale. The muzzle dipped an inch, then another. At last he lowered the rifle and slung it over his shoulder.
“You’re gambling with more than your own life,” he said.
“Maybe so. It’s still not your shot to take.”
Dale looked at Ranger as if the dog had betrayed something fundamental. “If I’m wrong, tell me in spring. If you’re wrong, those sheep won’t be the worst of it.”
The men mounted their machines. Engines tore open the stillness, tracks throwing snow against the fence. Eli watched until the last red taillight disappeared among the trees.
He knew the argument had not ended simply because Dale left. If Will ever hunted the sheep, threatened a visitor, or stopped yielding space, Eli would have to respond to the animal in front of him rather than the pup he remembered. That responsibility belonged to him. What he would not accept was another man forcing the decision at gunpoint while Ranger stood in the line of fire.
Only then did he kneel. Ranger pressed into him, trembling now that the confrontation had ended. Will came near enough to smell Eli’s cheek and touched it once with his tongue.
“He wasn’t wrong about everything,” Eli told them. His hand rested on the back of Ranger’s neck. “But he was wrong about today.”
For the next week, Eli checked every latch twice. He added a brace to the sheep gate and kept the rifle unloaded above the door until night. It was not fear of Will that made him cautious. It was the knowledge that trust carried work with it, and that the men’s visit had made the homestead visible in a way it had not been before.
Will did not punish the new precautions. He waited while Eli closed gates and moved aside when feed buckets passed. At night he often chose the covered porch instead of the hearth, facing the woods. Ranger slept just inside the door. The two animals had found a way to keep watch on both sides of the threshold.
The cold deepened. Daylight lengthened, but the extra sun offered no warmth. A hard crust formed over the snow, difficult for moose and caribou to break and sharp enough to cut a paw. Eli saw fewer tracks along the creek. The hares vanished. Once, beyond the north fence, he found the narrow prints of several wolves traveling close together.
The tracks crossed and recrossed where the animals had tested the air. There were at least four, probably more, and one print was broader than Eli’s palm. They had not approached the buildings. Still, he replaced a cracked rail on the outer fence and banked snow against the barn wall where the ewes had worried the boards thin.
Will smelled them before Eli did. He followed one set to the creek, then stopped over the broadest print with his mouth open in silent scenting. It was the same layered smell he had carried home twice. The hair along his spine rose, but he did not retreat until Ranger nudged his shoulder and turned toward home.
Three nights later, a howl woke the house.
The stove had burned down to a red seam. Eli lay listening for a second before the sound came again, close enough that Ranger’s water trembled in its metal bowl. Another voice joined from the creek, then a third from behind the barn. The pack was already around them.
Ranger was upright before Eli had both feet on the floor. Will stood rigid near the door, his nose lifted toward the smell leaking through the frame. A low, clipped sound left him. One voice at the north fence cut off and answered in the same rhythm.
Eli pulled on his insulated pants and parka, took the rifle from its pegs, and loaded it. “You two stay here.”
Ranger whined.
“I mean it.” Eli pointed toward the stove as though either animal would respect the gesture. “Stay.”
Another howl rose closer. The ewes began thudding against the sides of their pen. Eli slipped outside and pulled the door almost shut behind him.
Cold seized the moisture in his nose. He paused on the porch long enough for his eyes to adjust, keeping the rifle pointed at the ground. Moonlight revealed five lean shapes moving low near the barn. The largest had a notch where most of its left ear should have been. They had already forced their way through a weak section of the outer fence and were testing the sheep gate, driven close to the buildings by a hunger Eli could see in their narrow flanks.
He stepped off the porch and shouted. The wolves turned toward him but did not flee. He raised the rifle to fire a warning shot into the safe bank beyond the barn.
The distance was short enough that he could see the torn edge of the leader’s ear and the ribs beneath its coat. These were not animals wandering past. They had spent time locating the weakest boards, and the smell of frightened sheep had stripped away their usual caution.
Wood cracked at the gate. The sheep surged, bleating in panic. Eli hurried forward, planted one boot on snow polished slick over old ice, and lost his footing.
He hit the ground hard enough to empty his lungs. The rifle spun from his hands and vanished into a drift. Pain lanced through his right knee when he tried to rise, dropping him back onto one hip.
The damaged gate bowed inward. Eli dug through the snow for the rifle, finding only ice and splintered wood.
Behind him, the house door burst open.
Ranger cleared the porch in one leap and put himself between Eli and the five advancing wolves.
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