“There will be others,” Lucky replied. “Mickey’s right; it isn’t safe here.”

“What does he know?” Dart snarled, baring her teeth at Lucky and then turning to the rest of the Pack. “He’s a traitor, after all. This is our camp; he can’t just tell us to leave it at the first sign of trouble!” She looked to Alpha to back her up, but the half wolf stayed silent, still transfixed by the black cloud.

Bella turned to Dart and Twitch. “If Lucky thinks we should leave, I agree with him.”

“He’s not our Alpha,” whined Twitch, “and neither are you.”

Lucky was watching the black smoke twist in the sky, rankling at the foul odor that burned his nose. “The cloud is made of bad air. It will make us sick.”

“Lucky has good instincts.” It was Sweet. She had been watching quietly, looking from the cloud back to Alpha and Lucky. She spoke with authority, addressing all the dogs. “I know this . . . from before. If he thinks it is dangerous to stay, I trust him.”

Lucky’s tail rose at her words. He turned to the other dogs. “Twitch, Spring, you have the best noses of any dog here. Don’t you think the cloud is bad?”

The dogs turned to the littermates, waiting for their response. Alpha didn’t move, except for curling his lip scornfully, but his legs were trembling and eyes wide.

Twitch sniffed the air. At his side, Spring breathed deeply and winced. “Yes, it’s definitely bad. You can all smell it, can’t you? That’s no natural scent.”

Twitch sniffed again, his ears flicking back. “You’re right,” he conceded. “It’s dangerous.”

This sent fresh yaps of fear through the circle of dogs.

Lucky barked in acknowledgment. “We need to find a new camp, far away from here. Somewhere with better shelter if the cloud does come. We should leave right now!”

This time they all yelped in agreement, even Twitch. No single dog, Lucky noticed, had turned to Alpha for his opinion. They know their leader has turned coward, he thought. This gave him no pleasure. All he knew was that the new Pack needed to survive. I don’t know where we should go, but I know we shouldn’t go toward the city. He peered up at the tree-covered hill stretching away from the terrible sounds. They would be safer in the shelter of its high reaches and tall branches.