At the top of the ravine, Kallik had been busy. She had collected a huge pile of branches and another of small stones, and heaped them up close to the edge of the cliff.

“Good work!” Lusa exclaimed.

“I haven’t finished,” Kallik said, dragging another branch onto the pile. “I need to go over to the other side and collect some there, too.”

“I’ll help you,” Yakone offered.

“Oops!” Lusa felt a stab of guilt. “You can’t go down the track anymore. I’ve trapped it with thorns.”

“Not a problem,” Yakone responded. “We’ll just cross the stream above the waterfall and get to the other side that way.”

Leaving him and Kallik to their task, Lusa padded beside Toklo back into the forest. The sun had slid behind clouds, and it was cool beneath the trees. “I’m going to find Makya and ask her to help us,” she said. “And you should go see Aiyanna.”

Toklo glared at her. “I suppose you won’t stop nagging until I do,” he grumbled. “I hope when I see you next I still have my ears.”

He headed off into the trees, making for Aiyanna’s territory. Lusa watched him go, then turned her pawsteps toward the clearing where she had met Makya’s cubs and saved them from the wolves. I should be able to follow their scent trail from there and find their den.

Lusa kept alert as she trekked through the trees. With the sky overcast, she knew that the wolves might be hunting in daylight. I don’t want to meet them now, not when we’re so close to getting rid of them.

But the forest was quiet, except for a few birdcalls from high in the branches. When Lusa reached the scene of her fight with the wolves, the only scents were stale. She quickly identified the scent trail that Makya and her cubs had left and followed it through a wide stretch of fern and across a small stream. The scents grew stronger once she had crossed the water, and soon she came upon a sheltered glade where Makya and the cubs were settled in the shade of a maple tree, sharing a grouse.

Makya looked up as Lusa stepped out of the undergrowth. “Oh, it’s you,” she muttered. “What do you want?”

You might be a bit more welcoming! Lusa thought, trying to hide her indignation. If it wasn’t for me, your cubs would be in a wolf’s belly!

Before she could say anything, the two cubs sprang up and raced across the glade toward her. “Lusa! Lusa!” they squealed.

Flo was running so fast that she tripped over her own paws and rolled over in the grass. Fala was still chewing a mouthful of grouse, and she had a feather stuck on her nose.

“Come and eat with us,” she said, swallowing. “There’s plenty for all of us.”