He opened the office door and carried the animal through to the kitchen. The lights were on, and something savory was baking in the oven.

He set the dog down on the kitchen floor.

“Son?” His father came down the stairs.

“Found this dog in the barn.” He soothed it with his hands and checked out the wound the dog was tending. Four inches long, a half-inch deep, it sliced open the dog’s haunch. Seemed to be a gash of some sort— “This looks almost like a knife wound.”

His father took a look at the wound. “Or a bullet. See how there’s bruising along the edges, and the wound isn’t clean—as if it’s torn. And there’s still tissue connecting the wound in places.”

The dog moved, trying to bite his father, and Dodge held his head. “A bullet wound?”

“Or he might have been hit by something. A shovel?”

The dog had settled again, putting his head down. Dodge ran his hands over him, closing his eyes. A beautiful husky, with blue eyes, a gray body, and a full muscled chest.

He looked at the harness. Echo always marked her dogs with—yes. The name Iceman was inked into the back of the harness.

“This is one of Echo’s dogs,” he said.

His father got up and was fishing through the pantry for his first aid kit. Now he turned. “How did he get here?”

“I don’t know. We left Peyton a few days ago with the dogs up at Ranger cabin 37. Echo said she was okay, but this isn’t looking good.”

His father came over and knelt next to the dog. “I can clean this and tend him. You should get ahold of Echo and see if they’ve had any trouble over there.”

Yep.

He pulled up the ham radio and sent out a message to the Yazzie homestead.

No answer. He tried again.

Nothing.

“I’m taking a sled and heading over there.”

His father looked up from where he was washing Iceman’s wound. “Pack a bag in case you get hung up. And, take a sat radio.”

Twenty minutes later, Dodge loaded his pack onto the back of one of the Ski-Doo Expeditions, added gas, and pulled out of the barn. His father came out onto the step, his jacket wrapped around him. “I’ll keep calling them on the ham.”

Dodge lifted a hand, put down the shield on his helmet, and took off toward the Yazzies’. Ahead of him, the clouds had turned the sky a faded, smoky blue.

And behind him, the wind began to howl.

nine

For two days Echo had stood by the window of their home, pacing, watching the sky, listening to her father trying to connect with Copper Mountain on the ham radio. They’d gotten through to Deke Starr, but he couldn’t offer any help in this whiteout.

Peyton, where are you?