Chapter 8

Five days later, Lala was busy planning out how she would deal with the following night’s attack. Coming up with a different plan every night was exhausting, although since the Gara Gara wolf pack had learned by now that the Baku Baku wolves were varying their strategies, perhaps she could slip the same one in again without them anticipating it. They had come every night for the past week or so without fail, and while there had been no more deaths on either side, there was no shortage of injuries. Lala was starting to regret not negotiating with Grandma for more frequent healing visits, although who knew what that might have cost her in return.

She was lying on her pinnacle, deep in thought, when Ugui arrived, out of breath. “I’ve just got back from over the mountain. Sorry, I would have told you before I left, but Kekyo insisted on coming with me and we had to leave right away.”

“Over the mountain?” Lala said. “Tell me, what has Grandma been up to?”

And that was how Lala learned Grandma’s plan for stopping the Gara Gara wolf pack’s incursions into her territory. Of the many animals Gabu and Mei had befriended and were now living with, one of them just happened to be the former leader of the Gara Gara wolf pack. This wolf, Gon, had left the pack for reasons Ugui was unable to discern, but the pack still held him in high regard and would do what he said. Grandma had sent a message to him via Ugui, telling him what was going on and asking him to put a stop to it.

“So you took a message from Gon to his old pack?” Lala said.

Ugui shook her head. “He’s got some other way of communicating with them. I came straight back after delivering the message to him.”

That was a shame, Lala thought. Being able to send the Gara Gara wolf pack messages pretending to be Gon would have been useful. “Did Gon agree to call off the attacks?”

“He did. He also said that if they didn’t listen, he would go there himself and, um, ‘sort them out,’ he said.”

“Ah, a direct approach to problem solving,” Lala said, “a woefully uncommon quality in leaders today. How long before his message reaches the Gara Gara wolf pack?”

“If he’s using birds to carry his messages, and if he sent it at the same time that I left, then I’m guessing it would arrive around today.”

Lala gathered the pack together to tell them the good news. “It seems that the Elder Goat has made good on her promise to dissuade the Gara Gara wolf pack from continuing to trespass on our territory. In exchange, we’re going to do things a little differently going forward.”

“Hei!” the pack answered in unison.

“From now on, hunting goats will be strictly forbidden unless certain circumstances are met. Repeat after me: If I’m not sure, don’t hunt.”

“If I’m not sure, don’t hunt,” her wolves echoed.

“Good. Now, hunting goats will be permitted in some circumstances, depending on the number of wolves in the hunting party and the number of goats that are gathered together in one place. You must only attack a group of goats if there are at least double the number of goats as there are wolves. That’s two goats for each of you in the hunting party, and no counting the same goat twice.”

“Hei!”

“I know that for some of you, this will present an interesting challenge. Beach, what’s the golden rule?”

“If I’m not sure, don’t hunt,” Beach said, that stupid grin of his never leaving his face.

“That’s right. Now, let’s test your understanding. Remember that if you get this wrong when you’re out on a hunt, you needn’t bother coming back here.” Lala paused for a moment, as if in thought. “Or continuing to breathe. Gururi, suppose there’s a group of five goats and there are two other wolves with you. Should you hunt the goats?”

“No,” Gururi said promptly.

“What if one of us waited while the other two attacked the goats?” Zack said.

“That would be fine,” Lala decided on the spot, “so long as the inactive wolf remained so for the entire duration of the attack. Lili, suppose you’re out on your own and you encounter a lone goat. Should you eat it?”

“I mean,” Lili said, “technically it’s not a group of goats.”

“Is that what you’ll tell the Gara Gara wolves when they come attacking again?” Lala said.

“Okay, no, I shouldn’t eat the lone goat,” Lili said, making a gesture that was almost rolling her eyes but not quite.

“What if there are no wolves? Are lone goats good for eating then?” Beach said.

Lala couldn’t tell if he was joking, and she didn’t much care. “You just stick to that golden rule, Beach. Last question. If there are four wolves, what is the smallest group of goats you’re allowed to hunt?” She gave them as much time to ponder this as they would have while on a hunt. “Everyone answer together on the count of three. One, two, three.”

Most answered correctly with eight. There were a few answers of nine, and a worrying number of twos.

“Eight is the right answer. Anyone who said a number between one and seven, or who didn’t answer, you are officially banned from hunting goats until further notice. You can try again in a week or so. Anyone who said nine, get someone to explain to you later why that’s wrong. It’s not a mistake that would get anyone killed, though—besides the goats, I mean—so the ban doesn’t apply to you.”

Zack, who had answered two, now said, “I meant that three of us could stay behind while one of us hunted two goats.”

Lala was slightly impressed. She hadn’t thought Zack was capable of that level of abstract thinking. Even so… “Too late,” she said. “It was clear from the question what I meant. Try again next week like everyone else. Anyway, all of this is conditional on the Gara Gara wolves keeping out of our way. There’s a chance they’ll attack one last time tonight, and we need to be ready for that, but from tomorrow night onwards, I’m not expecting any more run-ins with them. Any questions?”

“Are we still not allowed to hunt mothers and children?” one wolf said.

Lala was just about to confirm that the mother and child rule was still in effect when she paused to consider the other implications of that fact. Should mother and child goats be counted when determining the size of a group? Grandma hadn’t said anything about that. The obvious answer was that they shouldn’t be counted since they couldn’t be hunted, but how could her wolves tell which goats in a group containing children were mothers? Best to be safe and avoid any group containing a child; after all, Lala had specifically warned Grandma against abusing that loophole back when they’d negotiated the first part of the deal.

“That’s right,” she said. “And if there are any children in a group of goats, leave the whole group alone. If you find that groups of goats have children in them a little too often, then come and let me know because that shouldn’t be happening.”

There were only so many children to go around, so not every small group could contain a child. If Lala kept it vague with Grandma about whether child goats would be included in the count or not, that should discourage them from forming large groups containing children too.

For a moment, Lala wondered if Grandma’s longterm plan was to make hunting goats so confusing that the wolves would stop bothering with them. If that was her plan, Grandma would have to work a lot harder at it. Even so, it was worth it to not have to worry about the Gara Gara wolves attacking, not to mention the visits from…

Lala froze. The healer goat—Lala had forgotten she was coming today. It wouldn’t look good if the goat arrived and found the whole pack talking about the Gara Gara wolf deal that they weren’t supposed to know about yet. Why hadn’t she waited before telling the pack? She scanned the group of wolves in front of her and saw that Boro wasn’t among them—probably out conspiring with the goats again—so that was one less thing to worry about. She’d just have to keep an eye on him over the next few days to make sure he didn’t realise the discrepancy. If he did, then… Well, she would deal with that if it happened.

“Just a reminder,” she said, “discussing any of this with a goat is strictly prohibited, including with the healer goat. Dismissed.”

When Mii arrived at Baku Baku Valley that day, she was ecstatic. She took Lala aside and told her, “Grandma says the Gara Gara wolf pack should start leaving you alone soon, so you’ll be upholding your side of the deal too, right?”

Lala’s face lit up. It looked like the wolf was just as relieved by the news as Mii felt, although for different reasons, of course. “I’m very glad to hear it. You can tell Grandma that I will most certainly keep my word and put in place the restriction she asked for in return. Just do me a favour and don’t mention this to anyone today; I want to be careful about how I explain it to them. You know how wolves can be sometimes.”

Mii wasn’t sure what Lala meant by that. “Of course,” she said.

With that done, she began her healing duties. There was the usual range of injuries for her to deal with: bites, claw marks, that sort of thing. She was quite looking forward to coming back next week, when with a bit of luck, all her hard work wouldn’t be undone like it had been from last week.

Thankfully, she didn’t have to deal with Gururi this time. Most of the wolves she met at least deigned to look at her. A few of them, like Tomo and occasionally Kazu, actually treated her like a fellow person and not a tool whose only purpose was to serve their needs. On a good day, some wolves even thanked her.

When she was getting close to finishing for the day, Tomo appeared at the entrance to her healing cave, looking slightly awkward. “Hello, Tomo,” she said to him. “How can I help you today?”

Boro was standing guard just outside the entrance like he always did, carefully putting the fear of Lala into any wolf coming to see Mii for the first time, and being ready just in case someone lost control of their appetite. So far, no one had, but it didn’t hurt to be cautious. Tomo turned to him. “Hey, uh, Boro? I was wondering if you could leave us alone for a bit. I need to talk to Mii about something kind of…private.”

“Oh, of course,” Boro said. He moved far enough away that he wouldn’t be able to overhear them even if he tried.

“I’m happy to talk about anything you need help with,” Mii said. “Just to warn you, though, I don’t know much about certain parts of wolf—”

“It’s about Boro,” Tomo said, his voice a whisper. “I think he might be…” He hesitated, checking outside to make sure they were really alone before continuing. “I think he might be using you to find out information to give to Lala.”

Mii tried to keep her face neutral. “What makes you think that?”

“I heard some rumours that Lala told Boro to befriend you so that he could find out information about the goats. Giro tried to do a similar sort of thing with Gabu, but that didn’t work out so well for him. And the other thing is”—Tomo checked over his shoulder again—“I overheard you talking with Lala a while ago about the Gara Gara wolf pack stuff. She acted like she was hearing it for the first time, but she was telling the pack about it just this morning, about the Elder Goat having made good on the deal. She told us to change the way we hunt goats starting from today. Did you say anything to Boro about it before you told Lala?”

Mii’s first instinct was to disbelieve what she was hearing. She was certain that Boro really was her friend and it wasn’t just an act. But she couldn’t help but recall how, when Ugui had got back from the Emerald Forest that morning with the reply from Gon, they had told Boro about it right away. Perhaps Boro had simply told Lala about it, thinking there would be no harm in doing so. But if that was it, how would Boro have explained to Lala that he knew the goats’ plans? Mii hesitated, and Tomo spoke into the silence.

“Look, Boro’s a good wolf. I’ve known him since we were kids. He really cares about what’s best for the pack, and I’m sure his relationship with you is important to him too, but the pack would always come first for him. I just wanted to make sure you know that before you get too involved with him.”

Why did everyone keep thinking that she and Boro were secret lovers? “I don’t have a relationship with him,” Mii said. “Not the kind you’re thinking of.”

“There’s nothing wrong with it,” Tomo said, smiling sheepishly. “Gabu was, um, like that too, and he was pretty cool.”

“What the hell does ‘like that’ even mean?” Mii said, and then caught herself. “Sorry. It’s true that Boro and I are friends. Just friends—I want to make that perfectly clear; we’re not even the same age as each other. I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t intentionally betray our friendship, but I’ll keep an eye out. Thanks for letting me know.”

Grandma was overjoyed to hear that the wolves would be keeping their side of the new arrangement. “That’s wonderful news,” she said. “I never thought I would see the day when each of us may go wherever in the forest we please without fear of wolves, or that such a day would ever come.”

Mii couldn’t help but share Grandma’s enthusiasm. “It’s all thanks to you. Elder Chōro could never have made this happen. But there’s something else I need to tell you.” Mii told Grandma about the rumours Tomo had heard about Boro, and about how Lala already knew about the deal going ahead but had pretended not to.

“This is quite troubling,” Grandma said.

“Surely Boro wouldn’t really betray us, would he?” Mii said. It was Grandma who had befriended Boro in the first place, early last summer when she’d caught him trying to escort her back through Peri Peri Woods at Mei’s request. After she had discovered the wolf, they had started talking, and Grandma had told him what she knew from Mei about how Gabu ended up choosing a goat over his pack. Eventually, Boro, who had always thought of Gabu as a role model, had started to see things from a goat’s point of view. There was no way all of that could be a ruse; for one thing, it would be far too convoluted even for Lala.

“Until just now, I would never have dreamed that he would,” Grandma said. “He always seemed such a kind young boy. And yet it seems that something is going on that we don’t know about.” Grandma paused. “Let me think on this. Don’t mention it to anyone else.”