Snowhook by Jo Storm

Her fear was seeping away, but in its place rose a terrible anger at what had happened, at how the dogs were not listening to her, Peter was not listening to her, no one listened to her.

She leaned her face right into Rudy’s, pushing down with the hand that held his muzzle. “Don’t you ever do that again,” she said. She held his muzzle down and pushed with everything she could. Her deadened legs screamed, but still she pushed, until the sled dog was pushed down onto his elbows, with her nearly on top of him. Behind her, she could hear Bogey moving, and she kicked out backward again, barking, “Go!” at the Lab over her shoulder. Then she returned her face to just above Rudy’s.

“Never, never, never!” she snarled. Then she waited. She could feel the anger in both her and the dog, like they were having their own silent battle now. Whoever won would be the leader, and she knew that no matter what, it had to be her. Rudy had already been thrown off by Sencha, and Bogey, not Rudy, had started the fight in fear. But Hannah could not let fear run this team — not the kind of fear that paralyzed or the kind of fear that made them fight. She had to lead them.

Slowly, deliberately, she drained the fear and the anger out of her body until it was gone. She had no idea how long it took, maybe a minute, maybe an hour, but each breath she took became slower. And as her breathing slowed, so did Rudy’s. The sled dog tried to take a few looks at Nook, but each time, Hannah pulled him back until he was looking only at her. His muzzle began to drop of its own accord, until in a rush, his body relaxed and she nearly pushed his muzzle through the snowpack, she was still pushing down so hard.

When she took her hand away, her glove was smeared with blood from Rudy’s teeth.

Hannah stood up. Behind her, Bogey shook himself, long and hard, then came toward her with his head down. He was panting and wagging his tail, and he shied his head away immediately when Rudy looked at him; he did not want another fight, it was clear. Hannah watched, but Rudy didn’t look at Nook again; he looked at her. She had won.

She surveyed the scene of carnage. The silence of the forest was eerie after the explosion of noise from the dog fight. The drifting snow was already covering the trampled-down area. The two blood-covered dogs, Sencha, and Nook were all hopelessly tangled in their lines at the bottom of the depression. The overturned sled teetered on a jutting branch, and the whole area was strewn with bits and pieces of gear: the supply bag, Peter’s sleeping bag, the dog food, ropes. Sencha tried to get to a nearby food packet, but her tangled line prevented it, so she sat down instead to scratch her flank, exposing her pink, salve-covered tummy. Hannah saw Peter at the top of the bowl, standing behind a tree.

“You okay?” she called.

He didn’t answer, but he sat down in the snow, pulling his hood up so that it covered his eyes and leaning against the tree.

All of this over a rabbit, thought Hannah. Although the truth was, all this had happened because she hadn’t been paying attention. No, it went even further back than that: it w

as because she hadn’t used Sencha’s neckline. A reckless gamble that they had all paid for. And why had Sencha bolted? Because Hannah hadn’t been paying attention, she had been thinking. She had blamed it on the dogs and on Peter and the weather and the trees, but she was the one who hadn’t been listening.

Once, when she was about eight, she had been at a dog race when a certain sled caught her eye. All the dogs were quiet, pointed in the same direction, not wacky with joy or excitement. The sled was older, the square kind used for heavy loads or long overland trips. A squarish carabiner attached the gangline to two bridles; all the other sleds had only one bridle.

This team was run by two sisters, twins so alike that people could only tell them apart by their different-coloured hats. Hannah drifted toward them, and their dogs watched with mild eyes.

“Why do you have two bridles?” she asked.

The sister in the green hat laughed, and the one in the red hat said, “Because you can’t afford to make a mistake in the winter.” Then she, too, laughed, and Hannah had wandered off, thinking they were very strange. Why would anyone laugh about making a mistake?

Now she thought she knew why: the sisters had made mistakes but come through them; they were laughing as they thought back to how lucky they had been. Just like Hannah. There were precious few second chances in the winter, and Hannah had just gotten one.

Thinking was for nighttime, she told herself. Think after dinner. Think when you first wake up; plan and think. But in the daylight, when the dogs were under her command, when the trail was the only thing between them and getting her mom help, there was no time for thinking. There was seeing and there was doing: seeing what was happening, and doing the next thing that needed doing. That was it. That was all.

The next thing that needed doing was to get everything back together.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Hannah scrambled across to Nook and checked her over. Besides the raw spot from wearing the wrong harness, she was fine. Sencha was also fine, twisting away from Hannah to continue rooting through the snow for the interesting scents she had caught.

Thankfully, neither Rudy nor Bogey was seriously injured. One of Bogey’s ears had a few teeth marks in it and a piece of the edge was torn, and Rudy had a few bumps on his chest where Bogey had gotten hold of him, but most of the blood was actually from their own mouths, their gums having gotten cut up when they met mouth-to-mouth during the fight. Hannah washed all their injured areas with snow. Only a couple of the wounds were still bleeding.

Hannah pulled off her gloves, which were soaking wet. One of them had gotten caught in the snowhook, and there was a long tear across the palm. She held her fingers up, flexing them. Her left pinky was white. She hadn’t even noticed it was cold. Not good, because it could be the beginning of frostbite. She massaged it until a pink flush started to appear, along with a twinge of pain as her feeling returned. She checked her other hand — it was fine. She looked up to where Peter was still sitting, now with his arms looped around his knees.

“How are your fingers?” she asked. She held up her bare hand. “I had a white one. You all right?”

“Fine,” he answered. “Just dandy.”

“Okay, well, I need a hand down here.”

“With what?”

With what? Is he nuts?

“Uh, with everything.”

Peter stood up, promptly delving knee-deep into the snow. “My snowshoes are down there, and I’m not coming to get them. I just got up here.”

Hannah heard that same angry tone in his voice that made it sound like everything she said was wrong and stupid. But beneath that now, she could hear it: the fear. Like she and Rudy had felt a few minutes ago. Don’t make me touch the dogs, it said.