by J. S. Morin
Roddy snorted. “Just hope they know how to cook meat. I’ve seen enough of Mriy’s dinners not to want mine raw.”
“Hey, according to DinnerBlab, this place is the real deal,” Carl said. He took an end seat and slouched down, letting a hand dangle toward the floor.
Mriy was not long behind them, arriving before they had even finished sorting themselves into the booth. “Good. Glad you all made it. I was worried you might have spread over half Meyang by now.”
“Nothing personal,” Tanny said. “But Meyang isn’t exactly bubbling over with tourist spots.”
Mriy shook her head. “No time for that now. I have a favor to ask. A big one.”
Carl sighed and let his head loll back. “Can’t keep cutting you out of future jobs, Mriy.”
“Good,” Mriy replied. “Because I’m not allowed to pay you for this favor. Not in any way.”
“This is sounding promising,” Roddy said evenly. “I love not making money. We’re getting to be fucking experts at it.”
“Hrykii wants a pack hunt, his pack of five against mine,” Mriy said. “Win, and I become heir to the clan again. I would take over when my mother passes. But to win, I need a hunting pack.”
“That’s nice,” Esper said. It was like listening to her older brothers talking about sports. What else was there to say? “But what do any of us know about hunting?”
Carl held up his hands and gave a magnanimous smile. “You provide me a Typhoon, and I’ll hunt you anything from squirrels all the way up to local patrol ships.”
Tanny cuffed him in the shoulder, reaching over Roddy to get at him. “I’ve had survival training, for what it’s worth.”
“Much,” Mriy replied, nodding. “I was counting on your help. I was also thinking of enlisting Kubu, since he has such an excellent nose.”
“Does Kubu know how to track?” Esper asked, not directing the question to anyone in particular.
Tanny laughed out loud, drawing attention from the nearby tables. She tossed a datapad on the table. “Sorry, just struck me. I heard back from that professor today, the one who was going to figure out what Kubu is.”
Mriy picked up the datapad first, her expression unreadable as her eyes flicked back and forth. “Blessed God,” she whispered. Her eyes went vacant and she stared off in the direction of the Mobius, as if it could be seen through the walls of the restaurant.
Roddy snatched the datapad from her hands and began perusing it himself.
“What’s it say?” Esper asked.
“Holy hell,” Roddy muttered. “Dog’s put on twenty kilos since we got him, and this says he hasn’t hit a growth spurt yet. He’s looking at two or three tons by the time he’s full grown. By then, he could take that robotic bull over at Human Joe’s and use it as a chew toy. His world’s got megafauna, and his kind eats them.”
“So that’s a ‘yes’ on the hunting, I take it?” Esper asked.
Roddy pushed the datapad in Esper’s direction. “Let’s just say I’m gonna be a lot nicer to that mutt starting now.”
“Will they let you bring a dog?” Mort asked.
Mriy shook her head. “No dogs, but I can convince them he’s sentient. That will make him a willing pack member, not an animal.”
“So, with me and Kubu, you’ll have three,” Tanny said.
“Four,” Mriy corrected her. “My clan’s chaplain is part of my pack. His name is Auzuma.” Mriy grinned, showing teeth. “Since Hyrkii’s pack includes a smoke seer, I have no reservation about bringing a wizard of my own. I would be honored if you would be our fifth, Mort.”
Mort leaned back and crossed his arms. “Nope.”
“What?” Mriy gasped.
“Feels too much like cheating,” Mort replied. “I don’t mind the stuff we do, generally. But this is family. I won’t be a party to that sort of thing. Besides, it’s like I’d be doing all the work for you.”
“The prey wears a charm, an heirloom of my clan,” Mriy said. “It can’t be tracked by magic or science. It has to be hunted by guile and senses.”
“Magic’s magic,” Mort replied. “You think your local witchdoctors are going to fool me? I’m sure that charm can discombobulate scientific whosamajiggers, but you’re daft if you think I couldn’t sniff that charm out from miles away if I was of a mind.”
Mriy sank back in her seat. “Auzuma may know a protective charm or two, but I could use a proper wizard.”
“Take Esper,” Mort replied. “I spent all day giving her a rundown of the basics.”
“Esper?” Mriy asked, confusion clear in her tone.
“Esper?” Esper asked, clearly not having heard correctly. She was no wizard. She knew one spell and knew it badly enough that she’d accidentally killed someone with it when it was supposed to heal.
Mort shrugged. “You’re young. Got healthy lungs in you. Getting away from science for a few days’ll do you some good. Practice away from the heavy expectations of civilization. Magic’s harder where people rely on techno-gizmos. Breathe some fresh air, levitate twigs, make the birds fly funny.”
“I need a wizard, not…” Mriy struggled for a word and settled for gesturing to Esper.
“Me.”
“You,” Mriy confirmed.
Esper looked down at the menu in front of her, but the words didn’t register. They were English, but her mind was on Mriy’s opinion of her, not the food selection. She just couldn’t look the azrin in the eye.
“Don’t even think about looking at me,” Roddy said, breaking the awkward silence. “A few days without booze or tech, I’d be ready to fucking kill myself.”
Carl looked off into the restaurant, for all indications taking in the ambiance. “You know, there’s more to being a leader than picking a bunch of ringers. Sometimes, pack leader—or a captain—might just have to take the ones she’s got because they’re the only ones who’ll have her. Esper’s no wizard like Mort, but who the hell is? She’s a quick learner, and she’d be better use in the woods than I’d be. I couldn’t sneak up on a cow unless it was in a bun with ketchup and bacon.”
“We will hunt an elk, not cow,” Mriy said.
“Point is,” Carl said. “I’d suggest you ask Esper nicely, else you might be running with a pack of four. I’m guessing we were your last stop.”
Mriy was silent. Esper listened, and all she heard was breathing and the rustling of clothes as the Mobius crew shifted uneasily in that silence. She spared a glance up and saw that Mriy was staring at her. The azrin had been waiting to make eye contact. “Will you help me?” Mriy asked.
There were a dozen reasons to refuse. Mriy obviously hadn’t wanted her along. Mriy didn’t think she would be any use, and who could blame her. Esper didn’t know anything about hunting and had never eaten anything she’d killed herself. She’d even gone through a phase where she didn’t eat meat. The seminary had taught her that animals were God’s gift to mankind, meant to be eaten, used to carry burdens, or kept as pets. This wasn’t wanton sport; it was a time-honored azrin ritual, and she had no place mucking it up. And as much as she hated to admit it, she liked datapads and holovids, food processors and voice-activated environmental controls. The woods had none of that.
But Mriy needed her. She hadn’t asked because Esper was any good. Mriy needed her because she was all she had. How could Esper refuse? “I’ll help you.”
Hopefully there would be enough time before the hunt to look a few things up on the omni, starting with “how to hunt.”
# # #
The Mobius lifted off as soon as Auzuma was aboard. Tanny hadn’t waited another minute before she got them out of the Yrris Clanhold. The Yinnak had a minute’s head start en route to the hunting grounds, and hadn’t left them any coordinates. She had no idea what the azrin custom was for forfeiture or concession in regard to tardiness or never finding the hunting grounds, but she’d be damned if it was going to be her fault that they lost track of the clan’s ship.
Tanny had been to Earth-like worlds before. The
similarities had always comforted her—familiar geography, familiar climate, familiar gravity. But Meyang was a bit spartan. It was like someone had taken Earth and stripped away civilization. Cities were pockets of modern life amid primordial forests and trackless seas. The hotbeds of culture and the population centers so common on Earth-like worlds were barren. The Yinnak took an erratic course, wandering the planet from the upper atmosphere.
“Are they giving us a tour, or are they just lost?” Carl wondered aloud. He stood behind the copilot’s seat, leaning his forearms on the headrest.
“Maybe they’re trying to keep us guessing,” Tanny ventured. “Jesus, this place is empty. It’s like someone turned a natural history museum inside out, and they’ve got a planet full of people stuffed in an old building somewhere.”
“Weird seeing the British Isles uninhabited,” Carl said. “We ever look at the population survey?”
“Less than forty million,” Tanny replied. “They can afford to pick and choose.”
The Yinnak sped over Africa and across the southern Atlantic—or at least Meyang’s equivalents. They crossed into South America and followed the Andes Mountain range north. The greens were so green, the blues so blue. Earth and Phabian, pillars of ARGO, were monuments of silver and glass, inhabited to the point of bursting. Meyang was an arboreal world, ripe for lumbering. Even the moon above was a pale white rock, with no sign of cities or orbital traffic.
It was in the northern part of Meyang’s Rocky Mountain analogue that the Yinnik finally landed. Tanny set the Mobius down a hundred meters away.
“You take it easy with this thing while I’m gone,” Tanny said, giving Carl a stern glare. “No racing, no daredevil bullshit, nothing that’ll get the Mobius impounded.”
Carl held up his hand for a courtroom oath. “I will be a model citizen.” The smirk didn’t make him convincing.
She cringed as he slipped into the pilot’s chair before she’d even left the cockpit. He wriggled into position, as if trying to form the seat to his backside.
“Not even going to wish us luck?” she asked.
“Since when have I ever been good luck to anyone?”
Tanny thought a moment. “Fair enough.”
“Just keep them as safe as you can,” Carl replied. “This isn’t a fight, it’s a hunt. Worst thing if Mriy loses is she gets written out of her mother’s will, or however the hell that works around here. Not worth anyone getting hurt over.”
Tanny shouldered the knapsack with her survival supplies. “Tell that to the Yrris Clan.”
The rest of the hunting pack was waiting for her in the cargo bay, with Mort and Roddy there to see them off. It was a motley bunch. Mriy was the only one who looked like a proper hunter. Auzuma was an old man, though Mriy had told her that he was a year younger than her thirty-one years. Tanny wasn’t quite sure how to take that, but it made her glad she was human. For all the times that she’d occasionally envied Mriy’s easy strength and feline reflexes, she’d outlive the azrin by decades. Esper looked like she’d packed for a holiday camping trip, all store-bought new. It was going to be a chore just getting her to contribute, let alone be an asset. Kubu was the only one who looked excited.
“It is time to go now?” Kubu asked. “Kubu wants to go hunting.”
Tanny eyed the canine—or canis ultra poltidae as scientists had dubbed his species. “Extreme dog from Poltid” was the translation. Was he bigger than yesterday? She needed to start scanning him more often.
“Yes and no,” Tanny answered. “Yes, we’re going outside now, and that’s where we’ll be hunting. But hunting is going to take a long time. We won’t find what we’re looking for right away.”
“You can really understand that beast?” Auzuma asked, eyeing Kubu. The old azrin and Kubu had fur the same shade of black, but could not have looked more distinct otherwise. Auzuma was tall and wiry, and moved with a statesman’s grace. Kubu was a barrel with legs and jaws that boiled with eager energy.
“Same as I understand you,” Tanny replied, flicking her earring. Auzuma understood English just fine, thankfully. Mort wasn’t going to provide another translator charm just so the azrin could understand Kubu. “Mort and Roddy understand your language, but they’re not part of the hunt.”
Roddy reached up and slapped the button that started lowering the cargo bay door. “May the wind blow your way,” he said. Some funny cadence in the words suggested to Tanny that she was hearing the translator charm’s interpretation of Roddy’s azrin. Showoff little smartass.
The wind was indeed blowing as Mriy and her pack exited the Mobius, but it wasn’t blowing any way Tanny wanted to claim as her own. If Rikk Pa had been cold, this area was frigid. On Earth, they’d have been a few hours walk outside Calgary Prime. She didn’t know what it was called on Meyang, but she had a few colorfully vulgar suggestions.
The Yinnak’s passengers were disembarking as well, none so bundled against the cold as Tanny and Esper were. The azrin wore heavy vests and leggings, but still left much of their fur exposed. Kubu wore nothing and didn’t show the first sign of being bothered by the weather. His breath came in steaming bellows as his tongue lolled and he bounced on front and hind legs like a bucking horse.
“There is our prey,” Mriy said, pointing. The Yrris Clan was unloading a beast from their ship. Tanny was no expert on tundra wildlife, but Mriy had informed them that they should be hunting elk. It was as tall at the shoulder as its azrin handlers, with a rack of antlers that rose to twice that height. Unless the local fauna had taken a drastic twist from Earth’s, its green and orange coloration was painted on.
“What’re those symbols?” Esper asked, saving Tanny the trouble of looking the fool for not knowing.
“It marks our prey,” Auzuma answered. “No azrin will interfere with the challenge by killing it. The medallion around its neck conceals it from science and magic alike. It is for us to find and kill, no others.”
“We hunt that?” Kubu asked. He took off at once, accelerating to a full run in three strides, sending up a wake in hip-deep snow that seemed to do little to slow him.
“Kubu, stop!” Mort shouted. They all turned to see the wizard following them. Kubu skidded to a halt in a self-made snowdrift. “Not now. They’ll tell you when it’s time.”
“Mort, what are you doing out here?” Tanny called out.
The wizard trudged through the snow in sneakers and jeans. His only concession to the cold was keeping his hands in the front pocket of his hooded sweatshirt. “Decided I’m going to keep an eye on things. Mriy’s clan might play things on the level; they might not. With me around, they won’t dare slant things Hrykii’s way.”
Mriy’s ears flattened back. “I don’t think my mother will approve.”
“Then I’ll just point out that we’re a long way from things out here,” Mort replied. “And there’s more than one way to inherit a clanhold.”
“You will not threaten—”
“I won’t have to,” Mort snapped. “I am a threat. You’ve gotten used to having a wizard around, but most azrin haven’t. They’re sensible, superstitious folk—smart enough to take heed of a wizard. They’ll worry about me wilting their crops or sickening their herds, when they should really be wondering whether I’d incinerate them or crush them into a grapefruit-sized ball of meat. But the result’s the same. They’ll let me oversee.”
Mort hung back as they approached the Yinnak. There was a brief ceremony where strips of cloth were rubbed against the elk’s hide, then passed out to each member of both packs. Tanny tucked hers away without giving it the elaborate sniffing that the azrins did. Her human nose had no use for scent in tracking. Not her job on this expedition.
“Most of you know the rules,” Seerii said. “For the outsiders, this is a traditional hunt. No weapons that shoot. Anything that harms the prey must be a part of you or held in hand. The prey will be left in the mountains. None of the hunters know where we will leave it. It will be at least one day’s travel
from here; beyond that I will not say. The prey must be returned to this spot, dead, for the bearer to be declared winner of the challenge.”
Seerii did not ask if anyone had questions, or whether they were unclear on the protocol of the hunt. Tanny had the impression that even the little she said was a concession to Mriy’s odd pack. The members of the Yrris Clan loaded the animal back into the Yinnak, and Mort followed them. There followed a quiet but heated discussion, and at the conclusion, Mort joined the azrins in the ship.
“We move,” Mriy ordered. Hrykii’s pack was already starting out, following the general direction of the Yinnak as it headed off to the northwest. Kubu bounded to the front of the group, running ahead and circling back to Mriy. He was clearly unfamiliar with the concept of conserving strength. Tanny waited until Auzuma and Esper fell into step behind their pack leader, and then took up the rear.
Just then, the engines of the Mobius roared to life. It lifted skyward, kicking up a storm of powdery snow that coated Mriy’s hunting pack. The ship rolled over so that the landing gear faced deep space and tore across the evergreen forest at treetop height, threatening to topple the ancient pines. In the distance a moment later, the Mobius headed straight up, spinning like a corkscrew before taking an orbital trajectory and disappearing from sight.
Tanny’s footsteps crunched in the snow, audible with the departure of the two ships and the increasing distance between the members of the pack. She didn’t worry about keeping up so much as she did what would become of the ship with just Carl and Roddy looking after it. “Maybe I can work for Mriy after they get it impounded.”
# # #
Mriy’s kinfolk gathered around Mort as if he were a zoo exhibit. He let them look. None approached within arm’s reach of him, but they conversed among themselves.
“Why did Seerii agree to this?” one muttered out of the side of his mouth, never taking his eyes from Mort.
“I don’t know, but I don’t like his look. Could we throw him out the door and be done with him?”
“He’s a wizard.”
“He’s scrawny.”
“Still a wizard.”