by Adam Browne
No, not inevitable. We can still win.
Nervously twiddling his gold pen, Vladimir looked beyond the windows to the passing lush wilderness of Everdor, territory of Pack Hummel, seat of the Summit. Somewhere out there an underachieving Howler and a mad hyena prince were deciding Lupa’s fate.
Ulf help us all.
Chapter 43
Thoughts of freedom spurred Noss on. The trial of Gelb was behind him. A year of torture, of surviving for his family’s sake, was almost over.
Still, there was much to do.
The Prince stared at Rufus and Nurka walking ahead, side by side, wolf and hyena, friends.
Pity it was a terrible lie.
“Not far now,” Casimir said, his voice quavering with relief. “Come on!” he gestured furiously, bounding ahead of Noss and the hyenas, lantern in paw.
“Mind the ants,” Rufus reminded him.
“Ants?” Helmut snorted worriedly, looking to the Howler for an explanation.
Rufus spread a paw at the slick, dark walls and endless side-passages. “We stumbled across some eggs on the way in. These tunnels are part of an ant nursery, albeit on the periphery. We should be all right passing through, just don’t agitate them.”
“Whatcha mean agita-”
Rufus suddenly grabbed Helmut and pulled the big hog to one side with the augmented strength of an imperium-guzzling Howler.
“For starters don’t step on their eggs, my good hog,” he advised, pointing at a cluster of ghostly-white, bean-shaped objects which lay just shy of Helmut’s hefty trotter, each one the approximate dimensions of a sleeping mouse. “Kick one of those and they’ll not be best pleased.”
“Cripes, big ‘en they?”
Suddenly the oval head and nipping pincers of a giant ant reached out of the inky blackness!
“Wooagh!”
Helmut nearly fell backwards in fright, but Rufus held both himself and the hog firm.
“Don’t panic!” he seethed, holding a paw up to Nurka and the others.
Everyone from Madou to Themba looked on as the bear-sized ant delicately stroked the eggs with her segmented, baton-like antennae, turning them, licking them, caring for them like a mother. Casimir’s quivering lantern was reflected dozens of times in those two morose-looking compound eyes, yet the ant appeared unperturbed by the intruders.
“I’ll kill it before it warns the rest,” Themba growled, readying his hammer.
Tomek grabbed the hyena’s arm, “No don’t!”
“Get off me, wolf!”
“Is all right, friend,” Tomek insisted. “She nearly blind and deaf, she probably not even see us.”
The stocky Madou hiked his unconscious cousin Zozizou, whom he was carrying, further up his muscled shoulders and grumbled at the taller Tomek, “How’d you know?”
The young wolf tipped his stripy cap, “I worked with my ant every day. I raise her myself, from egg just like those. Ants not fight without reason. They attack only things they recognise as enemy, like centipedes.”
“Stand down, Themba,” Nurka rasped.
Meanwhile, Rufus ushered Helmut backwards, paw over paw, trotter over trotter. They and everyone else shuffled backwards, putting some distance between themselves and the ant, who continued her duties.
Then a second ant appeared from an adjoining passage and greeted the first. They tapped their antennae together, feeling each other’s armoured faces, then the first ant scuttled down the nearest passage, leaving the second with the eggs. It was impossible to know whether they were simply unaware of the intruders or utterly untroubled by them.
“Like guards relieving each other,” Rufus marvelled from a safe distance. “Heath will be green with envy.”
Helmut snorted, “Can’t they smell us?”
“Perhaps the ambient imperium levels interfere with their senses,” Rufus theorised, removing his helmet to scratch his head. “Or maybe we’re just downwind,” he supposed instead, licking a finger and feeling for the airflow within the warm cave. “Either way”, he said, replacing his helmet, “let’s not overstay our welcome. Tomek’s right, but these are wild ants and we’re trespassing in their house. One false move could trigger an attack.”
Themba held his hammer up. “I’ll take a hundred down before they tear me apart!” he woofed, as if savouring the opportunity to die.
Prince Noss tiresomely pushed his hammer aside, “Boy, these creatures haven’t the capacity to be impressed by your bluster. Besides there’s a million of them in any given nest; they would not even notice a thousand losses.”
Noss had been quiet since spectacularly leaping the ravine with Rufus, so everyone looked to him, surprised.
Unsure if his knowledge was being questioned, the hyena prince flashed a slightly manic, wide-eyed smile at the one beast everyone recognised as an expert in such matters, “Isn’t that right, Red-mist?”
Returning Noss’s purple-tinged gaze, Rufus confirmed flatly, “Yes,” and turned to Themba, “I mean, what do you suppose the walls of Lupa were built for?”
Still mortified by his public, princely chiding, Themba said nothing.
Nurka, on the other paw, rasped confidently, “To pen in the citizens and control them, as slaves.”
“Not at all, my good hyena,” Rufus cheerily contradicted. “Lupa’s walls were originally thrown up to keep bugs out, not citizens in.”
The incredulous looks of the hyenas only impelled Rufus to continue.
“Before the Imperium Revolution reduced Lupa’s surroundings to the polluted Ashfall of today, giant bugs of all sorts roamed about the city’s hinterlands devouring crops and citizens alike. So the Founders built ever longer and higher walls around what was once a modest farming community. Wolves protected the little beasts in exchange for tribute, and the little beasts were our equals. It all began very nobly, I assure you.” The Howler looked to Casimir, the only little beast present, “Of course, the foundations of mutual respect and cooperation have rotted under centuries of greed.” He made a fist and growled, “Ulf willing we’ll soon recapture the old ways with our own brand of ‘revolution’, a social revolution.”
Rufus’s little audience remained a calm sea of silence and stolen glances.
“Change is coming, Red-mist,” Nurka promised vaguely, patting the Howler’s shoulder in passing. “We should keep moving,” he said, leading on. “Stay together and be mindful of the ants. Do not provoke them.”
Tomek came alongside Rufus as they picked their way through the tunnels. “Is it true?” he asked, arms swinging. “Did Lupa really start that way, with everyone equal, even the little beasts?”
“Yes. The last two times, at least.”
“Two times?”
Looking around, a somewhat distracted Rufus patted the youth’s back, “Never mind. Let’s just concentrate on getting out of here in one piece, all right?”
Tomek scoffed humorously, “You started it.”
“Yes, well, one day you’ll learn to ignore my waffling like everyone else.”
“Never,” Tomek said, tugging his cap down, perchance embarrassed to admit it, but admitting it all the same, “I missed your waffling.”
Throwing Tomek a sideways look, Rufus tugged the young wolf’s nearest ear. “Stop it,” he chided fondly.
“What?”
“You know very well what, Usenko.”
Leaving matters at that, Rufus rejoined Nurka at the head of the group, as if he were as much their leader as the hyena chief himself.
With every step the humid air grew fresher, the outside world beckoning, teasing, until that much-anticipated light at the end of the caves winked on, dispelling any creeping doubt in Nurka’s map-reading skills. After hours navigating by cold imperium, be it beast-made lanterns or nature’s rock formations, even the distant promise of the hot sun rendered Tomek’s eyes momentarily useless as he hurried for the blinding slither of sky.
“Hahaaa!” the wolfen youth woofed, twirling with arms outstretched into the
sun’s golden embrace, before tossing his cap into the air and catching it again – an impressive feat when he could barely see for the glare. “We made it!”
Helmut trotted forth to join his mining buddy, not laughing, even less twirling. “I don’t believe it,” he snorted, squinting hot tears from his beady eyes, half from the sun, half from happiness. “Nobody gets out of Gelb. Nobody!”
“You’re free, my friend.”
The hog nodded soberly. “Aye… aye,” he said, “but what now, mate?”
“What?”
“Where do I go? What do I do? What do you do? You can’t go back home.”
Tomek slapped the hog’s mighty arm, “Don’t worry about me. I’ve things to do.”
“Aye, is that right?” Helmut snorted. Glancing back at Nurka and the others as they emerged squinting into the daylight, the hog pulled Tomek to one side whilst he had the brief opportunity. “Mate, we need to talk,” he whispered.
“Talk?”
“This ain’t no game. Now I know you’re not thinking of joining these THORN creeps. That’s not you. But whatever’s going down beasts are gonna get hurt soon.”
Tomek smiled as usual, “I’m Watcher, not you. Is my job to worry about this kind of thing, not you.”
“Lad-”
“What’s going on here?” Nurka suddenly rasped.
“What?” Helmut asked, innocently distancing himself from Tomek. “Whatcha mean?”
As a matter of fact, the hyena chieftain wasn’t even addressing Helmut or Tomek, but Themba and Casimir who were walking beside him. “Where are they?” Nurka queried them further.
Big Themba kicked a smouldering campfire with his armoured toes whilst Casimir scanned the rough mountain terrain with his bleary eyes.
Nurka cupped his paws to his muzzle and called various hyena names.
“Mustaphaaaa? Tameeeer? Simooo?”
No reply. The Sunrise Mountains were silent but for a distant rockslide.
“What’s up?” Helmut asked at last.
“I left half my warriors out here, at least twenty beasts,” Nurka explained, purple eyes flitting about beneath his skull helmet. “They were supposed to wait until we returned.”
“Maybe they came in after you?” Tomek supposed.
Nurka checked the sun and concluded that, “They can’t have. We’ve not been gone that long. They had plenty of supplies too; they wouldn’t need to forage.”
Casimir bounded over to a strangely dark patch of otherwise grey pebbles. “Blood,” he said, ears erect. “Nurka let’s get-”
Crack!
Crack!
Crack!
The ground exploded all around Nurka and Themba in puffs of dust and dirt. The experienced hyenas knew from many a Lupan imperium raid when someone was shooting at them and immediately ducked.
“Back, back!” Nurka snarled, throwing a paw at Rufus and the others. “Ambush!”
Casimir zipped inside the caves and hopped behind the rocks, the hyenas hurrying after. Themba retreated backwards, unwilling to turn tail and run like a coward, until Nurka grabbed his arm and pulled him along.
“Run, Helmut!” Tomek yelped, dashing for safety, head down and zigzagging, just as he’d been taught in the Howler Academy. His bare back burned and tingled, not from the sun’s hot rays, but the expectation that a pellet might tear through his body. Pebbles exploded left and right of Tomek as missiles impacted the ground.
Ting! Poing!
Into the cave and throwing himself behind a rock, the wolf landed heavily between Rufus and Madou.
Rufus checked the youngster for holes, “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” Tomek panted, flinching from a final pellet exploding nearby. “I’m fine.”
The shooting died down as quickly as it had begun.
Tomek looked around the cave mouth, at all his comrades new and old cowering in the shadows, pressed against the dank walls, rifles and pistols drawn if they had them, and that hyena, Nurka, readying his imperium bow.
Everyone seemed to be intact.
“Helmut?” Tomek gasped. He peered over the rocks, catching a glimpse of the huge hog lying snout-down in the open, motionless.
“No! Helmut! Helmut, I’m coming friend.”
Rufus yanked Tomek back, “Get down you fool!”
A pellet pinged off the rock, showing them both with colourful imperious sparks.
“He was right behind me!” Tomek wailed. “Helmuuut! Helmut can you hear me? Helmut!”
“You can’t help him now!”
“I have to!”
“Tomek! Rufus barked, grasping Tomek by both arms. “He’s gone. I saw it.”
“But-”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, but keep your head down, please!”
Calm ensued. Tomek fell against the rocks and pulled his cap from his head.
“Schmutz!” he seethed to himself.
Rufus supposed Tomek had seen many beasts cut down before, being part of a firing squad, Rufus’s firing squad at that, but perhaps he had never lost a friend.
Patting Tomek’s shoulder, Rufus turned to Madou, “It must be the Warden. He knew where we were going to come out.”
Madou set the unconscious Zozizou on the ground beside him, then grunted, “You should have killed him when you had the chance back there.”
Rufus offered only a scornful scoff.
A few more pellets pinged off the cave walls, impelling everyone to duck and flinch.
“I know you could’ve!” Madou snarled afterwards. “Why do you always hold back, Red-mist? Why?”
“Well we’re here now!” Rufus snapped, leaning against the rocks. “Ulf’s fangs, he must have an army out there.”
“We are army in here too!” a tearful Tomek replied, thumping his chest and tugging at his collar. “My collar is fake. I can fight! They have only two Howlers, three with Warden; the rest are just bullies with pistols.”
Rufus shook his head, “And how many of us would be cut down by those pistols like Helmut?”
“I’m not coward!”
“Nor I, Tomek, but there must be a better way out of this.”
Rufus peered across at Nurka, who was pressed against the far wall, bow in paws ready to shoot back.
“Stay here.”
With that, Rufus scuttled across the cave mouth to join the hyena chief, throwing himself against the uneven wall, arms spread, like a giant starfish braving the tidal zone to eat a mussel.
Another few pellets pinged around the cave, after which Rufus turned around so his back was to the wall. “Helmut’s down,” he said.
“Dead,” Nurka corrected, flicking his snout at the motionless body of the hog. “Your friend’s been murdered, along with half my warriors,” he added, referring to those he had left guarding the cave.
Rufus grimaced, then replied, “Your hyenas might’ve been taken hostage, Nurka-”
“No, Red-mist,” the hyena chief replied darkly, his purple eyes squinting a little, “they knew what to do in the event of certain capture, we all do.”
Rufus nearly spat, ‘What’s that, swallow their black-imperium capsules like mad-beasts?’ but somehow refrained.
Casimir tugged his long white ears down around his cheeks like a bonnet, “Thump me, they’re gonna throw a yellow-imperium bomb in here and then we’ll be done for. Or worse, black-imperium. We’ll be melted alive!”
To his right, Noss cackled, “How comes you little beasts are always so positive?”
“Well what’s to stop them, eh?”
“The Warden needs me alive,” Noss claimed. “Perhaps if I give myself up.”
“I don’t think we can fool him twice,” Rufus said.
“I don’t intend to fool him again. He can have me, if it will save lives-”
“No!” Nurka dismissed at once.
“No?” Noss growled pompously. “And who’re you to tell me what to do, boy? I’m your prince!”
“I have lost many hyenas to get you this far;
hyenas who believe you can unite the tribes,” Nurka rasped, with the clarity of a beast, no boy. “I am not giving you back so that their lives are wasted, even less so that Amael can dictate terms with our prince in his paws!”
Silence prevailed, but for air whistling through thick, flaring hyena nostrils.
As if to change subject, Rufus snatched the map from Nurka’s belt and searched its crinkled passages. “Nurka, is there another way out of here?”
The chief came-to, “Not on there, Red-mist.”
“But there must be. Logically, if the ants aren’t using this exit to get to the surface there must be other tunnels, perhaps some they have dug themselves. They need to forage above ground.”
“I suppose they do, but would not the ants attack us if we tried to get by them?”
Themba hiked a thumb, “They didn’t even notice us back there.”
To which Prince Noss huffed, “They are more forgiving on the margins; they’d not take kindly to two dozen beasts traipsing right through their nest. If we provoke the ants too far we may trigger an attack. They could go into a frenzy and comb the mountain, killing anything not of their own scent. If you’ve ever trodden on a little ant hill by accident you’ll know what I mean. Now imagine that, but with great ants. This whole place would become a death trap.”
Nurka and Themba stared at their prince.
“If you do not believe your anointed prince, ask Red-mist!” he woofed, arms folding.
“Yes,” Rufus replied, staring into space. Tapping the claw of his index finger on his helmeted nose to a metallic clink, he hummed rhetorically, “Yes… that might just work.”
Grabbing a lantern from one of the hyenas, Red-mist precluded any questions with a command, “Keep them busy; if they negotiate draw it out as long as you can.”
Questions came regardless.
“What’re you going to do?” Nurka demanded to know.
“I need to find us a place to hide,” Rufus replied cryptically. “Somewhere the ants won’t go.”
“What?”