by J. D. Lakey
Another bright spot in the ambient approached. At just the right moment, she pivoted and raced straight up the slope towards a point where the ridge jutted out into the valley. Here the rock had collapsed under its own weight, leaving a lone stone spire standing sentinel over an expanse of rock slides dotted with patches of vegetation trying to find a foothold in the unstable ground.
The sound of snuffling and the click of claws on the loose rock above them greeted her ears as she clambered up to the base of the spire. The sound was faint and she heard it only because she was expecting it. They were nearly out of time, once again.
Climb, she signed frantically. She did not wait to see that they obeyed. She jammed her hooked stick into the loops on her belt to free both hands. Jumping up as high as she could reach, her fingertips caught a knob of rock as a handhold. Using her momentum, she swung her knee up to wedge the toe of her boot into a crack. From this precarious perch, she pulled herself up to reach for the next irregularity in the face of the rock.
Taking the holds dangerously fast, the climb took less than a minute but it felt like forever. A large flat stone crowned the pinnacle. She threw her arm over the lip and clawed at the rough stone as she inched over the rim on her belly. Safe at last, she collapsed and tried to get her breath back.
Was it fear or fatigue that turned her muscles to jelly? It was hard to tell. She had not taken a drink since well before the bhotta and the last food she had eaten had long since disappeared, making her belly feel hollow. Cheobawn pulled all the power she could handle out of the mountain’s reserve, postponing the needs of her body for some future time.
When she thought she could handle it, she crawled to the edge to help the next person up. Megan was almost to the rim. Cheobawn spread herself flat and pulled the older girl up the last few feet by her belt. Alain was next, with Tam climbing by his side, though there was little Tam could do if Alain lost a hold point and fell.
She risked a glance up the slope but dense brush blocked her view. Whatever it was, it had caught their scent. A deep, excited moan came from just beyond a thicket of thornberries. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end.
She grabbed Alain’s hand, Megan grabbed the other and between the two of them, they hauled him over the rim. He collapsed face down on the tiny plateau nearly sobbing with exhaustion as Tam pulled himself up and whirled around to reach down towards Connor.
The youngest boy was still too far down. He was having a hard time of it for some reason. Every gain up the rock face twisted his face in agony. Cheobawn measured the distance between him and the ground and then checked up-slope. They were out of time. A large prehensile nose pushed its way clear of the greenery and sniffed deeply. Massive shoulders parted the stalks as the rest of the animal followed its nose towards the desperate Pack.
A treebear. The thing was as tall as a grown man at the shoulder and standing on its hind feet it surely would be taller than three grown men. They were good climbers, these animals, if their claws could find a purchase.
Cheobawn felt sick. She may have doomed them, bringing them up here with nowhere to retreat.
The treebear rose on its hind legs and lifted its nose high in the air. It had not spotted them yet but surely it would soon. What it lacked in vision and psi abilities it more than made up for with its nose.
Megan pushed Cheobawn out of the way and lay down on her belly, inching forward as far as she could. Alarmed, Cheobawn grabbed the older girl’s ankles and braced her heels against the rock, holding on as tight as she could. Alain did the same for Tam as Tam leaned out over the edge, though Alain looked as weak as a baby and probably could not hold on for long if Tam started to fall.
Connor came up at last, clawing his way over the bodies of his friends. Cheobawn grabbed them all, pulled them away from the edges, and pressed them down into the stone. Alain shuddered, trying to smother a cough with his fist, his exhausted lungs betraying him. There was so little room in the center of the cap stone they were forced to overlap arms and legs, forming a solid ball of child flesh. Cheobawn spread herself thin around the edge of the ball, hugging Megan with her legs and Connor with her arms. Every moment or so, she lifted her head just enough to keep track of the bear.
The treebear whuffed deeply and dropped back down on all four feet. Rocks shifted and skittered under its weight. Its claws, large enough to rip open dead trees in search of honeybuzzer nests and treehopper dens, gave it an odd, toed-in gait as it clambered down the loose stones, swinging its head from side to side to catch their scent. Cheobawn watched as it approached the base of their roost and then disappeared below them.
Now was when she would find out how good their Luck was. She buried her nose in the small of Connor’s back, held her breath, and waited.
All sound of movement stopped right below them. The snuffing intensified. That could mean only one thing. It knew they were up here. Cheobawn cursed their rotten Luck and tried to figure out where she had gone wrong. On the surface, walking right up under the nose of a treebear with the breeze at their backs seemed suicidal. But getting above its nose should have confused it. If they had truly been blessed, the bear should have followed their backtrail down the slope.
Claws scraped against the rock face and the stone under them quaked slightly. The bear had not been fooled. It was trying to climb. It paced the base of the spire, trying every crack and crevice with a tenacious thoroughness, circling once, twice, and then again a third time, the sound of its excited whuffing marking its progress. Occasionally it would find a purchase for its claws but the stone was too brittle. They listened to the tiny pops as the rock fractured under the bear’s weight, the surface of the spire shedding flakes of itself, the chips clattering down the steep incline to add themselves to the already unstable scree.
The treebear’s frustrated moan gave her hope. What
had afforded small children a toe hold was not enough for something as massive as a treebear. Perhaps Luck was still on their side. Cheobawn lifted her head and then clutched frantically at anything within reach as the stone shuddered, then shuddered again.
For a moment she thought it was an earthquake. Then it hit her. The treebear was trying to knock the stone spire over using its massive strength.
The stones shuddered once more.
She had not thought she could be more afraid than she already was but true terror exploded in her mind like fire, stripping away any illusion of control she might have thought she had over what lay in her core. Adrenaline fueled a firestorm of psi that caught her up in its pressure wave and blew her out into the world.
For a moment, the world became nothing but light and sound and she was the formless thing unraveling at its core. She clutched at the fabric of reality, trying to find an anchor point. Cheobawn became a frightened ball of children, but she could not hang onto that thought, the winds of her fear too strong. In succession, she became a stone spire, then a treebear intent on toppling this great stone tree.
Cheobawn could not stop the storm that was blowing her away from herself. She became the stones and bones of a ridge line that held back the weight of half a mountain. She became the mountain, perpetual snowfields on her crown, the forest living flesh upon her flanks, the bones of her roots sunk into a hot mass of the plastic rock that seethed restlessly under the weight of its rigid shell.
Not even a planet could contain her. She was preparing to leap off into the vacuum of space after becoming the ball of living rock caught up in the tyranny of a star’s orbit when sanity returned. Little girls did not belong in the darkness between stars. Little girls belonged in little bodies. She released her hold on the expanding bubble of psi energy and sank back towards the fragile vessel meant to contain her life spark.
Cheobawn remembered, as she let go of the place where she existed as a mountain, that she was still in mortal danger. As she contracted down to tree size, she found the treebear, standing on its hind legs, front paws planted against a puny mound of rock. She settled int
o it, pulling its life close around her like a warm blanket on a cold morning.
Cheobawn found herself staring at her paws, confused. Why was she trying to tip this stone? Then the faintest smell of blood reminded her. She had treed a thing without a name and it was wounded. The promise of an easy dinner was hard to ignore. She reared back and hit the spire one more time, putting the weight of her massive shoulders behind that blow. Though stone ground against stone, nothing big seemed to be shaking loose. It was very frustrating. She lifted her nose high and tasted the air, her mouth watering, imagining warm furry bodies struggling in her jaws, the blood flowing hot, bones cracking.
No!
Revulsion flooded her mind. Cheobawn shied away, landing on all fours. She shook her head to clear it of the thoughts that buzzed around inside her like a swarm of flying nasties. She did not want to eat the nameless ones. She loved them. Didn’t she? She moaned, rocking from paw to paw, love and hunger mixed up in her mind.
A fernhen clucked somewhere downhill, a welcome distraction, and Cheobawn lifted her nose to catch its scent. Hens meant eggs. She loved eggs. She turned and scrambled down the scree, putting distance between herself and the unease that clung to the tall spire.
Someone was shaking her arm. She opened her eyes. Tam was crouched over her.
Sleeping? Really! he signed, a look of astonished disbelief on his face. This is not a stroll through the garden. We can relax later, his fingers scolded.
Cheobawn sat up and scrubbed her hands roughly over her face. Had she fainted? Had it been a dream?
Where is the treebear? she queried with the flick of a finger. Tam looked over his shoulder and clicked softly. Alain was flat on his belly peering over the edge. He looked up at the sound. Tam repeated her question.
Gone down into the trees, headed into the swamp, Alain signed. Cheobawn rose to her knees and looked over the side. It was truly gone. Once again, Luck had smiled upon them.
She turned and considered each member of her pack, biting her lip. Whether a dream or a prescient vision, her foray out to the edge of the world had told her one thing. She signed at Tam and Megan to watch the sky. She touched their bladed sticks and pointed up to reinforce that idea. Then she turned to Connor.
Are you hurt? she signed.
It is nothing, he signed back. She did not believe him, but she also did not believe he was trying to be stoic. He was angry with her.
Liar, she signed. Show me.
Connor scowled at her and then reluctantly answered.
Wet boots, he signed with a grimace.
Explain, she signed, puzzled. They all had wet boots. The liners were designed to compensate for that.
Sore foot, he signed with a shrug. She frowned at him. It was surely more than just being footsore. She calculated the distance left to go, calling up Tam’s map to compare it with her own internal map. It was still far. Too far. Doubly far if one of them was lame.
Show me, she insisted.
No. I will be alright, he signed with an angry flick of his fingers.
She reached for his boot. Connor tried to bat her hands away but Tam reached out and caught hold of his wrist.
Follow orders, the older boy signed. Connor pressed his lips together to contain his anger and then unlaced one of his boots. Cheobawn helped him pull it off. What she saw gave her pause.
Where is your liner? she signed with a sinking feeling.
Lost. At the pool, he signed.
The boots were cut big to accommodate the thickness of the liner. Without it, the foot had a tendency to slip around a lot inside the boot, causing abrasions and blisters. Soaking the foot and the leather in water exacerbated the problem a thousand fold. The sole of his foot, the back of his heel and the bottom of every toe were solid blisters. Most of them had burst and now oozed pink fluid. It was like looking at raw meat.
It had not been a dream.
Why didn’t you say something? she asked, letting her frustration show on her face.
You did not wait, Connor signed, a look of angry accusation on his face. You left me. Without looking behind. What was I supposed to do? Connor’s body shook with his outrage.
Tam touched Connor’s shoulder but the smaller boy shook his hand off, his eyes locked with hers.
She could not deny it. Connor knew even if Tam did not. She bit her lip against the words that wanted to spill out of her heart. She had forgotten him. At the pool. In the tubegrass grove. She had nearly left without him.
I was scared. It will not happen again. Promise, she signed. Connor glared at her, unmollified. His anger was justifiable. She did not tell him she might have to break that promise again soon.
What can we do? signed Megan
I can make it, Connor signed, grabbing his boot. Keep going.
No, Cheobawn said. His foot would be a bleeding wound in another click. The smell of blood would have every predator on the mountain on their trail. She considered leaving him here and coming back for him but she knew he would not live to see the morning. There were sky hunters large enough to pluck grown treehoppers from the top of the forest canopy. What chance did a small boy have? They could stick together, try to hold the rock spire all night and hike out in the morning but the thought of that made her insides turn to water. More people than just this Pack would be dead when morning came. They needed to get back before the Fathers sent out search parties. The Fathers would not risk their lives for four foolish children, but they might be induced to come after her, Mora’s truedaughter.
Cheobawn looked around at the faces of her friends. Alain was in trouble, lips pale and eyes deeply shadowed. Tam, though not as bad, still looked a little green. Megan was the least impacted, physically, but her mental state kept her close to the edge of control. Cheobawn rubbed her forehead, trying to push back the ambient of the mountain that threatened to crush her.
Things were going wrong. The Luck was shifting. She had walked the world in treebear’s body. That blackout did not speak well of her own mental state. It had been so easy, leaping out her body, becoming that which could not be dominated. Dead easy. What if she left and never came back? Would they let the mountain take her body, thinking her dead? Her mind shied away from that unspeakable thought.
They had to get off this rock and keep going. She looked around. Surely there must be something around them that they could use to bandage his foot. Next time, she thought, we will bring extra liners and a medkit and trail rations that could be eaten on the go and day packs instead of gleaner baskets, even though the gleaner baskets could hold fragile things without crushing them. Fragile things like eggs.
Cheobawn looked up, grinning.
I am an idiot, she said pulling off her pack. She pulled a handful of damp moss out of its depths and began arranging it into a foot shaped pad. She kept adding more and more moss until the thickness seemed right. Tam, understanding the point of her crafting, handed her Connor’s boot. She slid the pad in and then added a little more around the edges, taking care to pad the toes. When it seemed right, she handed the boot back to Connor.
Connor tried to put it on. The pain made him moan. Resting had not helped his foot. It was starting to swell.
Cheobawn lifted her head to taste the ambient. Time was sliding away. She moved to take the boot but Tam grabbed it first. He shoved Connor onto his back and grabbed his ankle.
Hold him down, Tam signed at Megan.
Megan moved to kneel over Connor’s head, pressing his shoulders down onto the rock with all her weight.
Hold his knee, Tam told Cheobawn. Cheobawn sat down and pulled Connor’s leg into her lap, his other knee pressed against her back.
Tam looked into Connor’s eyes and made sure he could see his fingers when he signed.
This will hurt. A lot.
Connor nodded.
The next two minutes were the worst of Cheobawn’s short life. Connor did not make a sound as Tam forced his foot back into the boot but Cheobawn could feel him stiffen and jerk with the pain.
Cheobawn was crying when it was done, her tears matching those that streamed down Connor’s cheeks. The small boy lay, pale and trembling as Tam scooped the rest of the moss out of her pack and stuffed it tightly around Connor’s ankle. When he was satisfied, he tightened the laces, securing them again in the top of the boot.
Tight? Tam’s fingers asked, his fingers catching at Connor’s attention. Connor sat up and rubbed the sweat out of his eyes and flicked a finger. Tam repeated his question.
Too tight, Connor signed with a grimace.
Good, Tam nodded, No movement. No blood on the ground. He used the hunter’s sign for an animal bleeding out, perhaps as a warning to Connor to remind him of his danger.
The others looked grim at that reminder. Good, Cheobawn thought, good to think such things when you are running for your life. She slipped her pack back on while she tested the threads of their future in her mind. One of the threads seemed promising. She slid over the edge and began the climb down.
Tam came next, leading Connor down as he tested the limits of his padded foot. He seemed to be more steady, the moss padding easing the pain a bit.
Alain came next. He lost a toe hold not far from the bottom and dropped the last two meters with Tam breaking his fall. Megan jumped down last. Cheobawn waited for them to sort themselves out. When she had their attention, she lifted her fingers.
Not far. Around two clicks, she guessed.
None of them looked happy at the news. Two clicks might as well have been twenty. The rest on the spire had not helped them.
Cheobawn shook her head, looking away. There was nothing more she could do for them. The mountain wanted her attention.
She turned and ran.
Chapter Ten
The weight of their exhaustion beat at Cheobawn from behind. It began to influence her decisions. She closed her eyes and tried to find a path that would spare Alain and Connor anymore pain.
Following a thread that wound its way around the northern edge of a marshy bog, careful to keep them out of the sucking mud traps that lay under the pools of still water, she stepped one step too far down a thread that suddenly had no future. Cheobawn stopped and tried to find a place to go but all the threads of all their futures faded and died in her mind.