Harthril stared at her through his brilliant-hued Viis eyes. His rill was halfway extended, but otherwise he showed no expression. “Good hunting there.”
“No!” she said. “We can’t risk crossing a boundary marker.”
Harthril’s rill extended more. He pointed at the bluff rising above them. “You saying to climb back up there?”
“Of course we can’t climb back the way we just came,” she said irritably, knowing the exhausted group would never make it. “But if we go into those mountains, we’ll be heading for greater trouble than we left.”
A sharp yelp and the sounds of a scuffle made her break off and turn around. Harthril turned with her.
At the opposite end of the ledge, Nashmarl was shoving the Kelth Steegin, who snarled an insult at him and snapped her teeth right in his face.
Harthril hissed, flicking out his tongue in anger, but a growling Ampris was already limping in her cub’s direction. She saw Nashmarl shove Steegin again, pushing her dangerously near the edge. This time, Steegin’s yelp held a distinct note of fear. Growling, the other Kelths rose to their feet and closed in on Nashmarl as a pack.
In mingled annoyance and growing alarm, Ampris roared, freezing all of them in place. “Nashmarl!” she yelled angrily. “You—”
But she never finished her sentence. From over the top of the mesa came a thundering boom of sonic pressure and the blinding flash of sunlight off metal. Two high-velocity, scout-sized warships came screaming over the rim of the mesa and barreled down right above them. The ships’ noses were aflame, and their jets spewed contrails of white exhaust. The noise of their engines deafened the world, making the ledge itself tremble beneath Ampris’s feet. Small rocks dislodged and went tumbling, then the ships went plunging down toward the far-off Plains of Filea, gone in the blink of an eye, with only the stink of exhaust and the boom of their engines echoing off the cliffs and canyons.
Ampris, although she had ducked instinctively like everyone else, was the first to recover. She jumped upright. “They didn’t see us!” she said, her voice ringing out over the panicky babble. “Stay calm, everyone. They couldn’t see us.”
Velia was in hysterics, her hands clawing the air over her head. “This close!” she said over and over. “This close! Could touch us. Had to see us.”
“No way,” Elrabin said. He gave Velia a shake and she fell silent, standing beside him wide-eyed and shaking, her hands clamped around her muzzle. “Those be spaceships, messengers, coming in on autopilot control. Slack yourselves. We be fine, see?”
The other Kelths weren’t listening. Yipping shrilly, they ran about, grabbing up their meager bundles and shoving each other.
“They’ll report us,” Frenshala said, as wild-eyed as Velia. “We’ll be taken back and flogged.”
The confusion increased as they yelped and milled about. Frustrated, Ampris could not make herself heard. Elrabin tried to shout above the noise they were making, but gave up.
Harthril, however, pushed his way through and waved his long arms. “Follow me!” he ordered. “Move fast. We go now!”
He started off the ledge, with Frenshala right on his heels. The other Kelths crowded them, still yipping and sobbing, refusing to calm down. Trying to back out of the general confusion, Ampris looked around for her sons and belongings.
Then a scream pierced the air.
Turning that way, Ampris saw Nashmarl teetering on the edge of the precipice. Horrified, she rushed to him, knocking someone out of her way, and dragged him back to safety. She clung to him a moment, feeling him tremble against her, and sent up a silent prayer of gratitude that he was safe.
“Look!” someone shouted.
A fresh babble of voices broke out, and Nashmarl squirmed from her arms to look over the edge.
Ampris stared down far below at Steegin’s sprawled, broken body. Sickened by the sight, she closed her eyes.
Wails rose up from the Kelths.
Ampris stepped back, forcing herself to look deep into the stricken green eyes of her son. “Nashmarl,” she whispered.
He was wide-eyed with shock. His usual defenses had crumbled. Ampris saw the lonely, frightened, deeply insecure cub that lay behind his moody facade.
“I didn’t,” he said, his voice airless and squeaking. “She shoved me, and I pushed her back. Then her foot slipped, and she just fell.” His mouth opened and closed several times. “She just fell.”
Ampris said nothing. Her heart went out to him, and she wanted to fold him back within the safety of her arms. But he remained rigid and unmoving, resisting her comfort.
Foloth rushed up to them, his dark eyes blazing. “You fool!” he said to his brother. “If you had to push her, why couldn’t you do it when no one was around to see you?”
Shock hit Ampris hard. She stared at Foloth, unable to believe what she had just heard.
Before she could react, the Kelths mobbed them, snapping and hitting, jostling the three of them dangerously close to the edge.
“Killer!” they shouted. “Monster! Freak!”
Ampris grabbed her sons by their arms and pushed forward through the pack of Kelths. She snarled, baring her teeth, and bit anyone who blocked her way. Reluctantly the pack parted to let her through.
A small stone came out of nowhere, hitting Nashmarl in the shoulder. He cried out in pain, and another stone hit him.
“Killer!” someone shouted shrilly.
Ampris lost her temper. Drawing herself to her full height, she spun around with the old speed that had once made her champion of the gladiatorial arena and roared with a ferocity that silenced them. Swiping with her claws, she chased one of the Kelths into the safety of the crowd. “Nothing is settled here!” she shouted at them. “Nothing!”
Another roar joined hers, and suddenly Tantha bounded to her side. The two Aarouns snarled at the Kelths, who quietened and backed away uneasily.
Tantha bared her teeth and shook her head from side to side. “Come on and fight, if you want a fight!” she taunted them.
But Elrabin came hurrying forward to stand between them. Holding up his hands, he peered at first one side, then the other, from beneath his rakish bandage. “Slack yourselves,” he said sharply. “This ain’t the way.”
“I told them this will be dealt with below,” Ampris said, fury still growling through her voice. She stared at the Kelths through a red haze of emotion, the old, long-dormant fighting instincts roused within her. “Or I can deal with it now, one by one.”
“I will help break bones,” Tantha said with relish.
“Killers!” yelled a Kelth voice from the safety of the crowd.
“Shut the gab!” Elrabin snapped fiercely. “All of you! We ain’t judging this now.”
“Steegin be dead!” Frenshala said in anger. “She be dead now—so we deal with this now!”
“You got no say in when we judge our own,” Elrabin told her. “Cool off and get down the trail. Move!”
His fierce orders did the trick. Obviously the Kelths were still conditioned to do as they were told. One by one, they turned aside and went down the steep trail—even Frenshala, although she was the last of them to go. She glared at Ampris as she went. “Liar,” she snarled. “Better off we be with Viis master than Aaroun.”
Ampris opened her mouth, then closed it without reply. Her anger was cooling now, and she was ashamed of having lost her temper. She had come very close to actually attacking some of them, and that was not the way to live peaceably with her comrades, as she had sworn long ago to do.
She and Elrabin exchanged glances, and the sad, pitying blame in his eyes deepened her hurt. She dropped her gaze from his, and turned around to look at her cubs.
Nashmarl’s head was hanging. His breathing was ragged and audible. “Mother—”
“Hush,” she told him. “Not now. This will be settled tonight in council.”
Foloth shot his brother an icy glare. “Fool,” he said so contemptuously that Ampris backed her ears.
/> “Foloth. don’t,” she said.
Her oldest son’s dark eyes snapped to hers. “He’ll get us shunned.”
Her heart squeezed in fresh worry, and she admitted to herself that Foloth might be right. Rubbing her muzzle, she told herself not to believe it. Something could be worked out.
“Shunned?” Nashmarl said, his voice shaky and uncertain. “We can’t be. Mother is too important.”
Foloth bared his short fangs in disgust.
“Was, you mean,” he spit out, turning his scorn toward her. He was so young and inexperienced, yet so swift to judge harshly, Ampris thought with a sigh.
She backed her ears and pushed both of them to the rear of the line. “You will both stay silent,” she said. “No more talking.”
“But I did nothing wrong,” Foloth said.
She wanted to shake him. “Quiet,” she snapped, and to her relief he obeyed.
In grim silence the group descended the rest of the treacherous slope. Several times while she waited for the person ahead of her to scramble over a dangerous spot, Ampris gazed across to the easier descent of the mesa. From this angle she realized now that had they gone down that, they would have ended up on the northern side of the mountain range instead of here on the southern side, where the vast Plains of Filea began.
Her suspicions grew, and she wondered what Harthril was up to.
Steegin’s body lay wedged in the V of a deep, narrow fissure, impossible to reach or bury. The Kelths wailed as they passed her, but a sharp order from Elrabin silenced them. After that, no one spoke at all. An unpleasant tension filled the air. Ampris could smell hostility and anger simmering in everyone except poor befuddled Robuhl. and she feared for her sons. Young and foolish, they had yet to show good judgment—either of them, although Foloth was far more responsible than his brother. She sighed to herself, grimacing as the climb over a boulder put too much strain on her crippled leg. Perhaps this tragedy, she mused, would help both cubs grow up.
By the time they reached the bottom, long shadows coated the rough terrain. The sun was sinking behind the bulk of the mesa, bringing respite from the day’s heat. Overhead, the sky glowed lilac streaked with coral and gold. Kreige mal-Hahfra loomed over them like a bad omen, its sides looking black and heavily forested. Ampris could smell the sharp tang of narpines. It would be cool up there in the mountains. It always was. There would be plentiful game as well.
For a moment, she stood gazing at the forests, the breeze ruffling the fur of her muzzle, her nostrils filled with old scents and memories of long ago. Sahmrahd Kaa. that resplendent, bronze-skinned sovereign, had hunted the forests of his imperial lands with great pleasure, coming back to the lodge on soft evenings such as this with his blue eyes gleaming and his jeweled collar brilliant with the reflected fires of sunset. Splattered with mire, his fine clothing smelling of narpine sap, Viis sourness, and blood, he would stride inside the lodge ahead of a noisy retinue of hunters, casting aside gloves and weapons before spreading wide his arms for little Israi, who always ran to him in greeting while Ampris tagged behind, watching and envying her mistress such a magnificent father.
“Ampris.”
The voice recalled her from the past, with all its pleasures and deep pain. Ampris slammed the door on her memories and turned to find herself staring into the sympathetic eyes of Luax.
“We camp here tonight,” the female Reject said. Her pink and green skin was dusty. Her eyes looked tired and worried. “Is not close enough to water, but folk too tired to walk more. When eat, will be time for council.”
Ampris stared at Luax through the twilight shadows, her breath tangled in her throat. Again she had to control an onslaught of fear and worry, had to remain calm, had to cling to the hope that she could successfully defend her son’s innocence.
“You hear?” Luax asked her when she said nothing. “We have the council after we eat.”
“Yes,” Ampris forced herself to say. She clutched her Eye of Clarity for comfort, wishing she could tap into the font of wisdom legend said it contained. “Thank you, Luax.”
The Reject flicked out her tongue. “Not time for thanking yet,” she said in grim warning, and left Ampris alone.
CHAPTER•SIX
Nashmarl stood among the trees in the darkness, his face mutinous in the light of the tiny fire Ampris had kindled. “I won’t do it,” he said.
She glared at him with a mixture of exasperation and alarm. “You must. It is the law—”
“Law!” he shouted. “We don’t have laws. We’re savages, living in the wilderness. We can do anything—”
In two swift steps, Ampris was on him. She snapped her teeth right in his face, wishing he had visible ears so that she could nip one. Instead, she gripped him by his neck and shook him the way she had when he was younger. “Shut up!” she growled at him. “Don’t say that. They will hear you, and believe you really did kill Steegin.”
His green eyes flared wide. “But I didn’t!”
Foloth laughed. He was sitting by the fire, tending it with small twigs that he fed into the flames one at a time. The firelight danced orange across his flattened features, making him look impish. “You are so stupid, my little brother. Mother, aren’t Aaroun females supposed to have visions when they give birth, visions that tell the future of their sons and daughters? Why didn’t you look into Nashmarl’s eyes and see that he was doomed to be a fool? You could have snapped his neck and saved us all this trouble today.”
Old grief and rage engulfed her. With a roar, she released Nashmarl and turned on Foloth with a savagery that wiped the smirk off his face and made him shoot to his feet.
“Silence!” she shouted at him, wanting to shake him, to claw him to ribbons. Trembling with rage, she came at him with her teeth bared, and Foloth scrambled back, nearly tripping over the fire.
“Mother, don’t!” he said in fright. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that.”
Another growl rumbled through her throat. Her ears were plastered against her skull, and she gave him the flat, merciless glare she had used when she was a professional killer. “Never say that again,” she said. Her voice was hoarse and unsteady. She pointed at him with her claws extended. “Do you hear me? Never say anything like that again.”
“I was just joking,” Foloth replied sullenly. He glanced at Nashmarl, then back at her. “Trying to lighten the situation.”
Her rage flared higher. “A joke?” she repeated, unable to believe what he’d said. “Do you think I am a fool, Foloth? I am your mother. I am not worthy of your disrespect.”
“It’s Nashmarl I don’t respect,” Foloth said. “Not you, Mother.”
She looked into his dark eyes and saw only deceit and self-interest there. Her grief over all that had recently occurred welled up again, intensified by her profound disappointment in both her sons tonight. Her throat filled with emotion, and she found herself unable to speak.
“Goldie?” Elrabin’s voice called softly from behind her. The Kelth came up to their small, private campsite, looking serious indeed. He was moving more slowly than usual, and he looked gaunt and tired. “It be time.”
She couldn’t cope with it, not just then. Nashmarl wasn’t prepared. He wouldn’t listen to her. He wouldn’t even try to save himself. Foloth was being so . . . so impossible and cruel. The past flooded her with unwanted memories, of a day so dark she’d hoped to close it from her heart forever.
“Goldie, you hear me?” Elrabin said more loudly. “Council is sitting. Got to take Nashmarl and—”
“I won’t go,” Nashmarl said in a defiant whine. “They all hate me. They won’t listen to anything I say. Mother should go and speak for me.”
“Your ma can’t speak for you, cub,” Elrabin said curtly. “For once, you got to face up to what you did.”
“They’ve already judged me,” Nashmarl said. “They threw stones at me.”
“Ain’t the only thing that should be done to your young hide,” Elrabin muttered.
/> Ampris bowed her head. She was shaking all over. Worry consumed her. Where had she gone wrong in raising her sons? She had loved them with all her heart from the first inhalation of their newborn scent. She had given them all she could, loving them doubly because of their poor sister. She thought of her one daughter, so tiny and new, with her flat little face and wobbly, misshapen head. Only a short span of life, only a few hours to hold and caress that little one before she was gone forever. A piece of Ampris’s heart had died with her daughter that day, leaving a small empty void that never healed. She closed her eyes, listening to her sons argue and bicker, and wished the rest of her could be as numb.
“Goldie,” Elrabin said quietly, coming up behind her. His hand touched her shoulder, and she started. “You okay?”
Tears streamed down her muzzle. She put her hands to her eyes, unable to answer.
“Hey,” he said in concern, coming around to face her. “You can’t defend the cub like this. You got to be more hopeful.”
She lifted her drenched eyes to Elrabin’s, unable to take his comfort. “I can’t lose another cub,” she said. “I can’t!”
He opened his mouth, but she could bear no more. She darted around him and started for the trees, but Elrabin grabbed the coarse cloth of her jerkin and pulled her back.
“You ain’t running off now,” he said. “Ain’t the time. Nashmarl needs your help.”
“What other cub?” Foloth asked sharply. “What does she mean?”
Ampris stared at the ground, knowing Elrabin was right, but unable right then to pull herself together.
“You can’t fall apart on us,” Elrabin said. “We need you, Goldie. Not just the cubs, but the whole camp.”
“I let them down,” Ampris said. “I let everyone down, especially Paket.”
Elrabin’s tall ears swiveled back and he wrinkled his lip. “Nah. You ain’t believing that. Paket knew what he was getting into. You think he didn’t have the choice of staying behind? Lose the pity, Goldie. Ain’t no room in this life for it. You got other things to do.”
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