The hunters weren’t far now. Their new burrow was purposely close. Several days earlier they had shoveled it out in anticipation of the goud that were preparing to come off the forest canopy. Their natural inclination was to follow the meat animals so they dug in here, waiting for them to come. But because there was no telling where they might find their next meal, Egris preferred the convenience of life underground in hollowed out burrows. With all this sand it was easy to dig another one wherever they happened to be hunting, and it was the most functional way of escaping the day’s intense heat.
Their sand burrow had been dug into the windward side of a dune, where thick bushes had taken root and grew all the way up the slope. Parting the dense foliage the first hunter pushed through the opening. Inside the air smelled of decaying vegetation. Thick wet roots brushed their faces; it was impossible to avoid them, for as quickly as they were cut down new ones sprouted back in their place.
The passageway was a long one. Numerous corridors angled away from the main branch, then merged at a central chamber that had been dug out and enlargened to accommodate everyone in the trod. Horhon was waiting there when Gangahar came through the passageway.
“We must talk,” she said gravely.
Dhorsal wandered past, then Negoragil and Magamengon shuffled through, and as these last two departed for their sleeping lairs the room was silent again.
Gangahar sighed. For his part he wanted a swift end to this tiresome discussion and brought down both hands in a gesture of weariness. “We will talk tomorrow.”
“Now,” Horhon said firmly, standing between him and the tunnel.
“Then speak and be done,” he gestured irritatedly.
“You know what you saw today.”
“It was no animal,” he finally admitted now that there were no others around to hear him. “It was the Iranha.”
“Then why do you let him take us on this insane trek tomorrow?”
“What can we do?”
“What can we do?” Her voice trailed off and she sank into a depression that lasted for the remainder of their conversation. “Leave. But first the others must see that this is our only option.”
“And Yaryar? He will not listen. He does not believe the Iranha are a threat.”
“He should.” Horhon frowned. “They are closer than ever. Each day will bring them back. How many more times are we to find them before they find us?”
“Then you have a plan?”
In a slow steady voice she said, “You must help me, Gangahar. If we are to do anything at all then Yaryar must be convinced.”
“And if he chooses to ignore my advice, what then? He is my friend. I will not stand against him.”
“That was never my thought. Only that you use your friendship to help him see what we both know and believe is true. Can you do that?”
He nodded hesitantly. “I will support you if I can.”
“Good. This is all I ask.” Her teeth-filled mouth opened wide, yawning as she exposed her rows of deadly points. “So tired. I must sleep.”
Gangahar was already thinking of sleep. With half-shut eyes he slipped into an adjoining tunnel and dragged his tail out of sight.
It was the following day when Negoragil, the first waking hunter, crawled groggily from his burrow. With half-shut eyes he stumbled out into the tunnel. As he entered the central chamber he saw another hunter’s blurred shape sprawled on the floor. Negoragil recognized her. Horhon must have spent the night here, was sleeping even now as he approached and prodded her with his clawed toe.
But she did not move.
When he bentto touch her shoulder, her skin was bone cold. Something wet and sticky brushed across his fingertips. There was confusion and fear on his face when he held up his hand, a hand smeared red with blood. Her blood.
Before he could think clearly, before he could decide what to do next, he was thinking only one grim thought: If Horhon was dead, then what about the other hunters?
Chapter Three
“Wake up, wake up!”
Yaryar’s eyes were two narrow slits, so heavy was his sleep. He awoke when Negoragil’s hoarse shouts penetrated his burrow. “What is the matter?”
“Horhon, dead. Something attacked her . . . so much blood.”
Even as he led him to the chamber Yaryar was still reacting to the news. Not until he saw her laying still, saw all the blood, did the grimness of Negoragil’s words sink in. Opening his mouth Yaryar screamed in horror, sick with revulsion. He was soon joined by the other hunters who were emerging from their burrows. They too reacted strongly, for even though they were well used to killing and butchering, to see one of their own kind dead was a shocking sight.
No one could think of what to say, they were still too upset to go near her. Only Gangahar went closer. His own grief was evident as he placed his trembling hand on hers. Yaryar glanced over.
“Is she . . . ?”
Tense silence followed, then . . . “No. Unconscious, but still alive!”
She was covered with blood. A lot of it. While he wiped away the worst messes with handfuls of wet grass he suddenly spotted something very peculiar. “Look at this.”
As the trod crowded around him to see, Gangahar pointed to what looked like a bite mark on her left shoulder. Looking closer what they saw was a triangular shaped pattern with several small marks that perforated her skin. Obviously something had bitten her, Gangahar concluded, thinking to himself, What beast could have done this awful thing, and why?
“I wonder what animal attacked her,” Yaryar queried.
“This.” Negoragil pointed to the floor where the evidence was clearly visible.
To be sure there was something there, though Yaryar had trouble identifying it because it was so strangely marked. “And what are these?”
“Tracks,” he answered simply.
Yaryar frowned. “I can see that. But what creature made them?”
Shaking his head Negoragil responded, “I don’t know. Just tracks. Of what I cannot say, or why they have no scent.”
“They must lead somewhere. Find out where they go.”
Gangahar was wiping away the last traces of caked blood when Horhon opened her eyes and groaned. “I feel terrible.”
“You are lucky. We thought you were dead.”
She had no idea what was going on, hurting so much she could barely think. Her only wish at this moment was that the fierce pain would drive her back into unconsciousness.
“Stay down,” Gangahar ordered. “Do not try to move, that will only make it hurt more.”
Ignoring his plea to remain calm Horhon struggled to a sitting position. Huge drops of perspiration dripped off her face; she was in agony. And when she saw her own blood-splotched skin she started to panic.
“What’s happened to me!?”
The answer eluded him. What had happened to her was still a complete mystery. Except for the wound on her shoulder there was no other place on her body which might account for all of this blood. No cuts or torn flesh. No openings or wounds. It was very strange. Looking at her now she seemed for the most part unharmed, so when Gangahar was absolutely sure she was all right he bent over her and pressed her for some answers.
“Last night. Do you remember anything?”
Lying perfectly still, Horhon barely shook her head. “No. Nothing. I remember nothing.”
Yaryar squatted beside her. “Are you sure?”
“Of course.” She blinked up at him. “What do you mean?”
Ordinarily Yaryar would not have spoken so forcefully, but he was afraid, they all were. “Perhaps I was mistaken to ask you, yet there is a reason for this happening and it must be understood.”
As he was talking, Negoragil came bursting through the tunnel, his mouth gaped open from the speed of his arrival. Because Yaryar wanted to hear this important news first, he broke off and bade him to approach.
“Did you follow the trail back to its source?”
“Just as you ordered.”
“Well,” he said impatiently, “Tell us what you found.”
“The tracks begin and end atop the same dune. I searched further on the field just to be certain. It was empty too.”
“Then obviously you did not search hard enough.” Yaryar spoke sharply. “Take some of the others with you and look again.”
Although Negoragil protested he did not disobey. This time four hunters accompanied him outside. When the last one vanished from sight every eye was again on Yaryar. There were great mysteries presented here today; things that could not be understood, and his audience was eager to listen to whatever he had to say.
“You Dhorsal. Your burrow is next to Horhon’s. Did you hear anything last night?”
Dhorsal scratched behind her ear, thinking hard. “Perhaps I did. It must have awakened me because I remember hearing a noise. Something was moving in the tunnel.”
“A noise? That might be important.”
“I heard it too,” Horhon suddenly remembered. Trying to recall it now was just a blur, though Dhorsal’s words had sharpened her recollection. “And a bright light. It hurt my eyes to look at it.” Her jaw slackened. “Strange that I cannot remember anything else.”
“Nor I,” Gangahar agreed. He gestured sympathetically toward her. “How do you feel? Can you move?”
“I think so.” She demonstrated by raising her leg, holding it up for only a moment before letting it thump back onto the floor. She closed her eyes. “Sleep. I need to sleep.”
Obviously Gangahar was upset. Everyone could see how Horhon was suffering. And it was no secret who he blamed for this vicious and cowardly attack. “The Iranha. It must be,”Gangahar growled.
“Might be.” Yaryar, as always, was hesitant to acknowledge their name. “To say this is the work of the Iranha means that everything we know about them is wrong. Since they are supposedly killers of Egris then I doubt they would have been so merciful to Horhon when they could have easily skinned us all.”
To Gangahar they were the logical choice, the only possibility. All of the evidence pointed to the Iranha. They were nearby, they had already demonstrated a penchant for killing, so they had every reason for attacking them now. What other creature would have been bold enough to enter their burrow? He stared downward at the tracks. “Something was in here. So if not the Iranha, then what was this thing who attacked her?”
What were the alternatives? None that Yaryar could think of. In disgust he obliterated the tracks with his tail, thinking instead of ways to defend themselves from this new and menacing invader. “Our only option is to leave.”
But Gangahar strongly disagreed. “Not with Horhon injured like this. Leave if you must, but I am staying.”
“Then we must be on our guard. Always. Whatever came here today can come again just as easily tomorrow.”
“Agreed. But how can we fight what we do not understand, worse, what we cannot even see?”
Dhorsal’s question struck deep into the heart of their fear. They were all paralyzed with fright. What if this same thing were to happen again and again? Thinking about it now made the hunters realize that any one of them might be next.
“It will not be coming back.”
The surety of Horhon’s words broke down the wall of silence. Yaryar looked around the circle of hunters, snorted. “How can you possibly know that?”
“I suppose I don’t,” she confessed. “It is only a feeling, the kind a hunter has when a herd is somewhere nearby.”
Scowling, he said, “That is no answer. If a hunter finds the hunting good in one place then he is certain to return.”
Horhon was in no mood to argue with him. Her head ached, she was dizzy and sank back down. With his strong arms around her Gangahar helped her through the tunnel. She dropped down into her own burrow with a groan, vaguely aware of the throbbing pain in her abdomen. The pain was only a small part of it though, and while the horrors of yesterday pushed deep into her thoughts she fell dead-asleep.
When Gangahar checked on her the next evening he could see that the wound was healing over nicely. The swelling had gone down and the mark was beginning to gray to an ugly scar. For Horhon, all she did was sleep. Each day was the same as the next, empty and formless. By the time she opened her eyes the fever had broken, the pain was over. The worst was now behind her. Horhon groaned and twisted inside her burrow. How long had she slept? Far too long, because when she awoke she was ravenous. Fresh killed meat was what she needed.
Something was troubling her and she could not think of any reason why. She recalled so little of the recent past that thinking of it now was as if it happened a very long time ago, maybe it had. Horhon struggled to understand, but these were thoughts that could not be understood. Something had physically attacked her. In the days that followed she had come very close to death. Had she not the willpower, the sheer determination to live, then she might have died. Yet it felt like her feelings were not her own because she honestly believed her attacker never really intended to harm her. Her head hurt from thinking. If there was an answer then it was beyond her comprehension. Emerging from her burrow, she forced it from her mind, the memory now forgotten.
The stillness around her suggested that everyone was out hunting. Horhon saw that the other burrows were empty and was annoyed at herself for sleeping when she could have been outside stalking prey with the hunters. Thinking about them now she felt a stab of fear that they had actually abandoned her and went south with Yaryar, although this was a foolish thought. Still, she anxiously awaited their return.
It was not a long wait. Horhon heard a noise echo in the main tunnel, the footsteps coming closer. Soon Karkakass strode into the room. Someone was trailing behind her, a smaller figure, though he bore an amazing resemblance to Yaryar. He was still very clumsy, moving as though each step was his first. She could not have birthed him too long ago, for his smooth hide still had a wet sheen.
Seeing Horhon in the room Karkakass brought up both hands and gasped audibly. “Such a surprise, to see you awake. Gangahar told us tomorrow, maybe tomorrow. And yet here you are now. Say something. How do you feel?”
“Hungry.” Horhon noticed the youngster circling in the background. Like all Egris newborns he had come into the world ready to kill. Within minutes of being born he would have been on his haunches and ready to eat. Blood stained his teeth; they must have just returned from a meal. “Was the hunting good?”
Karkakass saw the direction of her gaze and moved to get out of the way. “He killed his first tarser tonight,” she said proudly. “All by himself.”
Killing a tarser was no great feat, Horhon knew. Just skin and bones. Worthless to hunt, worse to eat. Ordinarily it would have scarcely received any notice at all, though she wanted to be polite to Karkakass, and so she praised her youngster’s hunting prowess.
To him her talking was just a noise. Horhon could have been saying anything, though this was mostly for his mother’s benefit. Taking him by the shoulder Karkakass led him over to Horhon.
“Greet Antayak, my son. He will grow up to be like his father one day.”
Like his mother, Horhon hoped. Two Yaryars in the same trod might prove unbearable! While Karkakass talked, Horhon was deep within herself. She saw all the shadows in her thoughts, things that until now she was not really aware of. So many awful things had happened to her. First the Iranha, now this. Horhon ran a finger over the scar on her shoulder, grimaced. Then the brief spasm of pain was quickly gone.
“How long?”
Karkakass blinked. “How long what? The illness you mean?” She nodded to Horhon’s affirmative. “Eight days. You were so ill I thought you were going to die, we all did. Don’t you remember anything?”
“Only the pain. I choose to forget the rest. Now, you said you were out hunting. Will the others be returning soon?”
“Not before the morning. Negoragil knew where there were goud to eat. They left early to stalk them. I’ll take you if you are strong enough to make the trip.”<
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If they traveled quickly and quietly under the cover of darkness the herd might still be there. Horhon could hardly wait to leave, rushing outside to the fresh air and starry night sky, only to wait impatiently for her two companions to join her. On Karkakass’s signal the three of them slapped down their tails and leapt away together, jumping high into the air with swirls of dust blowing off their backsides.
They trekked steadily southwest through the grass-filled fields, staying in the hollows of the sand dunes. Overhead the sky was clear. Stars flickered in the darkness and the second moon was clearing the distant plains. A rocky scarp loomed straight ahead. It was not until they reached the top when Karkakass landed to a halt to speak.
“See here where their trail leads?” Her arm followed a narrow track way that wound downward into the dunes. Smacking her lips, she said enthusiastically, “It will take us over that next hill and beyond to the flatlands. To the goud. If the hunters have already departed then we will find our own goud. Attack one, kill one, eat one.”
Horhon approved of this simple plan and was eager to move on. She started forward, only to stop when an image filled her mind.
“Is something the matter?” Karkakass said behind her.
Without answering Horhon quietly stared up at the shimmering star filled sky, then pointed eastward toward a cluster of brighter stars. “Do you see anything?”
“Only the lights.” She shrugged. “What should I see?”
After a long, ponderous silence Horhon shook her head and replied, “Nothing. I think these things I see must be my imagination. We go now.”
The downward climb was onerous, but once they crested the next hill the landscape began to flatten and a wide-open plain stretched out ahead of them. All those long days of immobility now taxed Horhon’s strength; even despite her great hunger she was slipping further behind them.
The Battle for Tomorrow (Ilon the Hunter) Page 3