The Prince Who Fell from the Sky

by John Claude Bemis

  Dumpster sniffed. “Hey, there might be Old Devil food in here.” He scampered up through the nooks lining the walls, and Pang rustled around to help, with the cub following him.

  Casseomae lay listening for the wolves, but they were silent. “Any luck?”

  “Nothing,” Dumpster said, appearing from the shadows. “It’s all been had by raccoons and mice.”

  The child returned, having found a metal stick, and settled back next to her, holding the stick tightly to his chest. When darkness finally began to fall and the cub lay sleeping against her side, Casseomae said, “We can’t stay here forever.”

  Dumpster circled around her, his whiskers twitching. “I think I have an idea.” Before she could ask what, the rat climbed up to the broken window and disappeared outside.

  Casseomae exchanged a curious glance with Pang. She went to the window and peered out at the dark. All she could hear was the restless shifting of the wolves encamped around the passering. Where had that rat gone?

  But then she heard wolves below, beneath the wing, talking to one another. “… his scout said it was protected by a bear.”

  “Is she the one?”

  “The Ogeema will know when he arrives.”

  Casseomae jolted, feeling angry saliva fill her mouth. Was the Ogeema coming? She rounded to Pang, but before she could say anything, a wolf barked and then the whole growling pack was on their feet, their paws crunching on leaves. An odor crept through the broken window, a noxious and eye-stinging vapor. The cub woke and whimpered to Casseomae.

  “I don’t know, little cub,” she said, licking him. “But stay quiet.”

  Her nose ran violently, and Pang seemed to be suffering the same result, because he shook his head trying to drive the terrible smell away. “What’s that rat done?” he whined.

  Dumpster came back through the window. “I think it’s working,” he said gleefully.

  “What is?” Casseomae growled.

  “Listen,” the rat replied, sitting on his haunches.

  The wolves barked at one another, but Casseomae could hear their steps moving back from the passering.

  “Gasoline,” Dumpster said. “Fortunately it hadn’t leaked from the crash. I snipped a line and let it spill out. An old mischief trick my da taught me.”

  Casseomae stood up to peer through the window. The wolves were retreating. She felt her head swimming and said, “Have you poisoned us to keep the wolves from having the cub?”

  “It’s not so strong in here,” Dumpster said.

  “It’s strong enough to make my tongue feel like pine bark,” Pang complained.

  “Oh, shut it, cur,” he said. “The effects will pass. But I spilled it right on some of those idiot wolves. They’ll have a time getting that stink from their noses, not to mention trying to scratchin’ follow us now.”

  Casseomae heard the wolves call to one another, the sounds growing distant. The cub was burying his face in her fur. “We need to leave,” she said. “I heard the wolves say that the Ogeema was coming.”

  “What?” Pang snapped. “You must have heard wrong.”

  “I didn’t.”

  “This is Gnash’s realm,” Pang said. “The Ogeema might hold sway over other pack chiefs, but he’d never enter another pack’s territory.”

  Casseomae growled up at Dumpster peering through the window. “Can we go?”

  “All right, then.” He slipped through the broken glass.

  Casseomae pushed against the door and it creaked open. Pang dashed out first, and as soon as he stopped on the wing, he whined, “Blessed Companions, it’s worse out here!”

  “Just watch out you don’t step in it,” Dumpster said from the edge of the wing. “It’s mostly under the passering, so just get all the way down here before you hop off.”

  Casseomae’s snout burned as she came out. She couldn’t smell anything besides the awful poisons Dumpster had released. She listened for the wolves, hearing only distant howls.

  “Come on, cub,” she called back. “Stay close.”

  The child emerged from the doorway looking around warily. He poked his metal stick out at the dark Forest and made a pop with his lips.

  The four hurried from the passering without getting any of the smell on their paws, and after they had traveled a time, Casseomae felt her head clearing.

  “That was pretty clever,” she admitted to Dumpster.

  He leaped onto her forepaw and climbed up to settle at the back of her head. “Of course it was,” he said. “I’m a rat, after all.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Casseomae worried as they journeyed along a rolling stretch of the Forest the next morning. Could the Ogeema himself really be searching for the cub?

  Pang gauged their direction with the rising sun. When he stopped abruptly, Casseomae felt her legs tighten, ready for battle. The cub, paying more attention now to the reactions of the other three, knelt and pointed his metal stick out protectively.

  “What is it?” Casseomae said. “I don’t smell wolves.”

  “Not wolves,” Pang said, looking around. A long line of ruined buildings stretched in either direction along a narrow trail. Several of the buildings had tall colorful treelike billboards and signs of plastic and metal rising from the ground. “I recognize this place.”

  “Scratchin’ good for you,” Dumpster said. “Now can we keep moving?”

  Pang trotted over to Casseomae. “We’re getting near the Auspectres.”

  Casseomae looked around at the ruins. “The witches live here?”

  “No,” Pang said. “But we need something first.”

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “We need to bring them a carcass,” Pang said.

  “Oh, I see how this works,” Dumpster said, leaping down from Casseomae. “Very clever. They convince voras to bring them their catch rather than having to search the Forest for it. Got to admire their knack for taking advantage of the gullible.”

  “It’s not for food,” Pang said. “They divine the future from the carcass.”

  “You’re saying they don’t eat it?” Dumpster asked.

  “Of course they do, but if we don’t bring them a carcass, they’ll have nothing to use to answer our question.”

  “Well, it won’t be a problem,” Casseomae said. “There are kills all over the Forest. I smell some rotting elk nearby at this very moment.”

  “It’s not that simple,” Pang said. “We can’t just bring them the first pile of maggoty hide and bones we find. It’s got to be something good. Something fresh. Otherwise, they might require an offering as well.”

  Dumpster rose on his hind legs. “What do you mean, ‘an offering’?”

  “They require payment. If the carcass is good enough, they might need nothing extra. But if it’s not, you might have to give something else. It really depends on the question and how difficult it is to divine.”

  “Was yours difficult?” Casseomae asked.

  “Yes.”

  “And what did you bring them?”

  “A pair of rabbits. It was a fresh kill. I thought they would like that. But there are so many of them.…” He shivered. “A pair of rabbits was hardly enough to go around. To answer my question, they told me I had to give them something else.”

  “Another catch?” Casseomae asked.

  “No.”

  “What, then?”

  Pang dropped his snout, his lone ear twitching. “My ear. They took my ear as a sacrifice for the knowledge that would eventually save my life.”

  Casseomae looked at the gaping ear hole on the side of Pang’s head and the scars around it.

  “How big a viand can you carry?” Pang asked. “Could you carry a doe?”

  “Yes, something bigger even, I’d suppose.”

  “Good,” Pang said. “We’re going to try a tactic my pack used. Come on.”

  The trail met up with a line of buildings. The ruined dens went on and on, occasionally spreading out to the sides where other tra
ils intersected the main one. Casseomae hadn’t seen so many buildings before, and she asked Dumpster, “Is this a city?”

  “No,” the rat laughed. “Not like the city where I’m from. The dens go up and up. But this was some sort of colony.”

  “All the rock the Companions placed for trails keeps the trees from growing thick here,” Pang said. “Good foraging for the viands. Lots of drinking holes too. When the sun sets, the tribes of deer will come in from the Forest. We just need to find … yes, I think I see something.”

  The dog sprinted ahead with the child chasing after him. The two reached a jumble of cars that made a wall across the road. They climbed over and disappeared on the other side. When Casseomae and Dumpster clambered over a car’s hood, Pang was investigating a building that had crumbled into a cove of rock and metal.

  “Look over there,” Dumpster said. “Those are dumpsters!”

  Casseomae eyed the big metal containers as Pang trotted back.

  “This will do,” he said. “So you know how when you’re running down a herd of deer, you hope to catch the slowest. A fawn or an old buck or an injured doe.” Pang looked around. “But sometimes, you can trap them. If they panic and run into this den …”

  “Not bad,” Dumpster said.

  “You’ll stay here,” Pang said to Casseomae. “Hide on the other side of those relics where they won’t smell you. I’ll go down a ways and find a water hole. I’ll wait there. When the deer arrive, I’ll drive them this way. You’ll steer them into that den. Then we can get a big one.”

  “You don’t have a pack to help you,” Casseomae said. “You expect to be able to scare them all?”

  “I can manage,” Pang said. “I could take the pup with me. He could help.”

  “No,” Casseomae said. “I’m not letting him out of my sight.”

  Dumpster let out a squeak of amusement. “Nice try, cur. Want to live out your hunting fantasies with a real Companion?”

  Pang gave an affronted lift of his snout. “Just be ready,” he said before trotting away.

  The child began to follow him, but Casseomae gave a gruff bark. He looked back at her. She lumbered toward him, nipping gently at his elbow. “Come back here with me.”

  The child watched Pang disappear. His shoulders slumped and he chirped something softly under his breath.

  As the sun set and they waited, Dumpster slunk around the undersides of the cars, scaring up grasshoppers from the weeds and catching them in his sharp teeth. The child watched with delight. When a grasshopper landed near his leg, the child crouched over it with cupped hands. With a quick grab, he caught it. He let out a laugh and ran over toward Dumpster.

  The rat scampered behind Casseomae. “I’ll catch them myself,” he sniffed.

  Casseomae lay on her stomach, chewing on soft shoots. The child looked at her, the grasshopper pinched between his fingers. Slowly he approached, holding out the insect.

  She knew what he wanted to do and gave a gentle huff. When he extended his hand toward her snout, she reached out with her long lips and took it from his fingers.

  The cub stood back up, a wide grin on his face.

  “You’re a weird one, Cass,” Dumpster said.

  The cub ran off to catch another grasshopper, but when he brought it to her, she turned her head away. It had been funny the first time. A curiosity. To let her cub feed her. But it wasn’t right. He had to catch food for himself.

  He pushed the grasshopper to her lips, his eyes wide with eagerness. But she grunted, “No,” and lowered her head to bite another cluster of grass.

  The child looked at the grasshopper in his fingers. He watched it for a moment and then stuck it in his mouth, crunching on the body with a wrinkled nose. When he at last swallowed it, he looked around and set off to catch another.

  Dumpster flicked his tail. “Weird,” he said. “Just scratchin’ weird.”

  The sun sank over the buildings, turning the sky crimson-pink. Casseomae looked over the car’s hood but didn’t spy Pang. Rabbits were hopping slowly among the weeds, their eyes and ears cautious for approaching voras, but they clearly couldn’t smell her. That was good.

  She paced around behind the wall of cars while the child sat nearby, poking a tire with the wide end of his metal stick. As usual, Dumpster had crawled under something to nap.

  A bark erupted. Casseomae peered over the hood and spied Pang’s copper-red coat flashing down the trail.

  Ahead of him were several deer—a buck with wide antlers, a few does, and a fawn—leaping this way and that, wide-eyed with fear and searching for some way to escape through the maze of cars. The does stayed close to the fawn, protectively. The buck’s gaze fell on the wall of cars blocking his path. He snorted something back at the does in his tribe’s tongue.

  He was about to leap over the wall when Casseomae rose up on a car. The buck froze, throwing his head side to side. There was nowhere left to go but into the neighboring building. Casseomae hoped Pang had made sure there weren’t any escape holes back in the dark corners.

  With Pang snapping at their tails, the does and the fawn dashed past the buck into the building. The buck snorted before following.

  “We’ve got them!” Pang barked.

  Casseomae dug her claws into the car’s rusty metal and bounded to the other side. The shadows of the building had deepened, and it took her a moment to find the deer frozen in a cluster at the far end, heads snapped up, snorting and stamping with fear.

  Pang and Casseomae spread out, blocking the way back out. The buck stepped forward to defend the herd. It lowered its antlers at Pang.

  “He might try to go for you,” Casseomae warned.

  The dog curled his lips. He snapped savagely. The buck stepped back, tipping and raising his antlers in warning.

  Casseomae slowly approached. Which one should she take? Not the fawn. She wasn’t above eating a fawn. She had done it plenty. It was the way of the Forest. But a fawn might not be good enough for the Auspectres. She needed a doe.

  Pang edged around to cut the buck off from the others. He snapped at his legs, and the buck drove him back with a stab of his antlers, nearly spearing Pang’s side.

  A cry came behind them. Casseomae turned to see the cub. He had climbed over the cars, his teeth bared like the dog’s. He jabbed the stick and cried out again in a little roar.

  A blur of brown swished around Casseomae, the does and the fawn using the moment to get past her. Casseomae raced after them, but knew she was too late. They rounded the corner of the building, white tails flashing, and escaped back down the trail from where they had come.

  Pang was ferociously barking, and as Casseomae spun around once more, she saw the buck getting away. He couldn’t follow the other deer—Casseomae had his path blocked. There was only one way to go. Over the wall of cars.

  And standing between the buck and his escape was her cub.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  The child panicked as the buck raced toward him. He stumbled backward, banging into the car and shrinking down.

  The buck’s hooves clattered on the concrete, and he dipped his antlers. The cub pointed the stick at the buck and turned his head away. Casseomae roared as the deer leaped, taking flight.

  A thunderclap of noise erupted, and a lightning streak of fire flashed from the front of the stick. The buck fell, toppling to the top of the car just above the child’s head. The boom echoed away through the trees.

  The cub stared down wide-eyed at the smoking stick in his hand. He staggered to his feet and looked at the deer lying on the car. The buck was dead. Blood ran down the rusted metal from beneath his body. The child threw down the stick, whimpering.

  “What just happened?” Casseomae growled.

  Pang circled around the dropped stick, sniffing at it anxiously. “It … it came from that! How did he do that?”

  Dumpster scuttled from under the car and approached the stick. He looked from it to the deer and then at the child. “Did the cub scratchin�
�� kill it?”

  “Yes, but how—?” Casseomae began.

  “It’s a gun,” the rat squeaked. “It has to be. I’ve heard of these Old Devil weapons.”

  “Didn’t you recognize it when he was carrying it?” she asked.

  “He’s picked up so many things,” the rat said. “And these guns, I knew of them and I’ve seen a few, but they were huge and mounted to vehicles. I’ve never seen one this small.”

  The child stared in shock at the deer. Water trickled from his eyes and he began shaking uncontrollably.

  “It’s all right, pup,” Pang said, licking his trembling fingers. He turned excitedly to Casseomae. “He’s a real vora! The pup … he’s a hunter now. Can you believe it? He can—” But then he stopped as a fierce note of disapproval rose from Casseomae’s throat.

  She nudged the child with her wet nose. “It’s safe, cub.” The child threw his arms around her neck and buried his face. She licked his ears, trying to calm him.

  “We should go,” Dumpster said. “The smell of the carcass will draw attention. Not to mention that ear-shattering noise.”

  Casseomae eased away from the cub and loped over to take the buck’s throat in a firm grip. She pulled him from the car. The child wiped the wetness from his face, still trembling. He followed Casseomae as she dragged the heavy animal.

  Pang looked back at the gun and barked, “He should take it. We might need a weapon like that.”

  Dumpster gave Casseomae a disconcerted look. The child hurried away from Pang and the weapon lying in the road. “Come on, cub,” she grunted through her teeth, which were locked on the deer.

  Pang lingered a moment by the gun and gave a whine before trotting ahead of the others to lead the way.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO