I couldn’t indulge such thoughts. I was the leader, I had to keep them going. There would be time later for guilt and grief.
We had only four packs between us and two firearms; Piet’er’s and Dyit’er’s packs had been on the third raft, along with the last of our provisions. The herd of harrunt’hs was still two day’s trek away. In the meantime, our only food was the dead liapt’h that Heckt’er had pulled onto our raft. I took out my knife and began to butcher it. Cann’an and Dam’an came to help me while Piet’er and Dyit’er silently built a fire of driftwood, encircled by rocks they had cautiously retrieved from the river shore. At night we burned the fire higher. I doubt anyone slept.
In the morning we found the harrunt’hs’ trail and followed it through the grasses. They had cut a wide swath in their grazing, and we walked down it, keeping close together. In the bright sun, on the track of our game, I began to relax. We would soon reach our quarry. The wind blew our scent north to the mountains while the harrunt’hs drifted west and we followed them undetected.
Since we were now only a day behind the harrunt’hs, we slept without a fire. The night was dark and cool. The movement of the grasses increased with the rising night wind, as though with the passage of ghosts. Nobody spoke, but we were all thinking of our dead comrades.
I felt that I’d missed something: something I should have noticed, and it disturbed me. But tomorrow we would reach our game. We’d have fresh meat and our youngsters would be hunters. Then we could go home.
The wind howled, the grasses swayed, and the dark night became darker. I dreamed we were being stalked by the harrunt’hs! In my dream I gaped in confusion as a one-eyed harrunt’h closed its herbivore mouth over Heckt’er’s arm, tearing into his flesh. I reached toward him but he faded, disappeared into the darkness. I could still hear his screams and I ran forward, gripped by the terror of nothing-as-it-should-be. He screamed again and the wall of nightmare that held me broke into reality. I awakened to hear Dam’an shrieking his parent’s name.
The grasses waved furiously as Cann’an was pulled by some unseen force racing away from us. For a moment I hesitated, nightmare and night attack intertwined. Then I charged after him with Piet’er close behind. We couldn’t shoot for fear of hitting Cann’an, and every step we took we fell behind while he and his assailant sped further and further ahead until, exhausted, defeated, we fell panting in the wake of his bloodied passage.
We returned to the youths. As we huddled together among the bruised grasses, I shivered in the cold night wind. It was then that I realized what I had over-looked.
The wind had been cool as it shook the forest treetops, cool as it chopped the broad Symamt’h into glittering wavelets. The wind was cool now as it raced in stealth between the concealing grasses. There was no hint of the heat of stillseason in the cool wind that shivered up our spines. I had convinced myself that an early stillseason was sending into premature hibernation birds and sadu’hs, fish and harrunt’hs. But Timb’il must have been right; something else hunted our forests.
“What was it?” Heckt’er asked me.
“We’ll kill an extra harrunt’h,” I said.
“It will be drawn to the scent of fresh blood.” Piet’er understood at once.
Then Dam’an spoke: “and we will be waiting.”
I saw that he knew his parent was dead, that all we could do was lay a trap for the thing that had taken him and kill it.
“You bring honor to your parent,” I told him.
*
We dropped our packs when we were close enough to hear the snorts and whistles of the herd, the tramping of their hooves and the swish of grasses when they lay and rose again. Piet’er wanted to rest until morning but I didn’t trust the treacherous night to wait on us.
The herd wasn’t large, a hundred beasts at most. We separated into two groups, Dyit’er and Dam’an with Piet’er, Heckt’er with me. Piet’er suggested we bring our firearms but I disagreed. Ghen do not hunt harrunt’hs with firearms. Besides, how could we shoot while our younglings were leaping onto the backs of harrunt’hs to kill them with knife and claws?
Heckt’er and I moved west, counting our steps as we circled the herd. Piet’er took Dyit’er and Dam’an to the east around the resting beasts. We hadn’t finished walking when the lead buck’s startled whistle rent the night and, lurching to their feet, the harrunt’hs stampeded.
I thought it must have been Dyit’er or Dam’an who alarmed them prematurely and I snorted under my breath. I had no time to think or I would have known my error, for the herd was thundering toward the east. I only had time to point to a young buck racing by us, to aim my knife at its throat as Heckt’er leaped onto it, sinking his claws into its neck. I raced after them, but I was unnecessary. By the time I arrived, Heckt’er was standing beside his first large kill. My youngling was a hunter.
I realized then that the herd had stampeded toward Piet’er and the youths, not away from them. They must have been caught in its path. But we could only step back and wait as the beasts surged past us. Then I began to wonder what had stampeded them.
I grabbed up my knife and yelled to Heckt’er to arm himself and so we were ready when the courrant'h swept down on us. It was in feeding frenzy, already bloodied with its slaughter yet seeking more. Predator, not hunter, killing beyond its need. I readied myself in its path, arms raised. Its eyes burned into mine as it crouched on its powerful legs and screamed defiance, exposing rows of reddened fangs.
It must have sensed my strength, for it swerved toward Heckt’er. He stood his ground while the beast leaped yowling toward him. It massed twice as much as he and only its face was vulnerable. The deep double thickness of matted hair that covered the rest of its body protected it not only from the mountain cold but also from the reach of knife and claw. Heckt’er’s only chance was to sink his weapon into its open maw or one of its eyes, if he could do so before it tore him apart.
I’ve heard of grown Ghen, experienced hunters, turning and running before the charge of a courrant'h, but Heckt’er stood firm. He thrust his knife into the creature’s right eye, his aim straight and deep, while the claws of his left hand raked across its sensitive nose. With a scream it twisted its face aside and its terrible fangs clamped onto his offending arm as it bore him down. I reached them then and slashed my knife across the monster’s face, cursing myself for refusing to bring my firearm. It released Heckt’er’s arm with a roar and turned to me.
I was full of a furious terror for my child and without hesitation I plunged my knife, fist and all, into the courrant'h’s gaping jaws, and twisted. Retching and coughing, it reeled backward, dragging me over the bloodied ground, but I found my footing and thrust deeper until it groaned and fell, pulling me to my knees beside it.
*
We found Dam’an first, trampled into the ground, almost unrecognizable, then Dyit’er, lying between the stiff legs of a yearling calf. He trembled and moaned but would not open his eyes. I carried him away where he wouldn’t see the body of his parent. Piet’er must have thrown Dyit’er behind the dead calf and stood before them as long as he was able, frantically waving the charging harrunt’hs away from the path of his youngling.
Piet’er had been my friend, had trusted me. Cann’an, for all his belligerence, had followed me, and so had Timb’il. And their younglings. I should have led them home eating berries, as Timb’il wanted.
*
Heckt’er’s left arm was mangled but he was otherwise unhurt. I cleaned it and wrapped it tightly to stop the bleeding, then he helped me build a funeral pyre for Dam’an and Piet’er. I felt Dyit’er’s eyes on me, almost as punishing as Heckt’er’s refusal to look at me.
I dared not wonder what they might be thinking. I dared not think at all. Get them home, I told myself, and nothing else. Get them home, get them home... over and over, the words building a wall within my mind between the enormity of what I had done and the inadequacy of what I could now do.
For myself as we
ll as them, I behaved with as much normalcy as I could manage. It is an insult to Wind to scorn the hunt we are given; therefore, I skinned the courrant'h while Heckt’er attended to the harrunt’h he had brought down. Together, we skinned two others the courant’h had killed. So much meat. I’d been too proud to lead my hunt home without meat. Now I had plenty of meat, and only two younglings to bring home.
We used the skins as sleds and packed the carcasses onto them, along with a fourth, half-eaten harrunt’h, which we dragged behind us. They slid over the taunting grasses with little resistance.
When we reached the Symamt’h we loaded everything onto one raft. I tied the half-eaten carcass around the edges of the other raft so that half the meat dangled into the water, and sent the baited raft down river. Using the rope I pulled us across as quickly as I could while the liapt’hs swarmed to our decoy.
*
As soon as we were in the woods I let Heckt’er and Dyit’er rest. We had a long trek ahead. I knew my forest and had no need to climb for direction, but now even the mangarr’hs had gone. A pall lay over the forest. We walked through the death-like stillness as though we were marked.
Every morning some of the meat was missing, no matter how we watched in the night. We found no footprints but our own, even when I brushed aside the leaves and twigs on the forest floor to leave damp soil exposed around us.
“It’s only mangarr’hs sneaking down the trees to snatch pieces of meat and scurry up again,” I reassured Heckt’er and Dyit’er. But it bothered me more than I let on. I showed them both how to use Cann’an’s firearm.
Dyit’er believed the thing that hungered between the hushed trees was only a sly mongarr’h. Dyit’er trusted my judgment, as had every parent and youth who died on this hunt, may I some day be forgiven. During the night, on his watch, Dyit’er left the circle of our campfire to relieve himself behind a tree.
Even a great hunter can be broken by being awakened too often with death at his campfire. Even great pride can be shaken by too many losses, too many miscalculations. I grabbed my firearm and ran toward the sudden silence where Dyit’er’s scream had broken off, pausing only to order Heckt’er to stay by the fire.
I found no trace of Dyit’er, not then, not in the morning. I saw signs of a struggle: snapped branches, blood spattered on leaves and soil. But I found only Dyit’er’s footprints stamped into the bloody ground, round and round, as though he had attacked himself, then charged away into the woods. I followed the bloody prints till they were hidden by the fallen leaves, calling his name among the silent trees.
I was responsible for Dyit’er’s disappearance. He was a youth in my care and I had failed him. I struggled again to push my thoughts aside, and yet they ate at me. Neither my pride nor my strength nor my skill nor my weapons had kept my companions alive. We were prey in our own forest. We were meat pretending to be carrying meat back to our people.
Heckt’er and I still had ten days’ journey home through a forest I no longer knew. For the first time, I was afraid. I wanted to send my child to burrow, like the sadu’hs. I wanted to hide him, quiet and still in the treetops, like the birds. We were too far from our home, too far from safety.
We abandoned most of the meat, carrying only what we needed, and I pushed us to greater speed. Heckt’er was hurting badly, almost despairing. Dyit’er had been a close friend, had trained with him and accepted him despite the age difference, when most of the others hadn’t. I told him that I would collect a party of armed hunters as soon as I got him home, and we would find Dyit’er; but he knew Dyit’er was already dead. I was too sick at heart to convince him otherwise. Sick with my failure, sick with fear for him.
We traveled for three days undisturbed. I began to hope that whatever prowled the spectral woods had been satisfied with poor Dyit’er and the harrunt’h meat we left behind.
Seven days from home. I barely slept. I was hallucinating with exhaustion when I finally lay on my mat. Heckt’er wakened me almost at once it seemed, but the night was half over and I felt a little better. I suspected he would have given me longer except that his own eyes were closing beyond his power to prevent. I rose and sat by the fire, making him sleep so close I could touch him.
I have never dozed on a watch before. I have never been so depleted, and I was lulled by four days without incident. Once, twice, my eyelids drooped and twice I startled into panicked wakefulness to find the night quiet around me. Against my will I dozed.
Sudden movement and Heckt’er’s surprised cry awoke me in time to see the skins with the last of our harrunt’h meat disappearing behind a bushy cappa. Heckt’er leaped up to give chase and I lunged for him, grabbed his legs and pulled him down. I dragged him back to the fire and held him, though he did not struggle, held him tight against me with one arm while the other held my firearm, aimed into the darkness.
We were not disturbed again that night. At the first light of dawn we stamped out our fire and packed our mats, canteens and firearms. I spent a few minutes examining the trail of the skin, looking for clues to the fiend that shadowed us, but the skin had swept the ground clear except, here and there, for what appeared to be our own footprints.
We had not come from this direction. We hadn’t stood in this spot, yet there were the partial imprints of our feet! I wondered in horror if something preternatural stalked us, leaving our own footprints behind. I was being mocked, my hunting skill exposed in all its sham!
It is my Pride, I thought, grown beyond control, taking on a malignant life of its own. My fears blew wild, toward madness. It only attacks when I sleep! It’s after Heckt’er, because he’s become the focus of my Pride. I was cold and trembling and I stopped looking for clues, more afraid of what I might learn than of being pursued. I returned to Heckt’er and we left.
Six days from home; five if Heckt’er could keep the pace I set. Even I could not make it in less. Five days with no provisions, only the water in our water skins and what we could find on the trail. Five days and four nights from safety.
It came again the next night. I sensed its baleful presence at the edge of our campfire, waiting for sleep to disarm me.
“There’s something there,” I said, willing now to strip my youngling of his confidence in me, if fear might save him.
“I’ve felt it,” he said. “I’ve tried to become it, but it’s not... I can’t think like it.”
A shiver of madness blew through me as his words confirmed my fears, but I also felt a thrill of pride. Under the shadow of death, Heckt’er still thought like a hunter. In the presence of demons, my youngling could not be made prey. And then I was more afraid than ever, because he fed my Pride even as I fought to subdue it.
“You can’t think like the thing that pursues us,” I said, bitterly. Heckt’er was not proud. Heckt’er had let the other youths go before him, had let them find the signs of harrunt’h, that they might learn what he already knew. Heckt’er used his skill to help his people.
I dared not sleep that night. The thing that prowled at the edge of our fire’s light did not sleep either, but my watch held it at bay. In the daytime we traveled, pushing ourselves almost beyond endurance. Four days from home. Three nights away from safety.
We stumbled on until the gathering dark obscured our way and then I panicked, afraid my unwillingness to stop had made us wait too long to find enough firewood for a full night’s fire. I slashed at living limbs with my knife, unwilling to let Heckt’er move out of my sight to gather dead branches on the ground. I needed a bright fire, but even a smoky one would do. Another hunting party might see it. We were almost near enough to meet with one and I was ready to accept any help that came to us.
It wasn’t Ghen we saw that night, drawn to our fire. At first I thought the two eyes were embers, glowing through the smoke. Then they moved closer and I saw its body, pale in the darkness. The exact shape was obscured by wisps of smoke but it massed no more than I. That threw me off; that and my sleep-deprived deliriums, for I was half expecti
ng to see myself, or some nightmare figure, the specter of my Pride. I suppose that, too, was pride, to think that only I could defeat myself.
Beside me, Heckt’er whispered softly, “Broghen.”
Too small, I thought, too pale. But I recognized the crazed look in its eyes, the hideous deformity, the mix of fur and scales, the gaping jaw and vicious rows of teeth. It should have been taller but it was still fearsome, broader and more powerful than I, even at the same height. I felt, for an instant, limp with relief that I was not insane, then Heckt’er said, more firmly, “Broghen.”
His voice broke the fire’s spell and the monster lunged for him. I threw myself between them and felt its claws rake down my side sending lines of fire across my ribs and tearing my left leg open to the bone.
I fired sideways and knew the shot was poor but the Broghen howled and reared back. Heckt’er fired over me but he was inexperienced and only grazed the brute. It turned and fled into the woods. I reloaded and fired into the path of its retreat but it was too far away. I could hear in the distance the sound of slapping branches as it escaped. Worse, I had used the last of my ammunition. All we had left was a single shot in Cann’an’s firearm, and our knives.
Heckt’er bound my leg and cut me a strong stick to lean upon and we traveled hard. At least I knew now why we had found only Ghen-like footprints. If it had been full-sized I might have guessed, for even half-obliterated as the prints had been, I would have seen they were too large to be ours.
Every step drove pain through the length of my leg, and every breath spread fire across my ribs. By afternoon I was feverish and the dressing on my leg was soaked with new blood, yet we hurried on. We had no respite but home.
At dusk we stopped. Heckt’er built a fire and watched while I slept until dark. When he wakened me, I sat against the wide trunk of a large ugappa with the firearm in one hand and my knife in the other. He fed the fire higher and placed several large pieces of wood where I could reach them easily, then I ordered him up into the ugappa to sleep wedged in its branches. Broghen cannot climb, but neither could I with my wounded leg. At first Heckt’er refused to leave me, but I insisted. He would be safe there even if I failed him.
Walls of Wind I Page 8