“Are you all right? All of a sudden you don’t look so good.”
He couldn’t take his eyes off her lips.
“Kiran, are you all right?”
“Ah, yeah, I’m fine,” he stammered and turned away.
“Where did those beasts come from? You said you couldn’t see anything.”
“I don’t know. It was as though they came right up out of the ground.”
“Right out of the ground? That’s ridiculous, Kiran.” She giggled and he started to laugh. They laughed together, a nervous giggle that masked their fears. Their eyes met for a moment, and held. A rush of heat surged through him as she blinked once, then again, her green eyes sparkling in the sun. He leaned forward, his breath shallow and quick. She held his gaze a moment longer, then turned away. Disheartened, he sat back.
“Well, it’s no matter. We must go on,” she said, rising to her feet and brushing herself off. “We need to find water.”
She was right. He rose to his feet next to her.
They headed westward, the sun baking the land dry, the wind too hot to be a relief. They crested a hill and stared down into a shallow valley with a rocky escarpment on the far side.
“I guess it isn’t as flat as we thought,” Kiran said, glancing back over his shoulder. “This land plays tricks on you.”
“Well, that explains the appearance of the beasts.”
Kiran scanned the valley in front of them. On the far side, he saw three of the beasts lying on the ground. He drew in a breath—there were men. He grabbed Bria by the arm and dropped to the ground, tugging her with him. Crawling on his belly, he peered through the tall grasses, trying to get a clear view. “What is it?” she whispered, crawling along next to him.
“Savages.” Not three hundred paces off, four men hovered around three enormous shaggy beasts that lay dead on the ground, their lifeless tongues hanging from their mouths, their exposed entrails a feast for the flies that buzzed about.
The men wore only buckskin breechcloths at the waist, their chests naked. Even their feet were bare. These men were the worst sort—uncivilized—with crude ways and primitive minds. Kiran could not imagine how they had taken down such large animals. His grip tightened around his makeshift weapon.
As two of the hunters skinned one of beasts, cutting along the spine, pulling the hide back to reveal the bloody carcass beneath, another sliced open its belly and disemboweled it, pulling the bloody entrails out onto the grass. The savage sifted through the pile of guts and came up with the red, stringy heart, his hands and arms covered with blood. He raised it to his mouth and took a bite. Kiran’s stomach squeezed in his throat and he had to look away. When he turned back, the savages were passing the heart around, tearing it to bits, their hands and mouths dripping with blood.
They had to get out of here.
Bria inhaled sharply, a high-pitched gasp.
Then, he felt the sharp point of a spear pressed to the back of his neck.
Chapter 9
His heartbeat pounding in his ears, Kiran craned his neck around to see two, three, four savages towering over him with spears held ready to strike. He swallowed hard. Their arms were big enough to rip a beast to shreds. Their broad chests were lined with muscles.
The men prodded with their spears, forcing him and Bria to stand. His knees threatened to buckle and his hands shook. He dropped his own makeshift spear and raised his hands in the air. “We don’t mean any harm.”
“We’re just looking for our friends,” Bria said, her voice barely a whisper.
One of the savages raised an eyebrow.
“Yes,” said Kiran. “We’re just trying to find them.”
The man nodded as if he understood. To the other hunters he grunted and spat in some primitive communication. They shook their heads.
Then came a shriek carried on the wind. It sounded like Kail.
Kiran scanned the landscape. In the distance, a flock of carrion birds circled. Flying scavengers meant only one thing; someone or something was injured, or worse.
“Friends trouble,” the man said.
Kiran nodded and took a step backward, waiting. He took Bria by the hand and took another step backward. The men made no move. “Let’s go,” he said. Bria nodded and they turned and ran. They ran all the way to the next ridge and ran until Kiran had to stop to catch his breath. He glanced back. The savages were gone.
The sun was setting as they reached a patch of woods that seemed to emerge from nowhere. “This way,” Kiran whispered.
They crept forward, into the forest, carefully placing each footstep, the crackle of dry grass under their feet. The orange glow of twilight streaked through the treetops, but the forest floor was dark. Kiran reached for a tree trunk, running his hand along its rough bark as they moved past.
There was movement in the shadows. Hair stood up on the back of his neck. He grabbed Bria by the arm, yanking her to a halt. Someone or something was watching—and it was close. He heard something. The snap of a twig? Something was moving, breathing.
They took another step forward. Then he heard a low, thick growl. He stopped at once and spun around, trying to pinpoint the source. The woods had grown darker. He couldn’t see beyond a few feet.
The growl came again, closer this time. From his right. No from the left. A shiver ran down his spine.
He turned around. He was face to face with an enormous wild dog baring its sharp, white fangs, its yellow eyes directed at his. He stared into those eyes, too frightened to blink. They were not the empty eyes of a monster, full of bloodlust; these eyes were deep and intelligent, calculating. His heart banged against the wall of his chest. He pushed Bria behind him, putting himself between her and the beast.
A second dog emerged from the dark, jaws snapping, then a third on its flank, moving into formation.
The leader paced forward, sniffing, as if assessing the strength of its foe, its eyes glinting in the twilight, never leaving Kiran’s. The other dogs circled, moving closer and closer. “We’re surrounded,” Bria said, her voice shaking.
Kiran took a stone from his pocket and hurled it at the leader. It jerked its head to the side and the stone grazed its hindquarter. Kiran threw another stone, hitting the beast on the ear. It reared back, snarling.
Something thrashed in the brush behind the dogs. The dogs spun around. Savages burst from the darkness, waving flaming torches at the beasts. The lead dog winced, but stood its ground, snarling. The savages kept coming, poking flaming sticks at the dogs, until all three, one by one, turned and faded back into the night.
“Get friend. We leave fast. More dog soon,” a savage shouted. But he wasn’t talking to Kiran.
Beside him, holding a torch, was Roh. “It’s all right. They’re friendly,” he said.
“Oh, thank the Father you’re here,” Bria cried, lunging toward him. She wrapped her arms around him.
“Are you all right? I thought I heard Kail.”
“We did too.” Bria eyed the man next to Roh.
“This is Haktu,” said Roh. “These are the hunters of the Lendhi clan.”
The man made no move of greeting, his face expressionless.
Kiran nodded like a mindless puppet, trying to comprehend where Roh had been and how he had befriended these savages.
A scream ripped through the forest.
Bria yelled into the darkness, “We're coming, Kail. We're coming!”
Haktu led them, his torch lighting their way, as they rushed into the shadows. The other Lendhi hunters moved with them, their flaming torches keeping the beasts away.
They found Kail clinging to Jandon, sobbing. Deke was swinging her pomander in the air in front of him, shouting. “Stay away! Stay away from me!”
Roh marched straight to him and yanked it from his hand.
Deke shrank back, staring wide-eyed, as though Roh were an apparition. Roh went to Kail and tied the protective amulet around her neck, then held her as she sobbed in his chest. Deke glanced around, seei
ng Kiran, then Bria, before recognition finally seemed to come to him.
Jandon stared at the ground, his eyes fixed in hypnotized horror, his chest heaving. Kiran took him by the shoulders and shook him out of his trance.
“Oh, thank the Father you are here! Bhau's gone. He's gone! Swallowed, vanished!”
“Calm down, take a breath. What are you talking about? Where is he?”
Jandon pointed to the ground some twenty paces away. “There! A Mawghul! It swallowed him and he was gone! We were just walking along that way, and he was leading, and then, and then he was gone.”
Kail wailed anew. She buried her face in Roh’s shoulder.
“He was screaming in agony.” Jandon stumbled backward on one foot. “We didn't know what to do. Oh, Great Father, help him! Then the wild dogs came out of nowhere. Oh, thank the Father you came.”
“What happened to you?”
Jandon looked down at his bloody ankle, his face a mask of confusion.
“A dog,” Kail cried. “One of the wild dogs!”
Haktu started toward the spot where Jandon had pointed. “No!” yelled Jandon. “It will get you. Don't go near it!”
Haktu kicked at the leaves and sticks that were scattered around the edge of the shadowy hole. He made a hand signal to his hunters, then motioned to Roh. “Friend gone. No help. We go now.”
So, that was it. A Mawghul had killed Bhau. For a moment, Kiran couldn’t move. Bhau was the strongest of them, their warrior. If this could happen to him, then… He took a step toward the hole. He had to see for himself. “Kiran,” Roh said, handing him a torch. “We need to get out of here.”
Kiran clutched the torch in his hand and nodded. He walked with the others as they staggered along, following the Lendhi hunters out of the woods. Deke trailed behind stone-faced, his head hanging low.
As they crested the ridge, utter exhaustion came over Kiran in a wave. His limbs ached with weariness and his body felt drained, but his mind wouldn’t rest. He sifted through the agonizing events of the day—the stampeding beasts, being captured by the savages, the terror of the Mawghul, and the wild dogs. Bhau’s death. None of it seemed real.
“How did it happen?” Kiran asked Jandon.
“One moment we were walking along, the next he was gone. Like lightning, out of nowhere, the monster had him in its maw. You should have heard him. He was screaming and moaning. I could hear his bones crunching. There was nothing we could do. Nothing!” His hands jerked in the air in meaningless gestures. “That Mawghul would have swallowed us too. I know it. If you were there, you would've seen it.”
“So you saw the demon then?”
“Saw it? He nearly got me too!” He shuddered.
“Did it leap out of the ground? Or did Bhau just step into its mouth? Were there no warning signs at all? Didn’t it make any noise?”
Jandon shook his head, his eyes wild. “We waited. We waited, but…nothing. His body… Then the dogs came.”
Kiran swallowed hard. To certain doom…
Roh slowed his pace to come alongside Kiran. “Haktu’s clan is headed toward a river,” he said.
“Hold on,” Kiran said, his mind reeling. “How did you get by us across the flatlands? We never saw you. What happened with the Javinians?”
“We don’t have to worry about them anymore,” he said.
“But what happened? How do you know for sure? Tobin said they’d track us ruthlessly.”
Roh exhaled, as if he thought it pointless to spend energy explaining. “The Javinians just needed incentive to look in another direction.”
“Well, how did you meet Haktu and these hunters?”
“I saw them chasing the beasts. I went to ask if they had seen you.”
“You just walked right up to them?”
“What else would I do? Hide in the grass? I’m sure they already knew I was there.”
Kiran bit his lip. “You said they are headed toward a river. Do you think we should go with them?”
Deke spoke up. “Are you serious? We’re not going anywhere with them.”
“Well, maybe we—”
“They’re savages.”
“Now just a moment,” said Roh. “Just because you—”
“Just because what? So, they happened to come along and scare off those dogs. It doesn’t mean we should go with them. We can take care of ourselves.”
Roh stepped in front of Deke. “From where I was standing, you didn’t look like you were taking care of anything.”
“Stop it you two!” Bria burst in. “Arguing won’t get us anywhere. Look what happened last time.”
Deke glared at her, his eyes full of contempt. “They may have infected us already with their wicked ways and we don’t even know it. You’re all so naïve.”
Jandon finally spoke, “Listen, I don’t know what to think, but they saved us from the Mawghul. Roh, you said they know the way to the river, right? I say we go with them.”
“I just want to go home,” Kail cried.
Roh gave her a reassuring pat on the back. “We have a very long way to go and many things to learn, like how to find food. We can learn these things from them.”
Kail lifted her head and sniffled, as if a spark of hope had returned.
“Whether they follow the Way is not our concern.”
“Not our concern!” shouted Deke.
Kiran grimaced. Roh was right. “Deke,” he said. “The rest of us want to go with them. That’s what we’ve decided. If you don’t want to, go ahead and leave on your own.”
“Oh, so you think you’re the leader now, is that it?”
Jandon piped up, “I’m with Kiran this time.”
Deke mumbled an unintelligible retort. Kiran couldn’t contain the grin that came to his lips.
“What should we do about Bhau?” Jandon asked.
Roh replied calmly, “There's nothing to do. He's gone.”
“Well, we can't act like nothing happened and continue on our way.”
“We have to,” said Roh.
“Well, we should at least say something,” said Bria.
“Yeah, something,” mumbled Jandon.
As they walked on, Kiran heard nothing but the rustling of the wind.
There was a pool of blood where the hunters had hacked the beasts into chunks, which they stacked on a travois, a sled-like device made from long poles. They lined up on either side, took hold of the poles, and heaved forward, dragging the meat across the dry grass.
“Come. You hungry,” said Haktu. Roh followed.
Kiran stared at the bloodied ground where the animals had lain. These men had ripped the beating heart from that beast and devoured the bloody organ raw in some sort of macabre feast. They could just as easily turn on them, with brutal force. He looked out over the endless sea of grass. They’d have nowhere to run.
With a knot of apprehension in his stomach, he followed the trail of blood.
Chapter 10
It was late when they approached the Lendhi camp. The scent of roasting meat and wood smoke wafted on the air and Kiran picked up the pace. He hadn’t eaten since the night before and even then it had been meager—stale bread, a bite of cheese washed down with what little water was left.
Eight dome-shaped tents formed a circle around a blazing fire where the clan bustled about, working to preserve the kill of the day. Kiran whispered to Roh, “Is this how they live? In homes made of sticks and animal hides?”
“They follow the beasts as they move across the flatlands.”
The Lendhi folk stole glances at the young Torans and exchanged subtle gestures as Haktu led them to an area out of the way and bade them to sit. He left without a word and disappeared inside one of the tents.
The clan numbered about sixty, that Kiran could see, young and old, each focused on a task. Mealtime was past, it seemed; children were cleaning bowls and utensils as scruffy dogs scurried about, sniffing for scraps.
Nearby, two men stood at a makeshift table, cutting chu
nks of meat into long strips while several women carefully draped the bloody pieces over the rungs of a drying rack that had been erected over a smoldering fire. An elderly man shuffled back and forth between the two fires, moving one hot coal at a time, slipping the embers under the drying rack.
Two women approached with a basket of meat, fresh berries, and a bladder of water. The Torans stumbled over each other to get a share, grabbing handfuls and gulping them down. The women bowed, exchanging looks of disgust between them. Roh thanked them kindly. Kiran stopped chewing and through a mouth full of food said, “Yes, thank you.”
A tiny, naked girl of about three years sauntered over to them and stood staring, her large, round eyes pools of innocent curiosity. She clung to a tiny doll fashioned from dried reeds whose braided hair matched her own.
Deke leaned toward Roh. “What were you thinking? We can’t stay with these heathen savages. They are uncivilized. Just look at them. They live like animals. Their children run about naked.” He tore into another bite of meat with his teeth. “We can’t trust them.”
“Which ones do you mean?” Roh asked, his face expressionless. “The men who saved your life tonight or the women who just fed you?”
Deke paused, his mouth full of food. His eyes narrowed and he furrowed his brow. He chewed, then chewed again, then without a word turned away and swallowed.
At last, Haktu emerged from the tent and walked directly toward them. “Tonight you request.”
Kiran looked to Roh, who shook his head. “We don't understand,” he said. “You will take us to the river?”
“If Spirits’ will.”
“Spirits?”
“By Manu-amatu,” said Haktu, matter-of-factly.
“Oh,” said Kiran, nodding as though he understood; but he understood nothing. What was Manu-amatu? A path?
Haktu patted Kiran on the shoulder, as if he were an innocent child. “Is Lendhi way.”
He left them where they sat and headed back to the tent.
Soon, the Lendhi clan put down their work and gathered round the fire, their eyes glittering with anticipation. A man with a long, barrel-shaped drum carved from a tree trunk, an animal skin stretched taut across the opening, sat down and with the palms of his hands started to pound out a beat—a slow, steady ba-boom, ba-boom that vibrated in Kiran’s chest. From one of the tents came a line of dancers, stomping to the rhythm, feathers and bones swaying on flowing garments of fur and brightly colored cloth, bracelets of blue and green stones jangling at their wrists and ankles. Each carried a wooden bowl of dried leaves that seemed the focus of their dance. Haktu was among them.
The Path to the Sun (The Fallen Shadows Trilogy) Page 8