by Janean Worth
Chapter Nine
After she and the fox had both drunk their fill, Kara filled her water skin and then sat back on the bank of the river to take in her surroundings. The fox kit gamboled around at her side, swatting playfully at several long stalks of grass that were tufted at the top with seed heads that resembled the fuzzy back of a caterpillar.
The river itself was beautiful, and Kara quickly realized that to her, the river meant life. In the wilderness, the river would literally be the difference between life and death for both her and the fox. She wasn’t certain how far she’d travelled from GateWide, but she’d heard no further evidence of being followed by the Enforcers, nor seen any signs of them in the forest at all. Realizing this, she thought that perhaps she should find some sort of shelter near the river to rest in for a while, until she decided what she’d do with herself for the rest of her life.
She had been told many, many times that there were no other survivors outside of GateWide, and knowing this sent a deep pang of loneliness through her. How could she possibly live her entire life alone, now that she’d fled GateWide and had no hope of being welcomed back inside?
The fox gave a tiny yip and swatted the grass shoot with renewed vigor, and Kara smiled, thinking that at least she would have some companionship, even though it was only that of an animal.
Kara pulled her bag across her lap and opened it, meaning to take stock of what food she had left inside, but no sooner had she opened the bag to peer inside than a large furred beast appeared on the other side of the river, branches snapping and cracking under its massive paws.
The river was fairly wide, but as the beast’s eyes settled on her and the then flicked to gaze at the fox kit, hunger in its gaze. Kara didn’t feel nearly safe enough with the distance between them. As she watched the beast as it watched them, she realized that she had no idea if the beast could swim.
Slowly, she reached over toward the fox kit, grateful that the animal did not bolt when it felt her fingers upon its back. She drew the kit closer, then gently put the kit inside her bag, nestling the animal carefully on top of her mother’s soft shawl. The kit made no objection.
The beast was still watching her from across the river as she tucked the fox inside and slowly stood, letting the bag drape across her front so that she could be sure that the fox did not jump out.
The beast roared at her as she stood up, its mouth opening wide to show enormous, yellowed teeth.
The sound of the beast’s roar sent a sizzle of fear shooting up her spine, and made the fox kit mewl in terror from inside her bag.
Kara began to back away from the river’s edge, watching the beast intently. She remembered suddenly that the beast was called a leob. She’d seen a sketch of the creature in one of her tutor’s old books and now clearly recalled the fierce predatory eyes and the large regal snout of the animal in the sketch. It likeness matched that of the beast across the river. Like all of the beasts of the forest that had suffered mutation caused by the poison clouds after the Fall, this one was said to be extinct by those who lived in GateWide. Kara was realizing that many of the things believed by the people GateWide were simply not true.
The leob still had not moved closer, and Kara hoped that it was because the animal was afraid of the deep water that flowed quickly down the center of the river. The tutor’s book had stated that the leob had once been what their ancestors had called a lion. The lions had been kept in captivity, in cages, in places called zoos. After the foolish people of the past had released the poison clouds, the few lions that had managed to survive and escape their confinements gave birth to sickly, mutated offspring. Those offspring had given birth to more mutated offspring, and after several generations, the beasts’ form had become fairly stable, and had been named the leob. The leobs were massive beasts, with patchy, shaggy manes of clumped black fur that formed a ruff around a thick neck, much like the lion’s of the past. Their eyes were a strange, colorless white, with a long black elliptical pupil. Huge and predatory, the beasts were said to have been very few in number, and the tutor’s book had stated that they’d become extinct decades ago.
The leob across the river was bigger than the bear that Kara had seen the night before, its paws were easily each the size of her head. Kara gazed at it as conflicting thoughts flitted through her mind. It was obvious that the leob was not an extinct animal. What other lies had she been taught in GateWide?
Staring into the beast’s strange white eyes, she wondered how far the leob could leap and if the beast could swim. Could it make it across the river? Could it climb a tree?
Kara held its gaze as she backed into the thick undergrowth carefully, her heart pounding with terror in her chest. She didn’t want to be eaten, ripped limb from limb as she screamed, much like the mother fox had been by the Fidgets.
When the tangle of plants obscured the beast’s view of her, Kara turned and ran. Even when she was sure that the beast had not pursued her, for she heard no crashing in the brush behind her and she knew that such a large animal could not travel quietly, she ran on, covering ground quickly in her all-out sprint. Fear drove her on relentlessly, until her breath sawed in and out of her lungs painfully and the muscles in her thighs began to burn with effort. Only then did she stop running, leaning against a massive rock to catch her breath.
As her breath heaved in and out, she looked again at her surroundings and couldn’t hold back a sob. Was there truly no safe place in this wilderness? So far, the trees had offered the safest resting place during the night but she knew that she could not make any sort of a permanent shelter for herself and the tiny fox in a tree. She didn’t have the skill to build any short of shelter at all, let alone one so high up off of the ground.
Despair swamped her and she felt another sob build up in her throat. How would she ever survive this place?