Moving quickly, Gazda reached under the low platform and pulled out first one, then several animal skins, all piled and dry, and from these also he recognized the animals that had once worn them.
He pulled two other skins from under the low platform, but these were different, for each was suspended by thin pieces of hide, center to a wide loop of wood. A long slim branch had been fed through the strips of skin and this kept the hide taut and flat.
He slid his fingers against the fur and then turned the skin and rack over to sniff at the inside surface that had been scraped of flesh, and while it was dry, it was not brittle.
Indeed, Gazda’s fingers worked the corner of one skin and the hide was soft and pliable.
He set the skins and racks aside and looked up at the skulls, horns and furs on the wall and he sighed.
Fur-nose was a hunter.
Gazda was a hunter.
The night ape squatted there in the center of the lair with his arms wrapped around his chest. Hooting fearfully, Gazda thought back to first entering the nest, and remembered the shock, and fright at its strange contents.
But now it felt like all the fear was gone.
Almost everything around him was strange: sight, smell, touch and sound, angular shapes forming unnatural structures; but as his eyes had continued to acclimate to the growing dark he had looked over the scene with less and less fear.
There could be no comfort. But these things felt familiar to him.
Gazda looked back to where Fur-nose’s body sat propped up in the fading light that crossed the floor from the entrance, and he approached it again, growling instinctively until he knelt in front of it.
Fur-nose was mostly bones from his shoulders down, but where dried flesh appeared on his chest and abdomen; it was torn, and shredded as though some creature had attacked him.
The night ape noticed something then, and he crept even closer to look where a great length of rotten material was bunched and appeared to have been wrapped many times around Fur-nose’s waist. It was deeply stained and displaced by the manner of the creature’s death, but something within its folds caught Gazda’s eye.
A curious length of wood or stone stuck out of Fur-nose’s belt. Its rounded end had glimmered suddenly in the setting sun’s rays, and even now the light shone along its length and led to a stained leather box that lay within the folds of cloth on the dead creature’s thighs.
Grasping the strange thing, Gazda gave a simple tug and a shiny, slender fang as long as his forearm slid out of the narrow leather box.
Hooting happily, the night ape held it up, and in his excitement gripped the gleaming fang with his free hand—and screamed, snatching his fingers away with a bark.
Dark blood welled up from a gash on his palm before it pooled and ceased to flow. Gazda had cut himself with the shining fang.
The night ape put a fresh hank of hair between his teeth and chewed as he studied the thing that had held the fang, and he quickly reached out to draw this away from the body.
He held the shining fang carefully; keeping his hand clear of its sharp point and edge as he cautiously slid this into a narrow opening in the broad end of the leather box that had previously contained it.
Gazda smiled as he watched the gleaming edge slide in and out of this holder, and his mind worked feverishly as he studied the weapon.
Fang? Bite. Claw? Scratch. Tooth. Eat. Cutter? Cut... Cutter. Knife? The unfamiliar word came floating up out of the recesses of his mind. Knife, he marveled incredulously, smiling as he admired its gleaming length.
It was a long knife!
But the only spoken word Gazda had for the weapon came from his lips as the ape language for ‘fang,’ which he repeated now as he continued his study of the blade smiling.
He slipped it away and then pulled it out with a flash. Panting and nodding with pleasure, he was thrilled by how quickly he could release the knife from its hiding place, and for a time he imagined it like the claws of a leopard that could be extended and withdrawn at will.
Gazda chuckled grimly, gazing hungrily at the thing in his hand and imagined the jungle enemies of the ape: the leopard, warthog, chimp and gorilla—and their prey, which was often the same thing. He wondered at how much blood he could coax from their flesh with the sharp instrument.
CHAPTER 13 – The Shining Fang
He sheathed the long knife and shifted it from hand to hand, wondering how he could carry it through the trees as he swung.
Impossible! And yet, he knelt by the corpse of Fur-nose again, and studied the long loops of cloth that girded his waist. Yes, the strange creature had carried the long knife within the folds of that belt, but Gazda could tell with a glance that the apparel was too large and long for him and would wrap many times around his body.
An idea struck him, and he leapt to the low platform and drew a skin out from underneath it. After several attempts he managed to cut a long circular strip of leather with his new blade. This he wound three times around his thin waist and then made fast by twisting its overlapping ends together until it stayed cinched.
A moment later, he had thrust the long knife and scabbard through this belt which tightened it the more. Gazda then drew the weapon with a quick flex of his right arm and stood armed for battle in the center of the lair.
He hooted and panted, then sheathed the weapon before slapping the floor with his palms and leaping up and down. The night ape was quite proud of himself.
The great Gazda! He thought, rising erect again, and drawing the long knife from its sheath. None are as great as he! Woe be to any other ape!
Then he groaned worriedly, sheathing his weapon and crouching low, before creeping over to the far wall by Fur-nose where he had noticed a strange thing lurking in the darkening shadow.
A curious twist of hardened stone lay there. Crouching by it and leaning forward upon his knuckles, he saw that it was of a material similar to the long knife—like smooth, shiny stone. This thing was slightly bigger than Gazda’s hand and smelled of lightning when he pressed his nose against it.
A realization struck him.
The night ape jumped back and banged into the door that still hung open on its hinges. Growling fearfully, he leapt into the doorway. The thing on the floor must have been the thunder-hand that old Baho spoke of in his stories, and Gazda kneeled there briefly, paralyzed with fear.
Baho and other apes had seen it flash in the tree-nest before the entrance disappeared. It had been like thunder in mighty Goro’s hands!
This thing?
He looked up and around Fur-nose’s marvelous lair and felt great anxiety. Could this thunder-hand make the entrance disappear again?
The night ape returned to it, face hovering near as his lips pulled away from his sharp fangs when he smiled.
The thunder-hand was unlikely to make the entrance disappear if it were not inside the lair.
Gazda took a deep breath and then with all the speed in his body, he snatched up the otherworldly weapon and leapt outside. The night ape threw it as far as he could.
Thunder-hand glimmered once in the setting sun before it fell into the long grasses and was gone.
Gazda turned to hear a muted sound coming from the south. Out on the open platform, he could recognize his mother’s distant call. She was far down the beach, and had finally missed him. It would take time for her to find his trail and discover where he had turned from the tribe to seek out Fur-nose’s lair.
Strength suddenly surged through his body and he realized that he had stayed far too long. The sun was setting out beyond the great blue water and night was coming. He had to return to the tribe before the full jungle darkness closed upon him. He would be safer thus, and he could guard the others also.
He entered the tree-nest again and stood before the corpse of Fur-nose. Gazda sniffed the stuffy air, but the stink of decay had departed with the open door. The night ape did not think to throw the skeleton away. There was no blood or meat in it, so being nothing more
than dry bones, the remains held little interest for him.
Again his mother’s call came from the distance. She was still very far away but she was moving north.
Gazda had to go, but his mind was already set on something. The night ape would make use of the tree-nest and call it his own for there was something comforting and secure about it that appealed to him.
With Fur-nose long dead this could be Gazda’s lair, and he could come to it when he wished to be alone, for all those years of alienation had taught him to crave solitude.
He would do that, but first he needed to answer his mother...
Then just as he looked away from the body, something else caught his eye. A silvery flicker came up from under the long, rotten hair that laid over Fur-nose’s chest. Shifting closer, the night ape saw a silver line looped around the corpse’s neck and shoulders.
Gazda hurried over to pry the thing off as Eeda’s desperate cries echoed in his powerful ears.
The silver line was made of many small bits of shining stone, round and interlocking, no bigger than bugs, and as he pulled it over Fur-nose’s head, a circular piece of hard metallic stone came free of the corpse’s mangled chest.
Holding the pendant up to his face, Gazda saw an image set on the disk that took him a moment to recognize: a tapered head and long, coiling neck.
He cried out fearfully and the odd artifact clattered to the floor. Kneeling over it, Gazda could see on the disk a long neck and the cold flat head of a snake. It was like the giant pythons that lived in the jungle and hunted apes.
Gazda studied the hard links for movement, and watched the round disk for a flicking forked tongue, before something within him frowned at his own fear.
It was dead—just shining bones.
Even if it had been a snake tricking him somehow by making its skin like shiny stone, was it still not a very small snake and easy for a hunter like himself to kill?
On impulse he drew the long knife from his belt, and smiling, loomed over the strange thing before he picked it up, marveling as the shining disk spun on the length of interlocking links.
After giving the disk a quick sniff, he glanced at Fur-nose’s body and shrugging slid his weapon away.
Gazda held the loop of links in his hands and thrust his head through before sliding the artifact over his neck and shoulders in the same way it had hung over Fur-nose’s moldering skull and neck. The flat, circular snake’s head rested against Gazda’s well-muscled chest, swinging on its silvery links when he moved.
He did not know the reason for the ornament, but he liked the feeling it gave him to have it there, or to simply have it. For once he was pleased to have something magnify his differences from the tribe of Goro. The thing was splendid, and marvelous and his.
How many apes in the tribe would dare wear a shiny stone serpent around his neck? Who but Gazda would have taken it from the very bones of Fur-nose?
They were different apes, indeed.
He left Fur-nose’s nest, but hesitated before pulling the door closed behind him, making sure he remembered how the curious wooden latch opened by pulling on the length of leather that was threaded through the wall. He tested it a few times and then sprinted to the closest tree where he swung up into the branches.
For the time being, he would keep the provenance of his unusual new possessions to himself, fearing that the blackbacks would grow bold if they knew the night ape had been in the tree-nest, and in his absence molest his new-found lair.
So to hide where he had been that afternoon, Gazda traveled east and left Fur-nose’s lair between himself and the great blue water before turning south again and angling west toward his mother’s call. Her frantic voice still echoed from south of him, well down the sands where she was likely turning over every rock in search of him.
It warmed his heart to know his mother was so protective, but he also felt guilty for causing her dismay. The least he could do was put himself in the way so she could find him herself, and after the initial celebration scold him roundly for being such a foolish son.
He sped along a trail through the high branches until coming to the great forest of shorter fruit trees that bordered the beach for miles and miles. He had used the path so many times before that he could have navigated it through the growing dark with his eyes closed.
His own scent was everywhere. Some hint of it lingered on every tree he passed.
With the night falling fast, Gazda’s powers were returning, and he could soon hear the ocean waves as though they were curling beneath his feet. He could sense also the powerful presence of the great blue water crouching like a monster in the west.
Its waves struck the sand hypnotically, and he soon smelled its salty breath on the warm jungle air.
The night ape was making good time until he came upon a broad swath of trees that had fallen over as if a strong wind had taken them down. This forced him away from the opening and east again to where the forest edged this gap of destruction and led back toward the shore.
Gazda fairly flew around this detour, flinging himself from branch to branch, listening intently for his mother’s call. All the while quite pleased with his accomplishments, happy to have explored Fur-nose’s lair, and proud of his courage and his actions.
He continued forward, leaping from tree to tree, and flitting like a shadow until a thick log three times the length of his body hurtled end over end toward him from of the jungle below.
The night ape contorted his body to escape the whirling missile’s jagged ends, but he was struck across the abdomen.
The impact sent Gazda tumbling through the air into the open space that was littered with broken trees. He glanced off a fallen trunk and cartwheeled over the sandy ground as the flying log exploded into jagged splinters when it struck the ground near him.
As Gazda scrambled to his knees a great cloud of dirt, dust and ruin descended, blinding him; but it did not in any way diminish his other senses, for he immediately felt the earth shake under him as if a great storm approached.
The night ape squinted up into the twilight sky to see Magnuh’s massive black bulk hurtling across the open space toward him.
Gazda shrieked, springing toward the closest trees south of him, realizing as he leapt over the fallen trunks that the bull elephant must have set this trap and now intended to take it to its bloody end.
The night ape growled admiringly despite his damaged body’s cries of pain, for he respected the sly beast’s ingenuity even as Magnuh angled his charge to block Gazda’s path into the trees.
Luckily, the sun had slipped completely past the horizon, and left a purple sky under which the night ape’s nocturnal strength returned in full.
He leapt onto a fallen tree and jumped toward the nearest branch 20 yards distant.
Gazda caught it...but too late, for Magnuh’s long trunk lashed out, curled around the night ape’s left ankle and squeezed.
Pain flashed up Gazda’s leg as his ankle bones shattered, and agony scorched through his mind even as his thoughts flashed to Fur-nose’s shining fang, the long knife in his belt.
The night ape held tight to the branch with his left hand, while with the right a single action drew the flickering blade from its sheath before it bit into the thick hide on the elephant’s trunk.
Magnuh bellowed mightily at this, and recoiled in pain.
Gazda’s leg sprang free of its grip as the beast roared in frustration and fury, lashing out and levering upward against the tree as the night ape heaved himself into the branches.
A moment more, and Gazda had climbed higher before leaping higher still.
There the night ape turned to glare down at Magnuh with his long knife still in hand. He slashed at the tree limb by his feet, scolding the bull elephant with a violent display.
Magnuh raged and blew a spray of scarlet foam from his trunk. He used his tusks to slash the bark away from the night ape’s tree before the wounded monster stormed off into the jungle roaring and drooling blood.
Gazda hurled insults after the thwarted beast until the night ape was suddenly taken by a wave of nausea that sent him reeling back against the tree trunk. He realized then that his ankle was broken at right angles to his calf, and the flesh was torn in many places on his chest and belly.
Sinking down upon a branch, he watched in wonder as the wounds began to heal, and a great hunger rose within him, even as the worried cries of his mother grew in his ears.
His legs were deeply bruised and the skin was ripped. He gasped in pain as the ankle cracked and clicked as it suddenly shifted from its unnatural slant, and aligned itself with the rest of his leg.
The pain faded quickly but the hunger did not.
Gazda smiled as he held the long knife up in front of his face where licking carefully, he removed all trace of the elephant’s thick blood from its sharp surface. After that he lapped at the rich fluid where it still clung to his wrist and forearm, relishing the taste.
Neither he nor Magnuh had expected such a turn, and without the blade, Gazda knew he would have been pulverized and killed by the monster.
The night ape gazed lovingly at the weapon and wondered what other uses he might put it to.
1904-1905
Ten to eleven years of age.
CHAPTER 14 – A Jungle Joke
Gazda’s special abilities continued to improve as he aged. He was as strong or stronger than any of his contemporaries, day or night—faster on the ground and in the trees—and he had become an accomplished and peerless hunter. He boasted a keen intelligence and wisdom far beyond his years—certainly beyond most of the apes in Goro’s tribe.
His mother was wise, he knew, as was Goro and old Baho, and there was no doubting the cunning that lay behind Omag’s twisted features.
But Gazda was able to outthink most of the apes his age—if little Ooso did present a challenge from time to time. The she-ape had a piercing intellect and delightful imagination which she exercised when she was not busy judging her many blackback suitors or enjoying the gifts they offered her with their proposals to mate.
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