Maryam

by Tracy St. John

  Shoo-wup! The deep-throated cry of a blaster echoed in the cabin. The light jerked once be­fore swing­ing wide, then dis­ap­pear­ing. Cries and shouts erupted. The dark fig­ures flew out of Maryam’s sight, as if they’d been jerked away all at once. Yells split the air, then all was deaf­en­ing weapons fire. Whether it came from Der­gan or the at­tack­ing squad, Maryam had no idea.

  “Pana, Maryam, come on!” Kels’s shout rose above the bed­lam.

  Pana yanked Maryam up­right. De­spite the small amount of il­lu­mi­na­tion com­ing from the open hatch, she couldn’t see to nav­i­gate the aisle be­tween the seats. She was ut­terly de­pen­dent on Pana as she ran in his wake.

  The bar­rage of per­cus­sion blasts had moved out­side the shut­tle, and she in­stinc­tively ducked when they rushed out. The view was con­fus­ing as she ran, her legs pump­ing for all they were worth to keep Pana from jerk­ing her off her feet.

  A kalei­do­scope of dim im­ages strobed across her sight. The fea­ture­less sil­hou­ette of Pana’s head, shoul­ders, and back were a black wall be­fore her. The star-lit sky and a dis­tant planet hang­ing high over­head. Shad­ows dash­ing here and there in her pe­riph­eral vi­sion. Strange waves dis­rupt­ing the lit­tle she could see, the tell­tale power of the fir­ing blasters.

  Loom­ing be­yond Pana, the black­est of it all: the canopy of the for­est. An­other shadow drop­ping back, an im­mense shape that Maryam some­how iden­ti­fied as be­long­ing to Kels. He grabbed her other hand while ear­split­ting re­ports erupted from his blaster.

  A rush of speed be­tween the two men lifted her off her feet. The pools of dark swept past her in a blur. Then an en­velop­ing void, a pit of such black­ness that Maryam had a ter­ri­fy­ing sec­ond’s be­lief she’d gone blind. An in­stant later, she un­der­stood. They’d en­tered the woods.

  Maryam’s toes touched the ground for a mere mo­ment be­fore she whirled in the air, yanked from Pana’s grip. She landed on Kels’s shoul­der and hung there like a sack.

  He bel­lowed, “Go, my Imdiko! Run un­til I tell you to stop!”

  Un­der the trees, the dark­ness was to­tal. Kels’s boots pounded the ground be­neath them, but Maryam couldn’t dis­cern even the slight­est trace of move­ment. Ter­ri­fied they’d run straight in to a tree, she yelled, “How can you see?”

  There was no an­swer, but Kels never fal­tered as he sprinted on. Maryam said noth­ing more, trust­ing that he wasn’t blinded as she was. What else could she do?

  She es­ti­mated their flight lasted five min­utes be­fore Kels slowed. “All right, Pana. Hold for a mo­ment.”

  They stopped. From the breeze that had blown Maryam’s hair, she’d thought they’d raced at a full gal­lop for the en­tire jour­ney. Pana’s breath­ing was louder than Kels’s, but nei­ther sounded ter­ri­bly winded—only as if they’d jogged a short stretch, at most.

  Kels let Maryam stand. “Stay quiet. Lis­ten for pur­suit,” he whis­pered.

  All that greeted her ears were an­i­mals call­ing in the dis­tance and a slight rus­tle of breeze in the trees. No per­cus­sion blasters. No shouts. No noise of a chase. It was as silent as one would ex­pect for late night in a for­est.

  “Der­gan.” Maryam strained for any hint of the Nobek.

  “He’s been in worse sit­u­a­tions. Come on; he’ll track us down when he’s sure we’re not be­ing fol­lowed.” Kels sounded sure of him­self.

  They re­sumed their trip through the woods, Maryam walk­ing this time. Kels and Pana warned her of trip­ping haz­ards and guided her steps as they trav­eled. There was still no more than a black cur­tain be­fore her gaze. Ap­par­ently, Kalquo­ri­ans could see in the dark.

  She peered up­ward, hop­ing to find the sky. Noth­ing. The canopy of leaves must have been too thick.

  It was un­nerv­ing, that end­less void they walked through. If not for the steady tread of her com­pan­ions’ boots, the warmth of their hands hold­ing hers, the whis­pered in­struc­tions and as­sur­ances they of­fered, she’d have been in­sane with ter­ror. How could there be dark­ness so ab­so­lute? As the min­utes stretched into eter­nity, Maryam re­al­ized she wasn’t grow­ing ac­cus­tomed to it. If any­thing, it grew more op­pres­sive.

  She won­dered if she’d ever see light again. Of course you will, her bet­ter sense chided, but it was be­com­ing harder and harder to imag­ine she would.

  Kels abruptly stopped. Maryam was grate­ful when he did. Her calves ached. It felt as if they’d been walk­ing for­ever.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Pana’s tense ques­tion erased Maryam’s re­lief. She froze and lis­tened hard.

  The for­est was silent. Not the quiet of be­fore, but ab­so­lutely silent. The crea­tures she’d rel­e­gated to the back­ground of her con­scious­ness no longer called out.

  There was some­thing else; a smell that wrin­kled her nose. It re­minded her of wet dog, but ranker. She bumped against Kels, crowd­ing close to him as in­stinct alerted.

  The Dramok’s whis­per barely reached her ears. “We’re be­ing stalked. Some­thing’s mov­ing in the trees. Smell that?”

  “Yes.”

  “They’re stay­ing down­wind as much as they can, but they’re clos­ing in.”

  “They?” Maryam’s blad­der abruptly felt over­full.

  Kels shifted. She sensed him bend­ing down. An ob­ject scraped against the ground as he stood up straight again. He’d picked up an ob­ject. A sim­i­lar noise on her right told her Pana did the same.

  “What are you do­ing?” Panic nipped at her, fed by the in­abil­ity to see.

  “Branches to beat off what­ever’s out there.”

  “What about your blaster?”

  “As I said, this is a pro­tected pre­serve and the Du­mai take it badly if the an­i­mals are killed. I’ll pro­tect you at any cost, but I’d rather not have to sac­ri­fice a hand if I don’t have to.”

  “A hand?” Maryam’s mouth went dry.

  “The fine for killing an an­i­mal here.”

  While she at­tempted to ab­sorb that nugget, Pana spoke up. “There’s a brighter area ahead, be­tween those trees. It could be a clear­ing.”

  “Make for it. If we can get in the open, it’ll be harder to be am­bushed. Maryam, hold onto my belt so I can keep my arms free for swing­ing.”

  They crept for­ward. To Maryam, it was as if they moved barely an inch with each step. Her skin crawled, imag­in­ing some in­vis­i­ble men­ace tip­toe­ing on her heels, ready to take a bite out of her. When dim light fil­tered through the trees at last, she should have been re­lieved. In­stead, she feared catch­ing a glimpse of drip­ping fangs and stiletto claws an in­stant be­fore they sliced into her. She didn’t dare peek over her shoul­der, con­vinced she’d see a mon­ster straight out of a night­mare.

  They stepped into a cir­cu­lar clear­ing, lit by the blue Earth-like planet that ruled the sky. Sticks and fo­liage un­der­foot gave way to softer ground cover. Maryam dared to look be­hind when they neared the cen­ter of the small space.

  The sur­round­ing woods were like a cor­ral, fenc­ing her and her com­pan­ions in. Within the shad­ows, large shapes shifted and moved.

  “There.” Maryam pointed.

  “All around us,” Kels cor­rected.

  Chap­ter Six­teen

  Kels passed his blaster to Pana. “Be ready, but shoot them only as a last re­sort.”

  “Is there any­thing be­sides a last re­sort at this point?” Maryam de­manded. She itched to take the blaster from Pana. She’d gladly give up a hand in ex­change for not get­ting eaten by the hor­rors her imag­i­na­tion had con­jured.

  Kels man­aged a short laugh. “If the an­i­mals will co­op­er­ate, I might con­vince them we’re more trou­ble than we’re worth. Here they come.”

  Big shapes, taller than Kels and Pana and long to boot, stole out from be­tween the trees. Marya
m couldn’t make much sense out of them. Hulk­ing fig­ures slunk, as if on four legs, to­ward the trio. There were glim­mers here and there, what Maryam took to be the beasts’ eyes, re­flect­ing the watch­ing planet. The smell grew sharper, a reek that made it hard to breathe. They closed in from all sides in a silent tide.

  Kels and Pana pushed Maryam be­tween them and faced away from each other to con­front the threat, their bod­ies brush­ing hers.

  “Be ready to pick up Maryam and run, Pana.” Kels’s voice was calm, as if he weren’t watch­ing en­croach­ing death.

  Pana cast a quick glance at him over his shoul­der. He looked fright­ened but not pan­icked. Was he that con­fi­dent in his leader? Maryam hoped she could trust Kels as much as the Imdiko ap­par­ently did.

  She re­turned her at­ten­tion to the en­emy. The beasts were only yards away, still creep­ing to­ward them. Cau­tious, though they had the over­whelm­ing num­bers. Per­haps they’d never en­coun­tered hu­manoids be­fore and weren’t sure how much dan­ger hu­mans and Kalquo­ri­ans posed.

  Not enough to sur­vive a full-on at­tack, Maryam was sure.

  She had an im­pres­sion of long, thick fur on the crea­tures. Per­haps that was why she couldn’t dis­cern spe­cific de­tails on their ap­pear­ance. No overt sign of teeth or claws, but who knew what those shaggy pelts hid?

  Kels dis­ap­peared.

  He was there, then all at once, he was gone, as if he’d winked out of ex­is­tence. Be­fore Maryam could re­act, the beast in front of her yipped, a star­tled and sur­pris­ingly high-pitched sound. An­other blat­ted the same noise. And an­other.

  In an in­stant, the crea­tures were twist­ing in all di­rec­tions, snarling and snap­ping at the air. The noise of their teeth, now flash­ing white, and yes, very long and sharp, cracked like whips. Maryam stared as they re­acted to some­thing she couldn’t see, beast af­ter beast wheel­ing about and search­ing for some­thing to fight un­til they were all yip­ping and bel­low­ing at once.

  What had got­ten into them? Not Kels—she’d seen enough to know he could move fast, but surely not that fast.

  Pana yelled and lashed out with his stick, a branch equal in length and thick­ness to his arm. A mon­u­men­tal fig­ure squalled and leapt aside, ter­ri­ble fangs ex­posed as a cur­tain of fur shifted from its mouth. Maryam yelped at the close call, turn­ing to face a dark beast loom­ing over her.

  She was swung up, slung over Pana’s shoul­der. A burst of sud­den move­ment and they were within the trees again, ob­scur­ing her vi­sion. Pana panted as he ran full out, set­ting wind in her hair.

  Kels’s voice came out of nowhere. “This way, Pana. There’s a ledge—maybe some­where to hide.”

  A jerk as Pana changed di­rec­tion. Maryam braced her­self against his back to re­lieve the bounc­ing he gave her. She lis­tened as best she could for pur­suit, but her ham­mer­ing heart and Pana’s gasps drowned out any ev­i­dence that the beasts might be chas­ing them.

  Then Pana halted. Heav­ing for breath, he set Maryam on her feet and sup­ported her as her bal­ance wob­bled. The ground was un­even. Rocks shifted be­neath her.

  Some­one else grasped her arm. Kels’s voice was winded too. “Down here, Maryam. This crevice might hide us if it goes deep enough.”

  He guided her to a rock face and a wide fis­sure split­ting it. Maryam slid in, feel­ing her way into what she imag­ined to be a size­able crack in a moun­tain or hill­side. It widened out as she crept along. The walls dis­ap­peared en­tirely within a few steps. Maryam stum­bled for­ward and stopped, lis­ten­ing to the sounds of the men fol­low­ing her.

  A light blazed bright, blind­ing her for sev­eral sec­onds. When she could see again, she saw they had en­tered a small cave. Pana stood next to her, blink­ing at the en­vi­rons. His back to the crack in the rock through which they’d en­tered, Kels shone the light around, dis­play­ing walls, floor, and ceil­ing made of yel­low-brown stone.

  The Dramok abruptly jerked, ex­claim­ing as some­thing en­tered be­hind him. Der­gan emerged, grin­ning at his star­tled clan­mate.

  Maryam ran to the Nobek and jumped up to wrap her arms around his neck. “You’re alive! Where did you come from?”

  Der­gan’s eyes were wide as she hugged him. A grin ate up his face as he squeezed her to him­self. “I showed up just in time to help Kels dis­ori­ent those adorable pups who wanted to eat you.”

  Kalquo­rian quick­ness mul­ti­plied by a fac­tor of two. No won­der all the beasts had freaked out at once.

  “Adorable pups, huh? If mas­sive beasts with eight-foot teeth are your idea of adorable.”

  “Oh, their teeth were only three feet long, at the most.” He waved neg­li­gently.

  “That makes all the dif­fer­ence.” She forced her­self to step back, though it was hard to do so. She had def­i­nite at­tach­ment is­sues.

  “Don’t be so quick to dis­like them. They might be our ticket to lure that squad from our shut­tle.”

  “The Earth­ers aren’t search­ing for us?” Kels ap­peared sur­prised.

  “Af­ter you were clear and I got away, I spied to watch if they’d pick up your trail. They seem to be of the opin­ion we’ll re­turn to the shut­tle. They have it sur­rounded, pa­trolling the perime­ter.”

  Pana snarled. “They found Briel.”

  “They opened the hatch, took a look in her pod, and closed it again. They haven’t done any­thing to the body. Lucky for them,” Der­gan added un­der his breath.

  “They’re wait­ing for us to try to re­claim her. You have a plan?” Kels pressed.

  Pana smirked, eas­ier now that he knew Briel’s body hadn’t been des­e­crated. “Doesn’t he al­ways?”

  * * * *

  Maryam man­aged a lit­tle sleep be­fore it was time to leave. When she stepped out of the cave with the clan, dawn was just break­ing. It lit the sky in a weak yel­low-or­ange mist that did noth­ing to dis­pel the morn­ing’s chill.

  With­out a word, Der­gan peeled off and dis­ap­peared in the dense trees of the nearby woods. Kels took the lead for the re­main­der of the group, walk­ing some dis­tance ahead of Pana and Maryam. The men hefted big sticks once again, and she gripped the largest rock she’d found that she was rea­son­ably cer­tain she could throw—for all the good it would do her against the mas­sive beasts, should they en­counter them again.

  She and Pana pro­ceeded slowly, barely keep­ing Kels in view as he nav­i­gated through the tan­gled growth. Der­gan had scouted their route to en­sure no preda­tors were about be­fore they’d set off, but they were cau­tious any­how.

  In the early hours, the scent of veg­e­ta­tion was heav­ier than the night be­fore. Or per­haps Maryam no­ticed it bet­ter be­cause they weren’t run­ning for their lives. Dry brown pods crunched and rus­tled un­der­foot, a sound she’d not ac­knowl­edged dur­ing their flight, though they car­peted the ground.

  Maryam judged they’d walked over an hour be­fore brighter light en­tered the shad­owed do­main of the woods. The for­est was fi­nally thin­ning, let­ting them know they were near their goal. Kels halted be­hind a large white-trunked tree, and he sig­naled them to freeze. Maryam and Pana im­me­di­ately went into a crouch and waited.

  Sec­onds crawled by. Kels’s back was to the hid­ing pair. He peered be­yond the edge of the for­est, mo­tion­less as he watched. At the dis­tance she hud­dled from him, Maryam couldn’t de­tect him breath­ing, twitch­ing—noth­ing. If not for the slight move­ment of stray hairs, he might have been a statue.

  He turned his head their way. Kels waved them for­ward with two abrupt jerks of his arm, then dashed through the trees on his left, dis­ap­pear­ing into the shad­ows.

  Maryam and Pana crept to the shel­ter of the same tree. Peek­ing be­yond the sweet-smelling trunk, Maryam caught sight of their shut­tle in the clear­ing be­yond the woods.

  Hu­man men wan­de
red around a camp­fire, the low hum of con­ver­sa­tion like the buzzing of in­sects. Bedrolls were be­ing cleared from the fire’s perime­ter. A few ate from metal plates, their uten­sils scrap­ing. A cou­ple were splash­ing their faces in the stream. Oth­ers strolled at the edge of the clear­ing, watch­ing the for­est with blasters at the ready.

  Ex­cept for the pa­trolling sen­tries, the boys looked as if they’d made them­selves com­fort­able. Low on sleep and ir­ri­ta­ble to spy at least two dozen be­tween her and the shut­tle, Maryam scowled. The odds were worse than Der­gan had led her to be­lieve. Surely Kels would re­turn and call the scheme off.

  In­stead, Kels broke from the op­po­site end of the clear­ing, fir­ing his blaster over the Earther’s heads. They scram­bled for cover, yelling to each other, some re­turn­ing shots. Kels faded into the for­est, dis­ap­pear­ing from sight.

  As the sur­prised squad con­gre­gated by the side of the shut­tle, us­ing it for shel­ter against his pre­vi­ous po­si­tion, Kels dashed out from a dif­fer­ent sec­tion of the woods, fir­ing at the ground in front of their feet. They scat­tered, dash­ing in two dif­fer­ent di­rec­tions, to ei­ther end of the tri­an­gu­lar-shaped craft. They blasted once more, but Kels was al­ready gone.

  Had they no­ticed he wasn’t try­ing to kill them? He’d had clear shots at them both times but al­lowed them to es­cape in­jury.

  Per­haps they had, be­cause when he emerged a third time, at­tack­ing those shel­ter­ing at the bow of the shut­tle, they re­turned fire im­me­di­ately. Bet­ter yet, they raced for­ward, chas­ing him as he darted into the for­est once again.

  The shut­tle was unat­tended. Maryam jumped on Pana’s back, wrap­ping her legs around his waist and her arms around his chest. He took off, rac­ing for the shut­tle.

  When the Kalquo­ri­ans had run while car­ry­ing her, it had been too dark for her to ap­pre­ci­ate their as­tound­ing speed. Pana’s pound­ing foot­falls were a rapid bat­tery of sound, bleed­ing to­gether so that she couldn’t tell where one be­gan and an­other ended. The land­scape blurred past her, not clear­ing un­til Pana dashed into the open hatch of the shut­tle and halted.