“Is that what your pack think of you?”
“I let them think it. Why not? Better to make jokes than get into fights.”
Adel let her gaze trail over his bare chest, realising that he lacked any of the scars most young men wore by his age. As soon as the wolf emerged, youngsters were often keen to vent their newfound aggression, feeding the beast within with challenges of dominance over even the slightest of disagreements. It was the way all men settled disputes that got out of hand, and the spilling of blood was often necessary to declare a victor.
Jarek was broad-shouldered and toned with bands of muscle, his dark physique easily rivalling that of any strong hunter. It would have been understandable for a weak male to avoid conflict, but Jarek seemed far from weak. A strange tingle stirred within Adel's body as her eyes slid over her companion's musculature, the shine of the moonlight contrasting beautifully with his earthy complexion. Heat warmed her cheeks, and she looked away suddenly before the confusing sensation could grow any stronger.
“Well, it seems both of us do things our packs find strange,” she said under her breath.
As they continued to talk into the night Adel found herself speaking more freely, telling Jarek things she had been hesitant to voice at first. She spoke of how she had found the pool all those years ago with Uriel, how she had a brother with whom she shared little in common, and how her father's rivalry with Alpha Kotal had brought nothing but hardship upon her pack. Rather than forgetting her worries, she instead found herself speaking openly of them, and instead of bringing pain and guilt, the voicing of those thoughts came as an immense relief. Her troubles seemed so much smaller when Jarek contrasted them with his own, making jokes about their foolish alphas and how their fights were like the squabbles of children. Soon Adel was laughing again as Jarek mimicked her father's voice, skipping stones across the pool to try and hit a tuft of grass he had dubbed “Alpha Kotal,” yelling increasingly absurd curses at the spirits every time he missed.
The fact that his disrespect would have incurred severe punishment had it ever left the privacy of the grove only amused Adel even more, the outrageous joke made all the funnier by its impropriety. It felt like a way to defy her father somehow, lessening his hold over her. In the jokes she shared with Jarek, Ulric became a bumbling fool, and how could she ever fear someone like that?
Once again the night ended far too quickly. As the first fringe of dawn crept over the horizon Jarek had to bid her farewell, setting out on the day-long journey back to his own pack before they missed him. Adel stood at the edge of the grove and watched him go, almost wishing she could travel with him as she waved goodbye. His wolf was a creamy brown, its coat almost the colour of sand. A strange juxtaposition to the shade of his skin, and quite different from the look of her own pack. Many things about Jarek were strange, she supposed, but that was precisely why she felt herself growing to like him. So many of her brothers and sisters thought the same way, felt the same way, and never dared speak words that challenged the norm. Their hearts were decided for them, locked into place by traditions that refused to change.
Adel sighed, the return home seeming all the more bleak as she realised it would be another full moon until Jarek came to meet her again. Bleak, but bearable. Her doubts had grown small. She no longer feared the coercion of her packmates. As long as she had this refuge, she could be reminded that there was more to this world than a woman's obligations to her clan. There was freedom, there was laughter, and there was... something else. The strange feeling that had stirred within her when she was with Jarek. Whatever it was, it lent a lightness to her step as she trotted back toward the river, making every breath of air taste sweeter, every touch of the breeze more soothing.
There was no rush to return, and she meandered for a while chasing phantom scents with her wolf's nose, giving in to a sense of whimsy that so rarely intruded upon her sharp and purposeful demeanour. A flash of russet red caught her eye, and a moment later the tang of fox worked its way into her muzzle. She wagged her tail in excitement and bounced after the creature, identifying the scent of the berries from earlier.
Show me your home, Mother Fox, Adel thought, losing herself in the undergrowth as she followed the creature south along the eastern bank of the river. There were other smells on the air that morning, lavender to match the purple of dawn, thick pollen and crushed grass, and something else unfamiliar beneath the surface. It was the fox that held Adel's attention, though, and she followed it for some time before making a detour to the edge of the river where she could dip her muzzle and slake her thirst. The cool water tasted especially sweet, yet another distraction that dulled Adel's senses to the signs she should have noticed long ago.
Grass crushed by footfalls. Unfamiliar scents in the air. The faint splashing noises downstream that she took to be fish or water birds. Only when a distant voice began to speak in a tongue she only half understood did she lift her head with a start, ears pricked and swivelling. Though the words were unfamiliar to her, she had learned enough of their language to understand Moon People and North.
Just down the river, a man stood in the shallows gesturing toward her with a long spear. The copper tip glinted in the rising sun, drawing Adel's attention down the warrior's arm to the leather baldrick slung diagonally across his chest, bound with trophies of teeth, fur, and the severed tails of wolves. He said something else, and a second warrior rose into view alongside him, before making a high-pitched whistle that sounded like the call of a bird. The danger Adel was in swept over the girl like a rush of cold water as a similar call answered from behind her.
These were the Sun People Alpha Neman had warned her father of the year prior. The ones who had killed her kind before. And in her foolish distraction, she had walked directly through their hunting line.
—8—
The Work of Warriors
Without wolves to call upon, and lacking as they were in the strength and resilience of her kind, Adel had always questioned what she had to fear from the Sun People. But as the hunters began to move, she questioned it no longer. Though they lacked teeth and claws, the spears they carried were long enough to impale a foe before they ever got close enough for it to matter. The pair south of Adel slipped away into the undergrowth, hunkering down so that she could not see them from her low four-legged angle
Heart racing, the girl reverted from the shape of her wolf and drew herself up tall, looking along the riverbank to the north as she searched desperately for the hunter that had returned the bird call. How many of them were there? How close were they? If she knew where they were she could take advantage of her speed to slip between them and escape before they closed in. A flash of orange sunlight caught her eye and blinded her, obscuring the silhouette of what looked like a man crouched by the edge of the water. Nothing but the sounds of birds and buzzing insects reached her ears, and for a moment she took the long, thin shape whipping toward her out of the sun to be a dragonfly. It was faster and sharper than any dragonfly, though, and almost as soon as Adel spotted it the wooden shaft covered the last of its distance and bit into her side like the sting of a hornet.
Pain shot through the flesh just above her hip as she fell to her knees with a cry, instinctively grabbing at the dart and tugging it out as if it had been a leech clinging to her body. It looked like some kind of totem, the sharpened, bloodstained end tapering to a fire-hardened point, while the top of the shaft was notched and bound with three straight feathers, overlapping slightly to create a vaguely chevroned look.
Adel had but a moment to stare at the strange piece of wood as she reeled from the pain in her side, then a second feathered shaft whipped through the grass beside her and buried itself in the soil. Loose earth near the riverbank crumbled away beneath her palms as she crawled backward, panic threatening to take hold of her. She swallowed the cry that had been building in her throat, fighting against the desperate urge of her inner wolf to turn and flee.
These were hunters. Killers of her kind
, if the trophies ornamenting the first man's body were to be believed. Adel was no hunter, but she understood what it meant to stalk and bring down prey. It was not raw speed or power, but the understanding and prediction of a quarry's behaviour that most often secured the kill. Some animals would bolt, some would freeze, some had sharp ears, others had dull eyes. The Sun People had crouched down to make her stand up, and then they had launched their darts at her when she had given them the opportunity. What did they expect her to do next?
Forcing herself to breathe through the piercing pain in her side, Adel struggled to remain calm and think through her next course of action. What did she know of the Sun People? What had she heard when Karel spoke of them and the way they fought?
They feared her kind, she knew that much. They used weapons that could kill from a distance so as not to make themselves vulnerable to the overwhelming strength of a wolf. That meant they were not likely to approach her if she remained still. But every moment she waited, they would be closing off her avenues of escape. If they were several of them they would surely be encircling her, drawing their snare ever tighter around the riverbank until there was nowhere left to run without exposing herself to their darts.
Whatever Adel did, she knew that the body of her wolf was her greatest ally in that moment. Enduring the painful shift with clenched teeth, she tried not to look at the blood running from her side as she changed shape and began to limp as quietly as she could away from the edge of the river. Two more vicious whipping sounds pierced the air behind her, and both times she flinched, her heart jolting in anticipation of another painful sting piercing her body.
She remained low, trying to disturb the grass as little as possible as she prowled blind, keeping her ears pricked to the myriad sounds of movement around her. The scent of men was impossible to ignore now that she had been made aware of it, and she cursed herself for having been so foolish as to miss it before. The thick salt of flesh and sweat, the animal tones of fur and leather, and the faintest hint of blood.
All she saw around her was thick grass. Her hunters might be poised mere steps away, ready to pin her with their spears the second she crept through the next bush. Fear beat at her heart and boiled beneath her skin, compelling her to run. The terror mingled with her pain into a horrible chill that would have drenched her body in cold sweat had she been on two legs. Yet fear could not control her. It compelled her to keep moving, lending an urgent strength to the wounded girl. Her will was stronger than her fear, intent only on survival.
A soft brushing sound caught her ears nearby. It was quiet, as natural as the stirring of the breeze. Less keen ears might have taken it as such, but Adel recognised the sound of a body moving through the undergrowth. A skilled, near-silent body, prowling with the caution of a hunter.
She froze in place, lowering herself to the ground. Her dark fur would stand out amongst the undergrowth more obviously than that of her mostly brown-coated kin, and she implored the spirits for it not to be her undoing. The sounds of movement had gone quiet, but Adel held still for as long as she dared, knowing that seasoned hunters always waited patiently for their prey. Sure enough, after an almost unbearably long time, the faint brushing noise returned, moving farther away to her right. A low chirruping sounded behind her. Perhaps the genuine call of a bird, but more likely another sound made by one of the Sun People to signal his companions. If they had crept to the spot where she had been by the river, then they would be following her tracks now.
Barely daring to breathe, Adel lifted herself off the ground and forced her body to keep moving forward, both as slowly and as quickly as she dared. How close were they now? She suspected there were at least four: the two she had seen to the south, the silhouette to the north, and the one she had heard a few moments ago. At least four, but perhaps there were others she had not noticed yet.
The lush grass thinned as she brushed up along the edge of an overhang where the ground had crumbled away into a broad depression below. It was a wide open area, perfect for cornering prey. She forced herself to pause again, peering through the grass to try and make out any signs of her pursuers on the other side of the dip. Even though it was exposed, if she could slip across it, then the thick undergrowth on the other side would be dense enough for her to disappear in and take advantage of her wolf's speed. They might hear her moving, but they would tangle themselves up trying to follow, and she would be hidden from the aim of their darts.
Adel's brief flash of hope soured as a twitch of movement caught her attention on the far side of the dip. A curved piece of wood swayed as it poked out from the undergrowth, a few light blonde slivers of a man's hair visible just beneath it. Adel backed away, skirting along the edge of the overhang to try and find a spot that was out of sight of the hunter, but he had chosen a position that commanded a wide view over the entire area. Could the Sun People hit moving targets with their darts just as easily as still ones? The girl shuddered as another stab of pain dug at her wound, doubting she could run especially fast even if she tried.
Behind her something cracked, and she froze again. The brushing sounds returned, more of them now, growing closer as they followed the path of her tracks. She had to run. There was no time left. The only path to safety was off the edge of the overhang and across the open depression. She simply had to hope that the hunter on the other side did not notice her until it was too late.
Parting the grass with her muzzle, she quickly scanned the stretch of ground for anything that might obscure her from view as she crossed. Instantly another shaft cut through the air from the position of the concealed hunter, slamming Adel's skull with an eruption of pain as it caught her in the side of the head and scraped along her temple. Her muffled yelp coincided with a sharp whistle from the hunter, and she barely had time to roll back into the grass before a second dart followed the first. Half blind from the blood trickling into her right eye, she scrabbled with both paws to knock free the dart that had caught in the skin close to her ear, grazing her skull along the way. The biting pain came on just as strong as it had in her side, but it was nothing compared to the sense of mounting desperation building within Adel's chest. She was trapped, caught like prey, and any direction she fled would only lead to death. Her wounds were beginning to steal the strength from her limbs. Perhaps, if she was fortunate, she might be able to fight one of the warriors and get past him. Or perhaps they would impale her upon their spears as soon as she attempted to lunge.
In a hopeless attempt to find some other path of escape, Adel dragged herself upright and crawled farther along the edge of the overhang, keenly aware of the sounds of movement that seemed to be closing in from all sides now. She tried to wipe some of the blood from her eye with the back of a paw, stumbling beneath the partially exposed roots of a tree and pausing to catch her breath in the small hollow beneath. A soft growl sounded in front of her, almost startling the girl as she caught sight of a fox, hackles raised, teeth bared, staring at her from the other side of the cramped hiding spot.
Mother Fox, Adel thought, too distracted by the danger she was in to be amazed at the animal's bravery in facing down a wolf several times her size within such an enclosed space. The growling would draw the hunters here. They would be upon her in moments. Please, Adel silently implored the creature, be quiet.
But instead the fox yapped, the sharp sound driving into Adel's throbbing skull like a needle. Before she could curse the creature with the wrath of a dozen dark spirits, it bolted, streaking out of the hollow beneath the tree's roots and disappearing in the direction of the overhang. Adel's breath caught in her throat as another trilling bird call sounded from directly behind the tree, followed by the sharp patter of feet on earth. Two men ran past her, backs turned to her hiding spot, one with a dart already notched to the string of the bow he held.
No momentary indecision hindered Adel's movements. She scrambled out from the hollow and fled in the opposite direction, caution forgotten as she ran back toward the river as fast as her achi
ng body could carry her. From over her shoulder she heard the yelp of a fox, followed by an angry yell in the language of the Sun People a moment later, then a rattle of words she did not understand. Her only chance was to hope that she had slipped through an opening in their trap. If she ran as fast as she could, perhaps she could get away to the north before they hemmed her in again.
Fortune was on Adel's side, for not a single dart followed after her, and within moments she was back at the edge of the river. She paused for a brief moment to prick her ears and listen, conferring some much-needed relief to her throbbing side in the process, but she heard nothing. The hunters did not seem to be chasing after her, but there might still be more nearby, crouched in the undergrowth with weapons ready. Without taking the time to lick her wounds, she bounded away to the north. If she ran into more of them, she would simply have to fight. Skulking and hiding would only result in her injuries sapping the last of her strength until the Sun People found her.
A flash of brown movement caught Adel's eye to her right. She snapped her head around, ready for the worst. The hunter almost ran by her before catching himself and turning back at the last moment. This hunter, however, was not of the Sun People. Clad in fur and walking upon four legs, she recognised him as one of her father's warriors. He fixed her with a narrowed pair of amber eyes, five more wolves emerging from the undergrowth a moment later. Relief flooded through Adel, though it was short-lived. The tension seeped from her body as the band of wolves drew in to surround her, their familiar scents bringing reassurance to her animal mind, only to be replaced with anxiety as she realised why they must be here.
The hunters that had just stalked her were about to become the prey. Four more furred shapes moved through the grass nearby, and at a soft bark from one of the others her father's distinctive, dark-furred bulk nosed its way out of the foliage. As a wolf it was harder to read his face, but the subtle twitches of his body and the sounds he made told Adel all she needed to know. For an instant he was overcome with concern, taking in the blood running down his daughter's temple and hind leg, before his compassion evaporated in place of anger. He drew his muzzle back from his teeth, a growl building in his chest, before throwing his head back and letting loose a bloodcurdling howl to the sky.
Daughter of the Night: A Book of The Moon People Page 7
