By Tooth and Claw - eARC

by Mercedes Lackey

  He’d been doubtful of that claim in the past, but he was doubtful no longer.

  Cold, cold, cold minds. There was no fear in them; nor fury, either. But he knew that should they choose to kill, they would do so with an implacability every bit as sure as everything else about them.

  The Sure Ones, indeed. They named themselves well—so well that the name was accepted by Liskash and Mrem, even though the Sure Ones had no language with which to speak that name. Nor any way to even think it. They simply were. The Sure Ones.

  So well named, happily, that even the great lizards of the sea understood their nature. It was obvious that the lizards were feeling frustrated. They were now swarming in the strait, surfacing constantly and sometimes even leaping half out of the water. Circling and circling the flotilla of rafts and its ammonite convoy, but never approaching too closely.

  The huge, scaly predators didn’t know—exactly—the nature of the peculiar beasts that were floating through their waters toward the island. But theirs were simple minds.

  There was food. There were mates. There were competitors for food and mates. All creatures large enough to be noticed at all fell into those three categories. So what were these?

  They were frustrated; in their own way, curious; and always prone to aggression. But they were not mindless. The strange beasts were surrounded by the shelled ones, and those could be dangerous. For one thing, they were almost impossible to kill. Not even the greatest of the sea lizards could bite through that armor. And while the tentacles could he attacked, the reverse was just as true—the tentacles were the shelled ones’ own teeth and claws. Attacking them was akin to matching bites with another sea lizard.

  Risky. There wasn’t room in the tight and narrow minds of the sea lizards for many concepts, but that one was well-understood.

  Risky. So, they kept their distance.

  The turtlesnakes didn’t come anywhere near the rafts. The river delta and its immediate environs seemed to be their natural habitat. They were great and fearsome predators in their own right—as any land animal discovered, even the largest, if they came too close to the water. But their normal diet was the fish and amphibians that dwelt in the delta. They would not last long if they tried to match themselves against the lizards or ammonites of the open sea.

  “Yes,” Sebetwe said. “It’s going well. But…”

  He glanced at the island, slowly drawing near. Then, looked back at the shore. His eyesight was very good and he could easily see the advance elements of Zilikazi’s army. Some of them had already reached the beach and he was pretty sure of the activity of those farther back, in the woods.

  They’d be building their own rafts.

  He glanced now at the tekkutu who were taking his place and Meshwe’s for the moment. Chikwe and Kudzai, those were. Neither was especially talented but both were solid and experienced. They would manage for a while.

  “We need to talk to Nurat Merav again,” he said.

  “I agree.” Meshwe’s jaws opened a bit. “She’ll be delighted to discover we want a new dance from her.”

  Nurat Merav

  “Are you joking?”

  Chapter 15

  Zilikazi

  Zilikazi had eventually realized he had no choice but to command the lead raft. Despite his power and his ferocity in using it, the morale of his army had deteriorated so much that his troops were still balking at making the passage across the strait to the island.

  Not openly, no; to all outward appearance, his orders were being obeyed. But resistance can take many forms. Knots poorly tied, logs poorly chosen, vessel designs mismanaged—always with the claim they’d been “misunderstood”—it went on and on. He’d soon realized that the creeping pace at which his troops were preparing the fleet of rafts was itself undermining their morale.

  Decisive action had to be taken, and it was. He announced to the whole army that he would be in personal command of the first raft to be launched into the sea and he expected all of his subordinate officers and warriors on the other rafts to launch with him.

  Failure to do so would be severely punished.

  That was enough. The pace of the work picked up; more importantly, so did the quality of the work itself.

  But the time they’d wasted! He had expected to start the crossing in three days. It was now the fifth day after his army had reached the shore—late afternoon of the fifth day. They’d have to wait until the next morning to make the crossing. He begrudged that reality, but there was no getting around it. The moon was waxing and was now better than half full, but he still couldn’t take the risk of trying to cross the sea except in full daylight. Leaving aside the risks of the passage itself, forcing his army to make a night crossing would shatter the morale he’d just succeeded in patching back together.

  Tomorrow morning, then. Standing on the same small rock spur that Meshwe and Sebetwe had used as an observation perch days earlier, Zilikazi glared at the island in the distance. He’d made another decision over the past few days and announced it to the army also. The only captives they would take would be younglings. Anyone old enough to have been infected in any way by the beliefs of the Kororo Krek were to be slaughtered out of hand.

  If there was any doubt, force the younglings to speak. Use torture, use any means of duress to put them to the test. Any youngling who could speak a complete phrase—even a short one—were to be killed.

  He made an exception for the Mrem who had taken refuge with the Krek. He didn’t understand how they had done it, but it was now clear to him that the Mrem dancers had greatly enhanced the so-called “tekku” of the Kororo shamans.

  All Mrem were to be butchered. Each and every one down to the least kit.

  By tomorrow night—well, perhaps not quite that soon; the island looked to be big and some would try to flee into its interior—this would finally be over.

  Achia Pazik

  “I should go with you,” insisted Nurat Merav.

  “Don’t be silly,” Achia Pazik chided her. “You’ve done all you can. Designed the new dance, and modified it as our rehearsals suggested. It may not be good enough, but there’s nothing you will be able to do tomorrow that will change anything. We can’t risk losing our best choreographer.”

  Her mouth twisted into a semblance of a smile. “Also our only choreographer.”

  Nurat Merav had recovered enough from her injuries to be sitting up straight with no assistance. She was even able to throw up her hands in a gesture of frustration.

  “And so what? All of our dancers—each and every one—will be on that raft tomorrow. If we lose, there will be nothing for me to choreograph.”

  Standing next to them, young Lavi Tur grunted with amusement.

  “And no time either, even if any dancers were left,” he said, using his chin to point to the mainland. “If that huge army gets across, they’ll just overrun us. Cut all of our throats for sure and probably hack off our limbs for good measure. They’ve got to be in a rage already—and if they aren’t, they certainly will be after the crossing.”

  Again, he grunted amusement. He did that a lot. It was annoying. But Achia Pazik saw no point in chiding him about it now.

  Maybe later. If there was a later. She was sure he was right in his assessment. Zilikazi and his warriors would be furious with the Kororo Krek and any who were associated with it. If they got across, they probably would kill everyone.

  She almost grunted with amusement herself, then. Zilikazi’s army would be even more furious after crossing, when they discovered most of the Kororo had fled into the interior. If they thought they’d have nothing to do but quick and easy butcher’s work, they’d soon discover otherwise.

  There was no point in most of the Kororo waiting on the beach. What could be done tomorrow would be done by the tekkutu and the dancers on the one raft that would be going out to meet the invaders. The rest of the Krek except a few staying behind to help launch the raft had already started moving inland.

  Not quickly
. The island’s terrain was mountainous, for the most part, especially further into the interior. They still didn’t know for sure, in fact, whether it was an island at all. The scouts had not yet reached the crest of the mountains to see all that might lie beyond. What they had been able to see suggested they were on an island, yes. But there was still perhaps a tenth of the coastline that remained unknown.

  And even if it was an island—now, she did grunt with amusement, although not as loudly as the brash youngster—the aggravation of Zilikazi’s warriors would still not be at an end. There were caves in those interior mountains, as it turned out. Some of them seemed to be quite large and deep as well as convoluted.

  Enough of the tekkutu would remain on the island to keep the gantrak under control. (That had been an adventure! Keeping those temperamental and belligerent beasts from tearing apart the raft that had brought them over to the island had been a close thing. If anyone but Sebetwe had tried to control them, they’d mostly likely have failed.) They could hide at least some people deep in those caves for days, possibly many days.

  Possibly even until Zilikazi’s army gave up the search altogether. Who could say?

  But there was no point in dwelling on that. Achia Pazik was quite confident the new dance would do what it was designed to do. She’d played no small part in designing it herself, from the experience she’d gained in their rehearsals.

  Four days of rehearsals, starting before dawn and not ending until sunset—and the only reason she’d ended then was because the dancers were exhausted and needed their rest. Never in her life had she been so well rehearsed with a new dance.

  Her muscles still ached a bit, from the strenuous effort. But she knew that by the morning she’d be full of energy and excitement.

  All of them would be, dancers and tekkutu both. A partnership had been forged here that was like nothing any of them had ever seen before. Meshwe had told her that he was just beginning to comprehend the great changes that would take place in tekku as a result. The future looked to be magnificent, he said.

  If they got there at all. The only way anyone had ever found to reach the future was through the present, and tomorrow that meant sailing one raft against a great fleet.

  True, that one raft would have help. Of a sort. You could hardly call them allies, though.

  Njekwa

  For the first time in her life, the chief priestess of the Old Faith was considering a possibility she’d never once imagined. What would happen if the rule of the nobles were broken?

  More specifically, the rule of their noble, Zilikazi.

  The thought had first come to her on the day the army had started down the slope to the sea and word had begun to spread that the fleeing Kororo had successfully made the crossing over to the island. That was something which no one had really expected. For Liskash—for Mrem too, she thought—the sea was a place full of monsters so immense that no one ever seriously thought of venturing far out onto the waters. Most Liskash were even reluctant to approach the shores and those who engaged in fishing, other than in fresh water streams, were considered not much different from lunatics. Either that, or outright idiots.

  But apparently the Kororo had managed it. Rumors were also spreading that they’d done so by using their peculiar and little-understood “tekku” powers.

  For days, now, the priestess had been pondering those powers. She’d always dismissed them in the past as not much more than superstition. But after watching the Krek’s success in eluding Zilikazi for so long, she was beginning to wonder.

  What if they did have psychic powers that were unknown to the nobility? Might those powers be enough to thwart Zilikazi?

  Or might they even be enough to destroy him?

  It was possible. For the first time ever, she thought it might be possible. The Kororo couldn’t have managed the crossing of the strait unless they could somehow control the sea monsters, could they?

  She went so far as to privately broach the question to Litunga.

  But the shaman was skeptical. “Control them? I don’t think so. If they could control animals the way the nobles can control people, they’d have already been sending monsters to attack us. There are plenty of monsters on land, after all. None of them as big as the sea monsters are said to be, but they’re plenty big enough. Have you ever seen a gantrak up close?”

  Njekwa shook her head.

  “Neither have I,” said Litunga, “and I plan to see that remains true. I once saw what was left of a trapper who’d been killed by a gantrak.” She used her hands to indicate something about the size of a newborn youngling. “The biggest piece of him they found was about this size. One of his shoulders with bits and pieces still attached to it. Most of him was just…gone. Eaten, I suppose.”

  Njekwa thought about it for a while. “You might be right,” she said finally. “Probably are, in fact. But just in case…”

  She thought for a while longer. “Spread the word quietly to all the priestesses and shamans. Every adherent to the Old Faith should be ready if the time comes.”

  “Be ready to do what?”

  “I don’t know yet.” Her voice hardened. “Whatever I command.”

  Sebetwe

  He’d come here alone on a little coracle every evening, since the first day they arrived on the island, rowing his way with a crude paddle. It took quite some time, with such a clumsy vessel and means of propelling it, before he got far enough out at sea for the depth to be acceptable to the one who came to meet him each evening.

  He—she?—there was no way to know—was the greatest of the Sure Ones. A creature so immense that if you didn’t spot the slowly moving nest of tentacles and if the ammonite had its eyes submerged, you might think you were approaching a small island. Birds and flying reptiles did perch on the Sure Ones’ shells, especially in the evening.

  The enormous creature took no notice of them, any more that it took notice of the small fish and big shrimp that were constantly swimming around it and even settling on its body. Sebetwe had wondered, at first, how the fish and shrimp avoided being eaten like all the other sea life that came within reach of the tentacle mass. Eventually, he decided they were feasting on the Sure One’s parasites, and somehow the ever-moving tentacles knew they were not to be engulfed.

  Such an arrangement suited the Sure Ones. It was the way they dealt with their environs. They were neither predator nor prey. Generally, they ate flesh, but now that he’d gotten more familiar with them Sebetwe knew the Sure Ones ate quite a bit of plant matter as well.

  They could swim through the water. Quite rapidly, in fact, although only for short distances. But for the most part they seemed content to drift with the tides and the currents.

  Unless something caught their attention. The one thing that was familiar about the minds of the Sure Ones—perhaps the only thing—was their curiosity. You couldn’t exactly call it an intense curiosity, because nothing about the great ammonites was intense. But it could be quite unwavering. The Sure Ones were patient in a manner that eclipsed any Liskash or Mrem understanding of the term.

  They were one with their world. They ate from it, they let it eat from them. Such matters were not worthy of their notice. Mostly, they observed.

  He spent some time, as he did every evening, just floating in the coracle and staring at the Sure One. And it stared back at him. His eyes blinked, now and then. The Sure One’s, never.

  On the third evening, he’d given this Sure One a name. Bekezel, he’d decided to call it, after the shaman of legend who waited faithfully for her husband to return from a voyage until she died of old age.

  The name would mean nothing to the Sure One. The need for a name had been Sebetwe’s, not the giant so named.

  Just as the words Sebetwe spoke to Bekezel on each one of those evenings meant nothing to the Sure One either. But they mattered to Sebetwe.

  The sun was almost touching the horizon. It was time to return to the shore.

  “Tomorrow, Bekezel,” he said.
“Tomorrow, I will come in the morning. And I will need you then. Please do not disappoint me.”

  Did the tentacles seem to coil with an unusual flourish?

  A silly notion.

  Probably.

  Then again, who knew?

  Chapter 16

  Zilikazi

  He’d been puzzled when he saw that the Kororo were only sending one raft into the strait to challenge him. Why had they even bothered? That single raft was smaller than any of the ones in his flotilla—and he had seventeen of them. Even that great number held not more than a third of his army.

  But as his armada neared the oncoming raft, he eventually spotted the huge shells that surrounded it. One, two, three…he counted seven of them! For the first time since he’d emerged into his adulthood, he felt a surge of fear.

  Angrily, he thrust it down. There was still only one raft and he was now close enough to see that it held not more than thirty opponents. Most of them he assumed to be Kororo, but there were at least half a dozen Mrem there also.

  Few of them would be warriors, then. That raft would be carrying mostly tekku shamans and the Mrem dancers they seemed to use as auxiliaries. Did they plan to send the tentacled shells to attack his fleet?

  Possibly. It seemed a poor tactic, though. From what little he’d seen of the creatures—ammonites, one of his subordinates called them—they were sluggish and slow-moving. The sea-going equivalent of gigantic snails. He thought it would be easy enough to simply avoid that raft and its escort altogether.

  Yes. He’d let them fester in the middle of the strait with their ammonites while he passed around them and landed almost two thousand warriors on the island. His own rafts moved sluggishly themselves, but he had dozens of warriors available to staff each of the great oars that drove them through the sea. He was almost certain he could outmaneuver his enemy.