by Robert Adams
“Tell the chiefs that I say to hurry, Dik. If they heed me in this instance, they stand to be chiefs of fairly wealthy clan by the time they leave this winter’s camp.”
With Dik departed, Milo and Djim continued to hunt vainly, for a while, but then Djim mindcalled, “Uncle Milo elk dung, still hot!”
Following the clear trail, the two men shortly came out of the thick woods into more open terrain. Well ahead, among the stumps verging a beaver pond, a solitary bull elk had cleared enough snow from off the frozen ground to give him access to the bunches of sere grass that underlay the white blanket; now, he was grazing.
Raising his head with its wide-spreading, still-unshed rack of deadly tines, the huge beast gazed at the two men without apparent alarm. A brief scan of the elk’s surface thoughts told Milo the reason for this unconcern — this particular bull had been hunted by men more than once and he now realized that the long distance separating them was just too far for the hurting-sticks to travel through the air. If the two-legs kept to this distance, he was safe. Should they try to close, he would flee. Meanwhile, he would eat grass. Simple.
A single well-placed shot from the ancient hunting rifle dropped the half-ton animal, but Milo put a second into the head at close range as a precaution, for bull elk could be highly dangerous adversaries. Then he and Djim. taking time only for a few refreshing drafts of hot elk blood, set about the skinning and cleaning and butchering of the kill.
“The Hunter and her brood,” thought Milo, “should be very happy with some hundreds of pounds of elkmeat, and that’s to the good. I want her in a very damned jolly mood when I breach the subject of her and them leaving here for good with us and living out their lives with the clans.
“I would imagine that the idea of a steady, reliable and effortless — on her part, at least — food supply will appeal to her, so that’s one point in favor of my plan. For all of her stubbornness, she’s highly intelligent — more intelligent than any dog or pig that I ever came across, and they’re supposed to be the most intelligent of four-footed creatures — and if you can convince her that something new or different is for her own or her cubs’ welfare, she’ll usually do as you say — as witness the fact that she has not pulled off her bandages even once, for all that those healing injuries must itch like pure, furious hell.
“If she’s a sport, she’s breeding true, for all three of her cubs can mindspeak, can beam every bit as strongly as can she, though not yet as far. When she has recovered her physical strength, she and I will have to travel around and see if we can locate a mate for her, since she avers that there are more of her kind in this neck of the woods.”
Secure in the belief of the efficacy of his own powers of persuasion, Milo chuckled to himself on that long-ago, snowy, bitterly-cold day, “Who knows? In time, there may yet be still another Horseclan — a four-footed and furry Horseclan!”
“And so there is,” beamed old Bullbane. “The Clan of Cats must be the most numerous of all the Clans of the Kindred, for every two-leg Horseclan has an allied sept of Cats. And there must be many claws-count of Kindred clans.”
“Yes, honored cat brother,” agreed Milo, “I, too, am certain that the full Clan of Cats is the largest of all the clans. Fourscore are the Kindred Clans, and each sept of the Clan of Cats averages some twelve, plus cubs, so there are well over one thousand prairiecats following the herds with their two-leg brothers and sisters. Nor does that figure include some that still are living wild, apart from the clans.
“The wild life is a good life for a healthy sound cat in its prime.” stated Bullbane silently, “but illness or serious injury or advanced age in the wild presage naught but a slow, painful death. Far better that a cat live our his life with his two-leg cat kin, secure in the knowledge that his abilities are valued, that his belly will be full as long as the bellies of his kin are full, that he will be protected and fed in illness or if injured, and that he will be vouchsafed a quick, painless death when he feels that the time has come for him to go to Wind.”
Chapter XI
Tim stumbled into the yurt a little after the dawning, half frozen, his knitted face mask stiff with ice rime. Dark blood had hardened on his mittens and in splashes up his sleeves, with blotches here and there on his trousers. His exhaustion was too great to allow him to do the normal things, so Mairee and Chief Dik’s other two wives made haste to fetch his gear from off the horse, then drape the mount with sheets of felt until it had had time to cool properly.
Bettylou helped her husband out of his wet, filthy clothing and into the lighter garb worn within the warm yurts. When she had seen him with a full bowl of last nights stew, she took his bare icy feet into her lap, under the swell of her belly.
Mairee and the other two came in laden with the gear as well as with two stiff-frozen winter wolfskins, each of them of a creamy, almost-white color.
“White wolves are rare, this far south,” remarked Chief Dik. Skillfully assembled, those two will make a fine, warm, heavy cloak, like my own black wolfcloak.”
“There are at least two more of these white ones out there,” said Tim, mindspeaking, so that he might continue stuffing his mouth with cold stew unhindered. “And they are huge, a third again as large as the biggest of the other, more normal-sized wolves, they’re braver, too, and more ferocious and cunning. This brace let the others go after the cattle and occupy our attention while they sneaked into the herders’ yurt and tried to drag out a sleeping stripling — a lad of Clan Skaht. They did kill him, but his shouts alerted those of us who happened to be in that vicinity. I was just riding in off herd guard, so my bow was strung. An arrow was enough for one of them; the other I had to get down and take on my spear, which is why the larger pelt is so ragged in the breast area.”
Shaking his head reprovingly, old Chief Dik said, “You must learn to exercise caution, Tim. You are the last Krooguh in the direct line of the chieftaincy. Were there not other armed clansfolk about who might have faced that wounded wolf in your stead?”
Bettylou felt her husband stiffen then, but when he spoke aloud his voice was controlled. “Uncle Dik, even when or if I am a chief, I never will ask or expect another man to fight for me against man or beast. Yes, there were other armed folk about out there, but I was closest and my bow was strung. You are chief and you bear honorable scars of manhood, marks of your bravery in battle and in the hunt. Would you advise me to not win such, then? If so, then choose another for your successor, for I would far liefer be a common clansman who fought and died in honor than a living but cowardly chieftain of the richest clan on all the plains!”
Bettylou expected rage from the older man at Tim’s words, but Chief Dik only nodded gravely. “A good answer, Tim, and though strongly worded, spoken with all due courtesy. You much put me in mind of my own uncle. He was a very good chief, and I harbor no doubt but that you will be every bit as good a leader of our Clan Krooguh. A chief must be courteous and display a level head even when driven to anger, you have shown us here that you possess right many of the needed attributes of the chief you soon will be. You please me mightily, nephew.”
Hwahlis Hansuhn of Krooguh was born a little later that day, and, of course, the wolves made their attack against the camp that following night. Asleep with her newborn boychild. Bettylou did not really notice Tim, Mairee and the two other women arm themselves and leave the yurt.
Chief Dik, so stiff and swollen and painful were his joints this night, could not even arise from his sleeping-rug, much less arm and fight. But still the old man insisted that a spear be left within easy reach of both him and the sleeping young mother, for with wolves all about the camp, anything might chance.
Starving one and all, the gaunt wolves made frantic efforts to thrust their bony bodies through the frozen, thorny brush that blocked the apertures of the horse stockade, and each one of the few that succeeded not only encouraged their packmates to renewed efforts but heightened the panic of the milling equines within that stockade. Nor did lupi
ne successes make any whit easier the efforts of their human opponents.
As long as the furry shapes were outside the stockades or even worming through them, the combination of bright moonlight and vaunted Horseclans archery was certain to cost the attackers most heavily. But once inside the stockades, flitting hither and yon among the legs of the milling horse herd, it were a dangerous waste of precious arrows to try for the intruders, and the only options were either to leave them to the horses themselves with the probability that they would kill or cripple one or more before being themselves killed, or to send a brave man in after the marauder with spear and dirk; neither choice was one pleasant of contemplation to the Horseclansfolk.
But the hard choice was made, twenty times or more was it made during that hellish night by desperate men against equally desperate beasts. Some of the horses were savaged by wolves, some were wounded or killed by arrows. But, too, some spearmen were trampled by terror-stricken horses or were injured or slain by wolves as they tried to avoid those heedless hooves.
The deadly carnage went on and on, the survivors of the pack not making a withdrawal until the first rays of Sacred Sun were streaking the sky away to the east. Only then did the weary men and women sheathe their steel, case their bows and wend their way back to the yurts.
Fresh horrors there awaited them.
Tim could only stand and stare at the huge dog-wolf that lay stiffening beside the firepit, the bared fangs coated in the blood it had coughed up after the spear blade had pierced its chest. The second wolf — this one the smallest — had the look of having been clubbed to death. The third had taken the spear at the confluence of throat and chest and lay in a wide-spread pool of coagulated blood.
The three women who had crowded in behind him were no less dumbstruck by the grim tableau presented by the bloody, well-dead carcasses littering the floor of the home.
Mairee was the first to recover from the shock, saying to Chief Dik. “Well, old one, is this what must be expected every time we leave you alone with sharp toys?”
He regarded her without speaking for a long moment, then he spoke, gravely. “Had it been me alone, Mairee, I would have been in that dog-wolf’s belly long since, as I cannot so much as close my right hand around the haft of my spear.”
“Then who . . .?” the chorus began, then all eyes sought out the only other adult human in the yurt, where she now lay in slumber with her day-old infant. “Behtiloo?”
The old chief showed his worn yellow teeth in a smile. “None other! She had but just arisen and hung the babe high — which was fortunate — while she fetched me a sup of water, when that monster forced open the door and entered. She did not even hesitate, but took up the spear that lay by me and, waiting until he rose for her throat, skewered him as neatly as any wolf I’ve ever seen speared.
She had dropped the spear and was retching when the bitch wolf came in and made directly for me. I was able to do no morn than flip a blanket over the beast, but before it could wriggle free of that binding hindrance, our Behtiloo had lit into it with the iron spit; I could clearly hear those wolf bones crack and crunch under those blows, too.
“The third wolf snarled once before he came in and gave her enough warning to be waiting for him with a spear. She missed the heart thrust, but still she managed to hold him on the blade until he’d lost so much blood as to be weak and helpless.”
“And then, Uncle?” demanded Tim.
Chief Dik chuckled. “And then she retched a bit more, but only after she’d secured the door against more uninvited dinner guests. Then she took down her babe and repaired to her sleeping-rug.
“That woman is a rare prize, nephew. See that you always treat her as such.”
* * *
As the weather became warmer by degrees and the ice of the stream began to thin to nonexistent except along the shallower verges of the waterway, the stockades were breached and the carts and wagons brought in for overhauls or repairs. Harnesses needs must be fabricated anew or at the least altered, for not many oxen had survived the winter just past, and so many more horses and mules would have to be used for draft purposes until replacement oxen could be bought or lifted from the Dirtmen.
At the first hint of rising water, the entire camp was struck, packed and moved out onto the prairie, then unpacked and reestablished while the work on harness and conveyances continued. Within a bare week after the move to higher ground, the site of the winter camp was under a yard of roiling brown water and those stockade logs not already washed away downstream were all leaning at drunken angles as the soil packed around their bases eroded swiftly before the force of the water.
All of the clansfolk knew and more or less accepted the fact that the two clans would most likely go in separate directions this spring. Chief Skaht wished to go northwest, where the game would be most abundant through spring and summer and early autumn. Dik Krooguh, on the other hand, intended to head either due south or southeast; there might be less game, but better raiding was there to be had, as well as milder, warmer winters, which last was important to an old man plagued by all of his infirmities. Uncle Milo had not yet seen fit to announce just which clan — if either — he would accompany on this migration.
The prairie near to the stream became soggier and soggier. finally resembling just a single endless morass, cut through at countless points with trickling water, and the clouds of flies and midges made life hellish and all but unbearable for two-legs and four-legs alike. With no announced consensus, the camp was once more struck, packed and moved some two miles further east and it was at that location that they were found by the scouts of clans already on the move.
Bettylou clearly overheard the report that the scout, Ben Krooguh — who. like a fairly large minority of Horseclansfolk, did not mindspeak easily or well with humans or horses, although the powerful minds of the prairiecats seemed to be able to range even marginal mindspeakers — rendered to Chief Dik and Tim.
“The two clans coming up from the south, they’re both our Kindred — Clan Makaiuh and Clan Fahrmuh — and they allow as how there’s two more Kindred clans traveling a few days back of them, too — Clan Fraizuh and Clan Lehvin. But this bunch coming in from the northeast. they’re another bowl of stew entirely, Chief Dik, They’re dog-people. Little coyote-sized and -shaped shaggy black dogs herd their cattle, while their scouts ride with war-dogs — beasts bigger than any wolf I hope to ever see, curly-coated and prick-eared, with overlarge feet and long legs. And these dogs of war are fitted out in an armor of boiled leather to protect their throats and chests and necks. The men seem to all be very arrogant and pugnacious, but that might well be simply their fear of us Kindred, their betters.”
“How many warriors do you think. Ben?” asked Tim.
“Between two- and threescore . . . that I could see, Tim. Few of these dog-tribes teach their women to fight or even to draw a bow, of course, so they’re not to be counted.”
“Which is not to say that their womenfolk can’t fight when push comes to shove, Ben,” put in Chief Dik. “Recall, if you will, that Tim’s wife, with no weapons training at all and but a few hours after having birthed a babe, speared two grown wolves and beat another to death with an iron spit. You give those dog-tribe women a good reason to fight and they will, ferociously, if not too skillfully.”
No one was aware that Chief Milo had entered the yurt until he spoke, saying. “Which last is a very good reason not to give men or women of this alien tribe any pretext for fighting. There are few enough nomads roaming these lands, and the accursed Dirtmen encroach ever farther out onto the prairie each year; be we to save the grasslands for those who use them in the way Sun and Wind intended they be used, and not see them plowed up and ruined again, nomads must cease to fight each other, but rather must unite to drive the Dirtmen back off the grasslands.
“The dog-people are dog-people only because they have not yet become Kindred, have not yet entered into the bond between two-leg and prairiecat. Otherwise, most non-Kin
dred nomads are not very dissimilar from Kindred nomads; the two are, at the very least, far more similar to each other than is either to the Dirtmen.
“Let us do as has been done many times before, over the years. Let us meet with the chiefs of these non-Kindred in true peace, determine which way they mean to wander, then wander in company with them, as if they truly were a Kindred clan. By the end of the summer, chances are, they will already be related by a marriage or three.”
* * *
Joel and Jonathon Dunlap had been secretly pleased — more than pleased, if truth were known — to leave the Abode of their birth and, in company with some score of other young men, ride the several weeks’ journey to the Abode watched over by the Elder Claxton. The party escorted wagons filled with grain and other foodstuffs, weapons (including a few swivel-rifles), two of the infinitely precious, irreplaceable cranklights, and oddments of hardware and harness, as well as the personal effects of the score-and-two of volunteers.
It was not often that young men from the older Abodes-of-the Righteous emigrated from one established Abode to another, most often, they and an equal number of young women along with a soupçon of carefully chosen older folk, would set out for virgin territory to establish a new Abode.
But it also was not often that a single Abode would be so hideously afflicted by the heathen raiders of the prairie. The Elder Claxton and his unhappy flock had not even had a bare chance to recover from the devastating effects of a raid that, but for God’s Will, would have burned them out when the Hell-spawn raiders returned just before the first snows. They had ambushed an unmounted party of herders and murdered many of those godly men, then driven off the cattle.
Then, an ill-advised, worse-led and too hastily mounted pursuit of the raiders and the lifted herd had resulted in a second ambush, more deaths and woundings and the loss of most of the horses and mules on which the pursuers had been mounted.
