by J. C. Hendee
He had forgotten that he still carried the ku’ê’bunst.
Karras clenched his hand and tried to ram the haft back and up. The weapon jerked to a sudden halt, and a yelping snarl erupted above and behind him. Claws tore across his neck as the weight on his back shifted.
In less than a breath he could not take, he twisted on the ground, and rammed the weapon’s butt spike up again. At a second jarring impact, something struck his back just before another snarling shriek.
The last of Karras’ air rushed out.
Pain filled his chest under claws scraping off his armor. The weight atop him was suddenly gone, though with it, the ku’ê’bunst’s haft lurched as if snagged on something.
Karras rolled over on the force of that jerk and finally sucked a tearing gasp of air. It had all happened so fast, and the noise of snarls, metal clashing, and Fiáh’our’s shouts… all vanished as a weight slammed down on his chest.
Claws tore at his armor, as his breath rushed out again, and a horror appeared before his face.
He barely caught sight of stained teeth in a smashed-in muzzle. Large yellow eyes with pinprick black irises were surrounded by speckled and bloodied fur. Karras’ mind went numb as that monster opened its jaws, about to snap at him.
Something struck behind one of its peaked hairy ears.
Its head whipped away as blood sprayed over Karras’ face.
He stiffened, even as the monster and its weight vanished.
“Get up!”
Fiáh’our’s close shout stunned Karras’ ears. A large hand grabbed his hauberk, jerking him up in a stumble. He wiped at his face in a slap, trying to clear the blood so he could see.
“Watch your back!” the old man shouted, rushing at something thrashing on the ground, halfway into the brush beyond a tree.
Fiáh’our went after… whatever it was, and Karras spun, looking everywhere. There was nothing except… a barking howl turned to a pained scream that pulled him around.
All he saw was Gän’gehtin’s back as the shirvêsh’s great iron-shod cudgel swung down and rearward, but he did not swing the heavy end forward again. Gän’gehtin rammed the butt end out beyond himself, as if at that tree on the clearing’s edge.
Karras remembered the spike fixed to the bottom end of that weapon.
A howl cut off in a choke beyond the shirvêsh, and he shuddered briefly, as if the cudgel’s butt end hit the tree’s trunk. Suddenly, Gän’gehtin’s booted feet slid back on the mulched cover ground.
Karras’ eyes locked open in panic at that sight.
The shirvêsh quickly shifted rightward. Then something rushed out of the brush, pulling Karras’ eyes away.
Fiáh’our reappeared, axe in one hand, and both of its blades had dirt and leaves stuck in the blood upon them. The old man was panting, but he barely locked eyes with Karras when they both turned at another snarling screech.
Another monster was pinned against a tree, the spike of Gän’gehtin’s cudgel rammed through its crudely armored belly. The shirvêsh ducked the weak swipe of its clawed stubby-fingered hand and threw his weight sharply into the great cudgel.
Flesh and armor tore as the reddened spike levered and ripped out sideways with a wet crackle of bone. All noise from the creature ended instantly as its yellow eyes opened fully round in shock and pain, and Gän’gehtin…
His face was covered with sheen. His features were a cold mask of hate as he reversed his weapon’s arc. The thicker iron-ribbed end smashed down on the creature’s head.
The side of its skull appeared to buckle on impact. Karras shuddered as it went down with a sound. And Gän’gehtin raised his weapon again.
Fiáh’our rushed in to snatch the cudgel around its ribbed upper half.
“Enough!” the old man snapped.
The shirvêsh never answered, and all Karras heard in the clearing as he stared at the body were Gän’gehtin’s rapid breaths.
There was little left of the creature’s face as more blood welled out of the crushed side of its huge head covered in bristling fur. He had once seen an “ape” caged up in a market in one southern port. This thing looked—might have looked—like that but bred with a huge hound, or maybe a bear, aside from its peaked and tufted ears. Only one of those ears was left whole by the cudgel’s strike.
Darker red seeping from its split skull spread through speckled fur over its wide-boned face. The blood ran down its short but broad and gaping muzzle, into long teeth surrounding top and bottom fangs… and onto its lolling tongue.
Only one yellow eye was left to stare blank and empty back Karras. He quickly dropped his gaze only to see hardened leather armor strapped crudely over its hulkish torso, for the armor was too small for it. That carapace had been pierced and torn open, along with the creature’s belly.
Entrails had spilled out upon the forest floor.
Karras stumbled back and hit a tree. The chill of shock gave way to a flush of nausea amid spinning vertigo. He twisted around, falling to his knees and only retched, for he had eaten nothing that day that he could vomit up.
· · · · ·
Fiáh’our heard Karras fall and almost turned, but at the sound of gagging, he knew the kitten could not be seriously injured. He had feared the young clan-kin might have been broken when the first sluggïn’ân had dropped from above. And it had gone for the smallest target first as the other dropped.
That pair had been small ones, fortunately not quite as tall as the kitten. They had to be in order to climb high enough not to be seen. How they had gotten up there without marking the trees worried him.
Fiáh’our remained locked in a glare with Gän’gehtin, looking into the shirvêsh’s wide and manic eyes, as he listened until Karras stopped gagging and only panted. At that much, he sighed in some relief.
Everything here had gone wrong in too many ways.
Fiáh’our shoved hard on Gän’gehtin’s cudgel as he released it.
“Go… now!” he ordered through clenched teeth, pointing blindly toward Karras. “Get him back to camp, dig the herb grease out of my pack, and tend those claw marks on his neck.”
Gän’gehtin’s eyes narrowed and then twitched toward the corpse.
Fiáh’our struck the shirvêsh in the chest with his palm. “Move!”
The shirvêsh turned slowly at first, his gaze leaving Fiáh’our last, and he stalked off. But Fiáh’our froze when he turned to follow.
14. Aberrations and Bones
All was quiet as Karras weakly clawed up the tree to his feet, or if there was any noise, he did not hear it for the shrieks and snarls that kept repeating in his mind.
He still clung to his weapon, though it dangled from his hand with its five blade tips on the ground. What he had seen, heard, and felt was all locked in his head. He could think of nothing else, though a burning pain began growing on the back of his neck.
Karras heard Fiáh’our bark, “move!” In not knowing whom that was for, he turned, looking for the thänæ or the shirvêsh. His gaze caught on something else.
He clenched and lifted the ku’ê’bunst as he backed into the tree.
No more than ten strides out into the brush, south of the clearing, two yellow eyes stared back at him.
It was far smaller than the corpse lying near Fiáh’our and Gän’gehtin. It would have barely stood to the height of Karras’ rib cage, if it came closer. Its fixed eyes shifted between all three in the clearing, and if there was any expression on its bestial face, Karras could not read it.
When this little one moved two steps rightward, it limped a bit sideways. One leg might have been slightly shorter than the other, though Karras was uncertain by where it stood in the brush. It was apparently naked with no scavenged armor or even a weapon.
Its gaze shifted for an instant, perhaps to its dead companion, and its hand on the side of that weak leg looked… deformed.
The hand’s lead digit appeared permanently swollen all the way to the base of its thumb, and perhaps it
might have always been that way. Unlike the claws on its other thick digits, that one claw was not black but a sickly pale yellow, the color of aged bone or one of these creature’s fangs.
A rushing pound of boots broke Karras’ fixation.
Fiáh’our and Gän’gehtin charged out, and the little one fled, vanishing in the brush.
Karras took two steps, but much as the shirvêsh and thänæ rushed about, they kept turning and looking all ways. Then something raced up a far tree.
No matter its misshapen form, the little one climbed with frightening speed and disappeared into the forest canopy.
Fiáh’our appeared to spot it, for he turned and looked up with astonished eyes. Once it was gone, and without a sound in the branches above, the old man spun slowly with a scowl, looking in all other directions through the forest.
Karras looked about as well and then upward again.
Perhaps the small one had been watching the whole time, waiting to signal the two others above. Gän’gehtin then appeared at Karras’ side, holding the helmet that Karras had lost in the ambush.
Long shallow gouges ran across the iron band on the helmet’s back.
“Come,” Gän’gehtin said. “We go back, and I will tend those slashes on your neck. They are only minor.”
Even as Fiáh’our stepped back into the clearing and looked about at the patches of matted brush and branches, all that Karras could do was stare. He did not turn away until Gän’gehtin firmly forced him to do so.
· · · · ·
Fiáh’our lingered in the clearing as the shirvêsh led the kitten off, for too much had gone wrong—been different—in what had happened.
The ambush was no surprise. He had dealt with such before, but how it had been done was another concern. The two above in the trees had to have been high enough that they could not see the clearing in remaining unseen themselves. And that one on watch in the brush…
How that one had silently signaled the others did not matter now. In all Fiáh’our’s years, he had never seen any like the little one among a pack. It was too small, young… and misshapen.
No one knew much about the way of life for these creatures in the Broken Lands, but there were few beings outside the civilized races that would have allowed that little one to live. Even the Wastelanders of the frigid north exposed any infant that was not whole and sound at birth. Animals in the wild were even less tolerant. It was the way of things, for the weak and infirm risked the survival of the group.
He did not know how or why the little one had been left alive, let alone what it was doing here with this strange pack. But there was something else here he might learn.
Fiáh’our crouched to search beneath the matted leaves and branches in the clearing, always looking about and listening for anything out in the forest. And he found one place—the one Karras had last looked at—where the forest mulch was too mixed with the earth beneath. He took out a dagger and began digging. It was not long before his dagger’s point snagged on something beneath the loosened earth.
Fiáh’our cleared the space to expose the pelt of a deer. Congealed blood on it was caked with dirt, and he flipped the edge of the skin over with his dagger’s point.
A fetid stench rose instantly, making him gag.
The fat of their kills was crammed in around the stripped bones in the pit. That the fat was still whole and the earth not charred meant a fire had not yet been built here to broil the bones and seal in what they held. Anything edible, even bone marrow, would not be wasted once they returned to their own land.
But these were only the bones. The pack’s main cache of food, dried meat and any hides worth keeping, were hidden elsewhere.
Fiáh’our stared long at those bloodied bones, looking over each one that he could see without touching the mess. When the stench became too much, he flicked the hide back over them and kicked earth back into the pit and branches across the top. He left that place for his own camp and to prepare to move it again.
Back in Shentángize, villagers wondered about the ones they had lost during the attack. No one should be left to grieve in doubt, but better that than what he had seen in the pit.
Fiáh’our would never tell them, and it was not the first time he had kept such things to himself.
15. Turnabouts
“We should have gone after them!”
Gän’gehtin’s sharp words made Karras stiffen where he sat with knees pulled up on another outcrop… on yet another stone spine. This time, they had camped on the side by which they had first entered the valley. He glanced over to find Fiáh’our standing silent, as usual, in staring across the valley as the shirvêsh paced on the old man’s far side.
“Are you listening?” Gän’gehtin demanded.
“I heard you… again,” Fiáh’our growled back without breaking his vigil. “And again, they are here somewhere. They have not left to go hunting and raiding, and even if… we would not catch them. They move faster than us on open ground, especially at night.”
“Then we hunt them by day,” the shirvêsh argued, also not for the first time.
Karras grimaced and tried to loosen his hauberk’s neck, for it was rubbing painfully against his bandage. Fiáh’our had moved their camp three times in as many days. Still, they had not spotted the pack, at least not in daylight let alone in the open. How the old thänæ knew the pack was still here was obvious by what had happened the night after the attack in the clearing.
After the ambush, they had set camp only one spine south of the first one they had used. Again someone had kicked Karras’ foot to wake him in the night. He was so shaken and worn from the day’s encounter that he barely roused in the dark.
Gän’gehtin was crouched by the campfire, stoking its flames as he looked all about. His great iron-ribbed cudgel was upright between his arms and knees, and leaning against one of his shoulders.
“Up!” Fiáh’our whispered, and Karras found the old man glaring down at him. “Put on your helmet, now.”
Panicked, he did so and clambered to his feet, his weapon in hand as he looked every which way in the night. He saw nothing until he noticed that Fiáh’our faced upslope toward the tree line high above. Karras followed the old man’s line of sight.
At first he still saw nothing and only heard the fire’s crackle in consuming new fuel. But as the flames grew.
Pairs of pinprick lights—yellow eyes—showed among the trees far above the spine’s head.
Around each pair was a shadowy shape, a hulk that shifted and moved to carry those eyes… except for two pairs. One was very tall, for the glimmer of its eyes was set higher than the others. Beside that shadow was a much smaller one, with yellow sparks set closer together and lower among the trees.
Nearly all of those paired sparks winked in and out, reappearing left or right, as if moving among the trees. All except the one tall pair and the shorter set to its right.
Karras was uncertain how many were up there. At a guess, maybe eight, though not one appeared to step beyond the forest’s edge.
Fiáh’our glanced over his shoulder and fire light illuminated his hardened features. The old man stared so long that Karras had to look back as well, but he saw nothing more than the shirvêsh still crouched by the fire.
“A torch,” Fiáh’our whispered at Gän’gehtin. “Light it and throw it straight downward.”
The shirvêsh quickly snatched one makeshift torch lying nearby, dashed its head into the flames, and darted to the landing’s rear edge. He hurled the burning torch downward, and it vanished from sight.
Karras stood rigid in listening to the torch clatter down the rocks. The shirvêsh remained poised with the huge cudgel upright in hand as he peered over the edge.
Gän’gehtin suddenly snatched his great cudgel with both hands. “One!” he hissed. “It scrambled away and down!”
Karras jumped slightly when Fiáh’our slapped him on the back.
“Another torch, both of you, quickly!” the old man o
rdered. “Left and right but downward.”
Karras barely shifted his ku’ê’bunst to his off hand when Gän’gehtin tossed a torch at him. He caught it, and they both thrust the last two torches in the fire. When he turned for the left side, he heard the shirvêsh’s torch whirl into the dark, but he hesitated at his last step toward the edge.
This was no place he wanted to be.
Karras took that last step as he swung the torch wide to cast it. Something grated on the stone at his feet, and he paused to look down.
A clawed hand clamped on the side of the stone ledge.
It was covered in fur and as big as a bear paw. A horrid face of bristling fur and snub snout of large teeth followed. Yellow eyes glimmered in that half-dog, half-ape face, and it stalled upon spotting him.
And that thing tried to grab for his leg.
Not courage or fury but horror made Karras swing, though he had forgotten his weapon was not in his good hand. The torch hit its face, and sparks exploded around its head. Claws tore across Karras’ boot as its snarl turned to a shriek. Someone grabbed the back of Karras’ hauberk and jerked. He stumbled in backpedaling, trying to keep his balance as Gän’gehtin stepped in front of him.
Karras stood quivering at the sound of claws scrabbling on stone and loose rock in the dark. But the sound grew fainter with each of his fast breaths, until he heard it no more.
Gän’gehtin turned and was panting as hard as Karras. “Two more,” the shirvêsh said, looking beyond Karras. “Both ran off.”
Karras twisted around.
Fiáh’our stood half-turned and wide-eyed, the great axe in one hand and a battle dagger in the other. The thänæ quickly shifted again, looking upslope.
“Why do they not come at us, all at once?” Gän’gehtin asked. “Why only sneak about?”
That question was not what Karras wanted to hear right then.
