Greenways

by D. B. Reynolds-Moreton

One of them addressed Kel’s companion in a stern voice,

  ‘What you doing here?’

  As she got no reply, she took the younger female by the arm and lifted her to her feet.

  ‘You go out.’ And she did, at full speed.

  ‘What’s been going on.’ asked Moss, all innocence in his voice in case he too was going to be chastised.

  ‘You not know?’ asked one of the females, ‘I am much surprised.’ and she bent down to smell his breath.

  ‘Not so surprised now. You feel good? You can walk?’

  ‘I think so.’ said Moss, staggering to his feet.

  ‘Good, you come with us.’ and Moss and Kel were led out of the hut, a little wobbly from their experience, but ambulant, with help.

  It was only a short distance to the main hut they had found themselves in the night before, but to them it seemed a very long way indeed. Strong arms helped them along the way, but there was little of the jollity of the previous group of females who had taken them to the river.

  The older female, who seemed to be in charge of the group, greeted them pleasantly enough, but she didn’t smile, and when Moss did, she didn’t return it.

  A meal was presented and eaten, but in contrast to the previous night, there was very little conversation as there had been on the previous night.

  Moss decided to try and get things going by asking if it would be all right for them to be on their way next day.

  ‘Yes, but where will you go?’ asked the older female.

  ‘We have a Direction Pointer, and we follow wherever it points. We hope to discover many strange things to tell our Story Teller when we get back to our group in the forest.’

  ‘Why you want to do this?’ she asked.

  Moss and Kel looked at each other for a suitable answer. They had both started on their journey because it was something exciting to do, and had never really thought about it any further.

  ‘We just wanted to see what the rest of the world was like. According to the legends, it wasn’t just the forest we lived in.’ Moss didn’t like the way the female had made their expedition seem of little value.

  ‘Well, you can go next morning, but where will you go from here? There is only the plain you come in from and the valley forest below with the big water, and you not able to go through that.’

  ‘Why not?’ asked Kel.

  ‘The big water go through big rocks, and no way up, no way around. We not go through, so you not go through.’

  She seemed quite certain of that.

  ‘We will have a look at that next day.’ said Moss, trying to make his voice sound as positive as possible.

  ‘We must have serviced just about every female in the group by now, so I wonder what they have in store for us tonight?’ Moss quietly asked Kel when no one was looking.

  ‘Perhaps it’s just food time, and they want to be nice to us, but I doubt it. Watch out for those brightly coloured fruits we ate in their little forest, we don’t want any more of those.’

  They needn’t have bothered. The juice from the fruits were already incorporated in the drink which was so liberally provided.

  The Lesser Sun rose to bathe the area in its pale and gentle glow, lighting the way for the pair as they were hurried from hut to hut in a state of euphoric stupor. The females were making sure that at least some pregnancies would be forthcoming, and if they didn’t, it wouldn’t be for the want of trying.

  Two Kinds of Water

  When they awoke next day they were alone, except for the large female standing at the entrance to the hut.

  ‘They’ve done it again,’ Moss exclaimed, ‘and I can’t remember if I enjoyed it, and that’s the annoying bit, apart from the soreness.’

  ‘Me too. I won’t be able to water in a straight line for days. They did what they thought they had to do in order to keep their group going, I suppose, but I wish we had had a little more say in the matter.’

  Moss looked thoughtful for a moment or so, before saying,

  ‘I haven’t seen any males at all since we’ve been here, do you think there are any left? Maybe they only told us half the story of what happened.’

  At this point the older female came in, looking in a much happier mood than the previous day, and actually smiling.

  ‘You start your journey this day.’ she said.

  Not knowing if it was a question or a statement, Moss decided to take the initiative and said as firmly as he could,‘Yes, we do. We mustn’t delay any longer, but we may come back this way on our return journey.’

  The female couldn’t hide her extreme pleasure at this news and the possibility of future romps, and smiled even wider.

  ‘You eat, we take you to forest.’ and with that she left.

  A fresh platter of fruits and pods were produced, and the pair tucked in with gusto, later asking if they could take some of the food with them for their journey.

  They checked their carry belts to make sure that nothing was missing, loaded up with food, and made sure their water bags were full. A feeling of relief and excitement gave an extra buoyancy to their steps as they set off for the forest, accompanied by a small group of females who were going to show them the barrier which had been mentioned earlier.

  They were soon down by the water’s edge, and followed a winding path along the smoothly flowing river until the trees began to thin out to low scrub, and the pathway came to an abrupt end.

  Moss drew out his Greater Cutting Knife and cleared a new path for them, much to the amazement of the females who, by the look on their faces, had never seen such a knife before.

  As the new pathway grew in length, Kel looked up from the task of pushing the cleared scrub to one side and exclaimed

  ‘I see what the older female meant when she said we couldn’t go past the forest. Look up there.’

  Above them, the massive cliffs of a rift valley were closing in to a narrow vee shaped opening, the river speeding up as it threaded its way between the towering, almost vertical rock faces.

  ‘We can’t climb up there, but the water is getting through.’ said Moss, pausing to survey the scene. ‘Perhaps we could swim in the water and let it take us out to the other side.’

  ‘What about the Water Snapper?’ asked Kel, remembering his narrow escape. ‘It may return, and there are no banks for us to climb up.’

  A little more cutting and they had reached as far as they could go, the smooth black rock forming a barrier to their progress in the direction indicated by the Direction Pointer.

  As they rested on the river bank, a large log floated by, and Moss had an idea.

  ‘If we were to tie several of those logs together they should take our weight, and we could float down the waterway, and the Snapper wouldn’t be able to reach us.’

  Moss took charge and directed the females to collect the logs they would cut down from dead trees, and carry them to the waters edge.

  Many admiring glances came their way as they swung the razor sharp blades, the trees crashing down one after another, to be cut into suitable lengths later.

  Some vines were cut from a nearby clump, and the work of tying the logs into a platform began.

  The Greater Sun had almost climbed to its midday height by the time the raft was completed, and was much larger than they had initially intended. They took a break to eat and drink, and then explained again to the females why they must go on with their journey.

  It was plain to see that the females were disappointed at their imminent departure, but on mention of the fact that they may well return this way cheered them up a little, none of them realizing the impossibility of the two lads making their way upstream against the river flow.

  It took all the available hands present to push the log raft to the waters edge, and then slide it down the bank and into the water. A vine had been attached to the raft to prevent it from floating away, and several eager hands held the floating log mass close to the bank in a last desperate hope that they wouldn’t really go.

&
nbsp; Moss and Kel jumped onto the raft, called for the vine to be released, and using the long steering poles they had thoughtfully cut, pushed the craft out into deeper water.

  At the last possible moment, Kel’s companion of yesterday ran forward and leapt across the intervening gap, landing safely on the raft.

  ‘You can’t come with us,’ Moss shouted, struggling to hold the raft steady with his pole as the current took hold, ‘you are only a female, and this is a man’s journey.’

  ‘I with you now. I no go back, I no swim.’ she said smiling, and quickly untied one of the spare poles which had been tied down to the raft’s surface in case of emergencies.

  The departing cries of goodbye from the females on the bank soon faded as the trio poled the raft into the middle of the water flow, keeping it away from the rocky canyon walls which were looming up ahead.

  ‘Now that you are with us, and we can’t put you back on the bank, you must work as we do,’ Moss said.

  ‘I will, I will. I just as strong as you.’ she replied, smiling.

  ‘I’ll bet she is,’ thought Kel, ‘and just as smart, I wouldn’t wonder.’

  As they entered the gap between the towering cliffs, the raft gathered speed as the waterway narrowed, and they had their work cut out trying to keep it in the middle of the flow.

  Several times the raft drifted towards the sharp rocky edge of the gorge as the river turned and twisted its way through, and the female proved her worth as she bent to the pole and helped keep the raft on course.

  The Greater Sun began its long drift down towards the horizon, and the light was lessening a little as the team frantically poled their raft around yet another tortuous bend in the now darkening canyon.

  As they cleared the bend, the river opened out to nearly twice its normal width, and the flow slowed down accordingly. Ahead was a small beach of sand, and they poled their way towards it, longing to take a much needed rest from their exertions.

  The raft ground to a halt against the gently sloping bank of sand, and Kel jumped ashore to secure the vine to a nearby rock. If the raft drifted off now, they would be trapped here forever, as the cliffs above them were just as steep as those at the beginning of their journey through the gorge.

  ‘We may as well stay here for the night.’ Moss said, as he sat down on the soft sandy bank. ‘I doubt we’ll find a better place.’

  The food supplies were brought out, and they had their evening meal as the last rays of the Greater Sun lit up the sky in streaks of yellow and red, heralding a good day on the morrow.

  ‘We don’t know your name.’ said Kel, turning to their female companion.

  ‘I’m called Jaylec,’ she responded with her usual smile, ‘but I like Jay better. You call me Jay.’

  With little else to do, after they had made sure that the raft was still securely tied to the rock, they prepared to settle down for the night, Moss volunteering to take the first watch.

  Kel scooped out a depression in the soft sand and settled himself into it, curling up for sleep, but hardly had he closed his eyes when he felt another little body cuddle into his back, an arm slide around his chest, and he was held captive by his admirer.

  During the night, something large and sounding very angry thrashed about in the deep water just off shore, and Moss was thankful they hadn’t encountered it while they were afloat.

  While they were changing over shifts, a small shower of rocks crashed down from high up on the cliff face, fortunately missing them and landing in the water downstream.

  ‘Not so safe as it looks,’ commented Moss as he lay down to sleep, ‘I wonder what caused that?’

  Kel had no answer, so didn’t say anything as he strained his eyes in the pale light of the Lesser Sun, looking for movement high up in the rocks.

  Nothing further disturbed the travellers during the night, except the odd dream, one of which brought Moss out of his sleep and bounding to his feet before he knew what he had done. After a quick snack and a chuckle about the incident, he was peacefully back in his slumbers.

  The Greater Sun broke the horizon in a blaze of glory, lighting up the little wavelets on the river with tips of fire.

  The crew were already up, gathering their belongings and preparing to set out for the day’s journey downstream.

  A shadow passed overhead, momentarily blocking out the light from the rising sun, and they had a quick glimpse of something very large on leathery wings and equipped with a wicked set of taloned feet, glide down the rift between the cliffs and out of sight around the next bend. Seconds later, there was an agonizing scream which turned their blood to ice water. Something had been caught for breakfast, and was complaining bitterly about it.

  They looked at each other in dismay.

  ‘So far we haven’t seen anything like that, and I hoped we wouldn’t. We’ve only seen them in the forest back home, and that wasn’t very often, so we’ll have to be on the lookout for the Leather Wings, although there isn’t much we can do about it when we do see them, except hide.’ Moss anxiously looked up, but the sky was clear except for the rising sun.

  The raft was pushed out into deeper water, and Kel took a running jump to get on board as it left the sandy beach behind. They poled it out some way, but not into the middle of the river as they had done the day before in case they had to make a dash for the shore, not that there was much shore ahead, just sheer rocks, but it felt better that way.

  By using a pole as a depth gauge, they were able to keep in relatively shallow waters, hoping that the giant Water Snapper would be unable to follow them, but it was only a hope, not knowing how far inshore the creature could go.

  They passed through another very narrow section of the gorge, the water flow speeded up considerably, and nearly wrecked the raft on a rocky projection which they hadn’t seen until too late.

  It ripped out two of the logs on one end, and Jay lay full length holding on to the loosened logs until they reached calmer waters and were able to retie them into place with some spare vines they had thoughtful enough to bring.

  The water flow was now almost non-existent, so wide was the river at this point, and they had to use the poles to get any noticeable movement at all, and that meant keeping as near inshore as possible.

  It was during this muscle aching exercise, poling the raft along, that they noticed high up on the cliff, small figures running about on some ledges. The occasional dark hole indicated that a cave of some sort was present in the cliff face, and was probably the home of the cliff runners.

  All was well until a small shower of stones fell around them, and realizing the height from which they had come, and the force with which they would strike, Moss immediately gave orders to pole out a little further, so getting out of range of the stone throwers.

  This wasn’t as easily done as said, because the river was quite deep a short way out, and the poles failed to reach the bottom.

  Kel cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted up to the cliff runners, asking them to stop, but they didn’t, replying in strange words which none of them understood.

  ‘Nothing for it, just try to dodge them when you see them coming.’ was all Moss could offer as a defence against the onslaught.

  They were lucky, and no one was hit by the stones, although several landed harmlessly on the actual raft.

  Soon they were past the point where the ledges ran, and the throwers couldn’t go any further. The trio on the raft jumped up and down, making faces at the cliff runners and laughing as loudly as possible.

  ‘Hope we don’t have to pass this way again, or if we do, they have a very short memory.’ Kel said, a touch of joviality in his voice for the first time since they had left the sandy beach. ‘I wonder why they were so aggressive?’

  ‘Looking back at the cliff, I would think that they are trapped there, as I can’t see any way up to the top or down to the water. Food and water must be a bit of a problem for them, and I don’t suppose they are very happy about that.’ Moss offered a
s an explanation.

  The midday meal was taken as they poled their way along, and by mid afternoon it was evident that the river was going to narrow down again. The current became turbulent, and the rocky cliffs closed in like two giant shields to shut off some of the light from the Greater Sun, making it a gloomy part of the journey.

  Moss was looking for a safe place to stop for a break in their journey when they rounded a bend and were confronted by a sheer rock wall.

  The river seemed to enter a large opening in the rock face, and before they could do anything about it, the raft picked up speed and was on its way towards the hole.

  ‘Get down flat and hold onto anything you can.’ yelled Kel, throwing himself down. ‘There’s nothing we can do about it, just hold onto the bindings and hope the river goes straight through whatever this place is.’

  The raft was fairly racing along now, luckily in the middle of the river, and as they entered the vast hole in the cliff the light suddenly went, and they were alone in the darkness with only the sound of the water rushing along beneath.

  Several times the raft hit the side of the tunnel as it careered along, nearly spilling its human cargo overboard, but they managed to hang onto the binding vines as the craft twisted and turned in the turbulence.

  As the noise of the rushing water subsided a little, and the raft ceased to bob about quite so much, Kel shouted out,

  ‘Are you two still there?’

  ‘Only just.’ the deeper voice of Moss replied.

  ‘Me here too.’ but it was tinged with fear.

  ‘I think we’re almost out of the hole, I can see some light ahead.’ called Kel, but he was mistaken.

  The light was coming from something growing on the walls of the huge tunnel, and hanging down from the roof and walls were a countless number of thread like tendrils, some reaching the level of the water.

  ‘Oh no,’ exclaimed Moss, who had risen to his knees, ‘over the side and hang on, they look like Whip Vines’.

  All three slipped over the edge of the now slowly moving raft just in time, as the first of the vines brushed across the logs. There were several jerks as the vines having contacted something, and not knowing any better, tried to grab the raft as a possible source of food.