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  We didn’t see our scouts that night or the next, but the night after that we met them on the trail in late afternoon. The beasts were less than two removes away, moving slowly. We would rest for the night and fall upon them at dawn.

  In the night the wind changed. I was awake at once, but Heckt’er was already going from blanket to blanket, quietly shaking the others awake. It was too late to move out of the path of the wind; we were too close. The youths would have to strike at once, before the harrunt’hs caught our scent and stampeded. We ran silent and intent between the trees, our eyes adjusting already to what little light filtered down from the starry sky above.

  We heard the snorting and stamping before we saw them. The older ones were circling through the trees, nipping awake young adults and yearlings, gathering them close, heading east. The herd was small, two or three dozen at most. Our youths split into their triads, racing silently toward the milling beasts. Holding their knives between their teeth they moved in circles as the beasts were doing, choosing their prey. Our nearness stirred the herd to greater fear, black shapes in the black night between tall, black trees.

  Dyit’er led Heckt’er and Dur’um in their triad. He motioned them toward a young harrunt’h looking belligerently about as though deciding which way to run. Heckt’er and Dyit’er circled behind the beast while Dur’um pulled himself into the tree he had indicated and moved along its lower branches.

  Suddenly an eerie whistle pierced the night and every beast took up the shrill cry until the forest rang with their alarm. The harrunt’hs stampeded, following the summons of their lead buck. The ground trembled under their hooves, branches lashing and snapping in the path of their flight.

  The young harrunt’h whirled straight toward Heckt’er and Dyit’er. They leaped into its path, shouting and waving their arms. Its eyes widened, ringed in white terror, nostrils flared, as it pounded toward them. They stood their ground, faces pale in the night as they waved and shouted, knives ready and claws extended. We parents held our breath while the forest thundered with the rush of the huge beasts. At last the harrunt’h swerved, heading under the tree where Dur’um waited.

  Dur’um dropped from the branches onto its back, sinking his claws into its neck. It bucked, rising and pawing the air with its hooves while it whirled in a frenzied circle. The side of its neck smashed into Dur’um’s forehead. Caught off guard, nearly stunned, he let his knife fall.

  Heckt’er and Dyit’er rushed forward with their knives but the flaying hooves kept them at a distance. Without warning, the buck threw itself sideways into the wide trunk of a ugappa and Dur’um leaped from its back barely in time to avoid being crushed. I watched him roll aside, then ahead I saw Heckt’er crouch to leap astride the buck when it raced by him. He was in a good position to do so, and it was bleeding, winded and running slowly enough that I knew he could mount it if his balance held. My youngling would bring it down alone on his first hunt!

  It had almost reached him when Dur’um cried out. He lay on the ground between the trunks of two trees, holding his left leg. A large harrunt’h bore down on him, crazed with fear. Dur’um was too low to the ground to turn its path, it would trample him as it would a mound of dirt. Prakt’um was already racing toward his child, silent and desperate, but we were too far away. I looked back at Heckt’er in the moment that he made his choice.

  Turning away from the buck, he raced to stand over Dur’um, waving his arms at the oncoming harrunt’h and yelling. It was too close to turn; the huge beast was almost upon them!

  “Heckt’er!” His name caught in my throat, tore free, was lost in the screams of the beasts and their thundering hooves. I willed him to leap aside, to save himself.

  He never flinched, not even in the last moment when the harrunt’h finally swerved, smashing against the tree beside him with such force it cracked, splitting in two as the harrunt’h swept around it.

  A few moments later Prakt’um reached them. He lifted Dur’um in his arms, and then I was beside Heckt’er. He looked up at me. When I stood speechless before him, he hung his head.

  “I lost the prey,” he said.

  I wanted to touch him, draw him against me. I wanted to fall to my knees and weep. I wanted to praise him for his courage and shake him and shake him for the risk he had taken.

  “Two dead hunters will not feed our people,” I said.

  ***

  Dawn was breaking as we returned to camp. Only one group of young hunters had brought down their prey. Another triad had wounded theirs. They’d started to follow its trail but their parents called them back.

  “Let it try to keep up with the herd,” a parent was explaining when we arrived, “until it falls from blood loss. If you pursue it now, it’ll run for denser cover, and be that much harder to kill. In a few days we’ll catch up with it.”

  We congratulated the successful triad, rolling up our sleeping mats while they skinned and butchered their kill to carry back to the city. We ate together the wild, juicy meat, cooking extra to take with us. The hot scent of harrunt’h blood and the savory odor of its flesh stayed with us long after we left the camp behind.

  There were only twelve of us now, two triads of younglings with their parents. The triad that was tracking their wounded prey had followed the harrunt’h herd, but we continued traveling north. Better to find a new herd that wasn’t spooked.

  The next day I heard the Symamt’h River, which began in the distant mountains and ran southward through the grasslands. At the edge of the forest it curved east between the tree line and the grasses, then twisted back southward, skirted the edge of the eastern wetlands, and continued flowing south all the way down to the sea. By late afternoon we were walking close to a section of it that veered in toward us. I was near the head of our group when I heard Timb’il cry out, pointing.

  “There can’t be liapt’hs here,” Cann’an snapped in disgust as he climbed the slight knoll to where Timb’il stood staring at the Symamt’h through a break in the trees. The river ran fast and cold, five times as wide as its tributary, the Symba, which flowed into our peninsula. In the middle of the vast river I was shocked to see the long, sinuous shape of a liapt’h, twisting through the water. Cann’an was silent as the rest of us gathered around. The mud-green lizard opened wide its long jaws to snap at a passing bird and the sun glinted off double rows of wicked, knife-sharp teeth.

  “We should go back,” Timb’il said. When no one answered, he continued, “There’s something wrong and we all know it: the forest so silent, the game so scarce and now a liapt’h leaving the wetlands to swim in the Symamt’h!”

  “So we won’t go swimming,” I said quickly, before his fear affected the others. I had never returned empty-handed from a hunt. I caught Heckt’er looking at me and I grinned to reassure him. He would have his hunt. “I’ve hunted the wetlands before. Liapt’hs don’t frighten me.”

  Cann’an looked at me darkly and rose to the bait. “No one is frightened!” he snapped. “We’ll continue.”

  “It isn’t just the liapt’hs,” Timb’il protested, “it’s the whole forest. Listen!” he paused, looking around uneasily. “Not a single bird is singing.”

  For a moment my own scales tingled, then I laughed. It came out somewhat forced but broke the tension.

  “You have too much imagination, Timb’il,” I said. “We’re on a youth hunt, don’t forget. You can’t expect youngsters to be as quiet as experienced trackers. Our noisy passage frightens the birds to silence and then their timid silence frightens you.”

  Timb’il flushed. The others looked away, turning to Prakt’um as leader of the expedition. He hesitated, looking at the liapt’h, then down at the hopeful youths.

  “Timb’il is right, the birds are too quiet,” he said, “but it may be because of us, as Mant’er says. We’ll continue with caution.”

  He wants to leave, I realized, and felt again that ominous tingle down the long ridge of my spine. Something was wrong in the forest and in the river. I
knew it. But I told myself, we are above it. We are outside the circle of prey and predator. We are Ghen. Prakt’um had deferred to my argument, for I was the better hunter, but he sensed that Timb’il was right.

  There were no sadu’hs to be seen at all, now. It was good that we’d brought harrunt’h meat with us. Nor was there any birdsong to cheer us. The only sound was the rustle of mangarr’hs in the trees above. We’d grown accustomed to it and ignored them as we marched. Heckt’er walked beside Bab’in as though guarding the smaller youth. Dur’um walked with them, still limping from his fall. Bab’in’s enthusiasm made him impulsive and Heckt’er saw that he stayed with the group.

  Why would Heckt’er befriend such a scatterbrain? Despite his eagerness, Bab’in would never make a good hunter. His parent, Mart’in, was too good-natured to discipline him properly.

  The sun was already setting when we stopped to make camp. Bab’in scampered up a tall ugappa for the evening lookout. We were stretching after our day’s trek, laying out our sleeping mats. Several of the youths were gathering twigs and branches for our fire. Mart’in waited near the tree his youngling had ascended.

  He had just bent down to open his pack when we heard a savage growling and Bab’in’s scream, sudden and full of terror, and just as suddenly ended. We stood shock-still, unbreathing for one instant, listening to the snarl and whine of feeding mangarr’hs and the savage movement of branches high above us. With a cry, Mart’in sprang up the tree, climbing frantically, while the rest of us rushed over.

  Prakt’um was already climbing after him. I ordered the youths to stay together at a distance and had Timb’il guard them. Already the sway and slap of branches in the treetops overhead was spreading out. I directed the other adults up into a wide circle of trees, wishing I could see through the thick covering of leaves, wishing that Bab’in would call out again. A shot rang out above me as I climbed and I saw a mangarr’h fall to the ground.

  “Knives!” I screamed. We were all in the treetops now, hidden from each other, following the growls of feeding beasts. I could hardly believe we were fighting mangarr’hs! Even when I myself saw several tearing into Bab’in’s severed hand, even as I swung my knife and watched them drop it and fall upon their wounded kin instead, even while I slashed at them again and again, I couldn’t believe it was real.

  We killed at least two dozen. If they had been less desperate in their feeding, most would have escaped. They were dark in the dark treetops and we were in the grip of a nightmare, slowed by disbelief. When we climbed down, the sight of Bab’in’s small body torn apart, half-eaten, was unbearable. We wrapped him in his sleeping mat and built the fire high, cremating him at once.

  No words were spoken. We were all in shock, shivering despite the mild evening and the blazing fire. When it burned down, we gathered his bones and ashes and presented them to Mart’in, bowing low with our claws retracted and our backs to the darkness beyond.

  We did not bow long, baring our backs. Mangarr’h hunt in pairs, never in packs. Mangarr’h do not attack Ghen. Mangarr’h don’t fight unless they are trapped. Their strange compulsion might be explained by the scarcity of birds and sadu’hs, but even so we were shaken as much by the manner of Bab’in’s death as by its occurrence.

  Death, from creatures no bigger than my arm! Creatures we considered pests, dangerous only to fish and birds and sadu’hs! The rhythm of the hunt was shattered, altered beyond recognition. The rules had shifted and all our acumen seemed suddenly uncertain.

  ***

  “I’m taking him back,” Mart’in said as we lay unsleeping in the darkness. He hadn’t spoken all evening and his voice was scarcely recognizable.

  “Of course,” Prakt’um said after a moment. “Dur’um and I will accompany you.” Dur’um’s blanket twitched in protest.

  “We should all go,” Timb’il’s voice was high, nervous. I waited for Prakt’um to reply.

  “We can’t,” I said finally.

  “You’re crazy!” Timb’il cried. “I don’t care if we go back without a harrunt’h. You’re going to get us all—” he broke off. Timb’il was a pathetic creature. I had to breathe deeply to keep the disgust from my voice when I answered him.

  “We don’t have enough provisions to get us all back home. We have to hunt.”

  “We could eat berries and cappa fruit.”

  I was speechless. Ghen travel hungry through the forest? Scrounging to keep from starving in our own forest? Why didn’t Prakt’um speak up? I reminded myself that Timb’il was in shock, that we all were. I could hear the sound of muffled weeping from one of the youths.

  “What happened to Bab’in is terrible.” I paused at the inadequacy of the word, and took a breath. “But it won’t happen again. We’re not going home to say we’re afraid of mangarr’hs!”

  “Who’s afraid of mangarr’hs?” Cann’an demanded.

  “You are, if you go back before your youngling’s a hunter.”

  “You’re saying I’m a coward?”

  “He’s saying we all are,” Timb’il cried. “I tell you, I’m not staying to satisfy his ego!”

  “Timb’il, you take Sark’il and go with Mart’in,” Prakt’um said, trying to calm us.

  “No, Prakt’um,” Piet’er’s voice was firm. “You want to go because of Dur’um. And you’re right.”

  “I’m okay. I want to stay,” Dur’um mumbled.

  “You’ve been limping ever since you fell from the harrunt’h’s back. You can’t hunt like that, it puts the rest of your triad in danger.”

  “Then we should all go,” Timb’il repeated stubbornly.

  “Only Prakt’um and Dur’um should go,” I said. “The rest of us are needed for the hunt.”

  “Who made you the leader of this hunt?” Cann’an demanded.

  “I do,” said Prakt’um. “Mant’er’s the leader when I go. We’ve argued enough. I’ve decided.”

  ***

  Two days after they left, Dam’an found signs of a herd of harrunt’hs. Cann’an was mollified and Timb’il had no one left to grumble to. I suspected that once again Heckt’er had seen the trail first, for he stepped aside and let Dam’an go ahead just before Dam’an called out. But this time I was glad that Heckt’er had remained silent. Or I would have been, except that he was too quiet. We were all subdued, but Heckt’er most of all.

  “I should have known what the mangarr’hs would do,” he said when I questioned him.

  “How could you have known? Mangarr’hs don’t behave that way!” I replied.

  “I should have been able to make myself think like a mangarr’h. Even like one of these.”

  I opened my mouth to tell him that that was impossible, and then I remembered finding him deep in the river on the Bria farm. It occurred to me that I’d never heard Heckt’er overstate his abilities.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I said at last, looking at my youngling as though for the first time.

  ***

  We spent seven days tracking the harrunt’hs, although their trail as we followed it was only a few days old. They were moving fast, almost as fast as we pursued.

  What’s making them hurry? I wondered uneasily, but for all my skill, I could detect nothing that would alarm a harrunt’h. Except for us, but we were downwind of them and too far behind. They were heading out of the forest toward the grasslands, long before stillseason was due. Already we were almost at the edge of the woods. I pushed us to greater speed, wanting to finish the hunt quickly and get home.

  “No youth hunt has ever come this far,” Piet’er said to me quietly, watching his youngling collect twigs for our evening fire. “And yet we’ve seen only one small herd of harrunt’hs.”

  “They’ve gone to the grasslands,” I said, deliberately keeping my voice casual, “as the sadu’hs went early to their burrows. Stillseason will be early this year.”

  “No.” Cann’an had come over in time to hear my reply. “Something is driving the game from our forests.”

  “I se
e no evidence of that.”

  “Something dangerous is hunting our forests,” Timb’il broke in.

  “That’s absurd,” I said coldly. “What signs have you found of this ‘something’? What scent have you smelled? What sounds have you heard?” When they were silent I said, “Do you think if there were anything here, I wouldn’t know of it?”

  “Perhaps we haven’t crossed its trail.”

  “An early stillseason doesn’t leave a trail, except in the behavior of birds and beasts.”

  “Stillseason is no time for youth hunts,” Piet’er said, seeking a compromise.

  “You’re right.” I touched my breath in agreement. “We’ll hunt the herd we’re following, then return home at once.”

  “What if our younglings miss?” Timb’il asked.

  “We should hunt also,” Piet’er said. “We can carry two carcasses easily, and that way be sure of one to feed our trip home.”

  To calm them I agreed. “But let the youths make their move first,” I suggested. The others nodded. We were, after all, all parents. We wanted to see our offspring become hunters.

  The ugappas thinned to clusters of cappas and finally to grasses. The wide Symamt’h twisted back across our path and on its distant shore the grasslands stretched away to the horizon where we could just make out the peaks of the mountains, gray blue against sky blue.

  The grasses were tall, reaching as high as our chests. They were golden in the sun, but something in their sinuous movement, in their sly rustle, struck me as threatening, malevolent. I shook off the feeling, angry with Timb’il for filling me with his phantoms. It was only the wind that moved these grasses, only the wind that shook a sound like moaning out of them.

  The wind blew away from us, carrying our scent toward the distant mountains. Again I shivered, as though there were something out there that should not know of us. Dyit’er pointed westward across the curving Symamt’h and there was the herd we’d been tracking, feeding peacefully upon the grasses perhaps three days away. The sight calmed us all, and I was disgusted with my earlier misgivings. Too much imagination, distracting me from the hunt. A mere youth had sighted our game ahead of me.