Catechist - A Triumph Of Souls Part 13

"Yes." Ehomba too spared a last, lingering glance for the immense old oak as he followed his frantic companion back into camp at a more leisurely pace.

The incident was not discussed as they ate, but everyone watched the surrounding woods a little more closely, paid a bit more attention to the distant rustlings and rattlings of the nocturnal forest creatures. The fish was delicious, not badly burned as Simna had feared, but only thoroughly cooked. As Ehomba had surmised, the addition of broiled mushrooms to the meal and wild oranges for dessert was an excellent complement to the main course. Even Ahlitah tried a little of everything, much to the surprise of both his human companions.

"I'm always open to new experiences," he told them as he spit out orange peel. "That's one I won't have to open myself to again. Paugh!" Nothing wrinkles in disgust, Ehomba mused, quite so exhaustively as the face of a displeased cat.

With Hunkapa Aub agreeing to take the first watch, the others retired, the two men to their blankets and the black litah to the mat of leaves and gra.s.s he had a.s.sembled with his paws. Ehomba drifted off with one hand feeling gingerly of his throat and the strip of cloth that now separated it from the beaded necklaces he wore.

As he slid into sleep, his thoughts drifted into dream-but it was most unlike any normal dream, or even a normal nightmare.

He was running, running hard, but on all fours.Bushes and gra.s.s sped past at an astonishing rate of speed. Though he could feel the ground beneath his feet and therefore knew he was not flying, with each prodigious stride he left it below him for an impossibly long time.

Startled by his sudden appearance, something with wide eyes looked up to encounter his gaze. Utterly paralyzed by the unexpected eye contact, it stood frozen for an instant and then flashed by as he raced past. A rabbit, too small and scrawny to bother with. Little more than a mouthful or three, certainly not enough to satiate the voluminous hunger that burned in his belly. He needed, and was after, bigger prey.

When he exploded from the high gra.s.s the herd panicked. Though it meant he would have to exert himself a little more to make a kill, he was exhilarated by the fear his appearance had incited. Eland and elk bolted in every direction, eyes rolling with fright, tongues lolling from open mouths. Impala and syndyoceros crashed into one another and bounded away wildly as they sought the safety of the herd that had not yet re-formed.

In the confusion Ehomba had an entire minute to single out a victim: more than enough time. Settling on an old bull elk, he accelerated to maximum speed. The elk never had a chance. Ehomba hit it head-on, his open jaws slamming into the hairy throat and locking like a vise. The elk tried to lower its head in order to bring its ma.s.sive horns to bear on its attacker, but, already caught and held in a death grip, it had no real chance to defend itself.

Blood flowed into and through Ehomba's jaws, exciting every nerve and sensation in his body. Unable to fight, the elk tried to run. His a.s.sailant's weight made sustained flight impossible. The prey sank to its knees, then its belly, and finally went limp, suffocated by the tightening of its attacker's jaws.

Ehomba held on for another several minutes until he was sure death had arrived. Then, crouching alongside the body, one paw placed possessively on the carca.s.s, he began to eat. Blood and muscle, organs and bone, all vanished into ma.s.sive, efficient jaws. Lingering over the kill, he ate intermittently for the rest of the afternoon and on into early evening. Only then did he rise and move away, belly dragging low, back into the high gra.s.s. There he found the stream, and drank for long minutes.

Locating a small clearing, he lay down heavily in the shade of a cl.u.s.ter of yellow-blooming hopak trees and began to groom himself. It was impossible to get all the blood off his muzzle no matter how many times he licked a paw and ran it across his face, but he made a start. The rest of the stain would come out later, following repeated washings. Glutted and content, he slumped down on his side and fell into a sleep any pa.s.sing traveler might easily have mistaken for death. But despite his seeming somnolence, the sound of a snapping twig would be enough to rouse him instantly. In the depth of his deep sleep, one foot kicked out repeatedly.

Wrapped in his blanket beside the campfire, Ehomba's left leg twitched restively.

Ahlitah was dizzy.Not from chasing his tail, which when absolutely convinced no one and nothing else was watching he would occasionally do to relieve unrelenting boredom, but from trying to maintain an alien and utterly unaccustomed posture. With each step he took, no matter how short and cautious, he was convinced, absolutely certain, that he was going to fall over. Yet despite his fear and misgivings, he did not.

By all that ran and crawled and swam and flew, what had happened to his other pair of legs?

And his eyes. And his ears, and his nose! Though he could see adequately, the acuity of vision he usually enjoyed had been replaced by a pale, fuzzy imitation of normal sight. Objects located more than a short distance away were unidentifiable. Anything at a reasonable distance blended invisibly into the landscape or the horizon. Furthermore, it was as if he were gazing through a steady downpour. Colors were washed out or absent entirely. It was horrible: He felt half blinded.

Nothing was audible except that which was in his immediate vicinity. The familiar panoply of distant sounds, the constant susurration of animate life, was entirely absent. It was as if the world had suddenly gone silent. There were noises and the echoes of movement close by, but nothing else. No complaining insects, no scuttling lizards or slithering snakes, no chirping birds. The wing-beats of dragonets no longer whispered in his ears, and the delectable murmur of prey animals cropping gra.s.s was sorely wanting.

As for the wonderful universe of scents that normally filled his nostrils, its absence const.i.tuted a kind of olfactory blindness that made his severely impacted vision that much worse. It was a struggle, a strain, a surreal effort to smell anything at all. What odors he was able to identify were so h.o.m.ogenized it hardly seemed worth the effort to inhale.

Simply keeping his ridiculous body from falling down demanded a preposterous share of his considerably reduced energy. And yet he was conscious of the fact that, though shorter, it was a much better body than many of those that were in motion around him. Feeling greatly enfeebled and not knowing what else to do, he instinctively sought shelter.

A nearby enclosure seemed to promise privacy if not enlightenment. Given his severely diminished capacity for perceiving the world around him, it was hardly surprising that he should be wrong about this, too. The edifice was not empty.

Ordinarily he would have attacked and killed the pair of two-legged young females that came running toward him. For reasons unknown and inexplicable, he did not. Instead, he allowed them to carry out a mock attack on his person; striking him about the chest and arms, gamboling around his middle, and prattling inanities into his ears. They made muted howling noises. The younger, a lithesome female not long past the cusp of p.u.b.erty, was only slightly more respectful of his person than her elder. The air of commingled antic.i.p.ation and affection they projected was oddly unnerving, as if it were forced rather than natural. Their strongest efforts to pull him farther into the enclosure notwithstanding, they struck him as wretchedly weak.

So did the third female figure that appeared from another part of the enclosure to throw both fore and hind legs around him. To his astonishment and disgust, instead of extending her tongue to lick his face by way of greeting, she thrust her tongue deeply into his mouth. So startled was he by this unexpected, unnatural act that he forgot to bite it. She, however, was not averse to nibbling on his ear. At least something about the otherwise inane interaction between himself and the unknown female made sense!

Most unexpectedly, given the extreme distaste and inner turmoil his extraordinary situation had brought about, he felt the heat rising in his loins. Disturbed and bewildered, he did not bother to resist as the female led him to another, darker portion of the enclosure. At least, he thought with relief, she had dismissed her irritating, overly exuberant predecessors.

When he realized what she had in mind, he knew only one way to react. Evidently, this did not displease her. Quite to the contrary. The mechanics of the act as well as its immediate consequences were surprisingly conventional, a touch of familiarity in alien surroundings for which he was grateful. After they both rested awhile, he was prepared to repeat the process. Again, the female had no objection.

By the fourth time, she was regarding him with unabashed awe. By the fifth, with hesitancy. When he ventured to initiate a sixth reiteration with as much enthusiasm as the first, she retreated precipitously from the darkened portion of the enclosure. Her reaction only confused him further. As was typical of his kind, he was prepared to continue for the rest of the day and far on into the night. Clearly she was not.

His head hurt. Agitated and bemused, he stumbled back to the enclosure's entrance. A pair of very large two-legged males were waiting for him there. They bore weapons and grim expressions. Standing behind them, the female with whom he had recently consorted appeared in a state of extreme agitation, pointing and jabbering in his direction. The looks on the faces of the two armed males grew ominous.

If there was one thing he was in no mood to tolerate at that moment, it was the absurd verbalizations and oral circ.u.mlocutions of a brace of irritable bipeds. To let them know how he was feeling, he voiced a warning roar. The effect was salutary. The fur stood up on their heads, their eyes grew as big as emu eggs, and they turned and bolted in the opposite direction as fast as their hind legs would carry them, flinging their weapons aside while screaming at the top of their lungs. From other enclosures, startled faces peered out in search of the source of the sound. Feeling much better about things, he strode out of the bordello. Though he had neglected to pay, no one dared to confront him.

Lying well away from the campfire, Ahlitah smacked his lips as he rolled over onto his back.

Simna frowned as he entered the city.The golden towers, the marble archways, the teeming crowds of barkers and bazaaris, the fragrant smells of fine cooking-all were absent. In their place were simple houses of stone and wood and thatch. In lieu of richly garbed horses and moas, dogs and rodent-hunting cats roamed the streets. Where he normally would have expected to see paving stones of granite there was only packed earth.

A few women tracked his progress as he advanced. Some were ancient, others not yet old enough to understand. Those of young and middle age were tall, proud, and comely, with elegant necks and straight backs, full b.r.e.a.s.t.s and curving backsides. He grinned at them and a few smiled back, though there was a hesitancy in their expressions that bruised his ego.

Where was he? Was this not the entrance to Vharuphan the Radiant, renowned capital of the Dhashtari Emperors? Where were the great domes of polished green verdite and the fine gilded latticework famed near and far across half a continent? The nearest thing he saw to fine latticework was a st.u.r.dily constructed well. As for domes, there was one of brick for firing pottery, and it was not habitable.

As he wandered in a daze something struck him in the legs. Looking down, he saw a young girl clinging to him and beaming delightedly, her sweet innocent features blushing with love. As he struggled weakly to disengage himself from her pythonic embrace, a young man stepped down from the porch of a nearby house and approached. In one hand he carried a spear suitable in size and weight for someone no longer a child but not yet an adult. It was more than toy, less than weapon. Bowing low, he then put a hand on Simna's arm and smiled, revealing a blaze of perfect white teeth.

Stunned and not knowing what else to do or where to go, Simna allowed himself to be led by hand and arm up the steps of the porch and into the house. In a back room an astoundingly handsome woman stood before a stone counter, using knives of differing size and heft to slice and butcher what remained of a human hindquarter. When Simna made gagging sounds, she turned. A conflagration of a smile spread across her face, making her appear more beautiful than ever and somewhat minimizing the effect of the bloodstains that spotted her ap.r.o.n and overblouse. The ensuing kiss she bestowed upon him almost, but not quite, allowed him to overlook the import of the three harrowing words she spoke to him.

"Welcome home-husband."

Simna ibn Sind woke up screaming.

The sounds of his yelling and thrashing about startled his companions to wakefulness. This included Hunkapa Aub, who, having never been relieved of his watch, had fallen asleep where he sat. Around the dying embers of the campfire the forest was silent, and night still held sway over the world.

Ehomba rushed to his friend's side. "Simna, what is wrong? Is there anything I can do?" Nearby, Hunkapa Aub was still trying to shake the sleep webs from his brain while the black litah looked on unblinkingly.

"Anything you can ... ?" The swordsman looked up at his rangy companion. "Yes, by Guquaquo. If you ever hear me making noises like that in my sleep ever again, wake me instantly." Putting both hands to his head, he stared blankly at the corpse of the campfire. "Hoy, what a nightmare! I-I was domesticated!"

His expression twisting, Ehomba stood up and stepped back. "Is that all?"

Simna fixed the herdsman with a look of utmost seriousness. "Bruther, every man has his own fears. I do not mock yours. Grant me the same courtesy."

Ehomba nodded soberly. "You are right, my friend. I apologize." His expression tightened slightly. "I am curious, for I also had a most peculiar dream. I had four legs and the keenest imaginable senses, and was hunting."

"And I," Ahlitah put in with a reverberating growl, "walked on two legs like humans, and visited a place where intercourse was expected to be paid for with human money."

It was left, unsurprisingly, for Ehomba to sort out what must have taken place.

"I do not know what happened, or how, but it seems that some unknown mechanism has caused our dreams to slip from one individual to the next." He nodded at the swordsman. "You got my dream, Simna." His gaze shifted to the intent big cat. "I dreamed Ahlitah's dream. And he must have suffered through yours."

The swordsman nodded vigorously. "Hoy, that's crazy, but crazy logic is logic still. I certainly ..." His expression twisted. "Wait a minute. What do you mean, 'suffered'?" He turned sharply to the watching litah. "Did my dream then cause you suffering?"

"Beyond doubt," the big cat replied. "I dare say you would have enjoyed it."

"Cursed unfair," the stocky warrior grumbled. "Every man-and cat-should keep to their own dreaming. Who asked you to s.n.a.t.c.h mine?"

"Believe me," Ahlitah replied, "if I had been allowed any choice in the matter, I would have opted instead for the dream of the nearest rodent. At least in such a dream I would have had the proper number of legs."

"Hoy, that's no given because-"

Ehomba cut him off. "Hunkapa Aub; you were asleep when Simna's nightmare woke us all. What did you dream?"

Enormous s.h.a.ggy shoulders heaved, framing a look of utter ingenuousness. "Hunkapa not dream, Etjole.

Sleep soundly."

Simna uttered a rude noise. "The slumber of the dumber. In ignorance there is purity."

"We must take care in the future." A thoughtful Ehomba gazed into the last dying embers of the campfire. "It could be dangerous for one to dream too often the dreams of another, be it man or beast."

They sat awhile together, discussing the remarkable occurrence. Eventually, fatigue overcame concern and they retired once more, this time to sleep the sleep of vacuity that refreshes the mind. In the morning they were rejuvenated-and much relieved. In the future they resolved to monitor their own sleep as well as that of one another more closely, the better to prevent a recurrence of the unfortunate slippage of the night before.

They resolved also to eat no more mushrooms gathered from this particular forest, no matter how nourishing or tasty they looked.

XII.

Very soon they no longer had to worry about the unknown properties of forest mushrooms of any variety, because those delightful but often mysterious edible fungi soon vanished, along with the last remnants of the forest itself.

They did not lose the trees entirely, but instead of dense woods or even isolated thickets, individual boles grew in isolated hollows or followed the course of the occasional stream. Otherwise, the ground was covered with a tall yellow-green gra.s.s that came up to Simna's hips. They had traveled through worse before, but it still would have made for slow going if not for Hunkapa Aub. With his thick coat of hair to protect him from cuts and scratches, he was virtually immune to stickers and sharp-edged gra.s.ses.

Following him as he plowed a path westward, they made steady progress.

The presence of many small creeks and streams meant they did not have to burden themselves with full bags of water, and the shade their gullies supplied provided a welcome respite at mealtimes and at night.

After sundown, tiny covert creatures ringed each campsite with querulous cheeping sounds. Whenever one of the travelers attempted to locate the source of these gentle fanfares, they quickly evaporated into the surrounding gra.s.s. Whether animal, insect, or wee folk of the prairie, their true nature remained shrouded in mystery. Whatever they were, Ehomba decided, they were curious but not hostile.

Monstrous bison ranged the gra.s.sland, browsers larger than any Simna or Ehomba had ever seen. The travelers gave these hulky dark brown herbivores a wide berth. Ahlitah had to be restrained from testing his skills against such tempting, oversized game.

"There is no need," Ehomba argued with the big cat as they traipsed along in Hunkapa Aub's wake.

"There is plenty of smaller game. What would be the point of risking your well-being to bring one of the beasts down?"

"To prove that I could do it." Pa.s.sionate cat eyes looked up at the herdsman. The litah was panting in the heat of the day, thick black tongue lolling out one side of its mouth. "I know you don't understand.

It's a predator thing."

"I understand that if you were to spark a stampede with one of your attacks we could all be killed.

There is no shelter around here. I understand that if you go down beneath those great hooves and break a leg or two we would not be able to carry you."

"Man, you waste almost as much time worrying about things as you do wondering about them." Idly, Ahlitah slapped a big paw down on a field mouse that was unwisely attempting to cross behind Hunkapa and ahead of them. As it was not even big enough to chew, the cat swallowed the snack whole. "When it comes to matters mystical, I defer to you. When it comes to the business of killing, you should trust in me."

"Very well then," Ehomba argued. "Suppose you catch one and bring it down. What if it falls on you? I know how strong you are, but these grazers are huge. A dying one would be difficult to handle."

The great maned head nodded slowly. "That is a valid point. Even the most skilled hunter can fall victim to an accident."

"Besides," the herdsman went on, "what would we do with all that meat?"

"Ordinarily, I would live nearby until it was consumed." The litah snorted. "But since we are traveling on a human timetable, something that sensible would be out of the question." He was silent for a while, pacing easily alongside the herdsman. "Perhaps you are right. I'll find something else to kill."

"Thank you," Ehomba told him.

They camped that night in a depression where a small natural dam of rocks and debris had formed a narrow but deep pool. Not only did it provide them with a source of fresh water, but it also offered a chance to bathe and even, to a very limited degree, to swim. In this Ehomba took the lead, demonstrating once again the natural affinity for water that he had demonstrated on more than one occasion. Simna was a fine swimmer, while the black litah contented himself with rolling about in the shallows and following his immersion with a dust wallow. Unable to swim, Hunkapa Aub splashed about near the sh.o.r.e like a happy child.

It was therefore surprising that Ehomba woke not to the smell of damp vegetation or surroundings, but to an odor that was distinctly acrid.

Sitting up and pushing aside his blanket, he tilted his head slightly and sniffed. The sun was just considering the eastern horizon and none of his companions were yet awake. The smell was as familiar as it was distinctive, but from what direction was it coming? Of one thing and one thing only he was certain: Something in their vicinity was ablaze, and it wasn't the extinguished campfire.

Turning his head slowly to his right as he tried to locate the source of the odor, his gaze fell upon the black litah. As was its manner, it had awakened noiselessly. Now it was sitting back on its hindquarters, nose in the air, inhaling silently.

"You smell it also," Ehomba murmured.

The big cat nodded once. "Something burning. What, I can't guess yet."

"Can you tell where? Which direction?" Knowing how much more sensitive the big cat was to odors of every kind, Ehomba ceased his own efforts in favor of the litah's.

There was a pause, then Ahlitah lifted a forepaw and pointed northward. "That way. And coming closer, fast."

"Better get everyone up."

While he roused Simna, the black litah prodded Hunkapa Aub to wakefulness. By the time the swordsman was sufficiently conscious to communicate, the sharp, acrid smell of burning vegetation was thick in Ehomba's nostrils.

"Etjole?" Raising himself up on his elbows, Simna blinked once, then wrinkled his features. "Somebody making breakfast?"

Satisfied that his friend was awake, the herdsman straightened and gazed soberly to the north. "I think this gra.s.sland is on fire."

It came roaring toward them like a wall, advancing in a solid line from horizon to horizon. Orange flames framed in red fed hungrily on the dry gra.s.s. Their superhot crowns licked at the sky, rising fifty feet and more before trans.m.u.ting themselves into gouts of dense black smoke that obscured the clouds. Fleeing before the blaze was a rampaging menagerie of terrified creatures large and small. Broad-winged raptors and agile dragonets swooped and darted in waves before the flames, feasting on the insects and small game that were being driven from their hiding places by the onrushing conflagration.

Wind drove the fire forward. Where it advanced too rapidly for those in its path to escape, charred corpses littered the smoking, blackened earth in its wake.

"By Gapreth!" Suddenly wide awake, Simna was scrambling to gather up his gear. "The pool! Into the pool!"

"It is not wide enough," Ehomba countered. "The fire is too big. The flames will consume the gra.s.s on both sides and merge above the surface. They will suck the air from above the water, burn the lungs and suffocate anyone who is not fish or frog." Even as he spoke, the towering flames had advanced another ten feet nearer to the campsite. "Downstream! If we can find a pool too broad for the flames to overreach we will be safe."

Carrying everything, they fled from the onrushing blaze. Ahlitah flew effortlessly over rocks and gullies that slowed less nimble companions. Burdened by packs, lesser individuals than Ehomba and Simna would have fallen fatally behind. Hunkapa Aub was not graceful, but his expansive stride compensated for his occasional ungainliness.

As they fled, the stream continued to flow strongly alongside them, holding out the promise of a hoped-for refuge somewhere up ahead. When the ground showed signs of sloping slightly upward, Ehomba took heart. The slight alteration in terrain strongly suggested that the water that was now flowing downhill beside them would soon have to come to rest in a large, still body.

It was the tallest of the travelers who sang out moments later. "Hunkapa see water!"

"Another pond?" a gasping Simna inquired. He was panting hard not so much from running as from the rising temperature. In spite of their exertions, the wall of flame was gaining on them, and the fire gave no indication of tiring.