Ratha's Courage (27 page)

“Be grateful to Quiet Hunter. He counseled me just like you would.”

“Was it just Quiet Hunter?”

“No,” Ratha admitted. “Just after I gave him the order, I thought about the fire-slain hunters in the canyon. It was brief, just a flash, but it was enough to make me hesitate when he resisted my order.” She laid her nose on her paws. “It will be a lot harder for me to use the Red Tongue against others. Every time I think about it, I get that taste in my mouth, that smell up my nose, and I see how those burned bodies fell apart. And that dead hunter up that tree . . .” She shuddered. “I hope this doesn’t . . . cripple me as a leader.”

“I think you will just seek other alternatives.”

“What worries me is when there are none.”

“Then you will do what you must in spite of your feelings. I have faith in that,” he answered.

For a while Ratha was silent, staring at the fire. Her creature had such power to harm as well as help. “Did you find more grazing space?”

“Yes. Those rumbler-creatures are useful after all. They’ve eaten down the brush and knocked over trees so that new grass is growing. There will be enough to feed the herd, at least for a while.”

He sat down by the fire with her. She watched it shimmer in his emerald green eyes.

Ratha felt her voice lower into a growl.

“I wanted to kill their cubs, Thakur. Revenge for every Named litterling that New Singer slaughtered. I still do.”

Thakur was quiet.

“Revenge would feel good,” he said, surprising her. “My teeth ache to tear New Singer’s hide. I could even kill the hunter cubs, if you ordered. I saw how our litterlings died.”

“Then . . .”

“I can feel this way and not act on it,” he said. “I know that such revenge would destroy us. We value the light in the eyes. True-of-voice’s people have that light, even though it has taken a strange form.” His voice softened. “Retaliating by killing cubs will not only cost our lives, it will taint us and everything we are trying to be. I think you understand me, clan leader.”

This time it was Ratha who fell silent. At last she asked, “What are we trying to be?”

“I don’t know. I hope I get a chance to find out. And I hope that True-of-voice and New Singer get that chance as well.”

“It seems so easy for you to forgive them.”

He lay down beside her. “It may seem so, but I struggle as much as you do.”

“Is that another kind of courage?” Ratha asked him as he laid his head on his paws and let the fire reflect in his eyes.

“Yes,” he said. “It is.”

Chapter Nineteen

Ratha awoke the next morning, half believing that the return of the treelings and her creature was a dream until she felt Ratharee curled up against her flank and the fire’s warmth on her face. This refuge seemed like home, a thought that brought mixed feelings. No, home was clan ground. Home was also Thistle-chaser, Fessran, Bira, Drani, and the others. Ratha was determined to free them.

First, she would get word to the captives that most of their cubs were safe. By using whisker patterns, she knew now that the Named had lost four litterlings. Fessran had five and two were killed. Bira and Drani had each lost one. Though the mothers would mourn their slain young, they would take heart to hear that most of the cubs were still alive, cared for by fathers. It would give the captives what they needed most—hope.

Ratha thought about sending one of the Named with that message, but dared not. Any male who approached New Singer’s stronghold would be killed. She was the only female left among the exiled Named. Thakur would argue that losing her would imperil them even more, both as a leader and a breeding-age female.

Did he really see the truth, or was he blinded by his feelings for her? Despite his words, she knew he could lead. Even if Cherfan became leader, Thakur would counsel and guide him. As for breeding, she knew she wanted only Thakur. Yes, she could accept another male and had, but somehow her body, shocked by what had happened to her first litter and her first mate, had never produced any more cubs. So she might not be as important in those ways. If she could help the captives and free them, she might be serving a greater good.

She knew that she and her friends were fast running out of time. By the feelings in her body, she sensed that she and the other Named females were coming into heat. It could not be denied or delayed.

Ratha knew the captives would be fighting the overwhelming urge to mate as well as the encroaching renegade males.

My friends and my daughter won’t be able to resist. Or if they do, they will be killed.

She knew that Fessran would certainly resist, turning into a spitting slashing fury. Bira, who had younger cubs, might not come into heat, but she would certainly be scared. In the commotion, a male might try to mount her. And Thistle-chaser . . . the first heat should be a time of joy, not . . . . Ratha buried her nose in her paws, unable to bear the thought.

I wish we were like the witness Un-Named or the dreaming hunters who are spared anticipation or dread.

Ratha knew she couldn’t choose anyone else for the task. She was the one who had to go.

She flattened her fur, holding in her scent. She didn’t want the males to know how close she was to being in season. They didn’t need the distraction. She didn’t either.

She surprised Thakur by agreeing to lead the next herdbeast roundup. The more animals they could secure, the better, since it would deprive New Singer’s renegades of easy prey and give the surviving cubs more food.

Leaving Khushi and Mishanti to guard the cubs, Ratha assembled the Named males and led them down the trail.

She kept her tail up and her step lively to convince everyone that she had recovered from the self-recrimination that had threatened to paralyze her. They, in turn, seemed to gain confidence as well.

“We’ve been sneaking around, taking strays,” she told the group when they stopped briefly for a drink at the stream beside the rocky trail. “This time we are retaking what is ours. We’re going for the herdbeasts in the meadow.”

The resulting yowling cheers were subdued but intense, to avoid alerting the enemy. Eyes shone and teeth flashed.

Ratha’s party found the edge of clan ground open. New Singer hadn’t set guards on the perimeter. This at once encouraged and dismayed her. It would make recovering the herdbeasts easier. At the same time, was New Singer’s carelessness an indication that the renegades were already distracted by the mating fever?

“I’m glad to see you feeling better,” said Thakur at her shoulder. Startled, Ratha skipped away. A rush of warmth ran through her, centering deep in her belly, making her head spin.

Not now. Please, not now.

She caught Thakur’s puzzled look and his tentative sniff, but knew she couldn’t stop to explain. She ran ahead, choosing a path where the wind blew her scent away from the clan males. She could just imagine the herdbeast rescue turning into a mating frenzy, the clan males suddenly turning on one another, fighting over her.

Thankfully the clan males had spotted the herdbeasts and the meadow. Only a few sentries watched the herdbeasts. Before the guards could even roar, Cherfan, Mondir, Thakur and the others charged in and overwhelmed them.

“Quick, before they alert New Singer,” Ratha hissed. Cherfan and Thakur surged to the front, leading the herders. Surrounding the animals, they nipped harshly at hocks and rumps to get the beasts moving. Hooves started to thunder, dirt spattered, grass flew. The mass of three-horns and dapplebacks tightened and began to flow out of the meadow. This was no usual roundup but a near stampede.

Thakur was at his best, dodging and darting with incredible speed to keep the animals at the edge from splintering away. Cherfan’s and Mondir’s strength and ferocity made the animals in the rear sprint past those in the front. Ratha helped Thakur in keeping the herd packed while yowling orders to the herders and keeping an eye out for New Singer’s minions.

The enemy came, charging out from the direction of the fire-den, but they were slow and late. Most of the herd had poured out of the meadow and was streaming away over the borders of clan ground, urged on by the herders. Cherfan and Mondir threw themselves at the renegades, a note of joy in their roars telling Ratha that they welcomed this chance to strike back.

Cherfan reared, belting down his attackers as if swatting half-grown cubs. He stunned them with body slams powerful enough to knock over a tree. Mondir landed on backs, raked shoulders, slashed flanks. Even Bundi kick-raked a bigger opponent, reddening the other’s belly.

Ratha, impressed by the power of the attack, thought for an instant that her forces could sweep onto the fire-den itself and retake the heart of their land.

No, there were too many raiders. Even as New Singer’s wounded fled from the fray, more raced to join them.

Fearing that the tail end of the escaping herd would be cut off, and the Named with it, she yelled to the fighting males to leave their opponents and help Thakur break off the end of the herd. She and the herders turned the animals across the path of the oncoming enemy while the main mass of animals disappeared in a swirl of dust.

New Singer and his gang were furious at having lost the animals and launched themselves at the clan males, but the Named had already sheltered themselves behind a wall of galloping three-horns, stripers, and dapplebacks.

Throwing their heads and arching their necks, the animals shattered the front of the renegade attack. Enemy squalls choked into silence as several renegades fell under trampling hooves.

Following the path made by the herdbeasts, the Named streaked through and ran after their animals. Seeing the results of turning the herd itself into a weapon, Ratha thought again of carrying the attack to the fire-den and rescuing the captives. If she could, she would spare herself the task of doing it alone. Weighing the chances of succeeding, she knew she didn’t have enough animals or enough herders to sustain such an attack.

For now, she thought, as she sprang into a gallop that carried her swiftly away from the raiders, it was enough to have rescued the herdbeasts.

“By the Red Tongue’s litterlings, that was fun!” cried a joyfully bloodied Mondir, pounding beside Cherfan. “Hope we can do it again, clan leader!”

She sped up, passing the heavier clan males, drawing abreast of Thakur. After making a wide arc away from the border of clan ground, she looked back, saw no signs of immediate pursuit, and ordered the herders to slow the animals.

She jogged to a stop. Thakur came to her, prancing with excitement and triumph.

“Did you see the look on their faces when we snatched the animals out of their claws?” he crowed.

“Take the herdbeasts to those trees and rest them. Then herd them to the grazing near our shelter,” Ratha said.

He cocked his head. “I thought you were leading, Ratha.”

She knew, even if he didn’t, that the brightness in his eyes was not just the exultation of winning back the herdbeasts. She was upwind of him, and he was catching more of her scent. She was definitely in heat. She could tell by the way her vision was starting to shimmer around the edges.

Again she sprang away. “I have something I need to do.”

“Ratha,” he began, taking a step toward her.

“No closer,” she said, her voice roughening. “Do as I told you. Tell the others I will meet them later.”

He knew what she was planning. She saw the look in his eyes and the question, What if you don’t come back?

“Help Cherfan lead the others,” she said softly, feeling an overwhelming desire to rub against him. Just a rub, but she knew what it would become. She leaped away, turning the rush of warmth into a surge of energy that lifted and carried her. A glance behind revealed Thakur talking to a puzzled Cherfan, and then moving the herd on.

Watching, she felt her throat tighten as if this was her last sight of them.

Her whiskers and ears sagged.

It might just be.

Fighting her sense of urgency, Ratha hid on the edge of clan ground and waited for the excitement to die down. Having lost the herdbeasts, New Singer would have to send his rogues out to hunt. The closest face-tails, of course, were the ones held by the Named. Thakur, however, had done what he could to cover the tuskers’ scents by mixing them in with the other herdbeasts, including Bundi and Mishanti’s rumbler-creatures. The rumblers’ sheer size would make any hunter think twice about approaching.

If I don’t return, Thakur will become clan leader, and he’ll be the best one the Named have ever had.

She could no longer spare thoughts for those she had just left behind. She would need all her skills of stealth to slip through New Singer’s guard and reach the fire-den.

Her knowledge of her home ground served her well, letting her choose paths unguarded by the renegades. For a while she used the forest, climbing and slinking along interweaving boughs so that she could run aloft from one tree to the next. Whenever she spotted any of the interlopers, she froze until they had passed by underneath.

She was about to leap an intervening gap from one bough to the next when the bushes rustled below. She checked and huddled, thinking that the disturbance was just another of the intruders. As she peered down through the leaves, a small rust-white-and-tan form emerged from cover, nose down to the ground, picking up fallen sticks beneath the tree.

Ratha bristled all over with excitement. Thistle-chaser! Unharmed and apparently alone. Had she managed to escape?

Ratha couldn’t help herself. She half dove, half fell headfirst down the tree, sliding with a crunch into the dead leaves below. Thistle, startled, dropped her twigs, half-reared and stared, her eyes wide. Her emotions fleeted through the shifting sea-green of her eyes: surprise, delight, but then fear. Fear? Ratha felt her own eyes widen.

“Go!” Thistle hissed, lunging at Ratha, sending her mother scrambling a short distance back up the tree. “Not alone, not free!”

Even before Thistle got all the words out, the bushes shook again, and three of the rogues pounced into position around her. One drew a paw back for a blow at Thistle. Ratha launched herself to intercept, her face pulling into a snarl.