The Hunter (35 page)

“Will he be all right?” Keri asked, staring at the huge, unmoving form.

“I cannot say,” Braldt replied helplessly. “There is nothing we can do now, except keep him warm and pray.”

“Pray?” said Keri. “Yes, we will pray, and if there is a god, his or ours or any other in that greater world he speaks of,
he will know that this is one who deserves to live.”

Carn wandered through the dark tunnels without any
knowledge of where they were taking him. Not that it mattered. He had no alternative but to continue on or lay down and die.
The choice was clear. At times he crawled and clawed his way up steep slopes with the walls closing in on him on all sides.
At other times, he all but tumbled down equally steep slopes doing further damage to his ravaged body. He lost his pack on
one of those falls and, despite a desperate search, was unable to find it.

After a time, the last torch cube burned itself out. He was on his own, forced to find his way through the labyrinth of tunnels
by touch alone. He could easily have tumbled into one of the many deep cracks that fissured the ground, but he probed the
way forward with a sliding, shuffling step that he hoped would detect such dangers before they found him.

Much to his surprise, he found that the darkness was comforting rather than oppressive or frightening, easier on his damaged
eyes than the bright flames of the torch had been. Further, he discovered that many of the passages glowed with a soft luminosity
that he could only guess was obliterated by the more powerful light of the torches. It was enough to help him find his way
and was a comfort to him as well for he took it to be a sign that his gods had not abandoned him to wander alone in the darkness.

Hunger and thirst battled with pain but his physical body and its limitations were no longer of interest to Carn; it was merely
an impediment, an irritating stumbling block to his goal, to that which he must achieve. The spirit would triumph over the
physical in the end, but until then he
would be forced to keep the shell that housed his spirit alive.

He abated his thirst by lapping water from places where it seeped from the walls. He stilled the demands of his growling belly
by eating the pale blind salamanders that hid beneath rocks. He pinched the poisonous claws from the curled tails of stingers,
crunched their hard bodies between his teeth, and devoured their sweet flesh. He even killed a small shadow, gripping it by
the tail and bashing its head against a rock, but he could not penetrate the tough scaly skin and was forced to leave it behind.

He became a growling, snarling predator, capable of killing and consuming the killers much as they had sought to kill and
consume him, in order that he might stay alive. Through it all, he never lost sight of his goal, to honor and protect Mother
Moon against those who sought to discredit and disavow her; everything else paled before this objective.

After a while, it seemed that the tunnels began to drop, leading him deeper and deeper into the heart of the mountain. From
time to time he passed deep crevasses and dark tunnels that released the hot stink of the fiery maelstrom, and he knew that
despite the layers of rock that might separate them, the inferno was ever present, waiting. He had observed numerous dark
openings all around the edges of the flaming pit and guessed that many of these tunnels would find their terminus there.

They drew him, those dark openings that carried the scent of Mother Moon’s earthly lair, but he knew that he could not give
himself up to her until he had found the others and told them of what he had learned. The revelation. He could picture their
joy, envision their gladness at the news that their god was not dead as the lying karks had said.

Once, he thought he heard their voices echoing through the maze of tunnels. He had called our their names with the odd croaking
voice that sounded strange even to his ears, but they did not reply. He ran, crying for them to stop, to wait, telling them
that he was alive and had not perished.
But there was no answer other than the echoes of his own voice.

He had fallen then, tripping over a stone, and lay there, weeping. Only then did a snippet of reason return to his fevered
brain and he realized with a rush of fear how very much he wanted to find the others, how very much he wanted not to be alone
inside this dark and frightening mountain. But there was no one to hear his cries, and after a while he fell asleep, curled
into a ball on the hard ground.

Consciousness returned slowly and he lay there, too exhausted to rise. For a time he thought about giving up, remaining there,
allowing the shadows and stingers to find him and fight over his tormented flesh. It would be easier than going on. But then,
even as he contemplated such an action, he felt the ground grow hot beneath him, searing hot, all in a single instant as though
punishment for his traitorous thought. He sat up quickly, but before he could rise, the ground flung itself upward, bowling
him head over heels backward, slamming him into the wall. His head was filled with pain and it took a minute for him to realize
that the deep, thunderous growl was not coming from inside his head but emanating from the earth itself! Mother Moon was speaking
to him! Commanding him to rise, to continue on, to serve her greatest glory!

Carn staggered on, unmindful of the shaking earth, of the rocks falling all around him, some of which struck him, drawing
blood. All that he could think of was that his god had revealed herself to him, answering his flagging spirit with words of
her own. Carn was filled with terror at those words and filled with awe as well. How had he dared to consider death; was that
not a form of disbelief? He knew now that he would continue on until he had succeeded or until he died; nothing else would
stop him.

As though appeased by his new resolve, the earth stilled and then, echoing through the darkness, he heard the sound of voices;
Batta Flor, the unbeliever, answered in turn by Braldt and Keri. He had found them. Turning toward the
sound of their voices, he pressed close to the wall and nearly fell through a cracked section of rock. He staggered forward
off balance, pushing through the wall itself that collapsed upon him, raining down with brutal force.

He was propelled forward by the outward thrust of the falling rock and to his surprise he discovered that he had broken through
into another corridor, this one smooth and lined with a material that was unknown to him and dimly lit by lights similar to
priest fire. Carn blinked, holding a hand before his eyes to shield them from the unaccustomed glare, and then he heard Braldt’s
and Keri’s voices somewhere in the distance and the faint whimpers of the lupebeast. He had found them at last.

Batta Flor had regained consciousness, and lay staring at
them without emotion. He did not speak. Keri and Braldt glanced at each other in dismay. “Can you hear me? Are you in much
pain?” Braldt asked gently.

“No pain,” said Batta Flor.

“Can you move?” Keri asked.

“Don’t know.”

“Here, take my hand.” Braldt extended his hand for Batta Flor to grasp. Batta Flor merely stared into space as though he had
not heard Braldt and made no effort to take his hand.

“What’s the matter? Can you tell us what’s wrong?” Keri laid a hand on his chest and leaned forward so that she could look
into his yes. Batta Flor did not reply.

“Come on, you can’t lie here forever, what if the earth shakes again. This is not a safe place to be; we need to be on our
way.” Still, Batta Flor made no answer to Braldt’s comment and merely closed his eyes. After a while, his chest began to rise
and fall with less agitation and his breathing fell into a smooth pattern. It was apparent to them both that the Madrelli
had drifted into sleep.

“What do you think is the matter with him?” Keri asked as they leaned back against the wall, resigning themselves to the fact
that they would not be going anywhere for the time being. There was no thought of moving him as they might have done with
one of their own race, for the Madrelli was more than twice Braldt’s weight and all of it solid muscle. He would move of his
own volition or he would not move at all.

“I don’t know,” Braldt said thoughtfully as he opened
the pack and removed the last of the hard cheese rounds and a handful of dry biscuits, noting the fact that the Madrelli’s
supply of the sour red berries so necessary for his continued mental stability was growing dangerously short. “Perhaps he’s
merely disoriented by the pain; the shock to his system must have been significant. Remember that those crystals are their
nerve center. A blow like that must have been a terrible overload for his body to handle. Rest is probably the best thing.
All we can do now is let him sleep and hope that his body will heal itself.”

“We can pray as well,” Keri said firmly, her eyes glittering as though daring him to argue with her. He offered no argument,
merely smiled down at her and touched her on the tip of her nose with his forefinger.

Keri smiled up at him and lay back against his chest, wrapping his arms around her waist, thinking how strange life was. Here
they were buried deep within a mountain that threatened to fall down around their ears at any moment, surrounded by monsters
and other horrors, and yet she was content. After all the years of futile yearnings, Braldt finally loved her or soon would
if she had anything to say about it. It would have been nice if it had happened at home surrounded by nothing more threatening
than the jealous looks of her friends, but Keri had waited long years for this moment and she was willing to take it wherever
it came.

Braldt was still lost in the wonder of it all, the feel of her soft skin next to his, the clean scent of her hair as well
as the subtle fragrance that was hers and hers alone. Had it always been like this? How could he have failed to notice for
so many years? The thought was incomprehensible. His mind was filled with a whirlwind of thoughts as his arms tightened around
her, holding her close. He would have to tell Auslic and then Jos and the rest of the tribe. And then the priests.

But that was another matter and Braldt’s jaws clenched at the thought of them. How much of what Batta Flor and Uba Mintch
had said was true? How much did the priests know about the hard ones and the masters and the myth that was their religion?
How much of it was true? Braldt wished
with all his heart that none of it were true, but he feared that it was.

For a time he had suspected some Madrelli scheme, some plan to defeat them from the inside by the destruction of their beliefs,
but the more time he had spent with the old Madrelli and Sytha Trubal had all but convinced him that they were telling the
truth, at least so far as they understood it. Batta Flor’s courage and stalwart nobility had further convinced him, for Braldt
knew in his heart that one such as Batta Flor would be incapable of deception or trickery. Batta Flor had behaved with honor
and saved their lives on several occasions. They would remain here by his side for as long as it took for him to recover.
He was their friend and the Duroni knew the meaning of honor too.