Ratha and Thistle-Chaser (The Third Book of the Named) (9 page)

“I watched her fight off a crested sea eagle from a duck-footed foal. I also saw her swimming with the creatures and sharing their food. Whatever she is doing has a purpose. What’s more, the fact she has done it amazes me even more because she’s lame.” He described how the odd stranger got about on three legs, keeping one forepaw tucked against her chest.

Ratha eyed him. “You seem to have been taken with this bit of an Un-Named one.”

“Do you think I missed the mating season so much that I would consider taking an outside female?” Thakur flashed his teeth at her in irritation. “You and I, of any among the Named, should know the dangers of that!”

“I don’t seem to have to worry,” Ratha said, her voice turning bitter. “I know I won’t have cubs this year, even though the courting fever took me as it did the others. Perhaps it is better that I don’t, since I have all of the clan to look after.” She laid her nose on her paw for a minute and stared ahead into nothing. “I’m sorry, herding teacher. I didn’t mean that. Words can hurt more than claws sometimes.”

“Well, in any case, I wasn’t tempted,” Thakur said, still ruffled. “She wasn’t in heat. She also stank of wave-wallower dung and fish.”

Ratha pensively licked the back of a forepaw. She glanced at him from the corner of one eye. “I will come with you to the lake-of-waves, and you can show me these animals. But you’ll have to wait for a few days. We’re driving the beasts to another river tomorrow.”

“I was afraid you’d have to do that soon,” Thakur said. “So the nearby one has gone dry.”

“And I don’t know how long this new one can supply us.”

“Well, another good reason for going to see those duck-footed dapplebacks is that I found a spring near their beach.” He went on to describe the gush of water from the face of a shaded cliff so well that Ratha became uncomfortably aware of her dry tongue. The drought was progressing so rapidly that a reliable water source had become more important than new game animals.

“I’m interested in the spring,” Ratha said. “I’m thinking of moving our animals permanently to another place until this drought ends.”

Abruptly Thakur asked, “Will you need me on the next drive? If you would allow me to get a head start on the journey back to the lake-of-waves, I could take another look at the spring. It would also help me learn more about the creatures there.”

“And the odd one who lives among them.”

Thakur rolled onto his chest, his front paws spread out before him. “She has much to teach me, I think. Suppose you lead the first drive until the herders can manage alone. Then you and Fessran join me on the shore.”

“By ourselves?”

“Yes.”

“Why not bring others who are not needed to manage our own animals?”

“I’m afraid too many of us would scare our little sea-dappleback herder away. Let me go first, then the two of you. She might get used to me. Perhaps she can talk but was just too frightened.”

“Are you thinking of trying to bring her into the clan if she can speak?” Ratha asked. She knew Thakur could hear the wary edge in her voice. He too remembered what had happened when she had admitted an unknown stranger to the ranks of the Named.

“Let us run that trail when we find it,” said Thakur smoothly. “First I want to learn from her. If the question of clan admittance arises, you, as leader, will have to decide. I don’t think it’s going to be a problem. If she can’t speak, how is she going to ask?” He crossed one paw over the other, the gesture ending his words.

“Well, she doesn’t sound as though she will be too clever for her own good, as Shongshar was,” Ratha growled. “All right, herding teacher. Your plan sounds like a good one.”

“Then I will leave again after I’ve eaten and rested,” he answered. “When you are ready, follow me.” He then told her the way to the shore and said he would leave scent-marks to guide her. He asked her to leave her own signs, once she got there, to tell him she’d arrived. She listened carefully, remembering his words.

Ratha got up as she spotted Fessran’s tan form jogging back toward her.

She turned to Thakur. “Hungry?”

She didn’t need an answer as the herding teacher scrambled to his feet, his belly growling.

Several days later, the Named and their herds were treading the way to another river that lay farther from clan ground. Dust swirled, kicked up by the feet of the lead three-horns. Ratha kept her eye on the gray-coated stag and the two herders to either side of him. If the Named could keep him moving steadily, the others would follow. They had gotten him away from the trickling remains of the first river after several attempts that nearly became fights. She thought she might have to order the stag culled, but that would cause the loss of a good sire and throw the herd into disarray.

She had delayed the decision to move their watering site as long as possible, but when the sluggish trickle in the river became stagnant and she found three-horns pawing the streambed to find water that wasn’t scummy or thick with mud, she knew they had to make the trek. It hadn’t been easy to get the animals organized and the herders ready. She glanced at the lead stag again.

Though the beast was cooperating now, a certain look in his eye, and the way he tossed his head, made Ratha wary. The two herders looked nervous, switching their tails with every step. They were strong but still young. How she wished she had brought Thakur after all, but he was far away on his journey to the coast.

Ratha decided to bring another herder up, just in case the three-horn became obstinate. Khushi. He was a good one. From a timid cub, he had grown into a steady, patient young herder who understood three-horns, although lately he had been showing a tendency to disappear when someone wasn’t with him. Ratha decided she needed to give him a reminder about clan responsibilities. Odd, though—he wasn’t one she would describe as lazy.

She trotted back along the line of beasts and herders, sneezing dust from her nose. Her tongue felt leathery against her teeth, and she couldn’t help thinking of the rainy season, when the brook ran full and lively through the pastures.

Firekeepers flanked the main three-horn herd. They walked in guard positions, some carrying torches bearing the Red Tongue. Bright sun and blowing dust diminished the fire’s light, making it look pale against the sky.

Ratha searched for Khushi, calling out his name against the bawling and rumbling of the herd. She searched the throng of animals and herders without finding him, gave up, and sent another herder. Irritated, she jogged past the outskirts of the flock, intending to scold the errant youngster.

She caught sight of the Firekeeper leader walking near a torchbearer. Khushi was Fessran’s son, although the Named tended to forget such things once a cub was grown.

“Where’s Khushi?”

The Firekeeper’s tail came up in surprise. “How should I know? I don’t keep track of him anymore.”

“Maybe you should. This isn’t the first time I’ve caught him shirking.”

A crackle of brush made Ratha turn her head. Khushi came bounding out from between two low hills. His ears sagged as he slowed his pace.

“Are you still a litterling that I have to insult Fessran by asking where you are?” she said sharply to him. “You should have been in the lead. The old stag is planning trouble again.”

Khushi gulped, lowered his head, and wheeled toward the front, but Ratha stopped him. “You’re too late. I’ve already sent someone. If you don’t want to work with three-horns, I’ll place you in the rear, with the dappleback herd.”

“No, clan leader, it’s not that... .”

“Well, what is it, then? I’m fed up with looking for you and finding you gone. I’m tempted to put you back with the herding students for some lessons about laziness.”

“Wait, Ratha,” the Firekeeper interrupted. “He’s not usually lazy. There must be some reason.”

Khushi sat up and gave his ruff a few strokes with his tongue. He still looked and smelled ashamed, but there was a certain sense of relief, as if he had been carrying a burden and could now let it down.

“Clan leader, you remember that you sent me as a scout to look for game,” he began.

“Yes, and you told us about the face-tailed animals,” Ratha said.

Khushi took a breath. “After I saw the face-tails, the Firekeeper I was with stumbled across an Un-Named one. It was a female with cubs, and she must have been moving them when we found her.”

Ratha waited, wondering what this had to do with his periodic desertion of the herd.

“She was odd looking,” Khushi said. “The same gray color as old Shongshar, the same eyes, and the same long teeth.”

Ratha felt the hair prickle along her back at the mention of Shongshar’s name. She remembered how she and Thakur had left the cubs Shongshar had sired far beyond clan ground. The place she’d chosen offered some limited chances for them to find food. Could it be that one or both cubs had managed to survive and even to have their own young? The gray female Khushi described would be about the right age.

“Shongshar’s cubs by Bira?” Fessran was staring at Ratha in open amazement. “But you said they were witless and killed them.”

Ratha flinched at Fessran’s words. “I didn’t kill them; I abandoned them. In a place where they could eat insects and other things.”

Fessran took a long breath. “By the Red Tongue’s ashes, Ratha, if you’d told me what happened to them, things might have turned out differently with Shongshar.”

“Yes, you would have gone out to find the empty-eyed cubs you fostered after Bira left them. That wouldn’t have done us much good either,” Ratha snapped. “Let Khushi tell the rest of his story.”

With a curious glance at Fessran, Khushi went on. “The Un-Named female looked at me in a way that made me shiver and then ran off with a cub in her mouth. But she left one behind and didn’t come back for him.” Khushi halted, swallowed. “He’s over there, beneath the bushes. ”

Ratha sagged back on her haunches, staring at Khushi in disbelief. “You mean you brought the cub back with you?”

He hung his head. “I’m sorry. It was a stupid thing to do. But once I’d been near him, his mother wouldn’t take him back. I put him out and waited as long as I could, but we’d scared her off for good.”

“How did you feed him?” Fessran wanted to know.

“The same way you fed me when you were weaning us from milk to meat. You burped up soft food from your stomach. I had eaten enough from the clan kill before I went scouting that I could do the same.”

Ratha started to pace. If the drought and the herd weren’t enough to cope with, now she had to deal with a young herder with motherly delusions and an orphaned cub that might well be Shongshar’s grandson. She stopped, turned to Khushi.

“If this wild tale is true and not just an elaborate excuse to make me sheath my claws, all I can ask is why didn’t you tell me about him?”

Khushi shuffled his paws in the dust. “Well, you were gone just after that, and when you came back, you were busy, and the longer I waited, the harder it got to tell you. ”

“So you’ve been sneaking away to feed this Un-Named litterling with food from your own belly.”

“And to move him too,” Khushi added. “When these river drives started, I thought I’d have to leave him behind, but I found that if I ran really fast with him in my mouth and got ahead of the herd, then I could hide him and then work until the herd passed the hiding place and—”

“All right,” Ratha interrupted. “Show me.” Khushi led them away from the line of animals, up over the crest of a hill and down the other side. He jogged to a low bush with peeling red bark and thorny leaves, pulled a dead branch aside, and peered in. A weak mew came from inside. Lying in a hollow between gnarled roots was a tiny, thin, spotted shape. Carefully, Khushi drew the cub out with his paw.

Every bone showed on the little body. The coat was dull and rough over prominent ribs, and the litterling staggered badly as he wobbled to Khushi and lay against the herder’s forepaws.

Ratha stared down at the cub, feeling totally at a loss. Even if he had come from one of the clan’s own females, she knew the drought was already straining the clan’s resources.

Yet she couldn’t help a twinge of pity for the cub’s condition and awe for his tenacity. Having been taken from his mother at an early age and bumped around by a young herder who didn’t know how to treat him, he should, by all rights, have been dead.

Fessran came alongside and peered at him. “Ratha, watch how he moves, tries to look at things. He reminds me of our own cubs.”

Ratha felt that things were galloping ahead of her. “Firekeeper, he’s too young and starved for us to make any judgment. And if there is one to be made, you are not the one to make it.” She turned to Khushi once again. “Herder, you should have left him where he was. Take him back.”

Fessran gave a derisive yowl. “You think his mother would accept him after Khushi’s had him this long? We’d be lucky to even find her. And she may not want him back, especially now. The dry weather is also pressing the Un-Named.”

Ratha eyed the Firekeeper. Fessran crouched down to nuzzle and lick the orphan. She wouldn’t have a family this year, and Ratha knew she wanted to raise cubs. That, plus the memory of Nyang’s death and the loss of her treeling...
 

“If you get your scent on him too, we’ll never get him back where he belongs,” Ratha said.