Preview “Seed” (an Upcoming Novel by Richard S. Freeland)
| January 28, 2011 | Posted by Richard Freeland under Ebook News, My Writing |
Seed News -
Fourth draft completed, now it’s down to the nitty-gritty, copy and content editing for what (I hope) is the LAST TIME. I’ve got folks thinking I’ll never finish this novel! But the finish line is in sight. Just need to put on a final sprint…
Meanwhile, check out the following preview to whet your appetite.
Seed
Prologue
Korii squirmed on the fiber sleeping mat. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could lie still, pretending sleep. Her skin tingled, anticipating with growing excitement pleasures to come.
Night pressed down on the village. Shadows enveloped the interior of the hut with an almost palatable presence, relieved only by a faint glow of dying embers from the banked hearth fire.
From somewhere beyond the hut’s reed walls, deep within the belly of the black woods, a jaguar coughed – a harsh, guttural sound, faint and far away. Korii’s father grunted and mumbled something unintelligible before resuming his placid snoring.
Korii could just make out the black bulk of her parent’s reclining forms. She concentrated on her breathing. Her breasts rose and fell, the rhythm calculated to fool her father were he to wake.
Patience. Just a little longer, to make sure her parents were well asleep.
Outside, wind moaned through the canopy of the ancient oak forest towering above the village. Fronds rustled as if brushed by the fingers of some unseen giant. The air was thick, moist, a harbinger of distant storms.
Sweat slicked Korii’s dusky body, trickled through her glossy black hair, and tickled the sensitive skin behind her ears. She thought of Emilo awaiting her in their secret place, and heat kindled in the hollow of her belly and spread into her thighs, leaving her weak.
Emilo! She pictured him, standing on the sheltered isle created by a tongue of forest that thrust through the marsh to penetrate the dark waters of the Great Lake. Dancing moonlight shimmered in his hair, highlighted the contours of his hard muscles, and warmed his brown eyes as he stared up the narrow, leaf-shrouded trail – waiting for her.
Korii smiled, her eyes smoky with repressed desire.
What she contemplated was in strict violation of her father’s wishes. He had told her what he felt of Emilo – the “lowland” boy.
“You will be the wife of Pacal,” her father had told her. “His people concur. It will be a good match for both families – a mating of strength.” His eyes gleamed. “Think of it. The wealth and status of your betrothed’s family coupled with my position on the council. Who could wish for a more mutually beneficial relationship?” He spat into the fire. “Maybe then I will have the influence to rid our village of these undesirables.”
Korii’s eyes smoldered, and rebellion arose in her soul like a tern riding the storm winds.
No one had asked what she thought of the arrangement – or even seemed to care.
It wasn’t as if Pacal was a bad catch. He was the eldest son of a prominent family, handsome and friendly, with an easy, outgoing nature. For fifteen seasons she had grown up with him – just another dirt-splotched child scrambling around the village and scampering through the forest. She liked him well enough, she supposed, and maybe would have mated with him sooner or later – if not for Emilo.
Emilo was Tomoanchan. He came from a line of lowland traders, one of those “undesirables” her father had spoken of, merchant warriors from the steaming southern swamps fringing the Crescent Sea – or so it had been said. No one was really certain where the lowlanders came from. But come they did, more every season, bands of roving traders traveling the mist veiled network of trails up from the coastal marshlands, their goods lashed to wooden frame packs slung from broad, hard-muscled shoulders. Singly, and in pairs or small, clannish groups, the lowlanders pushed into the highlands, probing and questing over the mountains.
Side trails split from the main trade route like tree branches seeking the light, and the Tomoanchan traders sought them out, following sluggish rivers, tumbling streams and foaming tributaries ever up into the high country, penetrating like spear thrusts through the vast reach of land to the northwest.
One such trail snaked through the protective circle of rugged mountains and snow-capped volcanoes ringing the fertile valley that held the Great Lake, along with Korii’s village and neighboring settlements hugging the lake’s placid shores.
Every year, close on the heals of the last rains, the lowland traders would breach the mountain passes, descend into the valley of the Great Lake, and make their way to the village, bowed under the weight of their wares. Children ran to meet them, pacing the travelers as they wound among the squat, spare huts scattered throughout the grove of moss-encrusted virgin oaks.
At the central plaza the lowlanders shrugged off their packs. Without fanfare, they unfurled colorful woven blankets, unlaced the packs, and laid out their offerings for all to admire.
This year, Emilo had been with them.
Korii smiled, remembering. She had slipped into the forefront of the inquisitive crowd, eyes bright with curiosity as the lowlanders spread their trade goods: pottery of every size and shape, splashed with rainbow colors; figures of wood, basalt, serpentine and jade, cunningly crafted to resemble fanciful jaguars, scaled serpents and rollicking monkeys; glorious plumed cloaks and exquisite headdresses made from the feathers of exotic birds; woven grass skirts decorated with tiny beads and shells; cured jaguar pelts worked to a luxurious softness.
The trading lasted through the morning. Korii thought the exchange somewhat lopsided – the wonderful goods of the lowlanders for the villager’s pitiful offerings of maize, dried fruits and nuts, pumice from the volcanoes, and rough carved figurines of animals and people. But when the handsome boy with the flashing eyes and the sun-bright smile caught her eye, she forgot all about trading inequities.
She stayed as long as she dared, sneaking glances at the boy from the safety of the crowd, until the chores she had banished to the back of her mind could be put off no longer. She risked one last look as she turned to leave, and her eyes locked for just an instant with his. The force of his gaze rocked her to her heels. She sensed pride and self-assurance behind those beautiful eyes, and a zest for life that quickened her pulse.
Then her nerve shattered like crystal dawn under the cudgel of the sun. But as she turned and skipped away, she found herself humming a glad tune under her breath.
That night, the face of the lowland boy sweetened her dreams.
* * * * *
The next morning she returned to the plaza. The boy sat cross-legged on the ground, brushing out a beautiful jaguar pelt that glowed tawny in the easy light.
The morning sun touched him, painting highlights of blue and silver through his jet-black hair, and casting the skin of his forearms in burnished copper.
When suddenly he glanced up, Korii froze like a deer under the eye of a hunting cat. Then he smiled, and delight sparked in his eyes, along with a hint of the promise she had glimpsed before.
He rose and started towards her, the jaguar pelt hanging loose in one big hand. She looked into the sunglow of his face and dropped her gaze, suddenly afraid.
Emilo slipped the pelt over her shoulders. It felt like fine down against her skin.
“A gift,” he whispered, “for one more beautiful than the sunrise.”
That morning Korii remained at his side, helping show his wares. He joked and smiled with the villagers, his manner witty and sharp or completely ruthless, as the situation demanded. Every so often his fingers would brush her hand, or his thigh would graze hers, and Korii would go suddenly weak.
As the sun dipped towards the western rim of the valley, Korii reluctantly rose to leave. Emilo folded his trade mat, put away his goods, and stood with her. Almost naturally, it seemed to Korii, he took her hand.
They left the village, strolling among massive grandfather oaks as the red ball of the sun slipped lower, spreading a mantle of shimmering gold over the surface of the Great Lake.
Geese flew low over the water, wing tips dimpling the surface. Herons posed one-legged in the shallows.
Korii noted absently that the fishing fleet was returning. The boats, tiny with distance, danced dream-like over the glittering water.
They strolled among the mottled gray trunks of ancient oaks, and Emilo told her of his people, the Tomoanchan, entrancing her with tales of the merchant trails. Without boasting, he spun stories of his adventures among the varied peoples he had encountered in his travels. Korii hung on every word.
At his urging, she spoke of village life, knowing how banal it sounded next to his wondrous tales. She was surprised to find him interested in what she had to say.
They wandered through the forest, talking softly of little things. Then, at the lake’s fringe, where the oaks thinned and gave ground to invading marsh, Emilo turned and took her in his arms.
The first kiss was hesitant, a butterfly touching of lips. Then, with a boldness that surprised her, Korii molded her body against his. Emilo’s gentle fingers caressed her cheek, drifted feather soft to her breast. To Korii it seemed natural and right, as if they had been lovers since the first warm breath of the sun breathed life into a barren world.
With great deliberation, they explored mutual treasures.
But then the fishing fleet was near, and Korii could hear the shouts of the men and the occasional splash of a paddle. The young lovers broke apart, flushed and feverish. The magical moment had passed. Emilo shrugged and shook his head, a rueful grin tugging at his lips, and Korii giggled at the exasperation on his face.
She promised Emilo she would meet him the next morning, kissed him passionately, then turned and scampered away, the jaguar skin warming her shoulders.
That night she showed her gift to her family. Her father was unimpressed.
“Don’t be fooled by the lowlander, girl. Look around you. We have little to offer, yet still they come, as sure and certain as the cycles of the moon. They have placed their ‘emissaries’ among us, and every time a trade band leaves, a few lowlanders remain. There are now almost as many of them as us.
“They taint our homeland with their strange ways. They bring weapons, and introduce brooding gods we care nothing about. On the pretense of trade they expand their territory, and no one seems to notice this but me.”
She tried to protest, to explain to him that Emilo was not like that, he was kind and good, but he cut her off with a wave of his hand.
“You are promised to Pacal. I forbid you to see the lowlander again.”
For Korii, emerging from the long dormant cocoon of childhood into the vibrant-hued world of a young woman, her father’s adamant refusal to let her follow her own path was like a knife-thrust to the heart.
Still, she was her father’s daughter, strong willed and independent, and endowed with a youthful innocence that believed everything always came out for the best. She was determined to have her way.
The days that followed were filled with endless periods of frustration and longing. Necessary chores served as an effective wedge to keep the lovers apart. Smoky glances and furtive touches only served to stoke the fires of longing. Korii lived for these brief, stolen moments.
But just when it seemed her heart would shrivel and die on the vine of loneliness, he would come to her.
They would meet at the fringe of the forest, where the giant oaks thinned under the questing fingers of marsh. Here, in cool hanging shade and dappled shadow, they lay together on matted leaves of seasons past. Korii’s woman-child body was like an awakening flower, and Emilo’s caring touch would quickly bring her to the pinnacle of arousal. Often they lay entwined, Emilo’s fingers tangled in her raven hair, his lips on her throat and breasts, her body arching against his. Sometimes they were content to lay close, holding hands and speaking on matters of little consequence. Words always seemed to succumb to touching, however, and before long they would be locked together, limbs entangled, lost in a passionate world of their own making.
But, to Korii’s increasing frustration, something always seemed to interrupt the consummation of their love. She was beginning to believe her father’s admonishment had been a curse, that she and Emilo were doomed to forever suffer permanent arousal without release.
Now, lying still in the hut’s black interior, she blushed as she thought of the band of village elders, members of the Heron Society, who had arranged a secret gathering in the very spot in the hardwood forest where she and Emilo lay together. The surprise had been complete for both parties, and the lovers had sprang to their feet, sprinting through the woods, dodging naked around thick trunks, the ringing laughter of old men scorching their ears.
Another time a sudden hailstorm pelted them with stone sized hail. As they scampered for cover, Emilo covered her as best he could with his own body. The painful battering had put an end to their amorous thoughts for some time.
But now it seemed that everything would finally go their way. She had found a hidden place – and had claimed it for her own.
Korii liked to wander the forest edge, where trees and marsh merged, searching for the reeds and grasses the village women used in making baskets, skirts and mats. She gathered the long grasses, along with useful seeds and tubers encountered along the way, carefully placing them in her carrying mat.
Suddenly she saw a goat, an old billy that had escaped the herd and now ran wild. It ambled along a dim game trail and disappeared into what seemed virgin marsh.
Curious, Korii picked her way through the marsh grass, over the quaking ground, to the spot where the goat had disappeared. There she discovered a low ridge, barely wide enough to walk on, rising just above the treacherous swamp.
She explored the faint path, careful not to step to either side, fearful of being trapped in the sucking earth. Within twenty paces the pathway widened, rising above the surrounding marsh until Korii found herself on a small spit of firm ground. It was a secret island, nestled in the wetlands, dotted with buckthorn and sallow. Catbirds pirouetted within the intertwined branches of birch, ash and alder.
Korii knew she had found her haven, away from prying eyes and the omniscient presence of her father. Here was where she would bring Emilo on his return to the village – and where she would become a woman.
* * * * *
Careful to make no sound, Korii eased from the sleeping mat and rose to her feet. Bending low, she stepped into a tightly woven grass skirt, adorned with translucent beads of volcanic glass and small, beautifully shaped mollusk shells shot through with shimmering rainbow hues – her finest garment.
Hardly daring to breathe, she crept across the dirt floor of the hut to the wall at the foot of her sleeping mat.
Her father snored from his bed just inside the door. Squatting on her haunches, Korii felt for the basket she knew was there, the one that held her earthen jars of pigment.
Lifting the basket, she moved on cat feet toward the spot where the door showed as a lighter smudge of night against the black of the interior.
She waited a moment, listening, and then slipped out into the night.
For a moment she crouched next to the wall, senses questing.
Nothing moved in the night, and there was no sound other than that made by familiar nocturnal creatures.
Comforted, Korii eased out from the wall, a shadow within shadow, moving fast but quiet so as not to alert the village dogs. Against her will, her eyes touched the elongated form of the temple the lowlanders had erected alongside the village plaza. It hulked on its raised earthen platform like some dormant beast of prey. Made of earth and capped with a reed roof, now rendered colorless and two dimensional in the moonlight, it radiated a sense of power and awareness that caused Korii’s mouth to go dry.
Her fingers touched the thin obsidian knife she wore on a thong around her hips. The blade was only as long as the width of her hand, more ornament than practical means of defense, but its presence gave her comfort.
Emilo had told her of the great ceremonial center at the heart of his country, where people gathered from miles around to trade and worship the Elder Gods. Xipe, the God of regeneration. The Feathered Serpent. Or the dread Jaguar God. To Korii it was all exotic and wonderful, although she didn’t understand the religious significance. Her people had never worshiped any god, and seemed to get along just fine without them. Talk of Feathered Serpent, or Chac, the Rain Bringer, or the brooding Jaguar God, and the seemingly endless pantheon of lesser Tomoanchan gods made her nervous.
Such talk was tolerable in the light of day. But here, in the night stillness, within a stones throw of the temple dedicated to such things…she increased her pace as much as she dared, hurrying to escape the temple’s influence.
At the line of trees that marked the wide stream emptying into the waters of the Great Lake she paused, breathing hard. She shot a quick glance back the way she had come.
All was serene. The only sounds were the rasping croak of tree frogs accompanied by the chuckling ripple of the creek.
Korii placed the reed basket on the ground at her feet. In the dim light from the full moon, she chose a small ceramic jar.
Hurrying now, she removed the lid, dipped two fingers into the jar’s contents. They came out stained red with pigment.
Working fast but taking care, she spread the vermilion paint over her breasts. A second jar yielded a yellow-based pigment. She applied this in broad diagonal strokes, starting from the hollow of her slim neck, traversing between her breasts, crossing her abdomen from left to right, and ending in narrow stripes over her hip. She followed the yellow with a discreet application of black pigment, made with charcoal gleaned from the family hearth, to subtly accent the natural uplift of her breasts and the curvature of her thighs.
Finished, she washed her hands in the stream and hid her basket of paint in the underbrush. She slipped the grass skirt around her waist, secured her little knife, and set off down stream, heading for a patch of light-freckled water gleaming through the trees ahead.
She flitted among the trees, a supple will-o-the-wisp, painted and adorned as any young woman of the village would be in meeting her man.
The urge was on her now, to be with Emilo, to feel his arms around her. She wanted to run. Fear of a broken ankle dampened her haste somewhat, but she picked up her pace as much as she dared.
Her father had not sanctioned her union with the man she loved, so she would have him in her own way. She recalled the promise she had glimpsed in Emilo’s eyes the first time she had seen him. The assurance of wonders to come.
She imagined the benevolent moon beaming down on her, blessing her union. She smiled. She was on the edge of understanding. Tonight, she would become a woman.
She increased her pace, eager to learn the secrets of the night.
* * * * *
Breathless, Korii approached the head of the path leading into the marsh.
Narrow bands of cloud shifted across the moon, birthing patterns of gray light and deep shadow that crawled over the surrounding landscape. The night was swollen with the presence of life. Within the marsh, frogs rasped. Crickets sang a monotonous chorus that seemed to hang, listless, in the still air. A distant owl asked a mournful question. Somewhere close, Korii caught the faint thrum of hunting wings.
No wind stirred the waist-high marsh grass. Korii wrinkled her nose at the rank smell of decomposing vegetation.
Although she knew the path was there she could see no sign of it in the washed-out light from the moon.
She had never walked the trail at night. Suddenly skittish, she glanced around, but there was nothing to see but the night and the marsh. The unseen trail she must travel to meet her lover awaited.
Carefully, she stepped onto the trail, placing one foot before the other. When she encountered soft ground she paused, probing with a toe until she located the path again. To wander off the trail would not only be foolhardy, it could well prove fatal.
Once her foot suddenly sank to mid-calf, destroying her balance. She swung her arms wildly, fighting for equilibrium. After she’d regained her footing, she wiped sudden sweat from her brow, and mustered her courage before resuming her slow progress.
After intermittent missteps and false starts, Korii’s toes encountered the solid ground of the island, and with the resilience of youth her spirits soared.
She had braved the marsh and was now on high ground, and Emilo would be waiting. A wave of desire swept through her. She shot a quick look around, but the moon had slipped behind thickening clouds, and her gaze could not penetrate the dense undergrowth covering the island.
She started forward, heading for higher ground.
A breath of wind from the lake sighed over the isle, rustling the dark brush, sounding to Korii like the whispering of dry and distant voices.
For no reason she could think of she was suddenly uneasy.
“Emilo?” Her voice was loud in the night. “Emilo, I am here.” A smile trembled on her lips. “Are you hiding from me?”
A stray gust of wind rattled reeds at the edge of the island.
The night surrounded her like thick fur, and suddenly she felt hot, suffocated. She crossed the remaining ground at a run until she came to the end of the isle, where the dark waters of the Great Lake lapped forlornly at the shoreline.
Something moved in the high brush at the center of the island.
Korii spun in a crouch, her hand going to the knife at her hip. She peered into the brush until her eyes began to water. Blinking, she took a tentative step forward.
“Is that you, Emilo?” Her voice was little more than a whisper. “Please come out. You’re scaring me.”
There was no reply. Korii strained to hear, to pick up some revealing sound, some indication as to what was concealed within the brush and brambles before her.
Suddenly she realized how quiet the night was. All the normal nocturnal sounds had ceased. An oppressive silence permeated the night.
Korii tried to swallow, but her mouth had gone dry.
The silence was split by the sharp crackle of brush off to her right, close to the water. She whirled, eyes wide.
Nothing.
Only a bird – or a squirrel, the valley was full of squirrels, they loved to run and frolic among the branches of the great oaks, yes, it was just a squirrel, that’s all it was…
The moon-silvered brush shivered, then went still.
Korii took a hesitant step.
Something caught her eye. A shape, low down at the base of the brush, half obscured by matted grasses.
She crept closer, trying to make it out.
The shape protruded from tangled vegetation and was almost lost in shadow. But there was a disturbing symmetry about it, and suddenly Korii did not want to identify what was lying on the ground there.
She started to turn away, to move back to the center of the island. Emilo would be there, yes, that was where he would wait for her, and if he wasn’t then she had missed him, or he had not been able to come, and she would just return to the village, to the safety of her home, slide into her bed, and find him in the morning. Yes, that’s what she would do.
She had already swung half around, but her eyes refused to obey, remaining fixed on the frightening shape, the tantalizing familiar form, that was beginning to look more and more like…
A foot.
Then she was stumbling towards the brush, her body awash in a wave of cold that started in her stomach and spread outward until it had enveloped her heart.
She reached the edge of the brush and looked within.
He lay on his back, eyes wide, unseeing. Blood streaked the pallid skin of his face, painted a dark stain beneath his ravaged throat. His belly lay open to the night. Ropes of intestine, tangled among the branches, linked him intimately with the entombing brush.
“Emilo…”, she tried to shout, to scream his name, but the words died stillborn on her lips, drowned by a primal fear that surged like the tide from deep within her soul.
The brush whispered again. Branches stirred. Drops of blood patted onto the mulch. Korii forced her eyes away from the remains of her lover and slowly raised her head.
Twin points of fire burned from the brush.
Korii screamed, reeled, slipped, fell, and scrambled backwards, heels digging at the soft ground.
She staggered to her feet. Her heart had thawed. Now it pounded with a hot rhythm, threatened to leap from her chest.
Korii watched, terrified, as the first pair of carmine eyes was joined by another, and then a third. From the left came a muted snarl. Her head jerked around, eyes wild.
Red eyes, glaring, thick as fireflies in the brush.
Korii took a reflex step backward and her foot came down in water. The cool wetness shocked her from her fear-induced trance. With a desperate bound she cut to the right, intending to round the brush on that side, where there were no eyes gleaming red in the moonlight. Before she had covered three steps a savage growl from deep within the brambles caused her to reel about. Frantic, she darted towards the center of the island, but now eyes were all around her, hemming her in, low growls and shifting forms in the treacherous shadows forcing her back once more toward the lake.
She stood, muscles quivering, small breasts rising and falling with her harsh breathing.
In her heart she knew she was about to die.
Though terrified, defiance flamed in her soul. Her lip curled in a half-snarl.
Emilo was dead, savaged by whatever lurked in the shadows and glared at her from soulless eyes of death.
Tears of loss and fear and rage shimmered in her eyes, and suddenly the shrill war cry of her people burst from her lips. She tore the obsidian knife from its securing thong, leaving a red welt stinging the skin of her waist, and started forward in a crouch, knife held low, intending to fight and die on the same ground her Emilo had died upon. Then the moon broke through the clouds, bathing the island in pale ghost light. Korii gasped.
Sitting on its haunches at the edge of the brambles, head cocked slightly to one side as it regarded her with open curiosity, was the biggest jaguar she had ever seen.
Stunned by the unexpected beauty and majesty of the beast, Korii hesitated. And in the interval between thought and action two more jaguars joined the first.
The three animals stared at her from slitted, unblinking, mesmerizing eyes, alive with a cruel intelligence.
Korii looked to the left. More jaguars padded from the concealing brush, forming a semicircle around her. A slight sound to the right alerted her, and she shot a glance in that direction, already knowing what she would see. The line of jaguars there was even longer.
Korii sank to her knees, senses dull with shock. Her mind trembled on the verge of shock.
And something brushed the back of her neck.
Korii jumped, cried out, whirled around, slashed with the knife, the keen blade finding…
Nothing.
She spun back to face the cats, fear flashing in her eyes, knife hand shaking but ready.
The jaguars stared at her with indifference. One licked its paw and rubbed behind a ragged ear. None made any move towards the all but defenseless woman cringing before them.
Korii realized that her initial impression of beauty and majesty had been misleading. The three cats she had first seen were indeed fine animals, their coats sleek and shining in the light of the full moon. But the others…Korii felt a shiver of revulsion ripple along her spine.
There was something wrong with the remainder of the great cats. Most seemed weak, disoriented. Some had lost fur from various areas of their bodies, lending them a patchwork look. Small pustules, suppurating noxious fluids, formed haphazard splotches on drab pelts. Korii noticed one cat dragging its hindquarters; another retched quietly in the weeds. All but the three jaguars she had first seen exhibited signs of some debilitating illness.
Korii spent only an instant evaluating the cats. Straight ahead lay the way out, across the center of the island to the path through the marsh. Her heart in her throat, Korii eased towards the sleek cats in the center of the group. She sensed that the rest of the pride would take their direction from these three, so she did her best to avoid any sudden movements that might be taken as a sign of aggression and provoke an attack.
She inched forward, knife held at the ready.
The jaguars watched, their weird, carmine-tinged eyes unblinking.
Korii reached the animals, her muscles shivering with tension. Sweat sheathed her body, ran stinging into her eyes. She dared not raise a hand to wipe it away, dared not let her attention stray from the big cats beside her.
She slid between two of the jaguars, passing so close that one copper thigh brushed a tawny shoulder. For an instant she was face-to-face with death, her wide, fear-filled eyes locked with orbs of vermilion cruelty.
Then the cat yawned, flashing huge fangs of startling white. She cringed, expecting powerful jaws to snatch off her face. But the jaguar only watched, waiting.
Korii cleared the big cat. She took a tentative step backward, then another. Abruptly her nerve shattered like old bone and, spinning, she dived for the brush.
Branches clutched and snagged her hair. Thorns ripped at her shoulders and thighs as she ran. She shot a glance over her shoulder and her stomach churned.
The jaguars were coming on behind, pacing her, grim as death and just as certain.
On either side of the narrow trail, shadows moved, slinking silently, whispering among the brambles. Now and then she caught a glimpse of supple fur, white in the moonlight. The jaguars were all around her, hemming her in.
Herding her.
Before her the brush thinned and she recognized the spot where she had come onto the island. She cried out, a ragged cry of hope, and with a spurt of energy she sprinted towards the trailhead.
And then something moved, loomed in the trail ahead of her. She screamed, slid to a stop, lips pulled back in a snarl of fear and hate and defiance. Gasping, near collapse, nevertheless she raised the knife, holding it tight in a hand shaking with fatigue.
So close, so close…
A man stepped from the shadows.
Korii almost dropped her knife. She passed the blade to her left hand, wiped the sweat from her palm on her badly used grass skirt, and then switched the knife back. The jaguars closed around her, forming the familiar semicircle. But the man held all of her attention.
He was old. Hair as white as the snowcap rimming the highest volcanoes. Tall – his bearing that of a chief. She noticed with detachment that he was nude. His body was still firm. Old scars laced his skin. But the face gave away his age.
And the eyes.
His eyes held her, unblinking, unfathomable. She could not slip his stare, could not turn away.
She sensed there was danger here, terrible danger. Something worse than the great cats. She knew she should flee, run, through the swamp if need be, do anything to get away from this man standing like a silent sentinel before her.
She tried to move, but her feet felt as if they were already mired in the muck of the marsh. Terror threatened to snatch her mind. Her heart bruised her ribs with its frantic pounding. In those eyes she saw cruelty and suffering and death…
And ghostly fingers caressed her throat – gentle, hesitant, like a breath of cool wind on a hot day.
Korii shivered. Goose bumps peppered her shoulders and arms. Feather soft, the phantom fingers sought the back of her neck, stroked the base of her skull.
She felt a sudden firm pressure at a point where her head joined her neck.
And suddenly she was no longer afraid. Her fear evaporated like standing water after a rain. She forgot about the jaguars, forgot those shadow things creeping and stirring in the brush. Her fatigue leached away to be replaced by a languid feeling of peace and well being.
The eyes of the nude man still held her, but now she saw that the cruelty had dampened. In its place was compassion, tranquility, a promise of safety and comfort.
The eyes no longer threatened. Now they spoke of the hearth, of home. Of companionship and love.
Mesmerized, Korii was unaware when her arm dropped to her side. Her fingers opened, and the obsidian blade slipped to the ground.
Her heart rate dropped and her breathing slowed until she was inhaling and exhaling slowly, rhythmically. Her respiration pattern perfectly matched that of the man before her.
She swayed, eyes half closed. The pressure on the back of her neck was gone now. She had forgotten it entirely.
Korii heard her own voice, coming from somewhere far away. “Who…who are you?”
The reply was like dry wind whispering among the bones of the dead. “It does not matter. All that matters is that we are here.”
Korii tried to concentrate. Frowning, she fought to remember. Her head felt heavy, soft. Like an overripe melon.
She gazed at the man before her with dilated eyes. “Emilo,” she whispered – a lost, plaintive sound.
The voice was there again, so faint it might have been her imagination. It seemed to come and go with the slight breeze playing around her sweat damp hair.
“Your young warrior is dead. I met him on the trail. He was Tomoanchan.” The phantom voice seemed to hold a note of bitterness.
The voice faded, and Korii strained to recapture it. When it returned the bitter flavor remained, accompanied by an undertone of weariness. “He sleeps the death sleep, and his dreams are no longer for this world. Perhaps his spirit lives on, traveling a better plane of existence.
“He was Tomoanchan, and now he is dead. It does not matter.”
But dimly Korii sensed it did matter, a great deal to the strange man before her. And for an instant she thought the man’s mask slipped. She glimpsed a depth of hatred and rage that momentarily shocked her back to awareness.
She blinked owlishly, licked dry lips. Something was not right.
She started to fidget, and a burst of pleasure permeated her brain. She inhaled sharply. A slow smile spread across her face.
The voice was back, gentle, insistent. “There is another who dreams – the one called Pacal. He dreams of you, of being here with you now. And when he awakens fresh and relaxed in the morning it will be as if the two of you were together. He will know no different.”
The man walked toward her. “Tomorrow you will be with him.”
Korii giggled. Behind her a jaguar coughed, but the sound had no meaning, no longer threatened.
The white haired man advanced until he was standing close before her. Volcano fires raged within his eyes.
Korii seemed drunk on palm wine. She swayed, and the man reached out a scarred hand, steadying her. His touch was like molten fire.
“What happens to me tonight?” she managed to whisper.
He reached up, touched her hair. “Empty your mind. Open your heart. Tonight you belong to me.”
His corded arms encircled her, alive with a strength that could not be denied. But Korii was beyond resistance, lost in a rapture she had never experienced.
The white haired man lowered her to the ground. His hands were on her, caressing, touching, where only Emilo – no, Pacal – had touched her before. She didn’t care. All that mattered was the euphoria rushing through her mind, raging through her veins with the force of rapids. Rainbow colors danced just outside her vision.
Her arms curled around the man’s neck, drawing his face down to hers. They kissed, his lips gentle yet demanding, insistent. As if from a distance she felt his big hands find her grass skirt, and she raised her hips to help him. His palm brushed her flat belly, drifted lower, and she moaned aloud.
Korii sensed somehow that something vastly important was happening. Her senses vibrated with awareness. She felt the throbbing of her own heart, tasted the strange muskiness of the man’s kisses. His touch left a trail of heat in its wake.
Abruptly the man lowered himself, straddling her, and Korii rose to meet him. She was beyond thinking. All that mattered was satisfying the ardent need that ruled her actions, that swelled her breasts and elogonated her nipples and caused her hips to push upward wantonly, eager for the questing thrust of the man who was not Emilo.
And then he was there, inside her, moving slow and easy. She gasped at the sharp pain that accompanied his penetration, and the man stopped, waiting. But the strange tide of pleasure had her in its grip and washed over her once again and she groaned, moving under him, wanting him inside her all the way.
He resumed his slow, almost languid movements. Korii cried out. The white haired man seemed to know just what to do to give her the most pleasure. Dizzy with desire, she gripped his shoulders with her nails, leaving welts. He seemed not to notice.
Korii wrapped her strong legs around him, her eyes glazed with ecstasy. She moaned and whimpered, thrashing on the ground, her body at the height of pleasure. She gasped, shuddering, as her first climax rocked her, felt the strange man stiffen above her as he filled her womb with his seed.
Gasping, she clung to him, wanting him, and, as a second wave of contractions surged through her, she heard his voice, dry and wintry, floating up from inside her mind.
“Look at me. Open your eyes and see me for what I am.”
Korii’s eyelids fluttered. She felt half-drugged with pleasure, and the pleasure lingered at the base of her mind, little tendrils of feeling shooting through her limbs, humming in her thighs.
She stared up at the scarlet eyes glaring down into her own, and was not afraid. Deep inside she knew she should be, but the pressure at the back of her neck had returned, soothing, comforting, easing her mind and channeling the fear into the realm of pleasure.
She seemed to fall. Her weightless body hurtled faster, ever faster, into a storm of angry crimson. Ragged streamers of color swirled and eddied around her. The sensation of speed increased, and she felt like a leaf sucked into a raging torrent. The blood rushed through her veins with an audible sound, gray wind shrieking through distant mountain passes.
Colors seethed and writhed, and within them she sensed phantom figures cavorting at the edge of her vision, wild bestial shadows stalking through her mind.
Then the hues darkened, converging towards shadow. A charcoal cloud enveloped her, and in it Korii could see what seemed to be distant flashes of lightning. The feeling of speed was gone now and she seemed to float in a vast thunderhead. But even as she thought this, the cloud altered, expanded, filling her mind with an endless gray void. The feeling of well-being intensified, and along with it a great drowsiness enveloped her. She smiled sleepily. The grayness shaded to a darker gray, then black.
Floating in a soft cocoon of ebony velvet, Korii drifted into a deep sleep. Her last thoughts were of Pacal, and she smiled at the memory of their lovemaking that filled her mind just as sleep claimed her.
* * * * *
The white haired man stood in shadow, gazing on the sleeping form of the girl at his feet. A cold smile curled his lip. He felt nothing for the girl, nothing at all. But he needed her to further his ends.
A chill wind from off the lake ruffled his hair. He shifted his stare to the dark water. The breeze caressed his face, and his nostrils flared. Strange scents rode the wind. Unfamiliar, threatening. Unlike the comforting scents of his homeland.
How he longed to turn around, to leave this land, to peel back layers of time and return to the place of his people, the mountain slopes and coastal jungles of which he was so familiar. He turned away from the lake and for a long moment stared into the night, stared with open longing towards the southeast.
Back there only death waited. No hope of ever returning. Their one slim chance lay in moving ahead.
He glanced at the jaguars ringing the form of the sleeping girl. They watched him expectantly.
For just a moment he held their gaze. Then, at a motion of his hand, the great cats faded into the undergrowth. The man sighed, watched them merge with the darkness.
Abruptly he bent low, whispered something in a singsong tone into the sleeping girl’s ear. She sat up, and he took her hand and pulled her upright. She swayed, eyes glazed and unseeing, as he patiently cleaned the pigment from her body with water from the lake. He repositioned the grass skirt around her slim waist, returned the obsidian knife to its resting place against her hip.
He stepped back, swept her form with critical appraisal.
Satisfied, he again whispered a command. The girl walked past him, eyes wide and staring at nothing, found the trail through the marsh with uncanny accuracy, and disappeared into the swamp. The white haired man stood quietly until the sounds of her departure had faded.
“So it begins”, he whispered. “The old ways wither and die. But we go on. New life rises from the carcass of the old…”
A form emerged from the shadows, drifted over to the white haired man. A second man, younger than the first, with strange, penetrating eyes of yellow-gold flecked with scarlet, stepped into the moonlight. They stood together, naked in the white light of the moon, staring towards where the girl had vanished into the marsh.
“Are we doing the right thing?” the young man’s voice was tense, strained. The white haired man cringed at the undercurrent of fear he detected there.
He faced the younger man, his eyes glowing a faint rose in the moonlight.
“There was a time not so long ago when fear was unknown to us,” the older man said. But there was no censure in his voice.
Still, the young man hung his head, shamed.
“I am sorry, father.” He raised his eyes to the older man, searching. “But how are we to know? Our people lay dead at the hands of our enemies, or are scattered to the corners of the earth. We are hounded and pursued, driven from our homeland.” He stared at his father, his eyes hard now, demanding answers, solace. “And so I ask, for all of us – is this the only way?”
The white haired man was silent for a long time. When he finally spoke, his voice held the ring of authority. “Behind us is death. Our people have been slaughtered. Our children…” He paused. Swallowed. “The children lie rotting in the sun while their butchers dance atop their corpses. Our homeland is in the past, and the past is closed to us.
“Our present is riddled with fear and uncertainty. We are the hunted now.” His short laugh was bitter, ironic. “Wasted by disease, and wounds that will not heal.”
He gestured towards where the girl had gone. “She is the first. There will be others like her, as we move north towards whatever destiny awaits us.”
His eyes burned into the younger man’s soul, and the son backed up a step under the father’s fierce scrutiny.
“She is the first, and she is the future.” His hand settled on his son’s shoulder, gripped hard. “Let us live for the future, my son. Let us live for the children. That is where we will find our salvation.”
Abruptly he whirled, striding purposely towards the path leading from the island. The young man hurried to catch up.
They disappeared together into the mists of the marsh.
The still waters of the lake rippled against the shore of the little island. The night creatures resumed their cautious chorus.
And from somewhere far away a jaguar screamed a challenge into the night.
* * * * *
Part One –
The Georgia Coast
Chapter 1
Corin Dunby sat his horse on a low hummock just off the Augusta road. Isolated stands of old growth pine, beech and oak, thick with shadows, were scattered across the land. Lower down, a dark fringe of birch and willow, their roots interlaced with patches of black, stagnant water, announced the proximity of the Savannah River.
Shivering, he pulled his worn pea coat closer around him.
The morning was fresh-born gray and somber. Tantalizing shafts of sunlight, glimpsed occasionally through breaks in the clouds, only served to remind him of elusive warmth.
The thunderstorms hounding them since they’d left the Cherokee lands had finally blown themselves out, leaving as legacy a fine, cold drizzle. He’d weathered worse as captain of the Shamrock Bay, but now that he was a landed man, athwart a saddle instead of a deck, wet weather seemed to affect him more. The damp settled in his bones, made his joints ache.
Ground fog laced the valley with streamers of opaque mystery that shone virgin white when touched by the fickle sun. The scene’s stark beauty was lost on Corin, however. He studied the river bottom, not bothering to hide his irritation.
Gatlin and the Shawnee had disappeared into those woods some time ago. Where the hell were they?
Corin’s horse nickered and rolled a nervous eye towards the thickly wooded slope below. Absently he put out a hand, stroked its neck.
Beside him, Drew Tarrington chuckled. “Caught a whiff of cat.” He looked at Corin. “Lend me your glass?”
Corin dug in his saddlebag, brought out a tarnished brass telescope. He passed it to Tarrington.
“Careful,” he said. His accent spoke of Ireland. “It’s a finicky thing.”
Tarrington scanned the wooded edge where open meadow surrendered ground to thick trees and tangled undergrowth. Ignoring him, Corin sought out the herd.
Horses milled below, his and Tarrington’s, blooded stock purchased four days before from the Cherokee. Now they pranced, heads thrown back, legs stiff, shying from the bottomland woods. A few slaves, under the dubious direction of Ira Pageant, Tarrington’s overseer, fought to keep them from bolting. Two huge hunting mastiffs strained at leather leashes in the hands of another struggling slave. The dogs padded back and forth over the trampled ground, massive heads dipping to sniff the blood-splashed ground before rising to stare with a hot, fierce eagerness into the trees.
Tarrington muttered a curse.
“Damn thing’s fogged. This weather…”
A cold droplet slid from Corin’s upraised collar and down his neck. He shivered anew.
Tarrington tapped his arm, pointed down slope with the telescope. “Here comes Silas. Doesn’t look too happy.”
A lanky black man approached the two horsemen. He gripped a worn felt hat in one long-fingered hand, and mist bejeweled his fine black hair. He looked up at Corin from shrewd, brown eyes.
“Mister Dunby, suh. The colt’s dead. Never had no chance.”
“Figured as much. The mare?”
Joiner hesitated, gazing off towards the dark woods. “She was some game. Put up a fight for that colt. But she’s all clawed up. Right forelegs almost tore off.”
Corin sighed. “The others?”
Joiner smiled slightly. “They’re stirred up a mite. Settle down directly, once we get them away from here.”
Corin pulled the oilcloth from the lock of the flintlock resting across his saddle, then handed the long gun down to the lean black man. “Put her down, Silas. Gently.”
Joiner nodded and headed back down the slope.
Corin tucked the oilcloth into his saddlebag, glanced sideways at Tarrington. “You sure you hit it, Drew?”
Tarrington smiled. He was from London, manager of a plantation outside Savannah owned by an English consortium. A big, gregarious man, Drew Tarrington was known from Charleston to Savannah and beyond for his free-wheeling lifestyle, flamboyant parties and wild, hard-drinking ways. Amused, he looked at Corin Dunby. “Saw the shot go in myself. Flung that cat half-around, set him to spitting and snarling and snapping at his own hide. And that little mare got in a few licks of her own.”
Corin chewed his lip. “The boys didn’t find any blood. Could be you missed.”
Tarrington frowned, shook his head. “I hit him, all right. That’s for certain. But I missed my aim. I was going for a heart shot, got him in the belly instead. He’ll likely die – but we got to be sure. Can’t leave him, wounded, in that thicket.”
“I know, Drew. Some farmer might happen on him. Or an Indian kid.”
He left the rest unsaid.
Tarrington nodded towards the woods. “We’ll have some answers shortly. Here comes Gatlin and the Shawnee.”
From below, where the horses milled, came the flat, final sound of a rifle shot.
* * * * *
Gatlin Dunby jogged up the rain-softened slope, Tenagwah following close on his heels. He stopped before his father, breathing easily, and pointed back towards the woodland below.
“We found blood sign in the thicket, Pa. He’s gone in deep and holed up.”
“Did you see him, boy?”
“No sir. But Tenagwah, well, he smelled him. He’s in there, all right. We’ll have to pry him out.”
Corin stared at the shadowed timber, then shifted his eyes to his son. Gatlin was tense, eager, fidgeting with excitement. Corin knew what the boy was thinking. It was written all over his face. He felt a chill trickle down his spine.
He looked to Tenagwah, standing easily a few paces to Gatlin’s left. The Shawnee was staring back the way they’d come, a scowl on his face. His thumb rubbed the butt end of a tomahawk belted at his waist.
“What’s your assessment of the situation?”
The big Shawnee glanced at him, met his gaze with frank candor. “Cat, he’s hurt. May die. Maybe won’t. But you can bet he’s some pissed.”
Gatlin interrupted. “We got to take him, Pa. Tenagwah says he’s old, can’t catch his regular prey. That’s why he tried for the colt. Now that he’s hurt, he’ll only be able to take prey he’s sure of. Might be a man, next time.”
The hollow feeling in Corin’s belly increased. He had been young and impetuous once. He knew what Gatlin was feeling – the fever pitch excitement of the hunt.
Gatlin wanted to go after the cat.
He hesitated. Now that it was too late, the damage done, he cursed his decision to make a camp in this spot. But the horses had been worn out, and the men. They’d all needed rest. So he’d ordered the stop, and the night had been uneventful. They’d caught hell, however, come the morning.
Who’d have thought there was still a puma in the area?
He sighed. Gatlin was right. It had to be done. And he was a man now, living in a man’s world. Some things had to be faced up to.
Gatlin spoke. “I’ve an idea, Pa. I think we should…”
Corin shushed him with an impatient gesture. “We’ll push him, son. Give him no time to lie up. Old, and hurt – he’ll drop soon enough, and we can finish him.”
Gatlin’s eyes narrowed. He gestured towards the thick stand of birch fringing the river.
“I don’t know. He’s moving pretty good. Shot to the flank may not have touched anything important. If no bones were broken, he could run clear out of the county.”
Corin’s lips thinned. “Since when are you an expert on cougars, boy? I’ve hunted my share. We’ve Tarrington’s hands, and the dogs. They can beat the brush, drive the cat out of hiding. Drew and I will ride inland, on the flank. We’ll be free of the thicket with a clear field of fire if the cat decides to take off cross-country. Pageant and Silas will back up the beaters from horseback.” He met everyone’s eyes. “When they flush him, one of us ought to have a clear shot.”
Gatlin started to speak and Corin slashed an impatient hand through the air. “Gatlin, you and Tenagwah come on behind in case he somehow gets by us.”
Ignoring Gatlin’s protests, he spurred his horse and trotted down the slope to where the herd had been gathered. Tarrington hesitated a moment, glanced at Gatlin, and then reined after Corin.
Gatlin scowled, his eyes black with anger. He should have figured his father wouldn’t listen. His attitude mirrored their relationship perfectly. Now Corin had ordered him to the rear, out of the action. It rankled.
From the corner of his eye he caught Tenagwah gesturing to him. He walked over to the Shawnee. The Indian was again studying their back trail, gazing speculatively at the mist-laced woods.
“How ‘bout it, Tenagwah? Is Pa on the right track?”
The Shawnee looked at him. Placid and taciturn, Tenagwah had been his friend ever since he was old enough to explore the marshlands and fringe forests surrounding Savannah. Gatlin wasn’t sure how old the Indian was – he’d looked the same for as long as he could remember. In the past, Tenagwah had been an ally of the Creeks. Now he headed up a small, nomadic band of Shawnee which included his immediate family. The band meandered through the lower Savannah River valley, unable to settle down for long, at a loss as to how to cope with the rising tide of civilization.
Tenagwah touched Gatlin’s arm, pointed towards the birch fringe.
“Cat won’t swim the river.”
“So Pa’s right? He’ll catch him?” Gatlin’s voice reflected his disappointment. He didn’t want to admit his father might have been right.
Tenagwah’s lip curled in a slight smile.
“They will make a job of it, beating the brush. Your Paw figures Cat will lay down under a birch, wait for him. Cat’s hurt, but he ain’t stupid.”
“Pa and Tarrington – they’ll be riding inland from the river. He can’t go that way.”
“I’d say Cat’s heading for the ford.”
Gatlin looked at him. “Forgot about Tucker’s Shoals. But that’s a good mile, two mile down river. That cat got the sand?”
“Likely.” Tenagwah eyed the fringe of trees paralleling the river. “Man a-horse back, make for slow going. Too much brush, thick stuff cluttering up the bottoms. But a man on foot, with just a rifle…”
He stared hard at the trees, his face set and lips thinned. Gatlin noticed an uncertainty in his manner.
“Something bothering you?”
“There’s…I don’t know. I have a feeling…there’s something else out there. Watching us.”
“Cougar’s generally don’t hunt in pairs.”
“Ain’t a cat. Ain’t a man, neither. No sign to speak of…” Tenagwah chewed his lip. “Maybe a ghost.”
Gatlin smiled, checked the oiled scrap of leather protecting the lock of his rifle from the weather. “Well, I don’t intend to let some spook keep me from a cat-claw necklace. We take off and run hard, we can get a good jump on Pa and Drew, set up a stand overlooking the Shoals. Let them drive that cat right to us. You with me?”
Tenagwah hesitated, then nodded curtly.
They trotted down the slope, and into the haunted forest.
* * * * *
Tenagwah set the pace at a ground-eating lope, skirting the river bottom thickets, holding to where the land started to rise slightly away from the flood plain. It was more open here, though still thick with pine and oak, sweet gum and hawthorn, interlaced with wire-tough underbrush.
Gatlin knew they had to cover some ground to reach a point down river of Tucker’s Shoals, and down wind of the cat’s anticipated path. There they could make a snug stand with a clear field of fire down on the ford. The cat would be hurting, wild to escape the noise and scent of horse and dog and man. It would be a tight race, but they should win. Gatlin grinned at the thought of one-upping his father.
You do the work, Pa. I’m more than happy to reap the harvest.
They ran. Gossamer thin tendrils of mist clung to the hollows, reflecting the slanting rays of the rising sun tentatively penetrating the cloud cover. The mist parted around their rushing forms, swirled and eddied before reforming behind them, unchanged.
Before long Gatlin’s linen shirt was soaked with sweat, his dark blond hair matted with it. His calves ached with the strain of running over uneven, saturated ground, dodging trees and hurdling fallen trunks. He brushed a sapling, dislodging a fine drizzle around him. Without missing a step, he slipped the wrap from his flintlock. A glance was enough to reassure him the powder in the pan was still dry.
A flicker of movement to his right snagged his attention and he slowed, studying the trees. The woods were more open here and there was less brush, but light-dappled shadows teased his imagination. He wasn’t quite sure what he’d seen, if anything.
He studied the dark woodland as he ran, finally deciding he’d been mistaken. Maybe a bird, disturbed by their passage. Or a rabbit.
Tenagwah called back over his shoulder. “I will be glad to meet this cat. His claws will look good hanging on a thong around my neck.”
Gatlin grinned at the Shawnee’s back. “Bet you a prime deer hide to that tomahawk you carry I’ll get off the shot that nails him.”
Tenagwah snorted and altered course, angling down through the thick fringe bordering the river, then turning back the way they’d came. He slowed, seeking, then stopped abruptly, signaling Gatlin to join him.
“There, just over that downed birch.”
Gatlin caught the brassy glint of sunlight off water. Past the trunk of the dead tree, the bluff fell away in a steep grade to river’s edge. The ford lay below them, water rustling gently over the shoals.
Crouching low, careful to make no sound, Gatlin and Tenagwah made their way to the massive oak’s trunk.
Gatlin studied the situation. The moss-livened deadwood had lain here for years, half-buried in the sand of the bluff. Where they stood was firm ground, matted in wet leaves and debris. On the other side of the trunk, the unstable sand bank was cut by erosion. One good flood, Gatlin thought, will undermine this tree, tear it loose, and send it on a fast trip down river. It’ll wind up in Savannah.
He grinned. “Here’s our stand. We can’t ask for better than this.”
Tenagwah grunted. His eyes moved, restless and wary. Gatlin noticed a tension in the tilt of the Creek’s head and the way he griped his rifle. He laughed, patted the Indian’s knee.
“Don’t worry. We guessed right. We’ll be the geefer, Pa the goat.”
He scrambled over the trunk, went to one knee on the unstable sand, studying the ground below. He saw no tracks, no sign of recent passage.
He turned to Tenagwah, smiling. “We’re in time,” he whispered. “Cat hasn’t been…”
The Creek knelt on the tree trunk, his head and shoulders twisted around, staring back the way they’d come. Gatlin had time to see his friend’s eyes widen in shock.
The big cougar exploded from the shadows, enveloped in a halo of whirling leaves and billowing mist. It smashed into the Creek’s upper body, driving him back and over the tree trunk. Tenagwah fell, his flintlock firing into the trees. The claws Tenagwah had favored raked diagonal runnels across his chest.
Gatlin heard the big teeth snap shut an inch from Tenagwah’s face. The Shawnee grunted and disappeared and Gatlin found his own face full of feline fury.
It seemed to Gatlin as if he’d fallen into a vat of molasses in winter. He twisted slowly as the cat filled his vision. His rifle came up, seeming to take forever. From the corner of his eye he saw Tenagwah, dangling backward from the dead trunk, his ankle trapped beneath a fractured branch. He could make out the grimace on the Indian’s face, saw his hand dip to the tomahawk on his hip.
The cat hit him chest high, claws of the forefeet digging into his shoulders. Gatlin knew the puma was poised to rake back and down with its hind feet, a stroke intended to disembowel.
Terror drove him to do the right thing. He went with the cat’s attack, throwing himself back. The crumbling slope gave way beneath their combined weight and man and animal tumbled head over heels down the bluff and onto the gravel bar at river’s edge.
Stunned, Gatlin rolled over, spitting sand. The cat was struggling to rise, favoring its hindquarters. Blood, bright red, tainted the cat’s tawny hide. It whirled on him, almost falling, and Gatlin groped for his rifle.
He found it half in the water, spun and raised it to his shoulder as the cat charged. He pulled the hammer back and touched the trigger and only then noticed the water streaming from the pan.
Gatlin threw the useless flintlock in the cat’s face and dived left, rolling. The puma passed over him, spinning impossibly in mid-air, landing in a shower of glittering spray in the shallows. It snarled, hind legs bunching, muscles quivering, ready to pounce and Gatlin yanked at the pistol in his belt and it snagged, hung up, wouldn’t come free. The cat screamed out a challenge full of hate and rage and defiance, already into its charge, and Gatlin knew even as he pulled the pistol free with a final, desperate jerk that he was too late, the cat was too close.
A blurred shape darted between Gatlin and the cougar. White fangs slashed the cat’s flank in passing. The cougar yowled, whirling, fanned claws slashing empty air. Then it corrected and angled up at Gatlin – only now the big horse pistol was out and aimed and the powder in this gun dry.
Gatlin’s shot caught the cat just over the right eye and dropped it in its tracks.
The echoes of the shot reverberated along the river. Gatlin stood unmoving, shocked at the sudden storm of violence. The cat twitched once, one hind foot furrowing the sand, and was still.
Something hot and wild tugged at Gatlin’s perception.
Slowly he raised his head and stared across the river at the far bank.
The great wolf sat its haunches at the top of the bank, tongue lolling, its pelt glistening with water. It stared down at Gatlin with a strange intensity. And Gatlin, frozen, locked eyes with those of the beast.
The wolf had saved him, had darted between him and the cougar, drawing the cats attention for that one crucial instant. That should have seemed amazing, more so even than the fact that the wolf was here at all. But the thought never surfaced as his eyes melded with those of the wolf and his perspective shifted…
A flood-tide of sensation washed over him. His awareness expanded. Alien feelings overwhelmed his senses. He gloried in an animal strength, muscles taut and quivering. His powerful heart sent the hot blood surging thorough his veins. He gazed from the eyes of a seasoned predator, staring out and down at a human figure standing rigid on the sand at river’s edge. A male, tall and hard muscled, hair matted with sweat, gray eyes now wide with shock, griping a smoking pistol in one hand as if his life depended on it.
Then, swift as a rattlers strike, his perception lurched again, so suddenly his belly clenched, bile rising. Now he seemed to lope through shadowed forests, roaming far and free.
Hunting. His pack ran with him, and he breathed in their musk scent. He reveled in his pride and strength, the hot thrill of the chase, running down the prey. Then, the savagery of the kill, coppery taste of blood slick and hot over his tongue.
A sapling beside the wolf’s head exploded in a shower of splinters. The wolf yelped, startled, and whirled around, staring up-river. Gatlin gasped, slipping to his knees. He shook his head, dazed as if he’d been thrown from a horse. His eyes refused to focus. Somewhere, as if in a dream, he heard the fading echo of a shot.
Then men were there, black faces hovering over him, shouting questions. Brush crackled and a horse barreled through the thicket at a run. Corin Dunby jumped from the saddle and slid down the bank to the shoals beside the river.
Hands were on him, pulling him up. He heard his father’s voice as from a distance.
“… all right? Were you clawed? Bit? Damn it, boy…”
Gatlin looked up, his sight clearing as the fog slowly lifted from his brain. “Tenagwah?”
The Creek limped over to him. The tomahawk he’d used to hack his foot free from the branch dangled from his hand. Blood slicked his chest and his face was gray with shock, but he showed no emotion. He glanced down at the body of the cougar. With a grimace that could have been a smile, he slipped the tomahawk into Gatlin’s belt.
Corin shoved aside the blacks, clutched Gatlin’s arm in an iron grip. “Boy, what the hell were you thinking? Taking off like that, disobeying me…you could have been killed.”
Gatlin forced a smile. “Got him, though, didn’t I?”
Drew Tarrington was on the rim of the slope, studying the opposite bank. “Was that a wolf? Haven’t seen one of those around here in years! Damn it! How could I have missed him?”
Gatlin ignored the others. His eyes sought the top of the bank, swept the wooded fringe.
Like the ghost they thought he’d been, the wolf had vanished without a trace.
###
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