Simon Hawke - The Seeker

The Ranger followed the track, moving quickly, but not making any sounds as he trailed his prey. From time to time, almost like an animal, he would stop and sniff the air, not wanting to come suddenly upon the bird and alert it to his presence. And, after following the trail for perhaps a mile or so, he caught its scent. A human’s senses would not have been sharp enough to catch it, but the Ranger smelled the creature’s faintly musky odor on the wind. He quickly judged the way the breeze was blowing to make sure he was down-wind of it, then moved forward at a crouch as he began to stalk.

After covering perhaps a quarter of a mile, he could hear it. It was moving slowly, its feet making soft, thudding sounds that would have been inaudible to human ears, but not to the Ranger’s. The Ranger checked the ground once more. There were no signs of other predators. Just the same, as he continued to stalk the bird, he took his time to make sure that no other creature hunted it. Erdlands were large enough to discourage attack by all but the largest and the fiercest of the night creatures, but it would not be smart to focus only on the game at hand and neglect another predator that might be stalking it. That could lead to an unpleasant surprise, and competing with another predator for prey would not only be dangerous, but a sure way to give the erdland enough time to make good its escape.

The Ranger felt the eager anticipation of the others and ignored it. A good hunter never rushed his kill. He stalked the erdland carefully and slowly. Gradually, he closed the distance between himself and the large bird. It was fully fourteen feet in height, with a long snake-like neck and a large rounded body from which its two strong legs sprouted like stilts.

Its scaly collar, which it flared and expanded when attacked to make its head look bigger and more fearsome, was folded back as it moved slowly, scanning the ground ahead of it for food. The Ranger got down very low and patiently began to circle behind it, taking care not to make the slightest sound. He ignored the eager tension of the others, not wanting anything to distract him. His movements were lithe and catlike as he proceeded on all fours, pausing every now and then to check the wind and make sure it had not shifted.

It took agonizing patience, for the slightest sound would alert his quarry—the merest snapping of a dry twig on some low-growing desert scrub; the slightest crunch of his foot upon some stones; a sudden shift in the breeze. . . . The bird would be alerted to his presence in an instant and either try to run or turn and attack. An erdland was most dangerous when one was meeting it head-on.

Slowly, the Ranger advanced, gradually closing the distance between himself and his prey. The bird was still completely unaware of him, even though he had moved up to within only ten or fifteen feet of it. He was almost close enough, but not yet, not quite. He wanted to make sure.

Only eight or nine feet now. If the bird turned, it could not avoid seeing him. The moonlight on the desert rendered him clearly visible, and it was only by stealth and by keeping directly behind it that he had managed to approach this close.

The bird suddenly stopped in its tracks, its head coming up alertly as its neck straightened.

In that instant, the Ranger made his move.

With a swiftness matched only by that of an elf, he came up from all fours, ran three quick steps, and leaped. As the bird started, he landed on its back, clamping his legs tightly around its body as he seized its neck with both hands.

The bird gave out a piercing cry and jumped for-ward, leaping high on its powerful legs as it tried to dislodge him, while at the same time, its collar flared out wide, and its strong, muscular neck twisted in his grasp. The Ranger clamped his grip with all his might as the bird tried to twist its head around and peck him with its beak. One blow of that powerful, wedge-shaped beak could break his skull. The Ranger resisted the efforts of the bird to twist its head around. He held on squeezing hard with his legs, as the erdland hopped around erratically, trying to buck him off.

The bird tried everything to fight free of his grasp. It lunged with its long neck, trying to pull him forward and off balance so that it could fling him off, but the Ranger held on tightly and pulled back, preventing the bird from extending its neck all the way. For a moment, the erdland fought against his pull, then abruptly gave in to it and brought its neck straight back. The Ranger almost lost his balance, but he managed to hold on.

The bird leaped from one leg to the other, doing everything it could to throw him off, and the Ranger felt his muscles burning with the effort of trying to hold on. The bird twisted its head first one way, then the other, but the Ranger would not loosen his grip. As the bird brought its neck sharply back once more to force him off, he went with the motion and used the opportunity to slide his hands up quickly under the erdland’s flared out collar, to the point where the skull joined the neck.

The bird screeched as he slowly started trying to bend its head straight up and back. Its leaping redoubled, but the Ranger held on. It tried to extend its neck out once again, but he pulled back against it, straining as he forced its head up farther until the bird’s beak was aimed straight up at the sky. It snapped that wedge-shaped beak uselessly and shrieked as he forced its head back, the muscles on his arms standing out like cords. And then, the neck broke.

The bird dropped like a stone, falling heavily to the ground, and the Ranger rolled free of it, landing hard and scrambling to get away from its legs as it thrashed several times, and then lay still. The others exulted in the thrill of it.

The Ranger got up and removed the hunting knife from his sheath. He bent down and lifted one of the bird’s long legs and slit its soft underbelly open. The blood gushed forth, and the smell of it was heady. The Ranger threw back his head and gave out a triumphant cry. The others felt his joy and sense of accomplishment, the fulfillment of his purpose. They celebrated with him. Then they began to feed.

The Ranger did not hurry as he headed back toward the place where they had camped. They had all eaten their fill and left enough behind to satisfy a hoard of scavengers. Nothing would be wasted. Only the bones of the large bird would be left to bleach slowly in the desert sun, after its scales had dried up and fluttered away upon the wind. After a successful hunt, the Ranger liked to walk and feel the night, savor its sounds and smells, open up his spirit to the vastness of the desert.

Unlike the shelter of the forest on the Ringing Mountains, where he enjoyed the canopy of leaves above him and felt the closeness of the trees, the tablelands were wide and open, a seemingly infinite desert plain that stretched out as far as the eye could see. The Ranger felt a strong affinity for the forest, for it was and would always be his home, but the desert possessed its own sweet and savage beauty. It was as if he could feel himself expanding in a hopeless effort to fill it with his presence. The forest was comfortable and cozy, but here, there was room to breathe. There was a different sort of solitude out on the tablelands. A solitude that filled him with a sense of the vastness of the harsh world that he lived in, the majesty of it. For all the desolation of the desert, there was a serene quality to it that filled one with a sense of peace. It could be a brutal, dangerous, and unforgiving place where violence struck suddenly at the unwary, but to one who did not fight it and who could accept its ways it could be a place of transformation.

The Child had almost died out on the desert once before, many years ago. Instead, the tribe had been born there, and had returned now and learned how to survive in it. And, on the tablelands of Athas, survival was no mean accomplishment. The Ranger dwelled upon these thoughts as he made his way unerringly back to the camp.