Harry Turtledove: Clan of the Claw

“Are we even smerps to Aedonniss?” he wondered.

“I doubt it, but he does not hunt us for the sport of it,” Enni Chennitats answered, following his chariot of thought perfectly.

That was something. Rantan Taggah wondered if it was enough. The Liskash didn’t hunt Mrem for the sport of it, either, but hunt them they did. And when the Liskash did not hunt Mrem, the Mrem hunted them. What else did being blood enemies mean? Liskash and Mrem even smelled wrong, alien, to each other. Like any kit, Rantan Taggah hadn’t hunted only smerps and other mammals. He’d gone after lizards and small snakes, too. (One of the first lessons kits learned-those who lived to learn it, anyway-was how to tell snakes that squeezed from the ones with poison in their fangs.) He remembered how strange their blood and flesh tasted after he made a kill. They were different from him in a way smerps weren’t.

He hadn’t fully understood the difference then. He did now.

“Someone coming to see you, Talonmaster,” Enni Chennitats said quietly.

It was Zhanns Bostofa. Of course it was. Zhanns Bostofa thought himself important enough to see the talonmaster whenever he chose. And he wouldn’t be happy with the dispositions Rantan Taggah had made for his herds and wagons. No matter when Rantan Taggah placed them, Zhanns Bostofa wouldn’t be happy with it. The talonmaster was morosely certain of that.

And he was right. The heavyset male tore into him as if Zhanns Bostofa led the Clan of the Claw and Rantan Taggah were a lowly herdsmale. Rantan Taggah listened for a little while. Then he said, “That will be enough of that.”

Zhanns Bostofa stared at him as if he were a krelprep that had suddenly opened its mouth to display a daggertooth’s fangs. “How dare you speak to me so?” Zhanns Bostofa demanded. With his deep, resonant voice, he might have made a better talonmaster than Rantan Taggah-or at least a more impressive one. Rantan Taggah was convinced there was a difference between the two. So was the rest of the Clan of the Claw-with the evident exception of Zhanns Bostofa.

“How? Because you’re wasting my time, that’s how. You should be getting your bundor and hamsticorns ready to move. The clan decided that was the better thing to do after the Dancers showed how Sassin had magicked poor, sorry Grumm into believing the lies the son of a serpent hissed in his ears. If you don’t want to come with us, you can stay by yourself-but how long will you last against the Liskash with only the handful of fools who stay with you?” Rantan Taggah enjoyed the rare pleasure of being able to say exactly what he thought.

The snarl of rage on Zhanns Bostofa’s face took in both Rantan Taggah and Enni Chennitats. “The way the two of you seem so friendly, I shouldn’t wonder if the Dance was faked to get the answer you wanted.”

It had never occurred to Rantan Taggah that a Dance might be faked. Zhanns Bostofa had taught him something, but not something he’d wanted to learn. He wanted to walk away from the black-and-white male and find someplace quiet where he could try to wash himself clean.

But, shocked as he was, his reaction was as nothing beside that of Enni Chennitats. Her pupils filled her eyes, as they would just before she sprang for a kill. And behind their blackness flamed raw, red rage.

“Fake…a Dance?” she whispered. “Fake the power we have through Assirra and Aedonniss? Come with me, Zhanns Bostofa. Come tell Demm Etter that you think she told a lie about the word the Dance gave us. Come on. I want to watch while you do that. I want to see how much of you is left afterwards.” She reached out to grab the male’s arm.

He sprang back before she could. He might carry fat around his middle, but he could be nimble when his hide was on the line. And it was. He knew it was. “Here, now! Watch what you’re doing!” he said in some alarm. “I didn’t say anything about Demm Etter.”

“You said the Dance was false,” Enni Chennitats answered implacably. “How could it be false unless the senior priestess made it false?”

Zhanns Bostofa made an unhappy noise down deep in his throat. “I might have been hasty,” he said at last-more of an apology than Rantan Taggah had ever got from him, or ever expected. But Rantan Taggah was a rival, not a priestess.

And, being a rival, he clawed Zhanns Bostofa while the other male was down: “You might have wanted to piss on things so they’d smell more like you. Next time you need to piss, go find a dry patch of dirt, squat, and cover your piddle with dust the way you’re supposed to.”

He wondered if that would provoke Zhanns Bostofa to fight. He hoped so. Tearing some strips off Zhanns Bostofa’s hide might let him forget the idea of a faked Dance…for a little while, anyhow.

Zhanns Bostofa’s ears flattened against the top of his head, as if he were ready to brawl. But the plump male turned and stormed away instead. His brushed-out tail showed the fury he was holding in.

Rantan Taggah let out a sigh. “Well,” he said, “ that was fun.”

“Wasn’t it?” The fur on Enni Chennitats’s tail rose up, too. “A faked Dance, a lying Dance…I should have torn out his throat for that.”

“Yes, you should have,” the talonmaster agreed. “When they stood to judge you, I would have sworn he had it coming. By Aedonniss, he did, too.”

“Do you know what he makes me wonder?” Enni Chennitats said.

“No.” Rantan Taggah wasn’t sure he wanted to, either. “But you’re going to tell me, aren’t you?”

She dipped her head. “Remember how I was talking about how there might be another god besides Aedonniss, a god who’s to blame for the Liskash?”

“I’m not likely to forget,” Rantan Taggah answered. “What about it?” He didn’t see the connection.

Since he didn’t, Enni Chennitats made it plain for him: “If that god reached out to touch one of us, what would the Mrem be like afterwards? A lot like Zhanns Bostofa, don’t you think?”

Till she first mentioned the idea, Rantan Taggah hadn’t dreamt there could be any gods but Aedonniss and his gentle mate. Now, watching Zhanns Bostofa’s hunched-over form recede in the distance, the talonmaster found himself a believer-a reluctant believer, perhaps, but a believer all the same.

The driver checked the harness on the two krelprep hitched to the chariot. Only after he was sure all the leather was sound and all the lashings secure did he incline his head to Enni Chennitats. “You can get in, priestess,” he said.

“Thank you, Tessell Yatt,” she said, and stepped up into the car. The wickerwork of the flooring gave a little under her feet. Everything in the chariot was as light as the Clan of the Claw’s finest shapers could make it. The less weight the krelprep had to pull, the faster and the longer they could run.

Tessell Yatt stroked one of the beasts on its muzzle before he came back to join Enni Chennitats in the car. Keeping herd animals…That, the Mrem had done for a very long time. The priestess still wondered how her folk had got beasts to draw them and their wagons, though. After all, in a krelprep’s nostrils what were the Mrem but predators?

And, perhaps just as much to the point, what were krelprep to the Mrem of ancient days but so much walking meat? Whoever first realized the brown-and-white-patched beasts might be more, might do more, must surely have been a male or female of godlike cleverness.

She looked back over her shoulder. As the trek began, her place was near the front. Behind her, wagon drivers, chariot crews, and warriors on foot snarled at one another. Everyone thought everyone else was getting in his way. Nobody imagined he might be getting in anybody else’s way. Mrem weren’t always right-Enni Chennitats had no doubts on that score. But, right or not, they were almost always sure.