Клэр Белл - The Named - The Complete Series

In the midafternoon heat Ratha ambled instead of trotted as she made her rounds among the scattered beasts, herders, and Firekeepers. At the nearest guard-fire, she saw Fessran. A tickle of worry about her friend crept along her back. The Firekeeper leader had seemed subdued lately.

Ratha touched noses and rubbed the full length of her body against her friend, crooking her tail over Fessran’s back. She could tell by the warm tone in Fessran’s scent that the Firekeeper welcomed such open affection. But underneath, Fessran’s smell told Ratha her friend was troubled.

“Thakur says he heard you singing last night,” Ratha said, trying to tease. “It is known among the Named that when Fessran is in full voice, the mating season is not far behind.”

Fessran’s reply was flat. “Thakur must have his ears stuffed with herdbeast hair. That was Bira, not me.”

Ratha’s ears swiveled forward, and she tried to look into Fessran’s eyes as the Firekeeper asked, “No one’s been complaining about me, have they? I mean, I haven’t shirked my duties even while I’ve been looking for my treeling.”

“No,” Ratha answered. She felt her own companion on her shoulder. Fessran looked a bit scruffy. Ever since her Fessree had disappeared, she had to depend on her own tongue for grooming.

“Do you want to borrow Ratharee?” Ratha asked.

“No. I appreciate the offer, but grooming isn’t the same if another treeling does it.” Fessran let her forepaws slide out until her creamy belly fur flattened the grass. “Funny. I never thought I’d really get attached to the little flea-picker. You and Thakur are as soft as dung when it comes to treelings, but I thought I was being more practical about it. It’s not Fessree’s little hands I miss. It’s her sitting on my shoulder and making noises in my ear. I got used to it.”

Ratha saw her shift some of the weight off her left foreleg, rolling half onto her side.

“How is your leg?”

“Thanks to Shongshar, it’ll never be the same again, even though it’s had this long to heal. I should be grateful that it works at all. Shoulder’s just a bit stiff. Bites heal better when you’re younger.” She licked the two puckered scars on her upper foreleg. There was another set of scars on her ribs where Shongshar’s saber-teeth had emerged through the leg and into her chest. It was a near-fatal wound, and Ratha was amazed and grateful Fessran had healed this well. Although Bira was coming along as Fessran’s backup for Firekeeper leader, Ratha needed Fessran in that role.

“You know, I wouldn’t feel so bad about Fessree,” Ratha said in an attempt to sound comforting. “Treelings sometimes wander off, but they come back. Aree did that to Thakur.”

“Well, I thought it might be because of the mating season. Everybody’s smell changing and all that. I notice it makes treelings nervous.” Fessran fell silent for a minute, but her scent told Ratha that she wasn’t in heat and probably wouldn’t be this season. After her wound and the long recovery that followed, she wasn’t yet in condition to bear a litter.

“You know why I’m so caught up with that miserable flea-picker?” Fessran asked suddenly, after a long silence. “It’s because of Nyang.”

Nyang. For a moment Ratha switched her tail, lost. Nyang was dead. He had been Fessran’s eldest cub from her last litter, one of those who went over to Shongshar when the clan split into two factions. He had been drowned when Ratha and Thakur managed to flood out the cave where Shongshar had hidden his worship-fire. In helping Ratha to dig the trench that diverted the stream from its banks, Fessran had helped in her son’s death.

“I don’t know why it’s bothering me. I still have Khushi and Chita, though they both are grown. I never felt I knew Nyang as well as I did the others. And then he was gone, and I lost my chance. Well, it’s foolish to mourn now.”

“No, it isn’t foolish at all,” said Ratha, thinking of her own daughter, Thistle-chaser.

Fessran stared at her paws.“After his death I kept thinking of Nyang until it hurt too much. And then Fessree started grooming me very gently and saying treeling nonsense in my ear, and it helped.”

“I know.”

Fessran lifted her muzzle abruptly, startling Ratha.“Do you really know, Ratha? Or would you like me to believe you know? Even though you are clan leader, you still seem so young to me. Have you ever felt the pain of losing a cub you birthed?”

Ratha closed her eyes, trying to keep Thistle-chaser’s story from rushing onto her tongue. No one knew about her lost litter except Thakur, and it was something best kept to herself. Besides, what good would it do to tell except to raise her own old pain again? Fessran didn’t need that. What she wanted was strength from her clan leader, not weakness.

Instead Ratha said,“If it will help, Thakur and I will search for Fessree.”

Fessran hauled herself to her feet, trying not to favor her shoulder.“I’ve been everywhere. It’s easier to see into the treetops now that the leaves are shriveling in the drought. No. You’re both busy. I’ll just leave Fessree to herself, the ungrateful bug-eater.”

She got up and walked off, swinging her tail. Ratha sat at the foot of the sunning rock, looking after her and wondering what else she could have said. Fessran’s change in mood had caught her by surprise, thrown her off balance. The accusation against her of immaturity and lack of understanding stung like a scratch. And even more so because it wasn’t true.

As she had promised, Ratha called the gathering on the following day just before sunset. The Named came to sit before the sunning rock in the old pasture, while the Firekeepers and their leader kindled the meeting fire from torches brought from the fire-den. Ratha noticed that the blaze was made large enough to serve as a beacon to those still coming in from distant corners of clan territory, but not so fierce as to serve as a hypnotic center for the gathering. That way lay danger, as she and Fessran had both learned. Their experience with Shongshar and his fire-worship had taught them caution.

From the sunning rock, she looked down at her friend. Fessran stood to one side, sitting stiffly with a torch in her jaws, shadows dancing across her sand-colored fur. Though at first Fessran had been reluctant, she now allowed and encouraged her Firekeepers to make use of treeling skills. And the treelings had proven more useful to the Firekeepers than anyone could have foreseen. Only this morning, Fessran’s assistant, Bira, had showed Ratha a young student who had taught his treeling to twist grass and bark into a long tail strong enough to wrap about a bundle of sticks. With twigs bound together, a Firekeeper could drag much heavier loads.

Ratha had been intending to send the youngster and his treeling out on the search, but now, she decided, she would keep him here and have him teach his new art to others who might use it. The young male would be disappointed at being denied the adventure, but he would be proud to know he had developed a skill worth keeping.

She sat up and spoke of the purpose for this gathering and of the searchers she was sending out to seek new sources of game, pasturage, and water. She was careful to say she would choose only those who could be spared from their duties, so as not to leave the herds vulnerable or the fires unguarded. And when she had finished, she called Thakur and let him take the place of his choosing, facing into the setting sun.

The other searchers, chosen from among both herders and Firekeepers, stood in pairs with their whiskers facing outward. Thakur stood alone. He was used to being by himself with just Aree for company, and he was experienced in fending for himself away from the clan.