Клэр Белл - The Named - The Complete Series

Ratha took his advice, sinking into a doze. She woke when someone squirmed against her flank.

“Bundi, get your foot out of my eye,” came a growl from Cherfan.

“I can’t. Someone’s sitting on me. Ooof …”

“Whose tail is sticking up my nose?” someone else complained and another voice said, “Be still, you’ll wake her….”

“She’s awake,” Ratha managed to say. “She feels better and she wants to get up.”

The Named unscrambled themselves from the protective panther-pile they had made about their leader. Ratha got squashed a few times by various paws before she wriggled free.

“The first thing I want is a drink,” she said, shaking her pelt. “And then we’ll follow True-of-voice.”

When Ratha had regained her steadiness and had drunk some water, which made her feel stronger, she led the Named in the direction that True-of-voice and his tribe had departed. Some of the clan carried the hunter dead, either on their backs or in their jaws. Fessran and her party had rejoined them, still unable to find Night-who-eats-stars.

Ratha could tell by the way the Firekeeper eyed the clan’s burdens that she was relieved to have been spared that task.

“Are you all right?” her friend asked, her scent strong with concern. “You smell like you’ve been through something bad. You look a bit shaky, too.”

Ratha head-bumped with Fessran, feeling her friend’s ears and eyebrow whiskers against her own. “I was and I did, but I’m better now. I’ll tell you more later.”

“I saw True-of-voice and his gang starting up that peak you see to the east. If you want, I can show you so that you don’t have to track them.”

Ratha accepted her friend’s offer, glad to have Fessran by her side again.

“Where’s Thakur?” Fessran asked, turning her head.

“In the back, Firekeeper,” came his response. “I’m staying here because I’m carrying one of them. Cherfan is, too.”

Fessran wrinkled her nose so that the tops of her fangs showed.“Ugh. I’ll keep away from you both until we get where we’re going.”

“That’s just as well. You stay up front with Ratha,” Thakur called back.

“Not because I stink of cinders?” Fessran returned mockingly.

“That, too.”

As they went, the Firekeeper gave Ratha nudges to indicate the way. The ground began to slope underfoot, and the plain gave way to brush and scrub oak. Looking back over her shoulder, Ratha could see the hunters’ plain sweeping out below her, and in the distance, the greener open-forested hills and meadows of clan ground. She hoped she could soon be back there, watching young cubs play in the nursery and older ones in the meadow, learning how to manage the herdbeasts. She also hoped that the clan members who were still guarding both during her absence had not encountered any problems.

On the hunters’ plain, she saw other animals: groups of face-tails scattered about the grassland, herds of springing antelope, and wild stripers grazing.

Soon both oak and pine shadowed the trail, then just pine with dirt and dry needles underfoot. As the Named continued up, the trees grew sparser and the trail rockier. Ratha thought that True-of-voice would climb all the way to the top, but instead she caught sight of the big gray leader and his tribe halted before a huge tilted granite table. It was shaded by pines and fissured by sun and rain. Where sunlight beamed, the granite made little sparkles that appeared and vanished as Ratha moved her head. Above the sloping granite face, an outcropping jutted from the mountain’s flank. The air was dry, yet fresh, and the skylight blue with wisps of cloud. Against it Ratha could see birds wheeling and gliding, huge wings outspread.

A bump from Fessran’s shoulder brought her gaze down again. She saw that True-of-voice’s people were padding into place in a half circle around the table. Those who carried bodies approached the table and climbed onto it. There they laid down their burdens, being as careful and caring as True-of-voice when Ratha had watched him help lift Tooth-broke-on-a-bone.

Though she had not given any order, Thakur and Cherfan walked forward to join the ones climbing onto the table. In a silence broken only by the hissing wind, she heard crumbled granite crunch under their pads. As they mounted the broken rock, their claws scratched and Ratha could hear their soft grunts of effort. When they reached the fissured flat surface, the two clan males helped one another unload their burdens in the same careful way as the hunters. Soon all the dead were laid out. The bearers withdrew, joining their companions, who were now sitting in a loose half ring about the table.

Ratha caught movement flickering at the edge of one eyes. Turning her head, she saw Thistle padding toward her. Her daughter nose-touched, then said,“True-of-voice glad you came. Me, too. Places there for you, see? Wants you all here to share song for dead ones.”

Ratha looked. Thistle was right. The hunters had left places for Ratha and the Named. They took them, slowly and silently. Thistle sat across from Fessran, on Ratha’s other flank.

“What now?” asked Fessran softly.

“Shhh. We wait,” Ratha answered.

From her position, she looked up at the upthrust ridge that formed one side of the table. It blocked her view of the top, although, if she strained her neck, she could catch a glimpse of it.

What are we waiting for? Ratha wondered. Are we just going to sit here while the dead ones rot and dry under the sun? Is that what they mean by“ giving them to the air?”

The answer came in the form of heavy wing-flaps overhead. A large hawk, its eyes fierce and beady, swooped over the table, landing on the outcrop. It stared down at the table, moving its feathered head around in a quick series of jerks. Another followed, also landing on the outcrop. Then a third.

More were gathering overhead, gliding down in an open spiral as Thakur and Cherfan returned from the table and took places near Ratha. The hawks on the outcrop bobbed their heads, cleaned their beaks against their talons, and mantled their wings at one another. One sailed down and landed.

Ratha felt herself grimacing in disgust. Then, as the hawk hopped and landed again on something higher so that Ratha could see its head and opening beak, the grimace turned into a snarl. Wretched carrion-birds, violating the stillness of the dead, she thought, wanting someone to chase them away, but neither True-of-voice nor any of his tribe made a move. Her muscles tensed and she was just about to launch herself up on the table when a heavy foot slapped onto her tail and pinned it.

“No, yearling!” a voice hissed in her ear. For an instant she wanted to leap, and struggled briefly against him. Then she became still, not wanting to interrupt the hunters’ vigil. Baffled, she turned her head to Thakur, whispering, “I was just trying to help. Those carrion-eaters are goingto ruin whatever True-of-voice has planned.”

In a softer whisper, Thakur replied,“Ratha, they are part of what he has planned. The dead are being given to the air. The birds of the air.”

At first Ratha refused to believe him. Instinct made her want to lunge at the raptors, driving them away as she would chase them from a kill. It went against her grain to let them land and feed on a herdbeast kill. To allow or even encourage carrion-feeders to alight on the dead of one’s own tribe was unthinkable, yet True-of-voice seemed to be doing that. It was all she could do not to whip her tail out from beneath Thakur’s paw. She felt the muscles in her haunches tremble and twitch with the instinct to attack.

Her ears twitched back, wanted to flatten. This has hideous, revolting, alien. How could True-of-voice… and how could Thakur understand?