Клэр Белл - The Named - The Complete Series

Struggle as Quiet Hunter might, he could not get her meaning across to True-of-voice.

“The song … I mean True-of-voice … does not understand how he has hurt your clan.”

Ratha explained again how events had cascaded into the final damaging result. She tried not to snarl as she concluded,“You are hurting our friends because they don’t want to be captive or have their cubs killed or be forced to mate.”

After a very long exchange, Quiet Hunter turned back to Ratha.“You must understand that for True-of-voice the song is all. To be alone behind the eyes, to be individual — the idea is beyond his reach. What an individual wants or needs means nothing to him, thus it cannot affect what he does.”

Ratha hated the floating-off-her-feet feeling that was starting again. She wanted all four paws slammed down on solid ground.

“Tell him that if he doesn’t stop his son from harassing my people, he will taste the Red Tongue,” she growled. “Or would he prefer a slash for a slash? For every Named cub that died, many hunter cubs would be slain.”

“This one understands now how you feel,” said Quiet Hunter to her. “But such threats are of no use if he cannot understand what you want, or why.”

Ratha hackled.“Don’t you understand, song-hearer? New Singer has my daughter!”

Something hardened briefly in Quiet Hunter’s eyes. “I want Thistle back as much as you do. Attacking True-of-voice won’t help her.”

Ratha’s temper was on the point of taking over and demanding that Quiet Hunter obey and translate the message. She wanted revenge for the suffering of her people. If True-of-voice had to kill New Singer to bring the renegades under control, so be it. If he didn’t do something, he would know the wrath of the Named.

“The song is growing restive,” said the dun male, his ears flicking nervously. “We are not enough to challenge it. This one knows that if the song becomes angry, we will be killed. We should go. Please, clan leader.”

She met Quiet Hunter’s gaze. He was asking her not to throw his life away, but whatever she decided, he would do. Then came a flash of memory. The canyon. The firestorm. The dead.

It took nearly all of Ratha’s will to round up her surging feelings and pen them away. It would do the Named no good if she, Quiet Hunter, and the two torchbearers were slain.

“You are starting to sound like Thakur,” Ratha grumbled, and grudgingly told the two torchbearers to turn around. With Quiet Hunter following, she turned away, taking the path back to their streamside refuge.

Brooding, she waited by the fire for Thakur and the herders to return. She extended her claws and ran her tongue along her fangs. There was a time when leading a charge with the Red Tongue between her jaws could sweep all problems aside. That time had gone.

Near sunset, Thakur, Cherfan, and the herders returned with the young face-tails, a few three-horns, and some dapplebacks. She wasn’t surprised that the renegades had eaten a few herdbeasts. She wondered why they hadn’t killed more.

“They are more interested in mating than eating. They want to be there when the first female comes into heat,” Thakur told her. He paused. “Quiet Hunter tells me that you wanted to threaten True-of-voice with fire, but you held off. I am grateful for that, clan leader.”

“Be grateful to Quiet Hunter. He counseled me just like you would.”

“Was it just Quiet Hunter?”

“No,” Ratha admitted. “Just after I gave him the order, I thought about the fire-slain hunters in the canyon. It was brief, just a flash, but it was enough to make me hesitate when he resisted my order.” She laid her nose on her paws. “It will be a lot harder for me to use the Red Tongue against others. Every time I think about it, I get that taste in my mouth, that smell up my nose, and I see how those burned bodies fell apart. And that dead hunter up that tree …” She shuddered. “I hope this doesn’t … cripple me as a leader.”

“I think you will just seek other alternatives.”

“What worries me is when there are none.”

“Then you will do what you must in spite of your feelings. I have faith in that,” he answered.

For a while Ratha was silent, staring at the fire. Her creature had such power to harm as well as help.“Did you find more grazing space?”

“Yes. Those rumbler-creatures are useful after all. They’ve eaten down the brush and knocked over trees so that new grass is growing. There will be enough to feed the herd, at least for a while.”

He sat down by the fire with her. She watched it shimmer in his emerald green eyes.

Ratha felt her voice lower into a growl.

“I wanted to kill their cubs, Thakur. Revenge for every Named litterling that New Singer slaughtered. I still do.”

Thakur was quiet.

“Revenge would feel good,” he said, surprising her. “My teeth ache to tear New Singer’s hide. I could even kill the hunter cubs, if you ordered. I saw how our litterlings died.”

“Then …”

“I can feel this way and not act on it,” he said. “I know that such revenge would destroy us. We value the light in the eyes. True-of-voice’s people have that light, even though it has taken a strange form.” His voice softened. “Retaliating by killing cubs will not only cost our lives, it will taint us and everything we are trying to be. I think you understand me, clan leader.”

This time it was Ratha who fell silent. At last she asked,“What are we trying to be?”

“I don’t know. I hope I get a chance to find out. And I hope that True-of-voice and New Singer get that chance as well.”

“It seems so easy for you to forgive them.”

He lay down beside her.“It may seem so, but I struggle as much as you do.”

“Is that another kind of courage?” Ratha asked him as he laid his head on his paws and let the fire reflect in his eyes.

“Yes,” he said. “It is.”

Ratha awoke the next morning, half believing that the return of the treelings and her creature was a dream until she felt Ratharee curled up against her flank and the fire’s warmth on her face. This refuge seemed like home, a thought that brought mixed feelings. No, home was clan ground. Home was also Thistle-chaser, Fessran, Bira, Drani, and the others. Ratha was determined to free them.

First, she would get word to the captives that most of their cubs were safe. By using whisker patterns, she knew now that the Named had lost four litterlings. Fessran had five and two were killed. Bira and Drani had each lost one. Though the mothers would mourn their slain young, they would take heart to hear that most of the cubs were still alive, cared for by fathers. It would give the captives what they needed most — hope.

Ratha thought about sending one of the Named with that message, but dared not. Any male who approached New Singer’s stronghold would be killed. She was the only female left among the exiled Named. Thakur would argue that losing her would imperil them even more, both as a leader and a breeding-age female.

Did he really see the truth, or was he blinded by his feelings for her? Despite his words, she knew he could lead. Even if Cherfan became leader, Thakur would counsel and guide him. As for breeding, she knew she wanted only Thakur. Yes, she could accept another male and had, but somehow her body, shocked by what had happened to her first litter and her first mate, had never produced any more cubs. So she might not be as important in those ways. If she could help the captives and free them, she might be serving a greater good.

She knew that she and her friends were fast running out of time. By the feelings in her body, she sensed that she and the other Named females were coming into heat. It could not be denied or delayed.