Norton, Andre - Moon of Three Rings

Hunger and thirst were dim urges stirring now. I scented man, the odors of a farm holding. And, wincing as I rose on my sore pads, I slipped through the underbrush. How much of the beast served me, I did not know. Man's knowledge might be an awkward leash upon my hunting skill. In dim twilight, as I stole from shadow to shadow along a wall of loosely piled stone, I was drawn by the messages my nostrils caught and classified.

Meat—saliva dripped from my tongue, my belly growled its emptiness—the scent of meat.

I crouched between two bushes, peering underneath them to an open farmyard. A kas stood stamping heavy hoofs. There were also four of those domesticated animals—forsphi—whose long-fleeced coats provided the raw material for the weaving of a highly weather-resistant cloth. They appeared uneasy, turning their long necks, bending their heads at queer angles, to survey the wall near which I crouched. And one of them voiced deep, coughing grunts of alarm. Just as I scented them, so must they also have picked up my presence.

But what I sought was not one of those, half again as large as I. A fowl picked an erratic path much closer to my hiding place. It was a long-legged creature with a sharply pointed bill which it repeatedly stabbed into the ground. I tensed as it neared. Unlike the animals, it appeared not to have any sense of danger. I burst from my bush and charged it. The bird whirled with a speed which I had not thought possible, and I felt a sharp and piercing pain above one of my eyes. Only a quick flinch saved me from another attack and I fled, blood blinding me on the left, aware that only happy chance had saved my sight.

The clamor of the animals rose as I ran back along the wall and into such cover as I could find. I ran a long distance before my sore paws and laboring lungs forced me to a halt.

Barsks were supposedly wily hunters. But I was not a barsk, I was Krip Vorlund.

I had one advantage not shared by my man body, the night did not blind me. The dark might be my day, which it probably was for a barsk. And before morning I fed, ravenously, certainly not daintily, on a reptilian creature I pawed out from between two stones in a stream bed. Then I found a hollow between a fallen tree and a rock and slept, waking now and then to lick my paws and hope that they were not too raw to carry me onward.

It was better, I decided, to switch traveling by day when I might be sighted to night, which was the natural time for barsk prowling. So I dozed throughout the light hours and limped on when the moon was high.

The Three Rings about that lunar disk were very bright tonight. My barsk head went up and, before I could subdue the impulse, I bayed—my deep cry echoing oddly until it sounded, even to me, more than just that of a night runner saluting the sky rider. There was something in that splendid display which drew and held the eyes, and I could understand why those of Yiktor attributed psychic powers to the rare phenomenon.

Three-Ringed moon meant power—but there was only one power I wanted and that was to regain my own body. I returned to the stream and hunted again, with slightly better results, for this time I flushed a warm blooded animal I surprised drinking at a pool. As Jorth I feasted, thrusting man-memory away during that meal. Then I drank my fill and started across country in search of a road which might be my guide.

I came upon an east-west path running through the woods. For a wide space on either side of the thoroughfare underbrush and saplings had been cut back, leaving open space. I kept just within this cover going west.

Oskold's land did not appear to be thickly settled, at least not in this section. Before dawn I passed, giving it wide berth, another fort such as the one I had been imprisoned in. But this one had a settlement by it, though the houses, or rather huts, were very roughly built as though meant to be only temporary shelters.

It was an encampment, I thought, barracks for more men than the fort could house. Sentries walked beats on the eastern side, and there were several lines of riding kasi pegged out, not grazing free. I believed Oskold's forces were alerted, as if to repel some invasion. I passed too close to a kas, which snorted and then gave voice to a roar, making its comrades highly vocal in turn. Men shouted and lanterns flashed along the hut lines. I slipped away hurriedly.

If the outer limits of the domain were empty land, prairie uncut by the plow, the same was not true of the country into which the road now led me. And it had been wise to change from day travel to night. After leaving the camp, I skirted before dawn a village of some size, slinking through the fields which sustained it. Harvest had bared most of the land. But as I skulked by a farmhouse, I was startled by a sharp yapping and read in that the warning of a long-domesticated hound-hunter. Other animals took up the alarm until the village rang with their cries, and I saw once more lights on, heard a shout or two aimed at the wildly baying yard dwellers.

The reaction of the people of Yim-Sin and the words of Maelen had assured me that a barsk was a rare and dreaded creature. Suppose I was sighted, or some farmer turned loose hounds to hunt the strange disturber? To go on into thickly settled territory could be suicidal folly. I paced up and down within the thicket I had chosen for the day's layup. And I heard myself whining a little at my thoughts. But somewhere—somewhere in Oskold's land was the answer to the fate of my man body, and that I must know!

After my experience, I dared not hunt at another farmyard. But wild life was scarce and shy hereabouts, and my hunger drove me at last to a walled field. Tonight there was no bright display of three rings in the heavens, rather clouds massed there. And that veiling gave me extra courage to attempt once more an attack on domesticated prey.

The creatures in the field were fodo; I had already sampled what they had to offer in the dried meat Maelen carried. They were small enough, about the size of Tantacka. Perhaps long ago some common ancestor had been theirs, though generations of domestication and supervised breeding had made the fodo much heavier of body and shorter of leg, doubtless thicker of wits also. The only trouble was that they chose to huddle together for sleeping, and a charge at the whole herd might well spoil my hunt.

I prowled around the wall, testing the air carefully for the scent I had come to identify with the yappers of the farmyards. The wind swept toward me, carrying only the rich odor of the sleepers. Had I a partner I thought it would be easy. One of us downwind could have stampeded the fodo to the waiting jaws of the other.

In the end I decided that my fleetness was my best weapon and I ran downwind. I had very little time to wait. The snorting heap of sleepers pulled apart, rose grunting. I charged and seized upon a squealer, dragging it with me in spite of its struggles. Getting over the wall so burdened was difficult, but hunger is a mighty drive and finally I managed it, as well as the return journey to a mass of rocks and brush along the river which provided me with a fort, though I had no mind to be besieged there.

I ate enough to satisfy my hunger. Then I prudently waded downstream, thus hoping to destroy any trail which an outraged farmer might bring his hounds to sniff out. A bridge spanned the river, and under its arch I came ashore and licked water from my fur.

While still so busied I heard the pound of hoofs echoing hollowly. Crouching in the shadows I lay low. There were two sets of hoof beats—each heading from opposite directions, and the speed with which they came spoke of dire necessity. I thought that the riders would pass close to where I lay, and I listened for any greeting which might explain their haste.