Ratha’s Creature

CHAPTER EIGHT

Summer’s golden grass and lazy sun faded into wind and blowing leaves. The rushes beside the shore withered, turning brittle. Their crisp green odor turned dry and nutty. The mornings became cold and drizzly; the afternoons gray. Only once in a while did the sun seep through the clouds hanging above the lake. Everything smelled dank and rotten.

Ratha shed her summer coat and with it the last faint tracings of her spots. Her fur grew back thickly in gold and cream. She was pleased with her new beauty, but, to her dismay, it didn’t last. The autumn rain turned all the trails to mud and she returned from hunting soggy and spattered from nose to tail. Bonechewer also shed his copper fur for a somber brown, which looked black in the rain.

The weather kept small creatures in their burrows. Both Ratha and Bonechewer worked hard to keep their bellies full. There were times when they returned empty to their den and could only lie and listen to each other’s stomachs growl until hunger forced them to hunt again.

Ratha learned to eat lizards and earthworms and to chew on tubers she dug from the ground. She developed a taste for the noxious bare-tails, for they were often the only thing she could catch.

Autumn yielded to winter. The rain fell hard and often turned to sleet. Ratha and Bonechewer hunted by day and spent the bitter nights curled up with each other in a nest of leaves in a hollow pine. It got so cold that the one who slept closer to the entrance would wake shivering, his or her whiskers rimed with frost.

The morning was still and pale as Ratha poked her whiskers out of the den. She was alone, as Bonechewer had risen earlier to forage. She crawled out and shook herself. She felt itchy and irritable. There was a strange fragile feeling in the air, an uneasy lull between last night’s storm and the mass of heavy clouds crawling down the ridge above the lake.

Better hunt now, she thought, knowing that she and Bonechewer would spend most of the short day huddled together in their den while the new storm lashed the lake to churning froth and flattened the rushes.

She circled the old pine until she picked up Bonechewer’s scent. Soon she saw his tracks and followed them up along the lakeshore.

There she found him, up to his chest in muddy water. He was trying to drag something ashore. As Ratha came closer, she could see that his prize was the drowned carcass of a young deer. She waded in, despite the freezing water, and helped him haul it ashore.

“It hasn’t been dead long,” said Bonechewer, nosing the body. “For carrion, it is fresh. See? The eyes are still firm and clear.”

“A three-horn fawn,” Ratha said, noticing a bony swelling on the animal’s nose that matched the two horn-buds on its head. She placed a paw on the fawn’s ribs and rocked the carcass. It seemed oddly limp and the head rolled on the ground.

“Are you sure it’s fresh?” she asked Bonechewer. “Put your paw on the back. Here, between the shoulders.”

He did. “The back is broken,” he said, cocking his head. “So is the neck. And here are the marks of teeth. This beast didn’t drown. I think this is a kill.”

“Who would throw their kill into the lake?”

Bonechewer twitched his tail. “Someone may have lost it in the storm last night. He may have been dragging it along the ledges that overhang the lake on the far side. We may find the hunter’s body washed up further along the shore.”

Ratha sat down and stared at the carcass. The prickly sensation she had been feeling all morning had soured her temper. “Bonechewer, I haven’t seen any three-horns around the lake, or anywhere else here.”

“I haven’t either,” he answered, shaking his pelt dry. “There aren’t any. I’ve lived here long enough to know.”

“Then where did this one come from?”

He grinned. “Perhaps Meoran sent you a gift.”

“Bonechewer!” Ratha stamped, sending mud up her leg, spattering her chest. Again she stared at the carcass, feeling waves of heat wash over her. She was in no mood for mysteries. She should just eat and be done with it. Something kept her back. This animal had to belong to the clan herds. There was no other place it could have come from, for it was fat and well taken care of, not scrawny and wild.

Bonechewer yawned, “I don’t care where it came from. It’s fresh and both of us could use a good meal.”

“Yarrr,” Ratha agreed, although the sight of the slain clan animal disturbed her more than she would admit. She was sure Bonechewer was teasing, but she sensed truth behind his words, even if it was twisted. She glanced at her companion, who was already tearing at the fawn’s belly. The sound of him eating and the smell of flesh in the damp air made her stomach cramp with hunger. She joined him and ate.

When Ratha thought she couldn’t force another bite down her throat, she felt Bonechewer start and stiffen beside her. She wiped her muzzle on the inside of her foreleg and stared over the barrel of the kill. In a patch of weeds several tail lengths away, sat two intruders, one gray, one spotted. Ratha bristled and started to growl.

“Sss, no!” Bonechewer commanded and her challenge died into a puzzled whimper. She watched as he stepped, stiff-legged, in front of the carcass and faced the two.

These were the Un-Named, Ratha realized, her heart thudding in her chest. One was a half-grown cub and the other an elder, but they looked rough and wild. Their faces were wary, their eyes hunters’ eyes. Their smell, drifting to her through the drizzle, was a scent she had never smelled before. The Un-Named had a strong odor, both sour and musky at once. It was laced with a mixture of prey blood-scents, some old, some fresh. It held the stale scent of age and the smell of mud carried far between weary pawpads. And along with the scents of the Un-Named and the creatures they hunted came the wild scents of unknown valleys, plains and forests where a hunter might roam in freedom or die miserably of starvation.

Ratha stared at the Un-Named Ones and saw that what their smell told her was also written in their eyes. Would such a life allow them to learn anything more than survival ? She had been taught that the clanless ones knew nothing but the urge to fill their bellies. She knew better now. Bonechewer bore no name, yet he spoke as well as any in the clan. But she realized, as she glanced at him and then at the two Un-Named, he was as different from them as he was from those in the clan. She waited, watching Bonechewer. She saw his eyes narrow and his mouth open.

She waited for him to attack or to roar a challenge at the witless ones. He did neither. He spoke to the Un-Named cub as he would have spoken to her. “Do you travel alone with the gray, spotted-coat? Or do more follow?”

The strange cub got up and walked forward. The gray female remained seated, following the cub with eyes that seemed strangely unfocused and diffuse. Ratha thought at first that the gray was blind, but she saw the grizzled head turn and the slitted pupils move as the cub walked past.

She sought the cub’s gaze, thinking she would see the same dull stare. As his eyes met hers, she felt her fur rise. His gaze was as sharp and clear as Bonechewer’s. Yet he was Un-Named. Would he speak?

He waited, holding Ratha’s eyes as if he knew the question burning behind them. Then he turned to Bonechewer. “More follow, dweller-by-the-water. Hunting grows hard. We turn to other ways.”

The sound of his voice sent another shock through Ratha. She let out her breath slowly. She had been as wrong about the Un-Named cub as she had been about Bonechewer. The clan knows nothing about the Un-Named, she thought. Nothing.

The spotted coat spoke again. “There will be many tracks across your ground before this season is done.” The cub’s gaze strayed to the gutted carcass. “Ho, dweller-by-the-water,” he said. “The lake has brought you a good kill.”

“A good kill. Are these the marks of your teeth on its neck, little spotted-coat?” Bonechewer asked.

“No, dweller-by-the-water.”

“Then make your tracks across my ground and leave me alone.”

The cub stepped forward, head lowered, tail stiff. “You have not been long among us if you have forgotten the wanderer’s claim, dweller-by-the-water. The old one and I are far from home ground and we are hungry.”

“I had not forgotten, spotted-coat.” Bonechewer grinned, showing all of his fangs. “I hoped you were too young to know about it. Ah well. Come then, and bring the gray.”

“Bonechewer!” Ratha’s jaw dropped. “Why are you doing this? They have no right to the kill!”

Both the cub and the gray turned green eyes on her. “She speaks for you, dweller-by-the-water?” the cub asked Bonechewer, who had stepped quickly to Ratha’s side.

“Ratha,” Bonechewer hissed in her flattened ear, “if you want yourself in one piece, shut your jaws and let me speak to them.”

“You fear them? A spotted-coat and a gray half your size? They have no right to this kill,” Ratha spat back. “It was taken from clan herds. I’ll fight for it even if you won‘t!”

“The clan? Ptahh! You would fight for them? Meoran would kill you if you returned to them. Fight to fill your own belly, if you must, but speak no more of the clan.”

Ratha’s ears drooped. “If we kept the deer, we wouldn’t have to hunt tomorrow. They are only a spotted coat and a gray.”

“A spotted coat and a gray, yesss, but others follow.” Bonechewer’s whiskers poked Ratha’s cheek. “I don’t want to fight all the Un-Named. Be still, I tell you, and let them eat.” He shoved Ratha aside from the kill, opening the way for the two intruders. Hatred and outrage burned in her, and for a moment her fangs were bared against Bonechewer’s coat.

“You know better than that, clan cat,” he said very softly. “Your belly is full. Let them fill theirs.”

Ratha’s anger settled. She watched as the cub went and nudged the gray. He pointed to the carcass with one outstretched paw. The elder lifted her head, stared at the meat and licked her chops.

“Food,” Ratha heard the cub say. “Come. Eat.” The grizzled one peered past him to Ratha and Bonechewer. She whimpered, raised her hackles and showed her teeth, yellowed and worn. “No,” the cub said, pawing her. “No fight. No hurt. Gray one can eat.”

Bonechewer walked off a distance and sat down, his back turned. Ratha, however, stayed close, watching. Something about the gray female repelled yet fascinated her. The cub, slavering, trotted to the carcass and began ripping at the flank. The gray followed him and the two ate until their bellies were swollen.

At last, the two were finished. Ratha noticed, with dismay, that not much remained of the deer except the skull and shanks. The rest was eaten or scattered. The gray-coat coughed, shook off the rain pattering on her fur and swung around. Not knowing quite why she did so, Ratha set herself in front of the gray, blocking the old one’s path.

“Old one, if you eat of our kill,” Ratha said, “you must give us answers in return. Who are you? Where is your home ground? Where do you journey in such bad weather?”

The gray’s answer was a swipe at her face. Ratha ducked.

“Save your words, muddy one,” came the cub’s voice from behind her. Ratha turned to see him licking his whiskers. “The old one can’t speak. She barely understands what I say to her.”

“Why?” Ratha demanded. “Has she lost her wits to age?”

“She never had any. That’s the way she’s always been.” The cub yawned and stretched until his tail quivered.

Ratha backed away from the gray-coat. The rheumy eyes followed her and she felt imprisoned by their dull stare. Her stomach tightened with anger and revulsion. The cub lifted his brows at her.

“I’m sorry for her,” Ratha stammered, wishing she had never come near the gray.

“Why be sorry?” the cub asked. “She doesn’t care. She doesn’t know anything else. She’s a better hunter than most of the others. I like her because she doesn’t talk.”

Ratha opened her mouth again, but couldn’t think of anything to say. Despite her words, she was feeling sorrier for herself than for the gray-coat. Again she had been wrong. The answer had seemed simple and easy to catch between her teeth. Now it wiggled loose like a marsh-shrew and escaped down a hole of contradictions. She felt upset and uncomfortable, as if she had been caught doing something shameful. But all she had done was to ask a few questions. No. It was those eyes that chilled her, those ancient eyes that should have been full of life’s wisdom and instead were empty.

Thunder rumbled overhead and the rain sheeted down, stinging Ratha’s skin beneath her coat. The cub and the gray looked at her one last time. She ducked her head to avoid the old one’s gaze. The two jogged away through the weeds, lifting their feet high to avoid puddles. Ratha stood still, watching them disappear into the rain. She felt someone come up behind her. She gave a violent start before she realized it was Bonechewer.

“They bother you, don’t they,” he said.

“Not the cub. The gray ... she doesn’t have anything in her eyes, Bonechewer. I don’t know how else to explain it.”

“Your clan teaches that the Un-Named are witless,” Bonechewer said, a harsh edge to his voice. ”Why should you be upset to find that some of them are?”

“I thought Meoran was wrong ...” Ratha faltered. “What I was taught; it was just words. I said them, I learned them; I even questioned them, but I never knew what those words meant. Not until I looked into the gray-coat’s eyes and found nothing there.”

Bonechewer heaved a sigh. “You thought you had caught the truth, didn’t you. Again, you were wrong. Each time you try you will be wrong. The only truth is that the Un-Named are of many kinds. Some are like you and me. Some are like the gray-coat. Some are different from either. You will have to learn not to be bothered by what you see.”

“And I will see more of them?” Ratha asked.

“Yes, you will.”

“Does seeing ones like the gray-coat bother you?”

“It used to,” Bonechewer said. “It doesn’t any more.” He paused. “I learned never to look too deeply into anyone’s eyes.”

“Except mine,” Ratha said boldly, remembering his intense stare that seemed to pierce into her depths.

“True, clan cat,” he admitted, wrinkling his nose. “I do make mistakes sometimes. Is there anything left on that deer?”

Ratha inspected the stripped carcass. The other two had devoured what she and Bonechewer had left of the viscera and the meat. Rain crawled along the bare white ribs and dripped through. The fawn’s head and shanks still bore coarse fur. The rest had been torn off. The only part worth taking was the head. Ratha stared moodily at the carcass. She wanted to get rid of the deer, to forget they had found it.

“Do you want the head?” Bonechewer asked. He came up behind her and nudged her, making her flinch. His touch sent a wave of heat rushing through her body with a violence that made her gasp. The cold rushed in and she shivered hard. Unable to keep still, she began to pace back and forth. “No,” she growled. “There isn’t enough there to risk breaking a tooth cracking it.”

“Then help me drag it back into the lake. I don’t want these bones on my ground.”

Ratha made an angry turn, lost her balance and toppled.

Bonechewer nosed her as she clambered to her feet. “You’re hot.”

“I’ve been running,” she snapped, but inwardly she was alarmed. Had she caught a fever? She felt so hot and wild that she wanted to run up the hill and howl or plunge herself in the lake.

Bonechewer was still nosing her, digging his muzzle into her flank. Her irritation flared. “Stop sniffing at me as if I was a putrid kill!”

He ducked her swipe and backed off. She saw a hungry glow rise in his eyes. Yet he had eaten. What else did he want?

She sat down and scratched herself. Besides being hot, she was itchy. Had she caught some illness? If so, it was a strange one. She had never felt anything quite like this before.

Bonechewer began to tug at the carcass. Grudgingly Ratha joined him and helped him haul the remains through the rushes to the lakeside. Try as she would, she could not help bumping against him and each touch sent another heat shock through her, starting at her middle and rippling out in both directions to her head and tail.

Ratha and Bonechewer reached the shore and threw the carcass in. She watched it sink beneath the gray water until only the faintest glimmer of white bone showed on the bottom.

Her belly was full and she wanted to curl up in the den and sleep. She wanted time to think, to try and make sense of what she had learned. Perhaps, as Bonechewer had said, she would always be wrong. Perhaps there was no sense to be made of it.

Bonechewer brushed against her as he passed. His scent and his closeness drove the questions from her mind. She shook her head, trying to throw off the fuzziness that was creeping over her thoughts. She only made herself dizzy.

Bonechewer, far down the path, lifted his tail and waved the white spot at the end. Ratha lowered her head and trotted after him, leaving only the rain pattering on the lakeshore.

The next morning, Ratha woke, nestled in brittle leaves inside the ancient pine, once hollowed by fire. Age and weather had softened the sharp smell of charred timber. Resin seeped through the cracked wood and mixed its smell with the fragrance of the dry leaves.

Ratha blinked sleepily, rolled over and rested her chin on the bark sill at the entrance. She was still lightheaded, although the sensation wasn’t as unpleasant as it had been. She snuggled into the leaves and watched the winter sun rise. Last night’s fever had fallen, leaving her comfortably warm and lazy.

Something worried at her mind, trying to catch her attention. She sensed that it was important or had been important. Odd that she couldn’t remember what it was. She sighed, feeling the cold wind on her nose in contrast to the snug heat of her body.

Bonechewer lay curled up near her, feeling warm and smelling musky. The sunlight fell on his coat, turning it from shadowed brown to burnished copper. Ratha rolled over next to him and leaned over him, fascinated by the pattern of hair on his chest and foreleg. Each hair was gleaming and haloed; so perfectly placed in the pattern that flowed down his leg until it ended in a whorl on the back of his foot.

His smell hypnotized her; drew her closer. A wild dark scent, tinged with bitterness. A scent powerful enough to send shivers down her spine to the tip of her tail.

Bonechewer stirred as the sun warmed him. Ratha retreated, frightened by the motion and astonished at her feelings. He settled and his scent drew her back. One paw flexed, showing ivory claws, and he yawned, rubbing his cheek in the leaves. One eye opened. The one-eyed golden stare made Ratha feel confused and abashed. She ducked her head.

“Hmm,” he said and yawned until the back of his tongue showed. “You’re feeling better, aren’t you.”

Ratha gave him a puzzled stare.

“You spent half the night trying to push me out of the den. I suppose you don’t remember.”

He rolled over on his back, the motion sending waves of his scent toward Ratha. They rocked her, sweeping over her and through her until she could barely stand. Bonechewer had never smelled quite like this before. Had his odor changed? No. It was her. Her nose, her eyes. Everything was so much stronger, so much more intense that she could scarcely bear it. What was wrong with her?

Bonechewer wiggled on his back, his paws open, his eyes inviting. It was too much. Ratha jumped out of the den and trotted away a short distance. The day was clear and the wind nippy. Overhead, the sky was cloudless and blue. Ratha fluffed her fur and began licking herself, letting the task calm her mind. She began to enjoy it much more than she ever had. The feeling of fur gliding beneath her tongue, the warmth and roughness of her tongue pressing the fur against her skin; all of these sensations kept her licking even though she had groomed herself thoroughly. It felt nice, especially on that itchy place at the base of her tail.

She was suddenly aware that another tongue had joined hers, licking the nape of her neck while she was grooming her belly. She snapped her head up, catching Bonechewer beneath the chin. He shook his head ruefully and backed away, leaving her swimming in his scent. She tucked her tail between her legs and scuttled away. She crouched, watching him from a distance. He cocked his head and grinned at her, then took several steps toward her.

Ratha felt her lips slide back from her teeth.

“Stay away,” she growled.

“All right,” he said good-naturedly. “You’re not ready yet. Are you hungry?”

“Go stalk your own kill,” she snapped. “I can feed myself.” The comfortable lazy feeling was gone. She felt prickly and hot. Bonechewer turned tail and sauntered off.

Wrathfully yet regretfully, she watched him go.

Ratha didn’t feel hungry, but she knew she should eat. She trotted back and forth until she found a likely looking hole and settled down beside it, waiting for the occupant to emerge. But she could not keep still. She itched and prickled and burned until she could no longer stand it. She gave up after several tries and scratched herself furiously. She began licking, dragging her tongue over her chest and belly. That was good, but it still wasn’t enough. She flopped on her back and began rolling back and forth in the grass. That still wasn’t enough. She lay and pedaled her rear paws in sheer frustration. I want something and I don’t know what it is. How can I want it if I don’t know what it is?

She stopped wriggling. Bonechewer was back, two lizards dangling from his jaws. He dropped one, went away and began eating the other. Ratha scrambled to her feet and shook off the dirt and pine needles clinging to her coat. She didn’t want to be caught acting like a cub. Soon the urge to roll and rub overwhelmed her embarrassment. She flung herself on her back and writhed and wriggled until she thought her coat would be worn off.

A shadow blocked the sky and something hit her face. The something was limp, scaly and smelled delicious. Ratha’s hunger came back in a rush and she seized the lizard Bonechewer had dropped on her face. She devoured the prey, savoring every bite and crunch of bone until the morsel was gone. She looked up, licking her whiskers.

Bonechewer’s eyes seemed to glow amber in his dark face. He nosed her and this time she did not leap away. He began licking her and, although she shivered, she stayed put, sensing that his tongue was the answer to all her itches and prickles. He was warm, and his scent so rich....

A strange cry bubbled up inside her throat, wild and plaintive. Ratha could scarcely believe that this was her own voice. She lay with her head and chest against the ground, her heart threatening to burst her ribs. Teeth seized her ruff. She cried out again and again, unable to stop calling, even though the sound of her own voice frightened her. She felt his belly fur against her back and she felt him shift, slowly, repositioning his feet. His scent washed over her, taking her, spinning her until the hunger, the fright and the astonishment all blended together. She rubbed her head against the ground, calling until her voice was raw.

His weight bore her down and she felt his paws press into her back, alternating in a deliberate rhythm. He loosened his grip on her ruff and seized her further back, between the shoulders. His tail swept hers aside. Ratha arched her back to meet him, and a new note came into her call. His voice joined hers and they were together, stiff and trembling.

With a violent motion, he pulled away. The sudden pain was so sharp and deep Ratha screamed and flung herself around to face her tormentor. Her claws dragged through his fur and the skin beneath, opening a bright wound on his shoulder. He staggered back, and Ratha could see from his eyes that he had not expected such a vicious assault. She lunged at him again. He fled, not out of sight, but beyond her reach, crouching beneath a bush and watching her, measuring her.... She turned away from those glowing amber eyes and began to smooth her coat. She licked angrily, trying to wash away the traces of his odor that remained on her, but his smell kept wafting to her from where he crouched, still watching. She flattened her ears and snarled.

“Come near me again, raider and I’ll tear you into pieces too small to be worth eating!”

“I imagine you would,” Bonechewer replied, keeping his distance. “I’ll wait. You’ll feel differently about me in a little while.”

Ratha turned her back on him, stalked back to the hollow tree and climbed inside. She was still sore and throbbing, but she felt much more like herself again. She resolved to have nothing more to do with him. She curled up and went to sleep.

To her dismay, she woke up as hot and itchy as she had the first time. This time she stayed inside the tree, licking herself, rolling on her back, wondering again what was the matter with her.

“You smell good, clan cat,” came Bonechewer’s voice from just outside. “Shall I come in?”

Ratha stuck her paw out, bared her claws, swiped back and forth several times, hoping his nose would get in the way.

She waited, listening. Nothing. He had gone. Good, she thought vehemently.

Her frustration, however, remained and grew until she could hardly endure it. She thrashed around, sending up a storm of dry leaves and needles inside the hollow tree. At last she collapsed in a disgruntled heap, letting the leaves settle on her. She lolled her head out the entrance. What am I going to do, she wondered. Am I always going to feel like this? I won’t be able to hunt. I’ll starve to death.

Ratha let her head sag, closing her eyes against the midday sun. She felt someone’s breath against her face and then a tongue, tentatively licking her cheek. Bonechewer again. She grunted, letting her head sag further. The tongue stopped.

“Are you going to claw me again?” his voice said in her ear.

Ratha growled, but she knew there was no menace in her voice. He knew too. The tongue laved her ear and went under her jaw. Defeated, she let herself slide back inside the tree. His tongue followed her. She felt him step inside and lie down beside her.

They mated several more times that day and the next. Each time Ratha’s memory of the pain that came at the end of their coupling made her vow she would never join with him again, but the fever of her heat drove her to him. Her appetite was magnified and she devoured the morsels he brought her with savage bites. The self she had once known seemed very remote and far away. Would this feeling pass or would she be forever enslaved to her body’s demands?

Bonechewer tried to comfort her in the intervals between matings. Some of his harshness and indifference seemed to fall away, revealing a gentler nature than Ratha had thought him capable of.

The sun rose and set several times before her fever finally began to cool. Bonechewer’s smell became pleasant rather than intoxicating. Her senses lost their heightened sensitivity. Other thoughts crept back into her mind as the urgency of mating faded. Her mind became clear enough to think about the future and survival. For those few days, she thought, it had been as though the future no longer existed, so strongly did her needs focus her mind on each moment as it passed.

Although Ratha rejoiced in the return of stability to her body and mind, there was a lingering regret. The few days of her heat, detached as they were from the rest of her life, had brought her new sensations, new thoughts and new feelings. Now that she had experienced it once, she knew what to expect if and when it came again. There might come a time, she thought, when she would welcome the changes in her body; she would willingly enter the waking dream that swung her between madness and delight.

Ratha thought at first that she would be exactly as she was before her heat. Some of her new feelings lingered, however, telling her that not everything was the same. Certain places on her belly remained tender. Deep in her loins was a heaviness that did not change whether she ate much or little.

During the next few days Ratha hunted with Bonechewer. They saw no more of the Un-Named. She thought less and less about them, although the encounter with the gray-coat returned to her mind. As days passed and no other intruders appeared, Ratha decided that the strange cub and the gray had indeed been traveling alone. When she said as much to Bonechewer he drew back his whiskers, took her out in the downpour and showed her tracks filling up with muddy water. The marks were neither hers nor Bonechewer’s.

Ratha stared at the tracks, then at Bonechewer.

“Why don’t I challenge them, clan cat? Is that what you are asking with your eyes?”

“There are too many of them, you said ...” Ratha answered cautiously.

He grunted and said, “This is the only way the wanderers can go. On one side of my ground lies the lake. On the other lie the mountains. They must cross my ground. I can’t stop them. I do not want to.” He circled the tracks and then began to paw mud over them. “I make sure that as they pass, they catch no sight of me.”

“Why?” Ratha asked. “Do you fear them?”

He patted the mud down. “No. But I don’t want to share my prey with everyone that passes, as I did the cub and gray-coat.”

“The wanderer’s claim,” Ratha remembered. “Is that a law among the Un-Named?”

“As close as we come to a law, I suppose.” Bonechewer sounded annoyed. “But we have work enough to fill our own bellies so I let the strangers hunt for themselves.” He turned away, flicking his tail. Beneath the sharp tang of irritation in his scent, Ratha detected a trace of worry.

He turned away to hunt. Ratha gazed at the smeared pawprints. She dipped her muzzle and smelled the edge of one track, but the rain had washed its scent away. She lifted her head and jogged after Bonechewer.

The next day Ratha returned to the same spot and saw fresh tracks. Bonechewer did not come with her and she decided to say nothing to him about it. He knew and, it seemed, he didn’t particularly care. Ratha began leaving the den earlier, hoping she might see the ones who made the tracks. Once she hid before sunrise and caught a glimpse of shadows moving far away in the misty drizzle.

Where were the travelers coming from, she wondered, and where were they going? Why would Bonechewer retreat each day to the far reaches of his territory and not venture near the trail? Part of it, she knew, was selfishness, but his odor and his manner suggested something more.

Once or twice, Ratha, hunting mice on the hillside, saw him stop on the trail the Un-Named Ones had taken. He looked down the path after their tracks and there was a longing in his eyes as if he wanted to join them on their journey. Then, as Ratha watched, his expression changed to disgust. He rubbed out the remaining pawmarks and leaped away through the bushes.

She noticed that his prowling was not random. Each day he spent in a certain section of his territory, inspecting it, marking it and making sure everything was as it should be before....

Before he leaves, Ratha thought to herself and felt cold and lonely as she shadowed him in the early morning drizzle. He had said nothing to her about such a journey, yet he appeared to be making preparations, catching more than he could eat and storing the rest in the crotch of a tree or under a flat stone. Often he would break away from these activities, as if he did them against his will, but if Ratha watched long enough, she would see him renew his efforts. She should go, she thought miserably. She had learned enough from him that she might survive the rest of the winter if she worked hard. He seemed caught up in some inner struggle that she could not understand, yet she sensed that it involved her in some way, as well as the Un-Named she had seen on the trail. The deer carcass they had fished from the lake was part of it too. She had a few of the pieces, but not enough to fit together.

She slunk through the wet grass and peered between the stems. She caught a glimpse of a rain-slick copper coat. There he was. Checking the trail as he usually did. Should she follow? He never found anything except pawmarks. Why should she waste her time?

She lifted her head and saw birds wheeling and dipping beneath the gray mass of clouds. A breeze tickled her whiskers, bringing with it the smell of the marshlands and the hills. She sensed, as she stood still and let the wind ruffle her fur, that this might be the last day she spent here.

Bonechewer had come out into the opening and was pacing toward the trail. Ratha saw him stop and stare up the path. The curve of a hill cut off her view, but she knew from Bonechewer’s reaction that he had seen more than pawmarks. She scampered down the hill, keeping herself hidden. She made a wide circuit behind Bonechewer and followed him, creeping low on her belly, scuttling from one weed patch to the next until she was quite close to Bonechewer.

As she approached the trail, she saw that it wasn’t empty. There were three of the Un-Named there. She dropped down behind a rise and hid, stretching out in the long grass, her chin resting on the top of the knoll. Now she could see and hear everything.

She watched Bonechewer approach the three on the trail. Two were tawny, the other black. The tawny ones were heavy and each bore a ruff. Their scent, drifting to Ratha through the damp air, told her they were males. They had the same eyes as the witless gray female and Ratha knew they wouldn’t speak. The two males crouched and curled their tails across their feet. The black sat upright, green eyes luminous in a narrow ebony face. The eyes fixed on Bonechewer.

Ratha crawled further over the crest of the knoll, feeling her heart thump against the ground. Would the black one speak or be as dumb as the two others?

The black rose onto all four feet as the copper-coat approached.

“I wondered when you would come, nightling,” Ratha heard Bonechewer say.

“The gathering place calls, dweller-by-the-water,” the stranger replied. The black’s odor and voice were female. “I and my companions are the last.”

“They who gather will wait for you,” Bonechewer said.

The black came a few steps down the trail, keeping her eyes on him. “We need you, dweller-by-the-water. Few among us have your gifts.”

The green eyes were intense, half pleading, half-threatening. Ratha saw Bonechewer’s hackles rise.

“That I know, nightling. How I will use them is for me to decide.”

The black lowered her whiskers and walked down the trail past Bonechewer. The two tawny males followed her. She paused and looked over one silken shoulder at Bonechewer. “I could make use of their teeth, dweller-by-the-water.”

Ratha tensed, gathering herself for a possible charge up the hill to Bonechewer’s aid.

“You could, nightling,” Bonechewer answered pleasantly, but Ratha saw the muscles bunch beneath his fur.

“No, dweller-by-the-water,” the black said, showing the pointed tips of her fangs. “I am not so foolish as that. You are right, the decision is yours to make. If we are your people, then come. If not, then return to those of the clan from which you came and leave this territory to the Un-Named.”

Ratha crept closer. If the black was right, Bonechewer was not one of the Un-Named. Clan-born? Could he be? That might explain many things.

The black waved her tail and trotted down the path, followed by her two companions. Bonechewer stared at the ground until their footsteps faded. Only then did he raise his head. He swung his muzzle back and forth, flicking his tail. Then he turned and gazed downhill to where Ratha was hiding.

“Clever, clan cat,” he said loudly, “but the wind has shifted and I can smell you.”

Disgruntled, Ratha trotted uphill to the path. As she approached, he laid his ears back until he looked as if he didn’t have any.

“So, dweller-by-the-water,” she said mockingly, staying beyond reach of his claws, “do you take the trail with your people? And will you raid those who were also your people?”

“Yarr. So you know my little secret,” he said, slightly taken aback. “No matter. You would have found out fairly soon. One wouldn’t know it from your hunting ability, but you are quite clever. Too clever, I think.”

She eyed him. “You bear no love for the Un-Named. That I know from watching you rub out their tracks.”

“I have no love of growing thin, either. The weather is already harsh and growing worse. Were I to stay here alone, my land would barely feed me. It will not feed the two of us. You are eating more every day, clan cat.” He looked pointedly at her belly. Her pregnancy was becoming noticeable even as her appetite was growing more voracious.

“Then we go,” Ratha said, taking a step down the trail.

Bonechewer’s whiskers twitched and he looked uncomfortable. “The journey will not be easy and there will be things you won’t like.”

“Do I have a choice? If I am to bear your cubs, I must eat. As for the things I won’t like, I’ll deal with them as they come. When I think about what I’ve lived through, I know I can survive anything.”

At least, I hope I can, she thought as she jogged along the trail beside Bonechewer.

* * *

Despite Bonechewer’s warning, Ratha found the journey to be pleasant at first. The hills were open, clothed only in waving grasses, and the trail rose and dipped among them. Every once in a while the sun escaped the clouds and made the rain-washed earth seem bright and new.

When night came, or when the day grew cold and the rain turned to sleet, Ratha would crouch with Bonechewer in a burrow or beneath a bush until they could resume their journey.

At first, the two of them were the only ones on the trail, but soon they saw and passed others, including the black and her companions. Bonechewer traveled fast, and Ratha had to push herself to keep up with him. He caught most of what they ate, for he could flush prey from the weeds along the trail and bring the animal down before Ratha had gone very far ahead of him. Sometimes the two shared what they caught with the Un-Named Ones they passed. When their bellies and jaws were empty, their fellow travelers would share with them.

As the days passed like the ground underfoot, Ratha noticed more of the Un-Named emerging from the underbrush or from side trails to join. The path, once dotted with individuals moving far apart, became a river of furry pelts stretching away in both directions. Bonechewer could no longer hunt beside the trail, for the prey animals had either been killed or frightened away by the travelers who preceded him.

While he was gone on hunting excursions, Ratha sometimes sat by the side of the path and watched as the Un-Named went by. Grizzled patriarchs, scruffy half-growns, females shepherding cubs, fight-scarred males, all of the kinds she had seen in the clan and others besides. Some were strong while others were half-starved and barely able to totter along at the rear. Some were sleek and as well-groomed as Ratha had seen in the clan. Others were rough, tattered and mangy.

But there was no way to tell, before she looked in each pair of eyes, whether or not the mind behind them had the spark of intelligence. In some it barely flickered, while in others it burned and lit their whole being from the inside out. The gift often showed itself in those in whom Ratha least expected to find it, and, perversely, was absent from those she assumed would have it. Shaggy, sullen hunters, who at first glance seemed capable only of brutality would surprise her by the depth of their gaze. Elders, whose gray fur betokened wisdom, startled her out of her assumptions when she saw the emptiness behind their faces.

Why? The question beat in her mind as her paws beat the trail. Why some and not others?

She also noticed that most eyes were dull; that ones such as she and Bonechewer had were rarities among the Un-Named. Few could understand speech and fewer still could speak at all, let alone with any sophistication.

Why? Why among these folk was the gift so rare? It was not so in the clan.

Ratha thought about these questions, but she could get no answers that satisfied her. Only her own study of the Un-Named would tell her, she decided. Somehow she sensed that the answer would come soon and part of it might come from her own self, although how she did not know. The thought, instead of reassuring her, made her feel uneasy. She said nothing of this to Bonechewer. She knew he wasn’t interested in either the questions or the answers.

The path grew steeper, the trail windy and narrow as the hills became mountains. It rained continuously and all the travelers acquired the same color, the dull brown of mud. Each day, Ratha woke chilled and sodden to plod along in the line, staring at the trail or at the curtain of rain in front of her whiskers. Bonechewer was quiet, almost sullen, showing little of his former energy.

Something began to bother Ratha, and at first she could not tell what it was. It was a feeling of familiarity, as though this country was not entirely new to her. The smells, the way the wind blew, the shape of the leaves and the rocks on the path told Ratha that she had passed through these mountains once before. Not on the same trail; she knew that. Perhaps not even across the same spur that the group was crossing now. Her memory could only provide her with vague images, for she had run most of the way, driven by rage and terror and the terrible pain of betrayal.

She found herself trembling as she put each foot in front of the other and she left the trail and stood aside, watching the others pass, blurred shadows behind the rain. She stood there, telling herself that it happened long ago and not to her. The Ratha that slogged along this muddy trail with the ragged Un-Named could scarcely be the Ratha who had brandished the Red Tongue before the clan. That part of her life was gone now and she cursed the things that woke her memory.

“Are you tired, Ratha?” a voice said. Bonechewer had left the line to join her by the side of the trail. She looked up, trying to hide her misery, but she was sure Bonechewer caught it, for there was a flicker in his eyes and for a moment he looked guilty.

“Come,” Bonechewer said gruffly, glancing back toward the trail. “I don’t want to be the last to get there.”

“How far?” Ratha asked.

“Less than a day’s travel. We should be there by sunset.”

Ratha wiped her pads on the grass and shook out the mud between them. There was no sense in doing so, for she knew she would pick up more as soon as she stepped back on the path. She intended it to annoy Bonechewer, and it did, for he drew back his whiskers and plunged into the stream, leaving her alone by the side of the trail.

The rest of the day she walked by herself, despite the others jostling around her. The rain slackened and then stopped. The clouds lightened and a little sunlight filtered through, edging the wet grass with silver. The drops clinging to her whiskers caught the light and startled her with their sparkle. She shook her head and tossed them all away.

The grass became scrubby and then sparse as Ratha climbed the mountain along with the others. The sun fell low, sending shadows among the peaks, and she knew that the Un-Named and she were almost at the end of their journey.

The line now was long and straggling. Some of the travelers Ratha had seen at the beginning were no longer in their places, having fallen out by the side. They reached the top of the ridge and wound along its spine as the clouds turned from gray to rose and gold.

Ratha saw an outcropping of rock rising from the flank of the hill. As she and the others at the end of the line approached, the river of the Un-Named ended, breaking up into streamlets that poured around and over the great mass of stone. This was the gathering place.

The sun flared over the edge of the rock, blinding her for an instant. Dazed and weary, she let the flow carry her to the base, and she washed up against it, caught in her own little eddy, while the others surged by her.

“Sss, up here,” came Bonechewer’s voice from above her. Ratha stretched her neck back and saw the outline of his head against the dusk. Ratha gathered herself and leaped up to the ledge where he was sitting.

“Look,” he said and Ratha did. Up and down the steep rock face, eyes glowed and damp pelts gleamed faintly in the sun’s last light. Bonechewer rose and walked along the ledge, Ratha followed, placing her feet carefully, for the stone was weathered and broken. Pieces skittered out from under her pads and went clattering down the rock face until their echo died. The ledge led into a cleft and then they were through to the other side. Here the stone had split and fallen apart in several sections, creating a sheltered hollow where many more of the Un-Named were gathered. Out of the stiff wind that blew on the rock face, Ratha was warmer. She followed Bonechewer as he picked his way over talus and fallen boulders, giving greeting to the Un-Named perched on top of them or clustered around them. No one spoke to Ratha, although she felt their eyes follow her as she moved among them.

“Bone—” Ratha started. His tail slapped her across the muzzle before she could say his name. Hurt and outraged, Ratha snapped at the tail and caught a mouthful of fur before he whisked it away.

“Why did you—” she demanded, but he cut her off before she could finish.

“To keep you from making a fool of yourself and of me as well,” he said softly. “There is no use of names here. Do not forget.”

“How am I to speak to you if I can’t use your name?” Ratha asked, feeling bewildered.

“Call me dweller-by-the-water, as they do. Or, better still, be quiet and listen.”

“Yarrr.” Ratha flattened her ears but she knew he was right. He had stopped calling her “clan cat” as well. Although the nickname had begun as an insult, he used it now in an affectionate sense. To have this stripped from her left her feeling empty and desolate, as if she were becoming one of those who had nothing behind their eyes. She hung her head and swallowed hard.

“What is the matter, young one?” The voice was not Bonechewer’s, although he still stood nearby. Ratha looked up into a pair of glowing green eyes in a face so black it seemed to her that the eyes floated by themselves in the dark.

“She is just tired, nightling,” Bonechewer said before Ratha could gather her wits to speak.

“I haven’t seen or smelled her before,” the black remarked, “yet she is too old to be of the last litters. Did she come with you, dweller-by-the-water?”

“She joined me on the trail,” Bonechewer said shortly. Ratha sensed a certain tension between him and the black one.

“We meet at the same place, among the stones-with-fangs.”

“I will be there, nightling.”

“Good.” The black turned and snarled at the two dull-eyed shadows standing behind her. “Away, cubs! I have no need of you until sunrise.” With guttural growls, the two males lowered their heads and padded away.

“Why do you keep them, nightling?” Bonechewer asked. “You are worthy of better companions.”

“If I wanted companions, I would choose others. The witless ones obey me and that is all I ask.”

“All you ask, nightling?” Bonechewer said.

The black opened her eyes all the way, revealing their full depth. “There are certain things that wit or lack of wit does not affect, dweller-by-the-water. And you seem to have made a similar choice, for I have not heard your little female speak.”

“I can speak,” Ratha spluttered, sending a burning glance at Bonechewer.

The other yawned and arched her back. “Ah. Perhaps, then, he will bring you to council.”

“I think not, nightling.”

“Very well, dweller-by-the-water,” the black said and trotted away.

“Your little female!” Ratha spat in disgust and pawed in the dirt as if she were burying dung. “If there are many like her among the Un-Named, I want nothing more to do with them. Where are you going?” she asked, for she felt Bonechewer start to move away from her.

“To the stones-with-fangs.”

“Are you taking me?”

“No. You stay here. Curl up and sleep. You won’t get much sleep later.”

“Sleep! How can I—” Ratha stopped. He was already gone, his shadow disappearing among the rocks.

She lashed her tail and dug her claws into the gravel.

What was this gathering for? What was this council the black spoke of and why hadn’t Bonechewer taken her? Was he afraid she would embarrass him by speaking his name? Ratha snorted. He was just being silly. Who other than she and he would know that “Bonechewer” was even a name? There had to be another reason.

She sniffed the ground. Bonechewer’s track was still fresh. She could follow him to the place he spoke of, the stones-with-fangs. Perhaps she could hide and attend the meeting in secret. Perhaps she would even get a chance to maul that slinky black before she could summon her body-guards. Now that was an appealing idea.