Husband, you are the sky the angry one the winged sower of rain.
Come, quench my thirst.
The Grove was waking when Carnelian picked his way among the sleeping hollows towards Fern and Sil's. He knew where it lay even though he had never been there. It was Sil who first noticed him approaching and raised her husband. Little Leaf began to cry and Sil put her to a breast to quieten her.
Carnelian felt he was intruding. 'Can I speak to you, Fern?'
Seeing that Carnelian wanted to talk to him alone, Fern rose. Both men made an apology to Sil, who looked concerned.
They moved up the slope a little to where the branches of the cedar forced Carnelian to bow his head.
'I won't be returning to the Bloodwood Tree,' Carnelian said.
Fern frowned. 'You've decided to stay with the hunt?' As Carnelian nodded, he could see Fern was waiting for some explanation, but how could Carnelian tell him what Osidian had threatened to do; how could he tell Fern that he had made Osidian swear on his blood that, if Carnelian went with him, Osidian would not deliberately harm any of the Tribe?
'Well, you've told me,' Fern said at last and returned, still frowning, to his wife.
That day Crowrane's hunt was warding so Carnelian, Osidian, Ravan and several others accompanied Akaisha and her women down into the ferngardens. Akaisha had watched Fern go off to work alone and Carnelian had to endure the pressure of her scrutiny. She was clearly unhappy not only with his decision but with the way in which he had made it without giving her an explanation.
In the perfumed shadow of a magnolia, he spent that day, wretched, watching the women harvesting termites from mud towers and trying to ignore Ravan and Osidian. In the evening, he made himself blind to Sil's enquiring looks and, studiously, tried to behave towards Fern as if nothing had happened.
The following day, he helped keep watch over Akaisha and her women as they dug fernroot. He would have helped if Ravan had not insisted that it was tradition that men should rest on their warding days.
Next morning the women had to return to the earth-working. By coincidence, Crowrane's hunt were working in the ditches too, so that Carnelian went with Akaisha and was able to work with Poppy by his side all day.
Three days he laboured thus under the resentful gaze of Crowrane and Loskai. Carnelian saw the deference with which the other members of the hunt were treating Osidian. It was the youngsters, Krow among them, who were most in awe of him. Some dared to ask him questions through Ravan, but the Master remained aloof and worked as if he were alone, carrying the baskets filled with earth up the ladders to the ramparts, his strength fully returned. The women who worked alongside them outnumbered the men almost three to one. The men had to work hard to match them. The older people oversaw the repair of the ditch, or did the lighter work. Carnelian took turns at digging, carrying the dislodged earth up the ladders, or beating it into the ramparts with paddles. The sun was merciless. Carnelian was sheathed in the slime his sweat made of the red earth on his skin. During the hottest part of the day they hid in the depths of the ditch where its high walls, or one of the trees fringing it, cast delicious shadow. They ate, sipped water, napped. At the end of each day they returned to wash under their mother tree and slumped exhausted around the hearth, almost too tired to speak.
The way it worked out, the hunt and Akaisha's women completed their stint in the ditches on the same afternoon. In the morning, Carnelian had to leave Poppy in Akaisha's care when she took her hearth down to the Bloodwood Tree. For the next six days, it would be Crowrane's hunt in company with that of Ginkga's husband who would make the journey each day to fetch water for the Tribe.
It was a relief to ride out from the Koppie to the vast spreading lagoon. At first, Carnelian maintained a careful watch on Loskai and his father. In full view of both hunts, Crowrane made a point of telling the Master that more heroics would not be tolerated. The Elder might as well have directed his tirade against a statue. Osidian's impassivity drove Crowrane and Loskai into an anger which only served to reveal how powerless they were.
That first day, water was brought back to the Koppie without mishap. The aquar pulled the drag-cradles right up to the Homeditch. From there it was unloaded and everyone made at least two journeys up the Lagooning rootstair with a waterskin to pour the precious contents into the cistern that lay in a cleft in the Crag.
The second day they saw riders moving on the other side of the lagoon. Ravan claimed they were from a neighbouring tribe, the Woading.
It was on the fifth day that Carnelian learned why it was the Plainsmen considered fetching water perilous. They were returning from the lagoon when they found themselves in the path of a stampede. Burdened with their fully laden drag-cradles, the hunt could not evade the charge. The bleating earthers thundered through their line. Many of the monsters managed to swerve around the obstacles; others were skilfully deflected with bull-roarers; but one gored a man and another crashed headlong into a cradle, exploding its waterskins everywhere. The hitched aquar was hurled over onto its side. Screaming, it flailed its clawed feet. The earther, tossing its head to free its horns from the ruins of the drag-cradle, ripped open the belly of the aquar and was, in turn, gashed by the aquar's claws. One of the Plainsmen leapt in to end the aquar's agony, others dared to approach the earther to hack it loose. Erupting free, the monster trampled a man. It was clear nothing could be done for him. Crowrane put an end to the man's agony by slitting his throat. They carried the body back on a drag-cradle. For fear of raveners, they used earth to cover the trail of blood they were painting across the plain.
That night the Tribe mourned their loss. Akaisha took Carnelian with her to watch the blackened body being carried up to the summit of the Crag. Osidian came too, with Ravan. At one point, Carnelian overheard them discussing the next day, which was to be his first hunt. He forced the anxiety from his mind by trying to pick meaning from the song of lamentation rising up with smoke into the sky. The dead man's soul would soon be carried up into that blueness by the birds that fed on him.
Akaisha and Poppy came down to the Southgate to see them off. In the predawn twilight many other women had gathered to bid their men farewell. Everyone spoke quietly.
Carnelian was holding his shoulder where Fern had touched it when he had wished him a safe hunt.
'You'll be careful, Carnie, promise me you'll be careful?'
Crouching, Carnelian looked into Poppy's dark eyes and nodded solemnly. Kissing her, he rose and saw Osidian standing apart from them, aloof and remote as he examined a huge spear he was hefting in his hand.
'I'm not a child any more,' said Ravan, looking aggrieved, as he confronted his mother. 'Fern had no right to it. It came to me from my father. It is mine to give away.'
Carnelian looked back at the spear in Osidian's hand and realized it had been fitted with Stormrane's iron blade.
As Akaisha watched her son join the Master, she had the look of someone who had just been slapped. Carnelian looked away so she would not become embarrassed. Harth, who had come down to see her son and husband off, was regarding Osidian with baleful eyes. Krow stood behind them, forgotten, sullen.
A hand on his arm made Carnelian look round into Akaisha's face. She made a point of glancing at Harth, who was hugging Loskai while her husband, Crowrane, stood by. Akaisha looked at Carnelian and raised her eyebrows to see if he understood her warning.
'I'll be careful, my mother.'
As her gaze moved to Ravan, she seemed suddenly old and frail.
'I'll keep an eye on him too,' he whispered and was rewarded by a squeeze of thanks.
'Come, child,' she said, offering her hand to Poppy. Today's our last day in the ditches for quite a while. The sooner we start, the sooner the day's work will be done.'
'And tomorrow we'll weave, my mother?'
Akaisha shook her head. The day after.'
As Akaisha led her off chattering along the Homewalk, Carnelian waited for Poppy to sneak a glance back at him. He grinned when she did, waved and then he turned grimly to the business of the day.
Once the hunt crossed the Newditch, they rode southwest with the morning breeze, their shadows streaming like pennants. At first curious, Carnelian looked around him at the land they were riding through, but he soon grew weary of the infinite fernland where only the acacias showed they were making steady progress. They had brought drag-cradles with them piled high with fernwood. He whiled away some time trying to imagine what they were going to do with it. He played with the javelins Ravan had given him. Though crude, they were nicely made. Scouring-rush shafts had been split to take a blade of sharpened flint. Many windings of gut held the blade in place. Though sharp enough, he was sure the blade would prove brittle and he was envious of Osidian's iron spear.
It had grown torrid when the first glimmer appeared on the horizon. He knew it must be water and for a moment wondered if they had been riding in an arc towards the bellower lagoon. A glance at his shadow was enough to convince him otherwise. Squinting, he saw that to the east of this lagoon there lay another smaller one he had never seen before.
When he spotted the specks of a saurian herd, his heart began hammering. No doubt the hunt would soon begin. A thousand fears took possession of him, chief among these that his inexperience was going to make a fool of him. To quell these anxieties, he busied himself moving his grip up and down a javelin to find its balance.
When he found it, he realized it was marked with notches. All his weapons were.
Eventually, there was nothing left to do but watch the steady approach of the herds, motes barely visible against the quivering dazzle of the lagoon. Soon they would be close enough to hunt. He wondered how it would be done. Who would choose their victim? What part would he be expected to play? Most likely, he and Osidian would be assigned positions of danger. There was nothing he could do about it. He would have to see the business through to the end.
Crowrane veered their march towards a stately acacia. As each rider entered its shade, he dismounted. Relief at the reprieve flooded through Carnelian, but was soon replaced by an ache anticipating the coming ordeal.
As he rode in, the shade slipped its cool delight over him. He dismounted, taking care to keep his hand on his aquar's neck so that he would not lose her. He was puzzled to see that people were unhitching waterskins, food bags and all manner of other baggage from their saddle-chairs. He found Krow.
'Are we stopping here long?'
The youth looked startled. 'All night, Master.'
'All night?'
'We must make many preparations.' 'Preparations?' said Carnelian.
Krow smiled and reached up to pat Carnelian's aquar. 'Come on, I'll show you where to put her.'
The Plainsmen cleared ferns from ground that lay just beyond the roof of branches and in the direction of the lagoon. They scraped a shallow crescent in the red earth and filled it with some of the fernwood they had brought. Hobbled, the aquar were near the trunk of the acacia. The hunters settled between the aquar and the fernwood crescent which they lit, taking care to keep the fire from spreading from the centre into either horn of the arc. Cooking pots were produced, bundles of fernroot, fernbread, some fresh meat wrapped in fronds. Ravan, Krow and the other young men began to prepare a meal while the older men busied themselves checking what appeared to be brooms whose twigs were matted with yellow fat. Leaning on his spear, Osidian stood gazing off towards the lagoon, now only a smoulder in the dying afternoon. Carnelian sat quiedy, seeking release from the general tension by watching the men cooking
Dusk creeping over the land was curdled by a screaming roar. Carnelian huddled closer to the fire with everyone else. The heat of the day had not lingered long and he clasped his hands to his bowl of broth to warm them. They ate in silence. When they were done, Crowrane sent Loskai to one of the drag-cradles that had been propped up against the tree. He returned, carrying a piece of an earther's hom which might have been a carving of the moon and which he laid, reverently, in his father's hands. The old man muttered something before plunging the fragment deep into the embers.
A sequence of ravener bellows set everyone trembling. They tried to drown it out with their talk. Mosdy they lingered on the glories of the next day's hunt. Solemnly, Crowrane put a choice piece of meat in the flames and, as they watched the smoke it made spiral up into the sky, they mumbled prayers to the Skyfather.
'Success and coming home safe,' said Crowrane and the Plainsmen echoed him.
The talk then turned to their wives, their children, to their sweet mothers. It was as if they already half believed they would never see them again. The gloom soaked into Carnelian, until the Koppie seemed faraway in another, brighter world.
Crowrane began telling them a story. Not following the old man's mutter, Carnelian watched the light catching the faces round him. The Plainsmen seemed so like children, blind to the world as the tale played out before their mind's eye. There stirred in him a love for these people. A cry rent the night, breaking the spell; causing eyes to search the blackness fearfully. Only Osidian seemed unconcerned, his attention rooted in the flames. Crowrane gathered them back into the story with the warm rumbling of his voice. Carnelian could feel how much the courage of the hunters was anchored in the old man and was glad, for he needed it too.
In his dreams, Carnelian was being hunted by a ravener who saw him through Osidian's emerald eyes. He awoke and saw above him glowing, gilded rafters and, for a moment, he was back in his room in the Hold. The rafters resolved into branches. He sat up. Crowrane was sitting hunched before the fire. Beyond, a winter world stretched moonlit all the way to the camphor-white lagoon. Malice was stalking the land. Carnelian jerked his gaze back to the fire. The old man leaned forward and stirred life into the embers. Seeing that he was keeping watch over them, Carnelian lay back, comforted.
At first light, the horror of the night began to lose its hold. Carnelian rose with the others, groaning as he stretched the stiffness from his back. The fire, burning merrily, drew him. Crowrane was making breakfast. He looked so weary Carnelian felt concern the old man might have kept guard all night. Excitement in the youngsters soon had Carnelian as eager for the hunt to begin as they.
After eating, he helped as much as he could packing up, among other things, returning the unburned femwood from the two ends of the fireditch to a drag-cradle. Carnelian fed djada to his aquar by hand as he saw the others doing and gave it water to drink. Krow helped him knap his javelin blades to a finer sharpness, whistling over them as a charm.
When everything was ready for them to leave, he saw the Plainsmen gathering at the fire and went to see what was going on. Crouched, Crowrane was poking among the embers with a stick. He uncovered something which he drew out gingerly. It seemed nothing more than a piece of charcoal until Carnelian recognized, from its curve, that it was the piece of horn Crowrane had inserted into the fire the night before. A bowl was brought and the charred horn crumbled into it. Several of the older men took turns in pounding it with a mortar. Fat was added and the grinding resumed. At last the bowl was handed to Crowrane who, sampling it, pronounced himself satisfied.
The bowl was passed round. When it came to him, Carnelian took a little of the paste onto the ends of his fingers as he had seen the others do. He saw Osidian frowning but then sitting on the ground to allow Ravan to reach and apply the black stuff to his face. Carnelian was distracted from this strange spectacle by Krow appearing before him.
'Would you like me to do you?' he asked.
Carnelian gave the youth a nod. As the warm stuff was smeared upon his skin, Carnelian wrinkled his nose against its acidic tang. When his face was done, Carnelian painted Krow's. The hunt were eerily transformed, each with his black face. More unsettling was Osidian, who Carnelian felt bore too close a resemblance to the monster in his dream.
As Crowrane led them into the herd, the earthers lifted the horned boulders of their heads. Carnelian held the lazy stare of an ancient bull, smelling his earthy musk, measuring the dangerous curves of his horns with nervous glances. Carnelian had been warned that any sudden sound or movement might alarm the earthers. He felt the tremor as the monster slid forward to reach his beak into a nest of ferns. The sinews holding his battering-ram head ran like hawsers under his scaly hide. Carnelian could not believe flint blades would dent such armour.
At last, Crowrane chose an old cow, wise from many years, rich with folds and creases. One of her horns had broken close to the slope of the crest that flared behind her head. Carnelian could see the bulge in her neck where the muscles had swelled to take the unbalancing strain of her other major horn. His companions gave the Elder their agreement with nods as slow as the saurians' as they lumbered across the plain.
They fixed their gazes on the cow as they kept pace with her. With somnolent signals, Crowrane divided them into groups. Carnelian found himself with two youths and an older man. The man gave Carnelian a nod and motioned for him to follow, smiling with relief when Carnelian did so.
They rode away. The further they were from the saurians, the faster they went until they had left them behind and were moving parallel to the lagoons into the path of the sun. Squinting against the glare, Carnelian saw, far off, other groups keeping up with them.
'Aren't we going to hunt?' Carnelian asked.
The leader craned round in his chair. The hunt'll be brought to us.'
Carnelian did not understand, but said nothing more. A while later, they came to a halt facing north. Carnelian was thankful of the eastern breeze: it cooled him and kept down the flies. The herd of earthers crept slowly towards them. Sweat was trickling down his back, his chest. A groaning was adding to the lowing wafting on the breeze. Squinting, Carnelian saw parties of the hunters sweeping down on the herd, whirling bull-roarers as they came in, scattering the earthers like a storm. Their horned wave rolled its rumble across the plain. Carnelian stared as he felt the thunder swell, the dark front getting ever closer. Looking round, he saw fear in the faces of his companions, but also grim determination. He set his teeth. He would trust in their knowledge. Come what may, he would not flee unless they did.
As the front came on, he saw its stampede was being led by one creature more massive than the rest. This maintained their flight, narrow. Carnelian's aquar began shifting nervously with the rest, her hands clasping and unclasping, her fan-plumes trembling on the verge of being fully open.
'She comes!' bellowed his leader.
The cry woke Carnelian rudely into action as he felt the aquar round him lurching into motion. Soon he was coursing with the others, riding parallel to the charging herd. Bull-roarers were singing above the tumult. Leaning towards the piston of one of his aquar's legs, he craned round the back of his saddle-chair and saw the cow with the broken horn close behind him. Separated from her herd, she was being swarmed by hunters screaming battle-cries, spinning bull-roarers, striking at her with the flat of their spears. Maddened, in terror, she lumbered on, bucking like a ship in a swell. Then she was abreast of him and Carnelian added his shouts to the clamour and, clumsily at first, but then with fierce strokes, added his attacks to theirs. He could feel her exhaustion and saw how heavily she lumbered on and how her heavy head was hanging lower and lower, until, at last, she stumbled and fell, rolling into golden ruin and they closed on her and, baying, started feasting their spears on her blood.
The Plainsmen's fury ended when they knew she was dead. A sadness spreading from them cooled Carnelian's bloodlust. Through its pulsating heat, he watched them dismounting, approaching the hill of hide now all striped with blood. He descended too and, stepping out from his saddle-chair, found it strange to walk among the ferns. He stared with wonder at the creature he had helped to kill and felt no joy, so that, when the Plainsmen began to sing her a lament, his heart joined his voice to theirs even though he did not know the words. When they fell silent, they grew wary again, scanning the plain as if they feared some thief might come to steal her. Carnelian helped them unbale the ropes and lash them to her horns, her neck, around the collapsed pillars of her legs. When she was hitched up to the crossbeams of their saddle-chairs, he did as he saw them do, leading his aquar until she had pulled her crossbeam ropes taut, then, at a cry from Crowrane, all the aquar were made to lean into the ropes. With a shudder, the mass of the saurian began slowly to crush a bloody road across the fernland.
They towed the earther to the nearest acacia and drew her into its shade. They dug a crescent ditch as they had done the night before. The aquar were unsaddled and some of the younger men went to protect them as they grazed. Some leaf-wrapped bundles were produced which, when opened, gave off an odour of cedar that made Carnelian homesick for his hearth. Under Crowrane's supervision, they scooped some of the cedar-impregnated fat and began to rub it into the hide of the saurian corpse. Carnelian asked Krow about it.
'It helps disguise the rot which otherwise might draw raveners here.'
When they were done, they laid their fire but did not light it and then they sat down to await the night.
The blackness suddenly came at them, causing them to leap to their feet. Clutching a javelin, Carnelian backed away with the rest of the hunt as tall shapes emerged into the flicker of their fire. Riders, their aquar coming on at a slow walk. A sound of laughter.
'Look how afraid they are,' one of them said, his accent so strange Carnelian could barely understand him.
Plainsmen from another tribe. Swathed in their ubas, only their eyes caught the fire. Carnelian drew himself further back into the shadows where, to his relief, he found Osidian. He sensed it would be a disaster should they be discovered.
'You're on our land, Ochre,' one of the strangers said, a touch of laughter still lingering in his voice.
Crowrane stood forward to confront them. The earth belongs to no man, besides, here we are nearer our koppie than yours, Bluedancing.'
Their leader made his aquar take a step towards the Elder. 'Perhaps, but even so, we're the great Bluedancing and we go where we want. Do you wish to fight us, old man?' The tone of mockery stung even Carnelian.
Crowrane stared fiercely up at the invader. 'We've no quarrel with you.'
His eyes followed the riders that were moving around the camp. The gaze of their leader fell upon the slope of hide rising behind them.
'Perhaps we should take your earther from you.'
Carnelian saw the way the men of his hunt moved to shield the saurian with their bodies. He felt possessive of her too. He set his teeth. If it came to a fight, he would stand with the Tribe.
'At least we should take the best cuts,' drawled another of the riders.
A mutter of amusement passed among the Bluedancing. Their leader made a gesture of contempt. 'Let's leave her to them. Look how scrawny she is. I doubt they had the strength even to take such a clapped out old cow themselves. Probably found her collapsed from age. Look,' he pointed, 'she doesn't even have both her great horns.'
This was greeted by a chorus of snorts and derisive laughter. Their leader caused his mount to spin round and then leap forward, kicking through the fire, scattering its embers into the darkness then, whooping, the riders rushed headlong back into the night.
As Carnelian helped the hunt gather up the burning fernwood, he was as angry as they were.
'Why don't we mount up and pay them a return visit?' cried Ravan.
'Riding across the plain in the middle of the night?' said Crowrane. 'Are you possessed, child? Have you forgotten there are raveners out there?'
'If they can do it why can't we?'
'You know perfectly well, son of Stormrane,' said Crowrane. The Bluedancing have at least twice our numbers. Do you want to bring a war down upon the Tribe we couldn't hope to win?'
They grow more arrogant with each passing year,' Ravan gave back.
They've always been arrogant,' said Crowrane.
Ravan confronted the Elder with a stare.
'Do you doubt, child, that I can remember further back than you?'
It took a while before the fire went out of Ravan's eyes. 'No, my father.'
For some moments the old man glared at him, but then he too swallowed his anger.
'Consider yourselves lucky they didn't spot the Standing Dead.' Face sweaty with anxiety, he looked round at Osidian and Carnelian.
Gloving his hand with fern fronds, the old man stooped to scoop some embers. 'Come on, let's get this mess sorted out before we find ourselves having to fend off a ravener without a proper fire.'
Crowrane woke them before dawn and made them breakfast as they sat ready with their javelins and spears. Raveners were still abroad. Crouching by the fire, Carnelian flinched at their every cry. He savoured his meal as if it were his last. Then they waited until the edge of the world began to show. His heart lifted as the aquar sang their welcome to the dawn.
The raveners fear our fire too much to attack,' said Krow.
'We're not home yet, child,' said Crowrane severely and set them to hitch their aquar up to the earther.
When it had grown bright enough for them to see the Koppie tiny on the horizon, they set off towards it. When the sun rose, it found them moving laboriously northwards. It was slow work and they had to stop often to allow the aquar to rest. At midday, they stopped within the flickering shade of a copse of ginkgos. Carnelian, who had hoped they would soon be home, saw through the trembling air that the Koppie seemed as far away as when they had set off. Gloomily, he realized they would be spending another night out on the plain. The sickly odour of death was already penetrating the saurian's cedar aura and floating away on the air.
Dusk robbed them of the guiding hope of the Koppie. Crowrane set them to rubbing more of the cedar balm on the earther, but this did not stop a mist of decay hanging around their camp. When a breeze picked up, they built a barrier of ferns on the saurian's windward side, hoping thus to stop the wind from carrying her odour out across the plain. Having done what they could, they huddled around their fire, eating, talking, while all the time sneaking glances out into the night.
Carnelian drowned slowly in nightmares and, when he managed to come up for air, his half-waking was haunted by the shrieks in the blackness. Eventually he forced himself fully awake. He rose and stood until his legs would no longer support him. Then he tried squeezing pain into his thighs. He was not the only one watching the night.
They were yearning for dawn when the raveners came. They felt their approach in the trembling ground. Crowrane slapped a youth's arm that held a flare questing for the flames.
'It could be anything,' he hissed.
A waft of carrion breath soon changed his mind. Foolishly, Carnelian did not think to look away when he lit his flare. Blind, he heard the Plainsmen's fear and, blinking for sight, he could just make out vast shapes coalescing from the darkness. Flares danced around him amidst a tumult of shrill battle-cries. Roars carried on a foul breeze of breath. The vast presence of their smell. A clashing of jaws. The fire describing their hideous shapes in monstrous movement. Then they left as quickly as they had come and the yelling raggedly abated until all Carnelian could hear was the guttering of the flares.
'Put them out,' came Crowrane's command. 'Mustn't waste them.'
'I've never seen them so unafraid of fire,' one man said.
Loskai pointed his flare at Osidian. The Standing Dead bring the raveners down on us as they did in the swamp.'
Ravan stood forward. 'Remember it was the Master that saved us then.'
Krow was nodding, his face pale as he relived that time. Crowrane shoved him so that the youth dropped his flare.
'I said, put them out.'
As the flares went out one by one, Carnelian glared at the Elder, disliking the way he had treated Krow, but also reluctant to lose the sorcerous protection of his flare. He ground its flames out in the earth. Then he stood with the others waiting, hardly drawing breath through his dry throat until the first light seeping showed the land free of the monsters.
The drudgery of another day pushing through the ferns, encouraging the aquar, dragging the saurian after them as if she were a slab they were bringing back from a quarry. The heat, the plagues of flies, the beacon of the Koppie staying obstinately the same size. Carnelian plodded on, drifting into a walking sleep haunted by black terror, squinting up at the cruel sun, watching with despair its slow fall to earth with its promise of another night.
Deepening dusk found them sullen behind their fire, fingering their flares nervously. It was then their fear was taken by surprise. The raveners came before the sun was fully down. Three black shapes loping against the bloody edge of the sky, heads slung low, their bobbing accenting each heavy stride.
A hand grabbed Carnelian's robe and clung to him. He steadied himself on the edge of flight. He stooped to put flames upon his flare. Wielding it gave meagre comfort. The last snuffing out of day stole away their view of the raveners' final charge. Thunder in the ground. Then the death grins slavering in the firelight.
Crowrane wailed: 'Light the wings, sweet Mother, light the wings.'
On their right, the horn of their crescent ditch grew a plumage of flames which lit the underside of a jaw connecting back and up to a dark mass which swung away gurgling, revealing for a moment an eye bright with malice. Gaping, Carnelian became aware the fire glow was missing on his left. The earth groaned as a ravener stepped across the unlit ditch. Firelight showed the wall of its flank; the grinning length of its head. It was among them and the Plainsmen were shrieking. Without thought, Carnelian tore himself loose of their hands and joined the two or three men keeping the monster at bay with wild swings of their flares. The sound of Quya froze him: the clear voice intoning an incantation. Osidian, haloed by his flare, was advancing on the monster with his iron spear.
The ravener's head turned to look at him with one of its tiny eyes. Osidian thrust fire up at it, so that it drew back screeching. Pouring Quyan syllables he rushed at it, driving it back. He cast his flare away and grasped his spear with both hands. As the monster lunged, Osidian shoved his spear up into its jaws. The monster impaled itself, driving the blade up through its mouth, snapping its jaws closed in a froth of blood, roaring, splintering the shaft. Carnelian cried out as the monster recoiled. Its legs knocked one into the other and it toppled, twisting, its tail lashing up and round, its mass punching thunder into the ground.
Osidian froze before it. Rage possessed Carnelian. Hardly knowing what he was doing, he leapt through their fire and charged the other two raveners. The hunt running after him lit the fernland erratically as they ran. The monsters fell back under the bright onslaught, turned and were soon thundering off into the night.
Carnelian chased them screaming, until a stumble brought him back to his senses. Flares dotted the darkness. Looking back the way he had come, the glow of their campfire seemed far away. Fear returned like a deluge of cold water. The other flares were converging on their camp. Quickly, he started making his own way back.
'He felled the ravener like a tree,' said Ravan.
They had watched all night, stunned, at any time expecting the monster to lift itself from where it lay just beyond the firelight. Now, with dawn breaking, they stood watching Osidian as he crouched within the angle of the monster's jaws and dug the iron spear blade from its head. When he had it free, he walked towards them displaying the bloody iron on his palm.
'May I cut a tooth, Master?' asked Ravan and, when he received a nod, the youth unsheathed a flint and ran to the ravener and was soon busy gouging a tooth from its jaw. When he held aloft the pale sickle longer than his dagger, the Plainsmen gave out a cry of triumph and soon Osidian was giving permission to everyone else in the hunt to take one. Even though he disdained to take one for himself, Loskai tried to appear to be sharing the general elation but a scowl was never far away. Crowrane was behaving as if nothing had happened, but Carnelian saw the old man sneak an awed glance at the Master. As for Osidian, he seemed as unaffected as if he killed raveners every day.
All the younger men wished to get as close as they could to the Master, but it was Ravan whom Osidian let walk at his side and carry what was left of his iron spear. Though the going was as hard as it had been the day before, their trek seemed to have turned into a jaunt. Their home seemed to respond to their high spirits by growing steadily larger on the horizon. A breeze blowing from the east cooled the torrid plain. Carnelian felt sufficiently at ease to take pleasure in the beauty of the waves chasing each other through the ferns so that the plain seemed to be a green and smiling sea.
They had hardly finished dragging their earther into position under the Bloodwood Tree before Ravan and the others were telling the women the story of the ravener slaying. Laughter broke out among them, swelling to a general cry of disbelief, but this was quickly silenced when the hunters produced the fangs they had gouged from the monster's jaws. Passing the blood-crusted trophies among them, one by one the women lifted their eyes up to the Master. Carnelian watched Osidian receive their awe with indifference while Loskai and his father tried to hide their hatred behind smiles.
Carnelian's gaze returned to Fern, whom he had been watching. He had the appearance of a peeled man and was the only one still working. As Carnelian approached him, he became aware of the stench coming off him and his halo of flies, but he forced himself to move closer.
'Fern.'
As the Plainsman looked up, his eyes were the only things that seemed alive behind his mask of gore. He resumed his work. After some moments, Carnelian turned to walk away, not wishing to increase Fern's humiliation.
Girls and women brought them water to wash under the Old Bloodwood Tree. If Crowrane had not insisted that they clean themselves carefully, many of the hunt would have rushed through it so as to get to their hearths more quickly. Leaves were kneaded into balls. A youth hurled one at a friend, soon involving everyone in a battle.
At first Carnelian remained as aloof as Osidian and Crowrane, but it only took the sting of missile to release the boy in him and he joined in. Before Crowrane managed to calm them, Osidian's disapproving gaze had already taken all the fun out of it for Carnelian. When Krow offered to clean him, he chose to return the favour just to irritate Osidian, however childish that might be. It was only when he noticed the way Loskai was looking at Krow that Carnelian realized he had got the youth in trouble.
'Perhaps you should do someone else.'
Krow must have seen where he had been looking, for he glanced at Loskai and shrugged. 'I've given up caring what they think.'
The pleasure of being clean and in the shade made
Carnelian remember Fern's situation and he pitied him. Ravan was working at cleaning Osidian as carefully as a slave might. Much as he wished to, Carnelian knew he must not return to share Fern's work.
Their hearthmates were waiting on the edge of the rootearth for the return of the hunters. None dared speak to the Master as he walked towards the sleeping hollows. By the way they looked at him, Carnelian knew the news of the ravener slaying must have already spread through the Tribe. Poppy ran into his arms. He laughed, lifting and nuzzling her as she clung to him.
'I've looked for you every day, Carnie.'
Whin nodded in their direction and Carnelian returned the gesture. Akaisha released Ravan from a hug and advanced on Carnelian. Still holding Poppy, he stooped to receive a kiss and an embrace.
'Welcome home, sister's son,' she whispered in his ear, then stood back, the joy in her face as she regarded her hunters making them grin like boys.
'You must all be hungry,' she announced.
'Ravenous,' growled Ravan and everyone laughed.
Holding Leaf, Sil was standing watching Carnelian. She twitched a smile as he approached her and kissed both her and the baby. People were moving back to the hearth, their arms weaving them into couples around which the children chattered. Carnelian hung back. Akaisha glanced round.
'Aren't you coming, Carnie?'
‘I’ll wait for Fern.'
Akaisha frowned as she saw Sil's face. As they all moved away, Carnelian felt that he had handled the situation badly, but convinced himself that it would only make it worse for him to back down now.
Sitting on a root of the mother tree, Carnelian watched the twilight thicken in the Grove. He wriggled his toes in the prickly needle loam. The feeling of being safe and at home swelled up in him. The interplay of voices coming from the hearth made his heart surge with a wish to join them. He grew sombre, considering what Sil might be feeling.
It was almost night before he saw a lonely figure coming up the rootstair. He rose. 'I waited for you, Fern.' 'You needn't have.' 'I wanted to.'
Fern's face was a vague shadow. 'It's good you and the others have returned safe.'
Carnelian reached out to take his shoulder, wanting to say something. Working out words, confused, he just said the first thing that came into his head. 'I'm missing you.'
Fern shrugged his shoulder free. That's nice.' He pushed past, leaving Carnelian feeling like a fool.
Yet again Carnelian considered proving how he felt by returning to work with Fern, but fear of what Osidian might do made him stay with the hunt. He took his turn on the brow of the Crag: a long languid day observing the headache dazzle of the land through narrowed eyes. He escorted the women gathering fernroot from the Tribe's ferngardens. When the hunt collected together in the Newditch, he took his place with them earthworking in the dust and stifle. Then it was out once more onto the plain to fetch water from the bellower lagoon.
That day, on their way back, the air began to haze from the east as if it were swarming with flies.
'Sporewind,' cried many voices and Crowrane had them redouble their pace.
By the time they reached the Koppie, the air was so thick with fern spores it seemed like dusk. Even through their ubas, it was hard to breathe. Lumbering blind over an earthbridge, one of the drag-cradles slid off, so that they had to cut it loose for fear it might pull its aquar down into the ditch.
For days the Tribe hid in their sleeping hollows while the sporewind choked the world. People moaned that it was the worst they had ever endured. Shrouded in his blanket, Carnelian ventured out only for water and to relieve himself as others did. For food there was a coil of djada in their hollow which he shared with Osidian and Poppy.
On the first morning when the air was clear, Carnelian unwrapped the uba from his head and pumped great, clean lungfuls. The world seemed much as it had been. As he resumed his tasks with the rest of his hunt, he might have considered the sporewind a dream if it had not been for the dust blanketing the plain.
It was on his third hunt that Carnelian witnessed his first earther hornwall. It was Osidian's impetuosity that startled the herd. Defended by the older cows, the saurians fell back into a closed ring facing out, their horns and armoured heads forming a fearsome rampart within which their calves were safely corralled.
'Fascinating,' said Osidian in Quya. 'This behaviour may well have been the model for the shieldwalls favoured by the levies of the Quyan cities.'
He glanced over at Carnelian and pointed. 'Behold the horns like spears, their crests like interlocking shields.'
Loskai rode forward and let his uba fall from his mouth. 'For all his legendary prowess, the Master has ruined this day's hunting with his babble.'
Krow's aquar moved towards Loskai's. 'Did you never cause a hornwall when you first started hunting?'
'Shut your mouth, Twostone.'
Krow advanced on him scowling.
Crowrane closed on the two of them. 'Back down, Twostone.'
Carnelian tried to redirect Krow's rising defiance. 'Surely they'll move apart if we ride away.'
His comment was greeted with disdainful looks but it did have the effect of breaking up the confrontation.
When Carnelian returned to the hearth, he discovered a stranger about his age sitting next to Fern on the root-bench. Akaisha introduced him as being Father Galewing's son, Hirane, who had married Whin's sister's daughter, Koney, while Carnelian had been away hunting. Carnelian kissed the young man and called him hearth-brother and received a look of thanks from his wife, who was sitting beside Sil.
Later, Poppy, wide-eyed as she relived the wedding, insisted on telling Carnelian everything. How they had spent the day washing Koney with cedar water and decked her out in a new robe the women of the hearth had been embroidering since before the Rains. How they had rouged her face and woven magnolia buds and petals into her hair. How when Hirane had come with his father and the rest of his people, wearing the black face of a hunter, he had found her waiting for him concealed beneath a wedding blanket of the richest ochre. How both his hearth and theirs had danced around the couple. When the moon rose high enough to make bright the root fork of their mother tree, he had poured water on Koney's blanket and she had come out of it as beautiful as the stars. Sitting in the fork they had spoken their vows, broken salt together, and then Akaisha had removed his shoes so that he might stand barefoot upon his new rootearth and all his new hearthkin had given him the kiss of welcome.
As the girl spoke, Carnelian saw the light filling her face and he would have kissed her but did not want to break her vision, but as she described the newly-weds being led to the sleeping hollow where they would make and bear children, he saw trouble come into her eyes.
'What's the matter, Poppy?' he said stroking her cheek.
She looked through tears at him. 'When I'm old enough, will you marry me, Carnie?'
Carnelian was taken aback.
She sank her head. 'None other will,' she whispered.
He raised her chin and looked into her eyes. 'You'll be beautiful, many will seek your hand.'
She shook her head. 'I'm not rooted in this earth.'
Carnelian glanced up at the boughs and branching roof of Akaisha's cedar.
This mother tree is yours now too.'
'She shelters me but knows nothing of my mothers.'
Carnelian was becoming upset when he saw a glimmer appear in her eye. He watched her reach inside her robe and fish something out from an inner pocket. She placed a tiny bundle on her knee and lovingly unwrapped it.
'A winged seed,' Carnelian said.
She looked up at him. 'I brought it from the koppie of my people. Within there sleeps a daughter to my mother tree.'
Then you must plant it,' he said, elated. 'Will the Elders allow it?' she asked. Carnelian's excitement died. He could not give Poppy the answer she craved.
'Will you ask them for me?' 'When the time is right.'
Accepting this, Poppy rewrapped her seed with infinite care, then returned it to its place next to her heart.
On the last morning of Carnelian's fourth hunt, while he and the others were preparing for the final day's journey with the earther they had killed, Ravan cried out, pointing. Smoke was rising from the Crag up into the dawn sky.
As one they converged on Crowrane begging permission to return. The Elder stood some moments in the midst of their tumult, narrowing his eyes in the direction of the signal, before he turned grimly to them nodding his head.
Carnelian did not need to be told something was wrong. As he worked the tow rope's loose from the crossbar of his saddle-chair, he grew sick imagining what might be happening at home.
He was soon mounted. The eyes of the riders around him betrayed that they too were listing dangers. Those who were still worrying at knots were cursed by those already mounted. With a cry of frustration, one of them produced a blade, hacked through a rope, then flung himself into his saddle-chair.
When everyone was up, Crowrane, without a word, turned his aquar towards the Koppie and sent her into a jog. They all followed him in a great raising of dust.
Their aquar reached the Newditch in a lather from the run. Smoke was eddying up from the brow of the Crag.
The Mother be praised,' a voice cried, and several women ran across the earthbridge to meet them.
'What is it?' Crowrane demanded, speaking for everyone.
The Gatherer's here,' one of the women panted, eyes darting from one black face to the next.
The men who had young children rode past her, their saddle-chairs clacking against each other as they scrambled across the bridge. Carnelian stared stunned, then remembered Poppy.
This can't be,' said Crowrane, aghast. 'He's not due until next year.'
Carnelian was gripped by another sickening realization: Fern's doom had come.
The woman seemed to be swallowing a stone getting her breath back. 'He came in the night as he always does.
The Tribe woke to find his tents already set up in the Poisoned Field.'
More of the hunt were streaming into the ferngarden while the women rushed around trying to stand in their way. 'We must hide the Standing Dead. They must be hidden.'
'Hide them where?' Ravan demanded.
Verging on hysteria, the women looked to Crowrane for help. The Elders, my father… they've told everyone…' They looked at Carnelian, at Osidian. They mustn't be seen.'
Carnelian felt nauseous. His world had come to pieces and now so would that of all these people he loved. If he or Osidian were found there, the Masters would destroy the Tribe. He saw desperate indecision in Crowrane's eyes.
'What are the creatures babbling about?' a voice asked in Quya.
Carnelian turned to see Osidian calm amidst the storm. His hand commanded Carnelian to answer. Finding his voice, he explained the disaster. Of all the emotions he had been expecting Osidian to feel, rage was the most unexpected.
Crowrane was arguing with the women.
Osidian looked away to the northern horizon. They seek us. I had expected that they would, but not so soon. I am not yet ready.'
'Ready for what? Who is it that seeks…?' Carnelian remembered whose creatures the childgatherers were. 'How could the Wise know we are here?'
'I did not say that they know where we are precisely, but you yourself told me they saw where we left the Guarded Land; saw our captors were from this plain.' Osidian smiled a dark smile. 'Of course, down here, without their watch-towers, they can only fumble blindly hoping to find. The fact they have set their childgatherers to the search implies much.'
Carnelian thought about it. 'Otherwise it would be the legions that sought us out.'
Osidian's smile grew colder still. 'My mother would see to that.'
Then they do this without her knowledge. Why?'
Osidian frowned. 'Who knows what has come to pass in Osrakum since we left.' He smiled again. 'Still, this development is suggestive.'
He leered at Carnelian. Tell me, my Lord, shall we allow ourselves to be found?'
Carnelian regarded him with horror. 'Why would the Wise seek to know where we are, other than to destroy us?'
'Or by finding us, pull down my beloved mother.'
Cold rage infused into Carnelian. 'If we are found here these people will be punished.'
'Exterminated,' said Osidian, taking pleasure in the word.
'You two Standing Dead, dismount,' commanded Crowrane, but Carnelian ignored him and addressed Osidian.
'I will not allow you to endanger the Ochre.'
Osidian sneered. 'Will not allow? I do not yet choose to reveal myself to the Wise, but you can be certain my decision pays little heed to your threats, Carnelian; even less to what might happen to these.' He indicated the people round them with a dismissive gesture of his hand. 'I have other plans.' Osidian turned his aquar with his feet. 'Come.'
'Dismount, I say,' bellowed Crowrane. 'Surround them.'
Carnelian saw Ravan, Krow, others of the young men of the hunt hanging back, looking from their Elder to the Master.
'Where?' Carnelian asked Osidian. 'We shall return to our quarry.'
Carnelian glanced at Crowrane, who was pouring threats on the youths. The two of us, Osidian? Alone?'
'And why not. Do you fear the predators?' He snorted. 'You are transparent, Carnelian. You hope to save your barbarian boy.'
Carnelian glared at Osidian, hating him. 'We both know he cannot be saved.'
'What then?'
'Poppy.'
Osidian frowned hearing the name. 'Akaisha means to give her up to the childgatherer.' Osidian dropped his head in exasperation. He looked up. 'And?'
'I will not let her do it.'
Osidian let his head flop back closing his eyes and groaned. 'And if you go back in there and the ammonites see you? I thought my Lord expressed the wish to save his precious barbarians?'
'I will be careful.'
Osidian fixed him with the terrible green intensity of his eyes. 'I forbid it. This course of action imperils your life.'
'Nevertheless, I will attempt to save the girl,' said Carnelian and coaxed his aquar forward towards the bridge.
Ravan began pleading with Osidian who turned on him. 'Choose to follow me or remain.'
He glared at Krow. 'You too.'
The youth moved his aquar to Osidian's side.
'My mother will expel you from our hearth,' cried Loskai.
'So be it,' said Krow.
This exchange seemed to make Ravan decide. 'I'm yours, Master.'
Crowrane raged. 'I'm your huntfather. You will obey me.'
Carnelian could not bear to watch any longer and directed his aquar towards the bridge.
'You mustn't,' the women cried trying to grab hold of his saddle-chair. The Elders…'
'Hang the Elders,' Carnelian cried, making his aquar advance through them, then, when he was sure they would not be hurt, he spurred his aquar into a run across the bridge. He was through the gate before they could bar it against him. Once in the ferngarden he glanced back and saw Osidian already riding away with Krow, Ravan and some others.