Onio (8 page)

“Smiles…stop
that,” Onio grunted. Mel opened her eyes.

She
batted at the dog’s exuberant washing and giggled helplessly. Then she stared
up at Onio’s worried face.

“Onio,
where are we…what happened?” The dog lay down beside Mel and placed its head on
her chest. Mel’s face was still very pale, with two bright spots of fevered red
on each cheekbone, but her eyes were clear.

“Here
take this, you’re ill.” Onio fumbled at the towel that held the medicine. Mel’s
eyes grew wide when she saw all the pill bottles.

“Onio,
what is this?” she asked, looking through the bottles. Choosing a bottle that
said ‘ampicillin,’ she studied the expiration date. Shrugging, she opened the
bottle and took two pills. Even this much activity seemed to drain what little
energy she possessed. She lay back on the fur with a sigh.

“Are
you better now?” Onio asked.

Mel
opened her eyes and answered, “Onio, if these work at all it will take time. I
don’t know what you did…how you got these, but thank you.”

Then
she was asleep again. Smiles chuffed and stared into the girl’s face. The worry
etched on the dog’s wrinkled brow made Onio tremble with fear. Often, he knew,
dogs could sense the seriousness of a situation long before any human, large or
small, could.

Onio
bent over and picked the girl up in his arms. Casting a glance over his
shoulder, he decided to head north again. There were fewer small humans there.
There were also more predators though, both sasq and animal. There were wolves,
bear and worse—the sasquatch tribe under the leadership of King Two Horses, so
named because he was known to ride into battle astride the backs of two horses,
because one horse could not support his weight.

Since
Onio had been just a baby, his tribe and that of his uncle had been at war with
Two Horses’s people.
And again
, Onio thought angrily,
it’s all my
fault
!

Of
course, Onio’s pedigree was just an excuse to seize power for Two Horses.
Still, Onio sometimes wished he had never been born at all. Dashing tears of
shame and fear from his eyes, Onio started running north. The lonely dog named
Smiles let out a bark and followed the sasquatch into a new day.

Chapter 9

Mel
swam into consciousness with a groan. Every muscle in her body ached, she was
parched with thirst and her stomach writhed with hunger. However, she realized
with sudden clarity that she was no longer ill. The fever was gone and the
sinking feeling of imminent loss had disappeared.

She
opened her eyes and looked around at her surroundings. She was lying in a pile
of furs on a pebbled beach. A small river, dotted here and there with chunks of
ice, flowed nearby. Tall fir, pine and cedar trees on both sides of the river
rose into the horizon. Their branches sparkled in the sunlight like diamonds.

Nose
twitching, Mel looked to her right and saw Onio bending over a campfire, a
skinny, chocolate colored dog sitting by his side. The sasq held a long stick
festooned with fish over the flames. She had never been a big fish eater, but
the smell made her mouth fill with saliva.

She
didn’t know where they were or how long she had been unconscious, but she
vaguely recalled being carried while Onio ran, and ran some more. She
remembered looking up at his sweating, worried face, feeling his heart thunder
with effort; she recalled weeping with fear.

Mel
wanted to thank him. Opening her mouth to speak she remembered the soul song
and her heart leapt with joy. “Onio, hi.”

Onio
turned around with a start and the smile that lit his face was breathtaking.
She had seldom seen such affection in anyone’s face besides her own mother’s.
The dog seemed to grin as well as they walked over to where she sat. Mel smiled
back.

“You
better now?” Onio asked. “The Botix worked?” He still held the fish in one hand
as he stared down at her. She couldn’t take her eyes off the feast and she
licked her lips. Onio’s eyes grew big and he said, “Good! You are hungry. You
eat!” Plucking a fish off the end of the stick by its tail, he handed it to
her.

Mel
started to bite into the fish’s hide, but the sasquatch snatched it away. “No…not
that way! Like this, see?” He opened the fish wide from a cut in its belly.
There were no bones that she could see. The flesh inside was firm and slightly
pink. She picked at the meat. It was indescribably delicious.

Mel,
Onio and the dog sat on the rocky beach in companionable silence, eating the
fish and drinking deeply of the icy water from the mountain stream. Mel felt an
almost unbearable surge of happiness well up from deep inside her soul. She
knew she had been very close to death’s door, and was triumphant in her
survival. Petting the dog that leaned against her thigh Mel asked, “Who is
this, Onio?”

Onio
looked askance at the dog and replied, “She says her litter name is Smiles,
although the small humans that kept her prisoner called her Sadie. I did not
ask her to come with us, but I don’t blame her for wanting to leave those
people. They were unkind.” He ruffled the dog’s ears affectionately. The dog
opened her mouth wide, grinning with glee.

“Where
are we, Onio? For that matter, what happened back in the cave?” Mel could only
remember bits and pieces of that horrifying time, like watching fragments of a
scary movie on TV. The last thing she recalled was Ironhands’s announcement
that Onio was to be put to death.

Onio
looked into her eyes and shrugged. “My mother, Petal, happened. She cast a
spell of belief over the tribes.” He seemed to struggle with the words. “You
see, Petal cannot talk so well with the soul song, but she is very powerful in
other ways. She made everyone believe that you and I were dead so we could
escape.” He started to cry.

Mel
was shocked. “Onio, what’s wrong? That’s good isn’t it? What your mom did…it
saved us!”

Onio
nodded, “Yes, we are saved, for now. But the others will know soon enough, I
think.” He looked past her into the trees.

“I
ran fast and far. We are in Canada now…many miles north of the city of Spokane.
I thought I was being careful…quiet…but yesterday we were spotted by one of the
tribes’ scouts. I knew you needed to rest and recover your strength. Also, I
needed food so I can run some more.” Onio hit his forehead. “See? I am stupid,
careless. Now my mother will be put to death!”

Mel’s
heart pounded with dread but she touched the sasquatch’s shoulder. “Onio, come
on now,” she murmured. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You did nothing wrong. You
saved me and got me the medicine I needed…you even saved this dog!” Onio’s
mighty shoulders were hunched in misery.

“It’s
not your fault that Petal tried to save her son,” she added. “Most good mothers
would do whatever they could to save their child. I think its Ironhands’s
fault. He’s greedy and used my presence as an excuse to seize power from your grandfather.”

Onio
stared at her in surprise. Mel blushed, whispering, “I wasn’t asleep when you
and Rain were talking. I heard what she said.”

Onio
grinned. “I must learn to shield my thoughts from you, little human. You see
through me like a clear pond!” He stood up and the dog spun around in an
excited circle. “We must go now. Do you need to relieve yourself…do you need
help?”

Mel
suddenly realized that she was clean. She didn’t know how long they had been on
the run or how many days she had slept in a fevered delirium, but her skin felt
scrubbed and her underclothes were sanitary. She stared up at the sasquatch.

“Have
you undressed me, Onio?” Her cheeks flushed red with embarrassment, and with
the shame came anger. Mel glared at the astonished sasquatch furiously.

“Of
course,” Onio exclaimed. “A person cannot lay in their own filth! They will
sicken and die. I would not have you die of waste poisoning, stupid girl!”

Mel
saw that Onio was angry now, too. He stalked toward the fire. The dog followed
with her tail between her legs. Smiles cast a glance back toward Mel and then
sat close to the sasquatch while he placed large rocks on the flames. His back
was stiff with outrage. She sighed.

“Onio,”
she said. “I’m sorry. You were right to do that…and, I thank you for taking
such good care of me. It’s just that…well, we small humans are modest. I was
embarrassed for you to see me with no clothes on.”

Onio
turned around, staring at her with a frown of concentration. “Embarrassed…you
would rather be dirty?”

Mel
shook her head. “No, definitely not…thank you.” She saw the anger melt from the
big male’s face and started to smile, but froze at the expression of fear that
suddenly filled his eyes. The dog started barking fiercely at something behind
her.

Onio
picked up a long, wicked looking spear. The gentle young sasq transformed into
something Mel didn’t recognize. His eyebrows slammed down into a dark, slashing
“V” of rage and his lips pulled up and back as he bared his teeth at the
threat.

Scrambling
to her feet, Mel stumbled to Onio’s side and stared down the creek bed. Two sasquatches
approached. One was enormous with silver fur, and the other was handsome with
bones and teeth braided into his mustaches. Mel breathed a sigh of relief. It
was Bouldar’s guard, Wolf, and Onio’s father, Hunter.

Onio
did not put down his spear, however. In fact, he brandished it at the two males
and roared, “Do NOT come any closer or I will kill you!”

The
sasquatches stopped. Hunter stared at his son for a moment and said, “Why do
you raise your spear to us, my son?”

Onio
quivered with rage. “Son…do not dare call me son! You ceased to be my father
when you left my mother and me so long ago! Have you come to take me back to
your king? I will kill you first!”

Hunter
sighed, and looking down at the ground in front of his feet, he nodded. “Onio…
First Son…I love you.”

Mel
saw Onio draw back in shock. The look of longing that came over the young sasquatch’s
face was painful to behold. “Then why did you leave us?” he whispered.

Now
the older sasq looked angry. It looked to Mel as if every hair on the sasquatch’s
body bristled. The dog laid its ears back and snarled.

Wolf
made a sharp gesture and uttered something aloud that Mel couldn’t hear. Smiles
lay back down with a thump. “Where do you find these creatures, Onio?” he
muttered. “They crawl to you like fleas to a bear!”

Onio
blushed. “I did not find this dog…she came to me. She was being abused by the
small humans!” Onio’s defensive tone of voice made Mel believe that this was
not the first time Onio had picked up a stray. She wondered uneasily if she was
just another stray the young sasquatch had picked up along the way.

Hunter
looked calmer now and Mel realized that Wolf’s off-hand comment was a
diversion. If so, it had worked. Both father and son regarded one another in a
friendlier manner. Hunter looked his son in the eye and said, “I left you and
your mother in the hope of keeping you alive.”

Onio
gaped, exclaiming, “How did that happen? If anything, Mother and I were in more
danger than ever without your protection!”

Hunter
was growing angry again. “Listen to me, you foolish boy! You and Petal were
never in danger from the members of Bouldar’s tribe. It was Ironhands…always
Ironhands that posed a threat. Bouldar and I knew that something needed to
happen to keep him in check! It was Bouldar who sent me away…Bouldar who wanted
me to stay close, to spy on his conniving brother. It broke my heart to leave
my family!”

Mel
saw tears fall from Onio’s eyes as he gazed at the older male. “Is this true, Father?
You didn’t leave us because you were ashamed of us?”

“Ashamed…skies
above, your mother is the most beautiful female ever created! I love her with
all my soul! And you, Onio, I am proud to call son.”

There
was only a moment’s hesitation before the two large males embraced. Mel could
feel their fists through the soles of her feet as they thumped one another on
the back. Mel grinned and the dog wagged her tail. Wolf rolled his eyes.

“This
is all very nice, but we need to leave before Two Horses’s people find us and
slaughter us for dinner.”

Onio
stepped back, wiping the tears of joy from his eyes. “Are you coming with us Father?”
he asked.

Hunter
shook his head. “No. I must return to the tribe now. Ironhands knows I grieve
over the loss of my son. He gave me time alone to hunt. I stashed my kill to
come here, but I need to get back to it now. The subterfuge has worked well so
far, but even the smallest mistake could give us away.”

Onio
looked devastated at losing the father he had only just found. Hunter regarded
him in silence. Then he spoke again. “Onio, I came with Wolf so I could speak
to you once more before you leave for good. I think that you should go to the
High Peaks tribe in Montana.”

Onio’s
mouth fell open in shock. “The High Peaks…Father, that is high royalty! They will
never accept me there!”

Hunter
glanced at Wolf, smiling. “Did you know that Wolf is cousin to the queen?”