Ratha’s Challenge (The Fourth Book of The Named) (10 page)

She staggered, fell on her side, and began to thrash. Eyes wide open, but blank, she struggled, trying to speak. “Wanted to help... but couldn’t... ran inside ... to hear ... song for healing.... Why... does he hear it when I can’t....”

“Thistle, don’t try,” Thakur said.

“He ... knows how much... it hurts.... Didn’t want to run from them.... Afraid, couldn’t help... Will hate me... Dreambiter ...” She shook violently.

Thakur lay down alongside Thistle, draping his paws and tail over her. The warmth and the weight seemed to help, for she closed her eyes and her limbs became still. He thought that she would fall into a deep sleep, but instead she spoke again.

“I could have reached them,” she hissed, her voice raw. “If I hadn’t let ... the badness... have me....”

“You can go back,” Thakur said, trying to soothe her. “You can try again, Thistle.”

“No.... They saw the badness.... Afraid of me now.... Jumped around, clawed somebody... hurt them.... No trust... anymore....”

“You didn’t hurt anyone. There is nothing to be ashamed of,” Thakur soothed.

“Should fight the badness, not run ... away....” Thistle’s voice slowed and slid as exhaustion took her. Thakur could feel the wiry little body go limp beneath him.

Gently he pulled his paws out from around her. She would feel nothing for a while.

Why is it so hard for her?
he asked silently, and found himself hackling, as if there were a flesh-and-blood enemy that he could fight for her sake.

He sighed, made his fur lie flat, and licked Thistle’s check. He had to think what to do next. She had managed to reach the hunters and get accepted. But she had ruined that tentative bond, or so she thought. What would happen if and when she tried again? The answer lies with that wounded young male. She was caring for him. Perhaps they will allow her back.

He grimaced. There were too many questions, uncertainties, fears. Besides, Ratha and Bira were coming, and he had no idea how to explain what had happened. He decided that he wasn’t even going to try.

* * *

 
“Come with me. Please,” Thistle said to Thakur above the soft crackle of the fire. It was afternoon, but Ratha had Bira light one just in case the hunters had followed.

Thakur tried to quiet Thistle. He was attempting to listen to Ratha, who was talking to Bira and Khushi about how they might capture a young face-tail. It was hard, because he was sitting away from them in order to tend Thistle. Ratha had been helping him while Thistle was still groggy, but when her eyes and mind cleared, Ratha had retreated to the other side of the fire.

He turned back to Thistle when she tried to get up and wobbled.

“Face-tail hunters. Need to ...”

“You’ve done all you can,” Thakur said, trying to soothe her.

“No. Need to show you something. Important.”

All his cajoling could not make her lie down again. With a sigh, he told the others that he and Thistle were going for a short walk and would soon be back.

Her eyes seemed to light from inside, as if they were seawater with the sun pouring through. Despite her shakiness, she bounded ahead. Thakur had to trot to catch up.

“What do you need to show me?” he asked, drawing abreast of her.

“Can’t say. Can only see.”

She led him to a place where they could observe the face-tail hunters without being sighted or smelled. “Watch,” she said, once they were settled.

“What am I looking for?” he asked mildly.

“Remember what Bira said—about hunters not caring for each other?” Thistle turned her head, her eyes large with excitement. “The wounded one. I helped him. There he is. Watch others near him.”

Puzzled, he did as she asked. The wounded male still lay alone, although he seemed to be better. The others went about their business, evidently ignoring him.

“Help him,” said Thistle under her breath, as if she were speaking to them.

“Thistle, I don’t think they will....”

“Did before. Was there.”

“Yes, but things were different because you were there. They might have copied you. And maybe he doesn’t need help any longer.”

“Have to help him,” said Thistle, her voice intense. “To show
you
.”

Thakur allowed himself one tail-twitch of annoyance and then relaxed. It would do no good to say that the hunters didn’t know that he and Thistle were there and so would not do anything to “show” their observers.

He was starting to announce that it was about time to return to the others when Thistle went stiff. “Look,” she hissed. “Look now.”

The wounded male was no longer alone. A party of the hunters surrounded him. Two were grooming him while several others were bringing meat from the face-tail carcass and melons from the patch that grew nearby.

Thakur watched carefully to be sure that he wasn’t seeing what he wanted to see. But it was hard to mistake the intent of those who were nursing their injured clan mate. They cared. They understood pain and answered with compassion.

“Didn’t learn it from me,” Thistle said in a low voice.

“You are right, Thistle,” Thakur said, feeling excitement growing in him.

“That big one. Gray with white belly. Coming toward them. Think he is True-of-voice.”

Thakur studied the distant shape. It was definitely male, huge and heavy-shouldered, with a ruff. Deep gold eyes stared out of a wide gray face streaked with black.

“Why do you think he is True-of-voice?” he asked Thistle softly.

“Song said he was. Before, when I heard it.... Hard to explain, Thakur.”

If the figure was not True-of-voice, he was some sort of leader, for everyone drew aside and crouched out of his way. Was it because they feared him?

Thakur remembered the tyrant, Shongshar, who had forced Ratha out of the clan and then ruled it heartlessly. Ratha had had to kill him to free the Named and win back her leadership. Was this True-of-voice another of the same breed?

Perhaps. But the hunters also seemed to need him. At their call, he came and touched noses with each of them. Each one stretched his or her neck forward eagerly, as if the brief nose-touch was a food more nourishing than meat or a drink more thirst-quenching than water.

Thakur thought that the gray-and-white leader would approach the wounded male and groom him, but instead he sat down close by. The others formed a loose circle around the injured hunter and the large male Thistle called True-of-voice.

“True-of-voice singing to wounded one,” said Thistle, with an odd catch in her own voice. Was it longing? Thakur wondered. Did she want to be out there in the circle, “hearing,” in some strange way, a soothing voice that helped and comforted?

“Need more than food or water to heal.” It was Thistle again, speaking softly.

How do you know these things, Thistle?
Thakur wanted to ask, but instead he said, “I think Ratha should see this.”

“Bring her,” Thistle said, her eyes never leaving the other clan. She seemed to be drawn to them—an attraction that made Thakur wary.

“You come back with me,” he said.

“No. Stay here. Need to stay here.”

“I’m afraid you won’t stay hidden. You’ll try to join them.”

“Want to,” Thistle admitted. “Now not good, though. Will stay, Thakur. Bring my mother.”

Nothing could sway Thistle when she was being stubborn. But she knew that it would not be an advantageous time to approach the hunters. She might disrupt whatever was going on between the gray-and-white leader and the wounded young hunter. And there was definitely something going on. Thakur could almost feel it.

Quickly he padded away to fetch Ratha.

* * *

Sometime later the clan leader of the Named crouched beside Thakur in a bush that hid them from view. Thistle had obeyed him and had stayed still, even though he knew she had been tempted to join the other clan.

“Wounded hunter and True-of-voice still there,” Thistle said as Ratha settled beside Thakur. “Others too.”

“So that is the one you call True-of-voice,” Ratha hissed after she had been watching awhile. “He’s got a good set of teeth.”

Thakur could tell by the look in Thistle’s eyes that she wanted to tell her mother about the strange “song” that was healing the injured hunter. But Ratha’s first comments had not encouraged her.

The scene with the wounded male and his leader went on for a long time. At last the circle around the two broke up, and its members wandered off to groom or nap.

“See?” Thistle said triumphantly to Ratha. “You and Bira—wrong, wrong, wrong! Hunters do take care of hurt ones!”

Ratha sent an annoyed look toward her, and Thakur groaned inwardly. Neither mother nor daughter was gifted with much in the way of tact.

“All right, I do see it,” Ratha said after a long silence. “Are you sure that the ones feeding the young male aren’t just his parents?”

“Too old to treat like cub,” Thistle said scornfully.

Thakur agreed.

“Bringing food to True-of-voice, too,” Thistle added. “He didn’t ask them.”

Thakur glanced at Ratha, who was studying the scene with narrowed eyes.

“They don’t need to fawn all over him,” she muttered. “All right, I admit I have made a misjudgment. These hunters obviously do share some of our ways. If they would stop driving us away from the face-tails, maybe we could reach some sort of agreement.”

“Have you seen enough?” Thakur asked her.

“Yes. Let’s go back. I want to think.”

Chapter Eleven

At the fire where the Named gathered, Ratha crouched with Bira, Khushi, and Thakur, listening to her daughter speak. Thistle was talking about her experiences with the face-tail hunters and how she had learned more about them.

When Thakur had returned that previous morning, with Thistle at his side, Ratha had been too grateful to ask questions, even though Thistle was subdued and looked as if she had been through another fit. She seemed to have recovered, but listening to her now, Ratha couldn’t help wondering. What she said seemed so nebulous and strange. And she actually seemed comfortable with the nature of the face-tail hunters!

Every word she says about them makes me shiver inside. How can she think that understanding more about this clan will make me
accept them?

Ratha tried to keep her nose from wrinkling and her tail from twitching, but she found it hard to hide her repugnance. Thakur evidently spotted her reaction, for after Thistle had finished speaking and curled up near the fire to rest, the herding teacher approached Ratha and took her aside.

“Clan leader, come with me,” he said, and they walked away from the fire together.

“I hope you are not taking me to watch that hunting bunch again,” Ratha said crossly when they were away from the others.

The herding teacher looked at her quizzically. “You really don’t like them, do you?”

“It is worse than that. Thakur, I hate them. I wish they were all gone, or dead.” She surprised herself with the coldness in her voice.

Thakur’s silence told her more eloquently than any words the depth of his shock and surprise.

“You never thought you would hear such things from me, did you?” she said wryly, but her whiskers trembled.

“No.”

She stopped, facing him. “You want to know why those hunters make my belly crawl? It’s that leader of theirs, that True-of-voice character. From what I saw and what Thistle said, he sounds worse than any of the Un-Named, or even Shongshar. Shongshar may have been a tyrant, but he couldn’t take away anyone’s thoughts. This True-of-voice seems to have something slimy oozing out of him that turns his people into infant cubs.”

“Thistle didn’t use those kinds of words,” Thakur said.

“Thistle was so befuddled she couldn’t see the truth. How would you like having someone talking in your ear all the time so that you couldn’t think for yourself?”

“I wouldn’t,” Thakur confessed.

“Well then?”

“Ratha, just because such a thing is wrong for you or me doesn’t mean that it is wrong for the face-tail hunters.”

“How can anything be wrong or right if you don’t even have a choice?” she countered.

“All right. The way these hunters are controlled is hard to accept. I’m not having an easy time either.”

“I can’t even think about accepting it. I can’t believe anyone would want to stumble around in a trance their whole life. If this True-of-voice really forces his will on his people, he is bad,” Ratha said bluntly, and added, “Maybe the best thing we could do for them is to kill him.”

She watched Thakur’s green eyes go wide, and his teeth flashed as he spoke. “You don’t know enough to judge,” he said, his voice hard.

“There are times when I’ve known even less about an enemy, yet I’ve acted. How much did I know about the Un-Named when I first used fire against them?”