The Mantooth by Christopher Leadem
'What is he doing?' asked the girl. At the same moment Kalusheard a loosened stone sent plummeting to the bottom of the canyon. Itsdry echo sounded sharp and clear below.
'Sylviana, listen to me carefully.' He spoke firmly, movingcloser. 'The mantis is coming toward us. Do not cry out---heprobably won't hurt us. But you must do everything I say withoutquestions.'
'Go on,' she whispered intently, surprised by her own courage.
'When the Mantis appears at the entrance you must act helpless andafraid, but afraid of him and not of me. Also, do not try to speak.Akar will speak for us. Here, he draws closer. When you first see him,hold on to me tightly, as if shocked and startled. We must make himthink you have never seen him, and had no knowledge this mountain washis. Now. Prepare yourself!'
When the Mantis' head finally did appear, leering in at themominously, she found doing exactly as he told her infinitely easier thannot doing it. She clung to him as if possessed, and the Mantis'first glimpse of them was exactly as Kalus had wanted it. Akar stoodsubmissively to one side, allowing the Monarch an unobstructed view.After studying the three closely, he gestured for the wolf to follow himto the broad ledge outside the larger cave. Akar obeyedunquestioningly, snaking his way carefully down the sharp incline.
'What will he do now?' asked the girl, moving with Kalus to watchfrom the stone lip that ran like a low parapet just beyond the entranceof the niche.
'I do not know. He will want to know why we are here, but after thatI cannot say. But I think if he was going to kill us he would have doneit already.' The girl was quietly stunned by the calmness with whichhe said the words.
Once down on the ledge, the two communicated in a way known only tothemselves: Akar through a series of short barks and body movements, theMantis through subtle movements of his antennae, foreclaws and upperbody. Kalus could only guess at their meaning. Roughly translated,this is what passed between them.
Skither (The Mantis)- Wolf. Was it you then that snuck from my cavelike a thief in the night?
Akar- Yes, mighty one. I was trapped inside by the spider.
Skither- But why were you in the cave at all? Have you lost all respectfor my sovereignty?
Akar- No, master. I was protecting the woman-child, to whom I owe mylife. I do not understand her words, but she speaks of having wokenfrom a long sleep, and finding herself in your lair. I tried to makeher leave it many times, but she believes she is somehow protected thereby gods I do not know. When I told her the cave was yours, she wishedonly to remain there until your return. She is deadly fearful of theworld outside your domain.
Skither- Do not flatter me, wolf. I have not grown so old as to befeeble and weak of mind.
Akar- Forgive me.
Skither- Tell me, then. Does she speak of having come from the longsilver box?
Akar- Yes, I believe it is so. What does this mean?
Skither- I'm not certain. Three moon-cycles past I was journeyingfar to the north and west among the mountains that grow there. At thebase of one such peak I found a broad and unnatural tunnel that led deepinto the earth. Searching it for spiders, I came across a chamberfilled with many strange and beautiful things. I forgot all else forthe wonder of it. But the thing I would most have for myself was thelong silver box. Inside it was the body of a woman-child, your mistressit seems. She was fair of face and skin, and I grieved for her. Itried to touch her, but was stopped by a film which was there, and yetwas not there (fiberglass). Breaking free the webs that held her(life-support tubes and wires), I brought her here to my cave, thinkingshe was dead.
But this passing is not important now. You and she are both welcome onmy mountain. It is the man-beast I do not trust. His kind aretreacherous and unpredictable, and they carry with them the fire thatkills.
Akar- But he is not like them, Master. He is an outcast, like myself,and worthy of trust. To him also, and more deeply, I am indebted for mylife.
Skither- It seems you owe your life many times, my friend. How is itthat the brother of Shaezar has come to lead such a perilous existence?
Akar- ... Shaezar is dead, killed by a rival while I was away. I couldnot serve in a pack whose unwanted leader had slain my true brother, soI set out to live on my own. The days have indeed been perilous, but Ihave vowed never to return.
Skither- This is evil news you bring me. Shaezar was a wise and nobleleader. I grieve for him. It seems that many things have changed in myabsence. (A pause). Very well, then. Send the man-beast down to me.I would have words with him.
Akar (sadly)- As you command it.
Moving to the northern and uppermost portion of the ledge, Akar lookedup to the place where the others stood waiting. Barking sharply threetimes in succession, he summoned the man-child to come down.
'What is he saying?' asked the girl.
'The Mantis wishes to speak to me. I hope that is good. Wait for mehere, I will return as soon as it is safe.'
Feeling terribly small and exposed Kalus began to descend, runningquickly through his mind all the things he wanted to say, while tryingto muster the courage to say them. Stepping weak-kneed out onto theledge, he felt his heart pounding, and as he approached the Mantis'awesome form, felt both hope and despair arise with equal strengthinside him. His mind raced. Had he read the moment correctly? Did hedare ask for refuge? How would they live if the Monarch refused him?The moment was upon him; there was no time to ponder.
Bowing low, he saluted the Mantis. Using modified arm and wristmovements he hoped the other would understand, he signaled the followingwords.
'Great Leader,' he began. 'I am called the Carnivore. Do youread the meaning of my hands?' The Mantis nodded.
'I am sorry for my presence on the mountain. As an outcast, I wishedonly to live in the safety of your shadow, but was pursued here by aCommodore, and forced to take refuge in the smaller cave above yourown.' He pointed, adding after an intentional pause. 'It seemsthey have grown bold in your absence.' He looked up quickly, but theMantis didn't flinch.
'Great King,' he continued, anxiety rising with each cominggesture. 'I am no longer one with my people, and live without ahome. The same is true of the female you saw with me. I would have heras my own, but she is not yet able to protect herself in the wild.....There is something I would ask of you.' Still the Mantis did notmove. There was no putting it off any longer. He would have to ask himnow.
'I know why you have gone away,' he began nervously. 'And whyyou must leave again soon..... The mating of the spiders has reachedits middle season, and will not end for many days to come. You and yourgod-friends have many battles yet to fight.'
'Why do you speak this lie?' signaled the Mantis angrily.'Where do the hill-people hear such a thing?'
'My people know nothing of this,' he answered, as calmly as hecould. 'And I would never tell them. Your secret is known only tome, and I tell no one. I swear it.'
Skither remained motionless, puzzled by the presence of the strange andknowing child. Utterly intrigued, he searched the back of his mind forthe meaning of their encounter.
'What is it then you would ask?'
'Since you are called again to the holy task, your lair will again beleft unguarded. I would ask that you allow the three of us to remainhere on the mountain, in the smaller cave above your own. Though eachof us alone are small, together we could create the illusion that youhad not left it.'
'But how, and for what reason do you do this?'
'My friends and I have only a short march of days before theCommodore must sleep, and many other predators follow the herds to theSouth. If you allow me, I could turn our shared need into sharedhelp.'
'Go on.'
'I have learned in my youth to make a sound like the flutter of yourmighty wings. And Akar could descend daily to the grasslands in plainsight, as if your messenger to the wolf packs below.'
'How would you make this sound?' Skither was perplexed, and feltan odd sense of antiquity as
'The sound is made by stretching a skin between two trees, thensoaking it with water and leaving it to dry in the sun. When it hastightened between them it is beaten rapidly with club-ended sticks,making a sound like the rhythm of your mighty wings.'
'But how will you use it here, where there are no trees? And why doyou think that my enemies will believe it, when the sound comes fromonly one place?'
'It can be built on a frame,' he answered. 'And moved todifferent places along the ridge. That way the sound can be sentechoing down the canyon, and seem to come from many places at once.'
Skither looked down at him thoughtfully. His first instincts told himnever to trust a man-beast. But these were difficult times. Yieldingto the unspoken Tao he consulted the wind, to see what hidden message itmight carry.
A cool breeze swirled about him; the valley grasses swayed with agolden, browning color on the plains below. He felt the seasonschanging. But more than that he felt his world changing, yieldingslowly to some new order in which he was to play no part. It was not thefirst time. The feeling had often puzzled (and frightened) him. Therecould be no denying the double reason for their meeting: the air wascharged with it, the mind echo of deja-vu all around it. Searching deepwithin himself, he felt the autumn of his life full upon him. He feltthe world he had known growing old. He felt his own weariness, andagain the premonition of impending death..... But what did the Namelessask of him now? And how would he answer the man-child?
'You have given me much to consider, small one. But this decisionmust be seasoned with time and careful thought. Now I must rest, as youshould well know. Go again to the place where I found you. Do notleave it until I have summoned you with an answer. Do you understand mywords?'
'Yes, Monarch. Your kindness will not soon be forgotten.' Feelingrelieved but still pensive, Kalus started to leave. An upward thrust ofthe Mantis' foreclaw stopped him.
'Yes, master?'
'How many summers have you known?
'Twenty-one, master.'
'And in what season were you born?'
'In mid-winter. Why do you ask it?'
'Twenty winters ago I saw a sign in the heavens and marked it well.I saw the light of its second full moon surrounded by a misty halo whichseemed to reach down towards the earth. Another, smaller halo eruptedsuddenly, and three stars passed through it as they fell from the sky,all in the same direction, and each within a breath of the other.'Now it was Kalus who did not understand.
'But how does this passing touch me?'
'I think that perhaps one day you will answer that question forme.'
The Mantis turned and retired to his lair. Kalus stood watching for amoment, then turned himself and retreated toward the shelter of thesmaller cave: wondering. Akar had already passed that way before him.
Chapter 7
The hours passed slowly. Using the wood Akar had brought him, Kalusbuilt a small fire and they divided the cooked meat between them.Sylviana had protested slightly, but given in when informed thatregardless of the Mantis' decision, there could be no more free mealsof sebreum.
There was an air of restless tension in the small enclosure. For thoughbeing banished from the mountain did not mean certain death, it did meana much harder and more treacherous life. Both Kalus and the wolf knewjust how difficult living without a home could be; Sylviana could onlyimagine it.
Akar had not forgotten that he and the girl were already welcome toremain there, but he kept this knowledge to himself. His friend neededthe companionship of her own kind, and he had made a pact of mutualprotection, however tentative, with the man-child. And Akar was acreature of his word.
As morning yielded gradually first to early, then to late afternoon, thethree had still seen or heard nothing of the mantis. Exhausted by hisseasonal battle with the mating spiders, he lay unmoving and death-likein the larger cave below them, buried in the deep, recuperative sleep ofan insect.
With time hanging heavy around them, Kalus and the girl were given thechance, denied them by the turbulence of previous days, to study eachother more closely, and to ask, if they would, the unspoken questionsthat had been forming in their minds. Kalus had finished with thecarcass by mid-day---cutting and shaping the skin, sharpening the ribsagainst the rock to make bone needles---but showed no sign of interestin talk, moving instead to look out from the entrance, apparently deepin thought. Sylviana watched him there in the sunlight, with the wolfsleeping peacefully beside her, as she gently stroked his fur.
For the most part she studied his primitive attire, crudely made, butnot without a certain atavistic grace. His primary garment consisted ofa large skin, possibly that of a buck, cut and worn like a sleeveless,thigh-length coat. Worn with the fur side in, it closed in a narrowingV across his chest, and was bound about the waist by a band of tiedleather. Long slits at either hip allowed his legs their freedom ofmovement. Beneath one of these as he crouched could be seen a tannedand soft-beaten loincloth, tied off with a knot at the crest of thesplayed and sinewy leg closest to her. His boots were made of somefurrier hide, silver-black in color, and tightly bound to his calves bycrisscrossing leather thongs. He also wore thongs about his neck andwrists, a sharpened clamshell hanging from the former, the strandsdangling loose in the case of the latter. Decorative in appearance,they were in fact purely practical, serving many purposes as need arose.He also wore the buckskin pouch, along with a drinking skin from whichhe rationed water for the two of them, Akar being free to pursue it ashe might. As for the man himself, his hair was light brown and wild; ashort and irregular beard wrapped a face whose stern features implied adetermination and experience beyond his years.
Nor had she failed to note the striking body beneath, endowed veryprobably with more supple and functional strength than any she had everseen. More than once she felt her eyes trail across it---the knottedarms and shoulders, the well shaped thighs and buttocks---very muchattracted.
But it was this same strength of mind and body, infinitely desirable ina tamer soul, that brought home so consistently her own helplessnessagainst him. That he could overpower her at any time was obvious, thathe had not yet tried to do so of little comfort. She wondered ifperhaps the presence of the wolf alone protected her. And the hardestthing was that she did respect him. All his actions seemed to indicatea courageous and unselfish character. But his morals? She suspected(correctly) that he had none.
But in truth she need not have worried. The idea of rape was so foreignand unnatural to his existence that the thought never occurred to him.As was the way of his people, he intended first to feed and protect her,to establish his claim and earn her trust, and only then to take her,willingly, as his mate. And in his own mind at least, he had begun theprocess already. His desire and timid affection for her bound him toher more closely than she knew. At last he broke away from the entranceand came inside. The wolf stirred.
'It will be hard if he refuses us. Very hard.' He sat oppositeher against a nook in the wall and once more destroyed allpreconception. His face was worried and drawn, full of very humanemotion. Again she felt the presentiment of inescapable reality: thathere before her was true Man, stripped of all pretense, reduced to hissimplest terms.
At length he looked up at her, and seemed anxious to communicate.Indeed, his eyes almost pleaded for some reassurance. She thought toherself, then offered a simple question.
'Kalus? What are the rest of your people like?' He shiftedpositions, drew one knee toward him, then answered.
'They are no longer my people. I am banished..... For what they arelike, I don't know how to tell you. I can only say they are not muchlike me.'
'In what way?' Finally she had something
'They act more and think less. I think they are closer to the truepredators than I.'
'How do you mean?'
'Well. Let me think how to say it.' A pause. 'My name isKalus, which stands for Carnivore, or Great Hunter. My father made itfor me, hoping that such a name would give me strength. I am strong,Sylviana, but not, I think, in the way he wanted.'
'Go on.'
Again he struggled. 'I draw no pleasure from the hunt. I don'tunderstand. To my people it is the proudest and most important thingthey do. But to me it is often ugly, and I kill only to live.Also. . there are times when I do not want to be aggressive. Like now.If the Mantis would let us stay here, I would trade that safety for allthe meaningless battles..... Perhaps I am just a coward and a fool.'
'No,' she said emphatically. 'You're not.' She had torestrain herself from going to him then and there. Why did his anguishmove her so? 'Maybe you're just better than they are. You feelthings they can't.'
'I do not feel better. I thank you for saying it, but I do not thinkit is so. Barabbas, my new father..... It is easy for me to speak withyou and say I do not love the hunt. But he must feed and protect manyothers. Please believe me, that is not an easy thing.' She let it goat that, sensing an undercurrent of anger, or something, in his words.
Kalus was silent for a time, lost among his thoughts. But as thedaylight began to fade, he too felt the need to know something more ofhis companion. Largest in his mind was the question of her origin,since it carried with it the one answer which truly mattered. Could sheever be his?