Clan Ground (The Second Book of the Named)

Chapter Eighteen

The sun hid for days behind a heavy bank of clouds, and the rain fell without ceasing. The stream began to swell, surging and cutting away at its banks until Ratha feared the wall of earth at the high end of the spillway would not hold it back. Now she crouched on the rise above the stream bank, watching the swirling water with anxious eyes.

The break had to be controlled, Thakur had said. If the packed earth gave way too soon or in the wrong place, the rushing water could destroy the channel and race down the hillside, missing the hollow. All their work would be useless if that happened.

Ratharee huddled on the ground beneath her, seeking shelter from the rain in the warmth between her forepaws and her breast. Ratha could feel the little body shiver.

“It won’t be long now, Ratharee,” she said softly, feeling the treeling’s paws on her forefeet. “Bira’s gone down to spy on the cave. She’ll be back soon.”

As she waited for Bira, she found herself thinking about Shongshar, as she had often done during the past days. At first her mind had been clouded with hate. Once the cave-fire was destroyed and his rule ended, she vowed to force the Firekeepers to change their arrogant ways. No one in the clan would speak Shongshar’s name without a hiss. Both his memory and his ways would be buried.

Yet she now realized that as ruthless and cruel as he had become, Shongshar had greater vision than she had. He was right: she had left the true understanding of the Red Tongue’s power to him, and thereby forfeited her leadership. The veneration of fire had thrust her people into debasement and a savagery previously unknown among their kind, but it also fed a hunger of the spirit, a need that could neither be ignored nor denied.

He was also right that the Named were pushed beyond themselves by the awesome presence of the Red Tongue. Not only did gazing into the fire inspire them to greater strength and courage, it gave them the vision to seek beyond the limits of their everyday life for a sense of meaning. Even Shongshar’s dream of extending his rule beyond clan ground was as inspired as it was arrogant, she admitted grudgingly.

As much as she hoped to obliterate all traces of his rule from among her people, she knew some of the things he had done could not be changed. This realization had forced her to put aside her hate long enough to see that not everything the Firekeepers had done under his rule was wrong. Storing wood and sheltering the source-fire in the cave were sound ideas, even though they had been turned to self-serving purposes.

If a large shelter such as the cave had been located in the meadow instead of far up the creek trail, it would have been more difficult to misuse. Had the Firekeepers been made to understand that the Red Tongue’s power was a gift for all to share, perhaps it might have been more difficult for Shongshar to lead them astray. And if she had understood the need of her people to belong to a power greater than themselves and used it for good instead of turning it aside, then Shongshar might not have been able to turn the clan against her.

Ratha heard the slap of wet pads and caught the smell of Bira’s soggy pelt. The shapes of the young female and her tree-ling appeared through the rain.

“Most of the Firekeepers are inside,” she panted as she crouched beside Ratha. “Shongshar is having a great feast in the cave. Where are Thakur and Fessran?”

“They’re coming.” Ratha shivered with cold and impatience.

When the other two arrived, Bira told them the news. They looked at each other with rising excitement and then all eyes turned to Ratha.

“Take Ratharee, Fessran,” she said and sprang onto the top earth dike holding back the stream. Dirt flew into the foaming water. She attacked the soil as if it were Shongshar’s throat; rage made her paw strokes more powerful.

“They’ll be starting ... to dance ... around the Red Tongue... soon,” she growled as she redoubled her efforts. Brown water began to trickle through the channel between her feet. She was turning to Thakur with a grin when she felt the earth give way beneath her.

Her triumph quickly turned to terror as the earth wall broke and toppled. She threw herself to one side, twisting and scrabbling for a clawhold. She landed on her belly, her hindquarters and tail in the surging flood that spilled through the break. As the wall crumbled the current grew stronger, tugging at her hindquarters. She splashed and kicked with frantic strength, knowing that if she fell beneath the pouring water, she would never fight her way to the surface. She would be carried like a leaf down into the frothing cauldron that would fill the hollow. The Red Tongue would have its revenge even before it died.

That thought gave her the added strength to stretch farther up the bank and drive her claws into harder ground. Her shoulder muscles cramped with the effort of dragging her body from the hungry current. Part of the bank broke away beneath one forepaw and she dangled, held by the claws of the other. She felt teeth seize her flailing paw and grunted as she was yanked up until her chest and then her belly lay on the edge.

Someone caught her scruff, someone else grabbed a hind paw, and treeling hands were on her tail. She was hauled, dragged and rolled away as the rest of the bank caved in, threatening to sweep away both her and her rescuers. When they finally reached safe ground, she could only lie and pant while the others looked anxiously at her.

“I’m all right,” she gasped, struggling to her feet. “See what’s happened.” She shook herself, though it was useless in the heavy rain, and staggered to where the others stood.

Water from the rain-swollen stream coursed into the channel, washing away the remains of the earthen wall. The flood widened and deepened its new course, eating farther into the original streambed and diverting more and more water into the spillway. Ratha and Bira ran along the edge of their ditch, following the foaming wave down to the bottom of the hollow. The strength of the current was enough to send the muddy water fountaining up onto the slope of the hollow and right into the cracks venting the cave.

“We’ve done it!” Ratha roared to Bira as they galloped back to the top where Fessran and Thakur waited.

“We certainly have,” said Thakur as she reached him. “Look. The stream’s left its old path entirely.” He pointed with his paw toward the streambed below the spillway opening. Only a small trickle of water ran between puddles in the sand.

Above the roar of water surging into the channel, Ratha caught the sound of shrieks and cries drifting up from far below.

“The cave-fire must be dead!” she cried, leaping up. “Now we strike against Shongshar!”

She led the four of them down past the new lake that was filling the hollow, to the trail that led to the bottom of the waterfall. She noticed that the sound of the fall was gone. Instead, the noise of falling water came from the cave that had once been the Red Tongue’s den. A torrent gushed from the entrance, washing away a portion of the trail that ran beside the stream and cutting its way back to fill the now-empty streambed.

Even as they watched, a body rode out on the flow, tumbling over rocks and boulders until it was finally pushed to one side and left. Ratha could see others, some lying limp and still in the rain, some trying to crawl away from the growing cataract.

Charred logs that hurtled out on the flood about the entrance gave evidence that the cave-fire had been drowned and washed away. The conspirators gazed at each other, awed by the destruction.

Ratha’s imagination gave her an image of what the inside of the cave had been like when the water came pouring in. First, a small dribble that hissed into steam when it struck the Red Tongue and startled the dancers. Then more rivulets falling from the ceiling, glinting in the firelight. The dancers would have stopped, laying back their ears and snarling at this strange invasion. And when the full force of the flood hit the great fire and plunged the cave into sudden darkness, she could almost hear the howls and screams above the echoing roar that grew louder and louder ...

Some would have tried to flee the cave in a panic near madness, guessing that the earth itself had turned against them for their wickedness in worshiping the Red Tongue. She could imagine that terror in the eyes of the half-drowned Firekeepers.

“It must have been terrible,” said Bira softly, saying what Ratha saw in the eyes of the two others.

“Let’s find Shongshar,” she said roughly and turned away.

They found him farther downstream, in a small gorge beside the trail. The rush of water had carried him with it, tumbling and turning him until at last it flung him aside. Now he lay, a sodden mass of silver fur, among the boulders at the bottom.

Carefully Ratha made her way down into the gorge, followed by the others. If Shongshar was dead, he shouldn’t be left to rot in the stream and taint the water. He should be taken elsewhere and buried. And if he wasn’t dead, she should know.

He remained so still as she approached that she was convinced life had gone from him. She was about to tell Thakur to take Shongshar’s tail in his jaws when Shongshar’s eyes suddenly cracked open. With a gasp, Bira skittered back, bumping into Fessran.

Shongshar’s eyes widened and focused on Ratha. She felt a sudden chill that was not just the wind on her wet pelt.

“Your rule is ended, Shongshar,” she said, trying to keep the tremor from her voice. “The Red Tongue in the cave has been destroyed and the Firekeepers are too frightened to listen to you again.”

“Then it was you who sent the angry water into the cave,” he hissed and drew a shuddering breath.

“Yes.”

“You have grown great indeed if water moves itself to do your will,” he said hoarsely. “The weaker power must yield to the stronger. That is the law of all things, clan leader. I offer you my throat for your fangs.” He rolled his head back as he spoke.

“Be careful!” Thakur hissed beside her. Behind her she could hear Fessran growl, “Kill him for me, Ratha.”

But Ratha stepped back from him. “No. There has been enough death among us. I offer you this, Shongshar. You may leave clan ground with your life, if you never return.”

“You offer me nothing then,” he snarled weakly.

“You say there is nothing for you outside the clan. What about your cubs?”

His eyes narrowed, and orange blazed between the lids. His lips drew back from his fangs as he spat. “You are crueler than I am, Ratha. You killed them. The thought of their deaths only left me when I gazed into the heart of the Red Tongue, and now that is gone, you torment me again with their memory.”

“Would you believe me if I told you I didn’t kill your cubs? Thakur and I took them off clan ground and left them in a place where they could find food and water. They might still be alive.”

Shongshar looked at her and she saw a faint hope warring with rage in his eyes. He sought Thakur. “Does she speak truth, herding teacher?”

“Yes,” Thakur replied.

“You couldn’t have told me, could you?” Shongshar said bitterly, turning his gaze back to Ratha.

“I couldn’t trust you. Listen, when you are ready to leave clan ground, I’ll tell you where we left them.”

Shongshar sank back, a strange glaze over his eyes. “You should have trusted me then, clan leader ... it’s too late now.”

Ratha barely heard Thakur’s warning cry before a fierce blow struck the side of her head, sending her reeling. Shongshar was suddenly on top of her, raking her sides with his claws. She writhed underneath him, heaving and bucking, trying to dodge the plunging teeth. A fang scored her side and she lashed up, dragging her claws across his cheek.

“I offered to let you go ... to find your lost cubs,” she gasped. She twisted underneath him, ignoring the rocks that bruised her back.

“What good would it do me to search for them now?” he hissed. “If they were as witless as you believed, they wouldn’t care who fathered them. And if they weren’t, they have been gone from me too long to know me.”

She understood then that hate had worked inside him too long for anything to turn it aside. The fierce glow of his eyes was the fire of madness. “No, Ratha,” he hissed, baring his fangs in front of her face. “All I want from you now is your death or mine.”

Again he strained his head back for a killing downslash. At the instant his throat lay exposed, Thakur struck. The momentum of the herding teacher’s attack thrust Shongshar aside from Ratha. She scrambled to her feet as Fessran and Bira leaped to Thakur’s aid.

Fessran made up for the handicap of her injury by the intensity of her rage. Shongshar was bleeding from many wounds by the time the three bore him down, but their combined strength could scarcely hold him.

“All right, Shongshar,” Ratha panted. “You have a choice. Either you leave clan ground now, or your life ends here.”

His only answer was a lunge at Ratha. Thakur cast her a look of despair that told her Shongshar had made his decision, and there was nothing the herding teacher could do about it.

“You are going to kill me,” Shongshar said, narrowing his eyes at Thakur. “That is a bitter thing, to have to kill one who was a friend. If you don’t, I will bury my teeth in her. Choose which one of us you will grieve for, herding teacher.”

Again he lunged for Ratha, nearly throwing off his captors. They seized him, throwing him back. Thakur opened his jaws for the killing bite.

“No,” Ratha said. “I brought him among us. I will take him to the dark trail.”

She felt the herding teacher tremble as he moved aside for her. He looked at her, his eyes dark with grief. “Be quick,” he said and stared away.

When it was done and Shongshar lay still, Ratha lifted her head with a deep weariness that seemed to fill her. She stared down at the blood oozing onto the silver fur, as the others backed away from the body.

“We will carry him into the meadow and place him beneath the tree where Bonechewer died,” she said softly. “He deserves at least that much.”

“Ratha!” The harshness in Thakur’s voice jerked her gaze from Shongshar. Fessran was looking up at the rim of the gorge, her tail starting to wag. Angry eyes glared down. The Named were all about them, descending the steep slope of the gorge on both sides. It was too late to run or to hide Shongshar’s body. Ratha knew she would either have to win the clan over or fight.

She felt Thakur edge against her, protecting Bira between himself and Fessran. The bitter smell of vengeance-hunger filled the stream as the Named crept down into the gorge.

“It’s a bad place for a fight,” Thakur growled softly.

“Stay together,” Fessran hissed. “To reach any of us, they’ll have to kill us all.”

Ratha narrowed her eyes at the pack. She sensed that the herders among them did not seem as vengeful as the Firekeepers; in fact the latter had to bully the herders into sullen complacency.

“There is the one who murdered our leader and teacher! Tear out her throat!” cried a Firekeeper and he clawed a herder, who flinched and growled, “Yes, tear out her throat!”

“Let her taste the same meat she gives to others!” cried someone else among the herders.

“Ptahh!” Ratha spat back. “You herders know the meat he gave you. He dragged away your beasts to glut himself and those who served him while leaving you nothing. Why do you howl for him?”

“He gave us power and strength,” roared one. “He gave us the dance in the cave,” howled another.

“The dance,” said Ratha. “And was that dance ever for herders? Were the ones who worked to feed the Firekeepers ever allowed to come before the cave-fire to feast and share in the celebration?”

The herders exchanged looks with each other, despite the Firekeepers’ prodding. “No,” muttered one. “They said our coats were too dirty and that we must watch from a distance and be grateful that the Red Tongue would even permit us in the cave.”

Other mutterings broke out, and Ratha could hear more complaints being spoken against Shongshar’s attitude toward those who tended the clan’s animals.

“I’m glad Shongshar’s dead,” roared someone else, and with a start Ratha recognized Cherfan’s voice. “I’m tired of crouching to those singe-whiskered fools and hearing that we herders aren’t worthy to approach the Red Tongue.”

Heads turned among the herders and more voices joined Cherfan’s until they broke from the rest of the clan and crowded around Ratha. Cherfan faced the Firekeepers and bellowed, “All right, now we’ll see how brave you are in a fair fight!”

But Ratha could see that the Firekeepers still held the advantage. Although there were more herders in the meadow, Cherfan had no way of summoning their help without forcing a confrontation. And whether the sides were matched or not did not matter to Ratha. This battle would cost the clan heavily in lives no matter who won.

“If she wins, she will forbid us to crouch before the fire creature or offer ourselves in the dance,” she heard one Firekeeper growl to another. Muttering spread among them and one yowled, “Attack now! She has killed the fire-creature in the cave. She will keep the Red Tongue from rising again.”

“No!” cried Ratha, turning to face him. “You are wrong!”

Even Thakur and Fessran stared at her in astonishment as she waved her tail for silence. “Hear me, Firekeepers,” she said. “I understand your wish to crouch and dance before the Red Tongue. I once thought that was wrong and should be stopped, but I know better now. I killed the cave-fire because it was being misused.” She paused, looking into their eyes. “Tell me yourselves. Was it right to look down upon the herders and take their beasts when your bellies were already bloated? Or to keep them from the cave unless they brought you meat?”

Several Firekeepers lowered their heads and stared down at their paws. “No,” Ratha continued. “Shongshar did wrong by making you believe that serving the fire-creature made you more deserving than the rest. He used your belief to make you do fierce and cruel things you would not have done. That is why he died.”

A Firekeeper raised his head. “Then you will allow us to honor the Red Tongue as well as use it to guard the herds?”

“Yes. I have said nothing against honoring the fire-creature itself. Listen. This is what I will do. We will enlarge one of the old fire-lairs to make an earth-cave in the meadow where the source-fire may be kept. There dry wood can be stored and the fire will be safe from rain. It will be guarded, but anyone, Firekeeper or herder, may enter for warmth, and they may crouch and lower their whiskers before the fire, if they wish.”

“I don’t think that’s enough,” growled another Firekeeper, glaring at Ratha. “Shongshar allowed only us to approach Red Tongue and crouch before it. The herders should tend their dapplebacks.”

Yowls and hisses rose from the herders and the fur on their napes began to lift. Ratha feared that she might not be able to avert a fight.

“Listen to me, both of you. I brought the Red Tongue to the clan for all to share. The Firekeepers were created so that their skills could benefit the rest of us. Herders, the Firekeepers need you as much as you need them. Neither of you can survive without the skill of the others. If you follow me, I will see that both herders and Firekeepers share the fire-creature in a way that is good for both.”

Again mutters broke out from the Firekeepers. The one who had challenged Ratha tried to speak again, but was silenced by his companions. She waited until the Firekeepers had stopped scuffling and speaking among themselves. “Clan leader,” the first one said, “most of us think that what you have suggested is wise. But we need our own leader. We would like Fessran to return to us.”

“I think that can be done,” said Ratha as she turned to her friend and said in a lower voice, “Now that you know the pitfalls along this path, I can trust you to tread it with care.”

A few Firekeepers separated themselves from their companions and glared at Ratha. “I still don’t like it,” complained the same one who had objected before. “You think that Shongshar was wrong to take meat from the herders and give it to us? We need more than they do. We have to be strong. What’s wrong with that?”

With a roar Fessran sprang forward. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong with that, you greedy wretch!” He skittered away as she glared at the others in his group. “What Ratha offers is fair to all, and I intend to support her. Either you obey my orders, or you leave the Firekeepers. Is that clear?”

With sullen growls they reluctantly agreed.

To pull Shongshar’s body up out of the gorge took the efforts of Ratha and her companions. When that was done, she sent Thakur and Fessran to search for other survivors of the disaster who might have fled and were now in hiding. Gradually they began to come back, their coats soaked and their eyes haunted. Some coughed and wheezed from the water in their lungs, while others walked stiffly, pained by sprains and bruises. When they were all assembled, Ratha led them down to the meadow.

Fessran and Bira took care of the half-drowned Firekeepers, treating them like a large litter of disobedient but still-loved cubs. Fessran made them dry themselves by the fire, a new blaze that had been lit from the fire-lairs. Bira soothed those who still trembled from their memories.

Ratha found the bodies of those who had died in the flood and helped to bring them to be laid under grave-trees at the edge of clan ground. Among the dead was the herder Shoman. Another, as she had feared, was Fessran’s son, Nyang.

Some of the more wrathful herders wanted to tear Shongshar’s body and scatter his bones, but Ratha sternly forbade them from approaching him. Carefully and respectfully, she and Thakur carried the body through the meadow and laid it beneath Bonchewer’s grave-tree.

In the following days, she and Fessran reorganized the Firekeepers, reducing their number and sending some to be retrained as herders. Now that she had control of the Red Tongue again, she could encourage Thakur and the others who had treelings to resume training them in the art of caring for fire. She was pleased to learn that Aree had not forgotten her careful lessons and the young treelings still retained much of what they had learned. She and Ratharee joined in with the others and soon were spending many of their evenings learning what treeling paws could do.

They had many spectators, for those in the clan who did not have treelings were drawn by curiosity. There was still some uneasiness about having such creatures tend the Red Tongue, but Ratha sensed that it was diffuse and no longer the threat it had been during Shongshar’s rise to power. She shared Ratharee with those who wished to try working with a treeling and encouraged Thakur, Bira and Fessran to do the same.

As Ratha lifted the first pawful of earth from the threshold of the old fire-lair, she hesitated before throwing it aside. Despite her words to the Firekeepers, she felt she had set her feet in Shongshar’s pawprints and hoped she would have the strength not to take the trail he had followed.

She felt Ratharee on her shoulder, turned her head to nuzzle the treeling and felt calmer. The creature’s gentle touch eased the loneliness that sometimes came over her even when she was close to her own kind. Ratharee couldn’t speak, but she seemed to say as much with her nimble hands and bright, wise eyes as the Named did with words.

The treeling shared much more than the skill of her hands. She was a companion who never questioned or judged. Her presence seemed to lessen Ratha’s fierce need to prove herself to others, and she felt herself gaining a stability of mind that she had not known before.

When she was directing Ratharee in a task such as laying out kindling, she often felt that the treeling knew what she wanted before she nudged her arms or gave the clicking sounds that she followed. The understanding between them grew less that of one creature serving another and became a partnership. In concentrating on a task, the bond between them grew so strong that she and Ratharee were one being with shared abilities beyond those of either partner.

She also realized that the relationship was more equal than she had first thought. While she experienced the tree-ling’s dexterity as if it were her own, she sensed that her companion was gaining knowledge treelings had never had. She gave Ratharee her strength and her speed as well as her ability to see at night. Her intelligence too she shared, although she often wondered, when she looked into the startling depths of Ratharee’s eyes, whether treelings might have a cleverness of their own that was equal to that of the Named, even though it was different.

When she ventured to ask her companions how they felt about their treelings, she found she was not alone in her discovery. Even those of the Named who had only watched or worked with them for brief periods seemed to benefit from the contact.

Now she scraped away another pawful of dirt as others of the clan began to dig with her. She glanced at Thakur, alongside her, and noticed that Aree was looking a bit bulgier than she had been.

“She’s pregnant again,” said Thakur with a grin. “Don’t ask me how she did it.”

Ratha continued her task, feeling happy. Soon there would be more treelings for those of the clan who wanted them. And nearly everybody did.

She sensed this was a coming change for her people, a change more subtle but no less powerful than the bringing of the Red Tongue to the clan. But unlike the use and worship of fire, which raised savage instincts, the growing partnership of the Named with treelings seemed to waken the gentler part of their nature, giving it strength.

It gave her a strange feeling of hope, though she almost doubted it herself as she continued to dig, but it refused to leave her mind. She found herself watching her friends to see whether the change she imagined was real, and she found that it was. Even Fessran, the one who had resisted the treelings and only taken a companion after her illness, admitted she felt the effect. She was no less irascible and her comments were as pointed as ever, but her sudden flares of temper, which made others wary of her, were gone.

Perhaps it was this that gave Ratha a true hope that she could lead her people along a new path. The treelings would serve the Named not only by caring for fire with the skill of their fingers, but by lessening the feelings of loneliness and hunger for those things of the spirit that had driven the Named to frenzied obedience to the Red Tongue.

The flicker of firelight lit the earthen walls and cast a glow over the wet grass of the meadow. A light rain fell in the dusk, but the source-fire was safe in its shelter. The den had been dug deep and well, with holes to vent the smoke and allow the flame to draw. A raised floor of packed earth had been made to hold the fire above any water that might seep in, and an adjacent chamber had been dug in which to stack and dry wood. It was now half-filled with remains of the cave woodpile, pieces of which had been recovered and dried before the watch-fires.

A little while before, Ratharee had ridden on Ratha’s back, bearing the brand to kindle this new source-fire. Now as the flame grew and crackled, it lit the faces of the herders and Firekeepers who gathered before the den.

“Now the Red Tongue’s protection will never fail!” cried Fessran, and to Ratha’s surprise, she gave a joyous leap into the air with her treeling on her back. She landed a little awkwardly, for her injured foreleg was still weak, but she gave Ratha a grin and jumped up again.

The sense of celebration was contagious, and everyone began circling the glowing mouth of the fire-shelter, their coats gleaming in the rain. They sprang and whirled. Even Thakur joined in, with Aree bouncing between his shoulders. It was all the treeling could do to hold on, but the shine in her eyes was excitement, not fear.

Only Ratha held herself back. The circle of dancers seemed to be overlaid by another image that floated before her eyes. That too was a dance, the terrifying frenzy of those who threw themselves into the heated air in the cave, whose eyes shimmered with cruelty and the worship of the fierce light in their center. It was all before her again, the sound, the smell and the racing of her heart until she wanted to cry aloud to end it.

The fire-creature of her dream was there too, rising out of the flame’s center with a shape that was and was not the form of the Named. But as it reared up to claw at the roof of the cave, it seemed to falter and sink back down as the roar of the fire grew muted and the flame itself dwindled.. until it was just a glow from the mouth of an earthen den and the dancers about her were her people and her friends. The shimmer in their eyes was joy, and the firelight shone on their power and grace.

Yes, they could dance before the Red Tongue, giving thanks for the light, the warmth and the protection it gave. And they could see the beauty in its strength and rejoice in that without seeking to make it a weapon for others to fear.

And suddenly the dance changed. The treelings had joined in, leaping in a counter-circle from one dancer to the next as if weaving them together.

In a moment, Ratharee sprang from Ratha’s back into the ring of dancers. Rain sparkled on her pelt as she scampered along Thakur’s back and launched herself onto Fessran’s withers.

“The only way you’ll get her back is to join in,” yowled Bira as Ratharee bounced onto the young Firekeeper as she danced around the circle.

And Ratha did.

Later, when exhaustion laid the Named and treelings together in a sprawl amid the soggy grass, Ratha lifted her head wearily to see happy lolling tongues all around her.

“You’ve got the longest one,” she teased, swatting Fessran playfully. “Stuff it back in your mouth.” The treelings scampered out of the way as the two wrestled like cubs and then broke away, panting at each other.

The rain stopped. Those of the clan picked themselves up and went back to their duties or their dens. Fessran and Thakur rose together and he offered to walk back with Ratha to her lair.

“No, I want to stay here awhile,” she said. She watched them leave and listened to the far-off lowing of herdbeasts and the muted crackle of the source-fire in its shelter. Soon she would have to call someone to watch over it while she went to her den, but for now she could be alone.

She felt Ratharee climb onto her and curl up on her flank. She yawned and sensed a quiet contentment creeping over her. Although she and her people had suffered much, they were still alive and together. They would mourn the ones who died, Shoman, Nyang and the Firekeepers. And Shongshar? Perhaps only she would visit his bones beneath the pine.

Yes, I will mourn him, she thought. It was grief that made him seek such a dark trail. And he has taught me a lesson that I will not forget, even though it is bitter, I must learn to feed the hunger of my people that does not ask for food, for I know now that a leader does not rule only by strength and will.

And she lay thinking, with the orange glow casting her shadow on the grass until it was nearly dawn. Again she had found a new way for herself and her people, and this time she would lead them not only with strength and persistence, but the care of her newly found wisdom. She lifted her head and narrowed her eyes at the sun as it rose over the trees and spilled its first light on clan ground.