The Named: The Complete Series

Chapter Fourteen

Thakur looked dumbfounded when Ratha stood before him and said the words that she had been practicing all the way along the trail.

“You’ve changed your mind?” he said. “You’ll work with Thistle and me?”

“Yes. Anything to help her get rid of this nightmare.”

Thakur gave her an odd look, and she realized that she had spoken as if the nightmare were also hers. Well, it was.

“Do you mind if I ask you why?”

“Because of what you said to me. I have been running away. Now I’m ready to fight.”

Thakur gave her another strange look, but he seemed to be satisfied. After all, it was he who was asking for her help, not the other way around. Or was it?

Quietly he led her to Thistle, who was having a nap by the dunking pond. Ratha could see that her daughter had obeyed Thakur by not attempting to go into any trances and thus risk the apparition again. Instead, she had rested, and eaten to gain strength. She looked good, her coat better groomed and dry.

When Thistle woke up and saw that Ratha had joined them, she looked a little nervous.

“Must have been hard deciding,” she said, glancing shyly at her mother.

“Yes.”

“Hope you don’t mind… getting wet. Thakur throws me in pond…. Chases the …” She faltered, then went on. “Chases the bad away.”

“Perhaps I won’t have to do that anymore,” Thakur said, with a glance at the pond. “Thistle, Ratha, are you ready?”

Thistle sat up straighter, her whiskers bristling. Ratha realized that she couldn’t tell which of her daughter’s forelegs had been the crippled one. She seemed to use both equally well now.

“I’m ready, although I don’t know exactly what to do,” Ratha said.

In answer, Thakur lay down, forming himself into a half circle around Thistle, his tail lying across hers, his head lifted so that he could look into her eyes. You make the rest of the circle, his eyes seemed to tell Ratha. She arranged herself on the other side of Thistle, draping her tail across Thakur’s and bringing up her forepaws to touch his. Her belly lay against her daughter’s rear foot and flank.

“All right, Thistle. Go … inside,” Thakur said.

The clear green in Thistle’s eyes seemed to shift, as if a cloud were moving across sunlit water. Her breathing grew fast and shallow and her jaw opened as she panted.

Thakur’s voice was soft yet strong. “Don’t be afraid. We’re here. We’re both here.”

Thistle swallowed, but her panting cased. Ratha’s own heart was pounding so hard she thought that Thakur might be able to hear it. Mingled dread and excitement swept through her. At last she was going to meet and battle the enemy.

“Dreaming,” Thistle said in a distant voice. “Caves. Walking. Speaking not easy.”

“Say what you can,” Thakur coaxed.

“Oh!” Thistle gave a sharp indrawn breath.

“What?” Ratha asked, her voice tight with anxiety and eagerness.

“Easy, Ratha,” Thakur said softly, pushing his forefeet against hers.

“Even here. Far away. It comes.”

“The badness?” Thakur asked.

“Oh, no!” Thistle’s face was rapt. “Good. Sweet. Want to follow.”

Thakur looked surprised. “The song? You can hear True-of-voice’s song?”

“Yes. So faint. Want to be closer.”

Thakur leaned closer to Ratha, who was bursting with impatience. “She’s picking up the song, the thing True-of-voice sends out to his people. I’m surprised. They’re pretty far away from us.”

“It won’t hurt her, will it? It won’t take her over?” Ratha’s worry made her whisper harsh. She felt intensely uncomfortable with the idea that the strange leader of the hunters could somehow reach from a distance and lure her daughter. She had thought she would have to fight only one threat. Not two.

“Want to go closer,” Thistle begged.

“Go,” Thakur answered.

A look crept across Thistle’s face that Ratha had rarely, if ever, seen. It was happiness. Pure delight.

“Not walking anymore,” Thistle said. “Swimming. Like… in the sea. But warmer. Softer.” Again she gave a sharp gasp. “Oh! Ahead brightness, shape, color, beauty… sweetness in the ears, the nose, the eyes, the skin, everywhere. No words good enough to say.”

“To say what, Thistle?” Thakur asked gently.

“What it is. What he is. What she is.”

“True-of-voice?”

“More than True-of-voice. Wise ones sing through him. Wise ones now dead sing through him. Fathers, mothers, all sing through him.”

Ratha felt her fur prickle as she listened. Wonder and dread fought inside her. This was stranger than anything she had ever encountered before. And it was in her own daughter! What was Thistle-chaser? More than Named. More than Un-Named. Something else, working through both, had shaped her.

“I’m lost, Thistle,” Ratha heard Thakur say.

“Not lost. Never be lost again.” Her daughter’s voice was breathy. The black of her pupils had gone to tiny slits in swirls of sea-green.

“I mean that I don’t understand.”

“Will tell you. When I come back.”

Come back! She might never come back. Ratha gave Thakur’s forefoot a sharp push to get his attention. “Where’s she going? What is this?”

“I don’t know. She’s never gone this far before,” Thakur admitted. “Having you here has done something.”

“It’s scaring me. Take her out of it.”

“It’s not frightening her. Let her go, Ratha. She knows this path better than you.”

“I don’t want to lose her! Seeing her sitting there, staring at nothing, makes me feel as though I have a million fleas in my fur. She might… just… stay… like that for the rest of her life.”

Thakur started to say something, but Thistle interrupted. Her voice was strangely light and she turned her head to gaze at Ratha, although the remoteness was still in her eyes.

“Do not be afraid, my mother. Can come back if I want. Help me to go on. Need you to help me go on.”

“Thistle, I care too much. I’m frightened. This is too strange. Come back. Please. I—I love you.”

“Must reach where the hunters are to speak to them.”

“I-is it that important to you?”

“Yes. If you give love, give trust too.”

Ratha closed her eyes, pressed her feet against Thakur’s, feeling the answering warmth. “Then I trust you. Go where you must.”

“Not sure about doing. But must try.”

Ratha opened her eyes, fixing her gaze on her daughter as Thistle continued her inward flight. Who had given her this ability? The one called Bonechewer who was her father, the brash and gifted outsider, Thakur’s brother?

Or was the ability from Ratha’s own lineage, a trait that had hidden among her parents and grandparents to emerge now in her daughter?

“Where are you now, Thistle?” Ratha asked, feeling her voice trembling.

“Swimming, but no closer. Sea is getting thick, heavy. Brightness ahead hard to see. Something… coming between.”

Ratha tensed.

Thistle’s voice rose in pitch. “Down deep. Getting cold. Swimming too hard. Have to walk. In the distance, hear footsteps.”

This was it. The long-dreaded enemy was at last making an approach. Ratha saw Thakur squirm closer to Thistle, guarding her, protecting her.

What good will it do when the enemy is inside? Ratha thought in despair, but she also wriggled closer to Thistle.

“Can’t block the way!” Thistle cried out in sudden rage. “Fight you, fire-eyes. Tear you before you can tear me!”

She sank to a crouch, her forepaws sliding out in front of her. She was starting to shake. Ratha could feel it.

And then Thistle began to draw one foot up against her chest, as if the leg that had been healed was being crippled again, right before Ratha’s eyes.

“No, you aren’t going to take her again!” Ratha cried, as if the nightmare could hear her. “Fight it, Thistle. Drive it off!”

But Thistle only seemed to crumple under a terrible weight of pain, her leg pulled tightly against her chest. Ratha felt a storm of rage building inside her against the thing that tortured her daughter.

In her mind she flung herself at the enemy, ripped it with her claws, savaged it with her teeth, and then set it aflame with a torch. In a low, hissing voice, she spoke her battle aloud, and the depth of her hatred. She would kill the Dreambiter a thousand times if she had to, rip out its throat and its guts so that it bled.

But it was Thistle who bled. From an invisible wound. And each time Ratha screamed her rage at the Dreambiter, Thistle drew a little further into a tight ball of pain.

And at last, though Ratha was far from emptied of rage, the sight, the feel, the smell of her daughter’s suffering made her voice break as she cried, “Thistle, I am with you. I hate this thing as much as you do. Fight it … Please fight it.”

But Thistle only huddled and shuddered. Thakur put a paw on Ratha’s nose to quiet her. She jerked her head back, baring her teeth, the wildness and the anger focusing on him, wanting to attack him.

Everything was fierce, wild, flaming. She would hurt, she would kill if she did not get away. It was out of control. She had to run or the fire inside her would destroy Thakur, Thistle, everything.

She was already on her feet, running, not caring where she went. She would charge into the midst of the hunters and go down in a last frenzied battle. She would tear her way through them until she found True-of-voice and locked her teeth in his throat.

And then something heavy landed on her back, squashing her flat. Rage, astonishment, and fear combined in a murderous frenzy and she squirmed wildly, trying to get at her assailant with claws and teeth.

But somehow he managed to pin her down and grab her scruff, pulling her head so far back that all she could do was claw the air. She spat, screeched, and struggled until her throat was raw and she was panting with exhaustion.

“Enough, Ratha?” said a muffled voice above and behind her head.

Hearing Thakur sent her into another wild flurry, but she was too spent to sustain it.

“Can I let your scruff go, or will I get shredded?”

“You’ll get shredded,” she growled, but she was too tired to make the threat real. Thakur released his grip, but stayed on her back.

“Go to Thistle,” Ratha growled.

“Bira’s looking after her. Am I too heavy?”

“Go to Thistle!” she yowled, trying to throw him off. “She’s the one who deserves you. She’s the one who’s hurt.”

“Is she the only one, Ratha?”

His soft voice, his warm weight, the very strength of his presence seemed to enfold her. Yet somehow it could not penetrate the hard center of misery deep in her chest.

“You can heal,” she gasped. “You can help. All I can do is … hate.”

Instead of saying anything, he began licking the fur on her neck.

“Don’t, Thakur,” she said, starting to shake.

“Why not?”

“If you knew what I really am, you wouldn’t.”

She felt his tongue caress her nape again. “I know what you are.”

“The Dreambiter. That’s what I am,” she said bitterly. “I hate the Dreambiter. I want to kill the Dreambiter … yet I am the Dreambiter.”

“Ratha,” Thakur began.

“I think that finding the Red Tongue poisoned me. All I can do is hurt and burn. The Red Tongue is in me. It is getting stronger. Soon it will take the whole of me. It will be all hate and biting and burning.”

“Not all, Ratha.”

“Keep sitting on me, Thakur. I want to rip everything to pieces and I will, if you let me go.” She struggled again, but was almost thankful when he kept her down. “That’s good. Keep sitting on the Dreambiter. Maybe a quick bite to the throat will get rid of her for good.”

“That is only another way to escape.”

“Let me escape, then. Why do you want me? Why would you keep something so dangerous in your midst?”

“Ratha, we are all dangerous. To ourselves and each other. Not just because we have claws and teeth. The Un-Named have those as well. Not even because we have the Red Tongue.”

“Then … why?” Ratha whimpered.

“Because we can hurt and be hurt in new and deeper ways. We are all Dreambiters. And Dreambitten as well. ”

“If that is so, we should all be dead. Maybe the world was never meant for the Named. Or the Named for the world.”

“I don’t think so, Ratha. And you don’t either. You were the one who fought hardest of all to see us live.”

“Maybe I was wrong. If all we can do is birth cubs who have to struggle, like Thistle …”

“And you,” Thakur added softly.

“All right, maybe me,” she said grudgingly. “What difference does it make? It doesn’t help Thistle. I can’t do anything to help Thistle. That’s what drives me so wild. I can’t go near her. I’m afraid I’ll hurt her. Thakur, maybe I’m going to have to go away….”

“No. If you choose escape, no matter what way, she will always have the Dreambiter.”

“But if all I can do is hate the Dreambiter and that doesn’t work, what else is there?”

“I think you have to remember who the Dreambiter is,” said Thakur.

Feeling the bleakness in her belly, she said, “I know who it is.”

“No, you don’t.”

She craned her head around and stared at him, lost.

“You think that it’s all of you. It is only a part of you. And not even the strongest part.”

“No,” she cried, despairing. “You say that because you think I am like you. I’m not, Thakur. You are patient and wise and good and caring. I’m not.”

“Well, I’ll admit you aren’t very patient and you are still learning. But you do care.”

“The Dreambiter doesn’t care. The Dreambiter just … bites.”

“You are like me, Ratha. And because I know you are like me, I can say this. We all have a part that bites. Even me. You’ve seen it. You saw it just a while ago. But the other part, the part you call good and caring, is stronger.”

“In you, maybe,” Ratha muttered.

“No, in you. You have it. It won’t let the Dreambiter take over.”

Ratha was silent, taking long breaths.

“You have it,” Thakur said again. “Trust in it.”

Somehow his words made her tight knot of misery ease. “Maybe…,” she said in a low voice.

“Maybe what?”

“Maybe you can get off me now. I don’t feel so much like ripping up things.”

He eased himself off and let her groom her rumpled fur. “See? I trust your better self,” he said. “You should, too.”

“Just for that, I should give you a swipe across the nose,” Ratha said, shaking herself. “But you’re bigger than I am. Is that what you call my better part?”

“Somewhat. It’s also your common sense.”

Ratha paused. “I need to think. Hard.”

“Do you want me to leave you alone for a while?”

“No, I want you to stay. Don’t say anything. Just sit by me.”

And Thakur did.