“For all we know, that beast’s on its way to the village,” Evenor said grimly. “We have to get back and warn everyone.”
“In the dark?” Demas objected.
“We have to go. For the village’s sake. And to get a healer for Goryx,” Phreneus pointed out.
At the sound of his name, Goryx groaned.
“We can make torches to light our way,” said Atalanta. “Wild creatures are afraid of fire.”
Evenor agreed. “Atalanta, you know this forest better than I know the faces of my children. You can guide us back, can’t you—even in the dark?”
Atalanta nodded.
“Right then, let’s get Goryx up,” Evenor said decisively.
They helped him to his feet and handed him his spear. Then Evenor leaned close to Goryx and addressed him urgently. “Can you walk, man?” When there was no reaction he repeated the question. “Goryx, can you walk?”
For a minute, Goryx’s clouded eyes cleared. Then he nodded. Gingerly he tested his wounded leg and then, leaning heavily on his spear, he hobbled forward a few paces. “Yes, I can walk. I wish I could run.”
Quickly, the men made four torches out of long branches and twig heads, wound about with pieces of their shirts. They held the torches into the campfire till one by one, they blazed.
Atalanta took the lead with Urso by her side, his ears standing up alertly. The nimbus of torchlight stretched only a few feet ahead, and with the light came accompanying shadows. Atalanta knew she’d have to rely on the bear’s instincts to alert them to any presence of the beast.
Evenor followed close behind, and at his back came Demas, one hand under Goryx’s arm. Phreneus was their nervous rear guard, flinching at every rustle in the undergrowth and jabbing his spear at irregular intervals as if to keep a whole host of imaginary enemies at bay.
It was dawn when Eteos finally came in sight, and only then did Atalanta relax a little.
With a great loud whuffle, Urso abandoned them at the edge of the village, bounding back into the forest. Atalanta turned for a moment, watching him go. She wished she could follow. To keep him safe. But right now she knew the villagers needed reassurance.
And reinforcements, she thought.
As they drew nearer to the cluster of cottages, she saw that the whole place was already astir, like a disturbed beehive.
On the far side of the village, across the square and to the right, a buzzing crowd had gathered around the goat pen. The hunters headed straight there, and when the crowd parted to let them through, Atalanta saw that five of the goats in the pen had been slaughtered, their throats and bellies ripped open and two of them partially eaten. The soft parts.
“It’s been here already,” Phreneus said, shaking his head.
“Yes,” Evenor agreed. “Nothing else could have done this much damage.”
Goryx began to tremble uncontrollably again. Atalanta could hear his teeth chattering. She put her hand out to him, but he shook her off, almost angrily.
Finding his wife, Herma, in the crowd, Evenor said, “Take Goryx to his cottage and have someone tend his wounds before his leg swells up.”
“What happened to him?” Herma asked, eyeing the bloody bandage.
“Nearly the same thing that happened to these goats,” Atalanta said.
For a long moment after that there was silence. Finally one man asked the hunters, “What manner of creature is it that can move so fast and strike so brutally in the dark? Not even a mountain cat or a bear does this much damage.”
“Atalanta saw it,” Evenor said.
“What did it look like, girl?” someone else called out.
“I only saw it for a second,” Atalanta replied, “but it was a monster. High as a bull at the shoulder, in the likeness of a cat, but with wings.”
A skeptical murmur passed through the crowd.
“Does it have a name?” someone else cried. “This monster?”
“I’ve never seen another like it,” Atalanta replied.
“Whatever this creature is,” said Phreneus, “we must warn the other villages that they need to guard their animals—and themselves.”
“I’ll go,” said Evenor, “and Atalanta should come with me. To describe it properly.”
Atalanta trembled, with fear as well as fatigue, but she gave her silent agreement to Evenor’s plan.
Only Herma seemed to notice her shaking.
“Not until you’ve had a proper meal and some sleep,” she told them firmly, before dragging Goryx off to be tended.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
LAND OF DANGER
ATALANTA FOUND IT EASIER to eat than to sleep. Her dreams exhausted her more than the long night’s trek through the forest, dreams of teeth dripping blood, dreams of wings of flame.
It was a relief when Evenor shook her awake.
“There are a few hours of daylight left,” he said. “If we leave now, we can reach the next village before dark.”
“Can we wait for Urso?” Atalanta asked, suddenly missing her furry friend.
“He’ll have to find us on his own,” Evenor told her. “There’s little, time to lose.”
Phreneus insisted on coming with them. Since he still seemed shaken by the beast’s attack, Atalanta was surprised that he wanted to be part of a journey that could prove so dangerous. Then she realized that it would be worse for him to remain behind, haunted by what had happened to them in the night forest. By coming with them, at least he had a chance to face his fears.
They reached the next village, Phylos, that evening, a place smaller and far dirtier than Eteos. There they learned that a hunting party had already lost two of its dogs to some wild creature, and they’d been unable to find any of the remains.
“Completely gone in an instant,” one of the men explained. “They were tracking well ahead of us, baying on the trail. Then we heard a strange yelp from one of them. From the other, only silence. But by the time we got to where their footprints ended—they were gone.”
“Clean gone,” added another man.
“We know the creature that did this,” Atalanta said.
The head huntsman stared at her for a moment with disdain, his nose wrinkling as if he smelled something bad. He was a tall, lean man, with lines as deep as craters across his brow. Turning away from Atalanta to Evenor, he said, “If you think this creature of yours is responsible, then what is it exactly?”
“Not ours…” Atalanta began, but Evenor put a hand on her arm to silence her.
“We only had a glimpse of it,” he told the tall huntsman. “All I can tell you is that it’s big. Very big. Body of a great lion but with wings. Moves as fast as a bird. Guard your herd animals. Take them into the houses at night. Travel only in the daylight or in large parties that can defend themselves.”
“For Hermes’ sake, don’t go after it alone,” Phreneus added.
Atalanta didn’t say anything more. It was clear that the hunters wouldn’t value the same information from a girl.
They heard a similar story in every farm and village they came to: cattle and sheep killed in the fields, goats and pigs carried off by an unseen predator, hunters coming upon their prey already slaughtered and stripped to the bone.
“This beast is unstoppable,” Phreneus said.
“No beast is unstoppable,” Atalanta said. “Or so my father used to say.”
“Your father,” Phreneus pointed out, “died under this one’s claws.”
Evenor gave him a look that shut him up. “This beast,” Evenor mused, “is eating for more than one.”
For a moment all three of them were silent thinking about the implications of that.
“It’s a female?” Atalanta said at last. She tried to remember what she’d glimpsed of it: head, mouth, haunch, wings, tail. She tried to put the entire picture together in her mind and see it as female. She failed. It had seemed overwhelmingly male: fierce, bloody, frightening.