Thakur licked the treeling until he was damp and rubbed against him until Aree’s coat was thoroughly rumpled. The creature’s ability had surpassed his hopes. The treeling had grown large and strong enough to handle all but the heaviest branches. Thakur knew that with enough time and patience, Aree could be trained to handle the Red Tongue with greater safety and skill than the best Firekeeper among the Named.
Thakur felt the sun’s warmth on his back and realized the mist had burned off. Soon the mothers would be bringing their cubs to the first training session for young herders. Quickly he nosed Aree onto his back and scuffed dirt on the remains of the Red Tongue. He still had to get the teaching herd ready before the cubs arrived.
He kicked a last spray of dirt on the embers and galloped away. Tomorrow he wouldn’t be angry if Aree woke him up early. In fact, he would be the one to wake the treeling. He would probably be able to talk Bira into letting him have the fire again and then he would see what else Aree could do.
Once Aree’s training had begun, Thakur was eager to continue. He thought that, after the first surge of enthusiasm, the treeling might become balky and unwilling to brave the morning chill, but that never happened. Perhaps Aree had caught the sense of forbidden adventure that Thakur felt each time he left the den in the half-light before dawn.
Aree learned rapidly and was soon responding correctly to Thakur’s directions. He found that the sharp sound he made by clicking his teeth together would command the treeling’s attention faster than would spoken words.
Soon Aree could extract a branch from the fire and walk around on three legs, holding the lighted torch. Once or twice the treeling tried to transfer the branch from his hands to his prehensile tail, but Thakur quickly discouraged that. Aree tended to pay less attention to things he held with his tail than what was in his hands. Once he had nearly scorched his back by letting the torch droop.
Thakur took great care to be sure that Aree didn’t burn or injure himself during the lessons. He didn’t want to wake the fear of the Red Tongue that seemed to lie deep in every creature. The treeling sensed that the fire-creature could hurt if it got too close and Thakur reinforced Aree’s caution with further training.
By early summer, the treeling could ignite a pile of tinder with a torch taken from the guard-fire. That morning Thakur was elated and praised the treeling endlessly. He caught grasshoppers for Aree until the treeling was stuffed and nuzzled his paws, whose dexterity seemed amazing in comparison to Thakur’s clumsy forefeet.
He remembered what Ratha had said to him while Aree was cleaning her fur. “He grooms me the way you would if you had his clever paws.” She had only been half-awake when she spoke those words and hadn’t really known what they meant. He hadn’t either, but now her words brought a half-seen vision of the possibilities of his partnership with the treeling. He stared at Aree as if he had never seen the creature before. A strange feeling prickled up his back from the root of his tail. He suddenly felt afraid, but it wasn’t the kind of fear he knew when facing an enemy, even one unknown. It was a fear closer to the one he got when he looked up into the night sky with its burning stars and felt awe and a strange undefined hunger. It was this hunger, rising from somewhere deep within him, that frightened him.
He gazed down at the treeling, who was crouching between his forepaws, looking up at him with inquisitive eyes. “Teaching you to care for the Red Tongue is only the beginning,” he said softly, and he listened to himself as if someone else was speaking. “There is much more we can do together.”
He watched the black paws deftly combing the fur on the treeling’s tail and sensed the beginning of a freedom he never knew he had been denied. Ratha was right. The skill of those fingers had started to become his own and it was a gift with far more power than he ever expected.
The sun was hot on his back and the sound of cubs squabbling and chasing each other far down the meadow reminded him that he had students to teach. Quickly he quenched the guttering fire and buried the ashes.
The teaching session with the young cubs began and ended late. It was almost dusk when the mothers came to take their litterlings back to their dens. Thakur stayed to care for his small teaching flock until another herder arrived.
“Could you keep my animals separated from the rest?” Thakur asked Cherfan. “It would save me from having to retrieve them from the main herd tomorrow morning.” Absently the big herder agreed, but his attention was on something else. A new fire flickered across the pasture near the sunning rock.
Cherfan stared and wrinkled his forehead. “Looks like the Firekeepers are having a gathering,” he said finally “Oh, don’t worry about your teaching herd. I’ll make sure your animals are grazed apart from the others.”
Thakur felt annoyed with the Firekeepers. He often liked to climb onto the sunning rock at dusk to catch the last warmth of the sun and watch the moon rise from behind the trees. Well, he would have to find another place tonight, or go and rest in his den. Despite his irritation he was curious about the gathering and decided to wander over and investigate.
The fire was large and cast its light far into the twilight spreading across the meadow. Smoke poured over the grass and billowed up into the sky. On his back, Aree sneezed and shook his head. Thakur’s throat stung as he circled upwind, away from the smoke haze. The Firekeepers have built a fire far bigger than they need, he thought crossly.
As he approached, he saw someone pacing back and forth in front of the bonfire, while others sat in a group facing it. Thakur swung back downwind, willing to brave the acrid smoke in order to catch the smells of those assembled in the gathering. He recognized most of the adult Firekeepers, including Fessran, Shongshar and Bira. He also caught the odors of some of the cubs. By now, he knew most of their individual scents. Thakur was not surprised to smell Fessran’s cubs, Chika and Nyang, among others, but he was surprised that her son Khushi’s scent was among them.
Khushi was to be trained as a herder, he thought. The cub had been among the students he taught earlier in the day, although Shongshar had come and fetched him early, saying that Fessran needed him. Thakur was sure it had not been Khushi’s own idea to come to the Firekeeper’s gathering. He did not smell happy.
The herding teacher caught another scent, so mixed with smoke that it only hinted at who it belonged to. Was Ratha here? Thakur wasn’t sure. The darkness, which had now fallen, and the fire’s glare made it hard to recognize anyone by sight. Smoke filled his throat again, making him cough, but the roar of the fire overwhelmed any sound he made. Carefully he made his way to the back of the group and sat close enough to see who was standing in front of the bonfire.
It was Fessran and she had stopped pacing. She faced the group and sat down. Shongshar sat off to the side, with Fessran’s three cubs. He was watching her intently as she began to speak.
“My first words are for the young ones who seek training as Firekeepers. You are at this gathering tonight because you are the best. You have been chosen to come here because you are the strongest and the cleverest of the cubs born in the spring season. You are here because we who serve the Red Tongue will not accept anything less.”
Aree moved restlessly on Thakur’s shoulder. Thakur gave him a nudge to quiet him, and then crept further into the gathering, trying to see the faces of those listening. The Firekeepers sat straight, with bristling whiskers and self-satisfied expressions. Most of the cubs looked awed and excited, their eyes glowing in the firelight. Khushi, sitting between his two siblings, lowered his head and nervously licked a front paw.