“Nasty scar there, big fella. How’d you get it?”
“Main pole of a circus tent scraped me, when I knocked it down. May 11, 2108.”
“Oh, you’ve been to the big city!”
“Indeed.”
“Never knew anyone to come back.”
“Now you do. Seen any of my kind of people in the neighborhood recently?”
“Recently, no. They come and go.”
“Know of any to the south?”
“That’s the way they headed. I may be flying down that way soon, what with the bug shortage here. What about this one?”
“That’s from a spear wielded by a gooey man.”
“Gooey man? What’s that?”
“That’s how he got after I walked on him. August 7, 2105.”
“Ever have any trouble with eeksies or bounties?”
“Yes, but not recently.”
“There are lots of them moving about in the jungle just now.”
“Which kind?”
“Bounties. But there may be some eeksy observers.”
“Bounties are tougher. One almost nailed me back when there was a price on my head. September 17, 2113. Lady. Big Betsy, they called her.”
“She’s dead.”
“Good. I sometimes dream she’s still after me. What killed her?”
“Sayjak of the tree people. Took her head. Still has it.”
Tranto snorted.
“Name sounds familiar.”
“He’s boss of the biggest clan. Fast. Can catch a flying bird in his hand as he swings through the trees. I’ve seen him do it. Strong. Dangerous.”
“They get gooey, too, if I walk on them. Big Betsy favored ambushes, though. Got one of her scars, too. What do the bounties and eeksies want now?”
“Sayjak’s head, I think. Mad about Big Betsy and the others he made short.”
“If they stayed away they wouldn’t have these problems.”
“True.”
“This is a land they didn’t design, where things just went their course. Now, all of a sudden, they act like it’s theirs.”
“They’re never happy.”
“I suppose not.”
“Maybe I’ll see more of your scars later. I’m heading back to the jungle now. Want to see what happens.”
“Don’t fly near Sayjak when he’s swinging through trees.”
“No. Good luck in your search.”
“Thanks.”
He plodded on. All that day, stopping only to eat and drink his fill at a water hole, he continued southward. At night, he browsed beneath a sky full of bright stars.
Days passed easily in this fashion. He endured a long, dry stretch where even the grasses were parched. Day after day this went on, to be followed by a cloudburst which filled every declivity with water. After that, the terrain became stonier. He continued into the south and that evening he passed a walking man and a woman upon a trail bordered by white markers, wavering, as through a heat haze. It appeared to be the same man who had helped him in his extremity recently. When he approached them, however, they faded, to appear high overhead where they spiraled amid red sun rays for perhaps ten minutes before vanishing. Before the day ended he came upon a trail fresher than any he had yet encountered—phant spoor—heading southward.
For three days he followed that track. On the third he caught a scent out of the east. His own kind. Phant. For the first time, now, he hurried.
That evening he came to an area which they had traversed very recently. The next morning he found an easy trail. The breezes shifted, but when they bore him the scents they were stronger.
By noontime, he had sight of them, great dark masses shifting slowly on the distant plain. He slowed, then halted, regarding them. For the first time in a long while, something like joy rose within him. The company of his fellows… It was immediately tempered by a certain bittersweet realization: It was not that easy for a stranger to be accepted into a herd.
One way of going about it was to hang around the periphery of the group, obsequious, waiting to be noticed. Gradually, after a long period of waiting, one might be accepted into the bottom of the society.
At some buried level of his being Tranto knew that he was probably older than any of them. It seemed that he had been around for a very long while. It suddenly seemed possible to him that he could have been a member of this herd before, that it may well have been his original herd, and that he could have survived all of the others in it. The thought of returning now, unknown, as an outcast, irritated him. True—if it were the case—it was to be expected of one with his wandering ways. Yet, it rankled. Pacing and snorting, he became more and more convinced that it was indeed the case. He belonged here, and they would deny him his rightful place. The more he thought about it the more irritated he became, though he had not yet made contact.
He paced them for a day, keeping his distance but allowing himself to be seen. His anger grew as he followed. Yes, it certainly seemed possible that this had once been his band. There were so many here who resembled those others. Then he thought of his anger. While it had often gotten him in trouble in the past, that was the anger born of pain-madness. This hardly seemed on that scale.
The second day he moved nearer, browsing much closer to the leeward fringe of the herd. That afternoon a runt male, doubtless the bottommost phant in the band’s hierarchy, moved near. A little later he glanced up and said, “My name’s Muggle.”
“I’m Tranto.”
“A legendary name, that. Father of the herd.”
“Who’s in charge now?”
“Scarco. That’s him over by the grove.”
Tranto glanced in the direction indicated, to behold a large phant engaged in the sharpening of his tusks upon an outcropping of rough rock.
“Has he been boss long?”
“For as far back as I can remember.”
“Is he ever challenged?”
“Regularly. The plains are strewn with the bones of those who didn’t make it to the graveyard of our kind, famed in song and story.”
“Indeed. What’s his policy on admitting new members to the herd?”
“In general, the usual. The newcomer follows us around for a couple of seasons taking a lot of shit and gradually being accepted into the lowest ranks. A few more seasons and he may work his way up a little.”
“A little?”
“Well, as far as he may—which isn’t very—from just being on hand. Unless, of course, he’s a fighter. Then he can go as far as it’ll take him.”
“In other words, it’s just like everywhere else.”
“So far as I understand it.”
“Good. Has everyone in the herd noticed me?”
“Not the near-sighted ones, I suppose, or the ones farther off to the west.”
“Well, I do want them all to at least recognize me. How long do you think that’ll take?”
“I’d say about three days.”
“You’ll mention my name to the others?”
“Of course. They sent me to learn it. I get all the jobs like this. I can’t wait till you join up and I have someone I can push around.”
The next day many of the phants wandered by, glancing at him. When Muggle came by again, he paused.
“They know your name,” he said, “and I’ve learned that it’s not at all a common one. I’ve been asked to see whether you have chain marks on your leg and to find out whether you were ever boss of your own herd. Apparently, there was once a Tranto who got hauled away to be exhibited. There’s some story involving a tall building he did something terrible at.”