‘They won’t,’ the Imass replied with infuriating calm. ‘In scenting its territory, the emlava saturates the air with its sign. Its own body scent is much weaker, freeing the beast to move wherever it will when inside its territory.’
‘Why are dumb brutes so damned smart, anyway?’
‘Why are us smart folk so often stupidly brutal, Quick Ben?’ Trull asked.
‘Stop trying to confuse me in my state of animal terror, Edur.’
An uneventful night passed and now, the following day, they walked yet further into the territory of the emlava. Halting at a stream in mid-morning, Onrack had knelt beside it to begin his ritual washing of hands. At least, Trull assumed it was a ritual, although it might well have been another of those moments of breathless wonder that seemed to afflict Onrack-and no surprise there; Trull suspected he’d be staggering about for months after such a rebirth. Of course, he does not think like us. 1 am much closer in my ways of thought to this human, Quick Ben, than 1 am to any Imass, dead or otherwise. How can that be?
Onrack then rose and faced them, his spear in one hand, sword in the other. ‘We are near the emlava’s lair. Although he sleeps, he senses us. Tonight, he means to kill one of us. I shall now challenge his claim to this territory. If I fail, he may well leave you be, for he will feed on my flesh.’
But Quick Ben was shaking his head. ‘You’re not doing this alone, Onrack. Granted, I’m not entirely sure of how my sorcery will work in this place, but dammit, it’s just a dumb cat, after all. A blinding flash of light, a loud sound-’
‘And I will join you as well,’ Trull Sengar said. ‘We begin with spears, yes? I have fought enough wolves in my time. We will meet its charge with spears. Then, when it is wounded and crippled, we close with bladed weapons.’
Onrack studied them for a moment, then he smiled. ‘I see that I will not dissuade you. Yet, for the fight itself, you must not interfere. I do not think I will fail, and you will see why before long.’
Trull and the wizard followed the Imass up the slope of an outwash fan that filled most of a crevasse, up among the lichen-clad, tilted and folded bedrock. Beyond this black-stone ledge rose a sheer wall of grey shale pocked with caves where sediments had eroded away beneath an endless torrent of glacial melt. The stream in which Onrack had plunged his hands earlier poured out from this cliff, forming a pool in one cavern that extended out to fill a basin before continuing downslope. To the right of this was another cave, triangular in shape, with one entire side formed by a collapse in the shale overburden. The flat ground before it was scattered with splintered bones.
As they skirted the pool Onrack suddenly halted, lifting a hand.
A massive shape now filled the cave mouth.
Three heartbeats later, the emlava emerged.
‘Hood’s breath,’ Quick Ben whispered.
Trull had expected a hunting cat little different from,a mountain lion-perhaps one of the black ones rumoured to live in the deeper forests of his homeland. The creature hulking into view, blinking sleep from its charcoal eyes, was the size of a plains brown bear. Its enormous upper canines projected down past its lower jaw, long as a huntsman’s knife and polished the hue of amber. The head was broad and flat, the ears small and set far back. Behind the short neck, the emlava’s shoulders were hunched, forming a kind of muscled hump. Its fur was striped, black barbs on deep grey, although its throat revealed a flash of white.
‘Not quite built for speed, is it?’
Trull glanced over at Quick Ben, saw the wizard holding a dagger in one hand. ‘We should get you a spear,’ the Tiste Edur said.
‘I’ll take one of your spares-if you don’t mind.’
Trull slipped the bound clutch from his shoulder and said, ‘Take your pick.’
The emlava was studying them. Then it yawned and with that Onrack moved lightly forward in a half-crouch.
As he did so, pebbles scattered nearby and Trull turned. ‘Well, it seems Onrack has allies in this after all.’
The wolves-ay in the Imass language-had appeared and were now closing on Onrack’s position, heads lowered and eyes fixed on the huge cat.
The sudden arrival of seven wolves clearly displeased the emlava, for it then lowered itself until its chest brushed the ground, gathering its legs beneath it. The mouth opened again, and a deep hiss filled the air.
‘We might as well get out of their way,’ Quick Ben said, taking a step back with obvious relief.
‘I wonder,’ Trull said as he watched the momentary stand-off, ‘if this is how domestication first began. Not banding together in a hunt for prey, but in an elimination of rival predators.’
Onrack had readied his spear, not to meet a charge, but to throw the weapon using a stone-weighted antler atlatl. The wolves to his either side had fanned out, edging closer with fangs bared.
‘Not a growl to be heard,’ Quick Ben said. ‘Somehow that’s more chilling.’
‘Growls are to warn,’ Trull replied. ‘There is fear in growls, just as there is in that cat’s hissing.’
The emlava’s single lungful of breath finally whistled down into silence. It refilled its lungs and began again.
Onrack lunged forward, the spear darting from his hand.
Flinching back, the emlava screamed as the weapon drove deep into its chest, just to one side of the neck and beneath the clavicle. At that moment the wolves rushed in.
A mortal wound, however, was not enough to slow the cat as it lashed out with two staggered swings of its forepaws at one of the wolves. The first paw sank talons deep into the wolf’s shoulder, snatching the entire animal closer, within the reach of the second paw, which dragged the yelping wolf closer still. The massive head then snapped down on its neck, fangs burying themselves in flesh and bone.
The emlava, lurching, then drove its full weight down on the dying wolf, probably breaking every bone in its body.
As it did so, four other wolves lunged for its soft belly, two to each side, their canines tearing deep, then pulling away as, screaming, the emlava spun round to fend them off.
Exposing its neck.
Onrack’s sword flashed, point-first, into the cat’s throat.
It recoiled, sending one wolf tumbling, then reared back on its hind legs-as if to wheel and flee back into its cave-but all strength left the emlava then. It toppled, thumped hard onto the ground, and was still.
The six remaining wolves-one limping-padded away, keeping a distance between themselves and the three men, and moments later were gone from sight.
Onrack walked up to the emlava and tugged free his gore-spattered spear. Then he knelt beside the cat’s head.
‘Asking forgiveness?’ Quick Ben queried, his tone only slightly ironic.
The Imass looked over at them. ‘No, that would be dishonest, wizard.’
‘You’re right, it would. I am glad you’re not dumping any blessed spirit rubbish on us. It’s pretty obvious, isn’t it, that there were wars long before there were wars between people. You had your rival hunters to dispose of first.’
‘Yes, that is true. And we found allies. If you wish to find irony, Quick Ben, know that we then hunted until most of our prey was extinct. And our allies then starved-those that did not surrender to our stewardship.’
‘The Imass are hardly unique in that,’ Trull Sengar said.
Quick Ben snorted. ‘That’s understating it, Trull. So tell us, Onrack, why are you kneeling beside that carcass?’
‘I have made a mistake,’ the Imass replied, climbing to his feet and staring into the cave.
‘Seemed pretty flawless to me.’
‘The killing, yes, Quick Ben. But this emlava, it is female.’
The wizard grunted, then seemed to flinch. ‘You mean the male’s still around?’
‘I do not know. Sometimes they… wander.’ Onrack looked down at the bloodied spear in his hands. ‘My friends,’ he said. ‘I am now… hesitant, I admit. Perhaps, long ago, I would not have thought twice-as you said, wizard, we warred against our competitors. But this realm-it is a gift. All that was lost, because of our thoughtless acts, now lives again. Here. I wonder, can things be different?’