Chapter 16
"Intercession"
The moon was with us, so when Keen Eye spotted the enemy, we were still well enough away to position ourselves downwind and spy with great success.
"They gather on the other side of the river," Keen Eye whispered, eyes steady on the spotlight the full moon created along the river bank. "One Mountain Cat. One Sky Shrieker. Two fully grown Chatter Rats. Two Golden Necks."
Cats, bats, rats, and snakes. All adversaries of the Mighty Hena to be sure, but not much of a hunting party. These creatures worked toward the same goal, but they were no pack. Especially since Exile was nowhere to be seen. The rest of their forces must be deeper in the riverlands.
"The Golden Necks coil close to the edge of the grasses," Keen Eye elaborated.
Which was typical of their kind. They were day serpents and instinctively kept away from open terrain, especially at night.
"The rest stay high on the bank."
It was a wise decision. Dangers often lurked in the depths. Especially this deep into the riverlands.
"They have something."
I looked at Alpha and he signaled the rest. Together, we stalked forward, blending with the moonlight and shadow and silence. We were closer to the river now. From here, the enemy on the other side was much clearer. All except the Golden Necks who were still camouflaged by the grasses. Keen Eye kept a careful watch on them because few others could. I did not blame the serpents for keeping their distance from the others. The Chatter Rats were the largest I had ever seen. Almost the size of a Slashing Shrew. Although Golden Necks preyed on younger Chatter Rats, the Chatter Rats in turn preyed on Golden Necks when they came to be this large.
Hearty and heavy, their teeth glistened in an ever-present sneer. When Rats did not chew enough, they rapidly clicked their teeth together to make an awful racket. Tonight, they neither chewed nor chattered which meant they had gnawed through enough to keep them content. The only thing I could think of was bone. With tussled knotted hair and thick wormy tails, they looked fiercer than the snakes. There was a cruel air about them, especially in the way they watched the Mountain Cat toy with two small creatures on the bank. They were Mud Kin, amphibians common in the riverlands and around muddy banks. They were small and sensitive to impurities, so they filtered them through their head fins, orange cheek prongs, and slimy blue skin. They preferred to live in the waterlogged earth for its ground and water properties.
Whenever the Mud Kin managed to slip past the cat's paws, the Chatter Rats chased them close again. It was a game the referees thoroughly enjoyed. The cat swatted and batted and bit with a set of teeth and claws that had an affinity for drawing blood. A scar puckered its lip on one side which caused a tooth to stick out from the rest. Part of its ear was missing, and another scar rode low on its eye. The cat was a male void of beauty and grace. No wonder he was an outcast of his kind. I recognized him from the visions Damon Doom Seer showed us at council.
The Mantis and its Grass Hoppers did not have the chance to return and warn them of our advance. We made sure of that. And apparently, we traveled more efficiently than them because the way the rats and cat loitered about meant they weren't suspicious yet. Our goal was to find and assess the enemy's strength, but with the full moon above and much travel behind us, I was sure we would not have a better opportunity to strike. Alpha thought the same and already had a plan in place. We split into two groups. Keen Eye would take the majority of the pack across the river to circle around and hide in the grasses to the rear.
Meanwhile, Alpha and I would travel down the river and launch a surprise attack from the water. This would push the enemy into the grasses, straight into those already lying in wait. Each enemy would be marked to avoid their escape. Keen Eye and Phantom Back, those with the best sight in the dark, would hunt the Golden Necks. The snakes would try to flee and find cover in the reeds. Should they fall into silence and out of sight, Omega would then find them with his sensitivity. The snakes' hidden voices would betray them. Maw Mouth and Gruff Growl, our biggest and strongest aside from Alpha, would each take a rat. I had no doubt they would win one on one, but there was no reason to take any risks. Ume and Watepei would each assist them, assuring their victories with two to one battles. Alpha and I would take on the Mountain Cat.
And although there was little to be done about the Sky Shrieker, I had a feeling I need not worry about it.
The moon shined brightly down on us, giving us strength and sight. The wind blew just enough to conceal us, quieting our paws. And yet, when I watched the Mud Kin get beaten and scratched, I became more and more concerned. They were little things with soft skin and had no chance of surviving this encounter alone. They cried and groaned and croaked with pain and terror. The cat must have snatched them from the bank before they recognized the danger. He had his way with them for some time because their bodies were dry and dull. The only glisten on their skin came from blood. I had no reason to keep them alive, and yet, I did not want them to die. They were young, hatchlings, and the Spirit within me stirred no matter how many times I told myself they were not Mighty Hena.
Alpha glanced at me, but I did not want to delay us any longer. We quietly moved upriver. Keen Eye led his party across the water. One after another, they slipped into the liquid darkness. This river was deep and wide, so they had to float and paddle to get across. When they emerged on the other side, they did not shake their coats. To do so would give us away. After waiting for the others to get into position, Alpha and I swam down the river in silence. We wetted our heads and backs to make sure they shined just like the water's surface. We barely had to tread water as the current carried us closer to our destination. The water was cool and refreshing in the thick hot summer air.
It soothed our every movement and boosted the circulation of the Spirit within us. The riverlands were not our home, but the land still understood our purpose and aided us through the Spirit. We came upon the bank and carefully angled ourselves toward the shore where we could put our paws on the ground to control our approach. Our most vulnerable moment would be when we stopped to launch the attack and our shadows no longer flowed with the current. We would be much easier to spot then. The water would drag on us, slowing us down. But we did not need speed for our cause. The bigger and fiercer the surprise, the more impact it would have and the more advantage it would give the others. The enemy would never think to look for Mighty Hena in the water. It was a tactic the riverlands never had a chance to deploy, but now gave to us as a means of great vengeance.
Crouching lower the higher we came out of the water, we positioned ourselves directly in front of the enemy who were higher up on the bank. All was ready. But now that we were this close, I could see every bruise and scratch on the Mud Kin's skin. One was worse than the other. Its fin was damaged and the look in its eyes was dim. Hopelessness had overtaken it. The other's flashed with panic. Constantly fearing for their lives had exhausted them. So the cat gave them rest between torture sessions. This way, they could lie down in the mud and regain some of their strength. He did not want them to dry out too quickly. His cruelty stoked a fire within me. All I could think of were the pups back home. Especially those from the Rivers that did not survive.
The energy around Alpha suddenly changed.
He knew something I didn't, which meant it was time to attack. We both tightened our stance, summoning all of the power in our bodies, and launched out of the water. I threw a pulse of energy ahead of us, spraying water as if we were twice our size. I filled our voices to match the illusion so that our snarls shattered the night with great violence. Then, there was Alpha. His glowing red eyes and shining silver teeth led the way to death with no hope of escape. Frenzied thrashing filled the night as the cat and snakes and rats sprinted away from the unexpected burst of ferocity. Their first instinct was to find a scrap of protection in the reeds from a foe as terrifyingly abrupt as the old crocodiles of the river temples.
The Mountain Cat turned tail with a spitting hiss and ran into the grass. Alpha powered after him, never once glancing at me even as I skid to a stop just before the grasses. Alpha's intent and focus were overwhelming. The Spirit about him was centralized and direct. He meant to hunt the cat alone. He knew before I did that this was the way. That I was not needed. A rush of guilt panged me to leave him, to break his orders, but an even greater sensation yanked me back to the bank. I turned around to face the water. The Mud Kin were still where the cat left them, utterly petrified and confused as to what happened. The poor creatures had suffered the same effect as the enemy when we appeared. It was too much for their exhausted minds.
A mighty storm of barks and snarls and squeals jumped up to the sky as the battles in the grasses began. The fight could easily spill onto the bank, so I ran back to the Mud Kin, kicking up mud and pebbles as I slid to a stop beside them. My swift arrival did not motivate them to flee. They had already tried and failed so many times already that they did not chance an attempt. I nudged them with my nose. They came together instead of going towards the river, relying on the only thing they had to survive, each other. I licked them to show them my goodwill. This always comforted Mighty Hena, but it only reminded the amphibians of the cat's rough tongue that had licked them raw already.
Something crashed out of the grasses onto the bank nearby. I quickly crouched low to the ground with the Mud Kin between my legs. It was Gruff Growl. He wrestled with a Chatter Rat. Foam and fury erupted from their mouths. Watepei came behind them and tackled the rat before it could open its jaws for a bite. I lowered my head over the Kin and growled. This created a dome of pressure around us. It exploded outward as quickly as it formed. Gruff Growl and Watepei recognized it immediately. Their fight was too close to me, to hatchlings under my care, which normally meant the pups, and they needed to draw the enemy far away.
Gruff Growl immediately changed tactics and chased the rat back into the grasses. My message went farther than I realized because the sounds of battle automatically grew farther and farther away. This was my chance. I picked up one of the Mud Kin in my mouth. Without any fur or scruff to hold onto, it was difficult to keep my teeth from piercing it, so I relied on my tongue to prop it up as I carried it towards the river. It strained my jaw to keep it so wide for so long so tightly, but I did not want to risk jostling the little creature.
I delicately trotted to the edge of the water only to realize that the current was too swift. It would sweep the Mud Kin away, as weak as they were, so I moved up a little further where I knew there to be a little cove outside of the river's main path. I placed the Kin in the shallow water and felt something strike my back. A tackle, but small and poorly placed in the thickness of my mane. The Sky Shrieker. But it would have to wait. I turned and ran back up the bank to the second Mud Kin. I lowered my head, delicately took the creature in my mouth and lifted it up. As I did, the Shrieker slapped into the back of my head. Its bite pinched, but I could do nothing about it. Not with the Mud Kin in my mouth. One shake of my head could fling it out of my jaws or I could tighten my bite and kill it. I set the Mud Kin back on the ground.
All the while, the Shrieker climbed around towards my face with the little hooks on its wings. The moment the Mud Kin was clear, I jumped backwards and thrashed my head, throwing off the Shrieker before it could get to my eyes. I heard it flap recklessly as if the taste of my blood told it something. Something that made it start shrieking. I should have tried to find it and kill it, but I could not think of anything other than getting back to the hatchling. Such a frenzy exposed more than myself to danger. I hurried over to the Mud Kin again, picked it up, and ran as fast as I could to the one in the water. The first was vibrating with a sound only creatures of the water could make. The moonlight rippled on the surface. When I set its sibling beside it, it too started making the same strange signal. It would have been a curious moment, but the Shrieker would not stop its attacks just because some amphibians were playing in the water.
The shrieks turned shrill, and like the hatchlings in the water, I felt energy in its voice. Using my body as a shield, I jumped over the Mud Kin and nested on top of them. A sonic blast struck me. It caused my fur to wave and ears to flatten. A loud ringing filled my ears, but even when deaf, the bat knew it could not defeat me. No matter how many attacks it threw at me, I would not be moved. I had too much experience. That may have been why it suddenly left, but I quickly realized otherwise. Like the Shrieker at the human camp, this bat was a weak creature.
So, it followed a much stronger one.
Something hard and narrow suddenly struck me in the side. It knocked the wind out of me and, had I not been crouched low already, it would have knocked me off my paws. I had no breath to gasp, but I managed a wince. The attack left what felt like a dent in my side, concave and tender and aching. It had energy behind it. The kind that gave me chills and made me sick to my stomach.
Cursed energy.
I staggered up straight and looked behind me. A glowing white skull bobbed above the reeds. It was smoother and narrower than that of the Bone Takers from the burrow. Instead of hiding its wearer's features, the skull had merged with the flesh of its host, making it less of a helmet and more of a head. When the upright reptilian body underneath it walked out of the grasses, the skull transformed into a crown whose jewels were the sharp brown eyes of a Shaman.
Unlike the others, it was attracted to my spiritual message. My calling to protect, was its calling to kill.
Had I not been warned, I may have thought it a hallucination because all Shaman were supposed to be dead. The Shaman casually stepped out onto the bank, a prince among slaves, and picked up the bone club it had thrown at me. He brushed off the dirt with his paw, inspecting the weapon for any damage the recoil might have caused.
Because beating the flesh of Mighty Hena only made it stronger.
Toe to toe, we would have stared one another in the eye, but with the incline of the bank, the Shaman looked down at me. Although, they never needed an excuse to do so. I'm sure he sniggered when he looked at me even though I still couldn't hear anything. Paw by paw, I slowly positioned myself to face him with all four paws in the river. The power Shaman had over the ground weakened when the earth was saturated with the life blood of the wild. Water. Both Mud Kin sank deeper into the shallows underneath me. The Shaman suddenly swung his bone club across his body as if to test it. The hatchlings flinched. I made no move or sound. My eyes locked onto the wicked creature. I could not let it see that I was still taking back my breath.
Luckily, he was too full of himself to notice. The Shaman smacked the club in his palm a few times. On the last strike, he held onto it and looked at me. I did not break his gaze. My legs were sturdy. So was my heart. He would not take me by surprise again. With a spark in his eyes, the Shaman threw his club again, winding back as far as he could. Moonlight flashed in the night. Bright and sudden and blinding. I spun. The club cracked off of me, scattering what looked like stardust into the river. My mane and tail softly fluttered back down as, paw by paw, I turned around to once again stand over the hatchlings. This time, unfazed by the attack. The club slapped back into the Shaman's hand. He almost failed to catch it, and in that moment, I saw his eyes widen and his chest stiffen. But his seemingly unshakable confidence returned. He inspected his club like before, rubbing a hand down it, feeling the energy it absorbed when it hit me. His hand stopped halfway across. The Shaman turned his eyes up at me without raising his head. He was starting to understand who I was.
Good.
Using the connection he had created between us, I sent a surge of Spirit into what resided in the bone. The energy exploded free. The Shaman jerked his hand away as if it bit him and dropped his club. A Bone Taker would never take any Spirit from me. They also never dropped their clubs. It was a sacrilege punishable by death. A wave of malevolent energy pulsed from the Shaman. He muttered curses under his tongue. The kind spawned by humiliation and deep loathing. Penetrating and bitter and full of spite. One little sweep of my tail brushed them away. The Shaman ground his teeth and picked up his club, but did not throw it. This little exchange warned him that my Spirit was at least equal to his own. And with the pack nearby, one call and the others would rush to my aid. Until then, he could try to beat me physically, but we both had our advantages and disadvantages. He believed us to be on equal ground. But that was only until the pack showed up to intervene.
So how did he gain the advantage before I did?
The Shaman looked at his club again. He felt what it told him. And this time, when he looked up, his gaze only rose to the hatchlings underneath my legs. One by one, the hairs on the back of my shoulders went up. With increasing speed and height, they lifted in a high pointed bristle that matched the growl steadily rising in my throat. The Shaman smiled. I bared my teeth. He swung his club into position. I bent low and raised my hips, covering the hatchlings with my chest. I'd lose at least one of them in this fight, but I'd make sure the Shaman went with it. He swung his club and struck the ground. The earth rattled. Energy surged toward us. If I jumped back into the water, the attack would have no effect, but the hatchlings would be exposed and dragged away by the current into the night.
I held my ground.
The vibrations raced up my legs. They threatened to throw me off balance. The Shaman sprinted toward me. He was faster than I remembered the species to be. I braced myself. All the while, the ground continued to shake. In fact, it intensified, jostling the hatchlings beneath me. The vibrations grew in strength, going from a rumble to a roar that rose up behind me. Water went with it, splashing on top of me as a Swamp Kin suddenly broke the surface in a bellow that not only returned my hearing but could have shaken the river off course. The Swamp Kin stood on two legs, screaming at the moon with its two head fins thrown back and orange braced arms in the air, before it came crashing to the ground. I flattened into the water, tightening into a curl as the enormous fully evolved amphibian dropped down on top of me.
The Shaman slid to a stop so fast that he fell backwards. He scrambled into a retreat, raking his hands in the mud to pull himself back up the bank as fast as possible. The Swamp Kin bounded forward, splashing mud and more water with every earth shuddering step. It plowed into the grasses after the Shaman, channeling its rage into another chest fluttering bellow. My heart hammered in my chest, and this time, it was the Mud Kin who comforted me. With the Shaman gone, they happily nudged my face because the reinforcements they had been calling in the water had finally arrived. The earthquakes slowly faded and I lifted my head out of the water, glancing around at an empty bank now riddled with deep three toed imprints.
Chest still heaving with the near-death experience, I stood up and looked down at the Mud Kin. They had regained their fervor for life. The strongest ran out gleefully a little ways onto the bank before it looked at me with a grand smile on its face. The other was content to stay in the water under my shadow and dig itself snuggly in the mud. Its sibling came back and rubbed its cheek prongs on my leg before showing its kin how to properly dig a hole for recovery. With the two hatchlings tucked away, I looked up at the sky, keenly aware that the Sky Shrieker was gone. In its place was the black shadow of a Brown Owl, wheeling in circles above my head. I narrowed an eye at it which caused it to fly away. Or rather, farther from my vision. I did not know how long I stood there, only that I could not leave the hatchlings unattended. Eventually, the lumbering steps of the Swamp Kin returned.
Its head cut through the grass like it did the water, further flattening the trail it had left in its wake. It stopped at the bank and looked at me, surprised to find a Mighty Hena standing watch over its kin. Given the Swamp Kin's size and color, he must be a male. It was possible he never realized I was there when he first emerged. It was likely he had ignored my immediate threat on the Mud Kin for the advancing Shaman's. Who, in fact, did not return with the Swamp Kin. Either way, the Swamp Kin did not expect me to be there when he returned. We stared at one another. Two creatures so very different from one another in size and color and shape. One with an affinity for water and earth and sound. The other, silence and shadow and teeth.
I had never seen a Swamp Kin before. I knew them only through story. They were rare even in the riverlands. He had to be nothing less than a Champion of the River. It was good to know that the waters of the riverlands were still strong. The River Champion narrowed his gaze at me. I folded back my ears and lowered my tail, averting my eyes with a slight bow. The Swamp Fin stood a little straighter at this. He then took a step forward to indicate he intended to come my way, so I stepped to the side and cautiously trotted out of the water. I did not want to alarm him with the hatchlings so close, so I moved fast enough to show him I meant to leave without harming his kin.
We kept on our respective paths, crossing one another at a respectable distance. The Swamp Kin turned an eye down at me as I passed to look at my face and my mane and my trot. I kept my eyes forward, not bothering to dwell on the fact that my decisions had endangered my life for creatures other than the pack. The Mud Kin were not pups. Yet I almost gave everything for them just the same. Was that something a Mother of Mighty Hena should do? Of course not. Such reckless feelings I had! Alpha and I were supposed to take on the Mountain Cat together. I could only pray that my absence had not cost us greatly. I stepped into the flattened grass and a grunt echoed up the bank, calling for my attention.
I stopped and turned around. The Swamp Kin had also stopped and was looking at me with his kin at his feet. They too stared up at me from the water. Washed free of mud by the river, I glowed with moonlight, black and silver, with two shinning red discs for eyes. The Swamp Fin stared a little longer before he closed his eyes and bowed, low and wide, with a deep bend of his head so that his tail fin rose in salute.
I did not understand why until later.
As I had never seen a river walk on land. He had never seen the moon walk on earth. Yet both of us had come for the same purpose.
Maybe we weren't as different of creatures as we thought ourselves to be.
