The Burning Shore - Smith Wilbur - Страница 106

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She paused at the corner of the hill and looked back.

the fire had died to embers, but the moonlight played into the old people's shelter. O'wa was in the shadows, just a small dark shape, but the moonlight washed H'ani.

Her amber skin seemed to glow in the soft light, and her head, propped on her own shoulder, was turned towards Centaine. Her expressed seemed forlorn and hopeless, a harbinger of the terrible sorrow and loss that Centaine knew she would suffer when she woke, and the necklace of pebbles gleamed dully on her bony old chest.

Goodbye, old grandmother, Centaine whispered. Thank you for your great humanity and kindness to us.

I will always love you. Forgive us, little H'ani, but we have to go. Centaine had to steel herself before she could turn the rocky corner that cut her off from the camp. As she hurried up the rough pathway to the tunnel of the bees, her own tears blurred the moonlight and tasted of seawater as they ran into the corners of her mouth.

She groped her way through the utter darkness and the warm honey smell of the tunnel and out into the moon light in the narrow valley beyond. She paused to listen for the sound of bare feet on the rocks behind her, but the only sound was the yelp of the jackal packs out on the plains below, and she started forward again.

As she reached the plain Shasa mewed and wriggled on her hip, and without stopping she adjusted his sling so that he could reach her breast. He fastened on it greedily, and she whispered to him as she hurried through the forest, Don't be afraid, baby, even though this is the first time we have been alone at night. The horsemen will be camped just a short way ahead. We will catch up with them before sunrise, before H'ani and O'wa are even awake. Don't look at the shadows, don't imagine things, Shasa- She kept talking softly, trying to shore up her own courage, for the night was full of mystery and menace, and she had never realized until that moment how she had come to rely on the two old people.

We should have found the spoor by now, Shasa. Centaine stopped uncertainly and peered about her. Everything looked different in the moonlight. We must have missed it. She turned back, breaking into an anxious trot. I'm sure it was at the head of this glade. And then, with a rush of relief, There it is, the moon was against us before. Now the hoof-prints were rimmed clearly with shadow and the steel shoes had bitten deeply into the sandy earth.

How much O'wa had taught her! She saw the tracks so clearly that she could break into a trot.

The horsemen had made no effort to hide their spoor, and there was no wind to wipe it out. They had ridden the easy line, keeping out in the open, following wellbeaten game paths, not pushing their mounts above an easy ambling walk, and once Centaine found where one of them had dismounted and led his horse for a short distance.

She was elated when she saw that this man wore boots.

Riding-boots with medium high heels, and well-worn soles. Even in the uncertain moonlight, Centaine could tell by the length of his stride and the slight toe-out gait that he was a tall man with long narrow feet and an easy, yet confident stride. It seemed to confirm all her hopes.

Wait for us, she whispered. Please, sir, wait for Shasa and me to catch up. She was gaining rapidly. We must look for their camp fire, Shasa, they will be camped not far from- she broke off. There! What's that, Shasa? Did you see it? She stared into the forest.

I'm sure I saw something. She stared about her. But it's gone now. She changed Shasa to her other hip.

What a big lump you are becoming! But never mind, we'll be there soon. She started forward again, and the trees thinned out and Centaine found herself at the head of another long open glade. The moonlight laid a pale metallic sheen on the short grass.

Eagerly she surveyed the open ground, focusing her attention on each dark irregularity, hoping to see hobbled horses near a smouldering fire and human shaped rolled into their blankets, but the shapes were only tree stumps or anthills, and at the far side of the glade a small herd of wildebeest grazing heads down.

Don't worry, Shasa, she spoke louder to cover her own intense disappointment, I'm sure they'll be camped in the trees. The wildebeest threw up their heads and erupted into a rumbling snorting stampede, streaming away into the trees, fine dust hanging behind them like mist.

What frightened them, Shasa? The wind is with us, they could not have taken our scent. The sound of the running herd dwindled. Something chased them! She looked around her carefully. I'm imagining things.

I'm seeing things that aren't there. We mustn't start panicking at shadows. Centaine started forward firmly, but within a short distance she stopped again fearfully.

Did you hear that, Shasa? There is something following us. I heard the footfalls, but it's stopped now. It's watching us, I can feel it. At that moment a small cloud passed over the moon and the world turned dark.

The moon will come out again soon. Centaine hugged the infant so hard that Shasa gave a little bleat of protest. I'm sorry, baby. She relaxed her grip and then stumbled as she started forward.

I wish we hadn't come, no, that's not true. We had to come. We must be brave, Shasa. We can't follow the spoor without the moon. She sank down to rest, looking up into the sky. The moon was a pale nimbus through the thin gunmetal cloud, and then it broke out into a hole in the cloud layer and for a moment flooded the glade with soft platinum light.

Shasa! Centaine's voice rose into a high thin Scream.

There was something out there, a huge pate shape, as big as a horse, but with sinister, stealthy, unhorselike carriage. At her cry, it sank out of sight below the tops of the grass.

Centaine leapt to her feet and raced towards the trees, but before she reached them the moon was snuffed out again, and in the darkness Centaine fell full length. Shasa waited fretfully against her chest.

Please be quiet, baby. Centaine hugged him, but the child sensed her terror and screamed. Don't, Shasa. You'll bring it after us. Centaine was trembling wildly. That big pale thing out there in the darkness was possessed of an unearthly menace, a palpable aura of evil, and she knew what it was. She had seen it before.

She pressed herself flat to the earth, trying to cover Shasa with her own body. Then there was a sound, a hurricane of sound that filled the night, filled her head seemed to fill her very soul. She had heard that sound before, but never so close, never so soul-shattering.

Oh, sweet mother of God, she whispered. It was the full-blooded roar of a lion. The most terrifying sound of the African wilds.

At that moment, the moon broke out of the cloud again, and she saw the lion clearly. It stood facing her, fifty paces away, and it was immense, with its mane fully extended, a peacock's tail of ruddy hair around the massive flat head.

Its tail swung from side to side, flicking the black tuft like a metronome, and then it extended its neck and humped its shoulders, lowering and opening its jaws so that the long ivory fangs gleamed in the moonlight like daggers, and it roared again.

All the ferocity and cruelty of Africa seemed to be distilled into that dreadful blast. Though she had read the descriptions of the travellers and hunters, they could not prepare her for the actuality. The blast seemed to crush her chest, so that her heart checked and her lungs seized.

It loosened her bowels and her bladder so she had to clench fiercely to keep control of herself. In her arms Shasa screeched and wriggled, and that was enough to jar Centaine out of her paroxysm of terror.

The lion was an old red torn, an outcast from the pride.

His teeth and claws were worn, his skin scarred and almost bald across the shoulders. In the succession battle with the young prime male who had driven him from the pride, he had lost one eye, a hooked claw had ripped it from the socket.

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