The young hunter darted through the tall grass, playing with the awakening streams and helping them break free from the sweet lethargy of spring. He deftly broke through pieces of thin ice to catch lazy fish. Sometimes, he would stop and stare for a long time at the barely visible tracks in the lightly trampled grass. Then he would spend nearly an hour sniffing trees, rocks, and the various trails scattered throughout the forest.
Ardi didn’t know the hunters of the forest, and he didn’t want to end up in someone’s belly during his first sleep just because he had stepped on a foreign path.
And so his first journey of the Spirit of the Day passed uneventfully as he played and entertained himself. It was a nice start to his first solo adventure. In the evening, tired, Ardi chose the widest and sturdiest tree. Making sure it wasn’t marked by a bear’s claws or gleaming with lynx or wolf fur, Ergar’s apprentice deftly climbed the rough bark and settled on a wide branch, hiding among the foliage.
The young hunter had learned the lessons of the snow leopard well. Since he hadn’t grown thick fur yet, and his claws couldn’t tear through flesh freely, nor could his fangs crack bones, there was no point in tempting hunters with his soft appearance.
After settling down and making sure he wouldn’t fall even if the Spirit of the Night granted him a restless sleep, Ardi began to prepare for his rest. As Ergar had taught him, he began with words of gratitude.
"Spirits of the present and the future," he said, looking up at the lights of the spirits of the past — those who had already walked the unseen paths — beginning to glow high above, between the broad wings of the Spirit of the Night. "I thank you for the path of the Spirit of the Day that you have laid beneath my paws." The young hunter gestured with his paw, placing the back of his fist first on his chest, where his heart was beating, and then on his forehead. "Thank you, Spirit of the Night, for coming to take me on a journey, and I ask only that you release me when the time comes."
Ardi opened his hand and covered the sky with it.
"Spirits of the old hunters and mothers — thank you for walking with me. My land is your land, and your way is my way."
With the ritual complete, Ardi curled up and fell asleep. He even dreamed something. He just couldn’t understand what it was. He saw a huge cave made of stone and wood, but somehow it seemed to have grown out of the earth. Nearby, a stream gurgled. And someone, a barely discernible silhouette — neither beast nor bird — was standing on the steps. And there was the smell of blackberries. But it was a little strange.
It wasn’t just the smell of blackberries, but something else. Something very...
Ardi woke up with a burning face. He reached out and wiped a few drops of moisture from his cheek. This had happened to him before, when the path of the Spirit of the Night had also ended with moisture on his face. Ergar had told him that it was a mirage and that it would be another five seasons before it stopped bothering him. He just had to be patient.
But never before had this moisture made Ardi feel pain and-
"I can smell something."
Ardi crouched down quickly and quietly. Using his fangs, he tightened the strap of his gloves that held his claws and squinted, peering through the foliage.
"The trail ends here," a second voice said.
"Keep looking..." A third growled, threatening and strong. "This is the scent of bipeds... Their young cannot walk the paths between the leaves."
"But, Pack Leader, I can feel the scent going up the trunk."
"Then your nose is wrong, Hargli. Keep searching!"
A few shadows, hidden by the veils of the Spirit of the Night, darted in different directions. The largest of them stood still for a moment, sniffing the trunk and the ground. It rustled through the grass with its snout, occasionally tearing at the ground with its paws, but eventually, it settled down. It stilled for a moment, then looked up sharply. Ardi didn’t flinch or move. Ergar had taught him to trust his camouflage, and unnecessary movement would only help his prey find him.
And it didn’t matter that in this case, Ardan was the prey.
The wolf’s eyes could see perfectly in the dark, no worse than Ergar’s and his little apprentice’s own eyes could. But even though they saw well, they didn’t know what they wanted to see. And so, the leader of the pack saw only a few fireflies among the high foliage, and nothing more. After standing for a few more moments, he growled low and rushed into the forest.
All the while, the young hunter’s heart was beating only slightly faster. And only after the strange scent of the forest dwellers had sufficiently dissipated among the trees and earth did Ardi allow himself to exhale. If he had shown weakness for even a second, the wolves would have smelled his fear and would not have doubted the abilities of their tracker so much.
"But why," the young hunter whispered, gripping a branch tightly. "I haven’t crossed anyone’s path or stolen anyone’s prey."
And the few fish he’d caught had been so small that they surely wouldn’t cause a whole pack to fight over territory.
"They have no reason to bare their fangs at me," Ardi frowned.
But those were all, as Ergar had put it, thoughts for another day. For now, he had to get out. His Master had always said that wolves didn’t abandon their prey and even if they went away for a while, they would surely return to the trail. They lived in packs, not alone like the proud mountain hunters, and therefore, they needed much more prey.
After waiting a little longer, sniffing the wind and peering into the darkness of the night trails, the young hunter began to prepare. He broke off a small twig and rubbed it over the spot where he had lain to avoid attracting unnecessary attention from lynxes or, spirits forbid, someone poisoned by the Ley. Who they were, Ardi didn’t know — Ergar didn’t like to talk about the Ley-Poisoned.
Descending to the ground, the young hunter placed his paw on the trunk and muttered words of gratitude. Maybe it was his imagination, but the tree seemed to creak differently under the increasing pressure of the east wind in response to his gesture.
Ardi practically pressed himself to the ground, trusting his eyes and nose. His eyes didn’t see as well in the darkness as Ergar’s, but it was enough for him to notice four tracks and a trampled path. His nose also caught the familiar scent of dried blood, stones, and added a few new and unfamiliar ones... or almost unfamiliar? It seemed like, in the very depths of his mind, those strange notes were called spruce, juniper, brown moss, and...
The young hunter frowned and shook his head. These were all remnants of the Spirit of the Night’s mirages. He didn’t know these words or these scents. Such things did not grow in the Alcade Mountains.
"There are four of them," Ardi whispered, straightening up and hiding in the encroaching darkness. "With the tracker, that makes five. That’s too many for a hunting party and too few for a migration."
But Ardi saw and heard nothing. He was just running, trying to get there in time, before something irreversible happened.
And he made it.
Leaping from a low cliff, he ran across a line of stones that served as a bridge over the stream and landed right in front of the frightened doe.
Drops of moisture still clung to her black lips and soft, brown fur. Her small antlers stuck out amusingly behind her ears, and her heavy, massive belly was almost touching the ground. Whoever she was carrying had to be a giant, perhaps one no smaller than Lenos himself.
The still very young doe backed away and lowered her head, showing her antlers. They could’ve only hurt Ardi if he’d been old and blind.
"I am sated at this hour," Ardi said, putting his palm to his lips and then to the ground. "I do not seek your life, future mother."
The doe did not move for a moment, then began to breathe loudly. Her nostrils flared like a frog’s throat, then deflated just as noisily.
"You smell strange, mountain cub," she said in a voice that somehow sounded like the rumble of spring thunder and the first thaw. "You smell like a biped that wanders invisible paths and desecrates old stones with iron. You smell like a snow leopard, barely opening its eyes and licking its claws, and you smell like..." she inhaled deeper, and Ardi saw sparkling stars in her dark brown eyes. But he must have imagined it. "Matabar."
Matabar... These sounds echoed inside the young hunter, but within a heartbeat, they curled up within him, hiding behind Ergar’s words that he’d spoken on that first day of the hunt, and fell asleep.
And Ardi had no time to think about it — the fur on his neck stood up, and the spot where Ergar’s tails always danced tightened. The wolves had come closer, he just knew it.
"You’ll have to run," the young hunter urged, making sure his claws were secure in his gloves.
"Run? Why should I run, strange cub?"
"Wolves," Ardi hissed. "Wolves are coming here."
"Wolves," the doe snorted. "This forest hasn’t seen a hungry winter in a long time. There’s plenty of prey here. No one will break the Law of the Matabar and hunt a pregnant doe just for dinner."
"These wolves are strange," the young hunter insisted. "Please. Believe me. They smell strange and speak strangely. You must run."
"They smell strange?" The doe asked, then bent down and practically buried her muzzle in Ardi’s chest. She took another deep breath, then whispered so softly that it was barely audible, "Ley... They are poisoned by the Ley..."
Ardi’s eyes widened and he turned sharply toward the stream, just in time to see five gray stones gradually grow in size. What could’ve been mistaken for dew turned out to be fur. Fangs were bared and bottomless, red eyes burned. Especially the eyes of the largest wolf standing in the center.
In its mouth, which resembled a predatory fish somehow, its fangs stuck out in two rows, and around its eyes glowed a network of burning scars. Even its fur looked more like a snake’s scales than anything. Tendons tangled and wriggled and swarmed all across its body, despite the almost complete silence that had suddenly descended upon the watering hole.
"Looks like your nose hasn’t let us down, Tracker!" The Pack Leader laughed. "There really is a two-legged cub here!"
Ardi tried to push the doe behind him, but his hand found only air. The young hunter allowed himself a glance back, but saw no doe there, no trampled grass from her hooves, no drops of moisture from her fur. Even her scent was gone.
"How dare you turn your back on me?"
The young hunter immediately turned to face the leader of the pack, but he didn’t dare look him in the eye — that would have been a challenge. The last thing Ardi wanted was to fight the leader of the pack. He knew he couldn’t even scratch him.
"Wise hunter," Ardi lowered his head, but not so much that he saw nothing, just enough to show his neck in a sign of submission. "I do not seek your paths, nor do I lay claim to your prey. I am merely passing through on my own paths, and my tracks come from the northern peaks. Let us part. You are a hunter, and I am a hunter, and we have nothing to quarrel about today."
The wolves closed their jaws and lifted their noses higher, catching the scent threads in the wind. The leader bared his fangs again, revealing several rows of dangerous teeth. Ardi could sense the strange, sweet smell emanating from the pack. It wasn’t like that of ordinary beasts, and it wasn’t like that of Ergar, Lenos, or Kaishas, either.
"A two-legged cub that knows our language?" The wolf hissed. "The Spirit of the Night has truly brought us an unusual meal. When our fangs break your bones and our claws slice your flesh open, I will try not to forget what you said about the northern peaks."
The wolves lowered their heads to the ground, growling and baring their teeth as they slowly emerged from the thicket. They stepped carefully over the pebbles scattered along the stream, their fur bristling at their necks and their tails tucked tightly between their legs.
Ardi backed away slowly, not breaking eye contact. His heart was beating so hard it almost jumped out of his chest — there was no need to hide his fear anymore.
The wolves felt this, and their faces twisted into bloodthirsty grimaces.
"Five snows of the Master’s lessons are still better than perishing in their stomachs," flashed through the young hunter’s mind.
He grabbed the fang hanging from a cord, but didn’t have time to call upon Ergar.