The Wild Lands: Legend of the Wild Man (4 page)

One prong is driven backwards, into the base
of the skull of the elk, but still looks intact. Slowly, he pulls
the prong out of the skull. It is not damaged and slides out with a
loud sucking sound. Like a curious child, he peers into the
wound.

There is a stone.

First it glows red, then turns black, then
red, then black. Back and forth like a dying flame or a light bug.
It can be neither.

He remembers the hermit's stories. The hermit
is the oldest member of the hunter's tribe. He does not stay with
the rest of them in their mountain jungle. Instead he lives high up
a mountain path, in a cave. He comes down to the tribe, mostly when
the moon is black, a dreaming moon, tends a fire and tells stories.
One of the hermit's tales captures the hunter's mind as he prods
the blinking stone:

A glorious battle between the hermit's father
and a vicious lion. The lion fought like one of the people. It did
not only try to use its bite. It fought with its claws like hands
instead of feet. It knew to defend its neck. No lion had ever
fought like it.

His father killed the lion by sneaking
through the forest and back around it. The hunter had laughed at
this when he was little. Everyone knew lions had powerful noses. No
one with a smell could ever hope to sneak up on one, but this one
did not smell the hermit’s father. The hunters would say that was
impossible if he smelled anything like his son and laugh and
laugh.

From a hiding place his father leapt from a
tree and stabbed the lion in its neck, but the prongblade had
shattered. Though the end of the tale was what seized the hunter's
mind like an eagle seizes a fish from a river. When skinning the
lion, the hermit's father had discovered a glowing red stone inside
of its head. The hermit swore that the stone guided the animal, and
that it had been put inside the lion by the Hidden.

The light coming from inside the prongbuck
reminds the hunter of the light of the story. He fears he has found
the stone's brother.

The young hunter convinced himself long ago
that stories and begging for food were all the hermit was good for,
yet the prongbuck and the light within it seemed to say the elder
told truths. The hunter decides to share the light with the hermit
when he shares the meat with tribe.

He lets the pieces of the story leave his
mind as he teeters under the buck's weight. He must balance it with
his one uninjured arm. He chuckles to himself. He does not think
anyone has ever caught a prongbuck so big! Perhaps having someone
else skin the beast will be worth it. He peers once more into the
wound, but blood and muscles block his view of the glowing stone.
He tries to forget the whole idea, shoulders the buck on his good
side, and goes home.

The young hunter must walk through much
forest, around the cliff face he cornered the elk against, and up
into the foothills of his people's mountains. He knows that fear
and the cliff hidden in forest were the only way to trick and kill
a prongbuck so large and dangerous, but his hike back is long and
he regrets his hunt. The forested mountain is his domain, he is at
ease there. It was an instinctual decision to drive the powerful
animal into the woods but surely there was a better way.

No weapon
, he reminds himself. A
twinge of pain from his arm reminds him he may never be without
weapons again.

Bands of trees trade with open savannah
around the mountain lowlands that his people live in this time of
year. Normally he would have stuck to the forests. His strong arms
and nimble toes are able to traverse the thick undergrowth or
storied canopy easily, but injured from the elk's prongs, and
struggling under its weight, he chooses the savannah. It is the
easier way. He follows the prongelk's trail out of the woods.

He can't help feeling fear in the open
plains. Elk live in the plains, as do all that hunt them:
saberlions, grizzlywolves, and worst of all, the monstrous
kingcrows, the lords of death. He is prey here, injured prey with a
meal. But the sun rises high and nothing attacks.

The day grows hotter, and the young hunter
relaxes. The grasses sway in the wind and put him at ease. The sun
is warm and soothes his tired muscles. Clouds chase each other
through the sky like lovebirds. Here and there pockets of boulders
jut out of the landscape, ancient game pieces thrown by the
mountains long before the hunter was born and sure to remain long
after he dies. He smiles at the thought. The hermit would like
it.

The sun eclipses. He cranes his neck to see a
silhouette of a kingcrow block out the light. The deadly birds fly
near the sun, where the bright rays hide them, but this one passes
too close, and alerts its prey.

In an instant the hunter drops his kill, and
is underneath it, his prongblade ready. He should let the lord of
death take his kill without a fight but the elk is too impressive,
the hunter too proud. He wants the village to see his trophy, clap
his back and sing him praises around the fire for seasons to come.
He can see their faces, mouths hanging open over antlers thicker
than a child's arm. The women bicker over who will cook and share
the choice cuts of meat. He wonders if any of them are worthy of
his favorite piece, the heart. Surely with a beast of this size he
can choose the strongest woman. Part of him longs to tell them of
how he battled a lord of death as well.

Yet the kingcrow does not strike. Instead it
circles a few times, and flies on. This troubles him. He hurries to
his feet and quickens his pace. kingcrows have insatiable appetites
and eat everything. The only thing they love more than killing a
meal is stealing one. The kingcrow's sharp eyes surely saw the
glitter of the elk's antlers, its acute sense of smell tasted the
iron tang of its blood, yet it did not strike. He hopes it is blind
to its senses like the saberlion in the hermit's story. He
immediately curses the idea. He does not believe the hermit's
stories, and if he did, the last thing he wants is a duel with one
of the Hidden.

A whiff of carrion and he knows the kingcrow
returns. It was trying to deceive him. He thanks his senses for the
few moments they give him. With luck, he will make it to the
nearest pile of boulders. A fresh surge of adrenaline makes the
prongelk lighter in his arms.

He runs.

The kingcrow is the biggest he has ever seen.
Each wing is as long as he is tall. A sharp black beak, big as his
arm, guides a body light enough to fly yet strong enough to kill a
prongbuck, towards the hunter like drops of rain fall to the earth.
It beats its wings a few times then tucks them in. The kingcrow
gains speed.

The hunter has never seen one so close. It
almost has a lizard's head. Rough dark red scales start at its
deadly beak, run round eyes that scream hunger and down its neck
before turning into feathers that sparkle rainbow shades of black.
It reeks of death: old death, fresh death, every death in
between.

The kingcrow flies much faster than he can
run. It levels out and approaches him opposite the direction that
he sprints. They will meet head on, closer than the safety of the
boulders. He quickens his already breakneck speed and cautiously
leans the body of the elk forward, eclipsing his view of the bird
with its girth. If he can not see the bird, then it can not see
him. Surprise is important to a hunter.

He races forward, balancing the falling
weight of his kill and does not see the kingcrow pull up from its
descent and begin to beat its wings. It hovers in place above the
boulders the hunter plans to hide in.

Faster he runs, the weight of the elk is
getting away from him. His injured arm screams in protest as he
struggles to hold up the body. The carcass grows lighter, not by
much, but his injured arm feels the difference acutely. Wind blows
through his fur, then gusts rustle the rope tied around his chest.
The winds build, offering more and more resistance while
simultaneously buoying the elk. The hunter listens carefully and
hears the beat of the kingcrow's broad wings, quick as his heart,
strengthen the wind. His pace slows to a trudge as gales of wind
whip past him, tearing plants from their roots and kicking up
swirling twisters that whip the earth itself into a frenzy.

The hunter tastes fear, but presses forward.
His weight combined with the prongbuck's is too much to be carried
by the wind. Though his pace is slow, the elk weighs less in his
arms. He will make it to the boulders that the crow has turned into
the eye of a windstorm.

The hunter has scaled mountains with nothing
but his arms and legs, his fingers and toes biting into the rocks
themselves. He has faced jungle cats in brawny fights and sent them
mewling for their mothers. He can stand a strong breeze! This is a
pleasure to a warrior like him! Surely the ugly crow has more than
this. The kingcrow cannot dive bomb while it throws the winds at
him. It struggles just to stay in place. Each beat of its
formidable wings sends it backward with all the force of the winds
themselves. The hunter draws closer to the safety of the boulders.
He has never faced a kingcrow, and did not think it would fight
like such a coward.

Once safely under the rocks he can snap off
prongs from his kill’s antlers one at a time and hurl them at the
crow. It will be a pity to waste the rack of antlers, but his life
is worth it.

Smells of wet earth and mosses that chew at
rock invite him in to safety. He is paces away from the boulders
and ready to launch his attack when the kingcrow rattles its wings
as it pulls them backwards. The tinkle of crystals rips his mind
from his murderous plans and forces him to consider the crow's own
schemes.

The elk obstructs his view. He peers around
it and immediately dodges as something whips past his face then
embeds in the earth beside him.

It is a prong from a buck. Another whips past
and lodges firmly in the ground, barely missing his foot. For a
moment, only a few fall, like fat raindrops heralding a coming
storm. But in no time enough shards of antler and bone fly through
the air to darken the sky. The wind was never the weapon, only a
way to hurl the deadly projectiles. The hunter roars and pushes
forward as dull thumps from above tell him his food is being
eviscerated. He has never seen such an attack, never heard tales of
something so ruthless.
The Hidden
, he thinks, wondering what
other truths the hermit tells.

A shard grazes his calf. He howls in pain and
his legs buckle. He heaves the prongbuck forward and drops to the
ground. He hides behind it.

The kingcrow lets out a piercing cry as it
beats its wings faster and faster. Splinters of edged antler and
bone rain down and turn the once verdant meadow into a bed of
shards sharper than crystal. Broken prongs pelt the elk. The hunter
clings to his kill and feels the dull thuds melt into each other as
the projectiles melt the elk's flesh to mush.

He had dropped the elk's belly towards the
bird, and he wonders idly if the tougher hide on its back would
have stood up any better against the razor-sharp hailstorm. He
doubts it, prongs are valued for their unmatched razor edge. Only
the thick carcass intended to feed his tribe can slow the deadly
storm.

The shards of prongs fall for what seems an
eternity. He clings to his now desecrated trophy, using it as a
meat shield. He knows the kingcrow cannot keep up its attack
forever. Its wings only hold so much. Already the field is reduced
to something more akin to a volcanic obsidian flow than the idyllic
pasture it had been just moments before.

The impacts grow less frequent. He readies
himself to sprint to the boulders. His ears carefully tune to the
bird's rhythms; he hears a change in the dull thuds of the prongs
hammering the earth. Instead he hears a higher pitched tinkle as
shards clatter to the boulders below the bird. The kingcrow
releases another piercing scream, and he knows it has exhausted its
reserves of prongs.

He lunges over the elk's messy body, then
scoops it up and raises it over his head. Its muscles and organs
form a bloody pulp on the ground in front of it. He lifts it by the
inside of its ribcage, and pulls the elk's skin around him in a
macabre shroud. It weighs less than a quarter of what it had
before. Thankful the belly of the elk had absorbed most of the
blows, the young hunter hopes the bones and thick hide of the elk
can protect him from another assault if the kingcrow holds anything
in reserve.

He aims the rack of prongs at the boulders
and charges forward, his feet skipping between the jutting barbs
that adorn the earth. He peeks out from under his shield to see the
crow perched atop the highest boulder, hurriedly preening its
feathers. It screeches loudly and beats its wings once more. He
hides under the elk's skin as another volley of prongs flies at
him. These shards lack the speed of the earlier attack and bounce
off his bizarre cape and hood and clatter harmlessly to the
ground.

By the time the kingcrow prepares its wings
for another assault the hunter is inside the pile of boulders it
perches upon. He watches silently, obscured by massive rocks and
his bloody cape as the bird folds its wings and squawks angrily
from its high vantage point.

The hunter snakes through passages between
the stones, trying to stay hidden and find a place from which to
attack the bird and hopefully scare it off. Animals never challenge
the kingcrows, and the hunter hopes it won't anticipate an
attack.

He peers up through gaps between the boulders
while the avian killer peers down for him. He drops the carcass in
a pool of sunshine, hoping to draw the bird's attention as he finds
another line of attack. He scrambles up between rocks, pokes his
head out into the sun and sees the bird beat its wings and send a
few shards down the tunnel towards his decoy. The young hunter
draws the prong he killed the elk with, takes aim, and hopes
kingcrows know fear.