at the long appendage. He missed it. One of the other Yatsill made the attempt and also failed. However, a third spear hit its mark, and the Yatsill immediately huddled together and started moving in a manner which caused me to realise that, although I couldn’t see it, a thin cord must have been attached to the end of the spear.
With much straining and shouts of encouragement, the creatures hauled on the line and pulled the Yarkeen’s limb out of the foliage and down to the ground. The tentacle looked strong enough to send them all flying, yet put up no resistance whatever.
I’d been reporting the action to Clarissa, but now paused and turned to Kata to ask, “Why does it not struggle?”
“Because it doesn’t know anything is wrong yet. The Yarkeen is very slow and stupid. If the hunters work fast enough, they will be able to kill it before it’s even aware of the danger.”
The Yatsill grabbed at the limb and pushed spears through it and deep into the earth, pinning it down.
Looking up at the disk, I could see that it was now leaning toward the hunters and watery ripples were playing across its surface. It seemed impossible that something so colossal could be pegged down with what, to it, must be nothing more than splinters, but it was fast becoming clear to me that the Yarkeen possessed even less substance than a jellyfish.
After ensuring the spears were all secured, the hunters left the edge of the clearing and disappeared among the trees. Nothing more happened for some considerable time, until one of the Koluwaian men cried out, “There! They have another!”
I saw that, farther around the circumference of the Yarkeen, a second limb was being drawn taut, causing the edge of the disk to dip so far down that it brushed the foliage.
Some moments later, I spotted the six hunters swarming into the upper canopy. The Yatsill do not by any means appear arboreal—far from it, in fact—yet they sped through the branches with all the ease and confidence of monkeys. Upon reaching the edge of the Yarkeen’s disk, they hauled themselves up onto it and ran toward its centre. It sank and wobbled beneath their weight until they reached the slope where the flesh of the vast creature rose into the central cord.
The Yarkeen finally began to react. The tentacles around its edge flailed about in a distressed manner. The two that were pinned down tore themselves loose.
“They must work quickly now,” Kata commented.
“What are they doing?” I asked.
“They are using their fingers to cut through the cord.”
I looked at the young Yatsill and noted that the inside edges of their long, restless fingers were sharp and serrated.
“There!” Kata announced.
I turned back in time to see the Yarkeen collapsing downward onto the forest like a silken shroud, while the gas sac, high above it, shot up and rapidly vanished from sight. The Zull that had been circling it wheeled away and disappeared toward the cloud-obscured mountains.
The Yatsill dropped with the disk, but the fall was slow—it floated down rather than plummeted—and as it descended, its tendrils retracted into it, and the entire expanse of flesh withered and shrank before disappearing into the trees.
“They will now cut out the edible organ,” the islander said. She rubbed her stomach and smiled. “Excellent! Yarkeen tastes good!”
A short time passed, then the Yatsill returned and clambered aboard the Ptall’kor. Yazziz Yozkulu was holding a long strip of rubbery flesh: a honeycombed diaphanous glob from which a clear jelly oozed.
While the Ptall’kor got moving again, the Yazziz crouched and, with keen-edged fingers, cut the meat into thick slices. These were then distributed among the children, the Koluwaians, and the Wise Ones.
I held the dripping slab that had been handed to me and looked at it doubtfully. Clarissa raised her piece to her nose. “It smells like lavender flowers.” She tested it with her tongue. “Mmm! It’s sweet! Taste it, Aiden!”
“I’m not sure—” I began, but stopped when my friend took a bite, chewed, swallowed, and sighed with satisfaction.
“It’s very good!” she exclaimed. “Aren’t you hungry?”
I couldn’t deny it. I took a cautious bite. Clarissa was right—it tasted delicious.
° °
The Ptall’kor dragged itself over the forest, following the course of the river. The purple-leafed trees were gradually supplanted by a taller but more widely spaced variety of plant, the base of which resembled a perfectly spherical cactus, about fifteen feet in diameter, out of the top of which grew a thin