The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure - By Storm Constantine Page 0,18

which was so far from the point, it was embarrassing. Ulaume was sure Lianvis was incapable of feeling the true meaning of what had happened, even though he was an experienced magician, perhaps the best. He would make something gross and common out of a rare, unique event. Ulaume could not bear it.

I must leave, he thought. That’s it. Leave my tribe. If I live in the desert for a hundred years, alone, perhaps the answers will come to me. If I scour my skin with ashes and eat bitter grasses, if I hardly drink, go mad, howl at the moon, I may be given the truth.

It was then he realised that the coyote behind him was an aspect of himself.

He could not return to the camp for any of his possessions or supplies. Now the decision was made, he must run with it, into the wilderness. If he could not survive, then it was what was meant to be. Somehow, he didn’t think he’d die. Without looking behind, he stopped walking and presently heard the faint sounds that indicated the coyote had almost caught up with him.

‘Go ahead,’ Ulaume said aloud. ‘Find the way.’ Still, he did not move.

After some minutes, he noticed the coyote about thirty feet to his left, but trotting ahead of him. He could see now that it was a female and had clearly recently had cubs, as its teats were engorged. Where were those cubs now?

But that creature is me, Ulaume thought, and I am bursting with something, I am hot and sore. This is just a symbol.

He followed it.

Dawn comes like a song to the desert, shedding scarlet notes of light over the distant hills. Shadows are stark and alive with creatures once hidden by the dark. Birds wheel high on wide wings in the purple sky. Like a compass they can guide the traveller, not in a particular direction, but to where there is water or food.

Ulaume saw three carrion birds, known to the Kakkahaar as crag rocs, circling quite low some distance ahead of him. The coyote had increased her pace, perhaps making for a water-hole. The birds flew lower, landing in a showy flap of wings, ungainly on the ground, uttering squawks. When the coyote ran among them, they protested and lumbered around, raising their wings, but they did not take to the air.

Ulaume approached. The crag rocs had found carrion then, and perhaps he could salvage some of it to cook, share it with his shadow-beast. He picked up a couple of rocks. It was possible he could take out one of the birds themselves. But what made Ulaume throw the stones wasn’t the thought of cooked crag roc. It was the fact he heard a soft mewling cry coming from the ground among them. His heart went cold and he ran forward screeching, letting the stones fly from his hands. The coyote, spooked, ran around too, snapping at the air, and the birds rose up in a complaining, clattering flutter.

Ulaume stopped running and looked down. Into a smile. He saw small hands reaching up for him, heard laughter. There wasn’t a mark on the child. Not one. Ulaume hunkered down. Who could have left a child out here? Humans? Surely not. And no Wraeththu would do such a thing. Children were too precious to both species; rare and new in Wraeththu, just rare in humans. Perhaps its parents had been killed, but there was no sign of bodies around, no blood or bones. The child was wrapped in a thin cloth, a piece of white linen that looked as if it had been torn from a sheet. ‘Am I to eat you?’ Ulaume asked it. There was something odd about the child. It wasn’t a baby, yet it was so small. Was it a midget or a dwarf?

Ulaume unwrapped the sheet and found the child wore a talisman on a leather thong around its neck. The leather was wet as if it had been chewed. The talisman, however, was Kakkahaar, a symbol of protection, stiff herbs bound with horse-hair, wrapped in a leather scrap. Ulaume stared at this talisman in disbelief. He knew there was only one Wraeththu child this could possibly be and yet it made no sense. Had he intruded upon some kind of ritual and soon shamans would emerge from the desert to chase him off? He looked around himself, saw only empty desert. The camp was some miles away. That left only one conclusion.