'How did you find this place? Alphie demanded of the lissom reptile.

  Shadower politely indulged the Treefur's need for conversation. ‘I sssimply followed her trail.'

  'Over rock?'

  'Yesss.'

  'But how did you get by the Bonehead guards at the entrance to this valley?'

  'I ssslipped passst them. Calf'sss play.'

  Alphie believed him. Nightclaws were infamous for their powers of stealth.

  'Time is wasssting,’ said Shadower. ‘Where isss ssshe?'

  The Treefur feigned ignorance. ‘I don't know who you mean.'

  'You ssstate a falsssehood.’ Shadower struggled to verbalise his accusation. He seldom had to string more than six words together to form a complete sentence. ‘Your tracksss ssspoke volumesss. The Ssshieldhorn plusss you essscorted the ssslag, ssslaying Fessstur at the ssstart of your essscape.'

  Alphie did well to hide his shock. This scaled tracker was good! He nonetheless continued his bluff. ‘Oh, you mean the Thunderfoot we helped, bird-beak. She's long gone. We parted company before I came here.'

  The Nightclaw was not buying the fib and cajoled Alphie in no uncertain terms to cooperate. ‘Your death can be ssswift and painlesss, or ssslow and agonisssing. Choossse.'

  'I always did make lousy choices,’ muttered the Treefur as he shot off between Shadower's legs.

  The Killjaw king's spy grabbed for the speedy marsupial and missed by a mile. Cursing silently, he gave chase.

  Weaving this way and that, Alphie somehow managed to dodge the pursuing Nightclaw. He had survived this long by outsmarting the likes of Shadower on more than one life-threatening occasion. This time his chaser was as fast and nimble as he.

  Agilely springing out of harm's way, evading those clawing, three-fingered hands by a hair's breadth, Alphie hit the ground scurrying. Although undoubtedly the best of his breed, he had a deathly inkling that this individual Nightclaw could prove better. Shadower, stooped low and fierce like a descending thunderstorm, was rapidly gaining on the racing Treefur.

  So Alphie did the unexpected. He attacked.

  Pivoting about, he came up on his back paws and, baring his teeth, gave a fair impression of a growl. His ploy worked. The astonished Nightclaw skidded to a halt, poised indecisively over his supposedly defenceless victim. Prey was not meant to behave this way!

  'Ssso ssscary,’ mocked Shadower, surmounting his shock and resuming a stance of readiness. Brave as the Treefur may be, the impetuous marsupial realistically stood no chance against his natural predator in a duel.

  Alphie glossed over his foe's sarcasm. ‘I just want to know one thing, moon-eyes.'

  'Yesss?'

  'Can you swim?'

  Alphie dashed forward to sink his small, pointy and very sharp teeth into the biggest toe of Shadower's nearest foot. The Nightclaw gave a mixed squawk of surprise and pain, then began to dance about, holding his bitten middle toe. Alphie struck again and nipped at the hopping lizard's good foot, piercing the scales and drawing blood this time. The result was predictably wet. Shadower pulled his other foot off the ground and hung suspended in midair like a reptilian ballerina before crashing earthwards. He bounced off the unyielding rock, disappearing over the lip of the embankment and plummeting into the crimson and black waters of the Oasis with a loud splash.

  The victorious Treefur cautiously approached the edge of the stony bank and peered over. The Nightclaw, floundering below in the deep mountain lake, was trying to scrabble up the slippery incline, but failing to find purchase on the mossy embankment, he slid back into the chill water.

  Alphie sniggered callously. Coldness was tightening about Shadower like a net, sapping his strength and slowing his fight for life. Morbidly fascinated, he watched the feeble struggles of the drowning lizard in the freezing tarn, applauding the other's death throes as the infiltrator from the Killjaw Court slipped beneath the dark waters into the inkier depths of the Oasis.

  'I didn't think you could paddle to save yourself,’ Alphie cheerily remarked over Shadower's demise.

  A malicious thought entered his head. If by some unlikely fluke the Nightclaw survived his immersion, his escape was going to be extremely short-lived. The Oasis emptied into Clearwater River via Starlight Falls. The spindly lizard was soon going to be flushed away in the raging cascade and ricocheted from rock to rock in the foaming rapids downstream. Alphie happily pictured in his mind the soggy, pulped corpse of Rexus's lackey washing up on the shores of Crescent Lake right under the snout of the tyrant-king as he was taking a drink.

  Staying put on the rim of the lakeshore for a long while, Alphie stared at the ripples marking the Nightclaw's submergence into a watery grave expand in concentric circles only to vanish as the stillness of the disturbed waters inevitably returned. Satisfied that Shadower was not going to make a miraculous comeback, he turned away and headed back to the conifer stand behind the Settlement, completely forgetting the grumbling volcano that had prompted his foray.

  Overjoyed with his impossible victory over the frightening prowler, the triumphant Treefur regretted that no one was there to witness such a stupendous conquest. What good was such a resounding win with no spectators to cheer him on?

  Exhausted but jubilant, Alphie checked on the insensate Thunderfoot upon entering the glade before ascending to his perch and lapsing into a sound, well-earned sleep.

  * * * *

  Shrok entered the hideout.

  'You took your time,’ complained a scratchy voice from the shadows.

  Cragg's embittered son stepped fully into the cramped grotto secretly tucked away near the end of a minor gully north of the Settlement.

  'It took longer than expected, Malp,’ he replied unapologetically.

  'So what was the upshot of our little gambit?'

  A querulous Bonehead elder edged out of the gloom darkening the back of the cave and into the patch of starlight shining faintly through the crack of an entrance. Looking as old as the hills themselves, he had the crusty disposition to match.

  'Your stratagem failed.'

  'How so?'

  'That furry runt of a lowlander interfered and sank our visitor in the Oasis a few moments ago.'

  'Are you certain?'

  'Aye. I saw the whole incident from start to finish.'

  Malp mulled over the news and concluded, ‘A small setback, that is all.'

  'It was a mistake to allow that skinny Outsider into our vale,’ criticised Shrok.

  The older highlander dismissed the stricture. ‘Granted it was risky, but we can salvage something from this mess.'

  Shrok was dubious. The moment that opportunity presented itself, grave doubts had formed in his nasty mind.

  When those guarding Thunder Passage loyal to his father were masterfully replaced late the previous afternoon by sentries drawn from Flatstone Clan, Shrok had been impressed with the quickness of Malp's subversion. But he had baulked when the devious chieftain suggested that the unsavoury looking lowlander seen nosing doggedly about the foot of the falls in the dusky evening should be granted unopposed admittance to the Bonehead hideaway.

  'It was a stupid risk, Malp.'

  Malp swung a meaty forearm and swatted Shrok about the head.

  'Remember your place, laddie. I'm the Elder—you're the junior. The decisions are mine to make and for you to carry out. Do you savvy?'

  'Aye, chief,’ the insolent bull sulkily acknowledged, rubbing his clouted skull. ‘I just can't get to grips with the workings of your subterfuge.'

  'Then I'll explain it to you again. Letting an Outsider, especially a dangerous one, loose in the valley was not only going to heighten our cause but boost the speed of the movement.'

  'Won't it also highlight the apparent lack of diligence on the part of your lookouts for failing to stop an intruder from getting in?'

  'That's inconsequential. The council will have to focus on the obvious; that Outsiders are steadily uncovering our whereabouts and making inroads into the sanctum of the valley and will continue to do so until prevented.'

  'That's gonna be kinda hard when our main attraction is drifting at the bottom of the lake.'

  Malp shrugged off Shrok's pessimism. ‘I don't foresee any difficulties,’ he said with assurance. ‘You are the star witness to the intrusion. That's why I had you personally monitor the situation.'

  Shrok was floored by the implications Malp's newest suggestion conjured up. ‘You want me to appear before the Deciders?'

  'The very same session your sire has been busy arranging for sometime tomorrow.'

  'I'm to tell them my tale.'

  'Don't be afraid to embellish, Shrok. Play upon the fight between the two lowlanders and hint that such conflicts will spill over into our sanctuary if their intrusions are left unchecked. That'll set the hearts of my fellow Elders racing with anxiety. The thought of violence creeping into their little corner of the region will sway even our most ardent critics to my way of thinking.'

  The younger bull remained sceptical.

  'Don't fret, lad,’ Malp croaked. ‘I'll be there to back you up.'

  'You're coming clean over your involvement with the movement?'

  'It is time at last for the leader of the Regressionists to reveal his identity,’ the Flatstone Clan chieftain resolved.

  A wicked sneer crossed Shrok's snout. ‘Stone the Outside, Brother Malp,’ he said, intoning the catchphrase of their clandestine group.

  'Aye, Brother Shrok. Rock pulverises meat every time.'

  Chapter Eighteen

  'Rise and shine, horn-face.'

  Orridus stirred and opened a sleepy eye at the intrusive Treefur. ‘What time is it?'

  'Dawn has come and gone,’ Alphie crisply announced, ‘though you can hardly tell. Now get moving.'

  The Shieldhorn yawned disinterestedly. ‘What's the hurry, whiskers?'

  'Your Thunderfoot has woken.'

  'Why didn't you say so! Let's be off.'

  The pair tramped from the home cave of the chieftain of the Highrock Clan out into a sorry looking day where the midmorning sky was sullied with rain-laden clouds and a swelling plume of ash from the sputtering Redmount.

  'How is she?’ asked the hurrying hermit.

  'Beats me, spike-nose,’ Alphie replied in a ho-hum sort of tone. ‘Hettinor roused me to fetch you as soon as our big friend returned to the land of the living. I never got the chance to see how she was for myself. I'm not even sure how long she's been wide awake.'

  Orridus grunted. ‘What about Cragg, where is he?'

  'How should I know? He's your friend.'

  'I've been asleep, Alphie.’ The old bull Shortfrill noticed for the first time the Treefur's dishevelled state. ‘You're a mess. What've you been up to?'

  'Giving an old associate a swimming lesson,’ Alphie said, alluding to last night's drama. Scampering ahead, he did not bother to look back at the bamboozled expression he knew was unfolding on the geriatric's snout.

  They arrived at the sick glade shortly thereafter to be greeted by the welcome sight of Bronte conscious and receptive to Hettinor's nursing. The two cows had apparently become acquainted quite quickly. Hardly bright and bushy-eyed, it was gladdening to see the titanic cow cognisant after her worrying state of shock-induced oblivion.

  'How's the patient?’ Orridus questioned the successful Bonehead healer, eagerly eying up the revived Thunderfoot.

  'Hungry,’ Bronte croaked in answer.

  'Hush now, lass,’ chided Hetti. ‘You need to conserve what little strength remains to you.'

  Addressing the Shieldhorn's query, Cragg's mate calmly said, ‘Bronnie is as fit as can be expected after her ordeal. She woke disoriented and distressed after the fever broke. I managed to quiet her down by feeding her a little motherwort weed. She made it through the night but is not out of the woods quite yet, even though her wound is healing nicely. I prescribe a lot of undisturbed rest, starting now. Just because she's up and about does not give you cause to bother her.'

  'You sent for me,’ Orridus reminded Hettinor.

  'Actually, Bronnie asked to meet her saviour.'

  The hermit wore a puzzled frown.

  'I told her about you, Orry,’ supplied the healer. ‘At least the part about you bringing her here.'

  'Then she needs to be related the whole tale.'

  'Nay, what she needs is her rest.'

  Orridus was adamant. ‘Explanations are in order and I've a nagging suspicion that time is pressing. I'm sure Bronte has as many questions for me as I have for her.'

  'More,’ said the listening Thunderfoot.

  'It's settled then,’ decreed the Shieldhorn. ‘Whiskers. You're of the same mind, aren't you?'

  Alphie was prudently non-committal. ‘I've learnt my lesson not to get stuck between arguing lizards. Last time I did that I got dragged along on this crusade of yours.'

  'You stand alone then, Orry,’ rebounded Hettinor. ‘Bronnie is my responsibility and I'll decide whether she will be interrogated or not.'

  'I'm afraid not, love.'

  All heads turned as Cragg shuffled from the enclosing evergreens to enter the clearing. He looked haggard and obviously had not slept a wink since the lowland trio wandered uninvited into his domain.

  'And why not?’ she huffed to her mate.

  'Given that, my bonnie wee lass, I have called for an emergency sitting of the council at midday. Orridus and his travelling companions are ordered by the Deciders to attend.'

  The hermit nodded and made the casual observation, ‘Their reaction is not unexpected.'

  Alphie pricked his ears. ‘What am I missing here, horn-head?'

  Cragg stepped in before things got heated between Treefur and Shortfrill. ‘First things first. Hetti, will Bronnie be up to tackling the council meet by noon?'

  The slighted healer forsook her injured pride at having her doctoring instructions countermanded for the sake of her patient. ‘If she takes nourishment, I'll consider allowing the Deciders to see her.'

  The Highrock chieftain was amused by his cow's obstinacy. ‘What do you eat, dearie?’ he asked Bronte, suppressing a chuckle.

  'Any kind of leaf will do,’ answered the ravenous Thunderfoot.

  'Will these suffice?’ Cragg gestured to the surrounding stand of White Fir.

  Bronte's stomach answered for her with a hungry gurgle.

  'Tuck in then,’ encouraged the highland elder.

  Craning her neck, bony tendons limiting the lift of her stretching head to three feet above shoulder height, the orphaned cow from the Northern Thunderfeet began cropping the lowermost branches of the nearest conifer. Orridus, looking like he was about to grill the feeding lowlander, found himself headed off by Hettinor.

  'Oh no you don't, Orry,’ she scolded the old forest loner in no uncertain terms, barring his way and thumping her stout tail on the glade floor to underline her determination. ‘You will let her graze in peace.'

  The thwarted Shieldhorn shot an entreating glance Cragg's way.

  'Don't look at me,’ responded the Bonehead bull. ‘She only listens to me when it suits her.'

  * * * *

  Gideon bravely stood his ground. At least he appeared to. In reality, the Berranian was rooted to the spot in fear. The father and son duo of Killjaw king and prince paraded before him, snarling and growling horrendously, with the court dogsbody slinking ghoulishly in the background. If trouble had an image, this was it.

  It all started when Tank left the glade early that morning to feed, leaving Gideon to his own devices beside the rotting log. The alien seized the opportune moment to hurriedly nibble some of his pocketed space rations on the sly out of sight before casually strolling to within a stone's throw of the encircling forest. Kneeling to examine a stray wind-blown leaf, prettily stained a three-tone blend of ochre, amber and crimson by autumn's palette, he scanned the outlying woodland. Malevolent shapes, matched to thudding footfalls, patrolled the unclothed trees with fanged monotony. Making a run for it was definitely out of the question. Not long after that Orn made a brief visit, hastening away without saying a word and returning soon after to usher into Killjaw Clearing a furtive Rexus and Luthos. The Fastclaw messenger had plainly been hovering at the timberline just waiting for the Adviser to depart and so bring his deceitful master to the throne unchallenged. Such underhandedness did not bode well for Gideon.

  'What do you want, Rexus?’ the alien abrasively said, his tone confrontational despite his inborn terror of the fearsome meat-eaters.

  'That's King Rexus,’ corrected Orn. ‘Monarch of Mother Forest, Most Exalted Excellency of Fang and Claw, Supreme Majesty of Killjaw Kith and Kin, direct descendant of the first Killjaw regent, Terrolphus the Tyrannical...'

  Finding Orn's standard recital of his titles boringly protracted, the tyrant-king gnarled his interjecting minion to silence. Addressing Gideon with dangerous frankness, he forewarned, ‘We both know I'm not here to discuss the weather.'

  'Tank's gone for the moment. I guess we can dispense with any false pleasantries.'

  'On that we agree, One-eye.'

  Luthos gave the alien a cursory sniff and his tongue lolled. ‘Is this my snack, pop? There's not much meat on it and it reeks of dung.'

  Gideon returned the prince's disdainful inspection. ‘This is your heir?'

  'You work with what you've got,’ Rexus said ruefully, waving his puny forearms in a poor imitation of a shrug. He stared balefully at Gideon. ‘So get on with it.'

  'With what?'

  'Changing Luthos into the immortal Killjaw that'll beat off this rockfall from the sky.'

  The Berranian laughed a nervous titter. ‘Is that what you think I'll be changing the Chosen One into ... some sort of super lizard?'

  'What else would he be remade into?'

  'Boy, are you going to be disappointed.'

  Rexus stooped until his frightening maw was inches away from the offworlder's cyclopean face, his foul breath misting the alienaut's visor. ‘Disappoint me,’ he whispered snarlingly, ‘and I'll eat you alive.'

  Using a gloved hand, Gideon wiped his ‘eye’ clear. ‘I'd taste awful. Your idiot son's right. Thanks to your diet plan, I'm nothing but skin and bone.'

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48