I awoke to a hot sensation on my chest, sometime during that magic time when night mingles with day, just before sunrise. I lay there unmoving and listening to the sing-song of birds high in the trees. All the horses were awake and clustered together, wide-eyed, neighing nervously, except one. The mare Cawop had been riding was gone.
“Tanner, Tanner,” said a hushed voice in my ear. It startled me because I hadn’t heard anyone approach. Glooscap was kneeling at my side, leaning in closely, as he’d done in the longhouse the previous morning.
“Where’s Cawop? And what’s going on with the horses?” I said, propping up on my elbows, blinking sleep from my eyes. He motioned with his hands for me to be quiet. There was a dull ache in my body from the previous day’s hard riding. And with this ache, I knew the others would be sore, much sorer than me.
“There is something coming,” said Glooscap.
“What is it?” I said, my heart picking up.
He didn’t respond, his fierce eyes were fixed on the forest back in the direction from which we’d come. “We must wake the others and go,” he said urgently.
He stood up suddenly and headed over to Brodan, who was still sleeping. He knelt down and spoke words in Sawnay. I looked around––Simon, Colby, the girls, but no Cawop. There was no empty fur, no sign that he’d ever been there. I rolled onto my side, got to my feet, and went over to Anna and Tabby. They were still asleep beside each other under a fur, Tabby holding Anna.
“Get up,” I said, shaking Anna’s shoulder. “We need to leave.”
Tabby opened her eyes first. She gave me a groggy, confused look, as if she’d been expecting to wake up someplace much different, maybe back home in San Francisco or Halton House or somewhere else on Earth.
“Come on,” I said. “We need to move.” She smiled dreamily like she thought I was playing some kind of joke on her, the kind we played almost daily back at Halton House. But then she focused on me, sensing there was something else going on.
“Now, Tabby. Get Anna up too.” Her eyes popped open. “Get up, get up, we’re leaving.” When I was certain that she fully understood the urgency, I rushed over to Colby who was sleeping on his side with a folded T-shirt shrouding his eyes, like all the youths did in the detention center to block the nightlight’s yellow glow. I jostled his shoulder, hoping to wake him quicker than I did Tabby, hoping he wouldn’t be typical Colby and try to argue with me.
“Hey, man,” he said, lifting his head. “I’m taking me another hour. My ass aches and my spine’s all rattled up.”
“We need to leave, lickety-split,” I said.
“Whatcha talking ’bout, man? Wake me up for breakfast, after that fire’s nice and toasty,” he said, and rolled back onto his side. Please, not now, I thought.
I grabbed his arm and tugged him back. He clutched my hand and pulled off his blind. “Touch me again. Something’s going to happen to you, all right.”
“This isn’t a joke,” I said, the pouch’s heat increasing on my chest. “If you don’t get up . . .”
Colby looked at Anna and Tabby as they hurriedly shoved furs into their bundles. Someone had awoken Simon. He was packing his bundle, too. Colby released my hand and nodded as though he finally got it. He threw off his fur and sprang to his feet. He started searching the ground around his bundle, becoming frantic, and said, “My shoes, my shoes are gone––someone stole my shoes!”
“Forget the shoes,” I said, sensing a change in the forest.
“You crazy, man. Those cost three hundred bucks,” he said. “My socks gone too––what am I supposed to wear on my feet?”
“Just hurry,” I said, and hustled back over to where I’d been sleeping to roll up my fur. The horses were casting glances back down the trail, their eyes wide and legs skittish. I’d seen horses act that way when a predator––wolf, bear, or cougar––was too close for comfort, their scent in the air. I stuffed my fur into my bundle, tied the thongs off, and slung it over my shoulder.
Glooscap and Brodan had notched arrows in their bows. An early amber sunrise scintillated down through the canopy, lighting up areas of the forest and leaving others inky dark. Then a fleeting movement, something shadowy between two trees, caught my attention. I watched for it again, waiting, my heart quickening.
A whizzing sound broke the magic-time silence. A spear struck the ground mere inches from my feet, quivering back and forth. Someone let out a blood-curdling scream. I whirled around. Brodan tottered back and forth, a spear protruding from his gut. Then he stumbled forward and collapsed onto his side, clutching the spear shaft.
Anna shrieked, covering her face with both hands. Tabby grabbed her shoulders and pulled her toward the thunder horses. They were neighing and jostling into one another fearfully.
Colby and Simon had their bundles shouldered, crouching near the firepit, glancing around, panic-stricken, unsure what to do.
“Follow the trail,” yelled Glooscap, drawing his bow. “I’ll find you.” Then he let fly an arrow. I knew he wouldn’t run. I knew he would stay and fight whoever the attackers were, whoever had speared Brodan. I stepped over to the spear that’d missed me by inches. I yanked it from the earth. I hefted it in my hands, light, balanced, about six feet long––just like the javelins I’d used in gym class, only the tip of it was obsidian instead of steel.
Simon and Colby rushed toward their horses. Anna had already mounted her mare, but Tabby’s mare was riderless and she was nowhere in sight.
A loud horn blared deafeningly, filling the early dawn, causing a shudder to run through my body. Shadows separated from shadows. They moved toward us like things from a nightmare, wielding weapons. I reached my arm back. I aimed at the one directly in front of me and hurled the spear at the same time Glooscap’s bowstring pinged.
The spear vanished into the cloak of shadow. A savage howl filled the night, as if a mortal wound had been dealt. It hit the ground, and began writhing and convulsing. There was a commotion behind me. Colby and Simon were wrestling someone to the ground. Another shadow leapt over the one I’d dropped, coming straight at me, whirling a tomahawk above its head.
“Go now,” screamed Glooscap. He tossed his head toward the horses as he drew back another arrow. He wanted me to flee with the others, but I wouldn’t abandon him and leave him to fight on his own—I couldn’t.
Another shadow darted from the forest, turning into a man in the early sunrise, bare-chested and wiry, his face painted black, body streaked like tiger stripes. When he reached an opening, I saw that he was actually bald, except for a black rooster of hair on the top of his head. He carried two long obsidian knives and moved eerily silently toward Brodan, almost like a ghost over the ground. I looked around for something to use as a weapon. Then I remembered Conroy’s Swiss Army knife in the kangaroo pouch on my shirt. Hastily, I pulled out the knife and opened the small blade just as Rooster Hair arrived at Brodan and bent over him. I took a final look back. Simon and Colby were on their horses galloping north on the trail.
I ran at Rooster Hair, the small blade in my hand glaringly inadequate. “Hey––get away from him,” I yelled.
Rooster Hair turned to me and all I saw were the whites of his eyes, teeth that had been sharpened, which made me think of shark teeth. He snatched Brodan’s hair and jerked his head back. Brodan tried feebly to grab his attacker’s hands, crying out in pain. Grinning maniacally, Rooster Hair plunged an obsidian knife deep into Brodan. His hands instantly flopped to the ground, his life extinguished like a blown-out candle. Then I noticed something on Rooster Hair’s hip. Instead of pouches tied to his belt like Glixtan’s, there were two darkened, shriveled heads, unmistakable with their mouths agape in silent, endless screams.
He roared like a beast as he wrenched his obsidian knife free, and plunged it again and again into Brodan’s lifeless body. Then he threw Brodan face down. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something flying toward me. Another spear whizzed by my head. Two more shadows emerged from the forest, heading straight for me. Then a spear soared between the two shadows. Someone had thrown it from behind me.
I turned around. It was Tabby, looking on as if she wanted to stay with us and fight.
“Get out of here,” I screamed. “You’re gonna get killed.”
She stood her ground, unmoving.
“Now––go,” I screamed.
She hesitated a moment, then dashed to her mare, mounted, and urged the horse north after the others.
“You go too, Tanner,” said Glooscap, backing up. I took a final look at the scene.
“But Brodan?”
“It is too late,” he said, drawing his bow.
Brodan’s lifeless body lay sprawled out on the ground, Rooster Hair standing overtop, the black paint on his face streaking from sweat. He saw me. He placed his obsidian knife to his mouth and licked the blade clean. Then he rushed at me.
He moved with inhuman speed, more like a wild animal. His hand shot out to snatch one of Glooscap’s arrows in midair. Without missing a step, he came on. He wasn’t so lucky with the second arrow. It hit him in the shoulder. The third arrow he dodged by rolling backward. Then he sprung to his feet and dove into the bushes.
Glooscap was right. It was too late. As I ran to my mare, I folded up the tiny Swiss Army knife. I leapt on. She spun around. She trotted ten strides, then burst into a full gallop after Tabby and the others. She moved without guidance. She took the trail like she knew it well, around protruding rocks and tangles of tree roots, up the steeper sections, navigating the snaky turns, huffing and grunting, her ears pinned against her head, her muscles contracting as I urged her onward. It was as if she knew we needed to get as far away from what had happened as quickly as possible. And so we did.