Moth

CHAPTER SIXTEEN: THE WOLF PACK

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

THE WOLF PACK

They raced through the darkness, a dozen wolfriders, heading toward the lumbering herd.

The towering, shaggy creatures raised their horned heads. Their eyes gleamed in the moonlight, as large as dinner plates. For a moment the stonebeasts only stared, confused. As the danger registered, they bugled cries of fear, a sound like wobbling saws that rolled across the plains. They turned to flee, hooves thundering and fur billowing.

Riding upon his nightwolf, Okado nocked an arrow. He snarled, prepared to kill.

As a child, a fisherman's son in a backwater, Okado had often pitied the crayfish they boiled. He had been weak. Since then, he had crushed that pity. He was a hunter now, a killer, a leader; no compassion filled his heart. He roared as he rode toward the stonebeasts, these hills of flesh that could feed a hundred people. Their horns were long, their hooves wide, their muscles rippling. Their teeth, which could grind rocks for moisture, could easily grind bone too. Yet Okado only growled, for he was a warrior, and no fear could fill his heart.

"Chanku Pack!" he shouted, leaned forward in the saddle, and tugged back his bowstring. "Ride!"

The herd wailed, galloping across the plains. Despite their girth--each stonebeast was large as a boat--they moved as fast as nightwolves. Okado's own nightwolf, a great black animal named Refir, ran beneath him, fangs white and eyes blazing in the dark. At his sides, hundreds of other warriors rode their own wolves, shouting battle cries. They held their own bows, and katanas hung across their backs.

"Fire your arrows!" Okado shouted. "Claim our prizes."

He released his bowstring.

His arrow sailed through the darkness. A hundred others followed from his fellow riders. The projectiles slammed into the fleeing animals. Three stonebeasts yowled, tumbled, and crashed onto the rocky plain.

"Fire!" Okado nocked another arrow and kept riding. "Take them down."

Already tasting the bloody meat, he shot again. A hundred more arrows flew through the night. More stonebeasts mewled and fell, raising clouds of dust. The wolfriders flanked the herd from three sides; the beasts ran in a panic, stumbling over one another, arrows slamming into them.

Okado kept racing alongside them through the dust, firing arrow after arrow, picking out all the animals he could. The carcasses covered the plains, blood dampening their fur. With every beast he slew, Okado's blood burned hotter.

The herd only traveled here twice a year, migrating from the Inaro River south across the plains, heading toward the sea, where they would breed. Only twice a year could Okado hunt them, and they would keep his pack alive. The flesh of each beast would feed many families. Their bones would form the skeletons of huts. Their furs would become clothes, their tendons would become ropes, and their fat would burn in their campfires. Not a part would be discarded; they were beings of life.

Okado shot another arrow, hitting a young animal--this one was barely larger than his wolf--and sent it tumbling down.

Finally, once a hundred carcasses covered the plains, the stonebeasts realized escape was impossible. They turned together like a school of fish and came charging toward the wolfriders. Thousands of them, their horns long as swords, raced toward Okado. Their hooves raised storms of dust, and their eyes blazed.

Okado fired another arrow, hitting one in the eye. His wolfriders scattered, raced upon the hills, then descended upon the herd from its flanks. More stonebeasts fell. More hope for food, fur, and a future spilled across the plains in crimson puddles.