Red Hands

Part Four: Tribulation

     The second night since Iesuah's death had already fallen when Red Hands crept to the outskirts of town. The forests surrounded her home no matter which way she traveled. Giant evergreen trees reached towards the canopy, so close to the Great Lion that some people swore that if a mortal could climb to the peak, he or she would ascend straight to the Great Lion's home.

Red Hands didn't know if she believed that fanciful tale—it seemed that the Great Lion was much more distant than that—but she thought the trees were pretty, nonetheless. However, that was not their true benefit: they were perfect cover for sneaking out...and hiding traitors amidst their welcoming branches.

Red Hands darted underneath the low-hanging bits, her eyes riveted on the ground. Every sense in her body felt electrified. She sniffed the air, as if she were a true wolf, and then bent down on all fours. She pulled the head of her Cub pelt down over her chin so that someone might, at first glance, mistake her for the aforementioned animal.

Now, she could peer out at the world through the vacant eye slots that Nanny had carved out for her. The moonlight illuminated a path in the forest that only other sharp eyes knight see: a stray footprint here, a crushed leaf or branch here, the signs of a hastily concealed fire.

Oh, yes. Iesuah's followers had been here. Perhaps even as recently as yesterday, as they watched the man they revered executed and delivered to the flames.

Red Hands crawled along in the dirt. Crimson now discolored everything from her palms to her elbows on both sides. And worse: the smell. She hadn't noticed it until Bear had mentioned when she'd sat next to him at another celebratory supper.

It was if the stench that had filled her nostrils when Iseuah's body was burned clung to her as well. She had hoped that she would somehow grow used to it, but no. There had been no reprieve as of yet.

But, wait.

She lifted her head. A new scent on the breeze. A familiar scent. A campfire.

She smiled and broke off into a run. She swung herself onto the nearest tree and scurried up the boughs for cover. She leapt from one trunk to the next, following her nose until her eyes could take over.

A flicker here of an orange light. Ground trod beneath clumsy feet. Damage to the bark where someone has separated bits of the evergreens in haste. At last, her ears pricked with the sound of hushed murmurs and sorrowful words. Someone cried, perhaps an infant or child, but the sound was quickly hushed.

There they were. Her prize.

Her prey.

She paused, perched on a sturdy limb in the middle of the closest evergreen. She could see a small group of wearied souls beneath her. Ten...fifteen...twenty people squeezed around a bonfire that was a little more than a flicker. Someone coughed. A few were missing legs or other body parts. One woman was covered in large welts—Red Hands recognized the signs of one of the many pox that beleaguered the Tribe.

So sickly. How had these miserable wretches escaped the slaughter the first time?

"I just don't know," one man said. Red Hands hasn't heard the original query, but she strained her ears to catch what might come next. "Her fever only grows in intensity. Iesuah would know what to do."

Someone spit on the ground. "But he had to go and leave us." This came from an elderly man who had a bandage wrapped around his eye. There was no blood to mar it, so Red Hands wondered if he'd somehow lost his sight in an old injury.

"He told us what would happen." This came from a large woman, pressed up against the first man who had spoken. "And he said he'd be back."

"I told you. They killed him." This came from the woman with the pox. A toddler sat on her lap—how odd. Was the child not scared of catching the pox themself? "I saw it with my own eyes."