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Torak cowered on his scratchy bed of pine-needles,listening to the World Spirit
punishing the trees. He was terrified of the hail, and of whatever had fallen onto the
roof. He was terrified of everything: the Lake, the Hidden People, but most of all,
the wolves. They were waiting for him in the Forest. Sometimes he glimpsed the
big gray one sneaking about just out of stone-shot, waiting to pounce.
Because of the wolves, he hadn't dared go into the Forest. Instead, he eked out an
existence on frost-shriveled berries and blackened mushrooms, with the 185
occasional slimy green hopping thing when he could catch one.
The world no longer made sense. The sky screamed at him, and from the trees,
little red scuttling things pelted him with wooden fruit. Darts of green lightning
shot past, laughing at him, and slithery brown creatures bobbed about in the water,
scolding him. While he slept, a monster came and gnawed his shelter, and when he
woke up, he saw branches swimming upstream.
Again something thudded onto the roof. This time, it squawked. Torak shut his
eyes tight. At last the storm blew over and the hail stopped. Shaking with fear, he
grabbed his axe and crawled out.
The ice had flattened undergrowth and ripped off branches; it had covered the
beach in hard, translucent pebbles, which crunched under his bare feet. In a patch
of crushed bracken, something stirred.
No. Two somethings. A pair of big black birds. Gripping his axe, Torak edged
closer. The larger one gave a terrified squawk and flapped, its wings, while the
smaller one tucked its head into its shoulders and pretended it wasn't there. Torak
saw the wreck of a nest, high-in a tree. The birds must have fallen out, bounced off
his shelter and into the bracken. 186
He took a step closer--which sent them into a frenzy of wing-flapping and high-
pitched squeaks.
He blinked.Theywere frightened ofhim.
He saw that the corners of their mouths were a crinkly pink, and although the span
of their wings was almost as wide as his outstretched arms, all that flapping wasn't
achieving anything.
"You can't fly," he said out loud.
That put an end to the flapping. They huddled together and stared up at him,
shivering with terror. His belly tightened. So much meat. And as they couldn't fly,
it would be easy. To his dismay, he couldn't do it. They reminded him of
something. Or someone. He didn't remember what. A rapidquork quork quorksplit
the sky, and he dropped to all fours.
High overhead, another big black bird wheeled-- except this one could fly.
Alighting on the remains of the nest, it glared down at him. Its head-feathers were
fluffed up like ears, its wings spread.
Angrily it snapped off a twig and threw it at him. Then it threw down several of the
wooden fruits. Quork quork quork!
"Leave me alone!" he shouted. Greatly daring, he picked up a wooden fruit and
threw it back.
The bird hitched itself into the sky and flew away. When he was sure it wasn't
coming back, Torak left
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the young ones on their own and went to forage on the shore. If he couldn't eat
them, they were no use to him.
He found a grubby mushroom which tasted all right, except for the bits that
wriggled and crunched because he'd forgotten to shake out the wood lice. Then he
caught two of the slimy green hopping things, which he killed with a stone. He ate
one raw and tied the other to his belt for later.
Returning to the shelter, he found the young ones where he'd left them. When they
saw the green thing at his belt, they flapped their wings and made squeaky begging
noises.
"No!" he said. "It's mine!"
The squeaks became outraged squawks. They didn't stop.
Maybe if he made them a shelter, they'd shut up. Piling an armful of twigs in the
fork of a tree, he grabbed the bigger bird and shoved it on top. It pecked his sleeve
and tugged. "Let go!" he protested.
The powerful beak was bigger than Torak's middle finger, and it easily ripped off
the sleeve. Gripping the buckskin in its formidable talons, the bird settled down to
shred it, eyeing Torak as if to say,I wouldn't have to do this if you'd fed me like I
asked.
In the bracken, the smaller one laughed.
Torak scooped it up and chucked it into the nest.
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The bird thanked him by waggling its hindquarters and spurting him with white
droppings.
"Hey! Stop it!" he shouted.
"Hey top it!" it croaked.
Torak blinked. Birds didn't talk.
Did they?
If they could talk, maybe he shouldn't let them starve.
Foraging in the undergrowth, he caught some spiders and squashed them in his fist.
The birds gobbled them up, and would've started on his fingers if he'd let them.
He fed them a leg of the green thing. And another. He decided enough was enough. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]