Chapter 45

As it turned out, getting the price demanded by Tako wasn’t a big problem. Lottie had spotted a herd of wild cattle a few miles up the valley we were in, to the east of our big grassy meadow. She’d spotted the animals as she’d been looking around for some place to put the helicopter down. It only meant that we needed to hoof it cross country for a bit to get to the herd. If she’d been one of my women, I’d have given her a kiss. Instead I just thanked her for the information and gathered my hunting party together. Within half an hour of Tako and the Forest People leaving, my hunting party was off and the rest of my people were hard at work.

The herd of cattle weren’t cattle, to be precise. They were aurochs, which pleased me even more as it meant that tomorrow, Tako was going to be impressed.

I’d gotten the impression from Tako, when he’d come down to negotiate the deal with me, that he hadn’t been impressed with my people or me. In fact he made it quite clear to me that he disliked dealing with outsiders. The thing was that I understood that attitude as it certainly wasn’t something new. Many of the people I’d dealt with over the last few years had felt they were better than everyone else. I’d even seen it in the way my people dealt with people that we were integrating into our community. A few of our older members could be arrogant and overbearing at times and they had to be reminded that they were once new to the tribe. Thus I could accept Tako’s attitude to a degree. What I couldn’t understand was a feeling he left me with when he’d finally walked away; a feeling that he secretly hoped that my people and I would fail to deliver the goods. I didn’t know exactly why the man would wish this since it was a profitable deal for his people, but I just couldn’t shake the sense that Tako would be very happy in the morning to find out that we couldn’t close the deal. Silently I wondered what he would do when he found out we had. I doubted that he’d be grateful that we had.

In a way it made sense that Tako had set the price to cross his tribe’s land so high, particularly if he really did hope that we would fail. Maybe deep down that was his motivation; he just didn’t want outsiders crossing his land. I didn’t know and the chances were that I would never know, but I could speculate about the way the man was thinking. I was sure he was comparing his hunting party to my group, and I was also sure he was looking at us as poor seconds to what he and his hunters were capable of doing on a good day. Bringing in four kills in one day was doable, but it would take a lot of work. His hunters could do it on a good day and we had less than a day to accomplish it. We would have to track the animals down, kill them and dress them out. We’d then have to haul them back to our camp, and on top of everything else, we’d have to feed our people as well. To Tako, it couldn’t be done ... or at least, so he hoped.

Gort and Geeta led the way for our hunting party. They’d taken off almost as soon as I’d told them where the game was probably located, and well before the rest of the hunting party was ready to go. I was taking the vanguard with me on this hunt knowing full well that without horses to haul the kills back, I’d need all the bodies I could steal away from the rest of the force to get the job done. It left Dunbar and Monty behind with most of the women to move the helicopter, to camouflage it, and to set up our camp.

Geeta and Gort met us halfway to where the herd was supposed to be. They’d been to the site and had confirmed that the animals weren’t wild cattle, but their larger cousins, the aurochs. They’d hurried back to tell us this along with how many there were, and in what direction the animals were moving as they grazed. Then they pointed out that they’d spotted a point downwind and about half a mile ahead of the herd, which would make a great spot for lying in wait for the animals to come to us. I thanked the two young scouts and had them lead the way.

The hunt went as expected. Gort and Geeta led us around the herd and to where we could wait. I let Gort take the first animal down with a well loosed arrow. As the animal collapsed onto the ground, the rest of my hunters took their shots, with a number of hunters doubling up on the same animal. Gogra and Tonko both targeted a large bull, Durt and I took a cow, and the ex-River People with us took the rest. In total we took down five animals; a bull and four cows. Then we waited as the rest of the herd moved on. After that, I stood watch with Gogra while the rest of men and Geeta dressed out the animals. We all built travois to move the carcasses back to our landing site.

We had to build ten travois to accomplish the move, as we had to cut the animals in half. Then we trimmed off the excess bits, just to lighten the load enough that my people could actually lift the travois and pull them. Even so it was hard work. We all found ourselves wishing that we’d brought horses with us. Thankfully the distance was only a few miles back to our landing site. It still took a lot of effort getting them back and we were all bagged by the time we got there.

That night we enjoyed auroch stew. I ate while Dunbar supervised shifting each of the half carcasses off the travois we’d used to haul them back, and oversaw lifting them into a nearby tree for the night so no scavengers could get to them. It was nice sitting and watching someone else working for a change. It helped make every blister I’d acquired pulling the travois back worth it.

When Tako showed up the next morning he wasn’t happy. He’d come with Sakkor and ten other hunters. They’d shown up as promised, roughly an hour after dawn. We were up and ready to greet the man, and we were ready to move out, having no desire to waste anymore time. Tako took one look at the half carcasses dangling from the tree limbs that we’d hung them from the night before, and cursed. Like I’d thought, he hadn’t expected my people and me to provide the price demanded.

It was at that point Tako got openly belligerent. Even though he had ten strong men with him, all capable of hauling a laden travois, he wanted my people to haul the kills to his village. I refused. The man’s temper flared at that.

“Tako says you have women with you,” Sakkor said with no hint of regret in his voice, translating a burst of verbal abuse spat out by Tako at me. “Use them to haul the meat.”

“The deal was to provide you with four kills, and I’ve done that,” I told Sakkor just as sharply as Tako had spoken to him. “My women will not haul your food. Tell him to honour our deal, now!”

Sakkor stepped back in response to my stern words and then he stepped off to the side, clearly not wanting to be in the path of Tako if he decided that he was going to resolve this matter physically. He then gave Tako my response. Tako didn’t take it very well.

I’d spoken about this to my people the night before. I’d learnt from my first encounter with the Forest People, way up north at the other compound that the Forest People were the most aggressive of all the people I’d encountered so far on this Earth, in the here and now. Marta had told me that there had been inter-tribal conflict from time to time amongst her people, where champions would fight to the death over the right to hunt a certain patch of forest, and that the men in her tribe treated anyone not a hunter, and/or not of their tribe, as an inferior and not worth of courtesy or respect. She even told me that many disagreements in her tribe had been resolved with physical violence, something that was unheard of in the other tribes I’d dealt with; at least until I came along and killed Hagar.

I’d told them what Marta had told me, and I’d warned them to expect Tako to be pissed off this morning. I’d also told them to let me deal with it. I was the tribe’s chief, and if anyone was going to face off against Tako it would be me.

Tako didn’t take my reply well. He snapped at Sakkor, who immediately stepped a few more paces away, in response to the barrage of obvious insults. Tako then turned to his hunters and spat out some more words, which from their response, I figured were statements to the effect that I’d insulted his honour and them as hunters. From their scowls and jeering, I took it that they weren’t happy with me as well.

“Stop acting like a child,” I shot at Tako when he was done ranting at his men, and he’d glanced back smugly at me. His smug smile faded immediately.

I’d spoken using the little Forest language I knew. It might have been the woman’s language, but from Tako’s reaction I knew that I’d hit the mark. His face turned purple with rage.

Tako attacked me. There was about twenty feet separating the two of us, which was plenty of room for me to see his intent and to respond to it. He pulled a bone-handled flint knife from a belt sheath first. He waved it in the air menacingly and then pointed it at me, spitting out a fusillade of abuse. When I didn’t do anything in response, but to stare at the man defiantly, Tako lowered the knife and then he came at me.

Tako was shorter than me and several pounds lighter, but he was muscular and fast and he did look like he had some skill when it came to knife fighting. He did telegraph his intentions, though. When he closed with me and lashed out at me with his blade, I jumped aside so he only slashed at air. It pissed him off a bit, adding fuel to his rage, and he came at me again. I let him slash at me a couple of times while I watched his movements and timed the speed of his actions.

The fourth time Tako slashed at me, I sidestepped his attack and I caught his wrist in my hands. With another step that drew me past Tako and behind him, I twisted his arm in such a manner that the man screamed out in pain. Before he or anyone in his party knew it, I had his arm reefed behind his back and pulled upward in the centre of it. While I did this, I kicked his legs out from under him. Tako immediately went to his knees. As he did, I put one hand on his left shoulder and with another tug, I dislocated Tako’s knife arm. At that point Tako cried out in pain and he dropped the weapon. As it slipped from his grip and dropped to the ground, I released his wrist. As I did, I stepped away from Tako, leaving him on his knees screaming out curses at me. I quickly moved around the man so I was standing in front of him.

Tako didn’t know when to quit. As I stepped around in front of him, he spat out another curse at me, and then he tried to force himself to his feet. I didn’t let him get up. As he shifted his weight to push himself up, using his one good arm to help him do it, I stepped forward and I booted him in the face. I was wearing combat boots. I’m sure that it hurt.

Tako went flopping backwards as a result of my kick. He landed with a thud, sprawled out like a rag doll and too stunned to move. He stayed down for a moment or two, as he groaned loudly, voicing his pain, but once more he refused to stay put. After shaking his head and cursing me again, the man rolled over and he forced himself to his feet.

Seeing him getting up, I decided it was time to finish him off, and to put him down once and for all. I let him charge me. He was unarmed, but for some reason the man thought he could simply run into me like some primitive football player, intent on tackling me. Once more I sidestepped his lunge, although this time I caught his other arm, and when I shifted my stance, I hip threw the man to the ground. Tako went flying, landing hard once again. While he was down, I stepped over to where he’d dropped his knife, picked it up, and stepped towards Tako.

The man was too wrapped up in his rage and anger to realize what was about to happen. As I stepped towards him, he rolled over and he forced himself up onto his feet again. Then he threw himself at me once more. This time he ended up impaling himself on his own knife. As the blade sank into his chest, Tako gasped with surprise.

He didn’t die instantly. I hadn’t driven the weapon in to hit a vital organ, but instead to cause him pain and to jar him into realizing that he’d made a major mistake. I think he did figure it out, although I really didn’t give him much time to reflect on it. As Tako’s eyes widened with disbelief, I pulled the blade out of him, and then I stepped about him. As I moved behind him, I grabbed him by the hair, taking control of him. Then I kicked his legs out from under him once again. This time as he went down, I yanked his head back.

I sliced the man’s throat in front of his people. I’d manoeuvred Tako so that when he went down he went down facing his men. I used Tako’s own knife. The flint blade was very sharp and it cut deep. When I was done, I just let the man go, allowing his now limp corpse to flop to the ground.

“Tako made a deal with me,” I spat at his men who were standing arrayed against me, some twenty plus feet away, “and I honoured it. Tako did not like that. He made a mistake. He underestimated me, and he underestimated my people. Who else wants to die?”

I spat this out, as best as I could, using what little Forest language I knew, hoping what I said made sense regardless of whether I spoke it like a man or a woman. From the men’s reaction, I think I got my point across.

There was a brief conference held by the men who’d come with Tako. Sakkor got pulled into it from the start. One of the other hunters took charge of the group from the very start, managing the discussion. Whenever someone else opened his mouth, the man shot him down with a growl. Five minutes after the discussion had started, Sakkor was sent back to speak with me.

“Makor will honour the deal with you,” Sakkor declared in a nervous voice. He spoke to me using the River dialect as before. “There will be no more fighting.”

“Good,” I replied firmly, tossing Tako’s knife aside as I said it. “Now let’s get going. The day is getting short.”

My insistence on leaving right away caused some more agitation amongst the hunters. They’d been intending to take us to see their chief, so that he could speak to me. I had no real desire to do so, especially after having killed Tako. I didn’t want to go there and have to fight someone else. If I did, I wouldn’t be happy, nor would the Forest People. Sakkor and I chatted for a moment or two about this. The hunters were insistent that I’d go, but I was insistent that I needed to move on, so I could go and find my friends. Sakkor finally pointed out that the village was along the route he would have us take, and that stopping there as we went would only mean a brief delay. I finally agreed that I would stop and talk to his chief, but my intention was to press on after the meeting. I had no intentions of waiting for the hunters who’d come with Tako to escort my people through the forest. Sakkor could do that.

Makor didn’t like the idea, but it only took a quick glance towards where Tako’s body lay for Makor to accept the inevitable. Once he’d finished speaking to Sakkor, he turned him loose so Sakkor could lead us on our way.

The trek into the forest and to the village took us only an hour of forced marching. I sent Gort and Geeta both out with Sakkor to show us the way, while the rest of us followed along at a crisp pace. I think Sakkor was surprised to see the two young people move out so quickly, while still moving stealthily. Their pace certainly left him breathless.

Sakkor’s village stood at the bottom of a large hollow. The hollow was formed by a creek that flowed down from higher ground. It had obviously eroded the land over the ages and the end result was the deeply sunken bowl, with a cleft at the lower end where the creek escaped. The village was large, by the present standards. It looked to be home to over three hundred people. It was surrounded by a low palisade of upright stakes that had clearly been erected to keep predators out, and not to defend the village from attack. Most of the dwellings in the community looked permanent; a mix of log cabins with thatched roofs and skin covered wigwams.

Sakkor went ahead to announce us once we’d crested the height that overlooked the village and we’d been spotted by the people in it. He was met by a party of hunters when he got to the palisade’s entrance. I watched as Sakkor spoke to them. His conversation was animated and the response of the hunters who’d come out to speak to him was heated. It was becoming clear to me that Sakkor wasn’t the top dog amongst these men, and that his status within his own tribe might prove a disadvantage later on. That to me would be a real pity. I’d only met Sakkor the day before, but from my brief interaction with him, and with the other hunters, I preferred dealing with him. Hopefully everything would work out.

“Chief Makot will speak with you,” Sakkor declared upon returning to where he’d left us, “but he does not want the rest of your people coming to the village. There are too many of them.”

There was a hint of hesitation in Sakkor’s voice as he spoke. He addressed me pointedly, which was something I noticed from all the men of the Forest People. They liked to puff their chests up and get in each other’s faces as they spoke. The impression I got was that the louder a man spoke in the tribe and the more aggressive a man was, the more people listened to you. What caught my attention was the fact that Sakkor’s aggressive nature seemed to fade over time when we chatted, but returned whenever he’d just spoken to his own people. It was like he was trying to reassert his manhood with me, whom by his traditions was an inferior outsider. Unfortunately for Sakkor, it just didn’t carry through when he did it. The nervousness in the back of his voice showed clearly that he really didn’t believe it in his heart.

“What about Tako?” I asked Sakkor curtly, actually making the man step back in response to my questioning tone. “Is the chief annoyed?”

Sakkor shook his head no, although he also lowered his gaze as he did, refusing to meet my eyes.

“No,” the man told me, in a hushed voice. “Chief Makot is not annoyed. Other men are, but the Chief promises you hospitality. Come with me now. He is waiting.”

I hesitated long enough to turn and repeat everything that Sakkor had told me to my people, speaking to them in our common tongue. Both Kim and Dunbar weren’t happy that I was going down in the village alone, but I pointed out that it couldn’t be helped. I did however suggest that Dunbar have our troops take up defensive positions about the village and to have them ready to move in if the shit hit the fan.

I was met at the village gate by the group of hunters who’d stopped Sakkor and who’d questioned him. They all glared at me in a hostile manner, but they did give way once they saw me up close. These men were all about the same height and build as Tako had been, and regardless of their numbers, my appearance obviously intimidated them. As the group parted and let Sakkor and me into the village, I glanced about taking in anything that might be of interest, particularly if I had to leave suddenly.

I did note a second group of people heading for the gate as Sakkor led me on. It was immediately clear that this group was made up of slaves. They looked in shabby shape even by the standard of the place and time, and they had a cowed look about them. Most of the group were women, all of whom were either in their mid to late teens or early twenties. They were scantily clad and barefooted. All of them looked away as they passed by me.

I forced myself to ignore the slaves. There wasn’t anything I could do about them now, whether I wanted to or not. I did however use my throat mic to speak to Dunbar and Kim and to warn them that the slaves were heading their way under guard. I had a gut feeling that most of the slaves were captured River People. I didn’t want any of my people deciding that now was the time to rescue their distant cousins. It might happen in the future, but not today.

Chief Makot met me by the central hearth. He was a tall man, who appeared to be slightly older than I was. He was a little more heavily set than most of his men, although it was clear that he was still well muscled. He was an impressive sight. He was wearing a sleeveless buckskin tunic and buckskin leggings. His garments were heavily adorned with beadwork, leather frills, and the quills of a porcupine. He had long, black hair, a scruffy beard, deep set black eyes, and tattoos all over his face, in addition to the ones encircling his arms.

Chief Makot met me standing. He was flanked by two hunters armed with spears. When Sakkor introduced me to him, I extended an arm in greeting so he could clasp forearms with me. Makot refused. He just glanced at my proffered arm and then spoke something to Sakkor.

“Chief Makot said sit,” Sakkor informed me a second later, pointing towards the bare earth that lay at my feet. Once more his voice had taken on an imperious tone.

“I’ll stand,” I spat back at him, resorting to my limited vocabulary once again, speaking the Forest People’s dialect so that Makot could understand my words.

My response startled everyone. Makot glared at me for a moment. Sakkor began to slip away, obviously expecting trouble once again. The two hunters standing behind Makot bristled with annoyance. For a moment, I was steeling myself for something more than a simple tongue lashing. I wasn’t afraid. My carbine was dangling around my neck and I was fully armed. I just hoped that this time trouble would pass me by.

I guess Makot decided that he wasn’t interested in trouble either. He called to someone, shouting off towards a hut. A woman appeared within seconds of him speaking. He spat out words at her when she appeared. The woman was young, well dressed, well fed, and physically fit. She did take on a submissive stance about her as Makot addressed her, but her attire suggested that she was someone of importance. She had a wolf’s head tattoo on her right arm, near the shoulder.

Once Makot finished speaking to the woman, the woman turned and hurried away, heading towards one of the better looking huts. While she did this, Makot turned and spoke to Sakkor again. Once he was done, Makot sat himself down upon a log that was obviously where he always sat. It was the only log near the central hearth and it was clear to even an outsider like me that no one else was allowed to sit by the fire, unless they plopped their ass down on the ground.

“The woman is Doha,” Sakkor informed me once all was said and done between his chief and him. “She was mate to Tako. She is now your property. She will be going with us.”

I had to bite my tongue! I hadn’t thought about it after having killed Tako, but I knew from Marta - who still teasingly called herself my slave - that the Forest People looked upon women as chattel at best, and a burden at worst. Since Tako was dead and I’d killed the man, I had gained Doha. If Tako had children, I’d have to take them as well. I didn’t want them, but there was no way I could refuse them. Instead I just stood and waited with Sakkor, until the woman reappeared about ten minutes later. Thankfully, even though she appeared heavily burdened with a pack on her back filled to overflowing, she showed up alone.

“Is that it?” I asked Sakkor gruffly once the woman had staggered to a halt near where we were standing.

Sakkor said no, that he needed to go and get his own gear, but that once he had gotten it, that we could go.

Sakkor left me standing by the central hearth under the gaze of Makot and the two hunters who acted as his honour guard. I didn’t even try to speak to Doha. Instead I muttered softly into my throat mic. I told Dunbar and Kim what was going on. Kim thought it was funny that I’d acquired another woman, but she didn’t spend too much time rubbing it in. Instead Kim updated me on our status, and then she informed me that Makor and the slaves hauling back the kills we’d provided these people, could be heard approaching and that they would be back to the village right about the same time I was going to be leaving. All I could think to myself was: ‘great!’