Chapter 28

After a little time talking about the thaka herd and how to handle it, Denac and I decided to go on and start our hunt. We could go back out the way we had this morning and camp well away from here. We might find another small herd or at least we would surely find a few to shoot. After all, we were already set up with food, our bedding, and the cashda were ready. We kissed our mates and Lanita and mounted up.

We practically followed yesterday's trail out again, and when we came to the spot where we'd found our herd we kept going. I noticed that the forest seemed a little thicker for a while, but occasionally we'd come to a large clearing, usually fifty acres or so, and a couple looked to be nearly a hundred. We stopped and made a camp about an hour before sunset.

We were by a small stream at the edge of one of the clearings. After watering the cashda, we hobbled them and then removed all the tack and harness, except the halters. We dug into our traveling rations, ate what passed for supper, and unrolled our bedding and went to sleep.

It must have been several hours later that I woke, with both moons nearly directly overhead. Buster was snorting and I could see well enough to tell that all of them were looking off in the same direction.

I stood up, trying to see what was bothering them, but even in the moonlight I couldn't. Nothing to do but lie back down and wait for whatever would happen. Nothing did, and I went back to sleep after the horses lost interest in whatever it was.

Denac and I woke just at sunrise the next morning. We both watered a tree and started on our traveling breakfasts before he noticed that we had some extra cashda and pointed it out to me.

"Well I'll be damned. That must have been what caused them to wake me up last night," I said.

"But what are they?" he asked.

"We called them Shetland ponies where I came from. They are like cashda, only smaller. They seem to like the company they're in though and I hope they follow us home," I said.

"Can't we drive them home like we did the thaka?" he asked.

"Maybe, but probably not, besides it would be too much bother and we really do need to get some more thaka," I said.

"There is that, since it's what we came to do in the first place," he said.

We saddled Buster and Red and put the leads onto Gertrude and Matilda before we removed the hobbles, then we mounted. I sat still for a few minutes, mostly to see what the ponies would do. They just stood around as if they were supposed to or something.

They had backed off as soon as Denac and I started moving around, but they had probably been here for hours before we woke, so we weren't a surprise to them. After hanging around us while we were sleeping they probably figured we were harmless.

Just as I was thinking about moving off I caught a scent of thaka. I could tell that there weren't nearly as many as the day before, but it was faint and I knew it was out on the edge of my normal scent range. I told Denac about them and we headed out. Sure enough the Shetlands came with us, trailing Gertrude and Matilda, all nine of them.

I was right about the thaka being at the limit of my scent, they were probably three quarters of a mile from us, and by the time we were within sight I could tell that there were three males, and four females with no young. We were still probably four hundred yards from them when we stopped and I dismounted to fire.

After finding a handy stout limb about the right height, I settled in to use it as a rest, acquired my first target, and started firing. The first two I took didn't even have time to realize they were in danger. The others knew something was wrong, but they didn't seem to be able to connect the loud noise and us with their predicament. I managed to get them all.

Our cashda had already heard the M1 so they weren't agitated. The ponies hadn't heard it before, but when the bigger cashda didn't cut up, they decided they wouldn't either, I guess. Anyway, when I mounted and we headed to the kills they came right along, and they hung around grazing with our stock while Denac and I built two travois and loaded the thaka onto them.

"This sure beats gutting one and cutting it up where you kill it," Denac said.

"Yes it does, and the women will be a lot happier about it too. Just think, all we had to do was ride out, spend the night, get up and shoot seven thaka, cut their throats to bleed them, and put them on the travois.

"The women will be proud of us for it and more than happy to do the rest. We barely had to do more than take a nice ride for the fun of it," I said.

He laughed at me about it, but dammit, I was right. This was the way to hunt. Go out and do the manly deed and then bring the work back to the women. Hell, they even preferred it that way, and damned if the ponies didn't follow us all the way back.

When we reached the gate to the canyon I got down, opened it wide, remounted, and then Denac and I walked the whole parade on in, ponies and all. One of the donkeys spotted the Shetlands and brayed like hell. When the Shetlands heard it they forgot about us and rushed up to greet the donkey.

Jortah was surprised, but he came trotting over to see what was going on.

"They're called Shetland ponies, Jortah, they found us and then followed us home," I said.

"Should we treat them like the other cashda and donkeys?" he asked.

I noticed then that he had about twenty of the adult quarter horses in the capture pen, and that two guys were petting and scratching on one of the mares in the chute. Damn, he was doing a good job, or they were.

"Might as well when you get to them. It won't hurt anything," I said.

Meanwhile, we had a small snafu. The dead thaka were on this side of the river and the women who'd rather skin and cut them up themselves were on the other. Jortah said he'd hold the lead for Gertrude and Matilda while we went back to camp for further instructions.

Denac and I took off then, I'm sure he was hoping, like I was, that someone would feed us after the details were straightened out. We'd missed lunch after all.

I found Caloe right away when we hit camp, and dismounted to give her the news. She gave me some of her own then.

"You need to have some of your workers help us then. We can skin and cut up the thaka, but we need some help processing the hides.

"The other men that went hunting yesterday brought back five more thaka, and they've gone hunting again today. I'm glad that everyone has done so well, but the work is backing up on us," she said.

"That's no problem. I'm sure they'd all be glad to help if you'd like for them too. In fact, I'm not above it myself," I said, grinning.

"That will work well. If you can get the skins scraped and stretched we can handle everything else. You didn't happen to bring the ones you killed back without gutting them did you?" she asked.

"Of course, but we can do that too if you'd like," I said.

"No, that isn't what I was getting at. I was hoping you hadn't done it yet. I do have something I want you to do though.

"While your helpers are working on the skins, I want you and Denac to start giving all the men lessons on using a cashda to pull a travois. Every one of the other thakas came back minus some of the best parts," she said.

"We'll be happy to do it, but where do you want to take care of the thaka I brought? I'm not sure we can get them across the river very easily," I said.

"I'll let Katia gather a group to go take care of them over there. Can you bring them down near the river?" she asked.

"Of course."

"Good, do that please, and I'll send Katia and some others over to deal with them.

I mounted again and Denac and I went back across the river.

"I'll have to say that things seem to be working out well for us, and I'm pretty sure you are the cause of it," Denac said.

"Why do you say that?"

"Well, I probably should say that things have been going better than I could ever have imagined since you knocked me out. I'd have you do it again, but I don't think I could stand it if life got much better," he said, and laughed.

"Well, you should consider this too. In a few days we're going to have to teach Zakat and Matatu how to ride the cashda. We can always hope that at least one of them falls off. Just think how hard it will be to keep from laughing at them," I said, and he went ahead and got his laughing over with just from the thought of it.

When we took the travois leads and headed for the river, Jortah told us he could send four men to help right away, and damned if they didn't come running and catch us before we got there.

Katia, Shaeta, and Nita came down a few minutes later with several other women, including Shata, and they brought six thaka skins with them. When they made it across Shata took over.

After all the thaka were off the travois, she sent two of the guys off to cut saplings for stretching frames and everyone else started cutting and skinning. Denac and I were summarily dismissed and sent to eat.

"Jekaycey is fixing you two some lunch," Shata told us.

We tried pulling the travois across the river, now that they were unloaded, and it worked well enough. It would have been a bother if they'd had skins covering them, but we'd just used small cross members when we built them and they were no problem.

Lanita and Nosey found us while we were hobbling our mounts and travois cashda so they could graze while we ate.

"Daddy, I heard that you and uncle Denac brought back seven thaka," she said. She was clearly excited and she had made Denac's day with the same breath.

"Yes we did, but that's not all we brought back," I said.

"I knew it, I just knew that was why you wanted them," Denac said, laughing.

"Of course it was," I said.

"Of course what was?" Lanita asked.

"You and Nosey will get to see as soon as uncle Denac and I finish our late lunch. Do you want some?"

"No, aunt Jekaycey fed me at lunch and she packed me full," Lanita said.

"Good, that means more for me."

"Well... Maybe I will try a few of the best bites," she said, grinning, but when time came she didn't.

Jekaycey brought Denac and I a bowl of lunch then and sat with us while we ate.

"I can never remember this Calak having so much meat come in at one time," she said, "and we don't really even need it so much right now."

"No, but we need the leather and the meat comes with it," I said.

"I know, but it just seems that it's easier now," she said.

"Yes, but in a few years it will be even easier when all we have to do it go pick one from the herd to slaughter," I said.

"Yes, I've been thinking about that too. We won't even have to dry so much for winter," she said.

"No, but we should probably cull them thoroughly as soon as it is cold enough to freeze the meat. We will have to find them enough food for the winter, and that isn't easy," I said.

"That's right. I hadn't thought of that, but we will have to find something for them to eat," Denac said.

"But what can we feed them," Jekaycey said.

"Hay."

"What is hay?" Denac asked.