She didn’t bother asking what it was. It was a pointless question and would waste valuable time. He was as clueless as her. Instead, she listened, the pounding of hoofs growing. It sounded like a stampede.
There, it was coming from her right, away from camp, but it wouldn’t be long before the thing responsible for the sound was on them.
“On your feet!” her father shouted seconds before Shea could, his deep voice carrying.
The camp stirred into motion, Fallon’s warriors and her father’s pathfinders slipping seamlessly from sleep to waking in seconds as they found their feet, weapons already in their hands. In moments, they stood at the ready, facing danger with alert eyes, anticipation on some of the warriors’ faces.
There was a long breathless moment where they waited, nothing happening. Just that relentless pounding drawing closer, a storm approaching and no means to get out of its way in time.
Close to Shea, slim forms burst into view, bounding over small rocks and around the large boulders strewn in their way, their shapes almost indistinguishable in the dim light. They were little more than shadows as they rushed toward them.
One of the creatures passed near. She caught an impression of antlers and a human-like body. For a long moment, she thought the deer-like creature was steered by a man on its back, until she realized the torso transitioned into the powerful body underneath. It was that of a deer or an elk, some four-legged creature with hooves. It was something Shea had never seen before. The beast’s powerful legs carried it past her before she could catch more than a glimpse.
It, and its brethren bounded around and through their little party. One leapt over a human when there was no other way. Almost as swiftly as they’d come, they disappeared into the night, leaving the befuddled group staring at each other.
“What in all the ancestors was that?” Buck asked, his voice carrying to where she and her father still crouched on the boulder.
That was a very good question. One Shea would like the answer to.
She slid down the boulder, landing on the ground, her father seconds behind her before they made their way to the rest of their companions. The light from the half-moon made the shadows harsh, and while she could see the tracks their late-night guests had left, she couldn’t see well enough to make out fine details.
She was careful not to walk over any of the ones she could see, her father doing the same on the other side of her.
“Shea.” Fallon’s voice was a quiet thrum of power in the fervor that was starting now the surprise of their visitors had worn off.
“I’m here, Fallon.” Shea looked up from where she crouched next to one of the hoof prints at the tall shadowed figure a few feet from her. “I’m unharmed,” she said as an afterthought. “Was anybody hurt?”
“One. Chirron is with him now.”
“How bad?” she asked.
“He’ll live.”
That was something at least.
“Anyone want to tell me what those things were?” Van asked from the opposite side of the camp, his voice full of irritation. The leader of Lion clan was every inch the warrior. A man who’d prefer to bludgeon his problems to death and then burn the carcass.
To say he wasn’t enjoying his sojourn in the Highlands was putting it mildly. With no one to kill and having to play nice with the pathfinders accompanying them, he’d been like a bear with a sore paw for the last several days. Even the odd beast hadn’t done much more than allay some of his irritation, since he saw little sport in killing them. His preferred prey was other humans.
Shea dusted off her hands as she stood. Fallon had come to stand next to her, and he touched her arm as if to assure himself that she really was alright. She clasped his wrist and gave it a squeeze before directing her attention to the others.
“They looked like people,” the hushed voice of a Trateri said into the quiet.
“Only with horns and the body of some type of animal,” Buck returned. The normal sly humor was gone from his voice. Something about the creature had seriously spooked him, and he wasn’t the only one.
Shea could sense the unrest in the Trateri. The pathfinders too, but there it was a little subtler. They were no happier about the events than their companions, but they were hiding it better. Maybe because this wasn’t something new to them?
As for the beast, Shea didn’t know what to tell them. She’d never encountered anything like it. Beasts were monstrous animals, in form and mind. Most were driven by instinct and would attack when threatened, but otherwise went about doing whatever it was beasts did. A few beasts showed signs of an almost human intelligence—revenants were the first to come to mind—creatures that could strategize and evolve their tactics based on the actions of their prey. Thankfully, that particular brand of beast was rare. Otherwise, the human population would be even smaller than it was.
“Do you know what it was?” Fallon asked in a voice meant only for her ears.
Shea shook her head, forgetting he probably couldn’t see much of her in the dark. “No, I’ve never encountered anything like it.”
“I think your pathfinders have,” Fallon said, his head turned toward where the pathfinders had arranged themselves in a clump.
“I think so, too,” she responded in a thoughtful voice.
“It makes me wonder what else they aren’t telling us.”
