Crat'ax frowns, then straightens. “The krai tried to kill us all, Sprub’ex. But it only succeeded in destroying a few platforms and huts. Let us show the Deep how well we are passing its test! Let’s now rebuild them better than before!”
The crowd cheers. Yes, Crat'ax is the real chief of the tribe. They all follow him, and no wonder. I’ve never seen anyone with more natural authority. Even the older men look at him for direction, including the chief. And now he’s a hero, too.
That scarred guy is a worry, though. He doesn’t seem to like me one bit. Or Crat'ax.
But I don’t care right now. I’m alive! My hands tremble, and my knees are still feeling weak. That monster was incredibly big, and its claws were as sharp as knives. If Crat'ax hadn’t come to help me, it would have killed me in one snip.
Everyone looks over at the destruction. Poles as thick as refrigerators have been snapped in half like toothpicks, and a lot of debris is floating on the surface. Men get in their canoes and paddle over to clean up.
I touch Crat'ax’s hand. “Thank you. It would kill me.”
“It would have killed us all,” he says with a little smile. “I’m just happy my spear was already in my hand. Did you get injured?” He looks me up and down.
“No,” I tell him. “But you did.” I point to his side, where two cuts are dripping dark blood. They’re two red lines with unhurt skin in the middle and could be from the very tip of a claw as it closed.His feet don’t look too good, either. “You almost die, too. You have leaf?”
“We have some leaves for treating injuries,” he rumbles, not too concerned. “But I think that wound is clean. It’s not deep. It will heal.”
“Where are the leaves?” I persist. “You show. Maybe other man is injured.” I don’t see anyone else who was hurt in the attack, but Crat'ax is dripping blood, and it should be taken care of.
“I’ll show you,” he says and puts three fingers at my shoulder, leading me away from the eyes of the others. It’s a possessive move, but I don’t mind it. His protective streak is clearly just as strong.
We walk along the walkways to a storage hut, many men grinning and slapping Crat'ax on the back as we pass.
“Here,” he says as we go in. “These are things that are not food.”
There are shelves of pots, ropes, and tools of all kinds, mostly wood. Crat'ax grabs a stack of red leaves and shows me. “These are what we use.”
We go back out to the sunlight, and I gingerly dab one leaf at his wound. The leaf is surprisingly absorbent and sucks up the blood. I put another one on the wound, and it seems to stick all right. “I think you right. The wound is clean.”
When I touch his wound, I’m very aware of how careful I’m being. And of how little he flinches. He watches me with a steady, unreadable focus, as if committing the act to memory. No one rushes us. No one interrupts. For all their noise and numbers, the tribe gives us space.
Up close, his size is less frightening than it should be. Still immense, still powerful, but no longer abstract. Just a man who bleeds. A man who could have died.
I force myself to focus on the practical task. Okay, clean, cover. Stop the bleeding. This is something I understand. Injuries don’t care about gods or tests.
His feet aren’t as badly lacerated as I feared, judging from the barnacle-like growth on the back of that giant crab. His skin under them is like armor.
I straighten. “And now very clean.”
“It doesn’t drip anymore,” he points out. “Thank you.”
I give him a little smile before I replace the leaves on the shelf in the hut. “Is fine. We help the men?” I point at the cleaning-up operation, where the whole village seems to be taking part.
The village has gone into motion. First it looks chaotic, and then it becomes purposeful. Men shout over one another, but their eyes keep bending toward the same center. Toward Crat'ax.
He doesn’t raise his voice much, and he doesn’t really have to. When he speaks, it’s in slow orders that cut through the noise instead of adding to it.
“Take the broken poles first,” he says, pointing with the butt of his spear. “If they drift beneath the platforms, they’ll be harder to get. Cut them loose and tow them clear.”
Three men immediately change direction, hauling knives from their belts and scrambling into a canoe. One of them looks back for confirmation, and Crat'ax nods once. That seems to be enough.
“Ropes here,” he continues. “We’ll lash temporary supports before we replace anything. We will put no weight on bare joints.”
Someone calls his name from farther down the walkway. Another voice overlaps it, asking about stored timber. A third wants to know where to put the salvaged planks.
Crat'ax answers them all. He’s not hurried and not the least bit irritated. He looks at each speaker when he responds, even when he’s already turning his body the other way. Nobody would think that half an hour ago he was in a battle to the death with a monster the size of a church.
“We have enough timber for two platforms,” he says. “Not three. Strip the ruined huts first. Anything sound gets reused.”
