Chapter-1-2

⁠—⁠—⁠— II ⁠—⁠—⁠—

“Ah!”

With a small yelp of surprise, the unknown watcher froze outside the rough-cut window of Guin’s cell. The leopard-man had initially assumed it was one of his captors—a warden, perhaps—come to check on him, but now he wondered if it might be some newcomer among the giants come to see the strange prisoner with the head of a beast. What had caught his attention in the gloom of the cave were two orbs burning with a yellow flame, like the fearsome eyes of a wild animal in the darkness.

Guin stifled the growl rising in his throat, and fixed his gleaming eyes on his visitor.

Gradually he made out the form of a small Lagon—a child, in fact. The youngster was nearly the size of an ordinary human man—tall enough that his head would be even with Guin’s chest if the leopard-warrior were standing. Yet the way he leaned up against the edge of the window suggested that unbalanced quality that children of all races share; and his eager, childlike curiosity was palpable.

The youngster’s face was slender for a Lagon’s, and topped with long hair, thick and tangled, much of it black with dirt and caked mud. Yet his trembling eyes were filled with the innocence of a newborn calf.

The young Lagon stared warily at the captive. He seemed on the verge of shouting and running for his life, yet Guin’s powerful gaze held him like a magnet, and the youngster stood frozen, as though caught in some ensorcelment.

“A… Amu,” he said, his voice shaking as he made a visible effort to stop trembling. The youngster was terribly nervous, that much was clear. Guin averted his harrowing gaze, and his visitor immediately seemed to relax. After a moment the visitor turned from the window as if to leave, his curiosity satisfied.

“Lagon!” Guin called to his back. “Tell me, what time is it now?”

The Lagon jumped, then froze in place. Guin’s eyes held him fixed, and the leopard-man’s voice, accustomed to giving orders, was persuasive as a whip. The Lagon child had no choice but to respond.

“A… Aii.” After a moment’s hesitation, he turned. Obviously he could not see well into the darkness of the prison cave. Yet he stood, staring through the window, meeting Guin’s bright eyes. “Aii… What…?”

“I asked you what time it is now. Lagon, do not leave.” Guin spoke this time with even greater force.

The Lagon child stood immobile for a long moment. Then he edged closer to the window, peering more carefully inside. Perhaps he was relieved that the strange prisoner spoke his own wildling tongue. Guin flattened himself against the rock wall behind him. It would not do to show too much of his face to his visitor and scare him further. His voice softened, and he asked his question again.

His visitor replied, “What… time? I do not understand.”

“You must know. Tell me.”

“I do not understand.”

Then it occurred to Guin that these Nospherus wildlings might have no system for dividing the day into periods that could be named or numbered. “Let me ask this, then: is the sun in the sky, or is it night? Does the moon shine upon the land?”

The Lagon furrowed his brow. “Yes, the sun is in the sky, where else would it be?”

“Is it high? Is it close to evening?”

“I do not know. Do not understand.”

“The sky—is it red?”

“Your words, they make little sense. I think perhaps your head is strange,” the Lagon said with something that sounded almost like a laugh. “Sky is blue. Sky is always not red.”

“Well, I suppose it’s not, I mean—Doalspit!—is the sky blue now, or is it black?”

“Blue.”

“Since I came to this place, have you slept? How many times have you eaten?”

“Too early for sleep. Lagon sleep only at night. I ate two saltmeats,” his young informant answered. Guin scratched at his chest. Now he was getting somewhere. At least it seemed that the sun had not yet set on the third day. That meant he was left with at least a day and a night.

Perhaps I have enough time after all.

“I have a request for you. Will you hear it?” Guin said earnestly.

“What? You are—you are evil, a lagon I have never seen. What if you are a demon? Mother told me never to listen to demons and their words.”

“But you’re listening now, aren’t you?” Guin pointed out. “Well? Has any harm befallen you?”

“No,” the youth said thoughtfully. “Nothing falls. No harm.”

“See? I am no demon, I promise you this. Please, hear my request.”

“What is it?”

“Bring me one of those saltmeats such as you ate. And something to drink.”

“Meat, and water?”

For a moment, Guin thought his visitor would refuse, but after a long pause the youngster spoke again. “I will go to the foodhouse, and bring you meat.” Then the Lagon turned and ran. Guin heard his footfalls receding down the hall.

A short while later, as the leopard-man sat deep in thought, he heard the thud of something thrown through the window landing on the stone floor of the cavern.

“Meat, I brought for you.” The youth had returned, and his voice was high pitched with excitement. “Mother is big lagon at the food house. She gets much food—as much as we need.”

“I thank you,” Guin said. But there was still a problem. He was overjoyed that the youth had brought him food, but now the saltmeat was lying on the floor beneath the window, well out of his reach where he sat chained to the stone wall in the back of the room. “I’m bound to this rock and can’t move. Bring a stick, and use it to push the meat to me, please.”

It appeared that his friend was beginning to take interest in their exchange. To a curious child it must have seemed like a marvelous game. Guin had relied on this from the moment he saw that his visitor was a youngster. As long as Guin kept his interest up and didn’t make him too uncomfortable, the Lagon child would probably do anything he asked.

After some time and a great deal of prodding with a long stick the Lagon had found, Guin held the meat in his hand. He doubled over, getting his head as close to his hand as he could, and crammed it laboriously through his mask into his mouth. It was terribly salty, being nothing more than raw meat caked with salt, but after long days of eating nothing but the plain food of the Sem, the taste alone was enough to breathe the life back into him.

Guin finished the sizable hunk of meat in the blink of an eye. He could have eaten more, but even this was enough to rejuvenate his strength and vastly improve his spirits. Yet his throat stung with thirst. He pleaded with his young friend for something to drink.

This did not turn out to be as easy as the meat. Yet, after a long search, the child was able to bring him a primitive canteen made of carved wood, with a cork in one end. When he pushed it over to the leopard-man it made a pleasant sloshing sound. Guin held the canteen between his knees, used his teeth to pry out the cork, and drank deeply. Ordinary water had never tasted so sweet, so delicious, nor had it ever felt so invigorating. In a moment he had drunk it all.

“Ahh…” Guin sighed, licking his lips like a contented lion. “May Janos repay your kindness a thousandfold! I wont forget what you have done for me. I feel like a man reborn.” He thought for a moment. “Say, can you tell me, is this village of the Lagon large?”

“Of course,” the child said, eyes wide, gazing in through the darkness at the strange man-beast hunched in the shadows. “The lagon are great and powerful,” he declared with evident pride. “Dodok the Brave and Kah the Wise lead us true.”

“And are Dodok the Brave and Kah the Wise in the village now?”

“Of course. As the sun and the moon are in the sky, they lead the Lagon. You know nothing.”

“That’s right, I don’t. That’s why I want you to teach me. Tell me about the Lagon. How many are you?”

“We are many, many,” his young informant replied. Guin tried several times to elicit a specific number, but the answer was always the same. Either the Lagon were as poor with numbers as the Sem, or his informant was too young to have learned counting.

“Do the Lagon enjoy combat? Do they like to fight?”

“Aii… I do not understand.”

“Are the Lagon strong?”

“Lagon are stronger than any other. Bhin stronger than Ta. Ran stronger than Bhin. Tii defeat Ran with one arm. And San and Ehb, and Lho are stronger than Tii, but Dodok the Brave strongest of all. He is the Brave. That is why Dodok the Brave is Dodok the Brave.”

“I see,” Guin said, collecting his thoughts. From what the child was saying, he could assume that the Lagon did enjoy combat, yet it seemed their militant energies were not directed at subduing other races, such as the Sem, but were exhausted vying for rank within their own community.

It sounded as though this Dodok the Brave were leading the Lagon together with Kah the Wise, yet he did not seem to be a hereditary chieftain in the vein of Loto, Ilateli, or Gaulo of the Sem, but rather the strongest warrior among the giants. He could picture a tournament whereby all the warriors would fight, with the winner of the final match claiming the title “brave” and leadership of the tribe.

If that were the case, Guin was in luck. All he had to do was to lure Dodok the Brave into combat. Even if the Lagon didn’t immediately accept him as their leader, a victory should still earn him enough respect among these hulking warriors that organizing a force to aid the Sem would be far more simple. As for the prospect of doing combat with the strongest among the Lagon, Guin was confident in his chances. Though these creatures were giants even compared to him, they were not particularly massive for their height. After all, Guin had overcome the grey ape of Gabul, a head taller than him and broader and heavier by far.

“I wish to meet Dodok the Brave.”

He heard a gasp outside the window.

“Why?” the child asked after some time.

“Why?” Guin echoed loudly. “Because I’m stronger than Dodok the Brave.”

“You lie!” came a swift response. Guin could hear the tremble of fear in the child’s high-pitched voice.

“It is no lie. Just tell Dodok that I wish to try him in combat. If he refuses, it is because he is afraid of me. Because he knows that if we fight, I will win.”

“There is none stronger than Dodok. If Dodok loses, Dodok will no longer be Dodok. Dodok is always strongest,” the Lagon said.

The logic was confused, but it appeared that Guin’s guess had hit the mark. He nodded to himself, satisfied, and went on, “Then call Dodok. Bring him here. Tell him I wish this. If he will not accept my challenge, tell him that I am stronger than he, and I am the next, true Dodok. I crossed the desert and mountains to test his strength, to challenge him. Tell him this.”

Another gasp. “Who…” the child began after a pause, “Who are you, lagon with the head of a beast?”

“My name is Guin,” the leopard-man replied, burying the twinge of doubt that he felt at his own words deep inside.

Though he had forgotten everything about his life before the Roodwood, when the girl Rinda called him Guin, he had responded naturally, unconsciously, accepting it as his name. It had to be right. I am Guin.

The child turned to run, but Guin called to him one last time. “Wait, child! Your name?”

“Rh… Rhana.”

“Good. Then, Rhana, do not forget to tell Dodok what I, Guin, the leopard-headed warrior, have said here.”

Rhana sped away without another word. Guin was listening to his footfalls disappear into the distance when a realization struck him.

Not “his” footfalls, but “hers”? Rhana was clearly a girl’s name. So the one who had given him food and water was a Lagon female. Guin smiled and gazed at the window of his cell. Then another, more sobering thought crossed his mind. I hope Rhana has the courage to deliver my challenge to Dodok the Brave.

Even if he ran the entire distance, Guin would need a full day and a night for the journey back to the Sem camp. That meant he had to get the Lagon on the move today and no later.

He hoped that Rhana would bring his message to Dodok and, in their fury at the leopard-headed monster’s impudence, the giants would drag him out of the cell. Yet if Rhana feared to admit that she had been to the cell, the challenge would never be delivered, and all his effort would have been in vain—

Even while he sat there thinking, precious time was slipping away.

No matter. I will deal with what happens when it happens, Guin decided, and make my next move when it becomes clear what that move should be. Now, he needed to conserve his strength, and so the chained warrior stretched out and made himself as comfortable as he could on the rock and closed his eyes. His stomach was full, and the burning in his throat had eased. As unfavorable as his conditions were, they had vastly improved in a short amount of time.

What will come, will come. What will be, will be.

Like many battle-hardened warriors, Guin was capable of sleeping at any time and in any place, returning to full wakefulness in an instant at the first sign of trouble. Within moments he was breathing regularly and softly. Rhana did not return, nor did an angry Dodok the Brave storm into the stone cell. Beyond Guin’s ken, high above the stony mountains, the sun began its slow arc down the sky.

“Rise! Rise, captive!”

Guin had awoken at the first sound of footsteps approaching down the corridor, long before the shouting started. Now he was feigning sleep to better gauge his visitors.

“He sleeps well!” one guard spat.

“Like a lazy beast,” another said.

On cue, Guin’s eyes snapped open. Three of the giant wildlings were standing in the cave before him. They carried stone-tipped spears in their hands and were naked save for hide loincloths tied about their waists.

“Dodok the Brave and Kah the Wise will see you now,” one of them announced with some pomp, then crouched to undo the leopard-man’s chains.

Guin was glad he had taken the precaution of hiding the canteen Rhana had given him in a nook in the rock where the guards would not see it.

The loosened chains fell to the stone floor. Surrounded by Lagon, Guin exited the small cell. His arms and legs tingled with receding numbness.

It seemed that Rhana had not managed to deliver her message to the chief, but there was little Guin could do about that. The stone of the dark hallway through which he passed was rough cut and damp with moisture. They passed through a doorless opening in one wall and he found himself abruptly outside.

It was a windy night. The stars seemed closer and more numerous than they had over the sands of the Nospherus desert. White Aeris shone in the sky above the jagged silhouette of a rocky peak. The moon, like a giant platinum disc, and the stars, scattered across the black drape of the night beyond the mountains’ spine, had the kind of harsh cold beauty that graces only such places where not a single tree grows or wild shrub flowers.

“Come along, monster,” one of the guards said, yanking Guin mercilessly in his wake. The prisoner followed without resisting.

As he was led along Guin gazed at the layout of the village, familiar from his passage through it earlier that day. The giants’ community was arranged on levels cut into the sides of the mountains that enclosed the valley. It was impossible to traverse it without either climbing or descending at almost every step. Now they descended toward a large open space at the very bottom of the vale that Guin guessed must function like the communal grounds of the Sem village. There were simple steps cut into the rock around this gathering place where the Lagon could sit to participate in tribal meetings. Perhaps the open ground was also used for their tournaments or the settling of conflicts.

Guin could see clearly thanks to the bright shining moon. His feet stepped lightly down the rough-cut stone steps. The three Lagon guards escorted him in silence. From somewhere far beyond the rocky slopes, the sound of a desert wolf’s howl came to them on the wind. It was a lonely sound.

As they passed each stone house, heads covered with thick hair peered out of doorways and windows, observing their progress. Guin caught glimpses of women carrying infants, as well as some Lagon he assumed must be very elderly from the grayish tint of their hair. In general, he found it very difficult to tell the female Lagon from the males. Those with newborns had breasts swollen for nursing and thus were easy to spot, but those without young children were flat-chested and as well muscled in their shoulders and arms as their male counterparts.

Most of them wore nothing but a solid coat of fur. To Guin’s eye, accustomed to the diminutive Sem, their height was unnerving and their necks seemed short and thick. Beneath jutting heavy brows eyes tracked the strange captive in silence with a mixture of curiosity and enmity. Though some heads withdrew into the doorways after the prisoner and his escort had passed, many of the Lagon emerged from their homes and followed the quartet down the steps. Before long a procession had formed.

To a hidden observer it might have seemed like a scene from a reenactment of Cirenos’ descent into Hell. It was a forboding and yet eerily comical sight: Guin, pushed and prodded by his three captors, making his way down the long rough stair to the stony clearing, trailed by a long shuffling line of curious Lagon. Several warriors were already sitting on the carved stone steps around the gathering place, waiting for their leader to pass judgment on their strange captive. No one spoke a word.

As Guin and his captors paused in the middle of the open place, the women and children who had followed behind them filed around to take seats behind the warriors on the steps. Guin cast his eyes about looking for Rhana but found no one resembling her among the children. He gave up and turned his attention to the Lagon warriors.

The three Lagon that had taken him from his cell now formed a watchful semicircle behind him, their spears held ready. Each one of them was a half-head taller than the leopard-man. The expressions on their craggy faces suggested a mixture of disdain for their captive and fear at his unusual appearance.

Guin raised his eyes to see that two chairs had been set at the edge of the clearing. A Lagon sat upon each chair.

In the right-hand chair was a Lagon of incredible age. Every hair on his body was white, and he was thin and bony to the point of emaciation, but the eyes beneath his bushy brows burned with an intense light. It had to be Kah the Wise. And sitting next to him—

Guin’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly.

Even though the Lagon was sitting, the leopard-man could tell he was immense—the biggest of any Lagon he’d seen so far. Were the giant to stand, he would be sure to overtop Guin by a full head and a half. His girth was massive for a Lagon as well. His shoulders, arms, and chest were thick with muscles that ran like bands of steel, bulging through his rich body hair, and his hideous face seemed drawn from a child’s nightmare.

This, without a doubt, was Dodok the Brave, strongest of the Lagon.

Guin would have to fight him.

And win.