Читать книгу Worlds Apart - William L Frame - Страница 11

Chapter 5

Along the River’s Edge

The landscape’s appearance changed quickly in their valley from the lush green freshness of spring into the yellowing dry tans of summer. Jennifer calculated it had been forty-four days since her landing and she had seen no one other than Taric the entire time. Today she was going to lose the hard dried out splint on her leg and be done with it. Grateful she would no longer need the pair of crutches Taric had made for her a few days after he set the bone.

She was waiting for him to come outside and called out to him. “Come on, Taric. What’s taking you so long?” she said in his language, thinking she said it rather well and smiled.

“Coming. What’s the hurry? The river is not going anywhere,” she heard him reply in English from just inside the cave entrance.

“Crutches or carry?” he asked Jennifer with a warm smile when he exited the cave, with a bow and a slender bag of arrows slung over his back and another neatly tied bundle over his opposite shoulder.

“You can carry me if you’d like,” she replied, knowing he enjoyed the closeness as much as she did. “Taric, where are your people?” she finally asked him, curious about the life he lived in this world.

He took the crutches from her hands and threw them beside the firepit. “You won’t need these anymore. Might as well burn them. They’ll make good firewood,” Taric joked as he swept Jennifer off her feet and into his strong arms.

“My people are on the other side of that mountain range in the north. I was on a journey when you fell to the land,” Taric answered, beginning their daily walk to the river’s edge, nodding in the direction of the mountains. “What is it like living in the heavens? Are your people up there?” he asked in return, wanting her to be just a girl, but still believing she was one of his people’s ancestors come back to life.

“I’ll tell you tonight when the stars are out,” she answered and then asked. “Do all young hunters take a journey into the wilds alone or are you running from something?”

“I’m not running from anything. I wanted to see the land south of the mountains and meet new people. My tribe is a small one and has more hunters than women to provide mates. There is no future for me in my tribe without a mate. I’m much older than the tribe’s oldest girl child. When she comes of age, I’ll be too old to be considered as a mate. She’ll want a younger hunter in his prime as she will be. Who would want to start a life with an old man as a mate? I wouldn’t. So I left the tribe to find my future and I’m not sure where it will lead me,” Taric honestly replied, unaware that her modern, jaded, and cynical mind’s interpretation of his matter of fact statement meant; she was not worth his consideration as a suitable mate.

“Oh,” she replied with a slight frown on her lips and then quickly smiled to hide the pain of her hurt ego and cheerfully quipped. “And then I came along and ruined your whole trip,” she said, forcing a slight chuckle out of her throat as she lay her head on his shoulders so he couldn’t see her watery eyes. At the embankment of the river, Taric relaxed his hold and lowered her softly to the ground next to the sunning boulder. He steadied Jennifer as she tested her weight on the leg using Taric’s body as support by leaning against him. The closeness and scent of him forced her to wave off his willing assistance because she did not trust her ability to restrain herself. Taric’s statement said it all, she thought as she watched him lay the bulky bundle onto the ground and then leaned his bow and quiver of arrows against the boulder. With practiced ease and easy smile, Taric swooped Jennifer up off her feet and back into his arms. He strode quickly down the embankment nearly to the water’s edge.

“No! Don’t you dare!” Jennifer screamed out a hopeless plea for mercy. They both began laughing uncontrollably as she twisted and squirmed within his strong arms to escape what was to come.

“Ready,” he announced, trying to suppress the laughter convulsing his body. Taric smiled as he held her squirming body firmly in his arms and launched them both into the chilly, quick-flowing, shallow water.

Still laughing at one another with amusement over what had become a morning ritual. They stood up to their waists in the water and stripped down to skin and tossed their clothes onto the shore. The chilly water urged them to wash quickly and return to the river’s sandy embankment as soon as they could.

As she washed, Jennifer thought about how their relationship had developed since they began their daily walks to the river in the mornings. It had become her favorite time of day. She was alone with Taric on a personal level, and it was the only time of day he wasn’t involved with some other activity. Taric never seemed to rest or simply stop what he was doing and enjoy life, except in the mornings with her.

Every night after eating, he’d go out into the grass and bring armfuls of the stuff back into their cave and weave them into various sizes of tightly woven baskets or large loose ones depending on their intended use. If he wasn’t out hunting or drying meat, he was scraping the inner hides of his kills. He was constantly on the move, gathering fruits and wild vegetables was a daily obsession. There were neatly stacked baskets filled with fruits, grains, and dried meat stored in the cool dark inner cave. To Jennifer, it looked like there was enough to feed a tribe. Behind their sleeping furs, Taric also stacked rows of firewood piled high and deep against the entire back wall, and yet every night, he would add more wood and make a few more baskets as they talked to each other in the caves dim firelight.

Jennifer finished washing and limped stiff-legged her way over to a large smooth, comfortable stone by the water’s edge. She sat down in the sun to dry and warm her naked body, letting her toes dance above the chilly running water. Before they left the cave, Taric cut the straps securing the splint onto her leg. “Hey, are you going to get this thing off me anytime soon?” Jennifer asked, watching him wade through the water toward her. “I think it’s soft enough to pull off,” she stated in a matter of fact tone speaking in his natural speech, comfortable with their mutual nakedness, but not with his appealing and desirable masculinity. She was falling for him and she knew it. Yet Taric hadn’t shown any signs of being interested in her. He always treated her kindly and would do anything for her, almost in respectful reverence, but he never really opened up or let his guard down around her and she wondered why.

“Let me get this wrap off your leg,” Taric said to her cheerfully, grabbing the wrap in his strong hands and with a good pull on the stiff, overlapped hide, he pried it open, allowing Jennifer to slip her leg free. Taric then let the flowing water carry the hide downstream. “Wait here, I have something for you,” he said smiling, with his eyes glinting in anticipation. He left her guessing as she dried in the warm sunlight watching him with an expressed interest in her eyes.

Taric quickly ran up the embankment, retrieved the bundle, then turned around in time to see her stand up and face the morning sun. Her radiant red hair was being blown carelessly about her shoulders and breasts by a gentle breeze, accenting her golden tanned skin and slender build. The sight of her standing naked in the morning sun took his breath away as it always did. She was incredibly beautiful and extremely erotic, but living in such close proximity as they were made it extremely difficult for him to express his forbidden feelings of love.

Taric returned and handed the bundle to Jennifer with a smile. He then retrieved his clothes from the shore and slipped them on while watching Jennifer excitedly open the bundle.

“Oh my God! Clothes! Did you make me some clothes? When did you do this? I can’t believe it! Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you so much,” Jennifer exclaimed with delight, examining the soft moccasins, skin trousers, and a beautiful tunic. She held the light, soft skin tunic in front of her admiring the pretty green, blue, yellow, and red feather adornments he had carefully sewn onto the tunic to hang loose in front of the shoulders and down the gentle slope of her breasts. Taric’s estimation of her size was nearly accurate. The beautiful tunic laced together under the arms and up between her breasts fit her slim figure nicely. Her new trousers, consisting of a loincloth and leggings, required a little adjustment for them to fit comfortably. But oh, the moccasins, so soft on the inside fit her feet perfectly, as they could be drawn and tied snugly around her shin’s just above the ankles.

“I made them while you slept,” he answered, grinning with the success of his surprise. “Sky clothes not good for life on land. You need new ones,” he commented, watching her as she admired the new outfit, pleased with her reaction to his gift, wishing once more for her to be just a girl. He loved her, but she was too perfect, too beautiful, and too unique to be a mere girl; she was something else. He witnessed her fall from the dark, mysterious heavens and take her first steps on the land with his own eyes. There was no other explanation within his mind for her presence—she is an ancestor of high rank in her sky tribe and he was not worthy.

The land had blessed her above all others, but Taric was only a lowly unmated hunter without status or rank in his tribe. He had nothing to offer a mating, so why would she choose him? he thought sadly to himself while smiling with her obvious joy, delighted as always to be near her.

Dressed in clothes for the first time since climbing into the hibernation pod aboard her doomed starship, Jennifer felt complete again as she twirled around, and then she stopped suddenly seeing something black and unmoving in the grass. She began to walk along the river’s edge toward the spot that had caught her attention.

“What’s that over there?” she asked as Taric began to follow her, looking ahead in the direction she was moving.

Taric immediately recognized what she was looking at and reached out a hand, grabbed her arm, and forcefully pulled her back to his side. “Walk backward very slowly, I need my bow,” he warned, urging her back with a gentle tug on her arm, never taking his eyes from the spot. “It’s a lycur.”

They reached the crest of the river’s embankment where Taric had left his bow and quiver of arrows, but the animal still didn’t move. “Do you think it’s dead?” Jennifer asked him, watching the spot for movement as Taric notched an arrow onto his bow.

“If it’s dead, I’ll throw it into the river. If it’s not, I’ll still throw it in the river. The body will get tangled up in the roots of some trees downriver and draw the scavengers away from this area,” Taric explained, realizing for the first time, Jennifer required a weapon and needed to learn how to shoot a bow. Taric kept Jennifer behind him as they approached the animal’s position until it was obvious to him that the beast was dead.

“Why, it looks very similar to a wolf on Earth,” Jennifer remarked as she knelt to study the dead animal’s wounds.

“It looks as if it was kicked in the head a few times. The lower jaw is broken, probably crushed by a hoof. It’s female, and she looks to have recently given birth. She must have a den around here. There might be pups still alive in her den,” she informed Taric with an excited smile he did not understand as he kicked the corpse into the water to float downriver.

“So what? If there is a den nearby, leave it to the scavengers. They will find it soon enough,” Taric said with indifference and added, “Life is hard on the land.”

“No! It doesn’t have to be that way. If there are pups in a nearby den, they don’t have to die. We may be able to tame and train a couple. That lycur must be a member of this planet’s canine species. Wolves were the first wild animals to bond with us. They’ve proven to be the most loyal, useful, and valuable companion we have enjoyed with another species. Maybe as part of your natural development, your people are supposed to bond with these animals? Maybe, just maybe, no one has thought of it yet? So what’s the problem?” Jennifer announced defiantly, then turned away from him as she began to search the area along the riverbank for the animal’s den.

Taric was at a loss for words, her reasoning, actions, and astonishing empathy for a dead animal eluded him, but to go in search of a predator’s den was just not done. “Leave it,” he said again just as they both heard the faint yelp of a pup nearby.

Jennifer followed the sound to its source and found a hole dug into the bank behind some shrubs and between some large stones. She knelt beside it and listened, hearing the cries of a pup calling for its mother inside the dark den. She extended her arm down into the den until she felt a squirming soft little ball of fur begin to nibble at her fingertips and pulled it out. “Well, look at you. It’s a girl!” she exclaimed with an exuberant smile, holding a black puppy in her arms next to her breasts. “You’re such a cutie,” she whispered softly, smiling down at the pup.

“Jennifer, what are you doing? That is a lycur, a predator, an unpredictable killer! Put it back!” Taric ordered sternly, dumbfounded by her actions and attitude toward the little beast.

“I will not!” he heard Jennifer reply defiantly, holding the puppy in one of her hands, letting the creature nibble on her fingers as she stroked its tiny head and body with her other hand. “I’m keeping her!” Jennifer announced as if that was the end of their discussion as she wondered how he could be so callous toward a little puppy.

“It will grow into a killer. You can’t keep it. People will not understand. I don’t understand, and I’ve grown to know you,” Taric tried to explain but was cut short by a tart angry reply with fire blazing in her eyes.

“What people? Look around, Taric! There’s no one here but us!”

Taric, was at a loss for words as he heard Jennifer’s stern forceful voice lash out at him and then turn soothingly soft to say. “She’s just a little puppy. I promise you, she will not grow into a killer, but she will become our friend. She’ll grow to become our partner and protector when we’re out hunting. All it takes is a little love and a bit of training. What’s wrong with that?”

To Taric, Jennifer’s statement of the creature’s future was impossible to believe because people can’t and don’t command animals, but to hear her speak, it sounded as if she knew what she was talking about. Just by looking at her, he knew she would not change her mind, and as crazy as it seemed, he best accept the idea.

“Fine, keep it,” Taric angrily said to her, knowing he’d lost the argument. But within a heartbeat, she rewarded him with the most beautiful smile he’d ever seen that instantly washed away his irritation.