(Short Story) As One

As One



Clarity was not the haven advertised. For three quarters of the year, it
rained in varying degrees of intensity. No one had told the colonists that rain
could be as bad as drought when it came to growing crops. Such plans those  initial colonists had. All failed. And since no ship had deigned to pass by in  several generations, Estar Astron was as stuck as everybody  else.
               
She survived as everybody did. It was that or die. Science could create so many
wonders, but it couldn’t stop the rain, and while food stuffs could be grown
under cover, the whole infrastructure of Clarity failed. The rich, if there was
any such thing on Clarity, might have their glass houses; the rest of the world
scrabbled for a living in the  muck.
               
Which was why Estar became a  hound.
               
There were natives on Clarity. But that was another thing the first explorers
failed to mention in their copious and useless reports. They’d classified
herbivores and omnivores and carnivores, but they hadn’t classified the horses.
Because they weren’t just horses, were  they?
               
Humans have such a lovely habit of wanting life to fit neatly into a box so that
they can label it as this or that. Give them a true alien and they go into panic
mode and forget all sense. At least Estar presumed so. Horses! She knew what an
Earth-type horse was and what it looked like, and, sure, those horses ate the
blue grass like the creatures back home. Horses back home, however, did not
transform themselves into ‘something else’ when they felt like  it.
               
Because Clarity’s ‘horses’ didn’t live in towns or cities, the planetary surveys
presumed the lack of structures meant no truly intelligent life-forms. Well, as
in humanoid-type-intelligent-life-forms. That might have been because the
natives didn’t build permanently. Sensibly Clarity’s natives had adapted to
their surroundings and were nomadic. The majority of humans weren’t like that.
They wanted permanency. They wanted what they’d left, and they’d bought Earth
with them in the shape of seeds to plant and plans for cities. Earth-type seeds
rotted in the soil or grew like pathetic yellowing stalks. There wasn’t enough
nitrogen or enough phosphates. Someone hadn’t done their damned research.
               
Oh yes you adapt and survive when you have no choice. Trouble is it isn’t always
you who suffers. Humans thought Clarity was theirs now, warts and all, and when
it came to survival you did what you had to.


#


Bite him, get him, hold him.

 Scent of sweat, scent of male, scent of  musk, scent of death.

Like the rhythm of an ancient drum, the stallion's  hooves pound dirt. Blue-green oaks bend their branches as he passes. Dying  leaves flutter in his wake.

Estar howls, urging her hounds after him. This  one will not escape her pack. Can’t.  She needs his blood.

Sweat  lathers the stallion's sides as he gallops from the trees. Hooves thunder onto
river rock, scattering pebbles like shards.
 
No! Don't let him reach the  river. Steady, don't rush him. Canen! Too soon, too soon, young pup. Estar  cringes as Canen flies through the air, victim of a great hoof. He lies still on  the rocks as the stallion leaps into the river.

No. No, you won't escape me. 
No.

In a ripple of charged air, Estar transforms. From brindled hound to  human, she changes, muscles and bones stretching, forming new structure and  shape. Agony flares at the rapidity; her howls change to screams of triumph and  pain. She dives into the river, the dismayed howls of her pack echoing in her  ears.

Fed by snowmelt from Harmony Mountain, river water meets Estar's skin
and dances a shiver along her spine. The force of the river's current tugs her
southward. She fights against that strength, cutting through waves.

The stallion leaps out the river on the far bank and shakes from head to tail. In
his arrogance, he doesn’t look back. True, most hounds will not dare the river
because of its currents, but this horse doesn’t know Estar. The rushing water
conceals any sound Estar makes as she pulls herself free. Not until she
transforms again does he sense her.

Estar leaps, teeth bared, to land on the  stallion's back. She scrabbles for purchase on his smooth black hide. She bites  down on his withers. He roars, twisting to shake her free. Muscles bunch and he  bucks, a violent concussion of power. Still she hangs on, teeth buried in flesh.  In desperation, he rears up and up, forelegs pawing the air in his anger and  pain. Her weight pulls him over. She jumps free before he crashes to the ground  and lies still. Estar sniffs the air. The scent of his blood tickles her senses
until she licks her lips. Then he changes, as she knows how to change.

Instinct begs her to hamstring him; fascination with his transformation
keeps her frozen for seconds.  He must have struck his head when he fell;
he is too motionless to be faking unconsciousness, his heart and breathing slow.
Estar approaches him, sniffing him all over, then sits on her haunches in
bewilderment. As a hound she cannot not tie his limbs. Even though she does not
want to transform again, she does. Finds some river wrack and ties his wrists
and ankles. Then she sets about making a fire to dry herself while she waits for
the pack to catch up. They will have to find a bridge or a ford, which will take
time.


#


As her fire smokes miserably in drizzling rain, Estar studies her captive.
Long black hair cascades down his back as thick as his mane. The honed muscles
of an athlete sculpt his body. His features are strong even in sleep. A beard of
dark hair coats his broad chin, wide nostrils flare with every breath.

Anger flares through her. A pretty face changes nothing. She'd hunted him for
sacrifice for good reason. Without the stallion's blood, the crops will fail and
her people starve, and his pretty face only confirms what folk say about the
stallions. Like handsome male birds, he flaunts his plumage to capture females
and breed like pests. The great herds of horses only deplete the land and must
be culled to save humanity from ruin. Too much rain washes the essential
nutrients out of this land, which the stallions’ sacrifices will replace.

Her captive stirs with a groan. No doubt he has a massive headache. Estar
draws her knife from its sheath around her neck. He awakes to the kiss of steel
at his throat and freezes, staring up at her with rich dark eyes.

"This world changes many things, but this… What is this?" she asks. He would know what she means, she is sure. Her blade does not waver at his throat as he swallows.
Clarity’s humans know the horses transform, but no one has ever seen it close
to.  They’d been as elusive as ghosts when humans had tried to approach,
thus adding to their mystery.

"If you understand the rules, then why are you  surprised?"

She frowns. The rules? His face shines wax pale beneath the  stubble, a green tinge around his lips speaking of pain. Though he is naked and apparently-human, he smells of horse. Her nose twitches as she sheathes her  knife and hunkers down beside him.

"The rules are that your blood is needed to nourish the land."

"Whose rules?" he shoots back. "Man's rules, not Clarity's. Do you believe everything you are told? Do you honestly think one stallion's blood will change things?"

"Don't belittle my intelligence. Who is the one lying trussed?"

He shifts, a grimace of pain twisting his features. Maybe he's hurt more than his head, but he says, "Why does man take the stallions?"

She stares into those fathomless eyes. So inhuman. No whites at all.  "Because you are all rutting whores and breed like vermin."

Temper flares across his face at her taunt. He attempts to move and grunts in pain.

 She wonders if he's hurt his spine. He fell hard. "You are foolish to move if you've hurt your back."

"What do you care?" he grinds out. "It will only make it easier to drag me to sacrifice."
 
For a while neither speaks. The bitterness in his voice touches a chord within her.

 He asks her name. Why does he want her name? The idea worries her but then she
shrugs. "Estar, leader of Pack Astron." There is pride in leading the pack of
the biggest town on Clarity. She's fought many battles to become alpha. Let him
know who has captured him.
 
"You should not be,” she says, because somehow this seems wrong, this human-like form before her, who speaks so tidily in human words. Who is the beast now?

"I am as natural as you are. You exist to hunt, we exist to preserve."

"We exist to prevent folk from starving."

"The lie is subtle but not the truth."

She thinks over his words. The hounds had been developed within the cities and are not natural at all. Does that mean the stallions have also been created by science? The common folk call the hound's transformation magic but it is not so. Where had those scientists gained their knowledge to achieve such a thing? Truly, Estar has not questioned it before.

He waits for her to answer, his gaze making her uncomfortable. "Then what is
the truth, you profligate brute?"

He snorts at her label. "No amount of blood could satisfy the land, which is simple science. Wrapping up slaughter in ritual might make our deaths acceptable to you. It is not the solution to Clarity's problems."

"So you say."

"So I know." Fury tinges his voice.
 
"The false priests of man might have a way with words,  but they do not
tell the whole truth. It is not blood alone which encourages your crops to grow.
You would need whole herds of our bones to do that."

"Then why do the crops flourish with each sacrifice?"

He hesitates, staring beyond her toward the river. "I am Tarin," he says softly, and, "I will show you. Look behind you."

Estar turns, sure he means to trick her. Her heart drums against her
ribcage. Within the river gallops an image of a black stallion. Flowing water
becomes his mane, tail and feathers, his body a swirl of impressions. The beauty
of the image holds her spellbound so that she has to wrench her gaze away.

In her heart she'd known it was a trick. The priests are not wrong, and now
he's broken his bonds. She faces him, knife in hand, wishing for something
heftier. He arches his neck, pawing the ground in challenge and letting out a
neigh that deafens her. When he rears, she cannot prevent instinct to step back.
His hooves dance in the air so that she feels the wind as they pass, and then he
comes crashing down. She stands her ground, knife raised, knowing it might be
her end, but she will not die a coward. At the last moment he twists
sideways. Her knife sinks into his flesh. A primal scream fills the air.

Startled, she lets go of her knife and spins. His hooves come down, not on
her but a catspawn. A feline as tall as a young child. It lies on its side, ribs
shattered, testament to what might have happened to her. She has no time to
wonder, for the catspawn is not alone. Unearthly yowls echo across the river
bank as the cats approach, dark-striped fur bristling their rage, teeth drawn
back to reveal over-sized canines.

Estar transforms and howls a dare to the cats, who no doubt are lured by the stallion's blood. In a flurry of fur, one cat leaps. So does Estar, a savage growl in her throat. The cat goes down, it's back broken, but there are six more circling at a distance.

Listen to me.

His voice in her mind. Used to the hound's communication it does not shock
her.

Listen, Estar Astron, and believe. Stallions' magic is not like yours, it is the true power of this land. Take some of that power within yourself. It is the resonance which nourishes the land, not our blood, and your priests understand that.

I don't need it.

You do. I am wounded both from the fall and your knife. Take what I have left. This is our seed, it is no rape. This once, we will fight together.

She hesitates, one eye on the approaching cats, weighing the odds, and knows she cannot outrun six catspawn. She bites her lip in hesitation. She can kill him afterward. She nods.

Power arcs between them. He neighs, she howls, and their voices join, a vibration that matches. 

Resonance. She feels it to her core, a primal play which finds rhythm and dances
an archaic waltz of survival. Strength fills Estar until her veins tingle
and she wants to burst from her skin. Wonder at that power makes her want to
question.

Now.
 
Her lips draw back from her incisors, ears fold, tail raises and her haunches bunch. She expects to fight alone, but Tarin is not done  yet. They dance indeed, using their strengths to fight and defend. Tarin kicks  as Estar worries at throats. He tramples, breaking bones so she can go in for  the kill.

Minutes it takes and then the roars stop, the screams stop. Estar pants, the smell of blood and offal surrounding them. Ichor coats Tarin's hooves, blood plasters Estar's pelt. Carnage lies around them.

Resonance. It  ripples between them, the connection vivid, so that she knows when he changes to human form--experiences it so that she knows his every muscle as well as her own. Feels his pain from the wound she's inflicted.

"Why? Why would you do that?" she asks, bewildered.

He holds a hand to his side where she'd stabbed him. It cannot conceal the blood that flows down. He takes a breath. "We protect the herd from prey. Today you were my herd."

"It's that simple?"

"Things often are."

"Explain them to me then."

He opens his mouth as though to reply but then he staggers. She stops him falling. Before this hunt began, Estar had no qualms about killing these creatures. None. Now guilt rushes through her that she's injured him. She feels his essence within her, joining with her more intimately than anything she has ever experienced. The wonder of it still burns through her as her heart matches rhythm with his. She will never be the same. He is no longer the beast she's always thought the stallions to be. He is right
that this is a lie. She doesn’t know the whole truth yet but she will.

Gently she lowers Tarin to the ground, straining with his weight. Despite
his objections, she studies his wound. If her knife has penetrated deeply enough
it will have damaged his intestines and there is nothing she can do. She bites
her lip.

"Can't you use your power to heal yourself?"

"Balance, it's all about balance," he says softly.

"You were going to tell me."

His gaze drifts away from her, as though he has already gone somewhere else. She catches his chin between her fingers and turns his face toward her. "Tell me why I am
wrong."

"You believe that the stallions' blood nourishes the land. There is some truth to that, but you were taking too many and destroying the balance. We are part of this world and its power resides within us. The world made us. Wefight our own battles to nourish the land, but man takes too much. That is why the crops wither and die."
He lifts a hand. "This world is not man's birthplace, yet he treats it as such. The rules here are different and he breaks them. There is power but it is not limitless."

"The hunts have been going on for years. Why have you done nothing to stop them? You say things are often simple, but often they are not. I became what I am for a reason. Do you now tell me I live a lie?"

"You believed a lie. There is a difference."
 
"Why should I believe your truth and not theirs? In the beginning, why did we not
know that you could transform like the hounds?"

"We learned it from you."

"How? Why?"

"Because it was needful for our survival."

Estar pauses. Humanity had come to Clarity hundreds of years earlier. A colony ship that had traveled the stars for millennia. They had no way back to their roots nor wanted any, but Clarity's climate was not as ambivalent as was first supposed. Facing
starvation from failed crops, scientists searched for answers and discovered
that wherever large mammals died vegetation thrived. The one thing that
flourished on Clarity were the herds of black horses. In desperation, men gave
hope to a starving population by sacrificing a stallion. When that year the
crops thrived, people grasped at the concept and the hounds were born, never
realizing that one horse's death could never have achieved such a miracle.
People believed what they wanted to believe.

"We call it 'magic'?" Estar says.

"That is your word for things you do not understand."

"But I do understand. You are saying that it is the power within you that enriches the
land."

"Yes, and always has. But humans changed the balance."

"You spoke about rules before, as though I should understand them."

"It is simple. If you use anything you must replace it in kind."
 
"Is that why you aren't fighting to live?"

"Nature will decide if I am strong enough."

"Will it? I understand what you are saying. It makes sense, but nature like anyone needs help to survive. You aren't an animal any more than I am."

That seems to sting for his eyes open more fully. "When the hunt arrives, what will you do?"

She thinks and then says, "Tell them to go away."

"Will they listen to you?"

"Yes!"

She says it too quickly and knows it. They will listen to her but they will argue and yip and whine about it. She has been so certain about things, now she is not, and that rankles. That an upstart male has thrown everything she thought is right and true into disarray. Trouble is, he could be dying and that pulls a different set of strings entirely. A stallion might instinctively wish to protect his herd, an alpha female is not so different.

"What is your hierarchy within the herd?' she asks, thinking.

He looks away uttering a long, pain-filled sigh. "There is more than one herd among the horses. There is the Great Herd and then the smaller herds within it. You know
the way of things. The strongest gets to mate; the strongest survives or gets
driven away. How do you think you come across stallions at all?"

"So you lost?"

"Oh no, I won."

She frowns. "Then--?"

"The stallion I chose to fight was leader over all the herds. I won, but I refused to deliver the killing blow."

"Why?"

"Because… I could not."

That isn't enough of an answer. Estar thinks back to the whole hunt and an idea occurs to her. "You placed yourself in our way. You meant to be caught. You meant to die. I thought luck was on our side, but it was no such thing. Tarin, why?"

She uses his name, and that changes things between them. He's become a person and not just a creature to hunt. He's given her his strength so both could survive. He fades. She feels it.

"Tarin, don't you leave me! You said you would explain and you haven't even begun."

"Why prolong it?"

"Because you aren't a coward and yet you act like one now, and I need to understand. If you want me to change my mind about anything, I need to know why. Yes, I felt your power, but it isn't enough."

"Then ask any of us."

"I am asking you."

He shivers. Estar touches him. "You gave me some of your power. Take it back."

"He will not give it because he is too proud and stubborn."
 
So it is not the hunt who arrives first. The man who walks into their tableau looks very like the man who lies dying. Estar does not attempt to run. He kneels beside Tarin and reaches with one hand. Despite his weakness, Tarin grips the man's wrist. "No," he whispers.
 
"You made a choice, am I not allowed to make mine? Are you truly that arrogant?"

Estar does not realize she holds her breath until she has to breathe. Whether it is weakness or he is shamed by the other's words, she does not know, but Tarin releases his grip on the man's arm. 

"Stubborn colt. Wise decision. Have you not proved your worth that you have got a Hound to care for you?"
 
"That is not enough for your life!"

"Oh, but it is. My life was over the moment you defeated me, but thank you for the time given me to say goodbye."

Estar feels like the worst kind of voyeur watching the two. She rises to give them privacy but the stranger looks up. "No, don't leave, someone must witness this." He presses on Tarin's wound.

Tarin arches his back, a cry rattling the air. Power crackles as Tarin writhes on the ground. The man does not release his grip until Tarin stills. Then he leans forward, brushes the mane back from Tarin's brow and places a kiss there. Without words, he slips sideways and lies still.

Estar shakes. Tarin breathes hard. There are tears running down his face. In that moment she wants to hold him but does not dare. 

"Who was he?" she asks.
 
The sorrow on his face is poignant enough to bring tears to her eyes. "His name was Rathor and he was my sire," Tarin says as he climbs his feet, "and the greatest leader the Herd has ever had."

"Why did you fight him?"

"Because he challenged me. Nature is a hard taskmaster and cruel as anyone. He said he had had his time. That it was time for a younger stallion. I did not agree."

"But he has had his way in any case."

Tarin wipes his eyes and lets out a rough laugh. "Yes. Yes he did, and he called me
stubborn."

He lifts his head and stares across the river rushing beyond.  Estar turns, wondering what he sees. On the opposite bank stand twelve black horses. As one they dive into the river. It seems only moments before they stream forth and surround them. One comes forward and stares down at Rathor's body then back to Tarin, a question in his dark eyes. Tarin's answer is to change. He rears, cutting the sky with his hooves as he neighs. The other stallions join him so that Estar covers her ears, her body vibrating with sound. 

Once more they rear, but this time Tarin does not and their action is an unspoken acknowledgement of him, Estar is sure. Then they turn and gallop away,  thundering along the river bank. When Estar looks back, Rathor's body has gone. His imprint still presses into the ground. The catspawn's blood has vanished with him as though the land has absorbed them all.

Perhaps it has.

The hunt never came for them and somehow that feels more of a betrayal than
anything, as though she hasn't mattered. For a moment hurt spikes but then she
lets the emotion go. She changes into hound form and barks at Tarin. He stomps a
hoof and shakes his head, mane flying in all directions.

Come, she hears in her mind. I promised the answers to your questions. She doesn’t hesitate. She runs at his side as he takes off, and as one they gallop into the trees.


(Today's photo is Everest, a Canadian Horse I used to own.)