They scrambled along the ridged wall to the exit in the trunk’s base. Dusk could see the last of the chiropters squeezing through. But converging on them from the ground was a swarm of soricids.
Dusk flapped with all his might, but he and Sylph weren’t quick enough. One of the lead soricids deftly clambered up and blocked the narrow exit. Dusk hurtled down on it. Avoiding its spitting mouth, he clamped his rear claws around the soricid’s tail and beat his wings hard. The soricid was surprisingly light and Dusk dragged it off the wood. He carried it high into the air before flinging it away.
The exit was clear. “Go!” he yelled at his sister.
She faltered. “What about the hyaenodons and felids?”
“Just go!” he shouted.
She dashed through the hole and into the night.
The soricids swarmed to cut Dusk off, but he threw himself at the hole, furling his wings tight and wildly dragging himself through. No jaws snatched him on the other side. Then he was out, and following Sylph as she scuttled for cover in the shadows of the toppled trunk.
CHAPTER 22
ALONE IN THE GRASSLANDS
He huddled with Sylph in a misty tangle of dead branches. From the other side of the toppled tree came the baying of hyaenodons, punctuated by the snarls of felids.
“Where are all the others?” Sylph whispered.
“Hiding like us,” Dusk said. He hoped so, anyway.
“Fly up and see,” said Sylph.
“You sure?” He didn’t want to leave her alone.
“Just do it fast. Find out what’s going on.” He left their hiding place and lifted into the air, the night silken against his fur. He wanted to be quick, but the soricid’s poison was still ebbing from his body, and his wingbeats were sluggish. He wheeled over the fallen tree.
The paralyzed hyaenodon, its head slumped inside the trunk, was overrun with soricids busily stripping away fur and flesh. A second hyaenodon was dragging itself away from the tree, followed at a careful distance by a large, patient group of the diminutive predators. Each step the hyaenodon took was slower than the last, until it crumpled stiffly to the earth. Despite the furious barking of the nearby hyaenodons, the soricids seeped forward onto their fallen prey. Carnassial and the other felid stayed well back. But behind them, more tiny soricids boiled up from hidden holes in the ground.
Circling, Dusk caught sight of several small groups of chiropters scattering through the tall grass in different directions. Auster might have been among them, but he couldn’t be sure. It was all chaos. How would they ever find each other again? He felt hopeless watching them all disappear into the mist, but he dared not shout out and draw attention to their escape.
He flew back to Sylph.
“This way,” he whispered, leading her away from the tree. “Where’s everyone else?”
“All over the place,” he muttered without stopping. He wasn’t thinking clearly; he just wanted to keep moving, to get away from all the predators. It was only a matter of time before the hyaenodons and felids retreated into the grasslands, and started sniffing them out. Leaves and twigs whipped against his face. He quietly sang sound, probing ahead. He watched the earth too, sniffing for holes that might release more red-toothed soricids.
“Dusk, where are we going?” Sylph asked after several minutes. He didn’t stop. “Poisonwood tree.”
Sylph looked shocked. “What about the others? We can’t just run away!”
“We’re not running away!” he said angrily. “Do you want to get eaten?”
“But how are we going to regroup?” Sylph demanded. “Everyone’s scattered. We’ll all meet up at the tree.”
“What if they don’t know the way?” He stopped, breathing hard. “Auster knows the way, he’ll help them.”
But he remembered how quickly the colony would slide off course without someone in the air. He tried to think like a leader. What was the best thing to do? His thoughts collided and ricocheted. How many groups had the colony split into? Would they dare call out to one another? “We need to find them, Dusk,” Sylph said. “They need you.”
Dusk filled his lungs shakily. He wished his father were here, to tell him what to do. “I’ll take a look,” he said finally. “Don’t go anywhere.”
He lifted, spiralling high to get his bearings. There was the toppled tree, thrusting its dead limbs skyward. And off to the east was the lone poisonwood—the colony’s next destination. He dipped as low as he dared and began a slow circle, parting the tall grass with his echovision, searching for the other chiropters. He hoped he’d find them already on their way to the poisonwood.
The mist thickened and Dusk was beginning to despair, when his echoes brought him back an image of a lone chiropter in the grass. He sped closer, and saw there were others, travelling together. He whispered a greeting to them as he glided in, wings tilting, and landed clumsily in the tall stalks.
“Dusk!”
Auster hurried towards him and nuzzled him quickly, and Dusk felt stronger for it. Auster smelled like his father.
“I saw you get bitten and thought we’d lost you,” Auster said.
“The hyaenodon saved me. Sylph and I were the last to get out. Is this everyone?”
Auster nodded. “We lost seven. One of my sons was among them.”
Dusk remembered the horrible mounds of soricids he’d seen inside the tree, and shuddered. “I’m sorry, Auster.”
“But afterwards the rest of us managed to find each other somehow,” said Auster. “That was good fortune.”
“You’re off course for the poisonwood,” Dusk told him, and nudged his older brother in the right direction. “It’s not so far. I’m going back to get Sylph. We’ll meet you at the tree.”
“We’ll wait for you there,” said Auster. “Please be careful.” When Dusk took to the air again he was startled by how much denser the mist had become. The far hills had disappeared and the grasslands too were starting to dissolve. Some of his landmarks were no longer visible. He wheeled, trying to orient himself. The darkness contracted around him.
Dusk flew on, watching as the mist seeped between the stalks of grass. He was pretty sure he was close now. He didn’t want to, but he had no choice: he had to call out.
“Sylph! Sylph!”
Her answering cry pulled him sharply to the left and he started shooting out sound to find her. He’d never known his echoes to bounce back so quickly, and they nearly blinded his mind’s eye. All he saw was a pulsing barrier of light. “Dusk! I’m down here!”
He forced a deep breath into his lungs, and this time altered the strength and speed of his sonic cries. His echoes returned a blurry image of grass and vegetation, and a bright smudge off to one side: Sylph. “I see you!”
He was just dropping down into the tall grass when something grabbed him. He thrashed wildly, but soon realized it was no animal that held him. His body and wings were tangled up in a web. He’d flown through plenty of spiderwebs—every chiropter had—but none with strands this sticky and strong. He ate spiders from time to time, though they weren’t his favourite food; often they were venomous, and though he was immune to the poison, it had a nasty taste. He struggled against the web some more, but it was quite useless. He bobbed around a few inches above the earth.
“Dusk?” came Sylph’s voice, much farther away than he’d expected. He’d seen her just over to his right, hadn’t he?
A chill surged through his veins.
“Sylph!” he said. “Where are you?”
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” she said. “Just keep talking.”
But he was now too frightened to speak. He croaked out a barrage of sound and saw the vague shape he’d mistaken for Sylph. It was certainly about her size, but completely motionless. Suddenly it shifted, standing tall on eight bony legs. Moving with shocking swiftness, the biggest spider he’d ever seen scuttled towards him.
Dusk wrenched his neck, chewing furiously at the web. His teeth seemed almost useless against the t
ough strands. He managed to saw through only one, and then the spider was upon him. Its abdomen was striped and hugely fat. Its face was amazingly hairy, with many globular eyes glinting darkly. Dusk saw fangs.
The spider lurched towards him and he bellowed, flailing about. He’d already been bitten once tonight and was in no mood to be bitten again. He shouted and hissed and showed his teeth, trying to convince the spider to back off. In his frenzy he wasn’t sure what has happening, whether he was being bitten or cocooned, as the spider darted all around him with savage purpose. Only when he felt his right wing pull free, and saw the severed strands of web, did he understand.
The spider was cutting him loose.
Dusk had messed up its web and the spider wanted him gone so that it could get on with catching proper food. Seconds later, he got a firm shove and tumbled down through the mist. He thudded on the ground.
Sylph was beside him.
“What’s going on?” she cried. “Are you all right?”
“I got caught in a spiderweb,” he panted. “Oh, honestly, Dusk.” Now she just sounded angry. “All that noise about a little web?”
“It was huge, Sylph, and—”
“Where? I don’t see it.”
Dusk looked up too, but the mist was so thick he could no longer make out the web or the spider. “Just right up there! The spider was as big as me. Its fangs—”
“You don’t seem that scared,” Sylph said. “Why aren’t we running?”
“Well, it doesn’t eat chiropters. It cut me loose and shoved me out.”
She stared at him.
“You believe me, don’t you?”
“I believe anything now. Did you find the others?” He told her about the plan to meet at the poisonwood. “The mist is thick,” he said worriedly.
“What about your echovision?”
“I can’t see very far in this, and it’s all blurry.”
“Just keep flying and scouting ahead.”
“It’s really bad, Sylph. I nearly didn’t find you just now. I’m not leaving you again.”
“Well, let’s just do our best.”
He took a breath. “I think we should wait for the mist to clear.”
“I am not waiting here any more,” said Sylph, and he saw how scared she was. “The whole time you were gone I kept hearing things in the grass. Sooner or later something’s going to stumble along and eat us. I want to keep moving. I want to get to the tree.” She started scuttling ahead of him.
“Sylph! Wait!” She didn’t stop, and he saw there’d be no reasoning with her. “That’s not even the right way. Come on.”
He caught up with her, prodded her in the right direction, and together they crept on through the mist.
“I smell them.” The scent was faint but unmistakable to Carnassial’s nostrils and tongue. “Eggs. There’s a saurian nest not far from here.”
Danian stared at him balefully. “Be sure of this.” Carnassial knew that the hyaenodon somehow blamed him for the two deaths in his pack. Carnassial had led them to the tree, it was true, but he wasn’t the one who’d rashly clawed it open and ignited the wrath of the soricids. He’d known many types of soricids, but none with saliva that paralyzed. To make matters worse, in the ensuing panic, all the chiropters had escaped. Carnassial’s belly ached with hunger. “I’m sure,” he told Danian. “I smell them too,” Panthera said.
Since fleeing the soricids, they’d been wandering half blind in the deepening mist, across the grasslands that Danian meant to claim as his new home.
Carnassial inhaled the saurian scent hungrily, but it was very difficult to tell where it came from. The mist confused him, sometimes obscuring the smell, other times intensifying it. Then it would disappear completely and he would have to scramble around in circles until he found it again.
He could not fail. He needed to find the nest to prove to Danian how useful he was. Glancing over, he saw that the four hyaenodons were nervous, heads dipped, ears pricked high. Danian pawed the earth. Carnassial felt some of the hyaenodons’ fear diffuse towards him. They knew these saurians, knew what they could do, even when sick and dying.
All Carnassial’s senses were alert as he paced through the mist, sniffing his way towards the nest.
“We’re lost, aren’t we,” Sylph said.
Dusk grunted irritably. His limbs ached and his fur was soaked with dew. “We should’ve stayed where we were.”
“You said you knew the way.”
“Do you know how hard it is to go straight in this?” he demanded. “You move around a plant and already you’re a bit off course, and it just gets worse and worse.”
“So we’re lost.”
“Yes, we’re lost.”
He was angry with Sylph for hurrying them on, and angry with himself for letting her. They certainly should have reached the tree by now. For all he knew they might’ve walked right past it. Or they might’ve turned in a complete circle and were now back where they’d started. He still clung to the hope, ever dwindling, that the journey was just taking longer than expected, that soon they’d arrive at the poisonwood.
“Does the mist feel warmer to you?” he whispered.
“The ground’s warmer too,” Sylph said.
Dusk slowed down, unsettled. His sister was right, the earth definitely felt warm—even hot in places. He lifted his feet apprehensively.
Sylph gave a sudden cry and hopped almost on top of him. “It’s coming from the ground!” she said. Dusk stared and saw, dimly in the gloom, a skinny column of vapour boiling up from the earth. The only reason he saw it at all was its dark tinge, making it stand out slightly against the general fog. It carried a heavy, earthy smell. As they moved cautiously forward, he spotted several more jets of warm vapour hissing from the soil. With a shudder Dusk imagined some vast, terrible beast beneath them, exhaling.
Before he could banish this premonition from his mind, something surged forward from the mist. A huge skull, flat against the earth, towered over them. He froze, too horrified to make a sound. And then the mist swirled again and revealed the rest of the creature’s massive bulk.
Dusk swallowed. It had only seemed to move, through some trick of the mist. “Just bones,” he rasped.
“A saurian,” Sylph said. “Nothing else could be this big.”
It must have collapsed on its belly when it died. Little of its flesh was left. It lay there, the size of a small hill, seeming to steam in the night air. Dusk let his eyes travel its length: the long skull, jagged teeth clenched tight, then its neck, and the huge arch of its spine and ribs, tapering to an undulating bony tail. Its right arm was trapped beneath it, the leg splayed and broken at the femur.
Dusk whirled, ears pricked, staring into the mist behind him. He’d heard something. Maybe it was just the sound of the hot vapour escaping the earth. He sent a sonic cry into the mist, and when his echoes returned he had to fight every instinct to keep himself from flying. “Get inside the skull!” he yelled at his sister.
Two felids bounded towards them. Dusk and Sylph hurled themselves at the skeleton and squeezed through an eye socket, tumbling down the smooth white insides to the saurian’s jaw.
Dusk peered through the chinks between its clenched teeth. Carnassial and his companion leaped onto the skull and tried to push their heads and shoulders into its various openings. But they were too big, just as Dusk had hoped. Carnassial suddenly thrust in a paw, claws fully extended. Dusk cringed out of reach.
The felid glared at him through an eye socket. “The flyer, come to ground. That was a mistake.”
The brutal bulk of four hyaenodons loomed over the skull now.
“Small prey,” said one of them in its guttural voice, almost as if insulting the felid.
“I will have them,” said Carnassial, pacing the skull, looking for a way in.
The hyaenodon sniffed and lunged forward, and Dusk thought he meant to maul Carnassial, who stepped smartly to one side. But the hyaenodon’s target was the skull itself. H
e clamped his jaws around the eye socket. Dusk watched in horror as the beast’s massive teeth slowly came together, crunching through bone, sending white splinters flying.
“Dusk, this way!”
Sylph tugged him around. At the base of the skull was a narrow opening, a kind of protected passageway created by the saurian’s neck vertebrae. Dusk squeezed into it, dragging himself after Sylph.
Through the gaps between the spiky vertebrae he saw flashes of Carnassial keeping pace with them. He felt the felid’s hot breath.
As the spine started to arch upwards, Sylph slipped out between two of the vertebrae into the cavernous space of the rib cage. Dusk followed. The ground was warm underfoot. Malodorous vapour rose around them. The rib bones curved down from the saurian’s spine, the skinny ends embedded in the soil. Dusk looked worriedly at the gaps between the ribs, and with relief saw they were small enough to keep out the felids and hyaenodons pacing angrily on the other side.
Carnassial looked in at him and purred menacingly. “You’re trapped inside the bones of an extinct animal, about to meet your own extinction. It seems the world won’t be seeing any more flying chiropters.”
“There are others,” said Dusk.
Carnassial sniffed and turned to one of the hyaenodons. “Bite through and we will have them.”
Dusk was amazed at how readily the larger beast followed orders. Powerful jaws closed around the lower half of a rib, crunching an opening that would soon be big enough for the two felids to slip through.
Within the rib cage, the vapour swirled and eddied, momentarily blocking Dusk’s view of the predators. “Let’s make a run for it,” Sylph whispered.
Desperately Dusk cast around for an escape route. Back towards the saurian’s hips the ribs got shorter and the ceiling lowered as the spine curved down and flattened against the earth. Dusk shot out a bolt of sound and saw how the tail vertebrae created a protective tunnel.
“This way,” he hissed to Sylph. He heard the hyaenodon’s teeth grinding and then a sharp snap, and knew the felids would be inside within seconds. He scrambled into the skeletal tail.