The bird skittered back and forth in front of its nest, still flapping but not flying away, being protective, and also being totally unaware that the ground was turning to mud around its feet. A moment more and the mud oozed up over its talons then instantly hardened, trapping it.
Saarh stood and brushed the dirt from her hands and stomach, walking toward the terrified, angry, squawking bird and playing with the beads of one of her necklaces as she went. She stopped directly over the bird, admiring its feathers, then grabbed and wrung its neck, tugging the bird free and starting to pluck its feathers.
She set aside the prettiest feathers as she worked, thinking she might make them into another necklace or give them to Brab as a gift. Brab was the crooked-faced goblin who kept closest company with her. He was among the throng of goblins tearing up small trees to fashion them into tools and torches and firewood. He was occupying the entire clan so she could have that precious time alone.
The bird would taste good after being cooked over some of that firewood, but then she would have to share the food. So Saarh ate it raw, careful to pick out its organs, which she thought tasted too salty. When she’d consumed most of the sweet flesh, she set a few strips aside for Brab, wrapping them in maple leaves and tying the small bundle with long strands of grass. The feathers she stuffed into a pouch that dangled from her newest necklace.
Finished with those tasks, she crept toward the nest. She’d not heard any cheeping sounds, so she knew there were no baby birds. She grinned wide when she saw the eggs-eight of them, each about the size of her thumb-a special treat. She sat with her legs protectively wrapped around the nest, one by one picking up the eggs, registering their warmth, then digging a claw into each one so she could break it and suck out the liquid.
Thoroughly sated, she rose and stretched, declaring it a very good morning indeed. She wasn’t ready to return to the goblins, though she was curious about their progress. She was more curious about the power she’d sensed in the forest, which was the ultimate reason she’d brought them all there.
She walked west. The air was moist, a carryover from the previous day’s deluge. The ground was damp but not muddy. Saarh discovered it was coolest up against the trunk, where the leaves held the summer sun at bay. Between knobby roots, the ground cover was thick with low-growing plants that boasted tiny, teardrop-shaped leaves. They looked so delicate, Saarh hesitated to walk on them.
There were few truly large trees, so Saarh knew the forest was young. But she also knew it could grow into something magnificent; her magic had revealed that to her. She wanted her tribe to grow with the forest. A few trees ahead tilted precariously, nearly blown over in the previous day’s storm. She continued walking, seeing one recently felled, the leaves still vibrant, the broken roots sticking out in all directions. Farther along she spotted a tree growing through a wide crack in a big rock. Curious, she touched its bark, feeling bumps and ridges and finding a sap that smelled rich. A tree nearby had stringy pieces of bark that she could pull off in thin strips.
Saarh intended to bring Brab that way later and show him the amazing plants. She stopped when something chattered at her. An unfamiliar sound, she tipped her head back and searched through the branches.
The creature making the noise was small and looked vaguely ratlike. She’d seen plenty of rats before, but this one was light brown, its tail incredibly bushy. Its small ears were pressed forward against the sides of its head, and it held a nut in its front paws.
Saarh watched it while it chattered loudly and scampered back and forth, putting the nut in its mouth so that one side of its face bulged.
“Scolding.” She realized the creature was angry that she had intruded into its territory. “Maybe tasty.” Saarh enjoyed cooked rats. But she patted her full stomach and moved along.
She came to another fallen tree large enough to sit on. Black bugs the size of her little finger scampered across the rotting wood, and she noted the small footprints of animals that likely lived beneath the log. A small tree had sprouted from the dead one, and Saarh thought that odd; all the other trees she’d seen grew from the earth. She shook her head. No, not all the trees, there had been that tree growing through the rock.
“Trees are amazing,” she said. “Better than the stone of the caves.”
There were thorny plants in that section of the woods and ones with supple stems and white, fist-sized flowers. More flowers, purple ones with yellow centers, grew on vines that hung from high branches. Tall grasses grew everywhere, and Saarh spotted a clump that had been chewed on by some creature. When she returned to the tribe, she intended to tell Brab to gather a party and explore, collecting plants and determining which were edible. And they’d catch insects, too, and learn which were the most tasty.
“A good home,” she pronounced, pleased that she had brought the goblins out of the caverns and to a place so abundant with space and food and good smells. “And a safe one.”
She’d seen no sign of dwarves or umber hulks-both races she was familiar with and hated. In significant numbers, they could threaten her tribe. During previous trips she’d not spotted anything in the woods that might pose a problem. It was a place where apparently even younglings could wander freely.
“A powerful place.” She’d been walking west because the arcane pulse that drew her out of the caverns still emanated from that direction. She hoped to find the source of that pulse that day. If it was too far away, she’d have to return to the tribe and move them in that direction. But she hoped that would not be necessary.
Saarh hadn’t traveled more than another mile before something else drew her attention. She’d never heard such a noise before, a “maaawww” that reverberated throughout the clearing she had entered. It sounded powerful, maybe fierce, but it wasn’t associated with the arcane thing she was seeking.
“What is it? What, what, what?” She headed toward the maaawwwing sound, veering a little to the south. She cursed herself for always being so curious, but she knew she would not be able to go on without finding the source of the sound.
A dozen steps later, and through a gap in some small flowering bushes, Saarh saw the maaawwwing beast.
“A bear.”
She’d seen a few in her younger years in the high caves in the mountain. She figured they were creatures of the range, and she’d not thought to find them in the woods. It was not terribly large, no more than the weight of four grown goblins, so she thought it might be a youngling. It had caught a small deer and had its snout stuck in its belly, feasting.
Saarh thought the young bear was a magnificent creature, with thick fur the color of mud, but silvery on the ends around its neck and hindquarters. It raised its head, blood dripping from its jaws, and made the maaawwwing sound again. It had a short, stubby tail, like the cave bears she’d seen, and a muscular hump on its shoulders. Its legs rippled as it tore into the deer more fiercely.
She’d seen enough, and she’d tell Brab about the sighting. But it was back to business; she promised herself no more distractions. She had started to withdraw when a throaty growl sounded, so loud that she felt the ripples of it against the bottoms of her feet. It was accompanied by a crashing sound and the appearance of a second bear, easily five times the size of the first.
Saarh stood rooted in awe. Terror seized her when she realized the great bear was charging straight at her. The shaman acted instinctively. She raised her right arm toward the clouds while dropping to a crouch and thrusting her fingers into the earth. The sky crackled with energy, and lightning flickered down, a thin bolt striking the large bear and another striking the top of a spindly oak. The ground surged around her fingers and churned outward in a growing ripple that turned to a mound right in front of the bear.