He saw its head shiver. That was it. Tarrin crouched down, then immediately vaulted straight up just as the monster lunged out at him, striking with that big head and those deadly jaws like a snake, trying to catch the little Were-cat between its jaws. But those jaws closed on empty air as Tarrin rose over them, and its momentum carried it under and past the Were-cat as he descended. He landed on its back, just past its neck, and whirled with his sword out the instant his feet came down on its scaly hide. The monster hadn't registered that Tarrin was on top of it, and it rose up its head and caught sight of the two Selani, who had retrieved their swords from their clothes and stood in defiant challenge to it. They knew that they couldn't outrun the monster, and there was nowhere to hide. So they preferred to fight. They would not give it an easy meal.
The monster came over the hill, bellowing in triumph as Var and Denai raised their swords-
– -and then it crashed to the ground, an impact so powerful it made the pond's surface jump from the shock of it, sliding down the hill on its belly and coming to a stop not thirty spans from the pond, its eyes open and glazed.
Var and Denai looked at it in confusion, then Var laughed as Tarrin stood up from behind the kajat's head. His sword was buried in the back of its neck. The blow had been precise and true, going right between the bones of the neck to sever the spinal nerve. It wasn't dead yet, but it could no longer move anything below its neck, so death was a matter of suffocation now, since the muscles that caused the lungs to fill with air were now paralyzed.
Tarrin wrenched his sword free of it as Var and Denai approached him. They looked a bit silly, standing there naked as the day they were born, dripping wet, and with swords in their hands, but they didn't seem to care. And in reality, he didn't either. He wiped the blood off the blade on the hide of the monster as Denai came up to where he was, a large grin on her face. "Wait til my tribe hears about this," she proclaimed. "You killed a kajat! That's a matter of tremendous honor!"
"It's easy, if you know what you're doing," Tarrin told her dismissively. "They all seem to make the same mistake."
"If it's alright with you, I'd like to take a couple of its teeth," Var said. "They make great trophies, and I can use them to demonstrate this one's size when I tell my tribe of this."
"It's yours," he grunted. "I don't want to eat it. Do whatever you want with it." He glanced at Denai, who had her head about halfway into the kajat's open mouth. "I wouldn't do that," he warned her.
"Why?"
"It's not dead yet, and if it really tried, it could probably close its mouth. You'll lose your head if you keep going."
Denai flinched back from it quickly, then laughed. "I should have realized that. How long?"
"Give it a few moments, then it'll be safe," he replied. "By the time you're dry and dressed, it'll be dead."
He stood by the dying giant as Var and Denai dressed, and he decided that it had been long enough. He stepped back and let them inspect the great beast, Var taking its four largest teeth and Denai taking the massive claw on one of its feet, a claw nearly as long as her forearm. "I think I could make something of these," Var said curiously, looking at the teeth. "A medallion or figure, a reminder of our time together."
"Whatever," Tarrin grunted. "Sarraya can Conjure you anything you need."
"I really need to learn how to do that," Denai laughed, holding the claw up to her sword, comparing them. "It must be very handy to make anything you want appear."
Tarrin ignored her. "We have to move. This thing is going to attract scavengers, and they may like their meat fresh."
"What about Sarraya?" Var asked.
"She can find me no matter where I am. She'll be fine."
They moved to a shallow valley about a longspan from the carcass, a valley abutted by the wall, a defensible position to await Sarraya's return. Var and Denai sat by the wall as Tarrin stood on the hilltop, watching out for any more surprises. They didn't wait for very long, for the Faerie appeared before him and landed lightly on his shoulder about an hour after they moved. "I saw the body. It looks like you had fun without me."
"That wasn't fun."
"It looks like you did it. Where were they?"
"Waist deep in a pond, splashing water at each other."
Sarraya laughed, then she hovered so she could look at him. "I'm impressed," she said seriously. "You protected them, Tarrin. That's pretty remarkable, coming from you."
"That wasn't protecting them," he said gruffly. "That thing was coming after me."
"Because you put yourself out where it would see you first, most likely," she said dismissively. "Rationalize it any way you want, Tarrin, but you can't hide the truth. You're protecting the Selani. I've seen you do it for days now, without making much of an issue of it."
Tarrin stared at her, but she just smiled at him. "You're losing your bite, you grumpy curmudgeon," she teased. "But as I recall, a long time ago, that's what you were trying to do. I think Triana would be proud of you."
Tarrin looked away from her, suddenly embarassed. And he had no idea why.
"Let's feed the masses, and then settle in. There are a lot of critters out there, and we'll be zigzagging quite a bit to avoid them. So we'd better leave at sunset. The most dangerous ones aren't nocturnal."
"Good plan," he said.
Tarrin hadn't thought of it, but he had to admit that it worked out perfectly.
Moving at night had been the perfect solution. With Tarrin scouting ahead and Sarraya leading the two Selani along the surprisingly dark canyon floor, they managed to traverse it without any major incidents. All the dangerous predators were sleeping, for they were cold-blooded, and couldn't operate after dark. The air was surprisingly warm, for the humidity there locked in the warmth radiating from the stone walls of the canyon, and the winds prevented the heat from radiating out. That kept the floor of the canyon very nice, like a summer night in Aldreth, and Tarrin found the journey across the floor to be almost pleasant.
The place was alot different at night. The towering walls blocked much of the sky, and that kept most of the light generated by the moons and Skybands out of the canyon itself. Tarrin's night-sighted eyes had no trouble seeing in the darkness, and the disappearance of the reptiles made the landscape seem almost like the grassy plains in the West. So much like them that it was easy to forget where he was, at least until he looked ahead of him and saw the longspan-high canyon wall approaching.
The reflection didn't really start until they got to the other side, and huddled by the wall to rest while Tarrin kept watch. Sarraya was right. Tarrin found that he liked Denai, and he could tolerate Var, and that had caused him to act in a protective manner. He was protecting them. Even though he still couldn't bring himself to be civil to Var, he would still act to protect him, and that confused the Were-cat. That was not his normal reaction. Usually he wouldn't care. But now it did matter to him that Var remained healthy, and he had no inkling as to why. Var meant nothing to him, but something inside him just wouldn't accept the idea of leaving the Selani in danger. Something human.
He had acted the same way before, with Sheba. He didn't care for Sheba, but he had prevented her from killing herself, even had healed her of her injuries. Out of impulse. Those impulses, long submerged under his ferality, were starting to reassert themselves, and that gave him a little hope for the future. They were human impulses, they were the remnants of his human morality trying to restore itself in his mind. He had swung about all the way he could towards the Cat, and now it seemed he was swinging back towards something of a center between his dual natures.