She was almost reluctant to give him back the duty of watching the treelings, but she also felt slightly guilty for hiding away where no one could find her.
Promising to return and look after the treelings the following morning, she gave Thakur a farewell nuzzle and trotted away. She took the trail leading back to the meadow and soon heard footsteps coming from the other direction. Ratha saw one of the herders approaching her. His steps were quick and purposeful, his eyes strangely intent, as if he were looking at something that always floated ahead of him.
A look of startled surprise came over his face. He ducked his head as he passed Ratha, but he did not slow his pace. She stopped and watched his hindquarters disappear around a bush.
He certainly didn’t expect to see me, thought Ratha. His astonishment had been tinged with a look of shame, as if she had caught him doing something forbidden and she knew at once he was on his way to the Red Tongue’s cave.
She wanted to race down the path after him and order him back to the meadow. That thought quickly gave way to a feeling of frustration. He knew exactly what he was doing. The look on his face told her that. Even if she caught him and scolded him, he would probably do it again.
She decided instead to follow him at a distance and watch what happened when he arrived at the cave. His scent was fresh and his trail easy to follow. She thought he might already be within the cave as she crept up the last stretch of the trail, but she heard his voice over the sound of the waterfall.
She hid herself in the scattered boulders to the side of the path and peered over, pricking her ears as far forward as they would go. The herder had his back to her so that she could see only his tail, which had begun to curl and wag. The cool breeze from the falls carried the scent of his dismay and another, less pleasant smell, the smug self-satisfaction of the two Firekeepers who barred his way.
“This is the Red Tongue’s den, not a place to amuse idle dappleback-keepers,” one of them growled.
“Just let me in for a little while. You speak so much of the strength and beauty of the fire-creature within this cave that I want to see it for myself.”
“Perhaps you think yourself worthy to serve it, young herder.” The other Firekeeper grinned. “I see you bothered to groom the manure out of your fur before you came, so the Red Tongue won’t be too displeased.”
The herder’s tail sprang upright and he took an eager step toward the cleft in the rocks. Again the Firekeepers blocked him.
“Not so quickly, dung-wearer,” the larger one snapped. “First we must tell you what you may or may not do when you are inside.”
“All right, tell me.” The herder turned his ears slightly back.
“Keep your ears up and your tail down. No scratching or licking.”
“I scratch myself near the guard-fires,” said the herder, mystified.
“Well, you shouldn’t. And this is different. This is the Red Tongue’s den and you should be respectful. Are you ready?”
The herder answered that he was. One Firekeeper led him in while the other stayed beside the entrance. He wasn’t gone long before he was led out again, but Ratha could tell he was dazed and awestruck. He blinked and, as he looked at the Firekeepers, a new, envious hunger came into his eyes.
“You must have been judged most worthy to serve such a wondrous creature,” he said, and Ratha could see that his words inflated their pride even further. She was tempted to jump out from her hiding place and snarl at them for being so supercilious and overbearing, but she held herself back. She needed to learn more before she could confront Fessran and Shongshar with any real proof of wrongdoing among the Firekeepers.
She decided to come back and hide herself again the following day to gather more evidence. If the behavior of these two Firekeepers was any indication, she thought sourly, she would soon have all she needed. Perhaps she could even persuade Fessran to hide and listen, for she sensed that the Firekeeper leader was growing uneasy about her dependence on Shongshar and her toleration of his methods.
During the next few days, Ratha fell into a regular routine of watching Thakur’s treelings while he was gone in the morning and then hiding out near the fire-cave and observing what went on there. More herders came to visit. Some, like Cherfan, she liked and respected, and it dismayed her that they were drawn here. At first the herders came to satisfy their curiosity, but their interest soon became fascination and they returned again and again to enter the cave.
Ratha noticed that the Firekeepers became more selective about whom they would admit. Herders who were eager to crouch before the fire-creature had to obey rules that seemed to grow harsher and more arbitrary each time Ratha listened to them. She ground her teeth and growled—promising herself that once Fessran understood what was happening she would end these abuses.
Yet, the more she watched, the more uncertain she became. Those who came to the cave begged to enter with such unabashed eagerness that Ratha felt shame for them. They were blind to the pettiness of the Firekeepers’ rules, accepting these restrictions as part of the ritual that seemed to be growing up around the cave.
As she watched, she gained a new and disconcerting knowledge of her people. There was something in the nature of the Named that drove them to crouch in obedience to this new power. Ratha sensed in them a confusion of loyalties. Never before had she thought her position as clan leader might be seriously threatened. She was the one who had brought this new power to the clan. She had tamed the Red Tongue and driven the Un-Named back in terror before its power. All the Named were grateful to her and all bared their throats to her.
But, she realized, they did not look upon her with the same awe and passion as they gave to the thing she had once called her creature. Without the blazing presence of a firebrand in her jaws, she had only the power of claws and teeth—and loyalty based on fading memories. Yes, she had tamed the Red Tongue, but she had given its keeping to others and been blind to how it changed them.
She began to see the real truth behind her dream. Her mind had built an image of a Named One made of fire to show her how deep its power reached within her people and even within herself.
“We are all crying cubs before it,” Thakur had said once long ago. Ratha remembered his words and thought, Once, I alone could stand before it without fear. Now I know I am no better than the others.
One day in late summer, she lay in her hiding place with the sun on her back and her chin on the rock, far enough from the Firekeeper guards so they wouldn’t smell her. The air was still and even the sound of the fall seemed to be muffled by the heat. No one had come all afternoon and the two Firekeepers were dozing where they sat. Ratha was thinking about leaving her refuge to drink from the stream above the falls when she heard claws scraping on rock. She ducked down and peered through a cleft between two boulders. For a moment, the crack framed an ugly face with lop ears and bile-yellow eyes.
Shoman! What was he doing there?
Ratha saw his grizzled brown coat and his kinked tail as he passed her hiding place. Someone followed him, and she caught a glimpse of a burn-scarred muzzle and the faded spots of a yearling.
“Bundi?” she whispered to herself, but she didn’t need his smell to know the injured herder. She felt a sense of betrayal, although she was not quite sure why. Perhaps she had assumed that one who had been wounded by the Red Tongue would never seek its presence again.
She saw Shoman and Bundi approach the Firekeeper guards. One of them was Fessran’s son Nyang and he came forward to challenge the two herders who sought entry.
“Take yourselves back down the trail,” Nyang said, flattening his ears at them. “The Red Tongue has marked you as unfit to enter its lair.”