Then one little male had been hit by a flaming branch, breaking the hips of both his hand-feet and true-feet on that side. Beautiful Mind had sent her other kittens ahead, then raced back for the injured one. Lacking the dense oils that gave the older People some protection, the kitten’s fur had caught fire and his injuries had made it impossible for him to roll free of the flaming branch, much less smother the flames.
Beautiful Mind had thrown the branch clear, beat out the flames, and then attempted to carry the injured kitten clear, breathing in lung-scorching smoke all the while. The kitten had died in her arms. When Red Cliff raced back to pull her to safety, she was already far gone after her little one. Yet, despite her injuries, Beautiful Mind continued to draw ragged breath after ragged breath. Her mind was untouchable except in fragments, and those fragments mostly dreams of better days, but Keen Eyes wondered if she held onto life because she knew that without her Red Cliff would likely fade away. So many bonded pairs could not live without their partners. Sometimes a parent would survive if their kittens needed them, but Red Cliff’s bond to Beautiful Mind had always come first. He loved the kittens truly, but always because they were part of her.
When Keen Eyes returned to where the Landless Clan was currently camped near a stream that offered good water, he found Sour Belly fuming that Red Cliff was gone.
<Gone! And gone beyond the range of my mind-voice.>
This was not good. A Person’s mind-voice carried a long distance, especially when seeking someone well-known. Clearly, Red Cliff had ventured further than was prudent or he was refusing to answer. Neither of those were promising.
<Which way did he go?> Keen Eyes asked.
<How should I know?> Sour Belly’s thoughts were as unpleasant as his breath. <You are the scout. I am just a retired hunter turned caretaker of kittens.>
A cough came from where Beautiful Mind lay. She was hardly more than a matted heap of brown and white fur, yet one true-hand rose and pointed, holding the position until Keen Eyes said <I see, sister. I will go after him. I will bring him back. I promise.>
But his heart moved uneasily within him, for Beautiful Mind had indicated the very heart of the territory held by Trees Enfolding Clan.
* * *
Anders had just finishing messaging Stephanie when his uni-link chimed. He glanced at the ID and took the call with real relief. Stephanie’s last message had been full of impending finals and her parents’ upcoming visit. Somehow, all her excitement had made her seem farther away than ever.
“Hey, Jess.”
“Hey, Anders. Listen. Mom’s asked me if I could do a favor for her. Tiddles isn’t feeling too well—”
Tiddles was Jessica’s youngest sister, a sturdy, determined three-year-old. Her given name was Tabitha, but Anders had never figured out where the nickname came from.
“—and Mom needs to take her to the doctor. Problem is, today is Mom’s day for recording plant growth in some of the burn areas, then collecting soil and plant samples. Timing’s really important with this. She asked if I thought I could handle it. I said I thought I could.”
Jessica sounded unusually nervous, and Anders thought he knew why. Naomi Pheriss was collaborating with Dr.Marjorie on a study of succession growth. The project was important for a lot of reasons—not all of them scientific. Dr. Marjorie had promised coauthorship to Mrs. Pheriss, which could mean a lot for future projects. The gang had gone along on a couple of Mrs. Pheriss’ collecting outings already, but they’d definitely been assistants, not in charge.
“Need company?”
“Seriously,” Jessica agreed. “I’m going to call the others, but I wanted to get you…Well, I mean, before you promised your dad you’d distract the x-a’s for him or carry buckets at the site or something.”
Anders laughed. “Honestly, I think Dad has me in mind for bucket duty. I was looking for an out. I’ll call you back if there are any problems, but otherwise you can count me in. Where should I meet you?”
“I can pick you up,” Jessica said. “Would you mind our leaving relatively early? We’re going to where the big fires were, up in the northeast Copperwalls.”
“No problem. See you then.”
* * *
When Jessica picked Anders up the next morning, he was surprised to see that—other than Valiant—she was alone. He’d figured she’d have at least grabbed Toby, since he didn’t live far from her in Twin Forks.
She saw him glance at the empty interior of her battered air car before he got into the front seat on the passenger side and, almost as if she was reading his mind, began to speak.
“Toby can’t make it. Today’s some special holy day for his family’s religion. Christine and Chet are on guard duty. I hope you don’t mind.”
Suddenly, Anders felt a touch shy. It wasn’t as if this was the first time he’d been alone with Jessica. And not only Jessica, but with her empathic treecat…He wondered why that should bother him.
He realized Jessica was staring at him, an expression of dismay spreading across her pretty features. He shook his head and hurried to answer her question.
“Mind? I don’t mind. Sorry. When I realized Chet and Toby weren’t going to be here, I tried to remember if I’d packed my handgun. We shouldn’t be out there, just the two of us, with no protection.”
“Do you need to go back for it?”
Anders made a pretense of checking his pack, even though he was absolutely certain he had the gun with him. He’d inspected it before coming down and made sure to put in a spare box of ammunition.
“I’ve got it,” he said.
“Great.” Jessica set the air car to rise. “I’ve never learned to shoot. I have a stun gun and a CS sprayer, but my dad is sort of into nonviolence. He doesn’t mind if I learn to defend myself. He even signed me up for an aikido class back on our last planet, but he says we should learn to defend ourselves without turning into our own enemy.”
“Tell that to the hexapumas,” Anders said. “Somehow I doubt they’d see it that way—or that CS would stop them. A stun gun, maybe, on full power, if you hit exactly the right spot.”
“Yeah,” Jessica said. “Stephanie says the same thing. Since I usually went hiking with her and Karl—and they’re always carrying some sort of shooting thing, sometimes more than one—I figured I was safe enough. Anyhow, we’d probably just use our counter-grav to get out of the way.”
“Well,” Anders said. “I’m still glad I’ve learned to shoot. I’m not as accurate as Karl or Stephanie, but I think I could at least slow down something the size of a hexapuma.”
They were speeding over the green canopy. Twin Forks and its outliers had vanished, but the Northeastern Copperwall Mountains didn’t look a whole lot closer. Jessica set the autopilot and leaned back.
“Funny,” she said. “It was learning Stephanie was so good with a gun that made me pretty certain all the stories Trudy told me about Steph being nova violent must be right.”
“Stories?” Like any young man in love, Anders was eager to hear stories about his beloved’s life before he’d met her, even—or maybe even especially—those she wouldn’t be likely to tell herself. “Stephanie uncontrollably violent? You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Apparently,” Jessica said, “it’s true. I heard about it first from Trudy. When Stephanie first met the local kids, there was a fad on for catching critters for pets. Chipmunks were popular. They’re ground burrowers, about the size of a small dog, and though they can climb, they’re nowhere near as good at it as, say, a wood rat, so they’re not that hard to catch. Almost everyone in Trudy’s gang had at least one chipmunk for a pet, and Trudy had a near-otter and a couple of range bunnies, too.