Bunduki (Bunduki Series Book One) (4 page)

Leaving the vicinity of
the
kopje,
after having eaten a good meal, Dawn had started to walk in
a south-easterly direction. She had had the sensation of being
watched by something other than the animals, but had not been able
to locate the person, or persons, responsible. Although the
scrutiny had continued, nothing had come of it. So she had decided
to let the observers make the first move in the matter of
establishing contact. They had not offered to do so, but she soon
had other things to require her attention. In addition to the
herbivorous animals, there were other and more dangerous creatures
to be taken into consideration. There had been other lions, a
couple of cheetahs, a family of Cape hunting dogs and, far away,
what she had taken to be a pack of wolves, but she had avoided
coming too close to any of them.

With the exception of the modem
materials used in the construction of her weapons, Dawn seemed to
blend perfectly into the primitive nature of her surroundings. Five
foot eight inches in height, with the kind of a figure that many a
sex-symbol movie star needed artificial aids to attain—bust, 38;
waist, 20; hips, 36—she presented a picture of primitive, savage
womanhood. Kept short for convenience, her curly tawny hair formed
a frame to set off classically beautiful features. Tanned to a rich
golden bronze, like all the exposed portions of her gorgeous
body and legs, her
face denoted breeding, intelligence, strength of will and
determination. Power-packed, yet not unfeminine muscles, rippled
under her sleek skin and she moved with the fluid grace of a
trained athlete.

While most flattering to her
appearance, the clothing which had replaced her garments was
anything but civilized. She was now wearing a very short, simple
dress made from the soft hide of a cow eland. It was one-piece,
sleeveless from the waist to its extremely daring décolleté, laced
with leather thongs and clung to the splendid contours of her torso
and hips as if molded upon them. The dress, a pair of leopard-skin
briefs, an archer’s arm-guard, a pigskin bowman’s glove and the
belt were her sole ensemble.

Despite the scanty nature of her
attire, armed as she was, Dawn felt sure that she could survive
until she had found her adoptive cousin. If she could not, she
would be unworthy of her heritage. Not only had her mother and
father been espionage agents in German-occupied Europe throughout
much of World War II, facing great dangers and living in the shadow
of a very painful death if they had been captured, but her
grandparents had survived for many years during their youth in the
jungles of Africa. With a bloodline like that, she ought to be
self-sufficient even in such puzzling and disturbing circumstances.
What was more, she had had excellent training for whatever might
lie ahead.

Always something of a tomboy, Dawn had
insisted upon duplicating the lessons in self defense and weapon
handling received by her—at that time—almost inseparable companion,
Bunduki. On being sent to Roedean for her education, she had thrown
herself whole-heartedly into every permissible kind of sport and
had excelled at them all. However, like her adoptive cousin, she
had grown disenchanted by the blatantly one-sided political bias of
the international sporting bodies. So, although of world class as
an athlete, gymnast and swimmer, she too had refused to enter
competitions. For all that, she had kept up her training and was in
the peak of physical condition.

There were, however, limits to how far
her physical prowess could protect her. It would not, for instance,
save her if the big, black-maned lion should attack.

Despite the perilous nature of her
predicament, Dawn did not panic. Instead, she turned her attention
to thinking of how she might extract herself from it. To turn and
run would almost certainly arouse the instinct which every
predatory creature had to chase anything that fled from it. During
a charge, a lion could attain a speed of around fifty miles per
hour. So, especially while she was encumbered by the bow and
arrows—which she had no desire to discard—even though a distance of
slightly over thirty yards was separating them, she could not hope
to outrun the lion. Nor was there a tree close enough for her to be
able to seek refuge in its branches.

Standing perfectly still, Dawn made no
attempt to raise her bow into the shooting position. While she had
not been so incautious that she had been carrying it without an
arrow nocked to the string, she realized that it would be
inadequate in the event of the lion making a charge.

No arrow, even when loosed from
a bow which drew seventy pounds and carrying a modern four bladed
hunting point, had the
stopping
power of a medium to heavy caliber rifle. If a
lion was hit by a heavy enough bullet, it would be knocked from its
feet and so allow the delivery of a second round. An arrow could
not do that, as the force of the powder charge behind the bullet
was far greater than the propulsive effect of any practical
bow.

Of course, the
killing
power of an arrow’s
four-bladed point was even more effective than that of a bullet
under certain conditions. Cutting a path almost two inches wide as
it entered the animal’s body, the arrow was almost certain to cause
death by bleeding—but, unless it was placed with great accuracy and
into a vital area, not quickly enough to end a charge.

A hit in the head, providing it caught
the brain, or through the chest cavity to tear apart the heart or
the lungs, would cause almost instant death. However, she felt
disinclined to chance aiming for such small targets when they would
be approaching her at speed. Even a slight error in alignment would
be fatal to her. While the wounded beast might—in fact, probably
would—die, it would not do so before having reached and either
seriously injured or killed her.

Studying the great cat, Dawn
began to draw conclusions based upon her past experiences and what
she had been taught about the habits of
Panthera Leo.
As one of her instructors had
been her adoptive great-grandfather—who had raised and
trained
Jad-Bal-Ja,
the Golden Lion
^xvi
and had had plenty to do with them in
the wild—she felt sure that she could rely upon the
information.

Taking into consideration the big
male’s obviously well filled stomach and the fact that the rest of
the pride were being allowed to feed from the kill—which, even in
the stress of the moment, she had noticed appeared to be a North
American bison—she decided that it must already have eaten its
fill. In which case, unless it differed greatly from those others
of its kind with which she had come into contact, it was no longer
hungry, and would be disinclined to exert itself without
considerable provocation.

‘
All
right,
numa,’
Dawn breathed, using the
Mangani’s
word for a lion. ‘I won’t provoke you. I’m
going away and, unless you want this arrow down your throat, you
won’t try to stop me.’

Having delivered the
sotto voce
comment, although
she knew that the beast would not have understood even if it had
heard, the girl made a slow and tentative step to the rear. At her
first movement, the lion tensed and its tail began to swing from
side to side.

Dawn came to an immediate halt, ready
to raise and draw the bow!

Standing like a statue, the
girl kept her hazel eyes on the lions, fixing them in a stare as
unblinking as its own. Almost thirty seconds dragged by on leaden
feet, seeming to be
much
longer, before the great cat’s tail ceased its swinging and
it looked away from her unremitting scrutiny.

Dawn took another step!

Although the lion’s eyes returned to
her, there was no other response from it. So, without turning her
back on it, she continued to retreat. She went unhurriedly, wanting
to make sure that she did not trip and fall as much as to avoid any
sudden motions that would alarm it. The lion watched her go and, as
she had hoped, made no attempt to follow. Instead, even before she
had passed out of sight over the top of the slope, it slumped back
into the shade of the bushes. Seeing that the head of their pride
was settling down, the three lionesses and their cubs resumed the
interrupted meal.

Once beyond the lion’s range of
vision, Dawn stopped and sucked in a long, deep breath. Although
she had extracted herself from the predicament without difficulty,
she did not minimize how dangerous it had been. If the lion had
been hungry, she would not have escaped so easily. Taking her right
hand from the bow’s string and supporting the arrow with her left,
she wiped away the film of perspiration that had formed on her
brow. While she was doing it, the memory of something that she had
been told as a child came to mind.

‘
If
Esmeralda
^xvii
was right and servants sweat,
gentlemen perspire, but ladies only glow,’ Dawn thought with a
smile, I can’t be a lady. This is either sweat, or the wettest
“glow” I’ve ever seen.’

Having delivered that sentiment, which
served to relieve the tension left by what she knew had been a
narrow escape, Dawn returned her hand to the nock of the arrow and
resumed her journey. However, she had taken the warning to heart,
and let neither her curiosity over the strange circumstances of her
rescue from the Land Rover, nor the continuing sensation of being
kept under observation, interfere with her vigilance.

After about an hour had passed without
incident, other than seeing game in the same bewildering profusion,
a column of smoke attracted Dawn s attention. It was some distance
away, to the east, but had the appearance of rising from a camp
fire.

The sight presented Dawn with a
problem. To go to the source of the smoke would take her away from
the direction in which her instincts suggested she would find
Bunduki. However, unless a certain theory which she had been
considering just before the meeting with the lion should prove to
be correct, whoever had made the fire might help her in the search.
Even if her supposition was right, provided she exercised caution,
she could gain some useful information. With that in mind, she
turned to the east and made for the smoke.

Long before Dawn was within sight of
her destination, her way was barred by a wide chasm through which
raced the waters of a river. To the south-east, about a mile away,
the plains began to merge with scrub and woodland that she sensed
was the outer limits of the jungle in which—if her subconscious
feelings were true—she would locate Bunduki. So she paused,
undecided as to whether she should go there or try to find a way
across the river and make for the fire.

While the girl was considering
what to do, she became aware that three mounted figures had come
into view at
the top of a slope on the other side of the chasm. Watching
them riding towards the edge and thinking of the theory which she
had been formulating with regards to her whereabouts, she was not
sorry that a gap of about fifty yards would be separating her from
them. While everything about them seemed to be further evidence
that she was no longer in any part of Africa as she knew it,
nothing supplied a clue as to where she might be.

The trio, a woman and two men, were
mounted on horse-like animals. The ears, mane and patterning of
black and white stripes on the smaller mans beast were suggestive
of a Grant’s zebra. Brown in color, taller and of better quality,
the other two animals had black and cream striping on the head,
neck and shoulders only. The long extinct quaggas of South Africa
had been colored and marked in such a fashion. In fact, they all
bore the same kind of resemblance to wild zebras as a thoroughbred
Arabian stallion bore to a tarpon or a Przewalski’s horse, the
progenitors of the domestic breeds. Apparently the three riders’
mounts had evolved from varieties of zebra which had been bred for
long enough in captivity to have developed into riding strains far
superior to the original wild stock.

Not that Dawn devoted too much of her
attention to the animals. She was finding the appearances of their
riders to be of even greater interest.

Sitting her mount with the easy
grace of an excellent rider, the woman was bronzed, black-haired
and very beautiful. Yet, for all the sensual pout to her full lips,
her dark eyes and expression suggested a cruel and imperious
nature. She was about an inch taller than Dawn and would probably
exceed the girl’s age, twenty-one, by six or seven years. Her
shoulder long tresses were held back by a broad band of what looked
like gold lame fabric. The halter which was flimsily covering the
full, firm thirty-nine inches of her bosom and the brief skirt
which emphasized the contours of her thirty-seven inch hips
and
buttocks
were made from a mesh of the same material. Her legs were in
keeping with the rest of her magnificent figure. Crisscrossing her
calves to just below the knees, the straps of her sandals were gold
in color. About her bare, twenty inch, waist was a belt comprised
of gold and silver discs. It supported the scabbard of an ivory
hilted sword shaped like a Roman soldier’s
gladius.
Apart from a wide gold bracelet on
her right wrist, she had no jewelry. Her right hand was holding the
reins and the left rested on the hilt of the sword as she
arrogantly returned the girl’s scrutiny.