Manly Wade Wellman - Hok 01 (4 page)

 
          
Still
more abruptly, Hok spun and fairly raced out of the cave, out of the clearing,
into the forest away from Oloana’s black eyes and fruit-red mouth.

 
The Capture of Hok

 
          
BUT
he did not run far. Somehow it had been easier to run yesterday, even when
encumbered by the struggles of Oloana. Hok lagged. His troubled young eyes
sought the ground. His feet took him where they wished.

 
          
The
day and the distances wore away, like rock under falling water. Hok did not
eat. Twice or thrice he drank at singing brooks,
then
spewed out the water as though it were brakish. Once he saw a wild pig rooting
in a thicket and by force of habit reached back for his javelins. Then he
remembered that he had left them leaning at the door of the cave. He had left
Oloana there, too. He could get more javelins, but never another Oloana.

 
          
It
was nearly evening. He walked slowly down a game-trail, less watchfully than he
had ever walked since childhood. Before he knew it, something huge and swarthy
flashed from behind a broad tree-bole and flung itself upon him.

 
          
On
the instant Hok was fighting for his life. One glimpse he caught of that
distorted, black-bearded face before they grappled—it was Kimri, the giant who
had sworn to follow him and take Oloana back. He was an adversary to daunt the
bravest; but Hok had faced Gnorrls, which were more horrible. Smaller but
quicker than Kimri, he locked his arms around the huge body in a python-tight
underhold. His tawny head burrowed with canny force into Kimri’s shaggy cascade
of black beard, driving under the heavy jaw and forcing it upward and back.

 
          
The
dark forest man’s huge muscles began to sag as Hok increased the leverage.
Hok’s heel crooked behind Kimri’s, Hok’s entire weight came suddenly forward.
Down they went with a crash of undergrowth, Kimri beneath, while his lighter
opponent’s oak-hard fingers drove through the beard-tangles, finding and
closing upon the throat beneath.

 
          
But
a flurry of feet drummed down upon them as they strove on the ground. Two
sinewy hands damped under Hok’s chin from above and behind. He bit a finger to
the bone, heard his new assailant howl, and next instant was yanked bodily away
from the prostrate Kimri. As he tumbled he tore free, whirled catlike to get
his feet under his body, and rose swiftly to face a second
blackbeard
,
shorter and older than Kimri. But something darted forward to quiver a
thumb’s-breadth from his heart — a long, lean dagger of chipped flint.

 
          
“Move!”
the newcomer dared him. It was Zorr, Oloana’s chieftain-father. “Move—and die!”

 
          
Hok
stood motionless. Kimri struggled up, wheezing and cherishing his bruised
throat with shaking fingers. He gulped welcome air into his great lungs,
then
seized his fallen axe.

 
          
“No!”
barked the father of Oloana.
“The rope!”

 
          
At
the voice of authority, Kimri dropped his axe and jerked from his girdle a coil
of rawhide line. Quickly he flung a loop of it over Hok’s shoulders and ran the
rest of it round and round, pinioning the prisoner’s arms to his body.

 
          
The
chief lowered his dagger. “Where is Oloana?”

 
          
Hok
shook his head.

 
          
“Answer!”
roared Kimri, and struck Hok’s mouth with his homy palm. Blood sprang to the
bruised lips as Hok curled them in scorn.

 
          
“Coward’s
blow,” he mocked. “Untie me, and I will take the head from your body like a
berry from a bush.”

 
          
“Where
is Oloana?” demanded Zorr again.

 
          
“I
do not know. I set her free.”

 
          
“You
lie,” raged Kimri. “Tell us where you have hidden her.”

 
          
“I
say that she is free,” insisted Hok.

 
          
“Tell
us,” Kimri repeated, “or we will kill you.”

 
          
“You
will kill me anyway,” said Hok.

 
          
Kimri’s
beard bristled, and again he clutched his axe. As before, the chief intervened.

 
          
“It
is nearly night, Kimri. We will camp. He can think until morning.” He studied
Hok narrowly. “Tomorrow, if his mouth is still empty of the words we want, we
will stuff it with hot coals.”

 
          
Kimri
grunted acquiescence, and the two herded their prisoner through the trees for
nearly a mile. In a grove at the top of a brush-faced slope they came to a
halt, shoved Hok violently down at the base of a big tree and tethered him
between two gnarled roots with the free end of the rawhide. Then Zorr kindled a
fire with rubbing sticks, chanting a ritual similar to the one Hok’s people
used. The forest men produced flitches of dried venison from their belt-bags
and began to eat, talking in low tones.

 
          
Darkness
came. The two dark men stretched and yawned. Kimri rose, larger than ever in
the fireglow, and came to the big tree. He examined the knots in the cord and
gave the prisoner a kick.

 
          
“Tomorrow
you will talk,” he prophesied balefully, and returned to the fire. Zorr built
it up with hard wood. Then the two lay down and fell into quick, healthy
slumber.

 
          
HOK
listened until the men by the fire began to breathe regularly and heavily. Then
he tried his bonds, cautiously at first, lastly with all his strength; but the
rawhide had been passed many times around him, and was drawn tight. He could
not make it so much as crack.

 
          
Forced
to lie still, he thought of Oloana and her resentful beauty, of how he had not
tamed her. With the dawn his enemies would awaken and question him again. .Zorr
had hinted of fire-torture. He, Hok, could truly tell them nothing, but they
would never believe. If he were lucky, he might goad them into finishing him
off quickly.

 
          
He
dozed fitfully at last, but started awake almost immediately. What was that?
... He felt, rather than heard, the stealthy approach of light feet. The
ash-choked fire suddenly cast a bright tongue skyward, and Hok saw the newcomer—a
woman, crowned with clouds of night-black hair. Oloana had tracked him down.

 
          
She
bent to look at Kimri, at her father. Another tongue of flame rose, and by its
brief glow she saw where Hok lay. Immediately she tiptoed toward him. Her right
hand lifted a javelin— his javelin, brought from the cave.

 
          
Kneeling,
she slid her other hand across Hok’s chest to where his heart beat, beneath two
crossed strands of rawhide. He looked up into her deep eyes and grinned
mirthlessly. If she but knew how she was cheating her father and her lover, if
she could foresee their rage when they would find him slain and beyond torture!
The flint point came down. He braced himself to meet it. Then—

 
          
The
rawhide relaxed its clutch upon him. A strand
parted,
another and another, before the keen edge of the javelin-point. He was free.
Wondering, he rose to his feet, chafing his cramped wrists and forearms.
Oloana, close to him in the dim night, cautioned him to silence with a finger
at her full lips. Then she beckoned. Together they stole away toward the edge
of the bluff.

 
          
Oloana,
going first, brushed against leaves that rustled. A roosting bird squawked in
sleepy terror and took noisy flight.

 
          
Next
instant Kimri’s awakening roar smote their ears. Oloana ran like a rabbit down
the slope, while Hok swung around to meet the clumsy rush of his late captor. A
collision, a clasping hug, and again the two who wanted Oloana were straining
and heaving in each other’s arms. Loose earth gave way beneath their feet. They
fell, rolled, and went spinning over and over down the declivity.

 
          
At
the bottom they struck with a thud, flew sprawling apart, and rose to face each
other. The giant hung back from a new encounter, his hand groping for his
dagger-hilt. But then he flinched and stiffened. In the gloom, Hok fancied that
the wrath on the hairy face gave way to blank surprise. A moment later the huge
form pitched forward and lay quivering.

 
          
Oloana,
revealed behind him, wrenched the javelin out of his back. She made an
apologetic shrugging gesture with her shoulders.

 
          
“I
knew that you would win,” she stammered, “but I—wanted to help.”

 
          
From
the trees above rang Zoor’s shouts for Kimri. Hok extended his hand for the
javelin, but Oloana held it out of his reach.

 
          
“No,”
she pleaded. “He is my father. Let us run.”

 
          
TOWARD
dawn, back at the cave where they had parted, Hok again coaxed fire from
rubbing sticks. In its warm light the pair relaxed, their shoulders to the
rock.

           
“Oloana,” Hok now found occasion to
ask, “
why
did you follow me? I thought—” He paused.

 
          
“Yes,”
she nodded shyly. “I, too, thought I hated you. But, before you left me, free
and alone, you—” she, too, fell silent.

 
          
“What
was it?”

 
          
“This.”
Her round arms clasped his neck. His lips groped for hers. It was, undoubtedly,
the second kiss ever to be achieved.

 
          
“Tomorrow
we start north,” he said, after a time. “My people are there. You will like my
brother Zhik, and my sister Eowi.” He frowned. “Yet there are things you will
not like.
The Gnorrls.”

 
          
“Gnorrls?”
she repeated. “Are they animals?”

 
          
“No.
Not animals.”

 
          
“Men?
Evil men?”

 
          
“They
are not men, but they are evil. Like the spirits
that trouble
sleep
.”

 
          
“I
shall not fear them,” she said confidently. “You, Hok, will fight and kill
them.”

 
          
“Yes,”
he agreed, “I will fight and kill them.”

 
          
Then
he paused, wondering how he would manage it.

 
The Capture of Riw

 
          
HOK
and Oloana had not much time in the days that followed to discuss or dread the
Gnorrls. As a matter of fact, Hok forgot the creatures, as much as any man
could forget, having once encountered them. But when, in sight of the familiar
plain and the bluff- bound river he saw on a ridge a cautiously peering hulk
that was neither beast nor man, the old hate and revulsion came to him—came
almost as strongly as though for the first time.

 
          
It
was then that Hok, clutching Oloana’s wrist with a crushing strength that
surprised even her who had seen him grapple the giant Kimri, half growled and
half quavered a command never to stand, walk or sleep without a weapon in
reach; never to relax guard; never to stir from the home shelter alone. Oloana
then knew that if her mate feared anything, it was the unspeakable Gnorrl.
Solemnly she promised to obey and strictly she kept that promise.

 
          
Approaching
the old rock-defended camp by the river, Hok’s trained eye glimpsed footprints
that told him of the presence of his kin. When he and Oloana drew into sight at
the narrow entrance between rock and water, young Unn, who was standing guard,
first sprang erect with poised javelin,
then
burst
into an uproar of welcome. Others dashed into view—Eowi, Barp and Nohda, all
larger and lovelier to Hok’s sight than when he had left them. There was a gay
reunion in the open space before the cave; Hok introduced Oloana, with the
simple declaration that she belonged to him and must be respected as much as
his own right eye. Eowi smiled shyly but winningly at the stranger girl, and
cemented a new friendship with a present—the finest of the scrapers captured
from the Gnorrls.

 
          
When
the first hugs and shouts had
subsided
a trifle, Hok
suddenly stiffened to attention. Two figures—living human figures—crouched in
the shadow of the rock.

 
          
“Who
are these?” he demanded at once.

 
          
“Oh,”
replied Eowi, with the carelessness employed in speaking of chattels, “Zhik
found them.”

 
          
“Zhik?”
Hok had missed his brother. “Where did he find
them?”

 
          
“Here
he comes,” interjected Barp. “Let him tell.”

 
          
Zhik
trotted into view, bearing the hide and choicest parts of a slaughtered goat.
He whooped at sight of Hok, and the two exchanged affectionate fraternal roars
and buffets. Then
came
once more an introduction of
Oloana, and finally Zhik’s explanation of the strangers.

 
          
He
called them to stand forth—a middle-aged man with a great slate- colored beard,
and a slim young girl, several years Eowi’s junior and as dark in complexion as
Oloana. The man’s name was Kaga, and the girl was his daughter, Dwil. Zhik
considered them his property, by right of discovery, capture and defense
against the Gnorrls.

 
          
“Two
days after you left,” he told Hok, “I was hunting, and saw four people—these
two, another man and an older woman. I did not know if they were friends, and I
kept out of sight. They were new in the country, for they did not watch for
Gnorrls. Before they knew it, Gnorrls had risen out of the grass and
bushes—nine.” He held up that many fingers to illustrate.

 
          
He
went on to say that the second man, foremost of the quartet of strangers, had
been seized and literally plucked to pieces by three Gnorrls—his arms and legs
had come away in those terrible paws, like flower-petals. The others ran. The
oldest woman had gone next, being overtaken by two of the pursuing monsters,
and had died under their rain of blows. Before the last two could win to
safety, a stone hurled from a Gnorrl’s cleft wand knocked the gray-bearded man
down. His daughter had rallied beside him, facing hopeless odds. She meant, it
seemed, to die in his defense.

 
          
“But
the Gnorrls did not know I watched,” continued Zhik, a trifle complacent in
memory of his scouting skill. “I jumped up, and let them have- both javelins,
one after another. I wounded two. A rock came my way, but it went to pieces in
the air, and it only cut me.” He laid a finger on his temple. A scar showed
,
that had not been there when Hok had left. “After that the
girl— Dwil—threw her javelin, and it went through a Gnorrl’s arm. That was
three down in less time than I have told it; the others ran before they were
well aware of what had happened, and carried away their wounded and the two
they had killed.”

 
          
He
told how he had gone up to the fallen man and the girl. She had been most
suspicious, and drew a stone knife, which Zhik took away from her. Then, as her
father regained consciousness, Zhik possessed himself of their other weapons
and obliged them to return with him to the cave. There they had been assigned
most of the community chores — wood-carrying, water-fetching and so on.

 
          
Hok
talked to Kaga, whose language like Oloana’s was understandable. He learned
that the unlucky four had been searching, as had Hok’s own people a year ago,
for new and uncrowded hunting grounds. They had friends, far to the south and
east, who waited for them to return and report.

 
          
“You
have friends?” Hok repeated. “You will stay here.” For he knew that the Gnorrls
would be quite enough to fight at one time; he wanted no human adversaries in
the neighborhood.

 
          
“Yes,
you will stay here,” seconded Zhik. Then he looked at Hok, at the manifestly
happy Oloana, and finally at Dwil, who lowered her eyes. Zhik muttered to his
brother: “I want to ask you something.”

 
          
“Wait,”
said Hok, with all the authority he could muster. His own courtship of Oloana
had been so brief as to be almost instantaneous, and he had by no means
repented at leisure; yet he wanted to be sure before advising
Zhik,
or permitting him to mate with this captive girl.

 
          
“You
are growing a beard since you got Oloana,” Zhik added. “It looks well.”

 
          
“Wait,”
said Hok again, and his brother sighed dolefully.

 
          
HOK
asked to hear more about the Gnorrls, and learned that they were more numerous
by far than a year ago. Not a day passed but what Gnorrls were sighted,
sneaking through thickets or among boulders, watching all that their human foes
did, but seldom offering fight. Zhik did not like this, nor, when he heard of
it, did Hok.

 
          
“They
are planning something,” said the older brother. “They care for their dead—that
means that they worship, as we do. If they worship, they think. And they are
many, where we are few.”

 
          
It
was early in the summer that Barp and Unn, rambling together in search of
marmots, came back in a scamper to gasp out what they had seen—a group of
Gnorrls overpowering a human stranger. He, a slim
youth
whose budding beard was dark, was patently unused to Gnorrls. They had stalked
and surrounded him almost effortlessly. But the novelty of the tale was the
fore- bearance of the captors. Instead of tearing their prey to pieces, they
had bound him with long strips of tough bark and dragged him away northward.
Hok frowned and pondered. Then he asked Barp and Unn if this was not a joking
untruth.

 
          
Both
lads protested earnestly, and offered proof of their adventure. Unn, stealing
in the wake of the Gnorrls and their prize, had picked up something that might
have been torn from the man’s belt during the brief struggle— a pouch, made of
striped catskin. Hok took the article, opened it and made an inventory. There
was a hank of split- sinew thread, three or four flint flakes, a bone awl
ground to a slender point, with a spiral line incised around it. At sight of
this last item, Oloana cried out sharply and ran to clutch at the splinter of
bone.

 
          
“My
brother!” she exclaimed.

 
          
“What?”
grunted
Hok.
“What about your brother?” Zhik and Eowi
both came near to listen.

 
          
“It
is his,” replied Oloana. “I made the awl for him. The man the Gnorrls took is
my brother—Riw, the son of Zorr.”

 
          
Hok
pursed his lips. “He must have followed us here. He should have kept his eyes
open.”

 
          
“The
Gnorrls did not kill him,” said Barp again. “I wonder what they will do with
him.”

 
          
Oloana
was looking only at Hok. “Go,” she said suddenly. “Follow him.”

 
          
“Huh?”
ejaculated her husband. “Follow your brother?”

 
          
“See
if you can get him away from the Gnorrls.”

 
          
That
began a discussion that did not end with supper or with bedtime. Hok pointed
out that Rivv had come north to avenge himself on Oloana’s abductor —which
meant Hok; Oloana answered that Rivv meant only to help her. Hok argued that
the Gnorrls probably had killed Rivv; Oloana made reply that, had they intended
to do so, they would not have bound him and carried him away. Hok complained
that Rivv was of a strange and enemy people, and Oloana flashed back with
considerable heat that she herself was of that same race.

 
          
The
night long there was little sleep for anyone within earshot of the two, and in
the morning the debate came to a conclusion that feminists might regard as
epoch-making—the woman had her way. Hok made over temporary command to Zhik,
took his weapons and a few slices of dried meat, and left camp to follow the
brother of Oloana.