Chapter Thirty-Nine: Bribe (Patreon)

Creating my clay pots definitely takes longer than I’d expected. Just forming the first one takes the rest of the time until dusk. Gauging my tiredness level, I decide to continue by the light of my fire. The downside there is that in order to see what I’m doing, I have to work quite close to the fire, which means my clay dries out more quickly than when I was working further away. That, in turn, means that although I manage to finish the second pot, I’ve run out of water in my canteen. It will be so much better when I have a bigger container in which to hold water. The canteen isn’t bad as the water supply for a single person for most of a day, but it really doesn’t last much more than that.

Without cooking water – and with my only current cooking container, my wok, being used to crystallise salt, I’m back to eating pre-cooked bird meat, despite technically having my cooking area sorted. I’m also pretty thirsty since I didn’t think about the fact that using my only cooking pot for salt production would mean no water to drink.

In the end, I might have to take a chance and drink the water straight. But that will have to be tomorrow: I’d rather eat a boring meal and be thirsty than go to the river in the dark – who knows what sort of beasties are there a’lurking? Still, I do have the luxury of reading a bit of one of my favourite books before falling asleep. At least, I read a few pages before deciding that I’m far too knackered even to read.

As I fall asleep, I muse that this has been the first day so far since I arrived that I haven’t been attacked at least once. It makes a change to not have that rollercoaster of adrenaline rushes, but I can’t quite decide whether I’m more relieved or disappointed. I fall asleep before I come to a conclusion.

By the time I wake, sun is streaming into my cave through the small gap left between the top of my chimney and the top of the hole in the wall.

Markus Wolfe, I hear Kalanthia say, her tone a little impatient. I have a feeling before she speaks about what she’s about to say. I must go to hunt. Are you awake enough for me to leave Lathani in your care? Yup, called it. Shaking the grogginess out of my head, I respond as soon as I’ve got my thoughts in order.

“Yeah, let me just get some water first, OK? I’ll be quick.” She lets out an impatient grumble, but doesn’t refuse my request. Hurrying out, I go down the the river as quickly as I can while still keeping an eye out for any ambush predators waiting for unwary prey. The water tastes good as I drink some at the river side, also snatching some pondweed while I’m there. Hopefully I’ve avoided picking up something nasty again.

Walking back with haste, I muse at the fact that I rarely see many creatures around this spot – probably something to do with them recognising the presence of a much more powerful predator not far away. Still, better safe than sorry, and I still keep a wary eye on the trees around and above me in case there’s a creature that’s missed out on the memo.

Fortunately, I make it back without incident. Once more Kalanthia disappears off into the distance and I’m left with an energetic and rambunctious nunda cub. We play for a while, the makeshift cat toy making a reappearance once I have a chance to recreate it. She seems more adventurous this time, though – I have to keep distracting her from going off the edge of the hill to explore.

At one point, I teach her how to play ‘fetch’, throwing a stick for her to find and pounce on. Well, I say ‘fetch’, but it’s more ‘pounce on and gnaw to death’. Natural I guess considering she’s a lot more feline than canine in nature. Still, she enjoys it. She enjoys it even more when I shift the branch through the grass and she tries to pounce on its end. By the time she’s tired and lies down for a nap, I feel like doing the same, but decide that I’d be better off actually getting something done.

My salt has crystalised overnight, the heat from the fire burning itself down to embers enough to evaporate the rest of the water. I’d taken the malachy leaves out long before going to bed, so what remains is a load of green-tinged crystals. Jackpot!

Searching around for something to put my greenish treasure into, I suddenly hit on an idea. Digging in my suitcase, I find a small tupperware box in which I had stored dice. Why did I bring my dice with me? I have no idea, but I’m grateful for it now.

Ditching the dice out of the box, I clean the bark off a stick and use it to lever the crystals off the wok. I could use my knife...but I don’t really want to risk damaging my wok’s surface. It works, though I might have a few splinters of wood in with my salt. Oh well, I’ll try and avoid them when taking a pinch.

Now, time to make something more interesting than just cooked bird meat. Covering the base of my wok with water, I dump in some uncooked bird meat and the leaves from the pond-weed I’d grabbed earlier. I’ve been continuing to test the weed and, by this point, I’m pretty sure that it’s safe. Sure, I haven’t actually tested it cooked yet, but I doubt that will be a problem.

Covering the wok with its lid, I let it cook while continuing to make some more bark-fibre cord. I haven’t seen Spike since first thing this morning – I sent him off to go and get some food and to come back when he’s finished like yesterday.

By the time Lathani wakes, I’ve finished cooking my ‘stew’ and have started grilling some more bird-meat since my stocks are running a little low. I cut up some pieces of meat and lay them on my grid, watching them sizzle in the heat of the fire. The sounds of fat dropping into the flames punctures the background noises of birds and the light breeze, but it’s a soothing, homey kind of sound.

I only realise the little nunda cub is awake because, turning away from the fire to cut up some more meat in preparation for when what’s on the grill is ready, I notice a small movement. Whipping quickly around, I’m fortunately fast enough to knock her paw away from the fire where she’s millimetres away from getting burned.

“No, Lathani,” I say sternly. “It’s hot. You’ll hurt yourself, and then your mama will hurt me.” The mini-nunda gives me a forlorn look as if asking why I’m being so cruel as to deny her sticking her paw in those beautifully dancing flames. She reaches for the fire again, but I make a chiding noise which makes her hesitate. Looking at me again, she continues moving ever-so-slowly. “Lathani,” I warn her.

She pauses once more, then as I don’t stop looking at her, she finally looks away and settles back on her haunches. I turn back to my meat but keep an eye on the cub in my peripheral vision. She creeps back towards the fire, staring into it and licking her chops. That makes me consider – what if she wasn’t being attracted to the fire but by the cooking meat?

“Hey,” I say to her gently, reaching in with the two branches I’m using as tongs and snaring one of the pieces which I reckon is almost done. And even if it’s not completely ready, Lathani’s supposed to eat meat raw, so I hardly think that it being mostly cooked will cause any issue. I do blow on it until it’s cool enough for me to hold with bare fingers as I don’t want to be responsible for her burning her tongue, though that would be a good lesson for ‘hot’!

Offering the cool piece of meat to the baby leopard, I’m surprised when she doesn’t suddenly dive for it. Instead, she looks at me almost questioningly.

“Sure, you can eat this,” I tell her, not sure if it’s necessary but figuring it won’t do any harm. She then moves forward with a bounce and takes the meat surprisingly gently from my fingers. Chewing it at the side of her mouth, she looks as pensive as a large feline can, her head cocked on one side. Then, seemingly deciding that she likes it, she gulps the last bits down and pokes her paw towards the fire again, not, I notice, trying to actually touch the fire, but making a rather clear sign of what she wants. Smart cat.

Then again, maybe I’m underestimating her intelligence: her mum’s perfectly capable of communicating telepathically, after all. Though Lathani can’t send thoughts to my mind, perhaps she can still pick up at least some of the thoughts I’m sending. Which then begs the question of why she doesn’t do what I want her to do more than half the time.

Stupid question: she’s a cat. Or something vaguely related, I think. Stands to reason she’d only follow my instructions if she wants to. Though...It’s like a lightbulb pings above my head as I get an idea. What if I use this cooked meat to get her to stay away from the edge of the hill? Something in it for her, something in it for me…

“Let me finish cooking this lot and then get the next set on the grill and I’ll give you some more,” I tell her, trying to focus on my thoughts the way I do with Spike. It seems to work. At least, she’s not trying to poke the fire anymore, but is sitting there patiently.

It turns out that using cooked meat as a bribe works better than I’d thought. We play outside, and every time she follows one of my instructions, I reward her with a small piece. I’m even more convinced that she actually understands most if not all of what I say, but just chooses whether or not to follow as she doesn’t seem to have any difficulty in earning her rewards. I don’t want her deliberately doing things I don’t want her to do just so she can get a piece of meat when she obeys me, so I try to give her the opportunity to earn a reward at other times too. It turns into a fun game that both of us enjoy.

Fortunately, I’m able to keep up with putting more meat on the grill than gets consumed, so I do replenish my stocks a bit. Besides, I still have a fair amount of raw meat so trading a bit of cooked stuff for an easy way to stop Lathani wandering into danger is a good trade for me.

I’m playing with Lathani, teaching her to come when I call when Kalanthia returns home, her muzzle still stained red. I don’t notice her at first – for a huge leopard-like creature, she’s surprisingly stealthy. When I spot her, she’s standing next to a large bush, still as a statue and watching what’s going on with her golden eyes.

“Hi Kalanthia,” I say casually. “Did you have a good hunt?” She doesn’t reply, not telepathically anyway. Instead, she snarls. For a moment, I think that she’s spotted something dangerous and automatically look around as I reach for my knife. Nothing. Looking back at Kalanthia, I feel a shiver of fright as she’s used the distraction to close the distance between us. Now only a couple of metres away and still moving fast, I can see she’s snarling at me.

My hindbrain kicking in, I back away quickly, my knife unconsciously appearing in my hand as if by magic. Of course, my backing up speed isn’t anywhere near a match for an angry nunda, though why she’s angry, I don’t know. She covers the last distance between us with a little leap, her paw landing on my chest and pushing me over. The world blurs around me and the next thing I know, I’m lying on my back winded with her heavy dinner-plate sized paw weighing down my chest. She’s snarling in my face, her bared fangs close enough to me that I can smell the rotten meat stench on her breath.

“Kalanthia?” I choke out with the little air I have left. “What are you doing?” My knife has been knocked out of my hand at some point in the last second, and I see it lying in the grass, just out of reach. What am I going to do?