The Godless band moved out of their camp the next day and continued on their way to the gathering. Arda and Bullseye walked with their arms around each other.

  Dodge and Distra walked with them and all four of them chatted together for the whole day.

  Hangman kept his distance again. No one encouraged him to do anything else.

  One more night. He just had to get through tonight. The party would arrive at the gathering tonight. The selection process and any negotiation would conclude in an hour—two hours at the absolute maximum. Then he could leave.

  Arda and Bullseye would go with Wizard’s band. Distra would depart with whoever she married. If Dodge took a wife, she would go with Wizard’s band.

  Hangman would go home with his own people. He never had to come back to the gathering—not as an eligible young man.

  He would return to support his younger brothers. That was all.

  The party crossed an open grassland and battled a few different creature attacks, but such a large group of travelers had no problem defeating anything that came along.

  The group passed alongside more cliffs, climbed down some hills into a plane, and approached the crumbling wreckage of an ancient city in the distance.

  “We should look for supplies while we’re in there,” Butcher suggested.

  “Uncle…..” Hangman got his uncle’s attention and pointed to the west.

  Four enormous Crushers strode across the landscape toward the city. The creatures passed some tall metal towers with clusters of knobs on top. Wires hung from these knobs and trailed down to the ground.

  The Crushers stepped on the wires and occasionally tangled the wires around their toes. One of the Crushers pulled the tower sideways when the creature tried to yank its foot out of the knots.

  “They’re heading for the city,” Magnet pointed out. “They’re probably going in there to hunt for scavengers.”

  Wizard pointed to the eastern side of all the wrecked buildings. “We’ll go around the city on the east side. The Crushers won’t bother us there.”

  No one argued. The party started forward again, but everyone kept an eye on the Crushers.

  Magnet turned out to be right. The Crushers entered the city streets and eyed the ground looking for anyone moving around in there.

  People always went into the cities, especially anyone not attached to a particular Clan. Living in the jungle was hard enough even with entire family bands working, hunting together, and protecting each other.

  The cities tempted isolated scavengers with dreams of forgotten food stashes and abandoned objects. The scavengers’ presence attracted opportunistic predators like the Crushers.

  The cities were no safer than the jungle and sometimes far more dangerous.

  The party circled the city and entered another dense patch of jungle in the afternoon. The gathering grounds occupied a plateau on the other side of this ridge. Just a few more hours and Hangman’s ordeal would be over.

  He wasn’t thinking about anything in particular when a fast-moving object dropped from the high canopy. No one heard or saw a thing before a massive creature plummeted through the treetops and landed right on top of Arda and Bullseye.

  The impact knocked the couple apart. Bullseye toppled flat on his back and the creature pinned Arda under its weight.

  Hangman saw the creature clearly in that moment and the world stopped. It was a large Demonex, a species of enormous cat with horn spikes surrounding its head in a mane of dagger points.

  Most Demonex stood as tall at the shoulder as a man’s sternum, but this one was even bigger. He was a male in his prime.

  More of the same armored quills covered the creature’s body flowing backward to a whipping tail with a ball of spikes on the end.

  The creature curled its lips back from its long, recurved fangs. Poison dripped from those fangs. The Demonex eyed Arda from inches away.

  She screamed when it flattened her under its weight. She couldn’t get out from under it. Hangman didn’t see if she was armed.

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  Bullseye struggled to get up in time to save her life, but it was already too late. The Demonex was too close to her for any man to get to her in time.

  Hangman reacted without thinking, ripped out his kukri, and hurled it at the creature. The blade tumbled end over end, but not fast enough.

  The Demonex lunged for Arda’s face to deliver the killing bite. Hangman had been aiming for the soft spot behind the creature’s ear. That was the only place to hit it to take it down instantly.

  The creature’s movements made the kukri miss. The blade sank into the creature’s neck.

  The Demonex spun around with a frightful roar. The creature didn’t see where the attack came from. The Demonex roared at everyone in the whole party, but at least he wasn’t looking at Arda anymore.

  Hangman didn’t think. He charged across the gap, tackled the creature off of her, yanked his kukri out of the Demonex’s spiked hide, and the two of them rolled away grappling and struggling.

  Hangman knew how to position his weight against the creature’s side so its spikes didn’t impale him. He could have killed himself if he held the Demonex any other way.

  The Demonex tried to raise its hind legs to kick out its claws at Hangman. He used the creature’s movements to plunge his kukri deep into the Demonex’s abdomen and ripped the weapon up.

  The creature bellowed in agony and its legs fell away, but only for a split second before it recovered enough to try again.

  That one instant gave Hangman the time he needed to raise his bloody weapon on high and drive it under the creature’s ribs. Hangman twisted and the Demonex collapsed groaning.

  It still wasn’t dead yet. It tried to slash its poison fangs at him. He ripped the blade out and finally sank it into the soft place behind the creature’s ear.

  The Demonex wilted onto the ground. Hangman toppled off onto his back dripping with blood and shaking from the effort. He didn’t even have the strength left to pull his kukri out of the creature’s skull.

  Viking and Alien both came over to him and bent over him. “Are you hurt, little brother?” Alien asked.

  “Just…..just….just a minute…..” Hangman panted. “Just….give me…..a minute……”

  Alien waved at some of Wish’s people. “Give him some water, will you?”

  The surrounding people stepped forward and handed Alien one of their water gourds.

  “Sit up and drink some water, brother,” Alien told him.

  Hangman opened his eyes. He didn’t want to sit up—not yet.

  In that moment when he opened his eyes, he spotted five more Demonex perched in the high canopy.

  They crouched in the branches observing the Godless on the ground.

  “Alien…..look……” Hangman pointed up at the creatures. “Get everyone….moving out……”

  Viking and Alien looked up. Then they stood up. “Everybody move out!” Alien bellowed. “There are more Demonex stalking us right now. Uncle—take everyone farther down the path. We need to get out onto the plateau before dark.”

  The surrounding people turned away and left Hangman lying there on his back. He tried to shut his eyes, but not before he spotted Bullseye putting his arms around Arda and leading her away.

  Saving her from the Demonex didn’t change anything. Hangman didn’t expect it to. He didn’t save her because he expected her to change her mind about him. Nothing would.

  She and Bullseye left with the others. Viking and Alien waited for a minute, helped Hangman to sit up, and waited for him to drink some water before they pulled him to his feet.

  He had to break the Demonex’s skull to get his kukri out. He wiped it on some leaves and kept following his relatives. Viking and Alien stayed with him until they caught up.

  “It was well done, little brother,” Alien murmured. “You saved that girl.”

  “I’m sure anyone else would have done it,” Hangman mumbled.

  “Anyone else would have done it,” Viking added. “Not many other people could have done it. I bet you anything her young husband couldn’t have done it.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Hangman replied. “As soon as we leave here, they can all forget about me and that’s for the best.”

  His cousins didn’t argue. They stopped at a stream where he washed the blood off his arms and body. At least he could show up at the gathering without looking like more of a monster than he already did.

  Bullseye kept his arms around Arda the whole way to the plateau. She huddled close against him and stayed by his side when the party stopped for breaks.

  “Anyone watching her would think he was the one who saved her from the Demonex,” Alien snarled.

  Hangman didn’t answer. He didn’t resent any of these young people for shunning him.

  He actually started to feel relieved that he would leave the gathering without a wife. He didn’t want to deal with one. His life made more sense when he walked alone.

  Arda and Bullseye had to separate when the party got to the plateau. Dozens of different bands already assembled there from multiple different Clans.

  All the bands stayed separate. They had to for the sake of propriety. Wish’s band, Wizard’s band, and Butcher’s band separated, too.

  Arda retreated with Wish’s band to the other side of the plateau. Bullseye, Dodge, and Distra went with Wizard’s band.

  The young people weren’t allowed to mix until the gathering started. They weren’t allowed to mix even after the gathering started. The gathering didn’t work that way.

  Hangman sensed his relatives closing around him in a protective huddle. They all knew what was about to happen.

  He couldn’t stop himself from glancing around at all the young women in every band. They all looked as nervous as he was—and they all looked beautiful—too beautiful for him.

  A few people sat down on the ground. Then everyone else did the same thing. The different family groups pretended to relax until the gathering started. They lit fires, cooked food, and conversation drifted on the night air as the sun went down.

  Everyone all over the plateau glanced around at everyone else. Everyone evaluated everyone else for their looks, size, shape, and facial expressions.

  Hangman spotted plenty of people looking in his direction. They all looked away just as quickly and went straight back to what they were doing.

  Without warning, someone clamped a muscular hand on Hangman’s shoulder in a tight, comforting grip. It was Viking.

  That touch meant a lot. Whatever happened tonight, Hangman would go home with his family. He would go home with the people who knew him and valued him for what he was. He didn’t need to impress anyone else. He already knew where he belonged.

  He actually pitied the young women who had to leave their families to join other bands and, in some cases, completely different Clans. He couldn’t have tolerated that. He would rather have lived alone than leave his family.

  End of Chapter 18.

  ? 2024 by Theo Mann

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