AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He yawned.
He was going to be asleep in two hidosecs, wasn’t he?
Yeah, sure enough, he was out like a plastorch. I glared at him and then turned back to the vvoln.
It growled at me.
I stifled a whimper.
Go away,I thought at it.
And then it did, backing away into the shadows.
But I found I didn’t like that, because I could hear something out there, in the woods, rustling around in the trees and underbrush, and I didn’t know what it was. Was it the vvoln, going in circles around our campfire?
I sat with my back to the fire, hugging my knees, and I didn’t move.
In the distance, I could hear the wailing of the vvoln. It was a bone-chilling noise that seemed to echo off the starry sky overhead.
I didn’t like this place, this place of perpetual night, where the only safety was this small fire.
After a while, I got up to put more logs on it. It probably didn’t need it. The fire was plenty hot—and it was not exactly cold up here, considering this planet was hot all the time. Of course, without the heavy atmospheric cover here, it was less humid, a dryer heat, and the trees helped somewhat too, though I couldn’t say why, because obviously, there was no shade in the dark.
But feeding the fire and tending it gave me something to do, and I wanted to make sure it didn’t go out. I wanted there to be no chance of that.
While I was feeding the fire more twigs and branches, I heard a noise.
I tried to convince myself it was the wailing of vvoln, but it was different.
It sounded like a scream.
It was close.
I stood up, and I heard something thrashing out there, something in the woods.
“Hello?” I called.
Someone responded, but not in Common. They were speaking Cobran, which was a trading language from the Lanisson sector. I was pretty terrible with it. I could count to ten and I knew my colors, but otherwise, nothing.
A woman appeared, shrieking in Cobran. She was a donen, and she was naked, but I guessed they were always naked. Still, I’d never seen one with breasts like that, huge, swaying naked breasts, and she was dirty and her hair was matted and she pumped her her hooved legs and came for me, tears streaming down her face and then—
The vvoln came from the side and tackled her.
NINE
cypra
I screamed.
The vvoln drove its tusks into her midsection.
She cried out in pain and terror.
I went for the bolts and bow, trying to figure out how to use it.
The vvoln was tearing its tusks into this woman, rooting out her guts, goring her in half.
I was moaning, my hands shaking, lifting the bow.
