Page 9 of Caveman Alien’s Horn (Caveman Aliens #26)

9

- Cora -

When I sit down by the campfire, Sprisk immediately serves me a delicious breakfast of meat fillets and cooked roots, overstrewn with dried herbs.

The open sky makes me feel vulnerable, so I keep looking up to check for dactyls. Eric is nowhere to be seen, and I don’t blame him. After Sprisk and I went inside the tree last night, he must have gotten bored.

“Did you sleep well?” Sprisk asks.

“Well,” I mumble as I chew the annoyingly tender meat, worried about how comfortable I was and how I woke up without stiff muscles and pain all over for the first time in years. And how delicious this food is.

I can’t get used to this kind of luxury, to sleeping all the night through and being perfectly sated with fruit juice and a hot meal to start the day. I can’t let this be my new normal, with campfires that are lit when I get up, food that appears fully cooked without me having to lift a finger, and even a sunlit clearing that feels completely safe. He abducted me! I can not start to feel good about where he took me. I have to start acting like a victim here.

“Borok village is where?” I ask and look around.

Sprisk must know what I have in mind, because he just shrugs his massive shoulders. “Oh, it’s somewhere in the jungle.”

“Where?” I persist.

He tosses a bone on the fire. “Somewhere.”

He’s as stubborn as I am. “You take me home now.”

“You are home,” he rumbles calmly. “You now live in a tree that’s much better than the other tree.”

That makes me think back to the abduction, and anger flares in me. “You kill loom!”

He raises his eyebrows. “I kill what?”

“My loom! In my tree!” I snarl, getting up and stomping the ground in an imitation of Sprisk’s destructive behavior in my home. I make crashing noises with each stomp.

“The trap in your tree?” he asks. “With all the threads that were supposed to keep me stuck? Surely you wanted me to step in that?”

“Is not trap,” I seethe. “Is loom! Very great thing!”

“It wasn’t a trap? But it almost trapped me!”

“Is loom,” I insist. “Very long to make. You kill!”

“I did break that thing,” he agrees. “Not on purpose, as I think you know. If it wasn’t meant as a trap, then it certainly did work as one.”

“Not trap. Loom.”

“ Lum, ” he ponders. “What is it for?”

“Be here.” Instead of trying to tell him with my modest vocabulary, I go into the tree and bring back the pack Astrid gave me. Taking out the folded-up fabric I wove, I hold it up. “Loom is for make this.”

Sprisk reaches out and carefully rubs the rough, canvas-like fabric between two long fingers. “You made this with that lum of yours?”

“Yes! Now not can. Because you break the loom.” I replace the fabric in the pack and march back to the tree.

Before I get inside, I make a quick decision and continue straight past the opening, headed for the closest edge of the jungle. Keeping the huge trunk between Sprisk and me, I reach the strange line of mushrooms that mark the circular perimeter of the clearing. Now they’re just plain white. Ignoring them, I march on until I’m deep in the jungle. The anger about the loom makes me brave.

The heat and humidity are oppressive, and I immediately get wet with sweat and dripping dew mixed with sticky sap. But this has to happen. If I stay back there, I’ll get too comfortable and Sprisk will think everything he did was okay.

Instead I’ll make an honest attempt to get back to my home. I’m sure Eric will find me, and maybe the adults off his tribe will, too. Then they can protect me on the way back there. I’ve sacrificed too much to leave that home behind. I can probably repair the loom, too.

The jungle is scarier than it was when Sprisk was with me. I haven’t been in the jungle alone since the vismonks found me and brought me to the hidden tree, years ago. I’d forgotten just how alive and threatening it is. There are sounds and movements everywhere. Strange webs hang down from branches, twigs and grass stroke along my ankles. Some creature high in a tree caws loudly, cold sap drips on me, loose leaves and pieces of bark fall on me, and at any moment I could be face to face with a dinosaur or some kind of giant insect.

I seriously consider turning around. But that would be defeat. That would be saying that I don’t think I can get by on my own. And getting by on my own terms is the urge I’ve been clinging to for the past months. If I refuse to join the girls in their tribe, I can’t turn around and agree to stay with a damn kidnapper in his weird hollow tree.

Something comes towards me from straight ahead. It’s bigger than a vismonk, so I sidestep to a tree with flat roots that flare out towards the ground. I duck down between two of them and hold my breath.

It sounds like a caveman, walking heavily and even unsteadily. As if he’s limping, almost.

I push my back and head into the rough bark of the tree, wishing I had a chameleon’s skin like Sprisk. A caveman walking this noisily may be badly injured. They are usually careful about not making much sound?—

“A-ha!” says a voice behind and above me.

I spin around and look straight into the face of one of the outcasts that Sprisk beat up yesterday. It’s the beige-striped one.

I bolt, but run straight into the arms of the brown-striped outcast.

“Here she is,” he says with a raspy voice as he grabs both my wrists in one moist hand. “Not being careful about looking around when she hides. Did you like listening to my footsteps? You thought I was going to walk right past you, didn’t you? Anything to make you feel safe while my friend got a little bit closer. We’ve been following you for a while, you see.”

They both emanate a sour smell, a sweaty sheen on their thin, aging bodies. The grip on me is strong, but I’ve been abducted before and I’ve learned a few things.

“Sprisk!” I yell as loud as I can. “Help!” He probably can’t hear me if he’s still in the clearing, but I hope he’s discovered that I’m missing and is out here looking for me.

“Oh, you think the freak Foundling can help you?” the beige-striped man wheezes. He’s still clearly injured after Sprisk’s rough treatment of him. “Better get ready, Gulu’oz. We will get our revenge. And then— aaargh! ”

I stomp my heel on his foot with my full weight, aiming for the toes. It hits fine, but the outcast’s grip on me doesn’t let up. He pushes me away and holds me at arm’s length. “You little rekh! I will soon deal with you.”

The other one takes an ugly, rusty blade out of a sheath that hangs down his back. It looks like a machete, wide and angular. “And I will deal with the Foundling.”

“Spriiisk!” I yell, making my voice as penetrating as possible. “Outcaaaasts!” I wish I knew more words to scream, but these two will find it hard to ambush Sprisk when I keep making noise. “Spriiisk!”

I can’t shake the outcast’s grip on my wrists, but my expert abductee eyes note that he’s making himself vulnerable. I suddenly bring my hands in close, open my mouth, and bite down hard on a thick, sour outcast finger.

Something gives between my teeth, and I try to ignore the foul taste and what it might come from.

“Aaaarrgh!” The outcast screams again, then uses his free hand to slap my cheek so hard I see stars, even though I duck and am able to half hide behind my wrists and the hand I just bit.

The impact makes me groggy and I struggle to see straight for a moment.

The outcast grabs my hair and pulls me to him, hard. “I understand you want to get close to me. We just have to get rid of your ridiculous Foundling, and then we will get very close indeed.”

His breath is revolting, and it makes me want to retch. But right then I see something among the trees. It’s a shimmering spot that seems to move, like the hot, rising air above the campfire this morning.

Trying to keep their attention away from the approaching danger, I kick backwards at the man holding me again, not connecting but not caring that much. Still held firmly with a hand in my hair and one holding my wrists, I do what I can to resist.

The other outcast is hiding behind a tree, holding his machete in both hands and clearly not expecting Sprisk to arrive anytime soon.

“Scream more,” the outcast wheezes into my ear. “Say ‘come and help me’. Go on.”

“Go fuck yourself,” I seethe in English. “It’s an ambush!” I yell, reasoning that Sprisk probably knows that already and it doesn’t matter if he doesn’t understand the words. I just want this outcast to not spot him before it’s too late.

“Uwh…” the other outcast suddenly says as his knees buckle under him and he collapses on the spot.

Sprisk becomes visible as he stands where the outcast just stood, in front of the tree trunk. His chameleon skin doesn’t change fast enough to disguise its complicated green pattern in front of a dark tree trunk. His drab loincloth is hard to spot anyway.

The outcast holding me sees him, too. Realizing that the game is up, he swears viciously and pushes me towards Sprisk as hard as he can. Out of balance, I stumble across the ground until I make a soft impact with his massive body, gently received in his arms.

“I’ll kill him,” Sprisk growls with an icy tone as he carefully holds me up.

I look behind me. The beige-striped outcast has turned tail and is frantically limping away into the jungle. It’s a pitiful sight.

I take hold of Sprisk’s hand as he passes me. “Not kill. Weak outcast. I not injury.”

His eyes burn into me with murderous intensity. And now I know for a fact he was the monster-like creature that chased away the raptor the other night and then made me scream in horror.

“Next time I see you, outcast,” he yells so the trees tremble, “I will kill you on sight!”

The outcast stumbles and falls, scrambles to his feet again, and keeps fleeing, dragging one leg.

Sprisk turns to the other one, who’s on the ground, groaning. “Aren’t you dead? Pity. I’ll just finish the job.” He walks over and picks up the machete.

“No,” the outcast groans, getting back on his feet by supporting himself on the tree he was hiding behind. “I’ll go. Please.”

Sprisk slashes the machete through the air. “I think I should at least hit you once with this, the way you wanted to do to me.”

“I’ll go, Chief,” the outcast wheezes, staggering away from tree to tree so he can steady himself on each one, barely able to stay upright. “I’m not a worthy enemy to you anymore.”

“Oh, you never were, outcast.” Sprisk turns to me. “No injuries? Are you sure?”

I touch my cheek where the outcast slapped me. It’s not sore, but probably still red. “Not is bad.”

He turns to glare after the brown-colored one, who’s obviously the leader of the two.

I can guess what he’s thinking, and I appreciate it. But I don’t want to see Sprisk murder someone. “Not kill, Sprisk. He injured.” Yeah, I have to learn some more words in his language. Like ‘weak’, ‘pathetic’, ‘wretched’, ‘miserable’, and ‘total loser’. And ‘creep’.

The Foundling looks down on me, and I sense that he wants to say something. Probably about me leaving the mushroom clearing without saying anything.

“Home now,” I say before he can ask what the hell I think I’m doing. “The mushrooms.”

His face brightens, and he gives me a small nod. “I will take you back home. Then I’ll do some hunting. I think we need some fresh meat.” He turns to go ahead.

“Sprisk,” I call after him.

He turns and raises his eyebrows quizzically.

I walk up to him and put a hand on his arm. With the other, I motion him down. “I want say thing.”

He lowers his head to hear my whisper.

I kiss him on his cool, stubbled cheek. “Thank you for not kill.”

That’s not really it, of course. But it’s the only thing I can say in his language. If he understood English, I would say ‘thank you for rescuing me from those lowlifes, and for not killing them, and for not yelling at me for escaping, and for not being like them, and for coming after me, and for cooking great food, and for being the gentlest and most responsible kidnapper ever. And for turning me on with your strength and care and obvious mastery of the jungle, making me forget how dangerous it is.’ I’m genuinely grateful for all those things and many more, and he deserves to know.

The kiss is a spontaneous thing, and I hadn’t thought about it before I just did it. I really should be careful — I don’t know if these guys have kissing in their culture, but on a planet with practically no women, I’ll guess it’s not what they do the most.

Sprisk first looks stunned, and then a small smile appears. “So that’s how it feels. I’ve seen Brak’s and Noker’s wives kiss them, and I wondered what it would be like.”

“Is nice?” I ask, relieved he’s taking it in the way it was intended.

“It is very nice,” he rumbles. “So nice that I would ask for more. But perhaps that’s being too hopeful.”

“Come.” I wave him back down and kiss his other cheek, too. “Is good being hopeful.” I hope I’m understanding the new word he used, but this shouldn’t be too risky.

“I’ll make sure to not kill many outcasts in the future,” he says as we start walking back to the mushroom clearing.

“Good,” I reply. “Not kill is strong. Kill is not.”

He gives me an amused look. “You think killing is weak?”

“Sometimes. Not when hunt food. Then is strong. But kill when not must is weak.”

“I see.”

We soon step over the dense row of white mushrooms. If they were edible, we’d have a big source of food. Of course I don’t know how fast these things grow, but if they’re like Earth mushrooms, they can pop up pretty quickly.

As we approach the tree, I start looking for the creek. The escapades in the jungle have made me feel sticky, and the outcast’s hands on me made me feel dirty, too.

“How far you hunt?” I ask.

Sprisk examines the machete. “How long? I don’t know. I’ll stay close enough to hear you scream. And I want you to scream if something happens.”

“I be in water,” I inform him. “The creek.”

He scans the clearing for threats. “Good. You’ll be out of sight. Still, remember to scream if something happens. Anything.”

“Those outcasts not come back,” I assure him. “Very injury outcasts.”

“Not yet, anyway,” he agrees as he walks away. “I’ll be nearby.”

I locate the stream, cheerfully babbling along in its stony channel. It must be six feet below me, and the bottom is all sand and round, polished rocks.

As I start to climb down into the creek’s bed, I notice a great number of strange, white roots that reach from one edge of the channel to the other. It’s as if someone’s buried thousands of ropes two inches under the ground, but they’re only visible where they span the creek’s deep channel.

Tugging at one of the roots, I can easily push them away enough to get in between them and get down to the creek.

“Just the kind of thing you’d expect from a jungle,” I mutter.

Back when Alba and Bronwen and Astrid and I dug tunnels to live in, we had to deal with a huge number of roots, hacking through them and sometimes having to dig our way past particularly stubborn or thick ones. So this isn’t new to me. But I never saw this exact type of rope-like roots, so smooth and supple and only about as thick as a finger.

I make my way down the side of the channel until I’m through the roots and I can dip my feet into the stream. It’s maybe three feet deep in the middle, and it runs so clean that it’s hard to even see the water in some places.

Stepping into the creek, I let a sigh escape me. The water is cool and fresh as it washes over my feet. The sand is soft and the rocks smooth.

I just stand there for a while, cooling down. I absentmindedly reach up and grab one of the roots, using it to steady myself as I slowly take another step out in the creek so the water reaches just above my ankles.

If those roots are strong enough, it might be possible to put some kind of a cover across them, creating a patch of shaded bathing spot down here in the channel. It would hide me from both the hot sun and any passing dactyls.

Adding a hand, I try to pull the root apart, but it won’t budge. It’s strangely soft and smooth to the touch, almost like satin.

Holding the root with both hands, I curl my legs under me and hang from it. It easily holds me, without any sign of creaking or giving. I only release a small avalanche of dirt and sand from one of the sides of the channel because the added weight on the root makes it dig in more.

I look around quickly, There’s nobody who can see me, and I’m dying to get properly clean.

I pull off my primitive tunic and skirt and hang them on the roots so they won’t get wet. For underwear I have one of the leather panties Astrid gave me, and that’s one of my most precious belongings now. I slip it off and carefully put it on a dry rock. Wading to where the water reaches me to mid-thigh, I squat down and immerse myself in the cool creek.

“Oooh,” I sigh. “I may actually get clean.”

There’s a current, but I don’t need to fight it — my weight is enough to keep me in place. Pinching my nose, I bow my head down into the water until I’m all the way under. It’s a major difference from my usual way of scrubbing each part of me separately with water painstakingly collected from the small spring that trickles out from the ground a hundred feet away from my old tree.

“This is incredible,” I say to myself. “Getting clean on planet Xren? Whoever heard of that? ”

Running my hands through my badly tangled hair, I feel downright luxurious. I scrub myself with handfuls of sand and feel the dirty feeling being washed away.

Finally I get out, feeling cleaner than I have since before I came to Xren.

“Is this even legal?” I mutter as I shake and scrape water off me with my hands. “Bathing and enjoying myself? Surely the caveman vice squad will soon be here to shut down this underground establishment.” I make a mental note to stop talking to myself all the time. It’s a habit that I hope is common for hermits like me, but I’m not strictly one anymore and I should try to keep it under control.

Just standing still, I grab hold of two of the roots that hang above my head, close my eyes, and enjoy the sun rays on me, drying me out and letting my thoughts wander. Try to divert them as I might, there’s only one place they want to wander to: Sprisk.

What if he were to see me like this, naked and frolicking in the creek? What would it feel like for me, knowing his green eyes were on my bare body, taking me in? The first woman he’d ever seen naked? Would he be able to control that bulge that keeps appearing in his loincloth?

“And would I want him to?” I ask myself. “Maybe I’d want him to just… do it, to be the caveman he is and take what he wants…” It feels naughty to say that fantasy out loud, but it feels so good, too.

“But of course I have no way of knowing what an alien keeps behind that bulge. For all I know, it could be a cactus.” Even that idea isn’t enough to cool me down. Because what if it isn’t a cactus, but something even more alien and really awesome?

It’s not long before my front is mostly dry, apart from a small spot halfway down my front that’s somehow wetter than before.

I turn my back to the sun and imagine Sprisk’s intense, half-dinosaur eyes on me, his spikes waving dangerously.

The roots are so soft and smooth in my hands, I start to wonder if they can be used as actual ropes. There must be thousands of them crossing the creek’s channel, and if I could cut them and then splice them together, I might be able to make a nice, long rope that’s both strong and thin.

“That’s if I can even cut it,” I mutter as I squat and pick up two rocks of the right size. I seek out one of the thinner roots and rub it hard between the two rocks. It doesn’t take long to rub off the soft outer layer.

I brush off the pieces of the outer casing of the root. The insides are also white, but nowhere near as smooth.

I turn around to look at the root in better light. Under the soft outer skin there are fibers, very thin and shining in white.

My weaver’s instincts are immediately activated. White fibers, this strong and this thin… I can probably use those. And it may be, from what I can see examining the root that hangs over my head, that those fibers are thick enough to be real threads. If so, there’s no need to spin them — they can be used as they are.

“If they don’t rot or stink or shrink or wither,” I tell myself to not let my enthusiasm run away with me. “And in this jungle, they’re bound to do one of those things. Or worse. Probably they will strangle me in my sleep.”

But it’s promising. The fibers are both thin and strong, and even rubbing them vigorously between the two rocks I only manage to sever a handful of them.

From the corner of my eye I see a shadow moving. It’s Sprisk, but I pretend not to notice him.

A thrill goes through me. I hope he likes what he sees.