Gazda was not bothered if the raindrops ran over his slick body when he was out at night. In fact, the fog and rain helped obscure his white skin while he was at his hunting games.
But for some reason silent pools like the one by which his companions knelt always sucked at him, always seeming to draw him toward their darkest depths—even there where he crouched well back upon an earthy bank.
“Drink!” Ooso peeped, and the others chimed in, leaning forward to lap at the pool.
“Drink, Gazda,” Poomak encouraged. “You are thirsty...”
“Look at Kagoon!” Kagoon said, rising up on his fingertips and toes to stare at the reflections in the water’s surface.
“Kagoon is a bushbaby!” Ooso chortled. “Gazda too! Come see your face!” And she slapped the water, sending a spray into Kagoon and Poomak’s eyes. Immediately, all three were rolling and wrestling again.
Gazda was very curious about this strange phenomenon that allowed the others to see themselves, and he had often been challenged to look at his own face upon the water’s surface. He knew that water reflected the jungle trees and plants that grew around it, and he’d seen curious inverted apes running in reflections, but he’d never gone close enough to see his own face.
He was curious to know what he looked like because so many had said he was ugly, and he already knew his body was different from the other apes.
Perhaps he was afraid to see just how different he was from the others in his adoptive tribe.
But the thought brought back his anxiety and the water pulled at him again. His heart pounded, and he gasped, caught between his burning curiosity and fear.
When his friends broke from their play to kneel by the pond and drink again, Gazda took a deep breath and crept closer with jaw clenched.
He set his trembling hands on Ooso’s furry back and on Kagoon’s, and grinding his teeth against his racing heart; he rose up and peered over his friends’ shoulders. There they were, each of them, the faces of Poomak, Ooso and Kagoon floating on the pond like in a dream.
But where was Gazda’s face?
Ooso whistled, craning her neck to look up at her friend, realizing what he was doing and she turned back to the water, tilting her head as she squinted at the reflections.
“Where is Gazda?” Ooso asked, and the others also leaned forward on their arms to search the pond’s surface.
“Gazda! Lean over more and look,” Ooso scolded, as Gazda crawled forward on shaking limbs until he was perched entirely upon her back and on Kagoon’s.
There was nothing on the water but his friends’ puzzled faces.
“Where is Gazda?” Poomak blurted, nudging Ooso.
A sudden shrill scream rent the jungle and the young apes by the pond tensed every muscle...and then moved!
Gazda leapt forward away from the sound and over the water, as Ooso and Kagoon broke to the right and Poomak bolted to the left.
What happened next was lost in part to Gazda for his mind was paralyzed by fear. He saw the water there beneath him, a great flat reflection of the high trees above him—behind.
But still there was no Gazda mirrored there.
Another vicious roar froze his heart—a leopard! NO!
Then came a shriek of pain and a great fear gripped him.
His friends!
A strange sensation came over him that dispelled the instant terror of the carnivore’s cry—and his panicked sense of sinking was replaced by another. Surging outward from his heart a heat rose up to buoy him, and Gazda did not fall!
He moved through the air! His vision flickered and his ears echoed uncannily—noises were everywhere beset by a sharp clicking noise—and over this came the splashing, and growling as a beast attacked its prey.
Gazda’s friends.
The night ape burned with anger, but he could not turn or look back or help. For a moment, it was like he had no substance, as if he were made of drifting mist, and then for a fleeting second it appeared that his hands had changed; his fingers had grown long and spindly with shadows of dark skin between them.
And just as suddenly his vision and hearing returned to normal.
The night ape glanced back across the water, and saw a yellow and black-spotted leopard dragging poor Poomak into the undergrowth.
Gazda gripped the thin branches of a tree that grew on the far side of the pool some 25 feet from where he had last crouched with his friends. His heart was racing and a clammy sweat covered his naked limbs, but his breath was slowing.
He cast about fearfully for his other friends and was relieved to see that Ooso and Kagoon had leapt over the rocks and into the trees by the ferns, and there they clung in the heights noisily scolding the leopard.
The night ape scurried along the branches to where they grew thicker near the tree trunk as his friends screamed angrily at the beast.
Gazda studied his hands, opening and closing them, holding them to his face with the fingers spread wide as he sniffed the nails and skin—normal now, but he was remembering—and when he looked up again, he saw that Ooso was watching him from across the pond.
Her eyes were shining with emotion.
CHAPTER 8 – Mystery and Danger
Months passed and the tribe rarely spoke of the red-headed ape, though some of the mothers used Poomak’s story as a warning to their little ones. The jungle was unforgiving to careless creatures.
It seemed that even Poomak’s mother Nuklo had put his memory behind her. The she-ape was carrying another infant and the sire Wogo was no doubt anxious to see the babe’s black crest upon delivery.
Life was moving on.
However, a silence had grown in Gazda in that time as he brooded over the loss of his friend. Where he had once been a fearless and restless spark, the night ape now had become uncertain and gloomy.
Eeda noticed
