The rain pounded down anew and scrubbed away the remnants of mud-skin that had darkened his limbs. When he found a sturdy ironwood branch that pointed at the tree-nest, he sprinted over the slick bark and flung himself like an arrow into the sky.
As lightning flashed across the western clouds it turned Gazda’s shining skin to flame. Atop that hurtling vector the night ape restrained the roar that burned within his breast. His fighting spirit had been stoked to life by fearless action, but he would attack in silence and only release his bull-ape cry when the invaders were dead.
The night ape hit the ground with a muffled thump where he arose to stand beside the trees that held his lair aloft, scowling at new wonders that were stacked beneath it.
Were these things made by Fur-nose?
Wooden boxes had been placed between the tangle of tree trunk supports, while others had been broken into pieces and the planks laid out in piles.
He looked up to see the tree-nest door was closed. So he had...
A bang came from overhead, and then a scrape and a scuffing sound.
Gazda snarled up at the noises.
Inside they were, and soon they would meet the master of the lair!
But then another sound caught at his incredible ears and held his heartbeat quivering. Like birdsong, at first he thought it, and then some moment later he recognized not one, but several voices.
Indeed, many invaders occupied his tree-nest and while the fury in him mounted, Gazda’s curiosity held his wrath at bay.
Growling quietly and swaying in place, he pondered.
Fur-nose was dead. There was no doubt...but were these his confederates?
Other night apes of his tribe? Of Gazda’s tribe?
And still there was Harkon. That thought came back to Gazda goaded by the pitch of the voice first overheard...like a bird it was. Harkon’s voice was higher also.
The night ape coiled and leapt up onto the raised platform by the door where he slipped without sound onto the wet thatch covering the roof and stretched out upon the sodden fronds in the rain.
His head hung close to the eaves where the falling raindrops glowed in the amber light from the window.
He listened quietly, and smelled the air for answers.
More voices from within came to him garbled, but they came with many thumps and taps as those who spoke inside there moved around.
In Gazda’s lair! He growled, rage tightening his features, and the muscles swelling on his chest and arms.
The night ape slid his head and shoulders to the roof’s edge and there he peered through the tight backlit lattice covering the window. Shadows shifted inside as his eyes adjusted to the eerie orange light that glared across his vision.
Voices came still, some gruff, but others were sweet like the songs of birds.
Floating flights these voices made that soared above the guttural growling of the apes, and for a moment Gazda’s senses flew with the trilling tones.
Until a shadow moved and led his adapting eyes to something strange. All of the things within Gazda’s lair had been removed or shifted—and a fresh flush of outrage colored his face.
For his bed had been set in a place across from the door, and new beds occupied the floor at its side.
His breath caught when he saw that a new wall had been hung in place, or the other had been removed, for his hunting trophies were nowhere to be seen!
Before Gazda could register more than disbelief, something moved into his line of sight that caused his breath to catch and knocked his growing outrage from his mind.
A female! There was no doubt. She was much like the night apes he’d seen in the skin-stones. She was shaped like Harkon. Tall and straight she stood, but more delicately was she formed.
This was no huntress!
And unlike Harkon’s shaved pate this female had long yellow hair that fell past her narrow shoulders to cover the upper part of her slim arms.
But she had no legs!
Gazda bit his lip, and craned his neck to give the female a sidelong glance. Seemingly, she slid about on a single broad white stem or leg that showed no knee or joint in locomotion.
She was like a mushroom, or some other broad-stemmed plant! But how?
Harkon had two long legs that despite their pleasant contour were strong of muscle and similar in function to Gazda’s own.
He hooted his amazement before swinging his head up out of sight when the strange female’s bright blue eyes glanced toward the window at the sound.
The night ape listened for alarm, and when none came he laid back on the roof where staring up into the rain he considered this puzzle.
An ape—a female night ape and others had invaded Gazda’s lair. Fur-nose’s lair originally, and he wondered again if these were of Fur-nose’s tribe?
And if that was true, could Gazda claim some kinship to the creatures?
The yellow-haired female was similar to Harkon. Her face, neck and hands were hairless—though they were white like a night ape’s.
But that could not explain the absence of legs! Unless, that was the natural condition of females of his tribe, and they were simply different from Harkon’s.
Or was he seeing the results of some sickness or grave accident that had left them less than whole?
Another fluting voice trilled below, so Gazda lowered his head by the latticed opening where he saw the first now joined by a second female. This one had brown hair, and the long tresses were folded over and over and piled atop her head.
She was taller than the other, but had white skin also on hands and face.
Mystified still, Gazda moved his own hand into the light from the window, and there compared the color of their skins.
All were hairless and so pale!
On this second female also, her upper torso stopped at the waist where a great stem grew down to
