be yu trees with red berries ready for picking. And stands of snow pine and bonewood thickets, birds and sleekits and baldo nuts. From somewhere beyond the cloud of blinding snow, Ahira called to him. He thought he could hear his father, the father of his blood, calling, too. He stumbled on in a wild intensity of spirit far beyond pain or cold or the fear of death. At last he fell to the snow and cried out, ‘O, Father, I am home!’
He lay there for a long time, resting. He didn’t really have the strength to move any further, but move he must or he would never move again.
‘Danlo, Danlo.’
Ahira was still calling him; he heard his low, mournful hooing carried along by the wind. He rose slowly and moved up the beach toward Ahira’s voice. Closer he came, and the sound drew out, piercing him to the bone. His senses suddenly cleared. He realized it wasn’t the voice of the snowy owl at all. It was something else, something that sounded like music. In truth, it was the most beautifully haunting music he had ever imagined hearing. He wanted the music to go on forever, on and on, but all at once, it died.
And then, at the head of the beach, through the spin-drift, he beheld a fantastic sight: a group of six men stood in a half-circle around a strange animal unfamiliar to Danlo. Strange are the paths of the Unreal City, he reminded himself. The animal was taller than any of the men, taller even than Three-Fingered Soli, who was the tallest man he had ever seen. He – Danlo could tell that the animal was male from the peculiar-looking sexual organs hanging down from his belly – he was rearing up on his hind legs like a bear. Why, he wondered, were the men standing so close? Didn’t they realize the animal might strike out at any instant? And where were their spears? Danlo looked at the men’s empty hands; they had no spears. No spears! he marvelled, and even though they were dressed much as he was, in white fur parkas, they wore no skis. How could these shadow-men hunt animals across snow using neither spears nor skis?
Danlo approached as quietly as he could; he could be very quiet when he had to be. None of the men looked his way, and that was strange. There was something about the men’s faces and in their postures that was not quite right. They were not alert, not sensitive to the sounds or vibrations of the world. The animal was the first to notice him. He was as slender as an otter; his fur was white and dense like that of a shagshay bull. He stood too easily on his legs. No animal, Danlo thought, should be so sure and graceful on two legs. The animal was holding in his paw some kind of stick, though Danlo couldn’t guess what an animal would be doing with a stick, unless he had been building a nest when the men surprised him. The animal was staring at Danlo, watching him in a strange and knowing manner. He had beautiful eyes, soulful and round and golden like the sun. Not even Ahira had such large eyes; never had Danlo seen eyes like that on any animal.
He moved closer and drew back his spear. He couldn’t believe his good luck. To find a large meat animal so soon after his landfall was very good luck indeed. He was very hungry; he prayed that he would have the strength to cast the spear straight and true.
‘Danlo, Danlo.’
It was strange the way the animal stood there watching him, strange that he hadn’t fled or cried out. Something had cried out, though. He thought it must be Ahira reminding him that he was required to say a silent prayer for the animal’s spirit before he killed him. But he didn’t know the animal’s name, so how could he pray for him? Perhaps the Song of Life told the names of the Unreal City’s strange animals. For the thousandth time, he lamented not hearing the whole Song before Soli had died.
Just then, one of the men turned to see what the animal was staring at. ‘Oh!’ the man shouted, ‘oh, oh, oh!’
The other men turned too, looking at him with his spear arm cocked, and their eyes were wide with astonishment.
Danlo was instantly in shock. He could finally see that Soli had told the truth. The shadow-men’s faces were much more like his own lean, beardless face than the rugged Alaloi faces of his near-fathers. And here was the thought that shocked and shamed him: what if the animal were imakla? What if these beardless men knew the animal was imakla and may not be hunted under any circumstances? Wouldn’t the men of the City know which of their strange animals was a magic animal and which was not?
‘No!’ one of the men shouted, ‘no, no, no!’
Danlo was ravenous, exhausted, and confused. Because of the wind and the spindrift stinging his eyes, he was having trouble seeing. He stood with his spear held back behind his head. His whole body trembled, and the spearpoint wavered up and down.
Many things happened all at once. Slowly, the animal opened his large, mobile lips and began making sounds. The man who had shouted, ‘Oh!’ shouted again and flung himself at the animal, or rather, tried to cover him with his body. Three of the others ran at Danlo, shouting and waving their arms and hands. They grabbed him and wrenched the spear from his hand. They held him tightly. They were not nearly so strong as Alaloi men, but they were still men, still strong enough to hold a starved, frightened boy.
One of the men holding him – remarkably, his skin was as black as charred wood – said something to the animal. Someone else was shouting, and Danlo couldn’t make out what he said. It sounded like gobbledygook. And then, still more remarkably, the animal began to speak words. Danlo couldn’t understand the words. In truth, he had never thought there might be languages other than his own, but he somehow knew that the animal was conversing in a strange language with the men, and they with him. There was a great yet subtle consciousness about this animal, a purusha shining with the clarity and brilliance of a diamond. Danlo looked at him more closely, at the golden eyes and especially at the paws that seemed more like hands than paws. Was he an animal with a man’s soul or a man with a deformed body? Shaida is the way of the man who kills other men. O blessed God! he thought again, he had almost killed that which may not be killed.
‘Lo ni yujensa!’ Danlo said aloud. ‘I did not know!’
The animal walked over to him and touched his forehead. He spoke more words impossible to understand. He smelled of something familiar, a pungent odour almost like crushed pine needles.
‘Danlo los mi nabra,’ Danlo said, formally giving the animal and the men his name. It was his duty to trade names and lineages at the first opportunity. He tapped his chest with his forefinger. ‘I am Danlo, son of Haidar.’
The black man holding him nodded his head severely. He poked Danlo in the chest and nodded again. ‘Danlo,’ he said. ‘Is that what they call you? What language are you speaking? Where did you come from that you can’t speak the language of the Civilized Worlds? Danlo the Wild. A wild boy from nowhere carrying a spear.’
Danlo, of course, understood nothing of what the man said, other than the sound of his own name. He didn’t know it was a crime to brandish weapons in the City. He couldn’t guess that with his wind-chewed face and his wild eyes, he had frightened the civilized men of Neverness. In truth, it was really he who was frightened; the men held him so tightly he could hardly breathe.
But the animal did not seem frightened at all. He was scarcely perturbed, looking at him in a kindly way and smiling. His large mouth fell easily into a kind of permanent, sardonic smile. ‘Danlo,’ he repeated, and he touched Danlo’s eyelids. His fingernails were black and shaped like claws, but otherwise his exceedingly long hands were almost human. ‘Danlo.’
He had almost killed that which may not be killed.
‘Oh, ho, Danlo, if that is your name, the men of the City call me Old Father.’ The animal-man placed his hand flat against his chest and repeated, ‘Old Father.’
More words, Danlo thought.
