Tribes of Venara Read online

  The forest floor was so grown over with plant life that every step he took was a battle against waist-high grasses and clawing shrubs, an endeavour made all the more difficult by a web of fat, gnarled roots that surrounded the base of every tree like an army of wooden limbs. Under such conditions Nolan quickly lost sight of the middle-aged man, and after persisting for some time he stopped to catch his breath. Where the hell was he?

  It was a struggle to keep calm, but somehow he managed. Since any random tree might have been hiding a monstrous centipede, he figured that no place in this overgrown forest would be safer than the next, so he decided to keep moving in the hopes that he might somehow salvage this situation.

  He didn’t get far before he saw someone lying on the ground in a clearing up ahead, half submerged in a looming bush. He hurried over to check up on them, praying to God that they were just sleeping. This man was slightly older than the last one he’d run into, with specks of grey dotting his otherwise dark hair.

  His first move was to pull the guy out of the bushes, since he had no way of knowing what other crazy insects might be lurking about. He knelt down and checked for a pulse. If he was dead then it would be best to leave here quickly. Nolan confirmed that he was still alive when, to his surprise, the man’s eyes opened and unleashed a flood of silent tears.

  “Are you okay?”

  The man could only whimper. He found it strange how he wasn’t moving despite having just woken up. The pained mumbles began to grow more frequent. Was he injured?

  “A—Ayú…”

  What’s this guy saying?

  “Hold on just a sec, I’ll get you out of there.” Nolan got his hands underneath the man’s arms and used all of his strength to haul him out of the bushes, though he was met with heavy resistance.

  “Ayú—ayúda…”

  He gave a strong tug and dragged him out of the leafy confines, along with two dark and furry masses.

  The horrifying spiders were bigger than small dogs, and furrier than most breeds. They didn’t seem to pay any attention to Nolan and continued to focus on eating each of the man’s respective legs, which were already lacking feet. Their blood-soaked mandibles looked like demonic little arms as they slowly stripped the flesh from the increasingly exposed bones of his mutilated stumps. It became clear that this man was paralyzed, and that Nolan would have to leave him to his fate lest he risk drawing the attention of the two abominations that feasted on his legs.

  “Ayúdame, por favor,” the man croaked, voice warped by the cruelty of his demise.

  With the knowledge that at any moment he might be barrelled into by one of those spiders and made into a living meal like the poor man by the bushes, Nolan frantically fled the scene with tortured steps.

  There was no telling how long he sprinted for, but he made sure to stop before he ran out of breath. Although every part of him screamed that he should keep pushing himself onward, he couldn’t help but imagine what else might be dwelling in this unpredictable woodland. With the forest floor so helplessly cluttered the thought of how much noise he made as he plunged into thickets and tore through bush after bush caused him to realize how foolish he’d been while blinded by fear.

  What the fuck am I supposed to do? How else should he react to giant centipedes, giant man-eating spiders, and giant trees? He looked around at the imposing wilderness and suddenly felt as if he’d woken up in some sort of hell. Could it be that everything in this forest was oversized?

  He found a jagged branch that was a bit longer than he was tall and then set off with cautious footfalls. He tried to keep to the open areas as best he could, but there were many times when the only way forward was to sack up and force his way through a patch of foreboding undergrowth that may or may not have been housing some horrifying creature.

  After an hour of anxious hiking, Nolan stumbled upon what appeared to be an old road. It was about half as wide as a standard suburban street and had nearly been swallowed up by the surrounding forest, an occasional eroded cobblestone visible amid the patches of the mercifully shorter grasses that carpeted the dirt path. Since he had no clue where he was it didn’t matter which direction he chose to keep to, so he decided to head right.

  It was hard to tell through the distant ceiling of broad leaves and thick branches, but it seemed to be around midday. After a terrifying, hour-long hike, Nolan spotted two figures off in the distance that were heading in his direction. Sweet Jesus—people! Normally he was skeptical of just about everyone, but he couldn’t afford to be a cynic in his current situation. There were two men up ahead, and they seemed just as invigorated by his appearance as he by theirs.

  He held off on speaking until they were close enough to talk without having to raise their voices, but it soon became apparent that he was the only one of the three who spoke fluent English.

  Both of the men were in their mid-to-late twenties. Nolan was able to guess their occupations with a quick glance at their clothes. The man dressed as a construction worker introduced himself as Jacques, and from what Nolan could gather he was from some small town in France. The soccer player’s name was Takeshi and he was from a city called Kyoto in Japan.

  Nolan knew a bit of French from school, but only enough to entertain a broken conversation. Takeshi also knew a bit of English from his high school days, but it was just as difficult to decipher as Nolan’s French. Still, the loose understandings helped the three of them to communicate through exaggerated gestures, as if they were playing an intense game of charades. After ten minutes of attempted communications, they were somewhat able to convey their own experiences, albeit vaguely.

  Jacques had been laying cement at work when he suddenly blacked out and then woke up sprawled about the forest floor. Takeshi had blacked out in the middle of a soccer game, and woke up to see Jacques wandering aimlessly through the forest. They’d only just found the path when Nolan had come into view.

  After deliberating for a while, they decided to follow the direction that Nolan had been heading in. Without the proper language skills they could only walk on in silence, each lost in his own thoughts.

  What the hell’s going on? First there was that American, now I’m bumping into a Frenchman and a Japanese guy? Am I really supposed to buy that we were all just minding our own business thousands of kilometres away from each other and then poof, we’re all waking up in Satan’s backyard?

  After persisting along the path for a few hours, they stopped to rest. Jacques had a chocolate bar in his work belt, which he split evenly between the three of them. After sitting around for a bit, they stood up and prepared to continue on with their hapless march when a shrill scream pierced through the silence and rooted them in place. The three of them exchanged troubled glances before surveying their surroundings.

  Nolan shifted nervously, knowing full well what sort of creatures inhabited this forest. That sounded like a little girl. A second scream confirmed his suspicions, this one sick with anguish. Takeshi and Jacques shared a hard stare before cautiously rushing away from the main path.

  “Wait, it’s dangerous in there!”

  Nolan tried to stop them, but Takeshi pointed into the unknown. “Little girl. We go!”

  They have no idea what’s out there! He shot a pleading look at Jacques, but caved under the Frenchman’s judgemental glare. Nolan had no choice but to follow. Only once they were past the treeline did he realize that he’d forgotten to take his jagged branch along.

  They found her a minute later with the aid of her dying screams. She was lying on the ground, wisps of blonde hair plastered to the tears and snot that dribbled down her terror-stricken face. She couldn’t have been older than ten-years-old. Hunched over her were three vicious-looking foxes that were making quick work of what was left of her body. Each was the size of a full-grown deer.

  Takeshi and Jacques shared the same look of grotesque disbelief, clearly unprepared to stumble upon such a sight. Nolan almost vomited. This is why I didn’t want to come out here! He
grasped at the two men and tried tugging them away, but they were too overwhelmed by the horrible sight before them to heed his words of warning.

  The sound of breaking twigs sent a shiver down Nolan’s back and he looked over to see the big, fluffy head of a fourth fox poking out from behind a large tree only a metre away from Jacques. Its razor sharp teeth firmly clamped themselves down over the Frenchman’s throat before Nolan could spit out a sound, the strength of its jaw separating head from shoulders with sickening ease. Seeing Jacques killed so gruesomely in an instant, Takeshi was spurred into motion and he took off in the direction of the road while screaming at the top of his lungs.

  Fuck! Nolan glanced back at the two corpses, horrified to see three more foxes emerging from a large thicket. Why didn’t you listen to me?

  They’d almost made it back to the path when Takeshi tripped on a hidden tree root and tumbled to the ground. Nolan stopped to help him up but had to lunge to the side in order to barely avoid the snapping jaws of one of the deranged foxes. Three of them had caught up in an instant and descended upon Takeshi, who connected eyes with Nolan at the exact moment that they began to tear into him. Nolan sprinted for the path without looking back.

  Chapter Three: Where the Hell Am I?

  I’m so fucked!

  Although they hadn’t followed Nolan out onto the path, the brief flashes of orange told him that the foxes were weaving their way through the surrounding underbrush with the hushed ease of practiced predators. There was no way he could outrun them. The fact that they hadn’t killed him yet could only mean that they were toying with him.

  After another minute or so of heavy sprinting, he stopped in his tracks and turned to face his pursuers. Fleeing was only prolonging the inevitable. Like hell he’d just roll over from exhaustion and die.

  He grabbed a nearby stick and snapped it in half, holding one jagged piece in each trembling hand. You think I’m a free meal? You want to pick me off after I run myself into the ground? Nolan let out a primitive roar. “Let’s see who’s losing an eye over dinner!”

  He heard a dense swathe of plants rustling off to the side but by the time he turned around it was already too late. The great fox slammed into him, causing him to lose hold of his meager sticks and tumble into a nearby tree. The first impact stole away the air from his lungs and the second one gave him a premonition that he wouldn’t be taking another breath in this lifetime.

  He pushed himself up to a seated position and leaned against the tree that would serve as his tombstone. Stars danced in his vision like a cloud of silver confetti and he couldn’t shake off the winded feeling that plagued his lungs. He could see now that only two foxes had followed him, but that was still two more than he could handle. He couldn’t even move.

  Faced with imminent death, Nolan could only let out a bitter, breathless laugh. I never thought I’d go out like this.

  The closest fox was bearing its teeth in a wild grin, one which Nolan could only mirror in a final show of defiance. Determined to observe his last moments, he watched as the fox pounced for his throat. Thomas, Steph…

  A warm wind rushed past, momentarily distracting him. It was then that he realized that something had just fallen onto his lap; the head of the closest fox, leaking fresh blood over his shorts with its mouth still curved upward in that dangerous grin. The animal’s body remained upright as the severed stump at its neck showered Nolan in hot blood like some hellish fountain. He stared with wide eyes and a slack jaw at the tall man that suddenly stood before him.

  Dressed in loose pelts and furs that left his heavily muscled arms and legs exposed, Nolan could only describe him as a barbarian. His hair was long and wild and the colour of dirt, his broad feet bare and scarred. A great iron axe was slung over his shoulder, its deadly double-sided edge gleaming in the sunlight where it wasn’t stained with fresh blood. Without sparing Nolan a glance, the man tilted his axe and slammed the flat end into the wobbling, decapitated body of the dead fox. The strike sent it flying into the other beast with relative ease as if the man were playing a social match of baseball. The two foxes sailed into a tree over five metres away with a dull thud, and the second fox’s spine snapped with an audible crack.

  The man looked back at Nolan and sneered, before walking over to the second fox and finishing it off with another casual swing of his axe. He then knelt down, grabbed two fistfuls of fur and began dragging the carcasses back into the forest.

  Over a dozen people emerged from the heavy underbrush before Nolan could register what had just happened. A handful of them were large and strong-looking men, each taller than him by at least a head and armed with a heavy metal axe. The rest were women who carried handle-less baskets of woven wicker that were filled with plants and herbs. Most of them were staring at Nolan with mixed levels of curiosity, specifically at his clothes. His running shoes, cargo shorts and torn up T-shirt drew an amusing comparison to their tribal appearances.

  They were all dressed in the same pelts and furs as the barbarian who’d just saved him. Looking closely, these pelts seemed to have been made from the fur of other giant foxes. The women only wore enough to barely obscure what needed to be covered, their way of arranging the furs and pelts leaving most navels, backs and thighs exposed. The men shared this immodesty in how their furry vests showcased their sculpted midsections and muscular arms, with pelted skirts covering them below the waist.

  Speaking of the barbarian that had saved him, he hadn’t made it far into the forest before he was intercepted by a young girl who couldn’t have been any older than fifteen. The mess of long, dark strands that spilled from her head gave off an unkempt sort of beauty, as did her vigorous eyes, irises the shade of a moonless night. They seemed to be arguing, but Nolan didn’t recognize the language let alone understand it. He guessed that he was the source of the argument, since the girl kept gesturing and pointing over at him as if to punctuate her statements.

  Eventually the barbarous man seemed to concede. He shot a look of vehement displeasure in Nolan’s direction before he turned around and led the rest of the group down the eroded pathway while dragging the two dead foxes behind him. At the back of the group the girl paused over Nolan and motioned for him to follow, looking him up and down with an inquisitive glint in her penetrating gaze.

  Luckily the fox hadn’t broken any of his bones, though he knew he’d have some ugly bruises in a day or two to top off those that he’d received from those older boys earlier on. He’d already been in pretty rough shape to begin with, but comparing the hits he’d taken from those degenerates to the oversized fox’s tackle would be like comparing a toddler’s punch to the right hook of a professional boxer.

  Nolan stood with a groan and subconsciously carried the fox’s head as he followed the girl and the rest of the group down the pathway. What kind of place are they taking me to?

  Contrary to his initial impression of the forest’s vastness, the towering trees and dense undergrowth eventually came to an end. Ahead of them was a sprawling expanse of open grassland, an endless swathe of dazzling emerald that shimmered in the wind like a rippling tide. The pathway persisted into the shoulder-high grasses, which swallowed Nolan’s line of sight as the group continued on through the new region. No one else seemed worried about the prospect of being ambushed by wild creatures, but that didn’t quell his unease in the least.

  The black-haired girl kept trying to converse with him until it became apparent that he couldn’t speak their language, at which point she began pointing at any random thing and slowly pronouncing what it was. Nolan was dealing with too heavy a shock to take her lessons to heart, but he still entertained her by absentmindedly repeating each word that she spoke and imitating her enunciations. Too much had happened far too quickly, so he figured that it’d be best to just put everything in the back of his mind for now lest he suffer a terrible breakdown and go insane.

  Aside from being roughed up by a few goons and a giant fox, Nolan had been on his feet for hours, which h
ad left him completely exhausted. How much longer would he have to drag his feet before they reached their destination?

  Looking up at the blazing sun that dominated the empty skies, he figured it must be late in the afternoon, or perhaps early in the evening. Aside from the girl, whose name could only be Nyla after all the times she had jabbed her chest with a thumb and slowly stressed both syllables, the rest of the group completely ignored him.

  Throughout the walk the men shared bouts of barking laughter, the women trading giggles and whispers as they peered into each other’s baskets, and occasionally avoided or enjoyed the groping hands of their protectors. Aside from the man at the front, three of the other warrior-looking brutes were lugging dead foxes along behind them. Nolan was having enough trouble carrying a single head, which was almost the size of his torso, but he didn’t want to look as soft as he felt so he forced himself to bear with the strain. Were his mind not in so much of a shock, he would have flung the furry ball of teeth and whiskers out into the grass and then issued a suitable scream.

  They ran into several strange-looking snakes and oversized rodents along the way, any one of which would have sent Nolan scampering for safety if he were alone. The unfortunate critters were all killed and scooped up by Nyla’s people without the slightest chance of escape.

  At one point a flock of birds passed overhead that was so dense it seemed as if a large black cloud had blotted out the sun. Staring up in wonder, Nolan thought he saw massive outlines darting throughout the distant feathery ceiling, but whatever disturbance had drawn his eye seemed to disappear before he could make out its identity.

  They eventually arrived at a huge clearing where a massive barricade seemed to hide a remote village of at least a thousand people. It was evident that a large patch of the field had been flattened to make room for the several hundred dwellings and few small buildings that came into view as Nolan’s group passed through the open entryway.