“Ok, enough riddles,” Tara said impatiently. “I’m hot and not really in the mood for your stoic routine, Aiman. Just tell us what the hell happened.”
Aiman nodded, “When my inquiry was rebuffed by the village chief, he said that ‘scholars had come before’ and that the knowledge of Werehyenas had been lost and it was forbidden.”
“I seriously doubt he said that,” Malikah said with a scoff.
“You are correct, his exact words were ‘the knowledge of the Bultungin is lost and forbidden,’” Aiman replied.
“Bultungin?” Mary asked.
Aiman nodded, “It means, I change myself into a hyena.”
“So, they know about Shape shifters here,” Acharya commented. “It would have been nice to get a little more information than that. But at least we know we’re close, sort of.” He added the last with a sigh and shrug. “We should find a place to camp tonight. Preferably somewhere a bit farther away from the village than here.”
The group made a collective groan.
“It’s so hot,” Tara complained, “Can’t we just hang out here for a bit? Please?”
Acharya shook his head as he slung his back pack onto his shoulders. “No, we need to move. The sooner we get away from here the better. I don’t want to be mobbed by an angry village worth of people who think we are dark sorcerers or witches, here to dig up their dead or cast evil spells on them and their family, or something equally ridiculous but will more than likely end up with us being hunted and killed if they have anything to say about it.”
“Good point,” Tara said as she stood up and put on her back pack.
The pack moved out towards the west. They didn’t want to give away a possible direction for the villagers to follow, or point out to others. They didn’t need a whole countryside knowing what they had planned on doing or where they really wanted to go. Once they were out of eyesight of the village they turned to the south.
As they walked, they took turns doubling back on their tracks and creating false trails with Asclepius running back and forth, retracing trails and smudging his pack mate’s footsteps. Malikah, using her tracker abilities, created false scent trails along some of the trails but not others. She masked her packs scent along their true path as much as she could.
When the sun dipped below the horizon they finally stopped in a small copse of trees. The wind had picked up a bit from the day and the temperature dropped rapidly and substantially. They built a tactical fire, even though Aiman didn’t think it was prudent to do so. Once the fire was lit everyone’s spirits rose a bit and they cooked their food.
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As the night deepened the temperature dropped a bit more and even though it was relatively early, they all huddled in their sleeping bags to preserve their body heat against the rapidly cooling night air.
“Do you really think that there are people out there trying to find us, hunting us?” Malikah asked.
“It’s always better to be cautious in a hostile environment,” Aiman replied.
“I think what she’s asking, Aiman,” Mary interjected, “Is, would people really come hunting a group of outsiders just because they asked, from what you told us, some pretty unpopular questions?”
Acharya raised his head and looked at them, “I think that we are here in Africa, and if I know anything about Africa, it’s that there are still a lot of superstitions that people think are as real as Asclepius and more dangerous than the native species of cobra.” He rolled over and looked up into the night sky. “I won’t take anything for granted, and neither should you. Assume everyone we meet is dangerous, and always assume they want more from you than you are willing to part with.” He glanced towards Malikah and winked with a smile, “as long as we do that, we should be fine.”
The next morning, they awoke before sunrise and continued their journey heading east. When the sun finally rose in front of them, they turned back north. They continued their trail masking tactics from the day before. They really didn’t want anyone following them. They could handle a half a dozen men if need be. Hell, Acharya knew that they could handle three dozen men from any village or city. But the kind of attention that a group of wolflike monsters from legend ripping into and almost killing a bunch of ‘innocent’ people was not the kind of publicity or attention that he wanted following them through Africa.
From what Aiman had gathered from the village yesterday, they knew that the fabled village of Kabultiloa would be somewhere in the region, otherwise the village elder or chief or whoever he had been, wouldn’t have had such a visceral reaction to it. Aiman’s questions may have been enough to get the attention of the right people. It’s possible that if Werehyenas were still in the region, they may find them first. And since this was their home turf, that might not be such a friendly meeting between them.
Aiman led the group north towards another village on his map. The landscape became jutted and more wrinkled. The hills rolled and folded upon themselves violently in some places. The crevices between the hills became sharp and steep, almost impossible to walk out of vertically.
Aiman left the group and headed towards the village.
It was eerily similar to the village he had entered the day before. Except there were more adobe brick structures in this village and it wasn’t as big. He could only see about three dozen or so buildings total and they were arrayed as two, sometimes three long rows, along the crest of the hill it rested on. Of course, this hill would have been an island as little as fifty years ago or so. The buildings were arrayed like this to show where the water line used to be. The buildings were only on the highest points, showing just how much the lake to the west had receded.
He walked openly directly down the center street of the village. There was no apparent center to the village but he did stop and ask people some questions about who was in charge. The first few people were just as suspicious of him as the villagers had been yesterday. Finally, however, he did find someone who actually spoke to him and he was pointed to the far end of the village.