Page 8 of Meat

But then there were the tusks. A pair of bone-white fangs curving upward from the lower jaw. The thing looked like a brutal alien orc.

Alyx tried to swallow, but her throat wasn’t working.

The bestial not-man towered over Alyx, raking his gaze up and down her naked and battered body, appraising her. His broad nostrils flared even wider as he sniffed, drinking in her scent.

He grunted with satisfaction and his face broke into a predatory grin.

That’s when Alyx finally found her voice again and started to scream. She screamed until she had expelled every ounce of air from her tired lungs and the light-headedness overtook her. The forest seemed to close in around her, enfolding her in darkness as she passed out.

CHAPTER 4

Ravnar listened to the fading echoes of the creature’s shout—the creature which now hung limp and unconscious in his rope trap. For such a small and apparently weak little critter, it could make an impressive amount of noise.

Finally, the last echoes disappeared in the distance, and all that was left was the rustle of the wind in the forest canopy overhead and the groan of the tree trunks as they swayed.

Ravnar stood dumbfounded, staring at the thing his trap had caught.

He had been a hunter and a trapper for well on ten cycles now, ever since he had won his freedom from the hated nith. In all that time, the ukkur hunter had bagged many a wild beast. Gollan birds with their tough, bluish meat. Vurkles, soft and chewy inside their hard outer shells. Krell spiders. Gluny fish. The purple-furred aboliths with five eyes and two sets of jaws—one for killing and one for eating.

But never, never had Ravnar seen anything quite like this.

It almost looked like an ukkur.

Almost.

It had two of everything, just as an ukkur did—two eyes and two ears, two arms and two legs. But it also had another pair of extra, fleshy protuberances on its chest, the likes of which Ravnar had never seen on an ukkur before. What the rot could those be for?

Where were the creature’s tusks? And for that matter, where was its piss stick? There was something like a wound between its legs where the stick should be.

Had it been cut off?

Ravnar would inspect that part last.

The ukkur hunter tossed his coiled leather cord on the ground for later use. Then he stooped and cupped the creature’s small head in his massive hands. The mane of fur sprouting from its head was soft and smooth. Perhaps it would make a good pelt.

He inspected the creature’s face, drew back its supple lower lip with his thumb. Teeth, small and blunt. Skin, soft and delicate.

How could a thing like this ever survive in the wild?

He found a clue wrapped around the creature’s narrow throat. A leather collar with a metal ring. So, this was no wild animal. It was domesticated. A pet of some kind, probably belonging to the nith.

Fine.

Domesticated meat was almost as good as wild.

Ravnar rose slowly, sniffing and snuffling his way up his prey’s naked skin. He lingered over those mounds on the chest. They were tipped with curious little pink nubs. These Ravnar bit lightly, testing their suppleness between his teeth.

Oh yes, these tender, nub-tipped mounds would make choice cuts. He would demand one of them for himself come supper. Krogg and Jale could fight it out over the other one.

Ravnar moved higher along the upside-down body. He sniffed and licked the divot in the middle of the creature’s smooth belly, savoring the salt of its sweat.

Strange feelings were stirring in his sacs. Strange feelings indeed…

Bloodflow shunted into his piss stick, swelling it beneath his loincloth. That happened sometimes, especially at night. It was a matter that Ravnar knew how to take care of. A bit of tugging with his fist, and his cock would spill a different kind of piss—white and sticky like the sap of a tree.

He felt an urge to relieve himself right now. To jerk himself until he spilled his white fluid all over this funny creature hanging in his snare. To drizzle it over the creature’s mounds and into its slack, unconscious mouth.

But Krogg and Jale would be none too happy if he brought home dinner all filthy and besmirched with his secretions.