Paw Prints

[Gilhert Greysand]

It had been three days since the town of Sandsline had abandoned itself. Led by Gilhert, the parade of the lost followed the fox further and further away from their previous life.

While Cyno had initially followed at Gilhert's side, his old father had baked beneath the sun. With Sylian beginning to slip from the pace, Cyno had opted to stay with his father near the back of the caravan, helping the other slower creatures. Soon, it was Arize and Gilhert walking alone at the head of their herd, facing down the barren plains of sand that stretched beyond any horizon.

Although the evening was still and clear, Gilhert squinted into the distance in each direction and inhaled deep breaths, tongue poking out from between his open jaws.

White pillars of dissipating smoke funneled up from the darkening sky behind him - he could taste the agave on the air and knew it came from Sandsline... but the second taste of wretched smoke, coming from the Southwest, gave the fox pause. He set his bag down, resting it carefully in a nest of sand. From the coiling ropes that bound his pack together, he pulled out a telescope so small it fit into but a single paw. Gilhert proceeded to twist a single ring around the end, and the telescope slowly stretched thrice it's length.

"Darling?" Arize's voice called.

"Yes, my gem?"

"That Oldburrows boy is coming this way."

Holding his telescope to his eye, Gilhert focused the lens with minute twists of the endpiece.

"Suppose he's hoping we'll invite him for supper again," the interpreter chuckled. "Suppose we're the only folks around here who don't look at him with suspicion."

"Poor little fella, to be branded a fiend so hastily," Arize sighed, setting her bag next to her husband's. She began to unpack, playfully hurling a pile of tightly folded cloth to Gilhert. While he stuck wooden poles into the ground, Arize unrolled several colourful woven mats. After Gilhert had pitched the cloth about the dowels and their tent was raised, Arize set out jars of pickled summer squash, a small wheel of hard cheese, and carved wood cups of warm cactus juice that sat beside a small sack of pecans still in their shells.

"Timbones, my boy," Gilhert called to the young beast as he drew nearer. "Why, you're just in time in join us for a bit of supper. We're going to rest here tonight, let everyone catch up a bit. The sun was fierce out today without a single breath from the sky." The fox held up a cup of juice, extending it towards the squirrel. "You must be scorched."

The careless choice of words was not lost on Timbones; Gilhert watched as Timbones quietly swallowed back a flinch.

"Thank-you kindly, Mister Greysand, sir," the young antelope squirrel said as he brought the cup to his mouth. He set it down and wiped the back of his single paw over his face.

"You're welcome," Gilhert replied, watching as Timbones reached for a cracked pecan Arize offered him.

"I helped Mister Cyno with his old man, just like you asked me to," Timbones began. "And I also helped some folks unbudge their cart. The thing hopped up on a rock and done broke an axle. Took all mornin', but we rigged it up so it'll roll good again."

"Good on you, Timbones, my boy," Gilhert said with an approving nod. "Keeping busy, keeping helpful, just like I told you. It's good advice, Timbones; let the folks see you're a fine fella and not sharing in your departed uncle's habits."

Gilhert's smile wavered as he saw Timbones' face fall, the young squirrel's eyes falling to his pawless wrist.

"Aw, come on, now, you keep being useful, they'll forget they ever thought you had anything to do with that horrible hardship. Never mind it," the fox pressed, a candied cicada suddenly in his paw. Offering the treat to the squirrel, Gilhert chuckled at his wife's playful objection.

"You'll spoil his appetite, Gil," the vixen admonished Gilhert with a gentle kick while offering Timbones an open jar. "He's a growing boy and he needs proper food. Not like you, you fat, rotten-toothed wanderer!"

Together, they picked over their supper spread until, between Gilhert and Timbones, every morsel had been chewed and the antelope squirrel's smile had returned. Groups of Sandsline refugees had begun to catch up, taking example from the interpreter and setting up temporary camps to spend the night. With the neighbours came news, and the comforting flavours of their meal were quickly washed away.

"Two gone," Cyno reported to Gilhert. "From the heat. Both of 'em long of tooth."

Gilhert shook his head sadly, polishing his glasses in the light of the small fire Arize had built.

"There'll be more," Cyno pressed on. "The pace you've set isn't kind to the elderly, or to those who are travelling with invalids, or even children-"

"Every day we spend out here," Gilhert interrupted, fogging his lenses with his breath, "Is a day we come closer to running out of water. The Chainbreaker's seat, it's still some time away."

"Yes, but the faster we move, the worse it gets for some!" Cyno protested.

"There is no easy way," Gilhert stated bluntly. In the glass between his claws, the flickering of their campfire tempted his attention.

"I'll help more folks what need helpin'," Timbones offered as he stood up.

"Sweetheart, you're just one beast," Arize gently protested, only for Timbones to grit his teeth.

"I can do it, Missus Greysand, I can! I'm a strong fella, and I can help!"

Gilhert snapped his claws, pointing at Timbones.

"If Timbones here says he can help, and he's willing, well now, I say let him. Every paw counts in times like these."

The squirrel's frustrated frown brightened into a pleased grin.

"As much as I'd like to take a kinder pace, for my own paws as well as yours..." Gilhert carried on. He laid a paw on Cyno's shoulder and leaned in, his voice becoming quiet. "I fear that what drove us from Sandsline is still a hungry beast."

The prairie dog shuddered, eyes flashing towards the path the caravan had carved out.

"I saw the smoke, too, earlier. We extinguished the town, though; would the storm have created more fire somewhere nearby?"

"Perhaps. Perhaps the wind carried a spark, perhaps the fire went underground and found the roots of your fields all the way to the end of their reach. Fire hunts how it wants," Gilhert whispered before dropping his spectacles to hang loosely about his neck. "We don't have a choice but to keep movin' and keep movin' fast, Cyno. Who knows what the brush has to burn."

~*~

When Cyno had anxiously departed their company, Arize laid out an extra blanket for Timbones.

"I should go back with mister Cyno," the squirrel quietly lamented, beginning to follow the prairie dog until Gilhert's scoff stopped him.

"Naw," the fox huffed. "You've a long day ahead of you tomorrow. Might as well sleep on a soft mat tonight and rest up well. You can have breakfast with us, since you'll already be here."

Exhausted, and lulled by the comfort of a warm fire in the cold night, it wasn't long until Arize and Gilhert heard Timbones' rhythmic and soft snoring. From the other side of the fire, Gilhert watched the squirrel sleep.

"What a sweet boy he is," Arize murmured, eyes just as unblinking as she watched Timbones somehow rest with his head lying atop a thick book, a pillow unused beside him. "Even after the terrible timing fate threw his way. To leave everything he knows behind, trying to find his uncle and a new life, only to find...his uncle dead, his prospects endangered by circumstance... To think he feels guilt over anything...so eager to please those he thinks he's wronged..."

Gil drew from the pipe perched between his front teeth, grunting in acknowledgement.

"Gilhert," Arize sat up, lifting her head from her husband's lap. "You're being very obliging to Timbones. You've no reason to be. You don't dabble in local politics, either."

A cloud of smoke escaped Gilhert's nostrils, blue tendrils curling about his face.

The vixen's fingers pinched around Gilhert's chin and forced him to look at her.

"What's runnin' through that mind of yours?"

The silence between them grew thick, neither one willing to be the first to break away. At last, Gilhert's swallowed. He set his pipe down and rose from where he had been sitting, shooting Timbones' prone form a final glance.

"My dear, let's go for an evening stroll."

~*~

The foxes darted across the sand until Gilhert found a dark space out of earshot of anyone in the caravan. He peered around again and again until, with a disdained sneer, he faced his mate.

"Sandsline was doomed," Gilhert stated, picking up Arize's paw and curling his fingers around hers. "It wasn't the lightning what destroyed everything."

Arize's eyes widened, the distant campfires reflecting in the bright green of her shocked stare.

"You did it," she said flatly.

Gilhert nodded with a single tilt of his head. "They would have all perished if I hadn't done something."

"But Gilhert..." Arize's mouth parted, her mouth silent and dry as she shook her head frantically.

"Nobody would have left if they thought they could eke out a livin'," Gilhert insisted. "You know what the Long Tooth clan is like! Every buck-toothed pellet-eatin' soul among them, they'd stay put until there was no one left to so much as kick sand over their corpse."

Arize turned, pulling away from him. Her shoulders tensed tightly as she groaned, "You don't know that, Gil!"

"You heard Timbones," Gilhert hastily answered, his grip loosening on Arize's fingers. He dropped her paw as she refused to turn back around.  "The other day, when he told us where he'd come from. That ranch his family ran beetles on..."

Arize choked out a broken gasp when Gilhert lightly stepped in front of her.

"Arize, you heard him when he told us how his Aunt Olna decided she'd stay and meet her death all alone. She knew what was coming, same as I do. That's why Timbones left all what he knew, Arize, he's young and he didn't want to die. He's probably the only Long Tooth with any sense in his noggin'! The folks of Sandsline, they...you know they would have stayed, and tried to distill their dead cacti until they were just as dead!"

Arize covered her face with her paws, breathing hard as she listened to her husband justify the destruction of a town. Lives uprooted, some having ended in flames while others would find their end as they fled for whatever hope the Chainbreaker might give them...because the drought was greater than any other force Gilhert had contended with.

"Arize, I wish it hadn't had to be so, but you know unless they had no other choice, they would have chosen death. Just like Oldburrow's old aunt."

Her mind reeled at the thought of Gilhert losing hope, of finding no other solution than destruction. He had never steered anyone wrong before; Arize's heart pounded in terror thinking Gilhert had felt so trapped and unable to make a difference beyond all the advice he had already given Sandsline...

Arize fingered the earrings Albi-Lee had gifted her, a simple tribute like so many others.

Everything Gilhert had told them to do hadn't helped. He had always been able to help the towns, the villages, the outposts of the South. He should have been able to help. 

He couldn't. Not even her husband, the most revered and wise interpreter, had been able to equip Sandsline to resist the drought.

They truly had been doomed.

"I did what I had to, Arize. For the greater good..."

Arize swallowed the lump in her throat, letting Gilhert guide her moist paw away from her face. He looked at her with large, wet eyes, desperately clinging to her, and she groaned through gritted teeth, stooping to throw her arms tightly around Gilhert's shoulders.

"I hate how you always have to help everybody," Arize whispered. "Why can't you just focus on us? It can never just be us."

"No, my sweet," Gilhert murmured, stroking her head with the tips of his claws. "I'm bound. By oath, by conviction... I have to do everything I can... I'm sorry, Arize. I never meant to upset you."

"Then tell me sooner," Arize growled, "Tell me when there is work to be done. I've always helped you before, my love. With my old master, with your father...we've never kept secrets from each other." She drew a heavy snort in through her dripping nose. "Don't start now."

"I won't, my gem," Gilhert whispered. He pressed his lips against her muzzle, sighing heavily. "I'm so sorry, I know I should have told you sooner. The timing... I just... I'm the worst husband in the Clans."

"And you have rotting teeth from stealing all my candies," Arize added.

"Yes."

"And you're fat."

"I love you, Arize."

"I know. I love you, too. Let's go back, now; the cold is creeping through my pelt."

~*~

Even after Gilhert slowed the marching pace, the long journey to the Chainbreaker's court remained arduous. Several beasts died from the heat and from their parched tongues, succumbing to the rolling sun that relentlessly beat down on the caravan. While prayers had been spoken for their souls, their bodies had been left in shallow holes then covered with sand.

"Even buzzards have to eat," the grieving families would chant to themselves as they left their loved ones behind.

Their packs grew lighter every day as jars of food emptied and containers of water were sipped away. Gilhert kept Timbones near when he wasn't sending the rancher on errands of assistance and good will. The squirrel had been as helpful as he had promised, carrying luggage, supplies, and even exhausted bodies when their own paws had failed them. He had danced about a pole, chanting a hymn Gilhert had never heard in his travels, and managed to call clamouring insects from the sand. Impressed by the dexterity of the one-pawed youth, Gilhert had been further impressed by the crunch of the beetles Timbones had offered him.

"You've done well, Timbones, my boy. Worked hard, proved useful," Gilhert told the squirrel when the sun peeked over the horizon to welcome yet another sweltering morning. The fox threw an arm around Timbones' shoulder and offered him his telescope.

"Are ya sure, Mister Greysand?" the antelope squirrel checked, eagerly looking at the delicate tool he had been handed.

The fox gave a nod and a reassuring wave of his paw. "Remember what I told you about the end bit, now. When things are fuzzy and far away..."

"Turn it to the...right?" Timbones answered as certainly as he could. Gilhert chuckled and nodded again, and the squirrel happily stuck the telescope against his eye. He looked left and right, squinting with both eyes until Gilhert stilled him and turned him to face north.

"Now, hold on just one tic," Timbones said, pointing vaguely into the distance. "What're those weird little things crawlin' up that there cliffside?"

"The outer Links of the Chainbreaker's city," Gilhert said, lips curling into a smile as his shaded gaze looked out towards the rise of red rock. "Run on back to Cyno and let him know we've made it."

~*~

The Links was a city that breathed and moved like the thousands of footpaws that dwelled within. Tents of varying colours, sizes and shapes lined the outcropping of stone cliffs, sloping upwards until the dwellings were so packed that it was impossible to pass between. The compacted sand streets were narrow and crowded with pedlars and merchants, noise being a more prominent feature than any single language spoken. Beasts of all kinds watched the forlorn people of Sandsline trail their way to the city and pitch their haggard camp along the outer most street.

Following the looping road, Gilhert brought Timbones and Arize further inward, walking through a more homely neighbourhood that changed its threading yet again to accommodate food vendors and the shops of craftsbeasts.

"The Links are always moving," Gilhert explained to Timbones. The squirrel could hardly pay him any attention, awed senses taking in every new sight and smell from the colourful banners that hung at every lantern post to the whiffs of pastries he had never tasted. Gilhert discovered he had to physically steer the young beast lest he be lost to his curiosity.

"The outer rings move, row by row, street by street, towards the centre, like a neatly coiling chain. Where the two rings meet, or the 'Shackles' as some call 'em, is a break in the circles. That's where we'll find the Chainbreaker. He's always at the centre. It's all very symbolic, Timbones, my boy, all about how the South broke out from the bonds of slavery under the Gila empire..."

"Did you fight in the revolution, Mister Greysand?" Timbones spared the fox a quick glance before being immediately distracted by the tantalizing shine of silver jewellery laid out on a linen-covered table.

"Why, as a matter of fact, I ran important communications across the entire South," Gilhert said, his chest puffing out. "Risked my neck many, many times leaving messages from the Chainbreaker and his secret plots all over empire-controlled towns...Hoping the right beasts would find them and follow the Chainbreaker's plans."

"Woah," Timbones gasped. He opened his mouth to bombard Gilhert with more questions but was suddenly interrupted by the silver merchant calling Gilhert and Arize over.

"Greysand! GREYSAND!" the merchant, a coyote with a curled tail, hollered without any regard for his neighbours. "Greysand, you fat lump, come here! Bring that pretty wife of yours, I have something for her that'll make her change her mind about not marrying me!"

With a brash and cheerful laugh, Gilhert linked his arm through Arize's and led them over to the coyote, Timbones trailing excitedly behind them.

"Thundertooth, you rusty cur!" Gilhert jeered at the coyote. The two hugged and slapped each other's backs harder and harder until they were practically punching the other.

"This is Tim-TIMBONES, boy, pay attention, I'm introducing you to one of the finest silver smiths from the Denner clan. This is Timbones Oldburrow, a fine young fellow I met in Sandsline."

Thundertooth grinned at Timbones. "He'll be popular with the Long Tooth flowers, but he's not nearly as pretty as lovely Arize..."

The coyote leaned across his table, slipping off his silver rings and offering them, one by one, to the vixen. Arize laughed coquettishly, fluttering her eyes at her admirer who began dragging strings of fine silver medallions and draping them around Arize's neck.

Gilhert gently lifted the necklaces off of his wife as soon as each one was adorned.

"Timbones here is an up-and-coming Beastmaster, and I've half a mind to train him up as my own apprentice, to boot."

Thundertooth finally tore his eyes from Arize. "No, really?! The great Gilhert Greysand finally takes an apprentice? You don't look smart, boy; what did you do, threaten Gil with a rattlesnake?"

The trio laughed, oblivious to Timbones' sudden inability to make eye contact.

When Gilhert had tired of Thundertooth flirting with his wife, the fox shepherded Timbones to a tent where a bobcat used her claws to weave highly intricate and vibrant tapestries of landscapes and battles. From behind a feathered veil, the cat happily boasted to Timbones how her current piece, meant for the king himself, depicted Kango Chainbreaker leading the freed slaves of the South into battle against an army of glaring Gila monsters.

A sword-maker, a gem-tumbler, a cartographer that traded Gilhert several maps; the fox seemed to know everyone in the Links. The name 'Greysand' rolled past the teeth of every beast who saw him, and he introduced Timbones to everyone in turn.

"Gilhert Greysand, the interpreter?"

The fox's ears twitched and he turned from watching a baker wrap Timbones a fresh loaf of cornbread.

"I am."

Gilhert's eyes roamed over the jackrabbit balancing on the very tips of her bulbous toes. Her enormous ears were marred with several scars and notches, and her wool jerkin was dyed too many shades of green to count.

"Oh, my, my," Gilhert whispered, his lips stretching into a toothy grin. "It's not often I get to make introductions. To whom do I have the pleasure of addressing? You wouldn't happen to be a one Jes-"

"Doe Jessiebelle Lotti Greene! As his personal messenger, I'm here on behalf of The Chainbreaker!"

At the hare's dramatic announcement, several of the nearby merchants and their patrons began to whisper excitedly. Gilhert, with an easy smile, shrugged and glanced to Arize.

"Always somebody, ain't there? Alright, doe Greene," Gilhert said while looping his thumbs behind his suspenders. "What does King Kango need from me?"

"Discussion, and immediately so! I require you to follow me to His Grace!"

"Alright, let me just finish up here."

Gilhert turned and gave Arize a coy wink before nodding to Timbones.

"Well, Timbones, it seems my occupational obligations are hailing me quicker than a hog eating through a cobb fence. Arize knows a swell place run by swell folk for us to lodge. If'n you see Cyno, tell him to meet us there. Here, let me give you my pack and you two find yourself a nice roof."

"How will you find us?" Timbones asked as Gilhert shouldered his pack off and hoisted it into his arms.

"I can find my way around the Links," Gilhert answered before giving Arize a dainty peck on her muzzle. "You go on and worry about yourself and Arize. Stick close to her and don't get lost now."

Already walking away, the grey fox waved over his shoulder while he trailed after Greene.

"The Chainbreaker has been hoping you'd come!" Jessiebelle remarked when Gilhert finally caught up to her leaping strides. "He sent out three scouts to the east where he last heard you had been."

Gil snorted. "They never found me. Still, it's flattering, and convenient."

"Oh?"

"I don't come to the city unless I've business here," Gilhert explained. "And I've business with the King; business he needs to hear."