“Why do you, uh, ‘dislike to do it’?” Brav asked, frowning. “Is it dangerous to go outside the walls of the town?” he asked, guessing.
“It can be if one is not careful,” Kozen said carefully. “But as long as we stay together in a group and no one breaks or tastes any of the tunga fruit, it should be all right.”
“Why can’t we taste the fruit?” Brav asked curiously. “Is it sacred or something? You save it for a feast or a festival or something like that?”
“Why no, Friend Bravik—we save it for the Riivers,” Kozen said mildly. “For it tastes like meat and can sometimes satiate their hunger. In fact, some call the fruit of the tunga tree ‘flesh fruit’ for that reason.”
“Who or what are these Riivers, anyway?” Brav demanded. “I keep hearing them mentioned but nobody will talk about them.”
“Because it is forbidden to speak of them within the township,” Kozen said firmly. “I should not even have said as much as I did. Come, let us pluck some fruit for our Midday meal and then we will go and harvest.”
Brav was in no way satisfied by the answer, but he had to accept it. Well, maybe he would catch a glimpse of the elusive creatures when they were outside the walls of the village. Or maybe he would just spend the day harvesting fruit they apparently couldn’t eat, he thought dryly.
Whatever the Riivers were, they must not have been very nice. When Kozen announced the harvesting trip after lunch, Brav noticed frightened looks on the H’raken males’ faces and a few even murmured in protest, though none of them voiced their complaints out loud.
The reaction was surprising to Brav, since these same men were supposed to be the toughest males in the village. They were, after all, on the butchering crew where only the most stoic males were placed, since the rest of the males in the village apparently disliked the sight of blood. And now they were upset about going out to harvest fruit? What in the Seven Hells was going on, here?
It wasn’t long before he found out but when he did, it was almost too late…
Twenty-Six
They went to another orchard a little way from the one Brav had landed his long-range cruiser besides, but it looked basically the same. The trees with the ring-shaped fruit were shady and thick and there was a cool breeze rustling their leaves.
Harvesting was cool, easy work compared to butchering, Brav thought. He and the other males who had come out beyond the township gates had long metal poles with hooks on the end, which they used to carefully pull down the fruit at the tops of the trees. Brav carried one—along with a woven straw collecting basket strapped over one shoulder—but he didn’t use it much. He was tall enough to reach most of the fruit he needed to get and found it easier to just pick it by hand.
“Remember,” Kozen had said before they started harvesting. “Stay together. Don’t wander off and never taste of the fruit. Try not to break the fruit either, as you know that the scent is quite pungent and we do not wish to attract…” He paused, licking his thin blue lips. “The wrong kind of attention,” he finished at last.
There were solemn nods of agreement and then, without a word, the H’rakens all took their long metal poles and collecting baskets and dispersed among the trees—though they took care to keep each other in sight, Brav noticed.
“Hey, want to watch each other’s backs?”
Looking down, Brav saw that speaker was an adolescent H’raken male with large purple-brown eyes and a friendly smile on his face.
“Sure.” He smiled back, liking the lad for being unafraid to come and talk to him. “I’m Bravik,” he added. “But you can call me Brav, if you want.”
“I know who you are—everyone does,” the boy answered. “I’m Jerber. I’ve been wanting to meet you, Kindred, but you’re always with the important people—no room for a little guy like me.”
“Well, you’re meeting me now,” Brav pointed out, grinning. He held out his arm for a warrior’s clasp. “Well met, Jerber of the H’raken.”
“Well met, Brav of the Kindred.” The boy seemed delighted to grip his arm and give the formal handshake, once Brav taught him how. “And now we’d better start harvesting,” he added, as they finished. “Come on—I know a stand of trees where the fruit grows especailly thick. We’ll meet our quota and fill our baskets in no time.”
“All right.” Brav followed him, the two of them weaving through the orchard until they reached a cluster of trees that seemed to have a lot of ripe fruit, just as Jerber had promised.
“So tell me, is it that dangerous—harvesting this ‘flesh fruit’?” Brav asked, as he began picking it to fill his basket.