140 Snakes

The night was hot and sticky. I lay on my bed looking up at the stars. It was my turn to stay on look-out; there were three others, each of us stationed at different parts of the village.

I turned my gaze out into the night. It was too still with no relief from the suffocating heat. I sat up and cast my eyes around, watching, but nothing came...until...I saw something move in the shrubbery, then another, then another. My body automatically reacted, and standing up, I grabbed my bedroll and started backing into the village. I growled an alarm call and other Blades came out.

"Snakes!" It was all I said.

Two looked in the direction of my gaze and saw as I did, large numbers of venemous snakes heading in our direction. "Grab the embers, re-ignite the fires, quickly!" He barked out orders to his men who immediately moved with speed. I grabbed a lighted stick and approached a bush, setting it on fire. The oils in the shrubbery took hold and soon there was a massive blaze, but the snakes, startled by the fires, started fleeing in our direction to get away from it. The ground was heaving with the writhing coils of snakes fighting each other, killing, maiming.

I called to the women, "Xin, get all the women up and out of the houses as quickly as possible. Head towards the river but don't go in. Some of these are water snakes."

"Okay," then she rattled out commands to the women, "all of you, up, get dressed in whatever and move!!! Unless you want to die tonight, the faster you move the better."

There were screams and shouts, with women, some of whom were too petrified to move. One woman grabbed another, slapped her hard across the face, "Snap out of it!" The two ran, dragging each other towards the water's edge, they stood there, beckoning the others to join them. The two children were scooped up and taken as they were, still bleary eyed, but sleepy enough not to realise the severity of the situation.

I stayed with the men, slaying as many as we could and setting fire to those we couldn't. Jumping and staying one step ahead of their strikes, we lashed out with our hunting knives.

"Make good eating if nothing else!" one of the Blades shouted as he evaded yet another strike and chopped the snake in two.

"They're not stopping, chuck the food towards them, let them fight over it, we need to go." It was Five. His knowledge of snakes was excellent. In his civilian life he was a snake breeder, so knew the best ways to handle them. He also had been bitten enough times to have built up a resistance to the more mild venoms. We bowed to his better knowledge. "Get the pots and throw the food over them. The smells will make them fight each other." We did as he said and backed away as we watched a carnage only Nature in her rawest state could create. "Awful, isn't it, but I'd rather they kill each there than put that into us." He gave my arm a squeeze, "Well spotted, Alpha."

"Where's the dog? Where's Wolfie?" Xin anxiously called.

It was then I noticed Wolfie, caught by a tumult of snakes, slowly sinking into the mire. He died that night. Nature finally took him.

I turned and faced the river, not wanting to watch his final death throws. " I'm afraid Wolfie didn't make this one Xin."

She howled into the night. The call of a mother to its pup. The call to the pack, telling of their loss. Then she cried. Wiping her eyes and stiffling her tears, she said, "We have to get out of here. We need to leave." Her urgency belied her pain. If we moved out now, she could bury her thoughts and mourn in private later, she didn't want to cry now. 

 

 The route they took was the same as had been done only a matter of a couple of weeks before, but they moved with speed, placing as much distance as they could between the invasion of snakes and themselves.

"This isn't a good place to stay is it?" one of the women commented.

"No it isn't, we need to find somewhere else and with such a number of people, we need to get away from all this wet land and find somewhere these snakes don't like living in." Five turned to me, "What do you think? We cross the river and get back to dry land? Hunt the men and their trade from a different angle?" 

It seemed the only logical answer. "Let's get down as far as we can tonight. Dawn is already chasing the night sky away," I said, looking up, "if we go as far as we can towards the village by the bridge, stop there and survey whether it's safe."

The move was agreed. We had little with us, everything has been left behind. The Blades had instinctively grabbed their bundles and Xin had also picked up her second bundle of medicinal herbs, but apart from a few bed rolls and a few knives, we had nothing to cook in, no stores, nothing. 

"Someone is going to have to go back and rescue what we can." Xin piped up, "we can't just walk away from everything."
I looked at her, "we might have to. Would you be willing to face the possibility of that?" Even I shuddered. I didn't exactly like snakes and gave them a wide berth when I could. The thought of returning there was too much. I shuddered again. 

Five placed his hand on my arm. "May I suggest we put it down to experience and avoid that place as the locals did. I suspect the smells from the food brought them in and now they're there, well fed and fat, they are going to stay still for a few weeks, digesting, before they move again."

"So what do we do?" one of the women asked.

"We improvise. Who's good at whittling."

A few of the men raised a hand. "Okay then, we need pretty much everything and once across the river, there's a wealth of bamboo just waiting to be fashioned into what we require."

To cross or not to cross; the decision had been made. Later, after a short rest, we would check the area around the bridge and if it was safe, cross over into the unknown.