Chapter 5: Kada Gate
Notes on the Chapter
Harylas - Macedon's capital city
Ecclesia - the part of Macedon's democracy that handles noble and military concerns.
Monokeros - Eden's version of a unicorn—it is carnivorous, and the army wants one because its blood is able to cure wounds.
‘hilts - slang for "sword-hilts," Macedon’s currency; has a raised sword-hilt shape on it.
Kada - POV character; a seven or eight year-old girl living in Harylas. She is a helper in the hospitals, as there is a plague in the city, caused by the infected body of one of Keihyn’s friends who died when he was bitten by a monokeros.
Daryos was a strong man who knew he was in control. He marched into the room and sat in front of the Ecclesia and made us three feel very small.
"What do you have to show me?" he asked. "Is this a monokeros?" He seemed very interested but wasn't convinced we were telling the truth. And after all, the monokeros didn't look very impressive, huddled in its hood between Kiar and Keihyn. I patted its velvety grey shoulder.
"Take off the hood and the ropes," ordered Daryos. "It just looks like a black colt from here."
The three of us looked at each other. No one had fed the monokeros—it hadn't eaten anything in days, except half of Kiar's horse last night. It was going to be starving.
"With respect, sir—you can cut the ropes,' said Kiar, and bowed away from it.
"Canos," ordered Daryos. A man sitting in the Ecclesia (he was Canos, I guessed) scowled and rose from his cushioned seat to obey Daryos' command. They didn't seem to be friends.
Canos dug a knife under the makeshift muzzle and carelessly nicked the delicate skin of its nose when he cut the ropes. The monokeros arched its neck back and gracefully flipped the hood off its eyes. The savage black jaws opened, and it spat an angry, dangerous hiss that rumbled, low-pitched and murderous, over the floor.
"Fsssssss," it hissed.
Black blood from its torn nose dripped over its bared black teeth. Canos reeled back, his hand bleeding where the monokeros's budding horn had ripped open his skin.
The Ecclesia chief speaker's prize hunting dog lunged off the leash and circled the animal. The monokeros ignored it and stared at Canos as he moved back. It was learning and remembering his face, and that he was something bad. I wondered if it thought I was bad too.
The chief speaker's was yelling something, but no one listened to him.
"What is the meaning of this?" said Daryos in a fierce, calm whisper.
"It's a monokeros, you stupid man. What did you think it would do?" I shouted. Daryos looked at me as though he'd just noticed a worm in his pudding.
The monokeros had fully shaken off the ropes and the hood, and now it folded its legs under itself and rested its head and long neck on the floor, remarkably like a dog. It seemed unconcerned with the people around it, or the dog. The chief speaker's dog sat on its haunches and cocked its head, curiously, then bent forward to sniff it. The monokeros didn;t move, and appeared to be going to sleep.
"We are the remainder of the hunting party headed by Liak," said Keihyn to Daryos. "His body was one of the ones our companion Deris brought back with him to the city. You put him in prison."
Slow realization blossomed in the eyes of the politicians. They sneaked glances at each other. "The one who brought plague,”" said Daryos.
"Yes. Plague comes from the bite of a monokeros. The cure is in its blood."
"I presume our money has not been wasted, then? It can heal itself and people as well?" He didn't wait for an answer, and stood up to come closer to the monokeros. I watched him walk. He didn't move like a hunter, but he did walk like a soldier—careful but arrogant, confident. His scabbard tap-tap-tapped against his thigh. He looked at the monokeros's teeth from a distance. It had rolled over on its side and was inviting the dog closer. The hound minced forward, and then they started to play with each other. The monokeros batted its little half-hooves in the air, and the dog barked excitedly and tried to catch them.
"It doesn’t look very dangerous," muttered Daryos, suspiciously.
Then the monokeros yawned its jaws widely, pensively. Then—almost experimentally—it bit the head off the chief speaker's favourite dog. Astride the body in a flash, it had eaten it down to the shoulders before any of us had even had the chance to blink. All traces of its play had vanished. Within the span of a few seconds, everything was gone: bones, brains, and all. The animal rose from its meal and tensed its muscles and its throat into a deep snarl.
A good soldier always has a weapon on his belt, I remembered. A good soldier is quick and agile as a spider. I didn’t see Daryos pull his sword out, but I saw him stick the sharp end straight through the monokeros’s neck. Then it was hanging at his side, bloody and shiny, while the monokeros coughed and writhed. Blackish blood dripped. It shuddered on the ground and didn't try to get up.
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