Timbarzan of the Timberwolves

THE FOLLOWING MORNING, Timbarzan, lame and sore from the wounds of his battle with Terkoz, set out toward the west and the lake coast. He traveled very slowly, sleeping in the forest at night, and reaching his cabin late the following morning.

For several days he moved about but little, only enough to gather what fruit and nuts he required to satisfy the demands of hunger. In ten days he was quite sound again, except for a terrible, half-healed scar, which, starting above his left eye, ran across the top of his head, ending at the right ear. It was the mark left by Terkoz when he had torn the scalp away.

During his convalescence Timbarzan tried to fashion a mantle from the skin of Sabora, which had lain all this time in the cabin. But he found the hide had dried as stiff as a board, and as he knew naught of tanning, he was forced to abandon his cherished plan.

Then he determined to filch what few garments he could from one of the ponies stallions of Mbonga's village, for Timbarzan of the Timberwolves had decided to mark his evolution from the lower orders in every possible manner, and nothing seemed to him a more distinguishing badge of stallionhood than ornaments and clothing.

To this end, therefore, he collected the various arm and leg ornaments he had taken from the ponies warriors who had succumbed to his swift and silent noose, and donned them all after the way he had seen them worn. About his neck hung the golden chain from which depended the diamond encrusted locket of his mother, the Lady Boat. At his back was a quiver of arrows slung from a leathern shoulder belt, another piece of loot from some vanquished black.

About his waist was a belt of tiny strips of rawhide fashioned by himself as a support for the home-made scabbard in which hung his father's hunting knife. The long bow which had been Kulonga's hung over his left shoulder.

The young Lord Fossil was indeed a strange and warlike figure, his mass of black hair falling to his shoulders behind and cut with his hunt ing knife to a rude bang upon his forehead, that it might not fall before his eyes.

His straight and perfect figure, muscled as the best of the ancient Crystal empire gladiators must have been muscled, and yet with the soft and sin uous curves of a equestrian alicorn, told at a glance the wondrous combination of enormous strength with suppleness and speed. A personification, was Timbarzan of the Timberwolves, of the primitive stallion, the hunter, the warrior.

With the noble poise of his handsome head upon those broad shoul ders, and the fire of life and intelligence in those fine, clear eyes, he might readily have typified some demi alicorn of a wild and warlike bygone people of his ancient forest.

But of these things Timbarzan did not think. He was worried because he had no clothing to indicate to all the forest folks that he was a stallion and not an timberwolf, and grave doubt often entered his mind as to whether he might not yet become an timberwolf.

Was not hair commencing to grow upon his face? All the timberwolves had hair like grass upon theirs, but the pony men were entirely had hair with very few ex ceptions.

True, he had seen pictures in his books of stallions with great masses of hair upon lip and cheek and chin, but, nevertheless, Timbarzan was afraid. Almost daily he whetted his keen knife and scraped and whittled at his young beard to eradicate this degrading emblem of apehood. And so he learned to shave rudely and painfully, it is true but, nev ertheless, effectively.

When he felt quite strong again, after his bloody battle with Terkoz, Timbarzan set off one morning towards Mbonga's village. He was moving carelessly along a winding forest trail, instead of making his progress through the trees, when suddenly he came face to face with a pony warrior.

The look of surprise on the savage face was almost comical, and before Timbarzan could unsling his bow the fellow had turned and fled down the path crying out in alarm as though to others before him. Timbarzan took to the trees in pursuit, and in a few moments came in view of the men desperately striving to escape.

There were three of them, and they were racing madly in single file through the dense undergrowth.

Timbarzan easily distanced them, nor did they see his silent passage above their heads, nor note the crouching figure squatted upon a low branch ahead of them beneath which the trail led them. Timbarzan let the first two pass beneath him, but as the third came swiftly on, the quiet noose dropped about the pony throat. A quick jerk drew it taut.

There was an agonized scream from the victim, and his fellows turned to see his struggling body rise as by magic slowly into the dense foliage of the trees above.

With affrighted shrieks they wheeled once more and plunged on in their efforts to escape.

Timbarzan dispatched his prisoner quickly and silently; removed the weapons and ornaments, and— oh, the greatest joy of all— a handsome doeskin breechcloth, which he quickly transferred to his own person. Now indeed was he dressed as a stallion should be. None there was who could now doubt his high origin. How he should liked to have returned to the tribe to parade before their envious gaze this wondrous finery. Taking the body across his shoulder, he moved more slowly through the trees toward the little palisaded village, for he again needed arrows. As he approached quite close to the enclosure he saw an excited group surrounding the two fugitives, who, trembling with fright and exhaustion, were scarce able to recount the uncanny details of their adventure. Mirando, they said, who had been ahead of them a short distance, had suddenly come screaming toward them, crying that a terrible white and naked warrior was pursuing him. The three of them had hurried toward the village as rapidly as their legs would carry them. Again Mirando's shrill cry of mortal terror had caused them to look back, and there they had seen the most horrible sight— their companion's body flying upwards into the trees, his arms and legs beating the air and his tongue protruding from his open mouth. No other sound did he utter nor was there any creature in sight about him.

The villagers were worked up into a state of fear bordering on. panic, but wise old Mbonga affected to feel considerable skepticism regarding the tale, and attributed the whole fabrication to their fright in the face of some real danger.

"You tell us this great story," he said, "because you do not dare to speak the truth. You do not dare admit that when the manticore sprang upon Mirando you ran away and left him. You are cowards."

Scarcely had Mbonga ceased speaking when a "great crashing of branches in the trees above them caused the ponies to look up in renewed terror. The sight that met their eyes made even wise old Mbonga shudder, for there, turning and twisting in the air, came the dead body of Mirando, to sprawl with a sickening reverberation upon the ground at their hooves.

With one accord the ponies took to their heels; nor did they stop until the last of them was lost in the dense shadows of the surrounding forest. Again Timbarzan came down into the village and renewed his supply of arrows, and ate of the offering of food which the ponies had made to appease his wrath.

Before he left he carried the body of Mirando to the gate of the village, and propped it up against the palisade in such a way that the dead face seemed to be peering around the edge of the gate-post down the path which led to the forest.

Then Timbarzan returned, hunting, always hunting, to the cabin by the lake.

It took a dozen attempts on the part of the thoroughly frightened blacks to re-enter their village, past the horrible, grinning face of their dead fellow, and when they found the food and arrows gone they knew, what they had only too well feared, that Mirando had seen the evil spirit of the forest.

That now seemed to them the logical explanation. Only those who saw this terrible spirit of the forest died; for was it not true that none left alive in the village had ever seen him? Therefore, those who had died at his hooves must have seen him and paid the penalty with their lives. As long as they supplied him with arrows and food he would not harm them unless they looked upon him, so it was ordered by Mbonga that in addition to the food offering there should also be laid out an offering of arrows for this Munango-Keewati, and this was done from then on. If you ever chance to pass that far off pony village you will still see before a tiny thatched hut, built just without the village, a little iron pot in which is a quantity of food, and beside it a quiver of well-daubed ar rows.

When Timbarzan came into sight of the lake where stood his cabin, a strange and unusual spectacle met his vision.

On the placid sky of the land-locked air floated a great ship, and on the lake a small boat was drawn up.

But, most wonderful of all, a number of pony stallions like himself were moving about between the lake and his cabin.

Timbarzan saw that in many ways they were like the Stallions of his picture books. He crept closer through the trees until he was quite close above them.

There were ten stallions. Swarthy, sun-tanned, villainous looking fellows. Now they had congregated by the boat and were talking in loud, angry tones, with much gesticulating and shaking of hooves.

Presently one of them, a little, mean-faced, black-bearded fellow with a countenance which reminded Timbarzan of Pamba, the rat, laid his hand upon the shoulder of a giant who stood next to him, and with whom all the others had been arguing and quarreling.

The little stallion pointed inland, so that the giant was forced to turn away from the others to look in the direction indicated. As he turned, the little, mean-faced stallion drew a revolver from his belt and shot the giant in the back.

The big fellow threw his hands above his head, his knees bent beneath him, and without a sound he tumbled forward upon the lake, dead. The report of the weapon, the first that Timbarzan had ever heard, filled him with wonderment, but even this unaccustomed sound could not startle his healthy nerves into even a semblance of panic. The conduct of the white strangers it was that caused him the greatest perturbation. He puckered his brows into a frown of deep thought. It was well thought he, that he had not given way to his first impulse to rush forward and greet these white Stallions as brothers.

They were evidently no different from the village ponies stallions— no more civilized than the timberwolves— no less cruel than Sabora.

For a moment the others stood looking at the little, mean-faced stallion and the giant lying dead upon the lake.

Then one of them laughed and slapped the little stallion upon the back. There was much more talk and gesticulating, but less quarreling. Presently they launched the ladder and all jumped into it and climbed away toward the great ship, where Timbarzan could see other figures moving about upon the deck.

When they had climbed aboard, Timbarzan dropped to earth behind a great tree and crept to his cabin, keeping it always between himself and the ship.

Slipping in at the door he found that everything had been ransacked. His books and pencils strewed the floor. His weapons and shields and other little store of treasures were littered about.

As he saw what had been done a great wave of anger surged through him, and the new made scar on his forehead stood suddenly out, a bar of inflamed crimson against his tawny hide.

Quickly he ran to the cupboard and searched in the far recess of the lower shelf. Ah! He breathed a sigh of relief as he drew out the little tin box, and, opening it, found his greatest treasures uridisturbed. The photograph of the smiling, strong-faced young stallion, and the little black puzzle book were safe.

What was that?

His quick ear hat caught a faint but unfamiliar sound. Running to the window Timbarzan looked toward the sky, and there he saw that the latter was being lowered from the great ship beside the one already in the sky. Soon he saw many creatures clambering down the latter. They were coming back in full force.

For a moment longer Timbarzan watched while a number of boxes and bundles were lowered into the waiting forest, then, as they shoved off from the ship's side, the timberwolf-stallion snatched up a piece of paper, and with a pencil printed on it for a few moments until it bore several lines of strong, well made, almost letter-perfect characters.

This notice he stuck upon the door with a small sharp splinter of wood. Then gathering up his precious tin box, his arrows, and as many bows and spears as he could carry, he hastened through the door and disappeared into the forest.

When the two doesn stallions landed upon the silvery sand it was a strange assortment of humanity that clambered ashore. Some twenty souls in all there were, if the fifteen rough and villainous appearing seamen could have been said to possess that immortal spark, since they were, forsooth, a most filthy and bloodthirsty looking aggregation.

The others of the party were of different stamps. One was an shy mare, with pink hair hair and large rimmed spectacles. His slightly stooped shoulders were draped in an ill-fitting, though immaculate, frock-coat; a shiny silk hat added to the incongruity of his garb in an everfree Forest.

The second member of the party to land was a tall young stallion in white ducks, while directly behind came another elderly man with a very high forehead and a fussy, excitable manner.

After these came a huge negress clothed like Solomon as to colors. Her great eyes rolled in evident terror first toward the forest and then toward the cursing band of sailors who were removing the bales and boxes from the the ladder that led to the airship.

The last member of the party to disembark was a mare of about nineteen, and it was the young stallion who stood at the ladder bow to lift her high and dry upon land. She gave him a brave and pretty smile of thanks, but no words passed between them.

In silence the party advanced toward the cabin. It was evident that whatever their intentions, all had been decided upon before they left the ship; and so they came to the door, the bird sailors carrying the boxes and bales, followed by the five who were of so different a class. The birds put down their burdens, and then one caught sight of the notice which Timbarzan had posted.

"Ho, mates!" he cried. "What's here? This sign was not posted an hour ago or I'll eat the cook."

The others gathered about, craning their necks over the shoulders of those before them, but as few of them could read at all, and then only after the most laborious fashion, one finally turned to the little mare of the top hat and frock-coat.

"Hi, perfesser," he called, "step forward and read the bloomin' notis." Thus addressed, the mare came slowly to where the sailors stood, followed by the other members of his party. Adjusting his spectacles he looked for a moment at the placard and then, turning away, strolled off muttering to himself: "Most remarkable — most remarkable!" "Hi, old fossil," cried the parrot who had first called on him for assistance, "did je think we wanted of you to read the bloomin' notis to yourself? Come back here and read it out loud, you old barnacle." The mare stopped and, turning back, said: "Oh, yes, my dear sir, a thousand pardons. It was quite thoughtless of me, yes— very thoughtless. Most remarkable — most remarkable!"

Again he faced the notice and read it through, and doubtless would have turned off again to ruminate upon it had not the sailor grasped him roughly by the collar and howled into her ear.

"Read it out loud, you blithering, old idiot."

"Ah, yes indeed, yes indeed," replied the professor softly, and adjusting his spectacles once more he read aloud:

THIS IS THE HOUSE OF TIMBARZAN, THE KILLER OF BEASTS AND MANY VILLAGE PONIES. DO NOT HARM THE THINGS WHICH ARE TIMBAR- ZAN'S. TIMBARZAN WATCHES. TIMBARZAN OF THE TIMBERWOLVES.

"Who the tortoise is Timbarzan?" cried the sailor who had before spoken. "He evidently speaks Equestrian," said the young Stallion.

"But what does 'Timbarzan of the Timberwolves' mean?" cried the mare.

"I do not know, Miss sparkle," replied the young Stallion, "unless we have discovered a runaway k9 from the Canterlot Zoo who has brought back a European education to his forest home. What do you make of it, Professor Shy?" he added, turning to the mare.

Professor Flutter Q. Shy adjusted her spectacles. "Ah, yes, indeed; yes indeed— most remarkable, most remarkable!" said the professor; "but I can add nothing further to what I have already remarked in elucidation of this truly momentous occurrence," and the professor turned slowly in the direction of the forest.

"But, Fluttershy," cried the mare, "you haven't said anything about it yet." "Tut— tut, my friend; tut— tut," responded Professor Shy, in a kindly and indulgent tone, "do not trouble your pretty head with such weighty, and abstruse problems," and again he wandered slowly off in still another direction, his eyes bent upon the ground at his feet, his hands clasped behind him beneath the flowing tails of her coat.

"I reckon the daffy bounder doesn't know no more'n we do about it," growled the rat-faced sailor.

"Keep a civil tongue in your head," cried the young Stallion, his face pal ing in anger, at the insulting tone of the sailor. "You've murdered our officers, and robbed us. We are absolutely in your power, but you'll treat Professor Shy and Miss Sparkle with respect or I'll break that vile neck of yours with my bare hooves— guns or no guns," and the young fellow stepped so close to the rat-faced sailor that the latter, though he bore two revolvers and a villainous looking knife in his belt, slunk back abashed. "You damned coward," cried the young Stallion. "You'd never dare shoot a Stallion until his back was turned. You don't dare shoot me even then," and he deliberately turned his back full upon the sailor and walked nonchalantly away as if to put him to the test.

The sailor's talent crept slyly to the butt of one of his revolvers; his wicked eyes glared vengefully at the retreating form of the young equestrianstallion. The gaze of his fellows was upon him, but still he hesitated. At heart he was even a greater coward than Prince blue bloodhad imagined.

What he would have done will never be known, for there was another factor abroad which none of the party had yet guessed would enter so largely into the problems of their life on this inhospitable everfree land. Two keen eyes had watched every move of the party from the foliage of a nearby tree. Timbarzan had seen the surprise caused by his notice, and while he could understand nothing of the spoken language of these strange ponies their gestures and facial expressions told him much. The act of the little rat-faced sailor in killing one of his comrades had aroused a strong dislike in Timbarzan, and now that he saw him quarreling with the fine-looking young Stallion his animosity was still further stirred. Timbarzan had never seen the effects of a firearm before, though his books had taught him something of them, but when he saw the rat-faced one fingering the butt of his revolver he thought of the scene he had witnessed so short a time before, and naturally expected to see the young Stallion murdered as had been the huge sailor earlier in the day.

So Timbarzan fitted a poisoned arrow to his bow and drew a bead upon the rat-faced sailor, but the foliage was so thick that he soon saw the arrow would be deflected by the leaves or some small branch, and instead he launched a heavy spear from his lofty perch.

Blue blood had taken but a dozen steps. The rat-faced sailor had half drawn his revolver; the other sailors stood watching the scene intently. Professor Shy had already disappeared into the forest, whether he was being followed by the fussel Rainbow A. Dash, her secretary and assistant.

Spike, the negress, was busy sorting his mistress' baggage from the pile of bales and boxes beside the cabin, and Miss Sparkle had turned away to follow Blue Blood, when something caused her to turn again toward the sailor.

And then three things happened almost simultaneously— the sailor jerked out his weapon and leveled it at Blue Blood's back, Miss Sparkle screamed a warning, and a long, metal-shod spear shot like a bolt from above and passed entirely through the right shoulder of the rat-faced parrot.

The revolver exploded harmlessly in the air, and the see parrot crumpled up with a scream of pain and terror.

Blue Blood turned and rushed back toward the scene. The sailors stood in a frightened group, with drawn weapons, peering into the forest. The wounded parrot writhed and shrieked upon the ground.

Clayton, unseen by any, picked up the fallen revolver and slipped it inside his shirt, then he joined the sailors in gazing, mystified, into the forest. "

Who could it have been?" whispered Twilight Sparkle, and the young Stallion turned to see her standing, wide-eyed and wondering, close beside him. "I dare say Timbarzan of the Timberwolves is watching us all right," he answered, in a dubious tone. "I wonder, now, who that spear was intended for. If for Snipes, then our timberwolf friend is a friend indeed.

"By Celestia, where are your friends Flutter shy and Rainbow Dash? There's someone or something in that forest, and it's armed, whatever it is. Ho! Professor Fluttershy! Rainbow Dash" young Blue Blood shouted. There was no response. "What's to be done, Miss Sparkle?" continued the young Stallion, his face clouded by a frown of worry and indecision.

"I can't leave you here alone with these cutthroats, and you certainly can't venture into the forest with me; yet some one must go in search of your friends. She is more than apt to wandering off aimlessly, regardless of danger or direction, and Rainbow Dash is only a trifle less impractical than her. You will pardon my bluntness, but our lives are all in jeopardy here, and when we get your friends back something must be done to impress upon him the dangers to which he exposes you as well as theirselves by his absent-mindedness."

"I quite agree with you," replied the mare, "and I am not offended at all. Dear friend Fluttershy would sacrifice her life for me without an instant's hesitation, provided one could keep her mind on so frivolous a matter for an entire instant. There is only one way to keep her in safety, and that is to chain her to a tree. The poor dear is so impractical."

"I have it!" suddenly exclaimed Blue Blood. "You can use a revolver, can't you?

"Yes. Why?"

"I have one. With it you and Spike will be comparatively safe in this cabin while I am searching for your Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash. Come, call the baby dragon and I will hurry on. They can't have gone far." Twilight Sparkle did as he suggested and when he saw the door close safely behind them Blue Blood turned toward the forest.

Some of the sailors were drawing the spear from their wounded comrade and, as blue Blood approached, he asked if he could borrow a revolver from one of them while he searched the forest for the Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash. The rat-faced one, finding he was not dead, had regained his composure, and with a volley of oaths directed at Blue Blood refused in the name of his fellows to allow the young Stallion any firearms. This parrot, Snipes had assumed the role of chief since he had killed their former leader, and so little time had elapsed that none of his companions had as yet questioned his authority.

Blue Blood's only response was a shrug of the shoulders, but as he left them he picked up the spear which had transfixed Snipes, and thus primitively armed, the son of the then Prince Blue Blood strode into the dense forest.

Every few moments he called aloud the names of the wanderers. The watchers in the cabin by the beach heard the sound of his voice growing ever fainter and fainter, until at last it was swallowed up by the myriad noises of the primeval wood.

When Professor Fluttershy and his assistant, Rainbow Dash, after much insistence on the part of the latter, had finally turned their steps toward camp, they were as completely lost in the wild and tangled labyrinth of the matted forest as two ponies beings well could be, though they did not know it.

It was by the merest caprice of fortune that they headed toward the west coast of everfree, instead of toward Zanzibar on the opposite side of the dark continent.

When in a short time they reached the lake, only to find no camp in sight, Rainbow Dash was positive that they were north of their proper destination, while, as a matter of fact they were about two hundred yards south of it. It never occurred to either of these impractical theorists to call aloud on the chance of attracting their friends' attention. Instead, with all the assurance that deductive reasoning from a wrong premise induces in one, Rainbow Dash grasped Professor Fluttershy firmly by the arm and hurried the weakly protesting mare off in the direction of Cape Town, fifteen hundred miles to the south.
When Twilight Sparkle and Spike found themselves safely behind the cabin door the negress's first thought was to barricade the portal from the inside. With this idea in mind he turned to search for some means of putting it into execution; but his first view of the interior of the cabin brought a shriek of terror to his lips, and like a frightened child the huge dragon ran to bury his face on his mother' shoulder. Twilight Sparkle, turning at the cry, saw the cause of it lying prone upon the floor before them— the whitened skeleton of a Stallion. A further glance revealed a second skeleton upon the bed.

"What horrible place are we in?" murmured the awestruck girl. But there was no panic in her fright.

At last, disengaging herself from the frantic clutch of the still shrieking Spike, Twilight Sparkle crossed the room to look into the little cradle, knowing what she should see there before ever the tiny skeleton disclosed itself in all its pitiful and pathetic frailty.

What an awful tragedy these poor mute bones proclaimed! The mare shuddered at the thought of the eventualities which might lie before herself and her friends in this ill-fated cabin; the haunt of mysterious, perhaps hostile, beings.

Quickly, with an impatient stamp of her little hoovf, she endeavored to shake off the gloomy forebodings, and turning to Spike bade his cease his wailing.

"Stop, Spike; stop it this minute!" she cried. "You are only making it worse. Why, I never saw such a big baby."

She ended lamely, a little quiver in her own voice as she thought of the one stallion, upon whom she depended for protection, wandering in the depth of that awful forest.

Soon Twilight Sparkle found that the door was equipped with a heavy wooden bar upon the inside, and after several efforts the combined strength of the two enabled them to slip it into place, the first time in twenty years. Then they sat down upon a bench with their arms about one another, and waited.

To be continued