The sun hung low in the sky, casting long shadows through the dense canopy as Taniel and his hunt brothers crested the ridge into the heavily forested overlook. Below them, a vast herd of mustangs roamed the open meadow, their coats gleaming in shades of bay, chestnut, and dappled gray—mares nuzzling foals, stallions tossing heads in playful challenges, the air alive with the snort of breath and thud of hooves on earth. The forest pressed thick around the vantage, ancient pines and oaks twisting roots into the soil, underbrush a tangle of ferns and brambles that whispered with the wind.
"Prime spot," Taniel rumbled, his broad shoulders rolling as he scanned the terrain, nostrils flaring to catch the wild scents of horse sweat and loamy decay. "We'll hold here till the next shift." Lightning Hawk nodded, his lithe frame already uncoiling rope from his pack, while Shadow Knife and Wolf Fang hacked at low branches with tomahawks, clearing a flat for their camp. Tents rose swift—buffalo hides stretched over willow frames, pegged firm against the evening chill. A small fire pit ringed with stones came next, dry tinder piled for a smokeless blaze. They stowed quivers and spears nearby, the metallic glint of poacher knives tucked into sheaths as backups.
As the setup wound down, Taniel dropped onto a fallen log during a water break, his muscular legs stretching out, moccasins scuffed from the trail. He shot a grin at Lightning Hawk, who was sharpening an arrowhead with rhythmic scrapes. "You moved quicker than a coyote on a rabbit's tail, brother. Claiming Sahari's friend Ayana before the dust from our last hunt settled. What's her fire like under those dark curls? What drew you to her so quickly to have such a desire to be by her?"
Lightning Hawk paused, his sharp features cracking into a wolfish smile, eyes glinting with memory. He sheathed the whetstone and leaned back, arms crossing over his chest. "You lit the spark yourself, Taniel. Told us to seize our mates, build the herd strong. So I struck like my namesake—fast and true. She's got spirit, that one; her laugh pulls like a bowstring. Her beauty draws the eye like a rainbow during a thunderstorm. Her voice lasting in my mind like a happy memory." His voice dropped, a hint of heat threading through. "And her skin... smooth as river stones, darker than deep mahogany wood, warm under my hands when I held her goodbye."
Taniel barked a laugh, deep and rolling from his chest, clapping his friend's shoulder hard enough to jolt him. "Fair hit. But lightning? I figured you'd at least circle once, test the wind. Not bolt straight in." They shared the mirth over jerked venison and hard corn cakes, chewing slow as the herd below grazed oblivious, the forest's hush broken only by distant bird calls. The banter eased the patrol's edge, bonds of brotherhood tightening like sinew on a bow.
Refreshed, they rose to relieve Shadow Knife and Wolf Fang, who had been circling the perimeter. The pair emerged from the treeline, sweat beading on their brows, quivers half-spent from practice shots at imagined foes. "All quiet?" Taniel asked, fist-bumping each in turn.
"Ghosts and squirrels," Wolf Fang grunted, his stocky build heaving as he slung his bow. Shadow Knife, leaner and quieter, just nodded, wiping dirt from his scarred knuckles. The shift swapped seamless—Taniel and Lightning Hawk fanning out into the undergrowth, senses attuned to every snap of twig or rustle of leaf. They prowled in loose formation, Taniel's werehorse instincts sharpening his ears to the herd's low whinnies, his eyes piercing shadows for unnatural signs. Lightning Hawk keeping an eye for physical tracks or signs of disturbance or strange marks that were man made.
The sweep dragged into dusk, the sky bruising purple as they looped back toward camp. Taniel halted mid-stride, head tilting, a low growl building in his throat. The air carried a wrong note—sharp, cold, like blood on steel. "Iron," he muttered, veering toward a thicket of laurel bushes, leaves brushing his arms like insistent fingers. He swept them aside with one powerful swipe, revealing the trap: jagged jaws of forged metal, chain-rusted and spiked with nails, half-buried in leaf litter, sprung empty but lethal.
His lip curled in fury, veins bulging along his forearms as the werehorse spirit surged. Muscles coiled, he gripped the jaws—fingers like iron clamps—and wrenched. Metal groaned, then shattered with a crack like thunder, shards flying as he snapped the beast in two. Panting lightly, he bundled the wreckage into his satchel, the weight a grim trophy. "For Elias. We'll see if he knows how to forge something better from this poison—arrow tips, perhaps, or knife blades to turn against the butchers."
Lightning Hawk crouched nearby, parting ferns with his spear tip. "Here—another." His voice tightened as he pointed; the trap lay concealed under moss, its teeth gnashing at air when prodded. Taniel crushed it the same, the effort fueling his rage, Lightning Hawk whistle signals Shadow knife and Wolf fang. They join them and are quickly brought up to speed on what they found in the area. With nods the two join their hunt brothers in sweeping for the traps.
Wolf Fang unearthed a third, half-hidden by fallen bark, and Shadow Knife the fourth, its chain tangled in roots like a serpent's coil. Four in all, they packed the twisted iron—jaws, springs, chains heavy with nails—into the satchel, the metallic tang now a badge of defiance.
As twilight deepened, the next patrol arrived—four slightly older hunters on fleet ponies, eyes wide at the news. "Step light in the bushes," Taniel warned, gesturing to the thickets. "These snares lurk like vipers. Mark your paths, call if you scent metal or find glitning shines among the darkness." Nods rippled through them, murmurs of thanks—"We'll honor the watch"—before Taniel's group mounted up, ponies snorting eager as they turned homeward.
The ride back cut through starlit trails, the forest giving way to open plains under a waxing moon. Taniel's thoughts raced ahead to the tribe—to Sahari's strong embrace, her dark water-kissed skin; to Maria's soft freckles and eager green eyes, both waiting to weave tighter into his herd. His cock stirred faintly at the memory of their morning kisses, tongues tangling hot and wet, of their courtship habits from massages, to the foot worship, to their breathy moans at his attention upon them, but he reined it in, focusing on the wind's rush. Lightning Hawk rode beside him, a matching fire in his gaze. "Ayana's blush when I left... it'll be waiting. Soft hands, fierce heart. Can't come quick enough."
Behind, Shadow Knife and Wolf Fang trailed, their ponies' hooves a steady drum. Wolf Fang broke the quiet with a grumble, voice rough as gravel. "You two trot home to your mares, all smug and sated. Me? Still hunting shadows for a woman who'll stand the nights." Shadow Knife snorted agreement, his usual silence cracking. "Jealousy's a poor meal, but it bites deep. Find our own claims soon, or we'll be ghosts in your herds." Envy laced their words, healthy as fresh scars—brothers still, but aching for the warmth Taniel and Lightning Hawk already chased.
The tribe's fires flickered into view as dawn's first light grayed the horizon, the scent of home—smoke, earth, and kin—pulling them faster. Taniel dismounted first at the central camp, satchel slung over his shoulder, ready to report to Chief Many Horses and unload the iron for Elias's ideas of how to reuse it and remake it. But his eyes sought the tents, heart pounding with the promise of reunion, bodies pressing close once more in the quiet hours before the day's labors.