Free To Catch A Warrior [Unearthly World Book 5] by C.L. Scholey Page B

were colored.
    Zabbie spun around when a bunch of warriors roared in anger. Her eyes widened in surprise when she saw four of the warriors covered in a pink dripping substance. A number of the fruit had simply fallen from the branches and all four warriors were saturated. Cy was scowling at her. A blob of pink jelly sat perched on his head.
    “Well don’t blame me,” Zabbie said. “One of you must have touched the tree. When the fruit is that ripe it doesn’t take much for it to fall. Simply walking under it could have caused it with all of your big clomping feet. I told you to follow me.”
    “How the hell do we get this shit off?” Cy demanded. He shook his head in disgust sending a few warriors fleeing from the dye.
    “It has to wear off.”
    “Damn it, I look like an overgrown Earth pink poodle,” Cy bellowed. “We all do.”
    “Franken poodles,” Zabbie whispered and rolled her eyes.
    Zabbie turned and hid a laugh behind her hand. The warriors looked ridiculous covered in patches of pink. The other warriors had turned their attention from Zabbie to the other four. Titus was doing some ribbing of his own, telling Cy he’d have to find him a cute little bow for his hair, maybe the human females would like this dye bottled for their fingernails. Cy could give them a glimpse of the shade. After the initial ribbing, their voices quieted to a few seething grumbles.
    The area they travelled was beautiful, lush foliage, brilliant colors. Small animals skittered into holes chattering at their intrusion. The flat ground tapered to a slope. Zabbie crept up the side of a hill and motioned for the warriors to be quiet. All on their hands and knees they surrounded Zabbie. The scene beneath them was tranquil. Huge shaggy ebony shadow beasts were bathing.
    In a hushed voice Zabbie explained what she wanted. “Those are shadow beasts. All the ones bathing are female and their young. See that massive one at the water’s edge? The only one with the stripe of white on its back. He’s the herd’s male. We don’t want to mess with him or his herd. Now over there are other males just waiting to pounce if they even think they could beat the herd leader. So if we go after one of them, the herd male won’t care and he won’t interfere and neither will the other males. It’s every male shadow beast for himself when it comes to survival.”
    “We should go after the male leader. He’s the only one worthy of a Zargonnii warrior,” Cy said in a scoffing tone.
    “No. We need one of the smaller males, it’s safer,” Zabbie insisted.
    “The larger male will give us more meat for the humans. I’m a Zargonnii warrior; I don’t need a safer route. We won’t let it hurt you, female,” Cy argued.
    “You won’t get near him,” Zabbie said her frustration rising. “It’s not me I’m worried about. If you attack, so will the other males looking to mate, maybe with an underage female, it would be chaos, the mother females will freak.”
    “Titus, are we going to let a human female tell us how to hunt? She can stay and watch how a warrior hunts from the sidelines where she won’t be injured,” Cy complained.
    “She appears to know what she’s talking about. Zabbie have you hunted these beasts before?” Titus asked.
    “Many times. A lone shadow beast will be enough of a battle without asking for trouble. I know where the spear needs to find its mark.”
    “It’s better to hunt if the tribe is confused. We need to rattle them so they panic and run,” another warrior said.
    “Tane’s right,” Cy said. “It will be easier to go after all to make certain we get one. Not corner one single one and hope for the best.”
    “These aren’t buffalo,” Zabbie snapped. “You’re not shooting fish in a barrel. Don’t let their lumbering movements deceive you. They think and work as a family unit. If you go after any of the young, even to scatter them, it’s their mothers you need to worry about. The male will laugh his