An Unauthorized Field Guide to the Hunt Read Free

his pack, trading the device for a collapsible cooking pot.
    He circled the bushes, picking berries at chest height. Other forest scavengers had already stripped fruit from that point down. No matter how his stomach grumbled, he harvested a thin band along that watershed mark so he wouldn’t leave obvious signs of his presence. Luckily he spotted wild mushrooms beneath the lowest branches that his screen once again assured him would not kill him. Between the berries and the mushrooms, he filled his pot.
    That should increase his odds with bookies taking bets across the galaxy. Another step closer to becoming too valuable for his family to kill.
    Carrying the pot so he could toss bites into his mouth, he moved on. The berries burst tart and juicy on his tongue. The mushrooms were bland and unpleasantly rubbery, but he’d been able to harvest more of them so the volume pacified the yowls of his stomach.
    He veered off his current heading when half the berries and mushrooms were gone. The gods must have blessed him, because the sound of gurgling water guided him to a pond the size of his sleeping quarters back home. Ordinary lilies floated on the surface. Insects buzzed, and their wings snapped. While he finished his supper, he crouched behind giant ferns and studied the tracks in the mud surrounding the water source. No claw marks, which was both warning and relief. Nambians and other taloned competitors hadn’t visited the pool. But neither had the cats. Maybe they were all too busy fucking to care about one lone human roaming their hunting ground.
    When he felt the cool night creeping near, he set out again. He needed to be far from a water source and hidden by the time the forest gloom deepened to pitch-black.
    The cats were nocturnal. Mostly.
    Shane hiked as long as he practicably could, but this time his luck gave out. He wanted a pile of rocks, a hill not built by biting insects, maybe a cave. He found none. Fallen trees that might’ve provided a camouflaging shelter had been markedly absent during his journey through this section of the arena. The forest was the forest was the forest. There were towering trees and random clusters of bushes and then still more trees and bushes. In some areas predators could survey the forest floor from above virtually unimpeded.
    Damn cats didn’t play fair.
    When the shadows of dusk began darkening the woods, Shane couldn’t wait anymore. Others would stalk the arena once daylight fled. Fellow competitors would exploit species adaptations that made the inky black their home. Without weapons and blind at night, Shane would be worthless and his strength too wasted from running. He had to hide.
    Though vanishing inside a shroud of thorns made his nerves jangle, finding a shallow trench in which to bury himself under a blanket of forest detritus felt too much like a grave. A thicket heavy with leaves was his best bet. He crouched and retrieved the standard-issue sleeping bag from his backpack, hoping the thin material was warmer than it looked. Tamping down shrieking unease, he wriggled under a cascade of greenery and unfurled his bed for the night. He twisted to tug his pack into the claustrophobic space to serve as his pillow. He unzipped the sleeping bag so he could squirm inside, squeezing into the tight cocoon. Hands shaking, he arranged the lowest branches of the thicket to hide him and fastened the sleeping bag to his chin. He considered pulling the drawstring tight around his face so he wouldn’t lose as much body heat, but he wanted to hear anything nearby.
    No cat or competitor would be able to see him.
    That was bad. Very bad. Competitors who disappeared made for a boring Hunt, which might prod wardens to flush him into the open if the fighting at the landing pads had tapered.
    And the surrounding brush haunted him. Eerie. Too creepy.
    Shane couldn’t remember the last time he’d hiked so much. He’d certainly never run so far. His overtaxed muscles burned, the sting at