Rahan. Episode Nineteen. The Forbidden Shore. by Roger Lecureux. A Puke (TM) Comic.

Rahan.

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Episode Nineteen.

The Forbidden Shore.

The son of Crao observed the thin skin drying in the sun, while playing with a round stone.
Rahan will soon be able to make a new loincloth!

Yes.
He could soon pound this skin to make it supple, as those of his horde did long ago.

He sometimes looked at his reflection in the small polished marble slab that had been given to him by the clan of Tuburk,

Why is Rahan's hair the color of the sun?

Page Two:

Why do "Those-who-walk-Standing" not all look the same, like their cousins, "Those-who-leap-in-the-trees"?

And why night and day?
And why the sun?
And the rain?
And the storm?
In those early days of human history, Rahan was curious about everything.

As he evoked the storm, the wind suddenly rose.
A gust swept away the drying skin.
Rahan will not let the wind steal his loincloth!!

The skin fluttered above the thickets, like a strange bird.
Another gust brought her back to the ground, behind the bushes where she disappeared.

For a long time the son of Crao searched for his property.
This shore was cracked with narrow fissures where the mud of the tides had accumulated.
Rahan will have to skin another beast.

Page Three:

He was about to give up his search when he glimpsed the skin at the bottom of a crevice.
Rahan cannot reach you, but he knows how to get you to him!

A moment later he had tied a thin vine to the handle of his ivory knife.
He was so preoccupied, that he did not sense he was being observed.

What does "The Enemy" do?
What is he fishing for in the veins of the shore?
In other circumstances his hearing or his sense of smell would have warned this son of fierce ages of the danger.

Rahan threw his knife, quite straight, on the skin that rested on the mud.

Rah-ha-ha.
His victory cry rolled to the other shore as he gently lifted the skewered skin.

Page Four:

He was grabbing this one when the men rushed out, brandishing their stone maces.
The enemy who violates our territory must die!

Stop Men!
Rahan does not fight “Those-who-walk-upright”!
Indeed, it was repugnant to the son of Crao to face those of his species.

But this time he had no choice!
He jumped to avoid the assailant, but his ankles got caught in the vine.

Lying on the ground, he saw the man diving on top of him.
As the club was about to fall, he stretched out his arm which held the ivory knife.

Argh!
This man rolled on his side and the second assailant, terrified by this response from "The enemy" fled screaming.

Page Five:

The ivory blade only scratched the hunter's chest.
What cursed weapon did you take Tanirk's life with?

Rahan did not take Tanirk's life.
Tanirk is only injured and Rahan knows how to heal this injury!
Here is Rahan's weapon.

The son of Crao showed the knife still attached to the thin vine.
Suddenly he jumped!

The folded skin, slipping on this line which had passed through it, lay a few steps away.
When Rahan heals Tanirk.

He will think about this very curious thing!
For the wounded hunter, a man who spared his adversary and who raved about a vine, could only have lost his mind.

Page Six:

At nightfall, however this hunter suffered less.
The blood of the "sun-fruits" calms the strongest pains.

And if Tanirk knows how to keep leaves on his chest, his wound will tomorrow close like the lips of the mouth close!

Rahan's knife went through the skin.
While Tanirk fell asleep, the son of Crao returned to the mysteries that preoccupied him.

And the whole vine slipped into the two holes!
And now Rahan can attach the skin like this!!

The son of the fierce ages who knew how to tie knots, including the flowing knot of a lasso, was still unaware that another system of attachment could exist.

Page Seven:

This new way of joining two skins was a revelation.
Rahan has found a way to never lose his loincloth again!

Rahan had amazing faculties of assimilation.
A moment later he cut a long, thin thorn.
It will pierce the skin better than the knife.

Pinching a thin vine fiber in the notch, he made that night what was, perhaps, the first "Needle" in the history of mankind!

But if this rudimentary needle pierced the skin well, it let the fiber escape, stuck at each pass.
Pock!

The hole should be a bit bigger.
Big enough to let the fibers slide.
Rahan could not invent the "Eye" of the needle.

Page Eight:

But he knew how to carve his thorn in such a way that it could bore a passage slightly wider than the notch pinching the vegetal thread.

At dawn, his clamor of triumph woke up Tanirk.
Ra-ha-ha!
See Tanirk, see!
In the past, when Rahan ran through the bushes, he sometimes lost his loincloth.
It slipped from his belt.

But now it cannot slip.
The son of Crao proudly tapped the hem of his new loincloth, the hem through which passed the skin belt bearing the lizard sheath

The face of Rahan suddenly became somber.
A group of men appeared in the distance.
Your clan searches for you, Tanirk!
It is you they're looking for!!

No one has ever ventured onto our shores without losing their life!
I would like to help you, Rahan!
Alas I, I can neither run. And not even walk!

Page Nine:

But you have a small chance of escape.
From the wrath of mine.
By taking refuge in the “Great Vein”!
Go Rahan.

Although, whatever may happen to you.
Tanirk will never forget the strange "Enemy".
You helped him!
Go! Go! It is time!!

The men who spread over the immense shore might have been more fishermen than hunters, for all brandished long harpoons.

Rahan is not a fish!
He will not let himself be captured by this clan!

The son of Crao knew how to see without being seen.
From bush to bush he crawled on the beach.
What Tanirk calls the "Grand Vein" is down there!

Page Ten:

The "Great Vein" was a much larger crevice than the others.
Opening from the shore, she zig-zagged to the distant forest.

Borrowing is indeed the only way to reach this forest without being spotted.
But before arriving at the "Great Vein" Rahan risks being seen ten times!

The shore, up to this fissure, offered no retreat, no hiding place.
His hiding place? Rahan will take it with him!!

The son of fierce ages quickly uprooted a small bush.
A moment later, he was crawling behind this frail rampart.

The men with the harpoons shouted at each other furiously.
Some sometimes looked in the direction of Rahan, who then froze, hiding himself behind his bush.

Page Eleven:

He was only a stone's throw from the "Great Vein" when a clamor arose.
The men had just discovered Tanirk.

Taking advantage of this unexpected diversion, he rushed towards the crevasse.
Though it was deep he jumped in.

The "Great River" must run through it very often!
Unlike the other silt-soaked cracks, this one was lined with pebbles.

However, the clan was surprised to find Tanirk alive.
"The enemy" wanted to make Tanirk suffer more!

He introduced poison into his body!
Orbk. Is mistaken!
Rahan wanted.
To heal him!

Page Twelve:

Lies! Who has ever seen an enemy heal the one he has just defeated!?
Rahan is not an enemy like others, Orbk!

In these wild times the generosity of the son of Crao exceeded the understanding of the members of the clan.
Their leader, Orbk, tore off the leaf bandage.
Argh!

And the man who had witnessed the fight between Tanirk and Rahan jumped.
The blood flowed! And flowed!
And now, now!

The closed wound was no more than a thin gash!
Does Orbk admit he was wrong?

No!
Rahan has closed the wound so that his poison remains in your body!
Before the end of the day, You will have reached the territory of shadows, Tanirk!

Page Thirteen:

The son of Crao, however, had just come up against a curious obstacle.
Rahan has seen nets like this before, he thought.

But the fishers of "The Black Island" plunged them into the Great River!
Why did the brothers of Tanirk place it here?

As a dull rumble rose from the shore, Rahan understood.
The waters of the "Great River will come here.
The fish will throw themselves into this trap!

He was pulling himself up in the mesh when.
The “Enemy” Orbk!
The enemy is hidden in the great fissure!

The fishermen stood out against the sky.
Harpoons flew towards Rahan, who had just taken refuge behind a projection.
They will not allow Rahan to climb the net, Nor to cut the meshes!
Rahan must turn back!

Page Fourteen:

The water quickly invaded "The Great Vein", and reached to the height of his hips, his chest, and then his shoulders.
Klack!
Ploch!

The son of Crao knew that the "Great River" came out of its bed every day, then returned to it.
He heard the hunters bustling on each side of the crevasse.

Rahan has only one way to escape these men!
He let himself sink under the foam, in these waves which always rose.

He knew how to "Crawl under water" as well as on the surface.
And, despite the strong current, he kept away from his enemies.

He saw fish of all shapes and sizes.
Carried by the flow, these would foolishly throw themselves into the net.

Page Fifteen:

The current became less strong.
But suddenly.
Rahan is trapped, like those fish!
A second net was raised in front of him!

Those who don't get caught in the first net get caught in this one, when the "Great River" recedes!

Rahan cautiously returned to the surface.
No one saw his face in the middle of this foam.
Rahan can no longer get out of the water without being seen!

Obrk and his men busied themselves happily on both sides of the "Great Vein" where the water now lay.
The catch will be good, brothers!!

They greeted with a clamor each jolt shaking the nets, this one signaling a new catch.
And we will bring back the corpse of “The Enemy”!

Page Sixteen:

Tanirk, still very weak, had been carried there by his brothers.
You are witnessing our fishing for the last time, poor Tanirk!

But we have avenged you!
We killed the one who introduced the great evil into your body!

However, the son of Crao was going through an agonizing situation as he tried to cut through the mesh of the net.

A school of strange fish had begun to circle around him.
For fun, perhaps some bumped into him with their long bony noses.

But let Rahan alone!
When he breaks through this trap, you can run away with him!!

Page Seventeen:

Oh!
A similar misadventure had already happened to the son of Crao, when he was faced with a young mammoth!

Rahan swooped behind the fish which was carrying his precious knife but this chase was in vain.

The fish disappeared very quickly and he himself, suffocating, had to come back to the surface.
Without his knife, Rahan has no chance of fleeing!!

But he will not surrender!
This time the fishermen again did not see his face.

And he dived back to the net.
Crao said: "A brave man always has a weapon with him, even if only his fingernails or his teeth!!”

Page Eighteen:

A moment later, he was biting furiously at the vines of the net, hacking, crushing, and slicing one by one the vegetable fibers.

Memories of his wild childhood assailed him.
He remembered the lion cub which had attacked him during his sleep.

And he had to attack with another weapon, with the engorgement of his teeth!

But Rahan was not a beast.
He only has human teeth!
And this exhausting effort forced him to come back to the surface more often.

The great river is retreating!
It was indeed in reflux.
The fish threw themselves blindly on the net.

Page Nineteen:

Of which he had only been able to cut a single knot!
In a moment Rahan will be uncovered and he won't even have the strength to fight!

The waters evacuated the "Great Vein" even more rapidly than they had invaded it.
The fishermen howled with joy.

Pointing to the countless fish that thrashed about in the meshes of the two nets.
Oh! And here is the best catch!

Suspended from the net like a spider on its web, the son of the fierce ages gasped.
Exhausted, he did not see Orbk the chief approaching.

Who raised his harpoon! But!
No Orbk!
Don't kill him!!
He healed me look!
He healed me!
You were wrong, Orbk!

Page Twenty:

Tanirk jumped and gesticulated happily among his brothers.

Orbk wants to admit its mistake!
But the enemy will have to tell us his secret.
All of his secrets!

Orbk can have.
Can ask for everything.
Right away.
Rahan does not ask for anything in return.

When the sun dipped into the "Great River", the hostility of the clan had long since given way to admiration.
We found your weapon on the nose of an "Espak".
Take it back!

Had Rahan not revealed the secret of the "Blood-of-the-fruits-of-the-sun", and many others still?

But the son of Crao was still talking.
Was it not his destiny to teach to some what he learned from others?
Was he not the link between all men, "Those-who-walk-upright", his brothers?

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