Leopard 01 - The Awakening

to support her rubbery legs. She wanted to hear every word he had to say with regard to her parents. “What do you mean, without my parents poachers would have succeeded in killing off the sun bear?” She made every effort to sound normal. She knew he had to think she was psychotic, one moment trying to seduce him, the next clawing at him.
    “With deforestation, plantations, and poachers encroaching every day, the sun bear, like many other animals, are in a tremendous decline and have been for a number of years. Your parents recognized the immediacy of concern.”
    “Why are poachers after the sun bear?” She was genuinely interested. Maggie had worked hard to learn about endangered wildlife, drawn to the cause from the first time she had seen a large cat.
    “Several reasons. It is the smallest of all bears and is marketed as a pet. The largest it gets is about a hundred forty pounds, very small for a bear. And the bear is beautiful with a crescent-shaped yellow or white mark across its chest. It’s really the only true bear living in our rain forest, and we don’t want to lose it.”
    “My parents were game wardens? Is that what you do?” Somehow the idea of Brandt being a game warden was even more appealing. She persisted in seeing him as a hunter, yet in truth he was a protector of the creatures in the forest and a poet at heart.
    He nodded. “All of us in the village have dedicated our lives to the preservation of the forest and the trees, plants, and animals dwelling in it. Your parents had two particular animals they fought to preserve, and eventually it killed them.”
    Her heart beat into the silence. “What killed them?”
    “Poachers, of course. Your parents were too successful at what they did. Parts of the sun bear are worth a fortune.” Brandt sat at the table and picked up his mug of tea, wanting to set her at ease.
    “Parts?” Her eyebrows shot up. She frowned at him, rubbing at her arms. She was itching again. That strange, uncomfortable feeling of something moving beneath her skin was back. “Poachers sell off parts of the bear? Is that what you’re telling me?”
    “Unfortunately, yes. The gallbladder is especially popular for medicine. And in some places the conversion of forest habitat to plantations of oil palm have put an even larger price on their heads.
    Because the bears don’t have their natural foods, they feed on the heart of the oil palm and destroy the trees. Naturally the plantation owners pay money to have the bears hunted and destroyed.” Brandt watched her closely, following the movement of her hands as her palms rubbed back and forth along her arms.
    “That’s horrible.”
    “Leopards are disappearing as well.” His voice was fierce now. “We cannot allow the leopards to become extinct. Already the numbers are dwindling at an alarming rate. Once these species are lost to us, we cannot recover them. We owe it to them, to ourselves, and to our children to preserve these animals.”
    Maggie nodded. “I’ve certainly done research in the area of saving habitats and I know the necessity, Brandt, but if it killed my parents all those years ago, I would think the danger would be even greater now.”
    “Danger doesn’t matter. We accept that as part of our lives. We are the keepers of the forest. It’s our duty and it has always been our privilege. Your parents understood that, and their parents before them.”
    His golden eyes moved over her, a brooding perusal. “There are only a few of us, Maggie, carrying on what your parents worked so hard for. It’s your legacy.” Noting her distress, he stood up slowly so as not to startle her. “What’s wrong?”
    “My skin itches.” She bit her lower lip. “Do you think I could have picked up some kind of parasite?
    It’s strange, like something’s moving inside of me, running under my skin.” She was watching his face closely and saw the fleeting, cunning expression in his eyes. He knew. He was looking at her innocently, but he knew much more than he was letting on. She tilted her chin at him in challenge.

    “You know what it is, don’t you, Brandt? You know what’s happening to me.” She moved around the counter, putting it between them, the only way she felt safe.
    “Are you afraid of me, Maggie?” he asked quietly.
    His tone chilled her to the bone. It was the second time he had asked her that. The silence in the house beat between them. Outside the walls, the forest was humming with life.