The First Americans #1: Beyond the Sea of Ice
by
WILLIAM SARABANDE


BANTAM BOOKS BY WILLIAM SARABANDE

The First Americans Series

Beyond the Sea of Ice

Corridor of Storms

Forbidden Land

Walkers of the Wind

The Sacred Stones

Thunder in the Sky

Edge of the World

Shadow of the Watching Star

Face of the Rising Sun

Spirit Moon

Time Beyond Beginning Wolves of the Dawn

And coming soon

To the Far Horizon

THE FIRST AMERICANS

BEYOND THE SEA OF ICE

WILLIAM SARABANDE

Created by the producers of Wagons West, White Indian, Wolves of the
Dawn, and Children of the Lion.

Book Creations Inc.. Canaan. NY Lyle Kenyan Engel. Founder

BANTAM BOOKS
NEW YORK TORONTO LONDON SYDNEY AUCKLAND

the first americans: beyond the sea of ice A Bantam Book December
1987

All rights reserved.

Copyright 1987 by Book Creations, Inc.

Cover art copyright 1987 by Jerry La Faro.

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ISBN 0-553-26889-9

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To Lyle

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Torka's band

Torka -Twenty-year-old Ice Age Paleo-Indian hunter from northeast
Asia

*Umak -- Torka's grandfather, an ancient man at forty-five

Egatsop --
Torka's wife, eighteen years old

Kipu -- Torka's son, five years old

Lo nit -- Torka's female, twelve years old and on the brink of
womanhood

Galeena's band

Galeena -Hunter from farther east than Torka's people

Ai- Galeena's favorite woman Mana ak -Hunter Torka's age

Iana --
Manaak's woman

Ninip -Young boy *Naknaktup -Matron

Oklahnoo -Matron

Supnah's band

Supnah -Mammoth-spurning hunter *Karana -- Supnah's son

Navahk -Magic man

Left the cavelike ledge with Torka

ANIMAL

GLOSSARY

Woolly mammoth- Gigantic elephant like mammal with huge curling tusks
and flat teeth perfect for grinding leaves and twigs. The skull was
double domed, and the body was covered with thick red hair. Stood
sixteen feet at the shoulder.

Dire wolf- A wolf that was taller and heavier than today's wolves.

Saber-toothed lion- Almost as large as today's African lion, the
saber-toothed cat had strong front legs and shorter hind legs. Its
upper canine teeth were enlarged into two great sabers with serrated
edges, with which it would stab its victims.

Ptarmigan -Small bird, slightly larger than today's quail.

Short-faced bear- One-third larger than today's bears, this beast was
primarily a carnivore.

Teratorni -- A condor with a wingspan of more than twelve feet.

PART I.

THE CROOKED SPIRIT

Something walked within the night something huge. Something silent.
Something terrible.

The hunter stopped dead in his tracks, listening, attuned to some inner
thrum of warning that caused adrenalin to run hot within his veins as
all his senses screamed: Danger!

He was a young man, winter lean, graceful even though he stood tense
within his multilayered garments of skins and furs. Braced upon
strong, heavily clad limbs like a running beast, he was poised and
ready to hurl himself from danger.

He had felt it stalking him for hours, as relentlessly as death. Twice
he had doubled back to check for tracks, but blowing ground snow had
mocked his efforts, and he had seen nothing only the vast, wind-driven
distances of snowcovered, perpetually frozen tundra and the endless
darkness of the Arctic winter night. As the wind wicked away whorls of
dry snow and sent them rive ring beneath the shimmering blue patterns
of the northern lights, he had seen a ridge that rose out of the broad,
flat, tundral face like the broken nose of a long-dead giant.

He had made for that veiled, distant refuge at a trot, not looking
back, knowing that Alinak and Nap would follow. During the last few
days they had tacitly allowed him to lead them. He had not been
surprised for he was Torka, and the blood of many generations of spirit
masters flowed within him. It was well known that his hunting
instincts never failed him. Alinak and Nap would know that he had
sought safety on the high ground of the ridge, which would allow them
at least some advantage over whatever it was that was stalking them.

Now he looked back, out across the vistas fogged by thick
clouds of blowing ground snow. Through these he could see his
companions, two figures emerging out of the freezing mists, ascending
the spine of the ridge toward him. Hunching against the wind, leaning
on their spears for balance, they wore the skins of beasts. Antlers
branched outward from their hooded heads. Half-human, half-animal,
Alinak and Nap had the look of horned apparitions ripped from the
nightmare fabric of a dream.

But this was no dream. This was the Age of . At least forty thousand
years would pass before hunters of another epoch would call this land
Siberia. There would be forests here then, and new races of men and
beasts. Now there was only a dark and savage landscape across which
the wind wailed and the cries of dire wolves ululated like women
keening their dead.

Far to the east, above the towering, ice-girdled mountain ranges that
encircled the treeless tundral plain, the first glow of dawn was
leaching the sky to gold. It was the faintest banding of light, but it
would stay long enough to be called morning, to set shadows of mauve
and gray upon a land that had not seen sunlight for months. The time
of the long dark was ending. The time of light was returning after the
longest, cruelest winter that Torka had ever known.

His two antlered companions came to stand beside him. Like Torka, they
were shielded against the weather in many layers of clothing. Their
undergarments were of the supplest skins of caribou fawns. Trousers of
dog pelts protected their legs from the subzero bite of the Arctic
wind. Within these were stockings of buckskin, chewed by their women
to the consistency of velvet, and over the trousers were hairy leggings
of bison hide, cross-laced over knee-high boots lined in fur and
triple-soled to form a barrier against the cold. Each man wore a tunic
of caribou hide and, over this, with the hair facing inward, a coat cut
from the skins of the same reindeer like animal.

No skins were wanner than those of winter-killed caribou. Although the
caribou was relatively short-haired when compared to the pelage of the
shaggy musk ox or the woolly shouldered giant bison, each shaft of
caribou hair was an air-filled, insulating cylinder, which kept the
warmth of a man in and the death-dealing cold of the Arctic out. In
garments sewn of such fur, a hunter could stay out upon the
wind-ravaged tundra indefinitely without feeling the cold.
But, although these men were warm, they had been away from their
people's winter encampment for three days. The warmth of their
clothing could not protect them from fatigue or hunger. Or from bad
judgment.

They stood together with the light of dawn upon them, and Torka went
dry-mouthed with apprehension as he eyed his companions' horned cloaks.
It was sacrilege to don the stalking cloak before the game was sighted.
His own cloak was still strapped to his pack frame, rolled tightly,
with the antlers upright like skeletal wings projecting outward from
his back.

A deep roaring suddenly rent the wind-scoured morning. Torka stood
immobile, his face impassive, although once again his senses screamed:
Danger! He turned, as did the two men beside him. They listened,
squinting into the distance and trying to ascertain from which
direction the sound had come. Within the faraway, glacier-ridden
mountains, the dire wolves fell silent. Torka wondered if they, too,
sensed that what they had heard had been more than the commonplace
thundering of an avalanche from the towering frontal flanks of the many
glaciers on the tundral plain.

This had been the sound of something alive--something passing below and
well beyond the ridge upon which the three hunters stood. It was made
invisible by blowing ground snow and distance but was so large that its
footfall set up vibrations in the permafrost and caused the earth to
tremble. Its scent reached them, and they drew it in, seeking
definition of it as only those refined to the kill could recognize the
smell of life within the lung-searing cold of the Arctic wind. It was
the merest inference of the warmth of living flesh and breath. The
wind brought it to them, taunted them with it, then took it away before
they could put name to it.

The moments passed. Long. Breathless. The hunters waited, but the
sound did not recur. Nap and Alinak salivated with want. Their
bellies were tight and aching with hunger. Unlike Torka, they sensed
no threat in the wind, no danger in the dawn. Fatigue had dulled their
instincts. Their minds were filled with visions of what they so
desperately wanted to see: caribou. They yearned to see vast herds of
migrating cows and young, with the bulls following in separate
traveling units, pouring out across the tundra from the distant
mountains enroute to their calving grounds far to the east.

The herds were long overdue. The starving moon had
risen and set over the winter encampment that their people had erected
against the brutal storms of the time of the long dark. Theirs was a
small hand. Composed of fewer than forty souls, the group had worked
together to dig pit huts into the frozen tundra, to raise domed roofs
of bison skins over frames of mammoth ribs. With provisions cached
against the long, dark months to come, they had settled in to await the
return of the time of light.

As always, they had encamped along a known route of caribou migration,
certain that, before starvation set in, the herds would return to
nourish them. But the caribou had not returned. The winter had been
more severe than any winter that even the eldest members of the band
could remember. There had been a brief thaw. Then the cold had
returned, and storms had raged down upon them from out of the north
like ravening wolves. Despite the weather, the hunters had gone out
each day in search of game, only to return empty handed. Soon their
provisions had been exhausted. Women stared blank-eyed at empty snares
as their breast milk dried and their babies wailed unceasingly.
Ptarmigan fences of the leg bones of freshly killed steppe antelope,
raised by the children earlier in the season, failed to confuse and
entrap any more of the low-flying, winter-white birds. As a sacrifice
to the spirits to bring the caribou back, Teenak, the headman's
youngest woman, had exposed her newborn infant. In sympathy, the sky
spirits had taken the suffering baby's body along with its soul. The
baby would feed upon the clouds until Teenak could give birth to it
again in better times. Two other women had followed Teenak's example
with their own offspring. But still the caribou had not returned.

So it was that the hunters of the band had been sent out to find the
herds. For three days now, they had been fanning out from the
encampment, desperately searching for any sort of game, each hoping to
be the first to sight the long-awaited herds upon which the band had
come to depend for all those things that were the very blood of life to
them: No meat was sweeter, no hides were warmer or more versatile, no
antlers or bones were more malleable. No sinew was stronger or more
resilient, no fat burned longer in the concave ovals of the burning
stones that served as lamps. The caribou was the staff of life to the
nomads of the Arctic tundra. Without the caribou, they could not
survive.
Alinak and Nap stared into the growing light of the snow driven
morning, each man trying to see what had brought Torka to such an
abrupt stop. Surely, there was something moving out there in the
mists. It had to be caribou! When Torka had suddenly made for the
ridge at a run, optimism had caused both men to assume that the herds
had at last been sighted. They had followed, donning their stalking
cloaks without breaking stride, certain that Torka was leading them to
high ground so that they might gain an overview of their prey.

Nap's gloved hand curled tightly about the bone shaft of his spear.
Above his high, round cheekbones, his black eyes slitted with
anticipatory pleasure. He could see himself now, trotting home, bent
forward under a load of fresh-killed meat, his belly full for the first
time in months, his blood singing.

Alinak shared his brother's vision. He could almost smell the sour,
steamy stink of caribou dung and feel it grainy-slick between his
gloves as he imagined himself smearing it over his garments so that he
might take on the scent of his prey, insinuate himself into the fringes
of the herd, and with Torka and Nap hunting close by, easily make his
kills.

The brothers nodded, one to the other, acknowledging their unspoken
thoughts. An Arctic hunter's ability to communicate without sound was
a sixth sense, as it was with all predators whose survival depended
upon their ability to hunt in packs. To speak was to alert prey to
their presence, and to break the concentration of others when game was
being stalked was unthinkable.

It was hunger, coupled with exhaustion, that put the word on Nap's
tongue. He did not know that he spoke until the wind blew his voice
back into his face and slapped him with it.

"Caribou ..."

The enormity of his transgression hit him at once. He sucked in a
half-strangled gasp of alarm, as though he might draw back his
utterance, but it was too late. The word was out, running free upon
the wind.

Torka and Alinak stood stunned to silence. Nap had just broken one of
the most ancient taboos of the Arctic. They all knew that to name a
thing was to give it the spirit of life. And life spirits had wills of
their own. If called forth without the proper ceremony or chants of
respect, they were dishonored and would seek to punish those who had
shamed them. In the case of game, they might not come forth at all,
thus
punishing the transgressors through starvation. Or they might
transform themselves into crooked spirits, half-flesh, half phantom ..
. clawed, fanged, invisible, and malevolent.. . big enough to make
prey of men and eat them .. . slowly.

Nap felt sick. He could see Alinak's wide face scowling at him out of
the shadowed recesses of his antlered headdress. Torka's hood was
fashioned from the pelt of a dire wolf, with the tail of the beast
stitched end to end to form an encircling ruff, within which his face
was but a pool of darkness in the meager light of the morning; but Nap
did not have to see the strong, even features to know that Torka's dark
brows had merged into one black sprawl above his all too expressive
eyes. He could visualize the well-formed mouth snarling back from the
white teeth as Torka hissed an exhalation that was more damning than
any rebuke.

Torka did not have to tell Nap that what he had done was unforgivable.
His lapse might well cost all three of them their lives. And if, by
some chance, they did manage to get safely back to the winter
encampment of their band, Nap's reputation as a hunter would be sullied
forever. Yet, as the initial flaring of his anger cooled, Torka could
not condemn Nap for his blunder. They were all exhausted, all hungry
and dangerously near to starvation. It was said that starvation fed
the light of vision. It was also said that hunger made men careless.
Any one of them might have blurted the word of longing and thus,
inadvertently, broken the ancient taboo. But if Nap had loosed a
crooked spirit, it would be a separate entity from the one that Torka
sensed stalking them. That phantom had been following them for hours.
And whatever it was, Torka was now more certain than ever that it was
no herd of caribou.

The three hunters stood immobile. They all saw specters, listened for
the voice of danger, and imagined that they saw death stalking them in
the wind-driven mists.

Torka stood with his fleshing dagger in one hand and his stabbing spear
balanced and at the ready in the other. He could taste bile at the
back of his throat as he recalled the words of old Umak, the
grandfather who had raised him and taught him to hunt after his parents
had been killed: There is a light that burns at the back of a man's
eyes when death is near, stalking, waiting for the hunter to make the
final error. The hunter must face into this light. Only by facing
death may his spirit overcome it.
The light that burns. Torka could feel it now. It seared the back of
his eyes and transformed his vision. The world was ignited by it,
bright, as white and bold as the great white bear of the north, and he
thought: Whatever is out there, the wind is in its favor now. It will
have our scent. And if it is a bear, it will be mad with hunger after
months of living off its own fat. It will come for us, even here upon
high ground. It will come.

Restlessness ran in his blood, heating it. Despite the cold, he could
smell the acrid scent brought on by his tension. He wished that his
grandfather were with him now. Alinak and Nap were both in their prime
and experienced hunters, but when old Umak was at his side, Torka
always felt that he had the courage and the wisdom of two men. But
Umak had injured his leg while chasing down a steppe antelope earlier
in the season. Now he sheltered within Torka's pit hut back at the
winter camp with Egatsop, who was Torka's woman, their newborn infant,
and Kipu, their little son.

Kipu! The boy grew paler and weaker every day. And here was Torka,
the brave hunter, dry-mouthed and in fear of an unseen prey whose flesh
would feed his son and save his people from starvation. Self-revulsion
caused him to scowl. What sort of a man was he? Why was he standing
here in silence when he should be making the chants that would summon
the unknown prey to him?

But what if the prey was a crooked spirit? Or worse, what if it was a
bear? He had seen what the great white bear could do. When Torka was
a child he had seen his father slashed and torn by those great paws. He
had seen his father die as many others were mauled, until at last the
huge, short-faced, lumbering marauder had been driven off. Later it
had been found dead from wounds it had suffered in the encampment. The
surviving members of the band had eaten it, but the bear had ruined ten
spears and taken the lives of three hunters and one woman, Torka's
mother, to the spirit world with it.

The memory roused anger and a fully formed resolve that drove away his
fear. Umak had stood against that bear. Umak's courage had enabled
him to place the killing spear. Not even the great white bear had been
bolder than Umak. And I am Torka. I am the son of Umak's son. I can
be bold. I, too, am mad with hunger after months of living off my own
fat.

The wind was gusting now, its power ebbing as morning claimed the
tundra and banished the terrors of the dark.
Torka's black eyes stared into the settling ground snow, searching for
a bear that was not there. Nap and Alinak frowned into the distance,
expecting crooked spirits to take shape and come at them to take their
lives. But, to their infinite relief, there was only the familiar,
empty tundra spreading out before them, with the mountains circling the
far horizon and, on that horizon, the frozen jewel of a shallow little
lake glinting in the cold colors of the morning. The lake was at the
base of the shouldering rise of a terminal moraine, no doubt the result
of the recent thaw and ensuing freeze. A huge embankment of loose
stones and rocky debris rose at the foot of a glacier. And mired at
the edge of the lake, its shape a dark scab upon the ice, was a corpse
whose color was unmistakable. Red. Deep red, the color of blood
rising from a wound.

The hunters exhaled in disbelieving unison. The terrors of the night
and caution were forgotten. Hunger took complete control of their
senses as they realized that at last they had found enough food to
gorge upon until they were sated and still have more than enough to
bring back to their starving people.

Torka laughed with relief. So his instincts had failed him at last!
What a fool he had been! The only thing that had stalked him in the
night had been the beast of his own fear! The light that had burned
behind his eyes had only been the color of that fear!

"Do you see it?" questioned Alinak softly, as though he dared not
trust his own eyes and feared a negative answer.

"I see it!" Torka affirmed, and put a name to that which lay before
them, obviously dead, fresh-frozen in the ice, waiting to be taken.
"Mammoth!"

Nap winced, but Torka reached out and gave him a friendly shoulder jab
that told the other man that everything was going to be all right. Nap
had broken a taboo, but it seemed as though the spirits were going to
overlook it.

They put the ridge behind them and went on toward the lake at a jog,
grateful for the light of morning, forgetful of the terrors of the dark.
They blessed whatever spirit had misled the mammoth and sent it plodding
into the quagmire of the lakeshore during the last thaw; they knew that
its weight must have entrapped it, and death must have come either by
starvation or in the storms that had followed the thaw to freeze the
lake solid.

They chanted as they ran, verses of gratitude to the spirits. Although
the flesh of the woolly mammoth was not their favorite meat--it was
bitter with the taste of the scrub spruce that was its favorite
fodder--starving men were not discriminating, nor were they curious as
to what had drawn the mammoth far from its preferred habitat in the hill
country close to the base of the mountains. They knew only that whatever
had set it on its course out onto the tundra had set it directly in
their path. They made incantations that would appease the soul of the
huge beast, whose flesh would now save their lives and the lives of
their people.

They were breathless when they reached the lake and paused before the
corpse of the mammoth. It lay on its side, two legs totally submerged,
and most of its great head imbedded in the ice. It was an enormous cow.
And, strangely, it was untouched by predators. They should have noted
this, but they did not. Hunger had consumed their caution.

The cold had lessened somewhat with the drop of the wind, although, in
the shadow of the towering moraine and the massive wall of the glacier
behind it, the air temperature was well below freezing. The long hair of
the mammoth was frozen into twisted pillars of ice above its equally
rigid hide. It would take all the hunters' energy to hack through the
hair and hide to the frozen flesh beneath; but they did not care, nor
did they hesitate.

They leaped onto the body of the behemoth and set to work with their
spears, chipping and wedging away at the hair, then bending to work,
with their fleshing daggers to open the hide. Weariness soon dulled
their excitement as they took up bits of frozen flesh and sucked the
blood from them, silently acknowledging that unless there was another
thaw, the meat of the mammoth would remain rock hard. It would take
better tools than they had to cut enough steaks from it to transport
back to their people. They would have to go back to the winter
encampment and bring others to help them, leaving one of their number to
keep predators from the corpse.

As they crouched upon the body of the mammoth, trying to decide who
should stay and who should go, a shadow fell upon them. They paid it no
heed at first. They were already in the shadow of the moraine and what
fell upon them seemed to be only a deepening of that shadow.

It was Torka who was first distracted by the sensation of being watched.
He looked up into the eyes of death.

A full eighteen feet tall at the shoulder, the bull mammoth stood on
stanchion limbs, with over half a ton of ivory curling forward in its
tusks. Nearly as long as the beast was tall, the tusks were discolored
at their tips, where, in its endless foraging, the bull had ripped and
torn into the fragile flesh of the tundra as deeply as it had also
ripped into the flesh of its own kind during many a battle for mating
supremacy.

Torka rose. This was what he had sensed walked within the night. His
instincts had not betrayed him. Never had he imagined that any living
creature could be so huge or so menacing. It was a haunting, risen from
the tales that the old men told in the winter dark, close to the warming
fire within the Man House--stories of monsters to frighten adolescent
hunters, to emphasize the meaning of danger, to stress the full
consequences of breaking a taboo. The beast that stood staring down at
Torka from the top of the moraine made the great white bear of his
memories seem as puny as a half starved Arctic hare. It made the most
malevolent of crooked spirits seem less threatening than a
winter-weakened ptarmigan flapping its wings in a snare.

Instinctively, Torka knew that the bull must be the mate of the mired
cow whose body he and the others were carving, whose flesh they had
eaten to nourish their own. It was the bull who had kept predators from
the body until, at last, it had wandered off, only to be drawn back to
its mate again, following the hunters.

The mammoth's great head lowered and swung back and forth. Alinak and
Nap saw it now. They crouched, gaping, incredulous as the low, measured
exhalations of its breath reached them. Then, impossibly, it reared back
and pawed at the air. Its huge trunk rose, and its long, sloppy-lipped
jaw opened as it trumpeted its rage at them.

Torka would never be certain of the exact moment in which it charged. He
only knew that it was suddenly coming at him, and he and Alinak and Nap
were grabbing for the spears that they had set aside. They leaped from
the cow, slipping and scrambling madly along the ice-rimed embankment of
the lake as they ran for safety. But there was nowhere to run. Torka
heard Alinak scream. The choking, retching gurgle that followed put the
hideous manner of his death into his companions' minds, but neither
Torka nor Nap looked back. They could not help Alinak now.

They ran close together. Nap was sobbing as he rasped in terror, "Run
wide of me, Torka. It is my crooked spirit. It comes for me. Make for
high ground! Run for the ridge! I will lead it away!"

"We run together!" was Torka's reply, even though he knew that there was
wisdom in Nap's advice. If they ran wide of one another, the beast could
not take them both at once. But if they both made for the ridge, running
in an erratic pattern, perhaps they could confuse it, and then they
could both make it to safety. The beast was the largest mammoth that
Torka had ever seen, but somehow he knew that it was a mammoth and not a
crooked spirit. And mammoths could not climb.

It was this certainty that gave him the power to quicken his pace, to
lengthen his stride into long, earth-eating steps that would surely have
brought him to the ridge in time had Nap not veered away, turning back
toward the lake, directly into the path of the mammoth.

"No!" Torka cried. "Run with me! We're almost there!"

But Nap had paused. He stood dead still, facing back across the open
tundra to where the mammoth trotted toward them, its gait slow now, but
gaining. It had stopped after knocking Alinak down. It had wheeled
around and ground his body into a bloody mash within the heavy casing of
his clothes. His blood was on its trunk and tusks and huge, toed feet.
Its head was down, and its hairy ears twitched forward like wings below
the high, twin domes of its skull. It eyed Nap, then nodded, huffing as
it increased its speed from a trot to a gallop as it moved directly
toward him.

Torka stood frozen. "Run, Nap. Now! Run!"

Incredibly, Nap did not run. He stood his ground before the charging
mammoth, not raising his spear until the very end. Perhaps, in that last
moment, when he smelled the stench of the beast's breath and the acrid
stink of its body, superstition fell away and he knew that what rushed
down upon him was no crooked spirit but a creature of flesh and blood,
as fully mortal as he. He screamed then and turned to flee. It was too
late. The mammoth had him in its trunk. His weapon fell away, snarling
uselessly in the beast's thick, tangled red hair. He was thrown down and
trampled, his organs exploding out through his mouth as every bone in
his body was broken and every fiber of his being was reduced to jellied
rubble.

Immobilized by the horror of what he had just witnessed, Torka stood in
shock, shaken by the mind-splitting reverberations of the mammoth's
trumpetings of victory over those who had profaned the body of its mate.
It was as though the sound of its roarings permeated the skin of the
world. The earth shook. Within Torka, the sound reached down into a
never-before-tapped core of molten rage that rose slowly to burn
white-hot behind his eyes.

The mammoth was staring at him. Its eyes were round and dilated with its
hatred of Man. Its great trunk swung upward. Its enormous body swayed.
One massive forelimb lifted, then came down to strike the earth again
and again until it seemed that all the world trembled.

But Torka did not tremble. Terror had taken him beyond fear. Rage
steadied his nerves. He waited, knowing that there was no escape for him
now. The ridge was too far. Death was too near. The light that burns was
bright behind his eyes. He thought of Umak and remembered the old man's
words: The hunter must face into the light. Only by facing death may his
spirit overcome it.

Torka faced death. With his body poised and his weapons balanced, he
waited for it. And when, at last, the mammoth charged, Torka did not
turn away. He ran to meet it, screaming. The hunter's cry cracked the
stillness of the Arctic noon. It was a shout loosed like a well-flung
spear, hurled upward toward the sun so that it flew across the
snow-whitened tundra as though it were a ptarmigan flushed from winter
cover.

But here, in this place, there was no sun. Morning had come and gone,
and that was all there would be of day. There was no hunter. There was
no spear. There was no winter white bird flying in terror of death.
There was only an old man crying out of his dreams within the domed
shelter of a pit hut beneath the appalling cold and returning dark of
the Asian winter sky.

"Behold! They come! The people shall not starve!"

Joy propelled the old man bolt upright upon his narrow mattress. It was
a jumbled piling of time-worn hides stretched over the much-mended
patchwork of oiled caribou intestines that, together with an under
layering of leather tarpaulin, formed the flooring of the little hut.
The cold dampness of the permafrost, into which the floor had been cut,
had melted to congeal into a soggy ooze beneath the waterproof covering;
but it did not soak through to permeate the old man's bedding, nor did
the frigid darkness bite at his bony brown body as his bed furs tumbled
down around him into his lap. Since the death of his woman, he had taken
to sleeping fully clothed. Now he was sweating with excitement within
his sleeved tunic of caribou hide and his meticulously stitched vest of
vertically aligned fox tails

"Yes ..." he exhaled with a reverence born of pure longing. The caribou
were coming. They poured out of his dream and into the darkness of the
little hut in a tide so vast that he could sec neither its beginning nor
its end. Caribou! The annual spring migration to their calving grounds
had begun at last! Soon the hunters would be returning with food for
all!

The old man's prominently lidded black eyes squinted as his tongue
emerged to lick the imagined sweetness of caribou fat from his
desiccated lips. He rested his strong, lean hands upon his mattressing.
He pressed down hard. Yes! He could feel the hooflbeats of the
approaching herd roaring deep within the earth. It was a rising,
thundering reverberation of life pounding toward the little valley in
which his people had made their winter encampment. The caribou were
coming at last from out of a thousand secret sheltering canyons deep
within the encircling mountains, where they had sought refuge from the
seemingly endless storms of the time of the long dark.

Yes, the caribou were coming at last! Or were they?

Suddenly disoriented, the old man cocked his head, listening, straining
to hold onto his dream as it dissolved into wakefulness, taking the
vision of caribou with it. The roaring sound of the animals' hooves
melded into something else, something deeper--something dangerous
somehow, although very far away. Then that, too, was gone, and the old
man heard only the growling voice of his own hunger. His intestines
lurched and contracted, hurting him with the gnawing, pitiless ache of
starvation. He had not eaten a full meal in weeks, and for the last
three days he had not eaten at all.

"Umak's belly speaks through his mouth." The woman's voice was a
whispered monotone reeking of contempt.

His face burned with shame as, through the long, un braided strands of
his black, as yet un grayed hair, he allowed his gaze to meet the
woman's. So he had awakened her once again with his blasphemous cries of
caribou sightings, which were nothing more than the pathetic outpourings
of an old man's wishful thinking.

"Would that we could eat of Umak's dreams, we would all grow fat," she
said, watching him out of her wide black eyes, eyes as cold and com
passionless as the Arctic night.

Her words shriveled his pride. Had he lost his dignity as well as his
youth? How could he shame Egatsop, as well as himself, by allowing her
to know that he suffered from the pangs of hunger while, by right, she
ate his portion of the family's remaining food? He could barely see her
in the darkness. Sitting cross legged upon the piJed sleeping skins that
she shared with her man and children, she had pulled the bed furs up
over the back of her head, so that they fell around her small, compact
form like a tent. Her man was not there. She sat with her infant at her
breast while her little son, Kipu, slept close by.

In front of her, within the pebble-lined central fire pit, a small stone
settled beneath the thick layering of banked embers. The stone,
superheated, cracked and fell into two halves. Its movement caused the
banked ashes of burned bones and dung to sag and separate, allowing a
little fissure of heat and light to rise. Umak stared across the
resulting light and saw the woman's face shimmering red and gold. For
all of its undisguised hatred of him, it was the face of a young and
undeniably beautiful woman: Egatsop, Torka's woman.

Within the fire pit, another stone cracked. It made a sharp, explosive
sound, which roused the nursing infant. The baby uttered a sleepy,
plaintive cry, then took suck again, making small gasps of satisfaction.

Egatsop continued to stare at the old man, her mouth downturned between
her small nose and pointed chin. Her black eyes flayed him. "All the
hunters have returned without meat. All but Torka, Alinak, and Nap. If
they do not soon come with game, my breasts will begin to dry. Then this
little one will be like the others .. . abandoned to the wolves or wild
dogs or--"

"The hunters will return. They will bring game. Your breasts will not
dry."

"Have you seen this in your dreams, Spirit Master?"

"I have seen this. He resented her sarcastic reminder of his title. Once
it was said that he, Umak, was the greatest hunter of them all, that he
could communicate with the spirits of his prey and command the herds of
game to appear or disappear at his command. These days, it was growing
painfully clear to him, as well as to the rest of the band, that he
could command nothing. Especially the tongue of his grandson's cold-eyed
woman.

"Old men see many things," she said with a rude snort of derision. "But
never do they see with the clarity of youth, or they would be out with
the hunters, scouting for game, not consuming the food of others when
they are unable to provide for themselves."

"I will hunt again. My leg is nearly healed." "Nearly is not good
enough. Torka hunts for you. Torka shall always hunt for you. And give
to an old man what should be for his woman and children."

Her words struck at his sense of justice. At forty-five, Umak was the
eldest member of the band. He knew that many considered him to be
ancient; but he did not feel old. Surely, even a youth could have
slipped and sprained a knee while running down and tackling a steppe
antelope, as he had done earlier in the winter. Recently widowed,
without a woman of his own to care for him, he had agreed to spend the
remainder of the time of the long dark with Torka. From the very first,
sensing Egatsop's sullen resentment of his presence within her pit hut,
he had made certain that half of everything that Torka apportioned to
him went to her and the children. Food, drink, furs. When Torka had
objected, Umak simply claimed that his needs were less than they truly
were. And for the past three days, since Torka had been gone from the
encampment, every morsel of his food had gone to Egatsop so that she
would continue to have milk for the baby. He reminded her of that now.

She snarled at him. She told him that it was his duty to give up his
food. She held no gratitude toward him, only disgust. "You should have
fed your spirit to the storms long ago, old man. Torka has been too kind
to you. It is a weakness in him. But now the headman has said that if
Torka and the others do not soon return, we will be forced to break camp
and move on without them in search of game. It will be better than
staying here to starve. But without Torka to walk at your side, how will
you keep up, old man? This woman will not help you."

Once again his belly lurched. He thought of his game filled dream. Had
it been the vision of a spirit master? Or had it been only the wishful
thinking of a hungry old man who could not hunt for himself? The winter
had been so long, so cold--perhaps snow still blocked the passes through
which the caribou made their migrations. Perhaps the herds would not
appear at all this year. And what of Torka? Why had he not returned? He,
Alinak, and Nap had been the first group of hunters to go out from the
encampment. They should have been back by now ... if they were going to
return at all.

For the first time in his life, Umak felt the weight of his years. All
of his children were dead, and the last of his women. Torka was all he
had left to remind him that they had ever lived at all. Torka and little
Kipu and the infant. How the old man loved the children! Almost as much
as he loved Torka. He knew that he had allowed himself to feel too much
affection for his grandson. Their years together had formed a bond that
choked him now as he thought of what his days would be like if Torka did
not return. Egatsop would take another man. She would send Umak from her
pit hut, and he would be alone, without shelter. And who, in these
starving times, would see to it that one old man, who could not hunt for
himself, was fed? Little Kipu would, but the boy was only five. Egatsop
would forbid him to show compassion for one who was useless. She was a
wise woman who would make him understand that survival was for the
strong. The old, the weak, the children who showed no potential for
becoming contributing members of the band had no right to a place within
it.

Despair was a cold and alien wind that stirred within the old man's
soul. He was not old! He was not weak! His leg was taking a long time to
heal, but it would heal! The knee was only sprained. He could already
hobble about on it. Soon it would be as strong as it had ever been.
Soon.

"Soon we will go from this place." Egatsop's voice was low; she did not
want to wake Kipu or disturb the infant who now slept, still sucking
fitfully, at her breast. "If Torka returns, he will care for you, Spirit
Master. He will walk at your side across the long miles and deprive
himself of strength for your sake. He will see to it that Umak has food
that should be for the mouths of his woman and children. One who is not
worthy to live will live. Torka will see to it. Then we will all starve,
because soon he will be too weak to hunt."

Shame filled him. He could not speak. He knew that she spoke the truth
and that the other members of the band would view Torka's kindness as
weakness.

Her voice continued on, barely audible, a croon, not to the old man, but
to the sleeping infant. "You sap me of my strength, little one. There is
not much milk for you now. If the hunters do not soon return with game,
the band will move on. But do not be afraid. Sleep. Dream. In this place
where you shall stay alone, the spirits will ease your hunger. Dream of
that. And know that, in better times, this woman will give birth to you
again."

Beyond the pit hut, far away across the cold darkness of the Arctic
winter noon, a wild dog barked, and Egatsop tensed, listening. "So it is
still there. Yesterday it came close, close enough to trip the snares
that we women have set for it. But it is wise and wary. It will take
better bait than we have to make it abandon caution in the hope of
satisfying its hunger."

Umak drew his bed furs up about his bony shoulders. He shivered. He knew
what she was going to say.

She rocked the sleeping infant. It made small, fretful me wings "It
would come for you. Yes. Now, while you are still strong enough to cry.
It would come for you. A good sized dog, if properly portioned and
prepared, could nourish your people for many days. They would sing
praises to you. Your death would serve the band. This woman would be
proud."

"Woman, you will not feed this man's offspring to wild dogs!" "The child
is Torka's, not yours, old man!"

"Torka will not allow it!"

"Torka is not here. And even if he were, he would know what this woman
knows: He left the encampment before this newborn was old enough to be
named. Without a name, it has no life spirit. It only looks alive. If
the band moves on in search of new hunting grounds, this woman will need
all her strength to carry her share of the traveling burden. Egatsop
will not be the only woman to abandon her baby to the spirits. Do not
look at me like that, old man. You know I speak wisdom. Egatsop can make
more babies only if she is strong. Be glad that I am not so unfeeling as
the headman's woman. Although she said that the spirits took both the
soul and the body of that little one, they did not. Teenak herself took
the corpse of her newborn. Her family have been eating off it for many
days."

Umak hung his head. He, who had faced down and slain a great white bear
in his youth, who had raced down and killed a steppe antelope with his
bare hands in his old age, could not bear to listen to Egatsop's words.
What was wrong with him? Why did he feel such loathing and anger toward
the woman? She was such a practical creature. Torka was the envy of the
men of the band for having won her. She was right in everything that she
had just said--right and honest and practical. And strong. Yes. Strong
of mind and body. While he was old and weak and not as fit to live as
the spiritless suckling whom she held to her breast. She saw his anguish
and smiled. Her teeth were small and sharp and even, but it was her
words that bit deep. "Go now, old man. Feed your spirit to the winter
dark before Torka returns to stop you. Go. Go, and this woman vows that
she will suckle this little one as long as there is milk within her
breasts. Stay, and this woman vows that what she holds within her arms
will be offered as bait for wild dogs. Go. End your shame. And mine. And
Torka's."

He took no weapons. He took no food. He went out wearing only the
clothes upon his back and the boots that he had neglected to remove
before lying down to rest. Around himself he draped the heavy bison hide
that had served him as a traveling cloak for many years. He did not wear
it as protection against the cold. It was something in which to hide his
shame.

Beyond the pit hut, in the pale blue light of the aurora borealis, he
looked out upon a landscape that was as savage and uncompromising and
beautiful as Torka's woman.

Torka. He could only hope that he was still alive, out there somewhere
with Alinak and Nap, even now enroute back to the winter camp with game
for all.

But not for Umak. No. He would not eat again.

He made his way through the encampment, past the other little pit huts
within which his people sheltered against the rising bite of the wind.
No one was outside. He could hear their voices. The sounds of life. But
he had put that behind him. The'future lay here, with these little
families, with Egatsop and her children, and with Torka, if he still
lived. He, Umak, was the past.

He accepted the finality of that truth, wondering why it did not come
easily. He had always imagined that it would. He had assumed that, if
not killed on a hunt, one day he would awake and know that he was old,
and after that his spirit would seek release and he would walk out upon
that final trek, at peace, as had so many others before him.

But there was no sense of peace within him as he walked on, fighting
against the knowledge that he did not want to die. Is this what the
others had felt? Rage? Frustration? A terrible sense of betrayal? A
young man's soul trapped within an old man's body, scratching at his
gut, digging in, trying to take control of his tongue and scream: I have
lived and loved and hunted and grieved with you for all of my life. I
have been your spirit master. I have brought down the great white bear
and taught your young men to hunt as only I, Unuik, know how to hunt. In
starving times, I have shared my food with you, and noiv can it truly be
that there is none for me? Am I to be thrown away like an old bone? Can
you not know that, from the marrow of my spirit, my soul cries out for
life?

Ahead of him, the figure of a female emerged from the last pit hut of
the encampment. It was Lonit. He knew her at once, despite her heavy
garments; for although she was not much more than a child, she was
already taller than any woman of the band and as strong and gangly as a
colt born to the wild horses that ranged the summer tundra.

She had come out of her family's shelter to secure one of the lashing
thongs that laced the hide roof cover tautly over the arching mammoth
rib bones of the roof frame. When she saw Umak, she paused,
instinctively knowing his intent.

With the wind rising around them, the old man felt her eyes upon him,
those unusual eyes that were as softly brown and deeply lidded as an
antelope's, almost totally devoid of the elongated fold of eyelid tissue
that was considered to be a mark of beauty among the women and girls of
the band. He knew that the skin around one of those strange eyes was
black and blue from her father's latest beating. It was a wonder how the
girl had lived to grow up. Since the death of her mother, she had become
the focus of her family's abuse. No doubt it had something to do with
her odd appearance. Many said that her father, Kiuk, should never have
allowed such an ugly girl to live in the first place; but Kiuk was a
fine hunter, an asset to the band, and what he did with his women was
his concern. Still, Umak had always felt pity toward the girl. She was a
strong, stalwart, uncomplaining child who, for reasons he could never
understand, went out of her way to be kind to the very young and the
very old. For a moment he was certain that she was going to speak his
name, to call him away from his purpose. If she did, she would shatter
his resolve and ruin this last act of dignity, thus shaming him forever.
But the girl stood motionless in the wind, and the moment passed, and
Umak walked past her in silence, committing himself to the final trek.
Death awaited him. He would seek it now. For the good of all. "Where is
Umak?"

Little Kipu awoke, looking for his great-grandfather. The old man had
promised to help him perfect his skill at bone toss; it was a game that
grown men played with sticks whittled out of leftover bone fragments for
which the women had no use. In all of the band, no man was better at
bone toss than Umak.

The little boy frowned. He missed his father. Torka had been gone so
long on the hunt. Kipu sat up and rubbed his eyes. His mother had an odd
look on her face. Expressionless. As flat as a much-used cooking rock.
And as smooth, with all detail worn away after years of marrow bones
being rubbed and splintered on their surface. Cooking rocks were pretty
things. Glossy. They looked strong, as though they could last forever,
but stress them too much or put them too close to the fire, and they
would crack. Kipu thought about that as he looked at his mother.

"When will Torka return?"

"Soon," she replied with absolute certainty.

Kipu's frown deepened. She sounded certain only because she was not. He
had come to know that it was her way when she was afraid. His dark eyes
took in the equally dark interior of the pit hut; there was not even
enough fat left to burn in the hollow stones that served as lamps. How
he wished that winter would end! How he longed for summer!

"Umak has promised to teach me to chase down a steppe antelope," he
confided. "When the time of the long dark is over, Umak has said that
Kipu will be old enough to begin to learn to hunt like a man."

"Umak has gone to set his spirit free upon the wind."

Kipu cocked his head. "When will he come back?"

"He will not come back."

The child stared. He was five, but he had been born and raised among the
nomads of the tundra. Far beyond the pit hut, a wild dog howled, and
Kipu listened, understanding what his great-grandfather had gone to do,
and why. Tears stung the back of his eyes. He adored his
great-grandfather. He would miss him more than he had words to say. But
he would not cry for him. He was Torka's son and of Umak's line. He
would have thrust his hand into the fire pit before he would allow
himself to cry.

Egatsop watched him, waiting to see tears, a display of weakness; she
was relieved when the child sat dry-eyed, stoically staring straight
ahead, saying nothing. She knew what the moment was costing him. Against
her breast, the infant stirred, and although Umak would have found it
impossible to believe, she fought down a wave of tenderness for it that
came close to overwhelming her. If she were to be forced to expose this
baby, she dared not let herself care for it, lest grief weaken her and
make her unable to give her full attention to Kipu and Torka.

Torka! She almost called his name aloud with longing. Where was her man?
Why had he not returned to her? Blood. And pain. Torka awoke to these
two realities and lay dazed, in agony and confusion.

Where was he? Why was he alone? He remembered watching the sunrise, and
now it was dark. And cold. The wind was a constant slur of sound coming
to him from across the tundra. He listened. For a long while, that was
all that he could do. It hurt to move, to think; even breathing was
painful. He sucked in shallow little takes of air, as carefully as he
would have sipped at liquid if anyone had brought him something to
drink.

Thirsty. In a black, aching limbo, his thirst was suddenly more intense
than his pain. He lay with his face down, his cheek half-frozen into the
earth. His mouth was open. He could taste the tundra. It was salty, and
sweet, as though the skin of the permafrost were the flesh of a living
being that had been flayed alive and now bled into his mouth.

Blood. Somehow reality was linked to that. And to his pain. And to the
fact that he was alone. Through blood-caked lashes, he looked out across
the miles, and suddenly it all came back to him.

The mammoth.

The deaths of Alinak and Nap.

And his own death. He remembered his raging charge. With his spear
raised, he had run to meet the mammoth head-on. As it had lowered its
head, he had leaped forward onto one of its tusks. As it had thrown up
its head to dislodge him, he had hurled himself against the beast's vast
shoulder. With one hand curled into its hair, he had held on and stabbed
and stabbed until, at last, the monster had pitched him off. He had been
hurled up and away as though he were a stone being loosed from a mighty
sling. And when he had hit the ground, he had known that he was dead.

But, incredibly, he was alive. He was in too much pain not to be alive.
His instincts told him that the mammoth was gone. Why? Why had it not
finished him as it had finished Alinak and Nap?

The answer came as he tried to rise, and levering upward with his hands,
gasping against the pain of several broken ribs, he looked down at the
ground beneath him. What he had tasted had been the flesh of a living
being that had been flayed alive. It was the bloodied mass of what was
left of Nap. The slowly ebbing warmth of his flattened, mangled corpse
had kept the unconscious Torka from freezing to death; the smell of
Nap's blood on Torka's body had caused the mammoth to assume that Torka,
whose body it had inadvertently thrown atop Nap's" was also dead. Its
rage sated, its thick, hairy hide barely pierced by Torka's stabbings,
it had gone on its way.

With the bloodied gore of Nap's exposed entrails upon his gloved hands,
Torka rose and turned away, retching, nearly fainting from pain. Twice
in one day, Nap had saved his life--once when Nap was alive, and once
when he was dead. When Torka returned to the winter camp, he would make
chants of honor to his name. Nap's woman would be proud in her grief;
Torka would see to that.

he returned to the winter camp. The wind was rising. A thin veil of high
clouds obscured the light of the aurora borealis. It was a dark, cold
world across which Torka began to make his way toward home.

Hours passed. The miles slipped away. He was weak, in pain, and several
times he had to stop to rest. A thin, dry snow began to fall at about
the same time that he first crossed the mammoth's tracks. Tramping on,
he knew that it was moving ahead of him, following the route that he and
Alinak and Nap had taken outward days ago from the winter camp.

Half sobbing, fighting against the pain and weakness that threatened to
overwhelm him, Torka hurried on. He knew what was in the mammoth's mind.
Poor, foolish Nap had been right. It was a crooked spirit, and its rage
was not spent. It was on the scent of Man. It would stay on that scent
until it reached the encampment of Torka's people. Once there, it would
kill them all. Uinak walked alone within the night. He tried not to
wonder about how long he had been walking or how far from the encampment
he had come; these things should no longer concern him. Yet he knew
exactly and could have found his way back to the camp blindfolded and in
a snowstorm. His knee ached, but not nearly so badly as he had expected
it would; perhaps it was nearly healed after all?

No matter. It is the time of death, not of life and healing. For Umak
these things will be no more.

Still, he walked on and wondered at his own stamina, for although he was
ancient and starving, he was not tired. He walked in the slow, measured,
steady manner of one who moves as easily as he breathes--in the gait of
a nomad whose feet have taken him across the world beneath the broad and
savage Arctic sky.

He looked up. The sky was filled with clouds. Hard pellets of snow no
larger than dust particles stung against his face. He found himself
gauging the weather. There would be no storm, but the wind was rising.
In a few hours the snow would stop, the sky would be swept clear, and a
deep cold would settle upon the tundra. It would be dangerous to anyone
not sheltered against it.

Umak harrumphed to himself. Ahead lay the gentle rise of a tundral
hillock. It was a scabby, wind-scoured mound, but it would offer a
pleasant view across the tundra to a man who sat upon its summit,
exposing himself to the wind, waiting to die.

This Umak did. And the wind came, speaking to him of many things: of
past hunts and of wives who had shared his pride, of long-dead children,
of ... everything but how to die. He was not even cold. It occurred to
him that he could strip naked. That would certainly hurry the process,
but he could find nothing dignified in the thought of shivering himself
into death with his old bones showing under his skin, and all of the
spirits seeing that, beneath his clothes, Umak was not the man he once
was.

Again he harrumphed. He gathered up his composure and began to chant, to
make his life song. The wind would take it to the spirit world. Death
would hear it and know that it was time to come. Umak might no longer be
able to call down the spirits of the game. But what sort of spirit
master would he be if he could not call down the spirit of his own
death? He sang and sang. It was an atonal rhythm, a chanting meld of
word and vibrations of his throat. He tried to match its resonance to
the wind, but could not quite get it right. The chant went on. He ran
out of words. Now the song was only sound. It bored him. Perhaps it was
boring Death as well? The thought piqued him. He was Umak! What hunter
could boast of more daring deeds than he? Death should be impressed. But
even the Arctic's greatest spirit master could only fill a life song
with so many stories. How many great bears could a man challenge in one
lifetime, or saber-toothed cats, or stampeding herds of giant bison? He
was, after all, only a man, despite his extraordinary prowess. What did
Death want of him? He could not very well make up stories to extend his
life song; that was a taboo that no man would break lest his life spirit
be thrown away upon the winds. He thought about it for a while and
decided that perhaps Death liked his tales so much that Umak was being
urged to repeat them.

Umak did this, several times. But his stories did not summon Death. They
summoned a wild dog instead. It was the same animal that had been
lurking around the peripheries of the winter encampment for the last few
days. Umak was not surprised to see it now. The dog had been wise enough
to avoid the snares that Egatsop and the other women had set for it; no
doubt, seeing a lone hunter wandering out of the encampment, the dog had
decided to trail him as potential prey.

It was very close to the old man now, a large, wolfish animal with a
mask of dark pelage surrounding its light blue eyes. It moved into the
wind so that its prey would not pick up its scent. But Umak knew that it
was there. Although he did not move but sat cross-legged, hands resting
open upon his knees, head upturned to the great, cloud-filled vault of
the sky, he knew. And smiled.

You will not sneak up on this old man, Brother Dog. Before you make prey
of Umak, he shall break your bones and suck the marrow from them to keep
the fire of his own life alive.

He did not speak aloud. Yet somehow the dog understood that it had been
threatened. It paused, head down, tail tucked, watching, waiting for the
unmoving figure to show the first sign of vulnerability.

Umak was not about to oblige it. He remained as he was. From the corners
of his eyes, he saw the dog fold its rear limbs into a seated position.
Despite its size, the animal's disproportionately long limbs and
gangling carriage betrayed its youth. It was an adolescent, a young male
on its own, perhaps driven out of its pack after unwisely and
unsuccessfully challenging the dominant male of the group. Umak did not
know very much about dogs. He assumed them to be much like the more
commonly seen wolves: social animals, pack hunters, dependent upon the
group for survival. A disturbing feeling of empathy with the dog made
Umak painfully aware of his own situation. Young or old, man or beast,
neither could long hope to survive alone.

Not that Umak intended to survive. No. He was resolved to die. Now, for
the first time, he moved, just enough so that he could eye the wild dog
over one shoulder. Perhaps this was the way the spirits intended to
answer his life song? He had called for death. Perhaps this masked,
blue-eyed wild dog was his deliverer?

"Hmmph!" The exhalation was so loud and vehement that both man and dog
were startled by it.

The dog was on its feet, growling. The two castaways stared at one
another, and taking in the bone-thin animal, noting its flesh-colored,
scarred nose and wound-scabbed ears, Umak suddenly became angry.

"This old man has not lived this long to be eaten by dogs! Umak deserves
a better death than this!" With these words, he snapped to his feet,
raised his arms, and charged, howling, straight at the dog.

Terrified, the animal wheeled and, without taking the time to bark or
yip, ran into the night, across the snowy tundra, vanishing as
completely as though it had never been there at all.

For a long while the old man stood looking after it. He wondered if it
had been a creature of flesh or spirit. Its tracks gave him his answer.
It had been real enough. And in all likelihood, all too soon, it would
be back. In the meantime, it was possibly headed back for the winter
camp. Umak thought of Egatsop and her promise not to abandon her newborn
to the storms. He thought of the other women who had. He wondered if the
wild dog had been surviving off the flesh of those infants whose mothers
had not been as practical as the headman's woman, who had fed her family
from the corpse of her newborn. His hands flexed. He wished that he had
killed the dog. He wished that he had brought his spears with him, or at
least one of his daggers. His long mouth twisted down into a scowl. If
the dog came back, he would kill it with his bare hands. It would be his
last brave deed. Perhaps then Death would not be bored by his stories
and would decide to come to him in a more honorable manner than through
the jaws of an emaciated cur.

But the dog did not return. Strangely, Umak found himself missing it.
What would come for him now? He shrugged. Whatever it was, he would face
it, even if it came as he suspected it must--in stealth, sneaking up on
him while he slept.

He went back to the summit of the little hill and seated himself. The
wind was dying. Snow had ceased to fall. He could see stars where, only
moments ago, clouds had covered the darkness. It was very cold as, once
again, he began his life song. He would slowly freeze, and his spirit
would ease away from the casing of bones and skin that had held it
captive since his birth. It would not be such a bad death. He could feel
sleepiness growing within him as he sang. But he was warm and
comfortable within his heavy garments and the encircling windbreak of
his bison-skin robe. It occurred to him that, in these same clothes and
robe, he had weathered many a winter gale upon the open tundra. He was
not likely to freeze to death in them now.

So, without ceremony, he cast them away. The wind cut through his
undergarments. It bit at his skin as deeply as any wild dog could have
done. When he breathed, the cold seared his lungs, and he thought: This
old man shall die now. In his sleep, Death shall come.

He sat down. He waited for Death. Time passed slowly. It was too cold to
chant. Too cold to sleep. He thought that he might make the time pass
more quickly if he did a spirit dance. Movement would promote
circulation; he would feel warmer until, at last, Death came for him and
he collapsed. He tried it for a while, but his knee ached, and he felt
foolish dancing when there was no one to watch. He hunkered down upon
the little hill, beneath the savage sweep of the Arctic sky, and
stoically waited for the end to come.

It did not. He shivered. His extremities went numb. His penis shriveled,
and his testes retreated upward against that warm hollow from which they
had descended when he was a boy. He thought of his boyhood. It did not
seem so long ago. Memories came. Yesterday was closer than tomorrow.

Time continued to pass. Umak did not die. He sat and at length conceded
that it was not possible for one who had spent his entire life fighting
the cold to succumb passively to it--especially when the warm garments
were close at hand. He stared at them and rationalized: This old man is
too cold to sleep. In sleep, death will come. Umak will put on the robe.
He will freeze .. . but slowly.

He made a tent of the robe. Without his caribou-skin tunic and vest of
fox tails without his outer trousers and leggings, he was still cold;
but he had put on his boots and gloves. Within the windbreak of the old
robe, the cold's bite was lessened, and he slept, albeit fitfully. Now
and again he awoke, expecting to be dead, but he was still alive. He
grumbled, vexed, and slept again. Sometime before dawn, he felt Death
come close. It called his name, and only the growling of a dog roused
him before he answered and allowed his spirit to follow.

The wild dog was back, standing very close. It must have been watching
him for hours, waiting for Death to come before it made its move. Umak
cursed it. He spoke to it aloud.

"Stupid beast! This old man was about to enter the spirit world! Could
you not wait! Umak has been trying to die! Were it not for you, my
spirit would be free and you would be feasting off my useless bones! But
those bones are not useless now! And you will not eat this old man while
he is still alive!"

The dog listened. Its head was down, its ears and lips back. Its growl
was deep and full of threat.

Umak growled back at it. "Aar ... go away! If you come too close, this
old man shall eat youl"

The dog did not move. Its growl continued. A single thrum of threat, as
cold and full of menace as a rising wind out of the north.

Umak was not intimidated. The dog was large, but it was also young and
thin and probably as weak as the starving man whom it had singled out to
be its next meal. Experience told Umak that he could brazen out the
dog's threat. He rose, then pulled the bison-skin robe about him so that
he looked twice his size. He growled at the dog again and, in doing so,
gave the creature a name. "Aar ..." snarled the old man.

And the dog answered, but did not back away. "Aarrr ..."

"Hmmph!" said Umak, annoyed with the situation. As long as the dog
stayed, his body would not allow his spirit to leave it. He bent and
reached for a stone to hurl at the animal. His aim was good; the dog
yipped and ran. But the action made the old man pant. He was weak. He
was dying. And suddenly he was frightened because he knew that he did
not want to die.

He retrieved his clothes, put them on, and began to walk. He did not
know where he was going. He only knew that he would walk until he
dropped. And then the dog, which Umak knew was following, would attack.
The dog, being young, would outlast an old man. It would be the death
that he had called for. The death that Umak no longer wanted.

The old man and the dog saw the abandoned wolf-kill at the same time.
They made for it, and Umak's hunger renewed his strength as fully as it
made him bold. He moved like a youth, shouting and waving and forcing
the dog to back away in confusion. The animal stood cowed as the old man
fell upon the mutilated steppe antelope, snarling and sobbing with
relief as he tasted the sweet blood of life and knew just how much he
did not want to die.

He ate and ate and did not know when the dog joined him. Somewhere
halfway through a haunch, he looked up to see the dog eating across the
carcass from him. Their eyes met. The dog paused; its manner was
submissive. Umak went on eating. Strangely, the old man felt no desire
to drive the dog away. The raw, near-frozen meat was restoring his
energy, and he knew that were it not for the dog, he would be dead, back
upon the hillock, and the dog would be feasting off his flesh rather
than the flesh of the prey they now shared. As he continued eating, he
wondered if, perhaps, the spirits had not sent this half-grown,
half-starved dog to tell him that they did not want Umak's death. But
why?

He pulled back from the carcass, his appetite, if not his questions,
sated. He watched the dog. It occurred to him that he was strong enough
now to stone the beast successfully. And now was the time to kill it,
while its guard was down. He could live off its carcass for many days.
He could even take it back to the band. There he could flaunt his
prowess with it. He could show Egatsop how thoroughly she had misjudged
him. Egatsop. He remembered her readiness to use her own child as bait
with which to snare the dog. Loathing of the woman made him frown. No,
he thought, watching the dog, you will not go into that one's belly. The
band has cast away this old man. But you have given bach to Uinak the
spirit to live. Now that we have eaten of the same prey, we are of one
flesh, Brother Dog. And Umak, he will not eat of the flesh of his
brother.

He rose, then stood looking down at the dog. Sensing his stare, the dog
looked up, studied him out of its blue, black masked eyes. The animal
sensed a change in the man. There was renewed strength and purpose in
his stance and a strange, undeniable power shining in his black, slitted
eyes. The threat had gone out of him. The man had allowed the dog to
share in "his" kill. In the unspoken, instinctive language of all
animals that run in packs, this sharing was a statement of acceptance
into the pack. Those that ate of the same kill were forever bonded by
the mutually ingested life-giving blood of that kill. Predator and prey
might never eat together. The dog understood this. He sensed that the
man understood it, too. Visibly, the dog relaxed. He turned his eyes
away from the man and set to eating his fill. The man would not harm
him. He would not harm the man. A covenant had been made between them.
They were of one pack now.

Umak and the dog stayed beside the carcass of the steppe antelope until
they had eaten it all. It had been a fresh kill, only partially consumed
by the wolves who had taken it, and it was not until Umak sat cracking
the last of the bones and sucking the marrow from them that he began to
wonder why wolves would abandon so much meat.

To Umak the question was sobering, for wolves were as frugal as men,
carrying away and caching what they could not eat on the spot; and these
were starving times for hunters, be they men or beasts.

The tenuous morning of the Arctic spring passed into dusk. It was night
again. The old man huddled in his tentlike robe of bison hide and slept,
with the wild dog close, but not too near. They were no longer
adversaries, these two, but they were not yet friends. The night passed.
Then it was dawn again. Umak awoke and smiled because he was alive, and
he was glad, although he was not quite sure why.

He walked on. The dog followed. When he stopped, the dog stopped. When
he went on again, the dog was still with him. In the fragile light of
the Arctic morning, they picked up the trail that Nap and Alinak and
Torka had taken out of the winter encampment many days ago. Umak paused,
wondering if they had yet returned to the band. With Torka as a part of
their team, Umak had little doubt that they had. His grandson was a
hunter of extraordinary skill, a man of profound instincts. Torka would
be a spirit master someday, when Umak had taught him all that there was
to know.

The old man ground his teeth. He remembered that he had been cast out,
and that he would teach Torka no more. Whatever his grandson had
learned, that would be all of it. They would never meet again.

There was such pain in that thought that the old man wished that he had
died, for surely to be alone upon the tundra, cast out of the band,
never to see his loved ones again, that was death.

The dog's sudden excitement put an end to Umak's black reverie. Up
ahead, another set of tracks crossed those of Umak's kinsmen. The dog
circled and sniffed, and the old man went to investigate.

Mammoth.

He knew better than to speak the word aloud lest he call down the spirit
of the game without the proper ceremony; but it was mammoth, all right.
A single mammoth, and from the size of its footprints, it was the
biggest mammoth that Umak had ever seen.

He checked the tracks. Touched them. Smelled them. They crossed and
recrossed the hunters' trail in several places-often enough to suggest
to Umak that the mammoth was following the route that the men had taken
when they had come out from the encampment.

Strange behavior, thought the old man. Mammoths usually traveled in
small, close-knit family groups near to the scrub forests by the base of
the distant mountains, with the cows and calves clustering together,
while their bulls ranged alone or in pairs, shadowing the herd only in
mating season. They avoided Man.

The tracks of the solitary giant informed Umak that they belonged to a
big male. He knelt, one hand splayed across the width of the enormous
footprint. Mempries stirred of tales heard in times long gone by, of a
legend whispered by the old men when he was a little boy. Of Thunder
Speaker. Of World Shaker. Of One Who Parts the Clouds. Of a mammoth that
men called the Destroyer, for where it walked no man might follow, and
all who fell beneath its shadow died.

He shrugged off the memories. He smiled at his own foolishness. The
beast of his boyhood recollection was only a fable. Mammoths were shy,
evasive creatures. If this old male was heading in the direction of the
encampment of the band, then his people's days of starvation were at an
end at last. The hunters who went out from the camp each day would see
it; they would feel the shock of its footfall quivering in the
permafrost. Although they were near starvation, their need would make
them strong. They would gather their weapons and their wits, and with
their combined strength, they would kill the beast.

He rose, happy for his people and sorry that he had listened to Egatsop
and chosen to die. It had been years since he had hunted mammoth. His
experience would be valuable to the band. But he could not go back; once
the decision to walk with Death was made, it was irrevocable. To return
after having called to Death might cause Death to follow and eat of the
life spirits of the entire band.

He drew in a little breath. Too bad. He would like to help, to tell them
that a mammoth the size of a walking mountain was coming toward them.

"Hmmph," he said aloud, not realizing that he was talking to the dog.
"They will not need this old man. A mammoth as big as a mountain will
also be as old as a mountain. Perhaps, like Umak, it wanders alone,
waiting to die. It will be weak. It will be easy to kill."

The dog looked at him. And clearly, as though the animal spoke the
words, Umak understood its thoughts and was rebuked. Had he not come to
know from personal experience that not everything that is old is
necessarily weak ... or easy to kill?

Night came down, and its wind was bitterly cold. The old man sat in his
contrived tent of bison hide and conjured past hunts and glorious
battles waged against big game. He chanted. The wind took his words and
blew them away across the tundra.

The dog listened. He lay nearby but not too close, curled against the
wind, nose tucked beneath his tail, dreaming his own dreams, twitching
against memories of his own past battles.

Not far away, Umak's chanting rode upon the wind, and Torka heard it,
disbelieving. He tried to rise and cried out as he fell again,
half-conscious, where he had collapsed hours ago.

The wild dog heard his cry. Its head went up as every hair along its
back bristled. Umak heard it, too, but it had come and gone so quickly
that he could not identify it.

He stopped his chanting. Had he heard the cry of prey or predator?
Unable to answer that question, all recollections of his youth vanished,
leaving him an old man again, alone and unarmed and waiting to die upon
the dark and savage tundra. Perhaps he had heard the voice of Death?

He rose. His head went up. His chin jerked outward defiantly. He was
Umak! He would not be afraid. Yet, despite his best efforts, his hands
flexed as he longed to hold his weapons. There was an acidic dryness at
the back of his throat that tasted too much like fear. He was afraid. He
was old and weak and alone, but he did not want to die. Death should
have come when he had first summoned it; he had wanted it then. But no
more. The drive to live was strong in him now. His eyes squinted
resolutely into the wind. His chin went down. // Umak is still tie
spirit master that he once was, then what he has called he can also send
away.

He began to chant again. A new song. A loud song. Noise always sent the
spirits of fear scattering out of a man's belly. Perhaps it would send
Death fleeing as well. But Umak's song scattered out upon the tundral
wind and reached Torka instead, into his ebbing consciousness. It roused
the dying embers of the young hunters life spirit and brought it up
through pain and desolation into a new hope.

"Umak?" Yes! He would know that beloved voice in the darkest night, in
the whitest storm, in the fiercest gale. "Umak!" He hurled the name
against the wind.

Umak heard it.

With the dog trotting on ahead of him, the old man soon found his
grandson and knelt to cradle Torka in his arms, listening to his tale of
bloody terror.

"Umak .. . father of my father .. . you must warn the people .. . you
must .. . get back to them in time...." Torka's words bled out of him as
he fought to hold on to consciousness and lost. The old man held him
close. There, beneath the winter dark, Umak knew at last why Death had
not come to take the spirit of one old man--it had been feeding off
younger, weaker life spirits. And now, with Torka severely wounded, Umak
understood that in the guise of Thunder Speaker, of World Shaker, of a
giant woolly mammoth whom men called the Destroyer, Death, the ultimate
predator, was moving toward the winter encampment of his people.

Only one old man was left to stop it.

"And this old man will try!" Across the long miles, across what was left
of the long night, Umak jogged toward, home with an unconscious Torka
upon his back and the wild dog loping at his side. Dawn had not yet
bloomed upon the horizon when he paused, gagging on fatigue, forcing
himself to suck in deep breaths of the darkness as though it were a food
that might nourish him.

It did not. He stood bent forward, with Torka deadweight across his
shoulders as wolves howled in the distance and, deep inside him, the
voice of exhaustion counseled: Old man, it is not far now. Only a few
miles. But your knee aches, and your body fails you. You will never make
it--not with Torka on your back.

Truth, or temptation to expediency? He could not tell which. He only
knew that he would not abandon his grandson, not as long as there was a
breath of life left in either of them.

He felt the eyes of the wild dog watching him, measuring him, and he
thought of the censure of Egatsop, Torka's woman. Weakness. Yes. She
would have called it that. He knew that he must get back to the
encampment of his people as quickly as he could. He knew that he should
leave Torka behind. If Torka were able, he would insist upon it.

"Hmmph," said the old man, listening to the wolves. "What Thunder
Speaker could not kill, Umak will not abandon to be meat for beasts."

It took all of his energy and concentration to force himself to go on,
but this he did, hefting his grandson, speaking aloud to the dog and the
wolves and the savage distances of open tundra that still lay ahead of
him. "This man is Umak. He is spirit master. He will run with the wind,
and it will speed him on his way. Soon Umak will be home. He will warn
his people. Together they will stand against the great mammoth. They
will feast upon its flesh and send its spirit away."

And because he was a spirit master, it seemed to him that the wind did
rise to speed him on his way, giving power to his limbs to keep them
moving, bending, lifting, falling; in his mind he flew across the night,
with Torka weightless upon his back and the wild dog leaping across the
sky beside him.

It came upon them out of the night, as all true terrors must ultimately
come--in silence, from out of that black pit in which fear is cradled,
and from which crawl all of the horrors that evade the light of day. It
came in stealth, walking into the wind so that its scent at first blew
back and away. Only the pressure of its footfall onto the shallow skin
of the permafrost betrayed its approach.

Within Torka's pit hut, little Kipu stirred in his sleep. It was the
deep sleep that comes toward night's end, when the heartbeats slow, and
the blood runs deep, and the mind lies inert and dreamless.

Across the warm, black substance of that dreamless ness a vague and
undefined awareness of danger ran like wind currents across the black
surface of a pitch pool on a moonless night: invisible but sending
subtle tremors deep. There was nothing tangible to fear--only the
darkness, only the silence, only the familiar rank and musty life smells
of the pit hut and the soft, arrhythmic rubbings and creakings of hide
chafing against bone as gusts of wind intermittently sucked and slapped
at the exterior walls of the hut.

The boy sighed and changed position beneath his bed furs. He moaned
softly, still deeply asleep but no longer peaceful in his slumber.

Egatsop heard him. With the sleeping infant curled against her breasts,
she lay half-awake, listening. Her nostrils picked up the faintest
essence of crushed spruce bark and clotted blood as an inference of
enormous height and weight slurred across her senses. The hide walls of
the conical little pit hut strained softly against the thong-lashed bone
framework that held the structure upright.

It is only the wind, she decided. It blows from the distant mountains
where the spruce forests grou;. But why the smell of blood? She opened
her eyes, staring into darkness, scenting the air like a small animal
huddled in its burrow, fearing that something huge and hungry stalks it
from above. But she could hear no one moving about outside. If there
were a predator lurking within the encampment, the hunters would have
sensed its presence, been up and in pursuit with spears and blades and
bold shouts to warn the women and children to stay inside until all was
safe. But the hunters evidently slept undisturbed, each within his own
shelter.

Egatsop lay with her infant daughter and little son, feeling vulnerable
and alone as she longed for the warmth and reassurance of her man.
Torka! She had never missed him more. Why had he not returned? If he did
not come back to the encampment soon, Egatsop would have to accept
another man. The headman would insist upon it. A woman could not live
alone.

A small, hard knot tightened hurt fully at the back of her throat. There
were other men who wanted her, but she would not think of that yet. Not
as long as there was a chance that Torka might still be alive. She lay
very still. Something was outside. But what? She resolved not to be
afraid. She told herself that it was only her fear that walked within
the night.

A pang of regret caused her briefly to lament her earlier goading of
Umax. Had he been here, he would have ventured out to check. But he was
gone, and she was not really sorry. For reasons that had always eluded
her, the old man had made her feel less than worthy to be Torka's woman
and the mother of Umak's great-grandchildren. She wondered if he was
dead yet. She hoped that he was, then remembered that the spirits of the
dead always lingered around an encampment until a newborn infant was
named for them, thus allowing them to reenter the world of the living.
Perhaps what had awakened her was only old Umak's ghost plucking at the
walls of the little hut, trying to get in out of the cold.

Egatsop drew her baby close, for the first time glad that it was not a
male child. Now that the old man had released his life spirit, custom
would have decreed that a male child be named for Umak so that the old
man could live again within the baby's body. Egatsop frowned with
revulsion as she thought of that possibility; of old Umak sucking new
life from the breasts of the very one who had sent him out to die.

As though sensing her thoughts, the sleeping infant rooted at her
breasts, found a nipple, and closed in hard, pulling fretfully with hot,
hard gums.

Egatsop winced. Had the old man already occupied the infant's body?
Uinak had been a spirit master in his day, and a good one. Perhaps he
would maneuver his way back into the world through trickery. Egatsop
recalled how tenaciously he had clung to life, how he had refused to
acknowledge his age or the extent of his injury, and how she had been
forced to shame him into abandoning his spirit to the winds. But would
any male be so hungry for life that he would willingly degrade his
masculine spirit by consigning it to live as a female? No. Not even Umak
would do that.

The baby made sleepy little bleats of dissatisfaction as it nursed.
Egatsop had not lied to the old man when she had told him she feared her
breasts were beginning to dry. It was already happening. If Torka and
the others did not return with game by tomorrow's dark, she would expose
this infant before it began to sap her of the strength she would need to
keep herself and her son alive.

She lay quietly, thinking about how she would do it. Without ceremony.
Since it has no name, it has no spirit. It is not alive. Its fate is
no consequence. This woman will carry it well out from the camp. This
woman will pack its mouth and nostrils with snow so that none of the
living will be disturbed by the eries of the dead as it is abandoned
naked to the cold. That was how she would prefer to do it; but for the
sake of her son and the starving members of her band, she knew that she
could not be so wasteful. This baby would be bait for wild dogs while it
still had strength enough to cry and lure them to the traps.

The smell of spruce and blood was suddenly very strong in the air as the
shallow skin of the permafrost twitched and rolled, like the flesh of a
gnat-stung giant. Egatsop sat up, startled and frightened. The movement
stopped, then began again in hard, sharp jolts. Footfalls.

Kipu was awake. He sat up, knuckling sleep from his eyes. "W-what is
it?" His voice was tremulous, but he tried to put a masculine edge to
it, flat, uncaring, as though he asked not out of fear and curiosity but
out of indolent afterthought, like a hunter asking politely about what
sort of prey his friend has sighted when he himself has already taken
all the game he can hope to eat in an entire winter.

Egatsop's eyes were round with dread. The little boy saw his mother's
fear and reacted to it. He was on his feet, five years old and protector
of his father's woman.

The scent of crushed spruce bark was overpowering. Kipu's head went up.
His nostrils dilated. He drew in the scent and tried to define it, as
Umak had taught him to do: Take the scent deep into memory, into that
place where a man's images are collected. But Kipu was not a man. He was
a little boy. The place within him where images were collected was still
a reservoir far from brimming. He had never been to the faraway
mountains. He had never seen a forest or a tree of any kind.

But Egatsop had and knew now that her fear had been well-founded. The
stench that filled her nostrils was less the stink of spruce than of the
animal that ate it--an animal whose diet was composed almost entirely of
spruce, so that its flesh and hide and hair and breath all stank of that
sap-rich tree even when it strayed far from the forests onto the tundral
plain.

"MAMMOTH!"

It was the cry of the headman. A shout of warning was given just as the
beast itself cracked the sky with its trumpeting.

Beyond the walls of the little pit hut, the encampment was suddenly rent
with screaming. The confused shouts of men, the startled cries of women,
and the screams of frightened children told Egatsop all that she needed
to know.

Thunder Speaker .. . World Shaker .. . He Who Parts the Clouds and
Destroys the Lives of Men .. . the litany of dreaded names rolled
through her mind as she remembered the old tales of terror. She drew in
the stink of the mammoth's breath and bloodied hair and hide and knew,
with a sick, sinking certainty that the blood she smelled was Torka's.
The Destroyer had killed her man.

The beast was on a rampage now, cutting back and forth across the
encampment. She could feel its movements in the earth. Scenes conjured
from the nightmare stories of her childhood were afire within her brain
as Egatsop leaped to her feet, clutching her daughter to her breast,
forgetting that the infant was a spiritless suckling. She was a real
child to her now.

It was all too real to her now.,

Kipu was gathering up the spears that old Umak had left behind, spears
that would be useless in the hands of a child. Egatsop kicked out at
him. He fell flat on his belly as she bent and scooped him up by an
armpit with one hand.

"We must run. If we stay within the hut, it will smash us flat."

It.

"I will kill this mammoth!" brazened the child, daring to name his
intended prey, fighting against his mother as she shoved him out into
the fading night through the piece of hide that served as a door. He was
furious with her as he turned back from several paces ahead to tell her
that he was her only protector now, that he must retrieve his weapons.
She had stopped, still bending low, with one hand holding the hide door
open as she looked up and beyond Kipu. She had the strangest expression
on her face, and he could not comprehend why she screamed his name the
way she did-high-pitched and half-strangling, with her pretty features
twisted into ugliness.

She was the last thing that he saw, and he did not even see her very
well through the blue darkness of the Arctic dawn. But for one split
second everything went very bright as something hit him from behind and
above. Kipu did not even have time to wonder what it was that killed
him.

But Egatsop knew. It paused as it crushed her little son beneath one
vast foot and then came at her. She could have run--she was a small,
lithe woman. She could have ducked away like a dancer at a hunting
feast, throwing the spiritless suckling at the monster to distract it
from its charge. But she did not, could not. In that last moment, when
Torka's woman looked up into the eyes of Death, she tried her best to
throw herself out of its path, curling her body protectively around her
baby in a vain attempt to save its life at the cost of her own.

The world was blue. Above, below, snow, sky, even the air and the
distant sounds of death and terror--all seemed blue. And Torka fell
through the blueness, through miles of it, like a man tumbling into a
glacial crevasse, hurtling downward through a bottomless chasm of blue
ice, plummeting while a companion called helplessly from above, his
voice dwindling .. . dwindling .. . until there was no sound but that of
his own frightened breaths and gasps and sobs of terror as he fell .. .
and fell ... his body bouncing off ragged, ever-narrowing walls of ice
until"Torka!"

Umak's voice. Far away, at the top of the crevasse, above the blue,
parting it somehow. The old man called down, as if by magic arresting
Torka's fall into oblivion, drawing him back up into the pain and
reality.

He lay on his side in the snow, hurting; it did not seem possible that
he could hurt so much. The fall to death within the blue abyss seemed
preferable to so much pain. He sank back into it for a moment, but Umak,
beside him in the snow, pulled him up, gripping him with gloved,
unrelenting hands, and shook him hard.

"Torka! We must go on. But this old man, his knee will no longer bend to
his power as spirit master. It has tripped him. He has fallen. Umak can
carry you no farther."

"Carry?" The word was less question than protest. He was Torka. No man
carried Torka. Not even Umak. Unless-With this half-formed supposition,
he fell into the abyss again, only this time it was not blue and filled
with ice; it was bright and filled with memories, which stabbed at him
and erased any vestiges of torpor.

With Umak's help, he sat up, half-fainting with pain; then, drawing
strength from the pain, he told himself that it was not there and almost
believed it. He leaned against Umak, against that old, hard body with a
heart inside it as deep and full of power as the unchanging, rock-hard
underpinnings of the tundral plain. There had always been comfort and
renewed strength for him in the mere closeness of that old man, and he
drew upon it now, as the dying dawn tangled itself in the shimmering
sweep of the aurora borealis, stole its color, and bathed the world with
the full golden light of morning.

"Listen!" commanded Umak, and there was something in the old man's voice
that sharpened Torka's battered senses and brought him up out of
pain-dulled lethargy.

He listened to the silence of the Arctic morning, the unnatural absence
of wind, the erratic beat of his heart, the even suck of the old man's
breath, and the uneven, shallow wheeze of his own. It was quiet .. . too
quiet ... as though, within the entire world and sky, only he and Umak
were left alive.

"We have come too late," said the old man, his flat voice revealing none
of his anguish. He had come so far. Driving himself beyond exhaustion,
he had reached the final boundary that any other man would have
recognized and accepted as the ultimate limit of human endurance. But
he, Umak, had willed himself to leap over it. With Torka on his back, he
had gone on and on--young again, powerful again, invincible-until even
the panting wild dog had looked at him with disbelief as it had strained
to continue running beside him.

Now the dog lay in the snow, not far off, on a gentle slope of tundral
rise, which lay above the little valley where Umak's band had made its
winter camp. It was upon that slope that the old man's knee now made a
mockery of his power. A spirit master he might be, but kneecaps were
spiritless things, and his buckled without warning. He had fallen down
hard, trying to hold onto Torka but failing, lying stunned and
breathless and winded in the snow.

The trumpeting of the mammoth cleared his head. But no startled shouts
and cries of his people reached him, and he knew that it was too late
for him to warn them. He limped to the top of the rise, and what he saw
caused him to drop to his knees. Gone was Umak, spirit master and slayer
of beasts. He became an old man again--old and unarmed, no longer
invincible but impotent. He bowed his head, and as the silence of his
people's catastrophe washed over him, he willed his own spirit to wash
away with those among them who had died. But Umak had already learned
that Death wanted no part of one stringy old man or of the injured
hunter who lay in the snow moaning in delirium. He went to Torka, knelt,
then lifted his grandson, attempting to soothe him, drawing strength
from the young man's need of him. He had been too late to warn his
people of danger, but they would still have need of their spirit
master's skills as a healer in its aftermath. The thought restored a
little of his sense of self-worth. He spoke to Torka, telling him that
they must go on.

The silence continued, and Umak listened, knowing that the mammoth had
gone its way. Soon, when the shock of its passing had ridden over the
people like a great and terrible wave, the survivors of its devastation
would begin to weep and wail. For Torka's sake, Umak would try not to
take too much noticeable pleasure in proving to Egatsop just how sorely
she had underrated his worth as a healer.

But the moments passed. The silence did not abate. It thickened; it
became palpable. And suddenly, Umak knew the truth, as Torka also knew
it. The Destroyer had come and gone. And within all of the world, and
beneath all of the broad, com passionless sky, only Torka and Umak were
left alive to hear the renewed song of the wind and to listen to the
desolate lament of a lone wolf as it cried out to them from the edges of
the valley far below. They sat in silence, listening as a wolf sang a
song that deepened their anguish.

Neither Torka nor Umak knew which of them first realized that it was not
the song of a wolf. But the wild dog knew and was on its feet, head held
out and low, ears back, recognizing the sound of potential prey.

Umak rose slowly, as did Torka. He leaned on the old man for support,
fighting and winning against pain and dizziness. He stood into the wind.
It had turned and was from the east now, blowing out of the valley,
across the devastated encampment, redefining the song of the wolf,
transforming it into what, in fact, it was: the grief-maddened howls and
wails of a woman.

They went down into the valley together, with the dog trailing at a wary
distance. They paid no heed to it; Umak had forgotten that it existed.

The wailing of the woman had stopped, yet Torka willed himself to hear
it anyway. The sound of that voice gave him back his strength and set
his pulse pounding and his heart racing with hope: It was his woman's
voice! He was certain of it! Even though he was exhausted from pain and
loss of blood, a new day was dawning. There was no way of knowing how
many more of their people had been killed or injured, but Torka was
alive, with Umak at his side. Egatsop called to him. Kipu would need
him. The other survivors would also need him.

Somewhere deep inside the innermost core of what was left of his reason,
Torka knew that his thoughts were irrational ramblings. But he could not
face the truth. His thoughts were scabs, which covered a. dangerous
wound. They soothed him and lessened the pain that every step and breath
cost him. Without them, he would succumb to insanity.

When at last he came to the edge of the encampment and saw what his mind
would not allow him to grasp, he paused, stared, and told himself that
somehow, amid the total carnage and ominous silence, survivors waited
... his woman and children waited .. . but the scabs cracked a little,
and the wound beneath them began to bleed. His next step was less
certain than the one before.

It was Umak who first saw the form of the woman. She knelt at the
opposite end of the ruined encampment, across a bloodied lake of
collapsed huts and scattered corpses. He focused past the bodies, not
wanting to see them, for most were crushed beyond recognition, their
garments dark with blood and fouled with gore. The mammoth had not been
content merely to kill; it had ground and crushed and mutilated until
most of what had once been men and women and children was now a part of
the tundral earth, joined to it in a final hideous melding so that, in
places, Umak could not tell where flesh ended and earth began.

The woman had knelt with her back to the carnage. She had covered
herself with a swathe of hide and looked like a little tent sitting
alone amid the devastation until she moved, rocking back and forth--as
Umak had all too often seen mothers do when their infant sons have died,
clutching the babes to the breast, tragically attempting to nurse and
croon them back to life.

It was understandable that Torka assumed that it was Egatsop who sat
there with his baby in her arms; he wanted it so badly. He crossed the
encampment to her. He lifted her by the shoulders, turning her toward
him as he spoke her name. The hide fell away, taking his illusions with
it. It was not Egatsop. It was the girl Lonit.

Huge-eyed, dirty-faced, pale with shock, she held no child but had
crossed her arms protectively over her chest, cradling herself as she
had sat and rocked and tried to prevent her terror from taking control
of her mind. It had already done that once, when she had been awakened
by the screams of her people, to her world collapsing all around her.
Her father's pit hut had fallen down, smothering her, it had seemed, as
her father's women had clambered over her, stumbling and fighting their
way out of the tangled mass of hides and hones, and left her to
suffocate. She had heard her father shouting, and the other men, too;
all screaming about gathering up spears and blades and making torches to
drive "it" away. His voice had been lost, then; there had been too many
voices, blending into one mass of sound. And above it all, she had heard
"it and had lain wrapped in her bed skins, trapped beneath the collapsed
frame of her father's hut, unable to move, nearly unable to breathe,
screaming in strangled terror as the world shook and shook and then went
silent.

She had fought her way free of the hut to see what had brought madness
to her; Her people were dead, all of them, and she was glad. Glad! Her
mind had filled with memories of hurt and humiliation, of cruelty and
lack of compassion. Of late, Kiuk had come to pound her in the dark, and
although she was not yet a woman, he had pierced her as was his right as
her father. Until another man spoke for her, she was Kiuk's to do with
as he pleased. Since his two women were both big with child, he used her
to ease himself. He rode her hard, stabbing deep. Sometimes she thought
he was trying to ram straight through into her heart so that he might
kill her. He pumped and pumped until her thighs were bruised and the
place that he entered was raw and sore and bleeding from his brutal
handling. She had not cried out. Not once. Not even when he blacked her
eye because he was slow to come to his release. When he finished and
rolled away, she had cried herself to sleep; a silent, inward sob that
she had learned to make so that he, or his women, would not hear her and
beat her for disturbing them. It was the females' place to be silent. It
was the females' place to be strong. It was the females' place to oblige
the men in all things. She lamented her inability to satisfy her father
when he rode her in the night. It was her duty to satisfy him, but
nothing that she did ever pleased him. And now nothing would please him
ever again. He was dead. They were all dead. And she was glad! Who among
them had ever shown kindness to her? Only old Umak. Only Torka. But they
were both gone, perhaps as dead as all the others.

The enormity of that possibility had nearly struck her down. In an
instant, her gladness had become guilt. What a wretched creature she
was! Her father had been right to despise her. They had all been right
to despise her. And now they were dead, and only she, a half-grown,
miserable excuse for a girl, was left alive, to run about the
encampment, howling her grief like a frenzied animal until she had
collapsed, unable to cry or howl anymorer Without her people she would
die. Without the protection of the band, the huge wolves, and bears, and
lions would come to feed upon her flesh. They, at least, would find her
satisfying. For them, perhaps, she had been born.

Now she stared at Torka as though she dared not believe that he was
real. The blank look of madness was in her eyes. She could feel it. She
blinked, willing herself back from the brink of insanity, back from that
mindless world in which she had taken refuge since the mammoth had gone
its way, leaving bloodied, tangled ruins all around her, leaving her
alone with no hope of survival. Until now.

"Torka?" She spoke his name. Her knees nearly buckled, but she kept them
locked lest she faint and shame herself before him. He was real. The
hard, hurtful grip of his hands told her that. She was glad for the
pain. She was alive, and Torka was with her. He was not dead. He had
come home. The spirits had heard the supplications that she had made
over and over since he had failed to return to the encampment with the
others. He had come back, as she had known that he would, even though
everyone believed that he would not. No one had spoken the words, but
Lonit had sensed them seeping through the encampment like smoke from an
ill-made fire. Bad smoke. Dark and foul with unburned things, such as
envy and covetousness and resentment. Torka had been a friend to all.
All would mourn his loss. Many would lament the starvation that had
rendered them too weak to go in search of him. But others would remember
that he was potentially better at so many things than they, and if he
did not return, how much braver and stronger and more clever they
themselves would seem to their women and children . and to themselves.

It was the way of the People. Lonit had learned it long ago. One did not
set oneself apart. One strove to be like all others, to unify the band,
to exist within it for the sole purpose of the survival of the whole.
The band was a living, functioning organism that was only as strong as
the whole of its parts. So it was that its weak members were cast away.
So it was that its superior members hid their strength in order to
inspire the lesser members to reach toward a level of excellence that
all might achieve. Experience had taught that twenty good, steady
hunters would always bring home more meat than a single stalker, no
matter how superlative his skills or extraordinary his bravery. Torka
had understood this. Lonit had watched him from afar, marveling at the
way he had paced himself. He was like a runner holding back at the end
of a race, knowing that he has won too often and too well; for the sake
of others, he held himself back, allowing others their pride, not
realizing that his very deference to them shattered it. Torka was the
best. They all knew it. Lonit knew it. She could not remember a time
when she had not adored him.

Now shame filled her as she looked up at him. She was aware of the wind
blowing across the devastated encampment. It surrounded her, whispered
to remind her that she alone was left alive to speak the traditional,
obligatory greeting of a female to a returning hunter.

Her mind went blank. It did not occur to her that, in such a scene,
words of welcome would be obscenities--she only knew that she could not
remember them. Her shame intensified. She was not worthy to be alive
when all of her people lay dead around her. How Torka must hate the
sight of ugly, awkward Lonit when his own woman was dead, when all of
the women were dead ... all the pretty ones with their small, compact
bodies and uniformly beautiful faces, which were as round and flat and
fair as moons. Torka would want no greeting from one who would have been
exposed at birth had she not been born to Kiuk's favorite woman during a
season of plentiful game. She had been so ugly that she would not have
been allowed to suckle had not her father, in a moment of weakness, seen
fit to indulge a poor female who had never before been able to bring an
infant to full term.

Her mother had thought her beautiful. Lonit had never understood why.
From the first, it must have been obvious that she was different. Her
face was oval rather than wide and circular. The bridge of her nose was
not flat. She was big for a female, and most unforgivable of all, she
had been born without the taut span of skin that covered each eyelid and
stretched from the inner edge of the tear duct to the temple. A shield
against wind and snow glare, this fold was more than a requirement for
female beauty; without it, no girl-child was allowed to live. But Lonit
had lived, despite her deformity. Her mother had begged for her to be
named and thus allowed a life spirit. Kiuk had conceded. No doubt he had
hoped that she would outgrow her ugliness. She had not; she had grown
strong instead. After the death of her mother, her father's other women
had not turned her out. Kiuk would have done so; her ugliness
embarrassed him. But the women always had work for her to do. Hers were
the heaviest loads, the most tedious chores. She was grateful. She was
worthy of no better life. Someday, when she came to her time of blood, a
man might take her to be his woman; an older man, perhaps, widowed or
scarred or in some other way undesirable. In the meantime, Kiuk found
his own uses for her. But, although eleven times of the long dark had
come and gone since her birth, she had not yet bled as a woman. Others
of her age had sucklings at their breasts, but it did not matter. Her
desire to live was fierce. Sometimes she found this puzzling, but always
she remembered her mother's dying words;

"You are not like the others, my little one. They call you ugly. They
say that there is no place in the band for an ugly girl. So you must be
useful. You must be brave. And above all, you must be strong. If you are
not, you will be cast out and your spirit will walk upon the wind while
foxes follow wolves to feast upon your bones." She had listened. She had
learned. She had made herself useful. She forced herself to be brave.
Lonit knew that as long as she was strong she would have a place within
the band.

But now the band was gone. Her father was dead, and his women, and all
the young girls, and all the sucklings. All dead. And here she was, the
most unworthy member of the band, alive and unhurt and as strong as
ever. She was confused. How could she stand before Torka, the most
worthy of them all, and presume to speak to him?

"Where is Torka's woman ... his son ... his infant?"

She flushed at the sound of his voice. Now, for the first time, she
noticed that he was badly injured. She could see it in his stance and in
his fevered eyes. His voice sounded strange to her--distant and hollow,
as dry and brittle as old bones. Lonit knew that when she spoke the
truth, something inside him would break.

And something did. He felt it bleeding deep within his chest.
Instinctively, he knew he would not accept Lonit's words as truth until
he saw Egatsop and Kipu with his own eyes. And perhaps even then .. .
somehow ... it would not be so.

Umak watched Torka and the girl from the edge of the ruined encampment.
He too felt the wind blowing around him. His eyes squinted against it as
they scanned the sky and the far, encircling horizon. Birds of prey had
already found the encampment. It was still early morning, but Umak knew
that, at this time of the year, the dark would soon come. With it, drawn
by the smell of so much blood, foxes, lynx, wild dogs, and dire wolves
would follow.

The thought of wolves was sobering. Their broad, crushing jaws could
easily snap a man's thigh. The wolves' strong, sharp teeth were
perfectly designed for cracking bone and ripping through skin and
muscle. He tried not to think of that, but the wolves walked within his
mind and fed upon his courage, and visions of the huge, voracious,
meat-eaters joined them: towering, fleet-footed, short-faced bears;
shaggy-coated, maned lions; saber-toothed, springing cats. With stabbing
fangs nearly as long as the forearm of a man and nostrils set far back
and high upon their muzzles, these lion like felines could breathe while
they rooted their faces into their prey and sucked their victims' blood
before it ran, wasted, out of the wounds.

Umak stood facing into the wind. Against such predators, he knew that
one old man, a young girl, and a severely injured hunter would be
virtually defenseless. They dared not linger here. The wind had steadied
and grown colder. Umak could sense the threat of a storm in it. He,
Torka, and Lonit must salvage what they could from the ravaged pit huts
and be far from here by tomorrow, protected against predators and the
storm within some rough shelter, with the makings of a new life gleaned
from the remnants of the old.

Umak frowned. It would be no easy task to convince Torka and Lonit of
this. Indeed, the premise was upsetting to him. The living were not
allowed to claim the belongings of the dead--to do so would deprive the
departed spirits of their weapons, tools, and shelter in the spirit
world. They would wander the wind forever, unable to hunt or rest,
haunting those who had robbed them until they, too, became spirits. But
what life would the three of them have if they did not take up these
things? Perhaps if the correct chants were made, the spirits would
understand.... It would be Umak's task, as spirit master, to make them
understand.

Umak watched Torka moving through the remains of the winter camp. He
walked stiffly, obviously forcing himself to ignore the pain of his
injuries, and was unaware that the girl, Lonit, followed at his heels
like a stunned colt terrified of abandonment. His step was slow,
cautious, as though he walked upon spring ice across the surface of a
deep and dangerous lake. And in a way, thought Umak, he did. When Torka
found what he was seeking, the ice would break and he would fall through
it to drown in his grief. Then he would die a little.... A portion of
his heart would always walk the spirit world with his dead woman and
children; but the man who would be reborn through the searing agony of
the truth that Torka must face would be a harder, stronger man. Like the
killing point of a well-made spear, Torka must now be shaped and
redefined in the fire of his anguish. Umak wished that he could help his
grandson endure the pain; but he knew that Torka, for the sake of pride,
must suffer it alone. Umak could not share or lessen the pain. Yet,
despite his resolve to remain a stoic observer inured to suffering by
age and wisdom, the old man's chin quivered when he saw Torka kneel amid
the rubble of what had been his pit hut. Umak knew what Torka was seeing
now and longed to go to him. He wished that he had the power to command
the pit huts to rise again and to order life back into the bodies of his
people. A true spirit master would be able to do these things. A true
spirit master would not have stumbled in the snow. A true spirit master
would have arrived in time to send an invisible spear into the mammoth's
heart.

But Kgatsop had been right about him: Umak was no longer a spirit
master. He was a useless old man who could only stand and watch as Torka
bent and lifted something into his arms .. . something small and mangled
and as limp as the dolls of caribou skin that the women made for their
little girls--dolls stuffed with ptarmigan down and bits of lichen and
soft scrapings of fur from old hides gone stiff and dark with rot.
Shapeless, its seams torn, its bloodied stuffing spilling out, its
little arms and legs hanging at grotesque angles out of a flattened
torso held together by the blood-sodden casing of its clothes, this doll
was not a doll. It was all that remained of a child.

"Kipu!" Umak cried the name aloud. He answered Torka's terrible wail of
anguish with a wail of his own. Until this moment, he had forgotten the
little boy. He had been so full of himself, so full of misery over his
failure to prove that he was still Umak, master of spirits, hurdler of
all obstacles. Now, the sight of Torka holding the crushed and lifeless
body of his beloved little Kipu broke his pride.

Umak closed his eyes. Tears seared his lids. His long, unbound hair flew
forward in the wind, whipping his face as he thought: This old man is
old. This old man is master of nothing. This old man has lived too long.

But not long enough.

The sharp, staccato bark of a wild dog brought Umak up out of the
drowning pool of despair. The dog stood nearby but not too close,
watching the old man out of its familiar sky-blue eyes.

Umak stared back thoughtfully. So, once again, Brother Dog had followed.
Once again, the intrusion of the animal into his thoughts caused him to
know that it was not yet time for him to die. Old he might be, and
unworthy to call himself spirit master, but he was still alive. He was
still Umak, a man. And if Torka and Lonit were to survive, there was
much for him to do before he set his spirit free to walk upon the wind.

They worked together to arrange the corpses in the traditional manner:
men, women, and children in family groups, on their backs in the
position that was called looking at the sky. It was an ugly task, and
when at last the grisly assemblage was complete, the three survivors
stood together, contemplating the terrible finality of the scene before
them.

As Torka dropped to his knees beside the bodies of his family, Lonit
shivered uncontrollably and Umak raised his arms, offering up the death
song. It was a brief incantation broken now and again by cracks of
desolation in the old man's voice, but he continued until the end, and
when the chant was concluded, he had a further plea.

"Go now, Life Spirits. Leave this place of death. Be now riders of the
wind and the guardians of Umak and Torka and Lonit. Be born again
through this female and live on in the words of these men who shall sing
of you always in their songs of life."

His arms came down. He looked at the girl. "Come. We must prepare now to
leave this place before the darkness comes."

Lonit stood mute, her face pinched and tight with cold, her eyes wide
with apprehension. What was Umak suggesting? Had he forgotten that they
must remain with their dead for five days? This was the time of the
obligatory death watch, when the spirits of the deceased lingered around
their fallen bodies and sometimes chose to return to life. Family and
friends alike would need assistance if they chose to awake from their
death sleep. They would need food and care, shelter and protection from
predators. To abandon their people during this critical time was
unthinkable. She waited for Torka to question the old man's order, but
the young hunter was in no condition to question anyone. She saw that he
had taken little Kipu's body into his arms again, and her heart bled for
him. He had placed his sleeping robe over the bodies of Egatsop and his
infant. The fur rippled like spring grass in the cold winter wind. Torka
stared across it, his dark eyes glassy with fever. Chanting softly,
imploring the life spirit of his son to return to Kipu's poor, mangled
body, he seemed to be in another world, entranced, beyond this place of
death.

"No spirit shall ever again come to live within the body of that little
one," said Umak softly, thus making his peace with a truth that Torka
would accept in time. "Now Torka must rest." He looked at the girl
again. "Come. Lonit and Umak have much to do."

Her strange eyes were round with confusion, enormous in her unusually
shaped face. With smooth, highly defined cheekbones set forward in a way
that differed markedly from the flat, moon-faced standard of beauty for
females of the band, she looked like a startled antelope as she stared
at Umak and then quickly looked away. To hold the glance of another for
any length of time was forbidden; life spirits could be sucked from the
eyes of one person right into the eyes of another. And in that short
span of time in which she had held Umak's gaze, she had felt the power
of his life spirit boring right into her. It sapped her own spirit. It
made her feel small and frightened and faint.

Umak understood Lonit's reaction to his words; it was what he had
expected, and now he must deal with it. He put a hand upon each of the
girl's shoulders and shook her a little. "Listen to me, Lonit, daughter
of the People. The People are no more. We cannot stay in this place. If
we are to have life, we must go. Now. Before the eaters of the dead come
to feast. Before we find ourselves defenseless against them and without
shelter from the storm that shall soon come. But first we must take the
things of life from the dead. We are all that is left of them. If we
die, the People die forever. Do you understand?"

She did not, but it was not a female's place to challenge the authority
of a male. Especially this male. She was terrified of him. Not because
he was a spirit master--not because he was old and wise and strong,
despite his years. She was terrified because she was certain that he was
more than a man. She had seen him limping out of the encampment to give
his life spirit to the wind. He had been a bent and ancient hunter,
taking a journey from which no one had ever returned.

But Umak had returned. When she had first seen him standing at the edge
of the ruined encampment, with a ghost-eyed dog staring at her out of
his shadow, she had known that he was a ghost man. And the dog was a
ghost dog; otherwise it would have followed Umak into the encampment to
feed upon the dead. Instead, it had kept its distance, sitting now where
she had first seen it, at the edge of the encampment. Its thick coat
ruffled in the wind like the fur that covered the bodies of Torka's
dead. Lonit trembled violently. Umak's hands tightened around her
shoulders, and she could feel the hardness of his bones within his
sinewy palms and long, strong fingers as he pressed them into the thick
layering of her tattered tunic of caribou skin. Did ghost men have
bones? Could they grip the living with such sure, consoling strength of
purpose? She dared a quick look at the ghost man's face. He did not look
dead. He looked like Umak. He looked like the spirit master. He looked
like the old hunter who had saved Torka's life and returned to his
people's winter encampment in time to help an ugly girl lay out the
dead.

Hot, stinging tears came unbidden into Lonit's eyes. The old man drew
her close and held her in his arms. In the cold wind, his was the smell
of life. She drew it in. She knew that he was no ghost. He was alive.
She clung to him and wept. And when there were no more tears, she
whispered, "I am afraid." He held her for a while longer, as comforted
by her closeness as she was by his. Then he said gently, "Come, Lonit.
There is no more time to be afraid."

Yet she was afraid as she helped him to rummage through the ruined camp,
gathering tools and weapons, clothes and skins and scraps of food. What
they were doing was forbidden and would surely anger the spirits of the
dead. Umak made incantations of apology, which Lonit fearfully echoed,
as he picked through the rubble and brought his gleanings to be added to
hers. Torka's own chanting grew fainter until, at last, he slumped
protectively over the body of his son. Lonit would have gone to him, but
Umak assured her that they could do nothing for the young hunter now.
"Sleep is good medicine," he said, and kept her at the task at hand.

They placed their gatherings on a bison skin: the few unbroken spears
that Umak found, daggers, strips of leather, rolls of sinew, knapping
tools, and stakes of bone. Lonit had found a net woven from the coarse
guard hairs of a musk ox, fleshing knives and wedges, three good sewing
awls, a fine adz of greenstone, and a chisel made from one of the
stabbing teeth of a great, short-faced bear.

It seemed to her that there were a thousand items on the hide, but Umak
grumbled and shook his head and told her to go in search of this or that
while he also sought out other necessities. Within her family's downed
pit hut, she found her collection of bone needles inside the strip of
badger skin where she kept them. The skin had been half-mired in the
muddied ooze of the permafrost. Incredibly, only a few needles were
broken. She drew out the good ones, washed them in her own spittle, and
rubbed them clean upon her sleeve before inserting them through the
carrying hole that all women of the band had at the base of the
nose--pierced for this purpose in infancy. When not transporting fragile
sewing needles from camp to camp, the nose hole was used for
ornamentation like stone beads or freshwater shells. Pretty things.
Lonit had never considered herself worthy to wear them, but they had
looked lovely on the other girls and women. The memory saddened her. She
was glad when Umak called and told her to get back to her gathering.

Satisfied at last, he began to assemble a large sledge, which would
carry the bulk of their supplies, and also hold the weight and length of
a reclining man. It was clear that Torka, now delirious, would be unable
to travel on his own.

The sledge was a simple enough contrivance of bison hides secured by
sinew thongs over a frame of caribou antlers, with runners of mammoth
ribs that would later double as support posts for the shelter that they
would raise against the coming storm. With Lonit's assistance, the
sledge was soon assembled. Umak grunted his approval.

As Lonit watched, he began the all-important glazing of the
runners--coating the mammoth ribs with a sludge of mud, moss, and snow,
which she mixed for him in a stone mortar. It was difficult to keep the
mess from congealing in the cold, but soon Umak had managed to smear it
on the runners. He sat back, allowing it to freeze solid in the rising
wind before scraping it smooth with his dagger.

Lonit volunteered to build a fire over which she would melt snow into
water in a skin bag, this for the final ice glazing of the runners. Umak
shook his head and cast a worried look at the sky. Day was rapidly
fading into dark.

"No time to waste," he grumbled, and walked around, scouting out a scrap
of bear fur. "This will be faster and will work just as well."

As the girl watched, impressed by the old man's resourcefulness, he
urinated onto the swatch of bear fur. The hot, steaming liquid
penetrated the thick pelage. He nodded and told her to observe as he
gently ran the liquid-soaked fur over the frozen sludge. After several
meticulous rubbings, he had produced a hard, slick veneer of thin ice
that would allow the runners to glide smoothly over the snowy tundra.

"Now we go! Like the wind," he said.

They worked to divide their collection of tools and supplies into three
piles. Two were wrapped and secured to pack frames; the third was rolled
into a bison hide and loaded onto the sledge. The old man gently
persuaded his grandson to release Kipu's body; Torka stared vacant-eyed
at his grandfather.

"Torka will not leave Kipu," he muttered in his delirium.

"Kipu is not here. His spirit waits. In a far place."

Torka's face was a blank mask. "We will go there?"

"We will go," said the old man, fighting against the bitter upwelling of
a terrible sadness as Torka slumped forward, unconscious, into his arms.
PART II.

WALKERS OF THE WIND

"The tracks of the great mammoth lead off toward the south. So we shall
go east, along the path that the caribou take when they migrate out of
the face of the rising sun. Soon we will intercept the herds. Soon we
will eat."

With these words of optimism from Umak, they moved out across the frozen
land, beneath a lowering storm sky, heading eastward into unknown
country, the wild dog following not far behind.

Lonit looked back, wishing that the dog would go away. Perhaps it was a
ghost dog after all. Why else would the spirit master have made no
attempt to kill it? It would make a feast for them. It would give them
strength to go on until larger, more palatable game was sighted, but the
old man showed no interest in either killing it or driving it away, and
Lonit, as a female, knew she had no right to question him.

They went on and on, bent double under the weight of their packs,
sharing the weight of the sledge and of Torka, who lay unconscious upon
it. After a while, the girl forgot about the dog. It was all that she
could do to concentrate on her next step. The dragging of the sledge was
nearly unbearable; it seemed to be growing heavier and more cumbersome
with each passing mile. Lonit told herself that it did not matter.
Torka's weight would never be a burden to her. Never. She had loved him
since the first days of her memory. Torka was the handsome one, the best
of all the hunters, the one who would be spirit master someday, and who
would lead the band when the headman grew too old. Torka was the one man
who had never mocked her for her odd appearance. And once, when she was
a very little girl and had blundered into her father's way to win a
kicking from Kiuk, Torka had watched her punishment, stern-eyed and
frowning. When her father had stalked away, Torka had come to her and
put her on her feet again. He had smiled at her ... a smile of
encouragement ... a smile that had erased her hurt. She would never
forget the moment. It was the first time since the death of her mother
that anyone had shown kindness to her.

"Be brave, little Antelope Eyes," he had said, and on his tongue, the
usually caustic reference to her large, uncommonly round eyes had seemed
almost an endearment.

She had loved him ever since. It did not matter that he would never love
her in return. She was not worthy of his concern, much less of his
affection. It was enough to live within his shadow, to see him, to hear
his voice. If Torka's spirit left his body to walk away upon the wind,
Lonit knew that her spirit would follow as surely as her body now
followed Umak's lead, eastward beneath the gathering storm, across the
snow-whitened tundra, putting all that she had ever known behind her.

But how long could she go on? She was hungry and tired, not only from
the day's ordeal, but from weeks of near starvation. She and Umak had
eaten only a few small wedges of rancid fat that the old man had
discovered in the ruins of the headman's pit hut. He had consumed his
share with distaste, eating with a revulsion that had puzzled her. Food
was food, no matter how foul. She would have gulped it all down had he
not insisted that half of it be saved, sliced thin, and placed within a
storage sack of oiled bird intestine. This he had pressed flat and
placed inside Lonit's traveling coat, between its soft inner lining and
her tunic, with the weight of her pack frame to hold it in place against
her back. In this manner, the strips of fat rode safely secured, out of
the wind, warmed by whatever body heat escaped outward through her
tunic, and rubbed soft by her movement as she plodded forward through
the snow. When she and Umak finally made camp and sat down to consume
this treasure, sharing it with Torka, it would be soft and broken into
greasy globs that would grant precious energy to them as they slept and
drew strength from its meager sustenance. The girl salivated as she
thought of it, and as her stomach began to ache with hunger, so did her
body also ache with need of rest.

The wind was rising. Daylight was only a vague, cold aura glimmering
beyond the clouded horizon. Night was spilling across the tundra. Lonit
wondered how long she could keep up with Umak. She cast a sideward
glance at him through the long guard hairs of her foxskin ruff.

Umak walked resolutely beside her, bent forward, head out. She could see
his profile jutting out from the fall of his heavy bearskin robe. Long
wisps of hair whipped in the wind above his wide, furrowed brow. A
heavy-lidded, wiry-lashed eye stared straight ahead above the high,
humping crag of his nose. His mouth was pursed and seemed shut above his
rounded chin. It was a strong face. It was the face of a true spirit
master. But it was also the face of a very old man.

Lonit felt suddenly sick with fear. If anything were to happen to Umak,
how would she care for herself and Torka? And what if Torka were to die?
No! She would not allow herself to think such thoughts. They were more
burdensome than the weight of her pack.

With grim determination, the girl leaned into the wind. It whispered all
around her, rousing memories of the many dead who now lay far behind,
reminding her that she and Umak had stolen the belongings of those who
now lay looking at the sky.

You will not get away.

We will follow.

We will take back from you all that you have stolen.

We will eat of your life spirit and throw it away upon the wind.

You will die. Forever.

Had the wind spoken? Or had she only heard the voice of her own fear?
She could not be certain. She lowered her head. She would not listen to
the wind. She would not think of the past or the future--both were too
frightening to consider. She would think only of the moment. Of the next
step. And the next. For Torka's sake, she must go on.

Umak sensed a change in the way the girl was carrying her side of the
sledge. It surprised him, for rather than lagging, her step seemed
suddenly revitalized. The girl was strong; that had been apparent from
the first. She had yet to utter a complaint or to falter beneath the
weight of her pack. But she was still only a female, and despite her
height, she was only a half-grown girl. Soon she would tire. Soon she
would stumble. And in the days ahead, until Torka recovered-the
recovered--Umak would have to hunt for her and see to it that she was
sheltered against the weather and protected against any predators that
might come against her.

The old man thought about this as he walked. Since the death of his last
woman so many moons ago, he had had no one to care for but himself; and
since he had injured his leg, he had been cared for by others. Now he
was needed again. Torka and Lonit depended upon him for their survival.
If he failed them, they would die. And if they died, it would be as
though the People had never lived at all.

It was nearly dark now. The wind was very strong. Yet the old man was
not chilled, nor did he slow his step. His awareness of his
responsibility to Torka and Lonit did not intimidate him. For them he
would be young again. For them he would be strong--as strong as the girl
who matched her stride to his. He eyed her thoughtfully out of the
corner of his eye, thinking: This one has courage. This one will someday
be a woman who will make brave sons.

Her face was hidden deep within her ruff. This was just as well, for
Umak knew that she was no beauty. It did not matter. In the vast,
hostile, unknown land that lay ahead, a woman's beauty would be measured
by her stamina and strength of will, not by the shape of her features.

But now, as darkness claimed the last of day, the woman was just a girl,
and the "young" spirit master's leg ached within the confines of the old
man's skin. When Torka stirred upon the sledge, both of those who
carried him were thrown off balance. They went to their knees in the
snow.

"Hmmph," snorted Umak, rising, extending a hand to the girl. "I think
now it is time to rest." His hand was steady. He was glad for the
darkness. It would keep her from seeing his weariness upon his face. But
Lonit was not looking at Umak. She was looking beyond him, back along
the way they had come, with an expression of terror frozen upon her
face.

Eyes.

Hundreds of staring eyes. They seemed to hang suspended within the
night. Floating, disembodied, blinking now and then, like sparks
hovering above an unseen fire.

Lonit was certain that they were the eyes of the dead .. . watching .. .
following across the miles .. . waiting for the dark .. . preparing to
steal the life spirits of those who had stolen the belongings that
should have been theirs in the spirit world.

But Umak knew better. He could just make out the form of the wild dog.
It stood between him and the watching eyes. The dog's tail was tucked.
Its ears were laid back. Its head was out, and its teeth were bared as
it growled deep in its throat. It was the warning growl of one animal to
another.

Now Umak growled--at his failure to sense the threat. The wind had blown
the scent away, but that was no excuse. The dog had picked it up. In
other days, a younger and less tired spirit master would have known that
it was there. He grimaced with self-disgust, then squinted into the
darkness, willing himself to see the sleek forms that crouched there, as
white as snow in their winter coats.

Foxes.

How long had they been following? Emboldened by starvation, gathered
into a great and ravenous pack, they would be as dangerous as wolves
when they moved to the attack.

And Umak knew that they would attack. They had seen their prey stumble
and fall. They had smelled the weakness of an old man and a young girl
and the blood of Torka's injuries upon the wind.

Slowly, purposefully, Umak slung off his pack and told the girl to do
the same. She obeyed, hesitating only when he told her to hand him two
of his spears and to take up two of them herself. She blanched; it was
forbidden for a female to touch the weapons of a male lest the
contaminating influences of her weaker gender sap their killing powers.
She had scrupulously avoided doing so when they had gathered the
belongings of the dead. Now she stared at the old man, hoping that she
had not heard him correctly; but when he scolded her sharply and
repeated the command, she did as she was told.

It took her only a moment to loosen his pack and draw the weapons from
it. There were seven spears in all. Long, slender lengths of bone sliced
from the leg bones of mammoths killed long ago by hunters of the band,
each was ripped with a flaked or chipped point of stone or ivory that
was secured to its killing end by sinew binding. The old man had
inserted the spears horizontally through the center of his rolled
stalking cloak. Normally he would have carried two or three of them in
one hand, their weight resting across one shoulder; but with the sledge
to drag, and the added burden of a pack frame loaded with supplies that,
under usual traveling conditions, would have been distributed among
several members of the band, the spears were an unnecessary hindrance.
He had not intended to hunt. For protection, he had his stone dagger and
a club made from the fire-hardened thigh joint of a long-horned bison
tucked into his belt beneath his traveling cloak. In an emergency, the
spears could be taken up quickly enough to be used against large
predators-as he chose to use them now against the foxes.

He stood tall. He puffed out his chest so that he would look big and
bold to the watching predators. He growled again, as the dog growled. He
snarled, as the dog snarled. With a brash gesturing of his spears and a
telling grunt or two, he showed Lonit what she must do.

The spears seemed awkward in her hands, but they did not melt or sag as
her female fists tensed around their shafts. Perhaps, now that the band
was no more, the usual prohibitions concerning the use of weaponry were
no longer in effect? The girl had no way of knowing. She only knew that
she must follow Umak's instructions. If she did not, it would be his
right to beat her or abandon her.

He strutted forward toward the foxes, and Lonit strutted beside him,
silently invoking the spirits that lived within the spears.

Forgive this unworthy girl for holding you. Give strength to her hands
and courage to her spirit. For Torka and for Umak, be strong and swift.
Strike true.

The spears responded to her plea as, with Umak beside her, her arms
seemed suddenly strong. The old man took huge, stomping, swaggering
steps forward. He shouted at the foxes to retreat. Lonit copied him,
surprised at the sound of her own voice. It did not sound afraid.

Ahead of them, some of the eyes blinked and vanished; but others glared
and glowed as the remaining foxes stood their ground. As Lonit and Umak
stalked forward, the wild dog looked back at them. The leaders of the
fox pack took advantage of the dog's movement. They sprang at it from
out of the darkness. Lonit saw them clearly now for the first time. She
gasped. They were like lemmings, surging toward the dog in droves. Never
had she seen so many foxes in one place, nor had she imagined that there
could be so many of them in all the world. For a moment the strength
went out of her arms, and her throat constricted with fear. She could
not move. The wild dog could easily have run. It could have turned tail
and vanished into the night. Instead, it stood its ground, circling,
snapping and snarling, savaging its adversaries as they swarmed around
it and leaped against it with ripping teeth and slashing jaws.

Instinct told Lonit to turn and flee. The foxes would consume the dog.
If she and Umak went quickly from this place, the foxes would not
follow; they would be content to stay and feed. But why was the dog
staying to fight them? It was as though the animal were deliberately
putting itself at risk for them; as though, somehow, it considered them
its pack and found itself bound to protect them.

"Aar!"

Umak's scream caused the girl to jump with fright as the old man ran
howling to the dog's side. He was knee-deep in foxes as he stomped and
stabbed downward with his spears. She heard yips and barks of pain. And
then, like a wedge of birds suddenly banking away across the sky, the
main body of the fox pack was gone. Umak and the dog stood together,
panting, surrounded by the torn and bloodied bodies of foxes that would
never rise to follow their kindred. Umak raised one of his spears. He
shook it, along with the spitted body of the fox that was impaled upon
it.

"Now we feast!" he proclaimed in triumph.

Lonit blinked, staring as the old man looked down at the dog. Except
for a torn ear and a bloody snout, the animal seemed unhurt; its thick
coat had evidently prevented the foxes from doing much damage. It stood
so close to Umak that, had the old hunter wished to touch it or to drive
his spear downward through its back into its heart, he could have done
so. The dog looked up at the old man and, obviously unafraid, made no
move to back away as Umak slid the body of the fox from his spear and
dropped it at the feet of the animal. The dog sniffed it, then calmly
lay down and began to feed upon it, as though it were the most natural
thing in the world for a dog to keep company with a man.

But it was not natural. Lonit continued to stare at Umak. Truly, he was
a spirit master, a hunter so skilled and powerful that, by magic, he
could enter the mind of an animal and coerce it to work his will. Not
only had he frightened the foxes away and killed others to make a meal
for them, he had also put his spirit into the dog. He had made it stand
and fight beside him as though it were his brother. With the wind rising
steadily around them, they hunkered down in the snow and devoured two of
the foxes raw, skinning the carcasses with their stone daggers as they
ate, sucking sweet, hot, life-giving blood from the fibrous flesh.

Energy returned slowly to their starved, exhausted bodies. They worked
together to assemble a pit hut to shelter them against the coming storm.
Umak used a stone ax and wedge to break the surface of the permafrost.
He whisked the snow away with the side of his ax and hacked the broken
surface into small, uneven sods. These Lonit carried away to stack into
a pile for later use. With the pronged stalk of a caribou antler, the
old man and girl took turns scraping out a hollow circle, approximately
six feet around and one foot deep. When the hut was complete, Umak,
Torka, and Lonit would be able to recline fully within, with room to
spare for their supplies; and the below-ground floor would prove an
effective protection against the wind and cold once the warm air from
their bodies and their cooking fire filled the interior.

When the circle was dug and smoothed, they dismantled the sledge and
laid the still-unconscious Torka down upon the snow-covered earth, on a
bison skin that they then wrapped around him. With the runners of
mammoth ribs and with the large antlers that had formed the body of the
sledge, they quickly erected the domed framework of their shelter. It
was cross-braced with thong wrappings at all critical joinings, and the
bottom ends of the ribs were stabbed as deep into the frozen ground as
it would allow. Next they brought in the floor skin of oiled hide, the
only one that they had been able to salvage from the ruined camp. It was
ripped in several places, but Lonit would mend it later. The walls of
fur and hide were staked and raised, draped in layers over the frame and
cross-lashed with thongs all around the bottom and across the top. The
last touch was the piling of sods at the base, not only to weight the
bottom of the walls but to serve as additional insulation.

When this was done, they brought Torka in and laid him down gently,
close to where they would build their fire. He lay inert. Umak touched
his pulse, high at his temple. He was still feverish, but the beat of
his heart was strong and even. The old man smiled. Torka would live,
Umak was certain. He dared not speak this certainty to the girl lest the
utterance rouse crooked spirits that would work against his belief, but
he told her that Torka seemed improved and heard her exhale with relief
and joy.

Now they dragged in their supplies, including one of the foxes, which
had frozen stiff. They would skin and butcher it later when the growing
warmth of the hut softened it a little. The rest of the dead animals,
six in all, they stacked in a small, hastily dug pit close to the hut.
Covered with a staked down skin, the pit would serve as a deep freeze;
even in summer camps, meat could be kept cold indefinitely in such
storage holes because, beneath the thin top layer of the tundral soil,
the earth was perpetually frozen.

Umak seated himself as Lonit laced the hide door skin closed from the
inside. It was dark within the hut. Outside, the wind lessened a little,
then changed direction. Almost instantly, the air grew noticeably
colder. Experience told the old man that the storm that would now
descend upon them would be so viciously cold that only the hardiest
creatures would survive against it.

We will survive, thought the old man. He was beginning to relax now and
thought of the dog, wishing that he had been able to lure it into the
shelter of the hut. It had accepted food from him, but it had backed
away when he had beckoned to it, inviting it into the hut. Now it lay
outside, close against the skin walls, using them as a windbreak as it
curled protectively about the remains of its fox. With a belly full of
meat and marrow to generate body heat, the dog's thick winter coat would
provide adequate protection against the cold.

It too will survive, thought the old man.

As if affirming the old man's thought, the wild dog lifted its head and
howled in defiance of the rising storm. Lonit sat very still, listening,
trembling against a sudden desolate sense of loneliness. She and Umak
and Torka were all that was left of the People. The full impact of this
settled upon her now. Within her heart there was no gladness, no guilt;
there was only the terrible, crushing weight of despair. Outside in the
darkness, the wind and storm and wild beasts ruled a world that
stretched on forever. They were alone in that world--a girl, an old man,
and a wounded hunter. Beneath the vast and savage Arctic sky, the wild
dog sang a lament to the endless night.

"What does your brother dog cry to the wind, Spirit Master?" she asked
the old man, trying hard not to sound frightened, hoping that he would
not strike her for daring to put a question to him.

He listened to the dog. He heard tremulousness in the girl's voice and
knew it for what it was. He too felt the desolation of loneliness and
the nagging beginnings of fear, but unlike the girl, he was Umak, spirit
master, and would have none of it. "That we are alive," he replied with
the grim ferocity of absolute resolve. "And that we shall stay alive."

The wind slapped at the little shelter, but it held fast even though
snow blew into its interior through the seams that Lonit had been too
exhausted to mend. In the darkness, with the wind drowning the howling
of the dog, Umak felt the temperature falling dangerously low. Alarmed,
he rose, hunching forward, for although the pit hut would accommodate
the full length of his reclining body, he could not stand erect within
it.

"Up!" he half shouted at the startled girl. He commanded her to undress,
so they might bundle together beneath the combined weight of their furs.
The combined heat of their naked bodies would serve to warm them against
the worst of any storm.

Shivering, Lonit complied as Umak stripped himself, then bent over Torka
and, not without effort, peeled off the bulk of his grandson's torn and
bloodstained garments. "Come!" he then demanded of the girl, and told
her to lie down against Torka's right side, while he stretched out
against his left.

With the bison hide beneath them all, skin side down so that its thick,
rough hair cushioned their bodies, they shivered themselves warm beneath
their piled sleeping skins. For a long while they lay awake, listening
to the storm while Torka slept, oblivious to it, between them. After a
while, only the hut shivered in the wind, and in the darkness, Lonit
heard the old man speak with quiet, absolute determination.

"You see? We are alive. We shall survive."

But for how long? wondered the girl, not certain if Umak had spoken to
her or to the storm. It did not matter. She sensed his drifting off to
sleep and knew that she was following. Within the soft, warm limbo of
total exhaustion, with her slender body naked against Torka's side, she
closed her eyes and shivered once again, but not with cold as she
thought: In all the world, there is no woman for Torka now. There is
only Lonit. I am his woman. He shall be my man. In time. Yes. It shall
be so. He shall forget that I am ugly. I shall make myself so worthy
that he shall have to forget! A sweet sense of euphoria nearly
overwhelmed her. She pressed closer to him. She felt the heat of his
fevered flesh melding into the heat of her own skin, into the rising
pulse rate of what was more than a child's infatuation. She was not a
child--not after today, not ever again. One small hand strayed upward to
rest open upon Torka's shoulder.

"Lonit is Torka's woman," she whispered barely audibly, sleepily,
feeling herself slipping into dreams.

But suddenly she was wide awake. Staring. Every muscle in her body
rigid. Umak slept on. Torka breathed evenly. But outside, the storm had
reached a demonic intensity. There was something unnatural about it,
something threatening. Lonit sat upright. Wind-driven snow was streaming
into the interior through the gaps in the seams. As she stared, the
streams of snow ribboned out, whirled in the air, took on the forms of
ghosts and demons as they swirled around her, plucking at her bare skin.

She gasped. She knew the faces of these ghosts. They were the members of
her band, yet they were changed. They had no form, no substance. They
were the stuff of storms and snow, as gray and as dank as mists as they
solidified into a single diaphanous column. The column took on the form
of a woman, but unlike that of any woman who had ever lived. Its flesh
was ice rimed, broken, and torn. It bled mist from a thousand wounds.
Out of a frozen, ruined face that had once been beautiful, eyes as cold
and unforgiving as the Arctic night fastened upon Lonit and, from out of
a skeleton's mouth came a single moaning word. "Torka ..." Lonit stared,
knowing that the ghost woman was Egatsop, Torka's woman, come to claim
the life spirit of her man. "No!" Lonit cried, throwing herself across
Torka, feeling the snow-driven hands of death raking downward across her
back. "He is alive! You cannot have him! He is my man now!"

The wind intensified; it roared inside Lonit's ears. The cold was so
bitter that it burned her nostrils and filled her lungs until she could
not breathe. She could feel bone-sharp spears of ice, Egatsop's fingers,
piercing through her body to get at the man who lay beneath her. She
felt Torka move as he suddenly cried out the names of his dead woman and
children.

A terrible wave of anguish ran through her. What a fool she had been to
imagine that Torka would want her, even if she was the last woman in the
world. Here was the woman he loved, come back from the dead, to claim
him. But she could not let him die--not Torka, not the one whom she
loved more than her own life.

She rose, turning to face the spirit. "Take me! Come! Live again in my
body if you would be with him!"

It seemed then that the specter laughed at her, and never in her worst
nightmares had Lonit seen anything more ugly than the sight of Egatsop's
ghost. Half-fainting with terror, Lonit flung herself back across
Torka's body and sobbed in terror as the wind rose and the pit hut
shook. Suddenly, above the storm of death, she heard the snarling of the
dog, and as quickly as they had appeared, the apparitions vanished.

She turned to see that Umak had risen. He was doing what he could to
close the seams and asked her to help him. He had seen no ghosts. He had
heard no voices. It had all been a dream, he assured her.

In the darkness, fumbling amid her belongings, she found her sinew
thread and with trembling hands managed to thread her needles and sew
the seams as best she could. By the time she finished, the wind had
dropped. She helped Umak to remove the snow from the hut and crawled
back under the sleeping skins to shiver herself back to sleep.

But she did not sleep. Beyond the walls of the pit hut, the wild dog
growled, and all night long, although Umak swore that it was not so,
crooked spirits walked the night while Lonit kept watch against them.
Dawn rose out of the east. The wind rushed toward it across the
crumpled, glacier-laden peaks and frigid polar steppes of Siberia. It
blew past the barren, storm-blasted expanse of tundra upon which Umak
and Lonit had labored to raise their little shelter of bones and fur. If
crooked spirits had ridden the wind, they were silent now, for the wind
was gentler. The storm had spent itself, leaving a dusting of dry snow
on the arching roof of the pit hut and on the coat of the sleeping wild
dog.

Lonit slept at last; the deep, dreamless sleep of total exhaustion.
Beside her, Torka awoke, his fever broken. For a long while he lay
still, staring into darkness, feeling the warmth of the two who slept on
either side of him.

Their presence gave no comfort, for the memories that washed through him
were more painful than the dull ache of his injuries. The ghosts of the
past lived within his eyes his woman, his infant, the faces of friends
lost to him forever. He saw the bloodied snow of his people's devastated
winter camp. He saw little Kipu and heard his cries as a terrible shadow
fell upon him. He saw the mammoth .. . Thunder Speaker .. . World Shaker
... He Who Parts the Clouds. With eyes round and dilated with its hatred
of Man, the Destroyer thundered within Torka's head as its impossibly
huge body raged over little Kipu and nearly everything that Torka had
ever known and loved.

Anguish choked him. The confines of the pit hut were suddenly
suffocating. Torka could not bear his memories. He rose, wincing against
his pain. He stepped over his sleeping grandfather, took up one of the
sleeping skins of caribou hide, and wrapped it around himself as he
unlaced the door skin and went out.

The world was white and unfamiliar. It stretched eastward for miles in
broad, rolling waves that shimmered with a lustrous patina of ice in the
Arctic dawn's light. To his left, a snow-covered mound of fur suddenly
rose, shook itself, and backed away, growling.

Startled, Torka hunched forward into a defensive posture, ready to
strangle the beast if it came at him; but he had awakened Umak when he
had left the pit hut, and now the old man appeared at his side.

"It is only Brother Dog," explained Umak. "He too is alone, without a
band. He has followed this old man and prevented his spirit from walking
away upon the wind. He has fought beside Umak. He has won his place
within this encampment."

Torka frowned, feeling suddenly weak and disoriented. He had no
recollection of the hours that had passed since he had succumbed to
delirium in the winter camp. Umak's words made no sense to him. The
moment seemed unreal, a part of his dreams. He reached out and put his
hand upon his grandfather's forearm to make certain that he was real.

Umak nodded, understanding. "It is so," he said. "Umak lives because
Brother Dog would not let him die. So it was that this old man found
you. Together with the girl, I have brought you out of the place of
death to a new life. We are all that is left of our people. But we will
survive."

Within Torka, weariness and pain merged to become something else,
something harder and darker and sharp with the bitter edge of total
desolation. "For what purpose?"

Now it was the old man's turn to frown. "For what purpose do men ever
survive? To make new life! To hear the laughter of their children! To
hunt boldly for their women! And to sing the songs of life in the winter
dark."

Torka closed his eyes. "This man will sing no song of life until he has
dipped his spear in the blood of the Destroyer. This man's life spirit
will be as dead as the spirits of his people until he eats of the flesh
of World Shaker and leaves the bones to bleach beneath the eye of the
midnight sun."

Umak stared at his grandson, aghast. "The Destroyer is a crooked spirit.
It cannot be killed!"

Torka's eyes met the eyes of the old man unflinchingly. "For my woman.
For my unnamed infant. For Kipu, my son. For all of those who now lie
looking at the sky. Torka will kill Thunder Speaker. Or he will join it
in the spirit world, to hunt it forever as it walks upon the wind."

The days passed. In the clear, brutal cold that followed the storm, ice
crusted the land, covering the tracks of man and beast alike. Even if
Torka had been well, he could not have backtracked to pick up the trail
of the mammoth. Umak and Lonit had brought him farther than the band of
hunters had ever ranged. Not a single familiar landmark pointed the way
back to the winter camp, and yet he remained obsessed with the need to
return, to pick up the trail of the beast that had killed his people, to
stalk it, face it, and kill it. He knew that he had virtually no chance
of surviving the confrontation. He did not care. As far as he was
concerned, his life was over. It had ended days ago, miles away, in the
bloodied snow where his woman and children now lay looking at the sky
forever.

It was warm and dark within the pit hut. Umak sat cross legged, scowling
at Torka through the gloom. "The mammoth you seek, you will never find.
Forget him. Before he kills you." Torka scowled back at him. "Thanks to
you, the Destroyer walks one part of the world while I walk another. If
I cannot find the mammoth, how can it kill me?"

Umak harrumphed. "The beast that walks within you is feeding on your
life spirit. Let it go, Torka, before it is too late."

"It is already too late."

Lonit listened in silence. The two hunters sat opposite her, close to
the little lake of fire that danced within the concave stone that served
as both lamp and a source of cooking heat. It was not a large stone; she
had easily carried it rolled in her traveling pack, along with her
fire-making tools: the notched, well-worn fire stick of bone; the drill
stick, also of bone, with its mouthpiece of polished stone and its
double-handed drill cord. These had lain close to Lonit when the mammoth
had charged the hut. Like the girl, they had not been damaged.

The making of fire with the stick and drill was art. Today, sensing the
depths of Torka's black mood, she had prolonged the ritual. Through the
light and warmth of her fire, she hoped to drive back the darkness in
which Torka's sadness grew. With the capstone held in her mouth and the
end of the drill inserted into one of the notches of the fire stick,
Lonit had held the ends of the cord in each hand, the tension of the
sinew strung around the drill. With expert manipulation, she was able to
keep the drill spinning in the stick until friction sparked a flame
this she nourished with bits of dried moss pinched out of her under box
of hollowed antler.

Fire starting was woman's work. Lonit's mother had taught her well. The
girl was proud of her skill; in this, at least, she did excel, and she
had wanted Torka to be cheered by her fine fire. She had made a thick
oil by pounding the last of the fat that she had packed out of the
winter camp on a scrap of leather with the heel of her hand. This she
had placed into the hollow of the stone, and into this she had dipped
one of her few remaining wicks of moss. Saturated with precious oil, it
was the wick that took the flame and held it, burning smokelessly under
Lonit's constant vigil. The stone bowl now glowed softly, held in place
by a circle of sods. Cut from the skin of the tundra, the sods were
composed of moss and lichen. They absorbed the heat of the little fire
and then radiated warmth outward to cut the chill of the interior of the
pit hut. But neither Torka nor Umak paid much attention to her fire.
They were too absorbed in their conversation and simply took it for
granted that, as a female, Lonit would possess the skills of hearth
making.

Torka stared into the flame. "I will return to the winter camp to pick
up the trail of the Destroyer. The days are growing longer and are bound
to become warmer. I will be stronger soon. With the weight of your packs
and sledge, your marks will be deep in the land. The tundra holds its
scars forever. When the ice melts, I will follow the trail that you have
left beneath it."

"There will be no footprints," replied Umak. "The tundra was frozen
hard. We walked in snow all the way."

"Hmmph!" Torka muttered, and Lonit looked up from her fire tending,
startled to note how similar the speech patterns of Torka and Umak were.
"Then I will look for circling birds," said Torka. "The carrion eaters
of both land and sky will come to feast upon the dead."

"They have already come. Before the storm, Umak sensed their threat. It
was for this reason that this old man chose to walk ahead of the storm."
Lonit shuddered against her memories.

Torka's face was set, shadowed by weariness and sadness in the fire
glow. "You have taught me well, father of my father. I will walk west
until the land is familiar. I will find the camp. I will keep death
watch. Then I will hunt the Destroyer."

"This old man will not go with you!" snapped Umak, angry and impatient
all at once. "This old man will continue east and seek the caribou. Umak
has been given back his life; he will not throw it away. Umak has Lonit
to care for. She is a girl now, but she will be a woman. The People may
yet be reborn through her, to make a new band, to begin a new life for
us all. But life feeds on life, Torka. When you find the Destroyer, if
you kill it, how will it feed you? It is a crooked spirit. When it dies,
it will disappear, into the mists of the ghost wind."

"Its flesh will feed me." A muscle pulsed high at Torka's temple. He
recalled the smell of the mammoth's blood. He remembered stabbing it
again and again before, at last, it had hurled him to what had seemed
certain death. "It bleeds...."

"Hmmph!" Umak was so upset that he cracked the edge of the spearhead
that he had been re knapping "So do you!"

Torka would never know exactly when he began to accept Umak's opinion
about the mammoth. Time was passing quickly. His bruises faded. His
gashes and abrasions were becoming scars. Spring was beginning to drive
back the winter dark. Each day, during the brief hours of light, he went
out. He searched for the way back to the winter camp but could not find
it. He searched for game and mammoth sign but found his strength
instead. Slowly, his body healed. His spirit did not.

He was obsessed by his memories. Whether he was awake or asleep, Thunder
Speaker dominated his thoughts. Then, one night, he slept and did not
dream. For the first time since the mammoth had walked into his life to
destroy it, he awoke refreshed, glad to be alive. He could not forgive
himself for this. His people, his woman, his infant, and his beloved son
were dead. He could not allow himself to forget them. He would not. As
Umak had warned, the beast that walked within him fed upon his spirit.
He let it browse. In some dark, perverted way that he did not wish to
analyze, it soothed him even as it sapped the joy from his life. They
ate the remaining fox, and even before they scraped the marrow from the
last of the bones, Lonit was busy setting snares. Soon there were
lemming and pika to roast. Umak speared a motley-feathered ptarmigan.
The first of the season's returning migratory birds were skeining across
the sky. Shyly, Lonit came to Torka to present him with a new tunic that
she had made for him out of the skins and tails of the foxes. It was a
beautiful garment. The girl's workmanship far excelled his dead woman's
skills with the needle. He resented her for causing him to make such a
comparison and was loath to wear it. With his own tunic in tatters, he
had no choice, but he lamented the loss of Egatsop. She should have been
there to mend and make for him, not this coltish girl with her round
eyes and her long, boyish gait. He had admired the child once. The
tenacity with which she clung to life despite adversity was admirable in
one so young. But he hated her now. His feelings toward her were
irrational and he knew it, but he did not care. She was alive when his
woman was dead. She was alive when his son and infant daughter were
dead. She was alive, and because of Umak's concern for her, the old man
would not seek out the Destroyer.

For this Torka hated her. She was the only female left alive in all the
world, and Umak was right when he said that, if the People were not to
die forever, they must someday be reborn through her. The thought was so
repugnant that Torka would not dwell upon it. But then the day came when
he awoke and ate a meal of roasted lemming, and as he went out of the
pit hut to stand in the warmth of the rising sun, he reluctantly
admitted that it was good to be alive. The beast of memory stirred, but
unlike the last time when he thought of the Destroyer, he knew that, in
truth, he never wished to see it again--unless it was on his own terms
and he had a chance of coming away from the encounter alive. He could
never do that alone. Nor would he put Umak and the girl at risk by
allowing them to follow him into the shadow of the Destroyer. Umak was
an old man. Lonit was a half-grown child. In this savage, hostile world,
they were all that was left of his people. Torka would not abandon them.
They broke camp and moved eastward into the light of the rising sun,
seeking the caribou. With the return of light and rising temperatures,
the texture of the tundra was changing. Land that had lain hard and
brittle beneath winter's thin layering of snow and ice now began to
emerge resilient and yielding beneath the feet of the travelers.

They walked out across a landscape that differed from any other on
earth. As in other lands and times, moisture and sunlight were the
determining factors of life, but here the cold, bitter wind was ever
dominant. Except during the longest days of summer, when the sun never
set, the chill breath of the polar wind kept the air temperature low
enough to prevent snow from melting on the north-facing slopes. Even on
the warmest days, when the tundra swarmed with insects and flamed with
the colors of hundreds of species of flora, snow lay in hard-packed
drifts on windward hills and in the shaded fissures of boulders.
Although rivers and ponds were free of ice, less than a yard beneath the
tundral earth the ground was perpetually frozen. The mountains that
reached to the western edge of the known world were never bare snows
that fell upon them in winter remained to greet the snows of the
following autumn, growing thicker and thicker until the combined weight
formed great, smothering blankets of white that lay upon the ranges,
burying all but the highest peaks.

Far to the west, much of Eurasia was entombed in ice. Eastward, beyond
the distant horizon toward which Torka, Umak, and Lonit plodded, bent
beneath their pack frames while the wild dog trotted after them, an
unknown land also lay entombed. Beyond savage, soaring, ice-mantled
peaks, this land mass had almost vanished beneath the crushing weight of
an ice sheet two miles thick and over four thousand miles wide.

The little traveling band, however, saw only the greening tundra as they
walked ever eastward in their search for the returning herds of caribou.
The going was slow. The tundra had split into oddly uniform wedges, the
result of the ground's contracting during periods of intense cold, then
cracking open. Now that the days were growing warmer, melting snow
seeped into the fissures. When temperatures dropped, the meltwater froze
and expanded, forming ice wedges that filled shallow gullies ten to one
hundred feet in length.

But neither Umak nor Torka nor Lonit complained. Skirting the gullies,
they gave thanks to the spirits that the long, rolling valley within
which they walked had only a thin coating of snow and was alive with the
sound of meltwater running off into icy streams and rivulets. They
paused, breathing hard. Umak nodded, content with what he saw. "Soon
many birds will come to nest. To raise young and be food for us."

Lonit was heartened by his words. Within her pack, she carried more than
enough sinew thong with which to fashion a stone hurler. If she could
find four small stones of equal weight, she could put together an
admirable weapon with which to capture waterfowl in the time-honored way
of the women of the band--by hurling the bola like device so that its
stone-tipped thongs wrapped around the feet of its victim, grounded it,
and prevented it from flying. Lonit was as adept with a stone hurler as
she was with the setting of snares and the weaving of nets for either
birding or fishing. She thought of this and was glad for her skills and
of the many hours that she had worked to perfect them, knowing that an
ugly girl must be good for something if she was to be of value and
worthy of survival.

Torka stared ahead into the narrowing neck of the valley. How far had
they come? How many miles now lay between him and the desolation of the
winter camp? He thought of Egatsop and the infant; it had been such a
pretty girl, with its mother's long, sloping eyes and lashes. How he
longed for her! And for little Kipu. He closed his eyes. He felt
suddenly weary beyond bearing.

"Look!" Umak shouted, suddenly rigid, pointing a bony finger skyward.
Torka and Lonit looked. High above and perhaps as far as a mile ahead of
them, an enormous broad-winged bird was riding the thermals.

"Sun eater!" exclaimed the old man, naming the bird for its ability to
block out the light of the sun when it flew before it. Weighing at least
fifty pounds, with a wingspan of some fifteen feet, the giant condor
made Umak's heart leap with joy, and the wild dog, standing close but
not too near, looked up at him as though he had suddenly become addled.
Umak hopped on one foot, and then upon the other, feeling so strong and
happy that he could not remember which was his good leg and which was
his lame. "Sun eater! We will follow your shadow!" he proclaimed,
knowing that the giant condor was a scavenger of big game and that where
sun eater flew, in the shadow of its great wings, there walked the
caribou!

Hope walked with them now. They proceeded onward, across the shallows of
an ox bowed river. They had been traveling for hours. Weariness brought
them to a halt. They set up a temporary camp in which they would pass
the night, raising a lean-to instead of a pit hut, for they had no
intention of lingering, certain that, only a few miles ahead, they would
encounter the herds of caribou.

As Umak and Torka took up their spears and went to scout for any small
game that might be in the vicinity, Lonit drew a scoop net of sinew
meshing from her back. While the wild dog sniffed at marmot sign and
chased the molting male ptarmigans that issued raucous mating challenges
to one another from every knoll and snowbank, Lonit knelt by the river.
Careful to cast no shadow across the water, she leaned out and dipped
her net into the flowing current. She held it with its open end facing
upstream. In no time at all, a sleek, fat grayling was splashing in the
pale light of day's end; then another was entrapped beside it, and
another, until the girl's net was filled to bursting. She laid the fish
in a neat line upon the bank, kneeling back to admire them until the
wild dog caught her attention. She was afraid of the dog. She knew that
Torka also distrusted it. The animal's size was such that, if it chose
to attack, it could do damage to a man, and a girl would be no match for
it at all. But the dog was Umak's spirit brother, and if it was a ghost
dog, there was nothing very frightening about it now. It chased the
elusive ptarmigan, dashing from one knoll to another, snapping at flying
feathers as the pugnacious birds squawked and cheeped and succeeded in
frustrating the dog's best efforts.

"Did your mother dog not teach you to hunt? You will catch no meat like
that!"

Shaking water from her scooping net, Lonit bent to break two stalks from
a clump of dwarf willow that grew, fuzzy with catkins, at the edge of
the embankment, close to the water and out of the wind. With these, and
the net in one hand, she walked slowly to a nearby knoll, one of the few
that were not occupied by courting ptarmigan. Snow lay banked on the
northern slope of the little rise. It was hard packed in the main, but
she was able to dig out enough soft snow to form two small balls. The
larger of these, about the size of a ptarmigan's body, she placed atop
the knoll. The smaller, a tiny, slightly elongated ball the size of a
bird's head, she placed firmly atop the larger. At the joining of the
two, she placed a few pickings of brown moss that grew at the edge of
the snowpack; this approximated the first tufts of summer plumage that
were appearing at the necks of each bird amid the molting fluff of its
white winter feathers.

She observed her creation, remembering others that she had made in
happier times. She forced herself not to think of the past. It was gone.
But she was alive, satisfied with her work. From a distance, her
snowbird would look real enough to fool any feather brained
eager-to-mate ptarmigan. She smiled a little as she packed snow in front
of her decoy, placing her net over it, staking it down with the twigs of
willow.

Now she scooted out of sight. She lay flat, concealed behind the knoll,
listening to the calls of the ptarmigan as, having paid not the
slightest attention to her efforts, they continued to sound their
territorial challenges to one another. With well-practiced skill, the
girl echoed them. Within moments a nearby bird was flying to attack the
decoy. It swooped low, feet forward, squawking a warning; but when its
talons raked into the snow that lay before its opponent, they tangled in
the net. Off-balance, the ptarmigan fell, flapping its wings, into the
decoy, as Lonit, alerted by its cries, raced to the top of the knoll,
pounced upon it, and promptly broke its neck. Holding her trophy high,
she gave a little whoop of triumph. When Umak and Torka returned to
camp, they would feast upon bird and fish. They would be pleased and
would find her worthy. She could see them now, trotting toward her out
of the distance. Both had their spears raised. They were gesturing, no
doubt in pleasure, as they saw the ptarmigan held high in her hand. She
shook it so that they could not fail to see it. Umak shouted her name.
He and Torka began to run. Lonit was elated.

But not for long. The cries of another species of bird caused her to
wheel around. Facing back toward the river, she cried out in dismay. The
wild dog stood at the edge of the embankment, wolfing down the last of
her fish. Above him, a shadow turned the last of day into dusk, as the
giant condor fucked back its enormous wings and dove straight down at
her.

Lonit froze. It was a huge blur of black and white feathers streaking
downward through the sky; its vult urine neck extended, its skull
resembling both eagle and condor with its flattened cranium and long,
aquiline, dangerously massive beak. That hornlike hook, so perfectly
designed for its rapacious, carnivorous feeding, gaped open as it dove.
The girl stared upward in horror, seeing its round, red eyes, its
equally red stab of tongue, and the huge, concave openings of its nasal
passages. It shrieked as it reached to rip the ptarmigan from her hand,
just as the wild dog leaped out of nowhere to knock her from her feet.

The force of the dog's impact caused Lonit to release the ptarmigan just
in time; had she not done so, the condor would have ripped off her hand.
She fell in a stunned heap, half expecting the dog to eat her; but it
was gone in an instant, after the huge bird that was banking downward,
screaming as it fell from the sky with one of Torka's spears in its
breast.

Lonit heard the hunters shouting now.

Her mouth had gone dry. She felt small and foolish and ashamed as she
watched the great condor come down on its side, squawking, wheezing, and
hacking blood. It was still dangerous, with its beak snapping and its
enormous legs kicking out. Torka and Umak ran to kill it, bravely
stepping close to plunge their spears deep as the wild dog kept close to
Umak's side, snarling and snapping and spitting feathers as, sneezing,
the animal helped its brother man to make the kill.

Lonit watched. Her own foolishness had caused her to lose her fish and
her ptarmigan. Tonight Torka and Umak and Brother Dog would gorge
themselves upon the meat of the condor. Lonit would not eat. An ugly,
unworthy girl had no right to partake of a feast to which she had
contributed nothing. Umak teased her when she said that she had no right
to share in the meat of the condor. He looked at her with a droll, but
not unkindly, smile. "Little girl, without you and your ptarmigan, what
would we have used as bait to bring the sun eater down from the sky?"

"I am not a little girl. I am almost a woman."

Torka eyed her sternly. "Then, Almost A Woman, you will butcher the
carcass of the condor. You will make a fire. You will roast the meat for
Umak and Torka. This is a woman's work. Complete it, and you shall be
worthy of your share."

She flushed to her hairline. Grateful for any word from him, she set to
work gladly.

Umak at least was easy to please. While out from the camp, he and Torka
had walked as far as the neck of the valley and climbed a low hill to
look beyond, across a vast plain where, upon the horizon, they had seen
what they had so long yearned to see.

"Tonight we eat the flesh of the condor," said Umak, "and grow strong
upon the blood and marrow of the sun eater, for we must not dishonor its
life spirit by wasting that which we have killed. But tomorrow we go
from this place. Tomorrow we walk far. Tomorrow we make a hunting camp
in which we will stay many days. Tomorrow we prepare to hunt the
caribou!"

His eyes glistened with excitement. "The herd walks toward us from out
of the east, as this old man has promised. The herd walks from horizon
to horizon, across a plain that stretches from forever to forever. Never
has this old man seen so wide a land. Never has this spirit master seen
so many caribou!"

Umak's enthusiasm was contagious. Lonit listened as she worked, saddened
at first as she recalled the long days of the starving moon, remembering
the suffering of her people, wishing that the caribou instead of the
mammoth had come to them, wishing that they had met life instead of
death. But the band was no more. All that were left of the People were
here, sheltering in this little encampment. Torka, Umak, and Lonit
composed a new band. And when the hunters brought caribou to their camp,
Lonit would make certain that her woman wisdom was put to good purpose.
She would provide well for her men. Her sadness drifted away. She smiled
a little, and dimples formed hollows beneath her high cheekbones as she
thought of all of the fine things that she would make out of the
caribou.

Torka was troubled as he listened to his grandfather--not by the old
man's words, but by his thoughts as he watched Lonit working at her
butchering. As always, the sight of the girl distressed him. She was a
strong, hardy, uncomplaining child, but he longed for his own woman now.
And for his children. Again the longing ignited his hatred for the girl.
Why had she survived when all of the others had died? Why?

He stood beside the lean-to that they had raised, staring out across the
world. It seemed so empty. It was so empty. Would he ever hear the
laughter of children again? Or the sound of women talking low in the
lonely dark and of men arguing over a friendly game of bone toss?

As he stooped to enter the lean-to, wishing to seat himself out of the
wind beside Umak, the wild dog growled at him. The animal lay on the
other side of the old man's extended limbs--close but at a wary
distance, just out of Umak's reach. Always, the dog kept itself within
the fall of the old man's shadow. Always, when Torka came anywhere near
it, it warned him away.

"Be at ease, Brother Dog," Umak assured the animal. "Torka is a member
of our band and flesh of this old man's flesh. You must get used to him.
He is also your brother."

The dog lowered its head, visibly relaxing a little; but it did not take
its eyes from Torka. "Aarrr .. It continued growling, albeit more
softly.

"Aar!" repeated Torka in annoyance, seating himself beside his
grandfather. Truly, Umak was a spirit master to have won the following
of a beast. As for Torka, if it were up to him, he would brain the
creature. A young dog would make good eating. Its pelt would make good
fur. But it would never make a brother to a man. Never. No matter what
Umak might say to the contrary, Torka did not trust the dog. Someday it
would revert to kind. Someday, instead of leaping to the assistance of
the girl, it would attack her. Someday, instead of assisting Umak with a
kill, the old man's powers over it would wane, and the dog would turn to
try to kill one who no longer was master over its spirit. Torka would
wait for that day; then he would kill "Brother" Dog.

"Look," said Lonit, holding up one of the long wing bones of the condor.
She had cut the meat and tendons from it with her fleshing dagger and
now openly marveled at its lightweight structure. "How can such a
fragile bone support the weight of such a great wing?"

Umak grunted. It was not a question that a man, even a spirit master,
could answer. But Torka rose, intrigued. What the girl had noted was, in
fact, worth considering, if for no other reason than to satisfy his
innately curious nature.

He knelt across the carcass from her, balancing his weight on the balls
of his feet within his multilayered boots. He took up not the bone, but
the entire other wing of the condor. The girl had cut it cleanly away
from the shoulder socket. It was intact, its intricate layering of
feathers sleek beneath his ungloved hand. Never had he seen flight
feathers of such size. He plucked one out and swept the air with it,
remarking that the lay of the feathering along the flexible, hollow
shaft created a powerful pull against the air.

Lonit eyed the feather. Her feminine eyes took note of more practical
attributes. Sewn together along a belting of sinew cord, the feathers
were long enough to make a skirt for summer wear, or a magnificent
ornamental collar for a spirit master to wear when he called upon his
powers, or an effective fan to keep away the biting flies that swarmed
across the land on windless days of endless sun. She ventured shyly to
share her thoughts with Torka, but he did not seem to hear her, or else
showed no interest as he worked the wing, fascinated by its anatomical
structure, intrigued by the strength and elasticity of the powerful
tendons that gave a spiinglike movement to the muscles and bones.

"This is how it flies.. he said thoughtfully. Not to be outdone by his
grandson, Umak got to his feet. He went to Torka and took the wing from
him.

"Hmmph!" He scrutinized the severed member, nodded, and hefted it upon
his back, extending it outward along one arm as he began to move about,
slowly at first, pretending that he was a condor. He made a dance of it,
mimicking the flight and vult urine sounds of the deceased creature.

Torka could not help but laugh aloud. Lonit covered her own laughter
with her hands lest, coming from such an unworthy girl, it offend the
spirit master. The wild dog whined and backed away, not knowing what to
make of such behavior.

Umak danced on, improvising as he went, moving the wing as though it
were an extension of his arm, chanting a song of praise of the great
bird whose flesh they would soon consume.

This is how it flies, Umak thought, and for a while he did not feel the
weight of his years in his old body. He danced. He turned. He soared.
And then, at last, he was a man again, and tired. He stopped, burdened
by his years and by the long miles across which he had come since
leaving the ruined winter camp of his people behind. He thought of the
broad plain that he and Torka had sighted, of the caribou, and of the
miles that still separated him from the long-sought-for herds. He
dropped the wing of the condor and stood, hands on his hips, breathing
hard, all too aware of the ache in his bad leg and of the pain in his
feet.

"Hmmph! If only this old man could sprout wings like a sun eater! If
only we could all fly with the wings of the condor! Think of the
distance we could cover! Think of the things we would see! And think of
the wear and tear it would save our feet!"

Lonit made a fire of dried fox bones and sods, which she had carried in
her pack for this purpose. They roasted the sun eater and ate all that
they could, sharing the meat with the wild dog, then bundling beneath
their sleeping skins to seek much-needed rest.

With bellies full of meat, warmed by the heat of the fire, they slept
huddled close beneath the lean-to. Torka dreamed strange dreams in which
he saw himself as a man with the wings of a condor--wings that carried
him high above the world, that made him weightless and allowed him to
experience the awesome thrust and power of flight. He was like a spear
hurtling across the sky, a spear that could control its own passage,
that could see with the eyes of a man.

He looked down upon the earth, the soaring peaks and ice-choked canyons,
the tundral valleys and the vast plains where the caribou walked in an
unending, continuous river of life across the land. And there, upon the
eastern most horizon, he saw a mammoth grazing ... a mammoth like no
other ... a beast with shoulders as high as mountains, tusks as hard and
cold and relentless as glaciers, and eyes dilated with hatred of man. It
looked up and saw his flight and trumpeted with a voice that shook the
sky.

Torka answered that voice. He cried aloud in his dream as his wings
folded flat and he hurled himself from the sky, downward, transformed
into a spear that struck the mammoth with the killing power of a
lightning bolt. The Destroyer fell where it stood, and Torka awoke,
shaking, with the taste of blood and death and absolute frustration in
his mouth.

For a long while he lay awake, thinking about the dream. Where did the
mammoth graze now? he wondered. And was there ever a spear made--or a
man born--capable of killing it?

The looped end of the leather thong hissed as it left Torka's hand. The
sleeping dog heard it, but too late. The loop encircled its head, and
when the startled animal leaped to its feet, the noose tightened about
its neck. The weight and stricture of the unknown thing set panic loose
within the dog. He turned to run, only to be brought up short and
half-strangled as Torka fastened the other end of the thong to a bone
stake that he had driven deep into the tundra the night before.

Stunned, the dog stood still, head lowered, its body straining forward
against the pull of the thong. The animal stared at Torka. Slowly,
understanding dawned in the blue eyes as they traced the slim run of
leather to the man's hand. A growl formed deep in the dog's throat.
Without further warning, it lunged forward, teeth bared, and would have
bitten right through the thick layering of Torka's sleeve had the hunter
not jumped away in time. The dog yipped in pain as it fell hard on its
side, jerked off its feet by the fully extended length of its tether.

Lonit looked up, startled. They had come far since taking down the
lean-to and heading eastward toward the distant hills. They had raised a
pit hut in the lee of those hills and had spent another night resting
and readying themselves to hunt the caribou that grazed by the hundreds
of thousands upon the plain that stretched before them. The girl would
not participate in the killing, of course, but she would do the bulk of
the butchering. With this in mind, she had awakened before her men,
eager to assemble her scrapers and fleshers, the sharp tools of stone
and bone that would render caribou carcasses into meat and hides. She
had crept from the pit hut and had seated herself before it, facing into
the sunrise, placing her tool bag of lynx skin upon her lap. The wild
dog had looked up to eye her once, then had dropped its head and gone
back to sleep. The short, silken hair of the lynx had felt sleek and
cold beneath her ungloved fingers. She had admired the meticulous
stitching of its seams. It was her bag now, but it had belonged to
another woman, as had the tools within it. Her own bag, which had been
lost somewhere within the tumbled ruins of her family's pit hut, was
made of the skin of a marmot, peeled whole from the body with legs
attached and head serving as a flap closure. She had searched for it to
no avail. Stroking the lynx skin, she had remembered Enilik, maker of
this bag, the bright-eyed woman of Nap. She closed her eyes, hoping that
Enilik's life spirit would understand why Lonit had taken her bag and
tools and would forgive an unworthy girl for having survived.

Lost in thought, she had not heard Torka come out of the pit hut, nor
did she see him cast the loop-ended thong toward the dog. He had given
no advance notice of his intent to tether the animal, nor did she
understand why he would wish to do so.

Umak burst from the hut, still naked. "What have you done?" he cried,
taking in the scene, distraught as he watched the dog roll and strain,
half-dislocating its neck as it arched back in a frenzied attempt to get
its teeth into the thong to pull it loose.

Lonit gasped. She bowed her head. She lowered her eyes. Not against the
sight of the old man's nudity, for, among the People, families often
slept naked together, although Lonit, Umak, and Torka had not slept so
since the night of the great storm. It was the tone of the old man's
voice that had shocked the girl. He had shouted at Torka. It was to
avoid seeing Torka's shame that Lonit had lowered her eyes. One man did
not speak so to another. Ever. Only females might be so abraded. Torka
paled, not understanding what he had done to so anger his grandfather.
"One whiff of dog, and the caribou will scatter like willow leaves
driven before an autumn gale," he explained, then added that he had
thought Umak would want the dog to be restrained before they readied
themselves for the hunt.

"A man does not bind his brother!" Umak shivered violently against the
morning cold. One weathered, high-veined hand went to his throat. He
could feel the stricture of the dog's tether closing about his own neck.
He was sorry that he had shouted. Torka's words were not without
substance, and he had obviously meant well. But when he had tethered the
dog, he had dishonored it, and Umak as well. "Between brothers, there
must be trust. That is the only bond that may exist between them.
Without it .. ." He let the words trail off and took a step toward the
dog, knowing that his fear had not been misplaced.

Seeing his approach, the dog got to its feet. Its black masked head went
down as every hair along the crest of its spine stood on end. A deep,
reverberating growl came from its throat as its quivering lips rolled up
to reveal the threat of its bared teeth. Umak paused. A terrible sense
of remorse filled him. He knew that he had lost a friend.

The dog took several backward steps, then ran forward, throwing all of
its weight against the thong. Stressed beyond its limits, the loop
around the dog's neck snapped, and the stake that held the thong broke
in two. For an instant, it seemed as though the dog was hurling itself
at Umak's throat. Lonit cried out, spilling the tools and bag from her
lap as she jumped to her feet. Torka whirled to grab one of his spears
from where he had placed them, upright, against the pit hut. But the dog
leaped past the old man, hit the ground with its two forepaws, and kept
on going.

Torka readied to throw a spear after it, but Umak stopped him with an
imperative shout.

Respect for his grandfather stayed Torka's hand, but that hand trembled
with frustration as he said, "The dog will drive away the caribou."

Umak's eyes narrowed. Torka was looking at him with an expression that
was more chilling than the air. There was pity in the young man's eyes,
pity for one who was old and no longer capable of making decisions that
could stand unchallenged. A defensive anger sparked within Umak, warming
him with the heat of pride. Dignity kept him from reminding his grandson
that he would be lying dead upon the tundra, looking at the sky forever,
had it not been for Umak's strength and ability to make lifesaving
decisions. He scowled with the regal disdain that only the very old
could feel for the ignorance and impatience and arrogance of youth.

"Torka has acted for the good of the band. Torka believes that Brother
Dog cannot be trusted. But Torka has driven off one who has saved Umak's
life, and Lonit's, and, yes, Torka's too. Umak and Brother Dog have
walked many miles together. We have eaten of the same kills and have
slept in the same camps. Aar is this spirit master's brother. And if he
comes back to claim his rightful place as a member of this band, Torka
will raise no hand against him."

Umak had spoken quietly, but clearly the words had been as much a rebuke
as a command. "The dog will not come back," replied Torka, frowning. Had
he heard correctly? Had Umak actually called the beast a name, as though
it were a man? Although he had already pressed his grandfather beyond
the bounds that propriety and tradition allowed, he could not resist
pressing for an answer. "Aar?" Umak's chin jabbed imperiously at the
sky. "My grandson has a name. So, too, has my brother."

"Your brother is a dog, Grandfather," reminded Torka. He was deeply
troubled. The old man looked so frail standing stark naked in the cold,
with his lean, sinewy arms locked together across the bony expanse of
his chest. Torka recalled the many times that Egatsop had pointed out
Umak's failings to him. Her voice seemed to be whispering contemptuously
upon the rising wind of morning. Umak is old. Umak has lost his powers.
Umak is no longer the man that he once was. Umak is no longer a spirit
master. Umak is no longer even master of his own mind. Umak is a
liability to the People.

But now the People were no more. Torka was alone in the world with Umak
and Lonit. Both had worked to save his life; but now that he was well
and strong again, he knew the truth, which Umak might well deny. Their
lives depended upon Torka. The girl was so young, and until this moment,
Torka had not realized just how old Umak really was. Perhaps Egatsop had
been right about him. Perhaps his wisdom, like the resiliency of his
body, was a thing of the past. His strange attachment to the dog seemed
to confirm this.

Gently Torka said to him: "Grandfather. It is time to forget the dog.
Torka did not intend to drive it away, but now that it is gone, Torka
says that this is a good thing. Never before have dogs and men walked
together. Never before have they shared their kills or their
encampments. If the dog comes back, it will follow us on the hunt. It
will drive away the game." Umak harrumphed, irked by the unmistakable
condescension in his grandson's voice. "As it drove the sun eater away
from Lonit to send it banking downward onto Torka's spear?"

Lonit felt her face flush. The tension between the two hunters seemed to
stress the very air she breathed. She knelt and began to pick up her
spilled tools. If only Torka had seen the way the dog had stood with
Umak against the foxes! If only he had seen the animal lie down at the
feet of the hunter! If only he had seen the beast take food from the
hand of a man! If only she were not a female, unfit to speak her
thoughts to anyone not of her own gender, she would tell Torka of these
things; then he would know that Umak was a great and powerful spirit
master and that the wild dog had been under the spell of his magic.
"Torka needs no dog to assist him with his kills!" Torka responded hotly
to Umak's cool sarcasm.

"Hmmph!" replied Umak. "We will see. Come. Let us prepare for the hunt.
Let us don our stalking cloaks. This old man is cold. This old man would
kill caribou. This old man would see how much Torka has remembered of
all that Umak has taught him."

They killed. And killed again. When the second cow went down, twitching
and slobbering with two spears in her belly, the herd broke and ran
before them--a teeming river of bawling calves and snorting, an tiered
cows, which spread outward before them from horizon to horizon, as far
as their eyes could see.

"No dog could drive away so much game!" said Umak.

Torka made no comment. He did not want to admit that the old man was
right. Still, he felt better now that his blood was up from the killing,
and he was actually glad that Umak had outperformed him. Despite his
stiff leg, the old man had been directing their hunt as though he, and
not Torka, was a man in his prime. Torka had not allowed Umak his kills.
The old man had taken them, and he knew it. Of the five spears that had
been thrown, each had found its target; only one of the weapons belonged
to Torka.

There was a cagey squint to Umak's eyes and a wry grin of smugly
suppressed superiority upon his face as he retrieved his weapons and
stood by while Torka withdrew his own.

Their eyes met and held. As often happened between them, their life
spirits seemed to meld. Each knew the thoughts of the other. This old
man is not so old that he cannot still out-hunt his grandson.

Torka nodded, chastised. This man has misjudged one who could still
bring down a great white hear if he chose to do so.

Umak's grin widened to show strong, time-worn teeth. He knelt, peeled
off one of his gloves, and thrust a bare hand into the wound that
Torka's spear had inflicted upon the now-dead cow. "This was a death
wounding," he conceded.

Torka smiled, knowing that his grandfather's words had been meant to
soothe feelings from their earlier conflict. He knelt beside the old
man, took off one of his gloves, and thrust his hand into the wound that
Umak's spear had made.

"Torka and Umak are a good team," he said. "Working together, we have
killed this cow twice!"

They killed no more that day. They made the song that generations of
hunters of the band had made in gratitude to the spirits of slain game.
They tried not to think of those who would not hunt with them again, but
they were there, whispering in the wind, watching from the sky.

But the dead could not eat, and Umak and Torka were both ravenous. They
gouged out the eyes of the caribou and sucked the bittersweet black
juices from them. They pierced the upper bellies of their kills, pulled
out the hearts, and ate them, making a ceremony of the eating as they
felt the life spirits of the caribou fill them with warmth, strength,
and renewed purpose. They smiled at one another. It had been too long
since they had eaten of the blood and flesh of the caribou; this was the
best meat of all.

The cows that they had taken were relatively small, tender haunched
yearlings with no calves that would starve for want of their milk. The
hunters hefted them with ease and plodded back to their encampment,
where Lonit awaited them.

She offered the traditional female greeting, which they, as males,
pretended to ignore. They dropped their offerings before her, then
removed their antlered stalking cloaks and hunkered down by the fire
that she had made within a wind-protective nest of stones and sods. Now
she began the obligatory litany of praise. Custom decreed that the man
speak no acknowledgment, but although they kept their silence, their
faces showed their surprise. The cadence of Lonit's praise song was
perfect. Her voice was so pleasant and soft, it seemed to gentle the
cold, flat breath of the ever-present wind. The little side-stepping
dance, performed slowly, with ritual simplicity, took the girl in a
graceful circuit of the game. When she paused before them, Umak made a
loud exhalation of approval, and although Torka made no comment, Lonit
beamed with delight--not only because she was pleased by the game, but
because her praise song had been accepted by her men.

Her men. The concept made her giddy with happiness. She set to work,
dragging the carcasses downwind and well away from the pit hut, lest
predators be drawn by the smell of meat and happen upon man instead.
With her sharp fleshing knife, she opened the bellies of the caribou and
cut out the blood meats. These she brought to the hunters, carrying the
livers and kidneys in her hands. Still warm with life, they steamed in
the chill air, and the smell of their rich, dark sweetness was heady. To
her amazement, while Torka took his portion and began to eat, Umak
magnanimously shared a part of his treasures with her, slicing off
dripping ribbons of what were his by right and insisting that the girl
consume them on the spot. This she did and was further delighted when
she brought the long lengths of intestines to the hunters. These, too,
Umak shared with her, portioning off generous sections that were filled
with a delicious puddinglike mass of highly nutritious lichens and
mosses made soft by the sharp, acidic tang of digestive juices. Not
since childhood, when her mother had shared such delicacies with her,
had Lonit tasted any of the prized portions of any big game. Her food
had been leftovers, cast-off sections of marrowbones with the best parts
already chewed by others, scraps of meat too tough to be eaten by any
but the most unworthy, and whatever "woman meat" she had been able to
catch for herself: birds and rodents and fish, grubs in season--all
considered meat unfit for males, except during the time of the long dark
when the starving moon rose and the People ate without complaint
whatever they could get.

Their hunger sated, Torka and Umak rose and completed the skinning of
the caribou while the girl stood by, admiring their skill. The skinning
of big game was a man's work; no female would dare even to think of
doing it lest she offend the spirit of the deceased animal. Yet Lonit
found herself watching curiously, observing the swift, sure movements of
the hunters' hands as, with beautifully dresseB blades of flint, they
lifted the skins and drew them away from the flesh beneath.

This done, the men returned to the fire and seated themselves. They
picked at the remaining pieces of liver, kidney, and intestine. Soon
they were dozing.

Now Lonit set to the butchering. First she spread out the skins, hair
side down, and weighted them with stones. She was careful not to stretch
them. Hides stretched when still wet would soon stiffen and become
unworkable. The girl eyed the expanse of bloody, cursorily scraped
skins. They were already crusting in the dry, freezing wind. Tomorrow,
she would scrape more fragments of tissue from them. Several days would
pass before they were ready for additional working. When she was
satisfied that they were dry enough, she would sleep with the raw skins,
flesh side down against her body. The warmth of her skin would permeate
them with curative oils that could only be obtained by prolonged contact
with human skin. The next day they would be scraped again and stretched
tautly in the freezing wind. Eventually, after several more scrapings
and stretchings Lonit would have hides soft enough to be formed into
new garments for her men. She would sew them with infinite care and join
the seams so that not even the coldest wind could penetrate them. Then,
on stormy days, when the hunters went out into the brutal cold of the
time of the long dark, they would know that, at least in some small
ways, Lonit was not without value. Perhaps then Torka would smile at
her. Perhaps then he would begin to see that she was not totally without
worth.

She thought these thoughts as she imagined the many caribou that Torka
and Umak would bring to her for butchering in the days to come. She
would make new clothes for them all! She could see the hides stretched
out beneath the sun and smiled as she worked to cut the meat from the
bodies of the caribou. Her back ached and her hands were raw, but she
did not care. This meat was for Torka and Umak. She was proud to be
their woman and to be able to prepare the meat for them. She worked and
worked, and soon thin red fillets of muscle tissue were hanging to dry
over frames of bone. Ignoring her fatigue, she turned her attention to
another task and began to pound the joint bones, cracking them open,
preparing to extract the marrow that lay within.

"You will stop now! You will come to the fire!"

Torka's voice startled her. She looked up to see that he was awake. He
scowled at her as he sat cross-legged beside the sleeping mound of a
snoring Umak. To her surprise, the world had gone dark. Bold auroral
patterns of gold and blue and green pulsed in the night sky. The smell
of roasting meat readied her. Her stomach growled. She realized with a
start that she was hungry again.

Torka beckoned. His face was immobile as she went to him and took from
his hand a bone skewer upon which long strips of caribou tongue had been
roasted. In the soft glow of the fire, with the multicolored
luminescence of the aurora at his back, Torka's handsomeness was so
overwhelming that Lonit could not move. Her hand froze in midair. She
trembled visibly.

"Take! Eat! Almost A Woman has done a woman's work . the work of a dozen
women! Does she not know when it is time to stop? Does she not know when
it is time to rest?" He patted the ground beside him irritably. "Here.
Sit on the skins beside Torka. Be warm by the fire. Rest. Eat!"

The invitation was so overwhelming that her knees nearly buckled. She
sat down. They ate in silence beneath the dancing colors of the night,
with the wind whispering all around and sparks rising from the fire like
stars trying to climb into the sky. The girl watched them, eating
slowly, tasting nothing, thinking only of the closeness of the man who
sat beside her. She was so aware of him that every nerve ending in her
skin seemed raw, waiting for the slightest word from him, wanting to be
touched by him, but he sat in silence, unmoving, staring into the night,
lost in his own thoughts. His face was set. Not even the fire glow could
warm the sadness that Lonit saw in his eyes. In time, that sadness
filled the girl, for she knew that, although he had called her to sit
beside him, he was unaware of her. His heart was with his woman, with
his children, with all that he had lost and would never be able to hold
close again.

As the night deepened, the wind rose and the temperature dropped. They
went into the pit hut to take shelter against the cold. Before dawn,
Lonit was awakened by the howling of a wild dog. She lay awake in the
darkness, wondering if it was Brother Dog, listening to its cries and to
the low, even pull and release of Torka's breath. Rolled in his sleeping
skins, he slept soundly beside her. It was a while before she realized
that she could not hear the familiar snoring of the old man.

She sat up, squinting, trying to see into the dark and succeeding. Umak
was gone.

She had been so tired from her labors that she had discarded only her
bloodied outer tunic before crawling beneath her bed skins. She did not
don it now. She wrapped herself in one of her bed skins and, after
pulling on her boots, tiptoed out of the pit hut to stand in the wind
and the first blue light of morning.

She saw Umak at once. He stood silhouetted against the dawn. His head
was thrown back. His hair whipped in the wind. With arms raised, he
cried aloud to the rising sun. But he did not cry with the voice of a
man. He howled with the voice of a wild dog.

And as Lonit listened, Brother Dog answered from out of the distant
hills, and the voices of man and beast were one.

The next day, when Torka and Umak went out to hunt again, the dog was
waiting for them. It stood on a tundral hillock, its thick fur ruffling
in the wind. It watched the caribou as they grazed. The wind blew past
the dog, taking its scent. The caribou caught no smell of it, nor did
they note the smell of man; for as the hunters approached the herd, they
rubbed fresh caribou feces onto their stalking cloaks, thus masking
their own scent.

The dog watched the hunters as they bent forward, imitating the slow,
halting steps of grazing game, disguised as caribou within their an
tiered stalking cloaks. It was difficult to tell that they were men at
all. But the dog knew--it had walked too many miles with Umak not to
have been imprinted by him. The old man's howls had drawn it back toward
the encampment from across the lonely distances into which it had fled.
The pack instinct was strong in the dog. Although its hackles rose when
it thought of Torka, Umak had become its brother. They were of one pack.
And the dog, by nature a social animal, had no wish to hunt or live
alone.

Born for the chase, Aar did not have to be instructed in the best way to
help the pack make a successful kill. To the amazement of Torka and
Umak, the dog trotted down from the hilltop, gaining speed with every
step, and raced through the rive ring herd, driving caribou in every
direction until the entire herd was on the run. Barking aggressively,
singling out its intended prey and cutting them from the herd, the dog
snapped at flying hooves as it drove several cows and calves straight
into the waiting spears of Umak and Torka. Hamstringing the beleaguered
game, the dog then backed away and stopped, watching as the men made
their kills, and by this behavior conceding to them their dominant role
as masters of the pack.

Umak was elated. "Brother Dog drives the game," he said, reminding Torka
of his earlier words. "But not away. He drives it to the hunters!"

Torka stared at the panting, bloody-muzzled dog and tried to make sense
of what he had just witnessed. It was not possible for a dog to hunt
with the wisdom of a man, but Aar had done just that, and more. The dog
had made it possible for Umak and Torka to take twice the game with only
half their usual effort. Torka frowned, admitting to himself that Umak
must truly have mastered the spirit of the animal. He rodded, wanting to
be convinced for the old man's sake; yet he was not entirely satisfied.
No matter how he reasoned it out, it was not natural for a dog to keep
company with men. Something about it made him uneasy. But the animal had
earned its portion this day; this much Torka would not debate. Life was
good. Even if ghost spirits from the abandoned winter camp followed to
whisper on the wind of death and desolation, Torka, Umak, and Lonit were
too busy to listen. The girl tended the new camp while the men hunted.
The dog always ran ahead of them, driving game toward their waiting
spears as though it had been trained to do so. They took much meat,
enough to last through the ripening time of light and on into the
dreaded return of the time of the long dark. The girl cured many hides,
enough to make new garments for them all. Soon there was no need to
hunt. Still the caribou continued to move across the land, pouring out
of the east in numbers so vast that it seemed as though the herds were
not composed of individual animals but were one endless, teeming being.

And then they were gone.

Torka stared across an empty, silent world. He stood upon a tundral
hummock. Below, the scars of the caribous' passing lay dark upon the
still-frozen land. They had vanished into the far western hills.

"They will return," said Umak. The old man had come to stand beside his
grandson. The dog was with him, close, but not too near, and well out of
Torka's reach. Umak drew in a deep breath of the morning, then exhaled
it with enthusiasm. The last few days of food and rest and good hunting
had made him feel young again. "This is a good camp. When the caribou
come east, we will be here to greet them. They will be meat for us in
the time of the long dark."

"From where do they come? To where do they go?" queried Torka. Umak
harrumphed. "That no man may know. The caribou walk back and forth
across the world. They go to secret places where only the caribou may
go."

"I wonder...." Torka turned his gaze eastward across the vast, rolling
plain over which the caribou had come. On the horizon, a broad,
snowcapped mountain shimmered in the haze generated by the distance
through which Torka viewed it. Beyond the mountain, the tundral steppe
rolled on into infinity. Torka stared at it thoughtfully. "It is from
somewhere beyond that mountain that the caribou have come to graze, to
calve, to eat of the tundra in the days of sun. But always, when the
time of the long dark comes near, the caribou turn back, returning
eastward. Where do they go? Why do they go? Upon what do they feed when
they disappear in the days of the starving moon? If hunters could
follow, if men could hunt caribou in the winter dark ..."

Umak interrupted Torka with another harrumph. "No man may do this! The
sun calls to the caribou. They follow, to a secret place in the sky,
above the mountains, into the face of the rising sun itself!

"Is it so?"

"It is so," Umak affirmed, for what the fathers of his father had spoken
in days long beyond remembering was sacred. It was not to be questioned.

Beneath a cloud of migrating birds, Lonit searched for stones with which
to make a bola. Her head ached, and her breasts were tender as she bent
to sort through pebbles that lay about a large, lichen-crusted boulder.
On the southern face of the stone, where lichen did not grow, the
boulder was so smooth that it seemed to have been scoured. Ordinarily,
the girl would have noticed this, for the unusual always caught her eye,
but she did not feel well and was absorbed in thoughts of her
unworthiness.

"Look at this female! she said to herself, her mouth drawn against her
teeth. A few days of butchering, and Lonit is as stiff and sore and
grouchy as an old woman! Never has she felt like this before. Lonit
dishonors the men who allow her to share their camp. Even the dog is
more important than Lonit!

Her silent self-recriminations went on, intensifying when she could find
no pebbles of the right shape or size. How could she make a proper bola
without the right stones? She had already prepared the four leather
thongs to which the stones would be tied; each thong was made of three
strips of sinew, meticulously braided into thirty-inch lengths, which
were brought together at one end and secured by yet another thong. When
the loose ends of the four braids were weighted with stones--with two
condor feathers attached to the united end to stabilize and guide the
bola in flight--Lonit would possess the perfect snare weapon with which
to catch the land birds and waterfowl that filled the sky. Soon they
would be nesting in the thousand pools and lakes that would jewel the
tundra after the spring thaw. Even now the more shallow lakes were
partially free of ice, and tiny, sparrow like long spurs were landing
everywhere to pick at the thinly frosted tundra for bits of new growth
and remnants of last year's grasses. Soon they would be nesting, they
and uncounted other winged nomads of the skies. There would be eggs to
gather and suck.

But now as a dull, deep cramp pulled at Lonit's belly, not even the
thought of such long-anticipated delicacies could cheer her. Coupled
with her aching head and tender breasts, the cramp was a further sign of
her unworthiness. Within her gloves, her work-worn palms were clammy.
She felt so strange. She wondered if she would die. The speculation was
so engrossing that, when Umak came up behind her, she jumped, startled.

"Almost A Woman has come far from the camp alone. This is not a good
thing. Always there is danger when one walks alone. For what does Lonit
search?"

She stood before him. His rebuke shamed her. She dared not look at him.
She knew that he was right. She felt so miserable that she did not doubt
for a moment that she was not fit to look at him. She answered lest her
silence offend him. "Lonit would make a bola. Lonit has come out from
the camp to look for stones."

"There is much meat on the drying frames. There is much meat in the
cache pits. Lonit has no need to make a bola. Lonit looks tired. Come.
Almost A Woman will never be a woman if she does not stop her work and
allow herself to rest. If she walks alone far from camp, flesh eaters
will stalk her, and her men will have to put themselves at risk to save
her."

Her shame deepened. She had tried so hard not to allow either Umak or
Torka to see her weakness. She had been so proud to do a woman's work
for them, to have the opportunity to show them that she was skilled at
making meat and hides and garments and a proper encampment. They had
been appreciative, in the tacit way that men showed their approval--with
grunts, nods, and by taking what she offered without comment; consent
was the highest form of flattery a female might hope for. If a man ate
her cooking or donned a garment or ornament that she had made for him,
her heart sang with pride. And this Lonit's heart had done .. . until
the weariness had come upon her. Until her head had begun to ache. Until
her breasts had suddenly swelled and begun to hurt. She had remembered
then. She had known that Umak and Torka were only tolerating her,
accepting her efforts on their behalf because they had no other choice.
She was the only female left to do a woman's work.

When Umak looked at her, he must secretly lament the lost lives of all
of the fine females who had shared his bed skins during his long life.
Now only a homely, unworthy girl was left to flatter him in his old age.
If indeed he believed that a new band would someday be born through her,
his manhood must shrivel at the thought of coupling with such a weak and
insignificant creature. No doubt he would leave this to Torka. And if
Torka had his way, new life would simply come out of Lonit as insects
emerged from the skin of the tundra--by magic, spawned of themselves as
fish spawned of melting ice carried in the currents of a river.

Even then, Lonit was certain that she would not be valuable. When she
was old, the children that she had borne would be ashamed to call her
mother. She would wander off into the winter dark, leaving them to live
their lives, hoping that they would soon forget her.

But in the meantime, she was alive, and when she had gone off in quest
of the stones, she had been thinking of her responsibilities to her men.
She had been thinking of the future and of the past. She had been
remembering the way it had been for the band during those last nights of
the starving moon. Yes. The men had brought much meat into this new
camp. And Lonit had prepared it and cached it against lean times to
come. But could there ever be enough meat in any encampment? If starving
times came again, would not even the pink, fatty meat of the great geese
and swans that flew ahead of the rising spring sun and, disappeared into
its dying light at summer's end be welcome? It was "woman meat," but
cured by long smoking over fires of dried caribou dung and tundral sod,
it would serve to keep her men alive when the last of the caribou "man
meat" was gone.

These were Lonit's thoughts as she followed Umak back to the encampment.
He had told her to rest, and rest she would; but her belly cramps would
not allow her to sleep.

The night would not be fully black again for months. Yet it was dark as
Umak and Torka sat before a little fire of bones and dung. They spoke
quietly together, savoring the feel of a wind that, for the first time
in what seemed too long to remember, bore no sting of winter.

There was no moon. Against a leaden sky, an owl soared, a pale
discoloration against the night, for its white winter plumage had still
not fully turned to summer brown. Torka looked up. He followed the pale
blur of its flight until it disappeared. All around, the night was
filled with the awakening sounds of spring, of water running in a
thousand streams, dripping beneath melting snow fields into air pockets
that insulated the yielding earth beneath. Across the fire from him,
Umak chewed on a long strip of caribou meat--holding it in one hand,
while he sawed it off, close to his mouth, with a sharp blade of flint
that he held in the other. As Torka watched him, Umak's stone dagger cut
through the meat as easily as it sliced warm fat. Umak grunted with
contentment. Through the mouthful of meat, he said that Lonit had
prepared the meat well. Torka nodded begrudgingly. The girl had cut the
strips against the grain, and very thin; they had dried quickly in the
wind and were as tender as though she had pounded them with stones. She
was proving to be a better camp maker than Egatsop had ever been. She
was a hard worker and meticulous at every task to which she set her
skilled hands. Although she had made no complaint, Torka had seen the
strained look of fatigue on her face when Umak had earlier brought her
back to camp and had insisted that she rest. He had sensed the weariness
growing within her over the last few days. He brooded over it now,
thinking that even though he disliked the girl, perhaps he and Umak were
going to have to rethink certain traditions of the band. There was man's
work and woman's work; but now, in all the world, there were only two
men, and only one woman. No. Not even that. Almost A Woman might be
nearly as tall as Umak and surprisingly strong for one of her years, but
she was still only a girl. She could not be allowed to do too much. Umak
watched Torka as he ate. As so often happened, he knew what his grandson
was thinking. The old man spoke thoughtfully. "In a new life, men must
seek new ways." He took a mouthful of meat, sliced it off, then
vigorously spat it out. It landed unannounced on the nose of the dog
that dozed in the firelight. Roused instantly, Aar snapped it up and
gulped it down whole.

Umak chuckled. "New times make new kinships. If this old man can become
brother to a dog, then Torka may also assist a woman with her work."

"Lonit is no woman. She is a child. She does not need to work so much.
We are two. She labors as though she had an entire band to feed. She
works too hard. She cooks too much. She shames the memory of the women
of the band on purpose, I think. It is not a good thing."

Umak eyed Torka thoughtfully. He had seen himself reborn in his
grandson. They were alike in so many ways. Yet, from the first, there
was a quality within Torka that even his wise, watchful eyes had been
unable to define. When at last Torka had come to his manhood, that
quality was still there . deep, subtle, a power growing in the spirit of
the man . unseen, unfathomed, like a current flowing in a great river,
hidden by winter ice but there all the same. Someday it would ripple the
surface of the water. Someday it would shatter the ice that held it
captive. Someday it would break forth to reshape the land. Someday, but
not now. Now the scars of a wounded life were too thick upon his spirit.
They blinded him to everything but the past. He could not even see the
merit of one young girl who tried so hard to please him.

Umak sighed. He mulled over the many miles that he had walked with the
girl. His lids came down, and he stared into the fire, allowing memories
to spark along with the light that danced into his eyes, through his
lashes--multicolored, as though viewed through a crystal.

"Hmmph," said the old man, not feeling old at all but young and warm
with his belly full of meat and his body fully rested for the first time
in months. "Almost A Woman is just that. She is strong. She is brave.
She is not a child. She has no wish to shame the memory of the women of
the band. She tries hard to please us, because she is ashamed that she
is not more like them." Torka exhaled an Umak-like harrumph and told his
grandfather that he was not seeing clearly.

The old man measured his grandson across the flames. "Umak has lived
long. Umak has seen many things. And Umak will tell you this about
Almost A Woman: Even the plainest bud, long dormant beneath the ice of
the winter dark, is soon a flower, swelling and open and eager to accept
the gift of life beneath the warmth and light of the summer sun."

His meaning was clear. The idea was one that Torka did not even want to
consider. "Lonit is not a woman!" he insisted.

Umak sighed almost dreamily, flung the last of the meat to the dog, then
pulled his bison-skin robe higher about his shoulders. "Now Lonit is a
girl," he conceded. His voice was low, thoughtful, weighted by an inner
sadness. "Soon she will be a woman .. . the only woman...." He laced his
arms about his bent knees and rested his head upon them. He was suddenly
sleepy. He yawned. He closed his eyes and listened to the wind and the
sound of the earth opening itself to spring. "Soon .. he said again,
drifting into sleep. Dreams came instantly, of far lands, of bounteous
hunts, of women who had loved him and walked beside him beneath the
savage Arctic skies of his youth. The girl was not a part of the dreams,
for they were of the past. Lonit was an unopened flower, awaiting the
rising of a future sun as she dreamed her own dreams in the last days of
the winter dark.

Torka sat alone by the fire. Wolves howled in the distance. His thoughts
turned inward--to his lost woman, his infant, the beloved little son
whom he would never see again. He closed his eyes. In the dying light of
the fire, only the wild dog saw his tears.

It was the growling of the dog that woke him. From the moment that Torka
opened his eyes until the moment of the attack, only seconds passed. It
seemed a lifetime.

A fierce alertness coursed in his veins. He was awake instantly. He was
aware of being watched, like some captive thing awakening within a trap,
with hunters gathered all around, ready to tear him to pieces.

Umak slept on, still sitting wrapped within his bison-skin robe. Not
recognizing him as prey, one of the dire wolves leaped right over him,
heading straight for Torka. Too late, Torka realized that he was too far
from the pit hut to make a grab for his spears. He would have cursed
himself for being a careless fool, but there was not even time for that.

The huge wolf was a blur against the night as the dog leaped to
intercept its spring. Torka was on his feet, ready to block the beast's
attack with his upraised arms, but to his amazement, the wolf was
knocked to the ground at his feet. The dog was on top of it.
Disbelieving, Torka saw their bodies seem to blend into a shadowed mass
of fur and legs as their combined snarls ended with a garbled yap of
pain as the dog's ripping teeth and burrowing snout tore out the throat
of the dire wolf.

The pack was closing now--heavy jawed, heads down and slavering. There
were four of them, with a big male in the lead. Torka dove for his
weapons. His spears stood upright with Umak's against the pit hut. Torka
grabbed two of them, and the rest collapsed with a clatter as he whirled
to face the wolves alone.

"Umak!" He cried the old man's name, but his grandfather slept on,
oblivious to danger. There was no time for Torka to rouse him. "Come!"
he shouted at the wolves, knowing from experience that a show of bravado
was usually sufficient to drive their kind away.

The clouded sky gave off a soft gray light of its own. Torka could see
the wolves clearly as they advanced, one halting step at a time. Why did
the wolves risk themselves? Had they not also feasted off the passing
caribou? They showed no signs of starvation. Their coats were thick,
their sides sleek. Their eyes glowed, staring directly into Torka's
eyes, and suddenly he understood. They savored the taste of man. They
preferred it to less hostile prey. They had eaten their fill of it miles
away, westward in the abandoned encampment where Torka's people lay
looking at the sky, defenseless against their ravening predations. The
thought filled Torka with rage. He hurled one of his spears. It missed
its target by inches. He threw the other, just as the smallest member of
the pack leaped for him. Surprised in midair, the wolf impaled itself
and fell, twitching and screaming in agony.

The sound filled the night. Umak awoke with a start. He blinked as the
scene before him slowly came into focus. One dire wolf was dead upon the
ground. Another twitched in its death throes at Torka's feet. And two
more were snarling, advancing on Brother Dog. He blinked again. Was he
dreaming? It took him several seconds to understand what he was seeing,
and several more for his mind to tell his body what it must do. By then,
Lonit had come out of the pit hut.

Clad only in her under tunic with her fleshing dagger in one hand, she
did not hesitate. She let out a cry that rivaled that of the dying wolf
as she ran boldly toward the interlopers, menacing them as fiercely as
they menaced her men. Torka reached for the spear that had fallen short
and, lifting it, echoed Lonit's strident cry.

The smaller of the two wolves cringed. It knew that it had lost all hope
of any advantage. It wheeled and fled, and its companion followed. But
the leader of the pack, the big male, did the unexpected. It, too,
wheeled--not to flee, but to lunge for the audacious, knife-wielding
girl.

Caught off-balance, Lonit went down with the wolf atop her, its teeth
deep in her forearm. The blade flew from her hand.

Now Umak was on his feet, spear in hand as Torka threw his weapon aside
and leaped to tackle the wolf. He fell upon the beast, grappling at its
neck, feeling its power tense and twist beneath his own. Then the wolf
went limp. Umak had thrust his spear downward with all of his weight
behind it. It pierced the wolf's skin, passed between its ribs, and
drove straight into its heart, killing it instantly. "Aiyee-eh!" exhaled
the old man, withdrawing the spear point with a vengeance. Blood spurted
from the wound. It was black in the darkness, almost as black as Umak's
mood. His reaction time in the face of danger had been slow, too slow,
and he knew it. His youthful spirit had screamed at him to hurry, but
his body had betrayed him; it had moved as though made of stone. Because
of his failure to leap to the attack, the girl had fallen beneath the
wolf. Torka had simply been too far away to do more than he had. Umak
felt sick with shame. His cry had not been a shout of victory; it had
been an exclamation of self-disgust.

Impatiently, Torka pushed himself off the wolf and rolled its limp body
aside. He felt himself go cold with dread as he saw the equally limp,
bloodied body of the girl lying beneath it. One arm was folded across
her face. The leather of her sleeve was punctured in a dozen places,
shredded, saturated with blood. Torka knelt beside her, afraid to touch
her, afraid to breathe. Blood was all over her. Hers, or the blood of
the wolf? He could not tell. He wondered if she was dead. Confused
emotions swarmed in his head like stinging insects upon the summer
tundra. His heart was like ice as he realized how much he would miss
her. Not because she was a hard worker, not because she labored
unceasingly at the countless skills that were a portion of woman wisdom.
Not even because she was the only female in the world. But simply
because she was Lonit. The realization was shattering. Yes, she was
homely, with her great, round, antelope eyes and her unsightly dimples
that formed in the hollows beneath her cheekbones whenever she smiled.
Yes, she was too tall for a girl, and too slender, but she was as brave
as the proudest hunter and as uncomplaining as any woman of the band had
ever hoped to be. Until this moment, Torka had not realized how much he
had come to care for her. And he did not want to care. He would not let
himself care. His memories of Egatsop would not allow it.

"Lonit?" It was Umak who spoke the girl's name softly, tentatively,
half-afraid that her life spirit had left her body. Within his belly,
the sickness of shame congealed into nausea. If the wolf had taken
Lonit's life, her death would be Umak's fault.

But the girl was not dead. She was merely stunned and hurt--and
frightened. Slowly, her. injured arm moved. Her eyelids flickered. She
looked up at Torka through bloodstained lashes and, without willing
herself to do so, flung her arms about his neck and buried her face in
the warm hollow of his neck as she sat upright. He was alive! She had
been certain that the wolves had eaten him! She clung to him, then
remembered that the wolves had also menaced Umak. She peeked over
Torka's shoulder to see the old man standing close, with the dog at his
side. Relief flooded her. She smiled wanly. "The wolves are gone? And we
are still together ... all of us ... Umak and Torka, Brother Dog and
Lonit ... we are still one band?"

"One band," affirmed Umak, wondering if the girl had seen his failure.

She had not. She had eyes only for Torka as, gently, he pried her arms
from about his neck. She sat very still as he carefully folded back the
tattered layering of her blood-soaked sleeve. She held her arm as steady
as she could. She barely winced as he examined her wounds. His brow
furrowed as he saw the damage that the wolf had done to the soft skin of
her inner forearm.

"This will need sewing," he told her, impressed by her silent endurance
of pain. "Almost A Woman is brave." He spoke the acknowledgment aloud,
only half-aware of what he was saying. It was not right for a female to
be so brave. Egatsop had howled like a gutted wolf during the birth of
her children. The sound of a woman wailing made her man feel strong. Was
this homely, round-eyed girl trying to unman him?

Unaware of his thoughts, her heart made a little leap of happiness.
Coming from his mouth, the observation was a compliment sweeter than
life itself had ever been. She spoke her heart to him. "With Torka
beside her, Lonit is not afraid of anything!"

She looked so young and vulnerable and trusting that he had to turn
away. He did not understand her. He did not want to understand her. A
terrible sense of desolation filled him. He thought of the wolves, the
giant condor, and the mammoth that had destroyed the band. He thought of
all of the tundra's hungry, stalking predators, and the vast, lonely
miles that stretched out all around. He heard the wind's soft whispering
as it moved in the night. It spoke to him about the thousand ways in
which a man might die and about how short the lives of a young girl and
an old man would be without a hunter in his prime to protect them.

Slowly, weighed by his thoughts, Torka rose. He had not failed to note
Umak's inability to respond quickly to the attacking wolves. Had it not
been for the warning growls of the dog, the wolves would now be feasting
off their bones. With infinite regret and sadness, Torka was forced to
admit to himself that Umak was old. The days in which he had depended
upon his grandfather for all-sustaining strength and wisdom were gone.
Umak had allowed him to make a nearly fatal error in judgment when they
had set up a butchering camp that two men could not possibly hope to
defend. It was an error that might have cost them their lives. They had
been lucky so far, but now Torka realized that if they were to survive,
they would have to live differently: No longer would they be able to
linger in exposed encampments, as their people had always done, while
meat and skins were cured and the local game was hunted to depletion by
men and boys until, at last, the band was forced to move on, following
the herds in search of new hunting grounds.

But how else could they live? The question cut deeply into his heart. He
was a man of the People. Without them, how long could he hope to hunt
alone, with only an old man and a girl at his side?

He was facing eastward, into the glow of dawn. And suddenly, as he saw
the shimmering silhouette of the distant mountain, he knew what he must
do. Like the herds that turned eastward at the beginning of each time of
the long dark, he must lead his little band into the face of the rising
sun. They would go to the far mountains, where they would encamp, with
high stone walls at their back to protect them from unexpected attacks
by meat-eaters. They would hunt the broad sweep of the tundra as the
People had always done. But they would rest where the People had never
rested before.

He stared straight ahead, letting the high, shouldering image of the
mountain fill him with a renewed sense of purpose.

"Lonit is ready."

The girl's voice distracted him. He looked down to see that Umak had
brought his medicine bag from the pit hut. The old man knelt beside
Lonit, preparing to suture her arm. She sat very still. Very straight.
Very bravely.

"Lonit is not afraid," she said.

Torka looked away, back toward the dawn, into the face of the rising
sun, hating the girl again, wishing that she were dead and that Egatsop
were here in her place. The mountain burned gold, and the tundra rolled
on forever, shivering in the cold breath of the ever-blowing wind.
Somewhere, far across the miles, thunder growled out of the
now-cloudless sky. Torka listened. He knew that it was not thunder. It
was the distant trumpeting of a mammoth.

He closed his eyes. Memories of the Destroyer walked within his mind.
Around him, the world was silent except for the low, whispering wail of
the wind. The mammoth did not roar again, but Torka thought of Nap and
Alinak, of Egatsop and of little Kipu, of all whom lay dead, looking at
the sky. He opened his eyes. The wind whirled around him, once again
speaking to him of the thousand ways in which a man might die. The wild
dog was watching him. Their eyes met. Then Torka looked away, not
wanting an animal to see what he would not reveal to Umak or Lonit.
Torka was afraid.

"Now we must go from this place."

Torka's announcement stunned both Umak and Lonit. They stared at him.
His face was grim. His arms were folded across his chest. He had made a
necklace of the paws of the wolves that had been killed, this not to
honor the spirits of the beasts but to show mastery of them. They had
fed upon the bodies of his people. By taking the paws, he had prevented
the beasts' life spirits from walking the spirit world. He had killed
the wolves. Forever. And now their claws hung downward over his outer
tunic, the paws still bleeding around the thong that pierced their
flesh.

He saw the expressions of astonishment upon Umak's and Lonit's faces. He
knew that by asking them to abandon this camp, he was also asking them
to leave behind most of the meat that they had taken. Hours of work
would be wasted. The lives of the caribou that they had killed would be
wasted, and this would be a grievous offense to the life spirits of the
game. Yet it must be risked.

"In a new life, men must seek new ways." He looked directly at Umak as
he quoted the old man's words. "Umak has given new life to Torka and
Lonit. Now we must walk from this camp, as Umak walked from the winter
camp of the People because he knew that he could not defend the living
from the beasts that would come to eat of the dead. The wolves have
shown us that this camp cannot be defended." He paused. The next words
would be difficult for his listeners to digest. "We must go to the far
mountain. Upon its flanks, we will make a new camp and will have the
advantage over any predator that would come against us. Upon its flanks,
we will have a new life. Here, in this camp, we cannot live, except in
the blood of the beasts that will come to eat us."

Lonit flinched. Her face paled. The People had always avoided the
mountains. It was well-known that the wind spirits lived there,
eternally giving birth to clouds and storms. Lonit had heard their
voices many times ... in terrible, deep roarings and crackings ... in
desolate moanings that echoed in the canyons and wailed out onto the
tundra from high, unknown vastnesses where the People had never gone-not
even to follow the caribou. To venture into the high realm of the wind
spirits was to risk vanishing into the eternal cold and ice of the
misted heights where the wind spirits took form in the ephemeral flesh
of the clouds. Huge. Churning. Shape changing. Man- and woman-eating.

Lonit shuddered.

Torka did not have to be told what she was thinking. He knew of the
tales that were told of the wind spirits. "We will make our camp on the
flank of the mountain," he emphasized, frowning at her for her unspoken
challenge of his decision. "We will not go high."

His words were not comforting. She was still not feeling well. To camp
anywhere even near a mountain was unthinkable. She remembered a story
that her mother had told:
Long ago, in yesterdays that existed only on the far edges of the
People's group memory, a headman whose name was long forgotten led the
band to make an encampment close to a high peak. Hunting was good. Many
days passed. Then, in the time of the endless sun, the wind spirits grew
jealous of the band's good fortune. They caused a great mass of ice to
fall from the heights of the mountain. It buried the encampment. Many
died. Never again had the People risked offending the wind spirits by
venturing too close to their mountains. Lonit would have liked to remind
Torka of this. But surely he knew it! He was Torka. He would suggest
nothing that might prove hazardous to them. They were at risk upon the
open tundra. Her recently stitched and bound arm testified to that.
Still, a knot tightened in her stomach when she thought of the far
mountain. She told herself that she was being foolish. They could not
stay where they were. It was not safe. And they could not go back. There
was nothing to go back to--no People, no camp. Only a hostile land where
the caribou now grazed the greening tundra and, somewhere, the great,
man killing mammoth walked. Its shadowed, bloody memory was more
terrifying than any mountain.

Lonit swallowed down her fear. If Torka's plan was unsound, the spirit
master would question it. But Umak remained silent. He did not even
harrumph. The girl relaxed. If Torka and the spirit master were in
agreement, everything would be all right.

They dismantled the pit hut. Torka observed Umak as they worked. He was
concerned. The incident with the wolves had changed the old man.
Although the teeth of the beasts had ripped Lonit's arm, they had given
Umak a deeper wounding. He moved slowly, lethargically, favoring his bad
leg. He showed no interest in the wolf that he had slain; he had killed
the beast, but something in him seemed to have died with it.

Torka cut the paws from Umak's wolf. He strung them upon a length of
thong. He went to his grandfather and hung them around the old man's
neck.

"For Kipu. For Egatsop. For the People who lie looking at the sky. This
wolf runs no more, in this world or the next, because Umak has killed
him. Forever."

Torka's statement had been meant to bolster the old man's wounded
spirit, but it did not succeed. Umak accepted the necklace without so
much as a grunt or a nod. He knew that his performance against the
wolves had been less than adequate, and he knew that Torka knew it. No
words could stanch the inner bleeding that was slowly draining the old
man of the last vestiges of his pride.

Now, as Torka watched his grandfather listlessly assembling his
traveling pack, Umak seemed to be shrinking before his eyes--aging,
growing weaker. Soon he would dry up and disappear altogether. Without a
sense of self-esteem, even a young man could lose the will to live, and
even the bravest man could become useless on the hunt. For a nomad of
the tundra, death must soon follow the ultimate degradation of being
proved worthless before one's peers. Torka felt sick with frustration.
To live in a world without Umak would be to live in a world eternally
deprived of light. He could not bear to think of it; he had lost too
much already. Umak had saved his life. And Lonit's. Umak had brought
them out of the winter camp, away from certain death, to a new life.
Torka would not stand by and watch him slowly waste away. He knew that
he must counter his grandfather's will to die, even if it meant trying
to shame him back into a sense of pride.

He walked slowly to where the old man crouched beside Lonit. They sorted
through their things, readying to roll them into their pack skins.
"Hmmph!" said Torka as nastily as he could. "Umak works with the speed
of an old woman! Look, even a girl with one arm in a sling works more
quickly than Umak!"

Lonit looked up at Torka, her mouth agape.

Umak froze. Never had his grandson spoken to him with such open
contempt. He took the words as truth. He let them settle. "Umak is old,"
he said.

"It must be so," agreed Torka disdainfully. "Look at Umak! No doubt he
will now ask Torka to carry the bulk of the girl's load plus some of his
own because Umak is old and the girl is injured. Hmmph! Or will he put
his old man's spirit into Brother Dog so that even a beast will be
burdened by the weight of one old man?"

This was too much. Umak reacted as though stung. He was on his feet with
the speed and agility of a man half his years. "No man ... no girl .. .
not even Brother Dog will carry Umak's weight! This old man has come
this far without assistance! This old man has carried Torka when Torka
had not even the strength of a spiritless suckling to lift his own
weight off the ground!"

Relief flooded through Torka. It warmed him. It almost made him smile.
Insult was a venom with healing power. It had put the fire of life back
into Umak's eyes.

Lonit stared from one man to the other, not understanding. She was
horrified to think that she might be the cause of enmity between them.
"Lonit will carry her own load! Lonit is strong! Lonit needs no help!"

Torka measured her with withering reproof. "Almost A Woman has an arm
with many stitches in it. Almost A Woman will not carry a full load. She
will need Torka and Umak to help her. But Umak says that he is old.
Perhaps he would prefer to stay in this place. Perhaps he would find it
easier to give his life spirit to the wind than to go with Torka and
Lonit. Perhaps our life spirits will soon join his because without Umak,
our loads will be great and our weariness will slow our steps. Perhaps
when next wolves come to feed upon us, they will not go hungry from our
camp. They will howl their praises of one old man who was too weak to
continue!" Umak's eyes bulged. His mouth arched downward above the out
thrust jab of his chin. "Hrrmph! This old man will show the suckling
Torka what he can carry! This old man will see who can walk farthest
before growing too weak to continue on!"

Lonit looked at Umak, then at Torka. Suddenly she understood. Umak
seemed reborn! She knew what Torka had done. She smiled. She would walk
to the mountain with confidence now. She would not be afraid, knowing
that she would walk in the company of two spirit masters.

They moved on. The hills were behind them now, extending along the
western horizon like the mounded forms of Sleeping, white-crested
animals. Behind those hills, the land of their ancestors lay cold and
bleak, icebound save for the east-facing valleys and narrow, tundral
plains from which the People had been eking a tenuous existence for
countless generations.

Ahead the land rolled eastward toward the distant mountain. To the north
and south the tundra stretched for a thousand miles before vanishing
into the ice-choked depths of waters that would someday be called the
Chukchi and Bering Seas.

Torka led the way. Umak followed behind Lonit. The dog trotted at his
side across the broad, taut flexings of the greening land. With the
coming of spring, the daytime temperature climbed to just above
freezing. The world filled with the sound of the awakening land as
snowbanks began to melt and glacial runoff poured out of distant
mountains to transform the tundra. In a few hours it would all freeze
again, but as the travelers walked across the open, wind-driven miles,
streams and rivulets were everywhere. Lakes and ponds, thick with
ice-sludge but no longer totally frozen, glistened in the slanting light
of the sun.

They were not aware of when the lay of the land began to change. It led
them subtly downward over shouldering humps of low hills that were thick
with unfamiliar wormwood and sage like scrub. The inclination was so
illusory that they were unaware of it until their shins began to ache
from the unrelieved stress.

The dog stopped first, head up, tail curled, nostrils working to sieve
the wind. There was something different about it. Torka noticed it, too,
as did Umak. They stopped. The girl paused beside them. Her arm ached
within the sling made of strips of caribou hide. Her load was lighter by
half since Umak and Torka had insisted upon dividing much of it between
them. Still, it was a heavy burden; its weight intensified the dull,
deep cramps that refused to leave her lower belly. Readjusting her pack
frame, she wished that the cramps would go away. She hoped they did not
mean her slow but imminent death. She felt miserable as she leaned
forward, hefting her pack higher onto her back. As she did so, she
looked down, her attention suddenly drawn to a scattering of stones that
lay at her feet.

Her first thought was that, at last, she had found the perfect weights
for her stone hurler; for they were all of similar size, approximately
that of the eyeball of a large caribou. Then, as she bent to pick up one
of the stones, she frowned, puzzled. Its sleek, spiraling configurations
were so beautiful that she caught her breath. It was like no stone that
she had ever seen.

It was not a stone.

It was a shell--or had been, untold millennia ago. Now it was a fossil.
It was heavy in the girl's hand. She stared at it, not understanding how
a shell could be made of rock, or how a rock could be shaped like a
shell. Her frown deepened.

There was no way Lonit could know that the object in her hand had once
lain at the bottom of a wide, shallow strait of water. She could not
know that the climate of the world had changed, that when glaciers lay
upon the earth, they held much of the world's moisture captive, and as
they grew, oceans shrank .. . seas atrophied ... a strait rapidly became
a scattering of saltwater lakes and ponds trapped within the low-lying
depressions of its exposed sea bed. Gradually such drying bodies of
water thickened with the detritus of a dying age, suffocating all living
things that had not managed to swim or crawl to deeper, life-sustaining
waters. With the passing of years, a strait could completely disappear.
And shells such as the one that Lonit held in her hand could be buried
in the sediment of centuries, transformed into stone by time and the
inexorable processes of fossilization.

Now, brought to the surface by the pawing hooves of migrating caribou,
the shell spoke to Lonit of another epoch, of another world; but it
spoke in a language that the girl could not understand.

Where once the blue, shining waters of the Bering Strait had stretched
beneath the Arctic sky from the coast of Siberia to the shores of
Alaska, now the skin of the continental shelf lay bared beneath Lonit's
feet.

It was the fragrance of that skin that had brought Torka, Umak, and the
dog to pause. The layering of soil that lay upon the permafrost was
thicker, redolent of the vaguely astringent stink of primordial ooze, of
the thousand unnamed species of marine flora and fauna that had lived
and died and decomposed to form the flesh of this land. It spoke of
ancient seas, and of warmer skies in which a more beneficent sun rose
and set over a less hostile world. Through their highly developed sense
of smell, the hunters knew that the tundral plain that lay ahead of them
was different from any land across which they had ever walked, but Torka
and Umak could not describe the difference. They were men of the Age of
Ice. They had never seen a sea or an ocean, nor could they imagine a
gentler world or a wind that blew beneath a benevolent sun.

"Look!" Umak pointed off. Eastward, between them and the still-distant
mountain, the shapes of high-humped, shaggy camels could be seen
grazing. The old man counted three of them, then squinted and nodded to
affirm another. And there were musk ox! "So much game!" he exclaimed.

Torka made no comment; to have spoken would have been to confirm the
obvious. The sun was as high as it was going to get this day. Soon it
would be dark. The mountain was still for away, and he would not rest
content or allow his "band" to hunt until they had made a safe
encampment upon its flanks.

"We will go," he said, and after Lonit had scooped up several more
fossil shells, he led them on and on, across the wide, rolling land that
had once lain at the bottom of the sea.

They trudged toward the broad, snowcapped mountain that, in future
millennia, would not be a mountain at all but an island rising out of a
shallow sea. It would be called Big Diomede, after a prince of Argos, a
hero among a race of men who would not be born for another forty
thousand years.

But Torka's thoughts were not of the future as Umak, Lonit, and the wild
dog followed him toward that shining mountain. He thought of the
past--of the dead, of all that he had left behind him as, unknowing, he
lengthened his stride and led his people out of Asia toward a new world.

PART III.

MOUNTAIN OF POWER

They walked until the dark came down, but still the mountain loomed
ahead, its huge snowcap glistening in the night.

Exhausted, their bodies aching with fatigue, they stopped and dug a
communal burrow into the lee side of a tundral hummock. They spread
their sleeping skins, and after eating a meal of dried caribou meat,
they bundled together like foxes beneath the windswept indigo sky. They
slept. Umak smiled in his dreams. He was content. He had matched Torka
step for step across the miles. It was the young man who had called for
rest, not the old.

Lonit also smiled in her dreams, for now she kept a secret from her men.
She lay with her back to them, curled up at the very edge of their
sleeping burrow. If they knew her secret, they would make her sleep
alone, and she was afraid of that--the tundra was too dark, too strange,
and too threatening. So she kept her secret, understanding at last that
she would not die from the cramps that had been plaguing her. Had she
been among the women of the band, she would have understood long before
now. She would not have been surprised when she had made her discovery.
Never again would Torka have just cause to call her Almost A Woman. The
spirits of her gender had found her worthy. Lonit had begun to shed a
woman's blood at last. Luckily, she had brought enough scrap cuttings of
skin left over from her sewing to conceal her secret from her men.

Torka lay awake for a long while. He would have preferred to go on, but
the mountain was farther than he had thought. When at last he succumbed
to sleep, his dreams were troubled; they kept him on the edge of
wakefulness, and for this he was glad. He wanted to remain alert to
danger. He had not forgotten the wolves. He could sense the tension ebb
and flow within the dog; he shared it and for the first time was
grateful for the presence of Umak's spirit brother, which lay at the
crest of the hummock, just out of the wind, a self-appointed sentry. If
predators came to sniff out the scent of man, the dog would give
warning. Torka conceded that perhaps the animal's loyalty to Umak was
not without advantages.

Because of the dog, Torka allowed himself to sleep in fitful spurts. His
dreams were troubled, filled with sound--a low, deep roaring that filled
the world. He led Umak and Lonit across miles of darkness, spilled
across the endless black plain of his dream. A wall of water surged
toward him, as black as night, as high as the mountain toward which he
led his band. The incomprehensibly huge wave roared as it threatened to
sweep across the world and drown everything before it. In his dream, he
ran, and Umak and Lonit and the dog ran with him; but the wave came on
and on ... and they were swept away .. . into a black, choking limbo
where their life spirits were lost forever. He awoke with a start and
sat bolt upright. He stared eastward, toward the mountain, into the face
of the rising sun. The night was gone. A new day had been born. And
Torka, who could not know that his dream had been a vision of the
past--and of the future--was glad to be alive as he was warmed by the
light of the dawn that swept across the tundra and turned the entire
world to gold.

They walked on, single file, with the dog in the lead now. Umak strode
out ahead of the girl, and Torka walked close behind her. She leaned
into the wind and watched the dog trotting on, its tail up, curled high
over its back.

Ordinarily, the sight of the animal would have been comforting to Lonit.
The dog's manner often amused her, and she was certain that, if danger
lay ahead, the dog would alert its human pack. But then Lonit began to
sense that they were being watched. She frowned. Aar kept his pace,
heading ever eastward toward the mountain. If he sensed eyes watching
them, he showed no sign of it.

After a while, although the sensation of being watched remained strong,
Lonit told herself that she was being a foolish female. After all, Umak,
Torka, and the dog were hunters. Her senses were not nearly as acute as
theirs. And it was well-known that when a woman was in her time of
blood, her thinking was as erratic as her moods. Had she been traveling
with the People, she would have been isolated from all except females in
the same condition. They would have trudged along at the very rear of
the column lest their condition infect the others with all sorts of bad
luck.

Flushed from her guilty feelings, she was glad that neither Torka nor
Umak could see her face. Her cheeks blazed with her deception, and if
her men saw her, they would know she was keeping something from them and
be angry. They might even command her to walk away from them forever.
She would deserve no better. But no, she was the only female in the
world, and they would not send her away. But they would make her walk
behind them. Tradition and taboo would demand it. And it was this that
she feared, for the one who walked at the end of a traveling column was
the one most vulnerable to predators. A group of women might be safe
enough, but long ago, when she had been a little girl, she had seen a
straggler mauled by a lion. The woman had fallen back to relieve
herself, and the huge, shaggy feline had leaped upon her from behind a
tundral hummock where it had lain in wait until the entire traveling
column had passed. By the time the men of the band had rallied to kill
the marauder with their spears, it had been too late for the woman.
Lonit had never forgotten what the woman had looked like when the lion
had finished with her.

She shivered and kept up with her men. Torka, Umak, and the dog would
know if something observed them. In the meantime, she tried not to think
of either lions or the wind spirits, which might be observing their
approach from the cold, savage heights of their distant mountain. With
her eyes turned down, she willed herself to think of nothing but the
next step, and the next, and the next, until Umak came to a sudden stop
and she bumped right into him.

"Look!" He seemed unaware that she had blundered into him. He pointed
off as, wilting, the girl followed his gaze.

There, directly ahead of them, a huge skeleton lay upon the land.
Torka's hand curled so tightly around the hafts of his spears that his
fingers ached. His teeth clenched. It was all he could do to keep
himself from crying out. The Destroyer .. . Thunder Speaker .. . He Who
Parts the Clouds .. . World Shaker .. .

"No!" Torka shouted his disbelief of a truth that was unbearable. If
that enormous rubble heap of bones belonged to the great mammoth, then
he would never be able to kill it with his own hands. Until this moment,
he had not known just how much he still longed to do this, regardless of
Umak's sage advice and of all odds and obstacles--even if, in killing
the beast, he forfeited his own life. The confrontation was all that
mattered, to stare once more into the red, man-hating eyes, to drive his
spear home ... in memory of his slain people, for Egatsop, his woman,
and for Kipu, the beloved little son whom he would never hold proudly
upon his shoulders while the child's laughter rang out with the joy of
life.

Bile was bitter at the back of his throat. Tears stung beneath his lids
as he choked back a cry of agonizing frustration. With his spear arm
raised, he ran forward, with the dog at his heels and Umak and Lonit
racing after him.

They stood together in silence, examining the skeletal remains of a
creature unlike any they had ever seen. Torka experienced a soaring
sense of relief, even as Umak grunted to express a disappointment that
he shared with the girl.

"No mammoth this," said the old man, wondering where the great beast
grazed now, hoping that it was far, far from this stretch of tundra.

Lonit stood stiffly against unwelcome memories. She stared at the
strange elongated bones. She was sorry that they were not those of the
mammoth that had destroyed the lives of the People. Somewhere, that
beast still lived. Somewhere, it shook the world with its mighty,
hateful trumpetings. Somewhere. But not here. Umak had led them away
from it. But what if it had veered eastward? What if it had come out of
a tundral valley onto this very plain? What if it walked ahead of them?
What if it were the thing that she had sensed watching them across the
miles? She shuddered. It was too terrible to consider. The dog whined
softly. It circled the enormous carcass, sniffing ardently before losing
interest when its nose told it that these were ancient bones, without
promise of a meal. With an exhaled snuff of disdain, it trotted around
the massive length of bones, sniffing and snorting, and leg-lifting here
and there to mark its places of passage. Seating itself at last, it
yawned and stared eastward as though to inform its fellow travelers that
there was nothing of interest to keep them here and it would just as
soon get on with their journey.

But the carcass had captured Torka's interest. Never had he seen
anything even remotely like it. Half-buried in the tundra, from head to
toe it was over seventy-five feet long. He paced the distance twice,
just to be certain that he was not imagining it. Legless, tusk less and
toothless, it had the look of an enormous fish. But how could a fish
have come to its death upon dry land? And of all the streams and pools
and rivers he had ever seen, where was there water wide enough or deep
enough to contain the swimmings of such a fish?

Umak seemed to know his grandson's mind. Their eyes met. Umak nodded,
grunted, and puckered his lips. "In the time of the great rain, when the
waters gathered to walk upon the earth, in this time such a fish would
have had wide water to swim in and deep water to hide in. It is said
that the flesh of the People was food for fish in that time." He paused,
and the Creation stories that he had learned from the old men in the
long-gone days of his boyhood returned to fill his mind. Again he
nodded, comforted now by the sight of the impossibly huge carcass; it
confirmed the truth of the tales. Only in great waters could such a fish
exist. Still, Umak was a man of his own time, of the tundra. It was
difficult for him to imagine an ocean, much less a whale.

Torka recalled his dream, the great black wall of water sweeping across
the plain. He reached out and touched a portion of the skeletal remains
of the whale. His hand rested upon a portion of fossilized rib. He knew
from experience that fish bones dried and blew away in the wind and were
not like the hard bones of man and beast. But this .. . beneath his
ungloved palm, the bone was rough, as unyielding as rock. The dream
washed through his mind again. He saw the wave coming toward him from
the south, north, east, and west. It surrounded him, reared up, and
showed a mile-high wall of watery death as black as the fluid that
filled the eyeball of a caribou. The blackness thickened and shone as
sleek as obsidian. It roared. It rose higher and higher, and then it
began to fall, to curl into lips that foamed like the mouth of a man
filled with mad spirits.

Torka willed himself up and out of his vision before it drowned him. As
he did so, he brought his hand up from the whalebone, then down again in
a reflex action that had so much power behind it, it cracked the
fossilized bone in two. The upper portion fell at his feet.

Umak's eyes went round. Both he and the girl made sounds of wonder, and
then the old man's face clouded. Torka took a step back from the broken
bone and would have turned away had Umak not cried out to stop him.

"No! The hand of Torka has cleft the bone. The life spirit of the great
fish has yielded to Torka's power. It has given a part of itself as a
gift to the man. Torka cannot walk away!" He wanted to add: Or it will
follow. It will become a crooked spirit. It will feed off Torka's soul,
and Torka will die. But he dared not speak so, lest he guarantee that
his warning come to pass. He said instead: "You take!"

Torka recognized Umak's words as an undeniable command. The old man was
right. Although he had not spoken his warning aloud, Torka saw it
clearly on his face. He could not disobey. He knelt and stared at that
which had fallen at his feet.

Torka sucked in his breath, amazed. The bone was slightly shorter than
his forearm, with a natural arch, and it was clear that the force of his
blow had done more than merely fracture it from the main portion of the
rib. Where the break had been made, the bone was as sharp as a dagger.
He could not have flaked it more cleanly if he had tried, nor could his
most meticulous knapping have achieved a sharper edge. He ran the inner
edge of his thumb lightly along the break to test it, then quickly drew
it back again. Although he had applied only the slightest pressure, he
had drawn blood.

"Hmph!" exclaimed Umak. His chin went up, and he nodded his head with
approval.

Torka smiled despite his dark mood. He did not like this piece of fish
rib that was neither bone nor stone, but it was good to see that Umak
was feeling arrogant again, assuming credit for the discovery by having
ordered Torka to take the bone. He lifted the blunt end of the broken
piece of whalebone into his hand; he hefted this gift from the life
spirit of the great fish that he knew was, somehow, not a fish. He
raised it high as he got to his feet. He tested it for balance and
decided that, like it or not, it would make an extraordinary weapon. "I
take," he said, conceding.

Umak harrumphed again.

Once again, they went on toward the mountain. This time, not only Lonit
was discomfited by the sensation of being watched. Torka felt it, too,
but the eyes of his vision stared from within, and now again he turned
to look back, half expecting to see the wave of his nightmare vision
rising to follow. There was nothing there--only the empty miles and the
skeleton of the whale growing smaller and smaller. Then it was gone.

And still they walked on. The land tilted upward as they neared the
mountain. They left behind the broad, open expanse of rolling grassland
and entered a realm of high hills. There were grasses here, too,
interspersed with wide stretches of tussocked marsh plants and
communities of familiar mosses and lichens, but now they passed stands
of droop-branched, man-high spruce trees. Umak and Torka instinctively
looked for signs of mammoth. They knew that spruce was the favorite
fodder of the great beasts; but if mammoth browsed here, they left no
sign. Relieved, Umak walked on with Lonit and the dog at his heels.

Torka paused, his eyes inextricably drawn back across the way they had
come. The plain lay far below. The miles seemed to tremble in a glaring
haze born of distance. And in that haze, upon the far horizon, he could
just make out a dark form following ... its back as high as the distant
hills, its tusks glinting in the sun, its color as red as dried blood.

Squinting, he put a hand across his brow to cut the glare and saw .. .
nothing.

Still he stared, his eyes burning and his heart pounding. Mammoth.
Thunder Speaker. World Shaker. The Destroyer. He nearly raged the words
aloud. He wanted the beast to be there, to be coming toward him across
the plain, to be following him into the high hills where, hidden by the
scrub spruce, he could lie in ambush. As in the dream that he had dreamt
after he and Umak had slain the condor, he could see himself swooping
down upon the mammoth from the heights. He could see himself driving
home a killing spear. In memory of his lost family, he could see himself

"Torka!" Umak called, gesturing him on. He stood still. Memories of the
dream ebbed away. He knew that he would need a spear fashioned out of
the power of a lightning bolt if he were ever to pierce the hide of that
monster and drive a killing point deep enough to rupture its heart. In
all the world, there was no such weapon. And except in his dreams, no
man could hope to stand against the Destroyer twice and live to tell the
tale.

He went on, troubled by his thoughts, satisfied that what he had seen on
the horizon had been a trick of the haze induced by his overly active
imagination. Still, he thought of the mammoth as he walked. He was so
absorbed in his frustrated lust to kill, he took no note of the changing
landscape.

The dark stands of fragrant spruce were rare now. The travelers had
entered a forest that was unique to the high Arctic: a mixed woodland of
tiny conifers and hardwoods, of dwarfed trees that were products of
extreme cold and endless wind, of a paucity of light during one half of
the year and an excess of it during the other. Composed of willow,
spruce, and birch in the main, many of the trees were hundreds of years
old, yet not even the most ancient of them reached a height much above
the travelers' ankles. They grew with the inexorable slowness of
lichens, adapting to their environment so perfectly that, in places, it
was difficult to tell that they were trees at all. They grew flat to the
ground as though consciously seeking to absorb the maximum warmth of the
sun as they sprawled out, not up, extending their branches protectively
out of the way of the wind.

The mountain was close now. A huge, black-shouldered, ice-mantled giant,
it filled the sky ahead of them. They paused to rest, staring up at it
in awed silence. The mountain seemed to exhale its breath upon them from
out of the frozen heart of its soaring, glacier-choked canyons. From
somewhere within the massive ice cap that sprawled across its summit,
there came a grinding, wrenching sound, which caused Lonit to wince
against her fear of wind spirits. Umak frowned. Never had he seen a
mountain so massive. Torka eyed it with cool speculation. The peak
itself was intimidating, but where its tundral flanks rose to merge with
hard, unyielding walls of rock, a safe encampment might be made upon any
of dozens of wide, high ledges that erosion and time had conspired to
carve into a base of the mountain.

"We go," he said at last, impatient to find just such a site before
nightfall. They went on.

Lonit's arm arched within its sling, and a low fever burned within her
blood. She felt hot, tired, and irritable, but she made no complaint.
She walked resolutely behind Torka, doing her best to keep up with his
long stride. Twice she tripped over nothing but kept her balance and did
not break her pace. She bit her lip. To do less would prove her
unworthiness to Torka. Despite all of her best efforts, she knew he
still thought the worst of her. She tried to remember the times when he
had been kind to her, so long ago, in another world, when she had been a
child. Now she was a woman, the only woman, and he hated her for that.
She could not blame him. She drew in a breath and held it, drawing off
as much strength from it as she could. In time, perhaps he would see
that she was not so bad. In time, she might come to see that, too. But
now she was tired, disgusted with herself for being a miserable excuse
for a female. Her arm hurt so much. The wolf had done more than rip skin
and muscle; it had bruised the bone as well.

Despite herself, she slowed her pace, grateful that Torka did not look
back to see her display of weakness. Umak would see to it that she kept
up. The old man seemed to be concerned for her. Why? She could not say,
other than she was the only female in the world. Still, it was apparent
to Lonit that, even with this in her favor, she was not worth much.

Umak watched the girl plodding on ahead of him. It was obvious that she
did not feel well. He saw her trip and regain her balance with only the
slightest break in stride. Admiration for her sparked. At their last
rest stop, he had noted fever shining brightly from her eyes. She had
said nothing. He knew that her arm must be hurting; it had taken many
sutures to repair the damage that the wolf had done to the tender flesh
of her inner forearm. As Umak watched Torka walking steadfastly on, he
growled to himself. The dog looked up at him curiously as the old man
wondered how Torka could have no concern for the girl. Not once had he
turned back to make certain that his pace was not too fast for her. He
had seen the extent of the wolf's mauling. He had witnessed her bold
leap into danger when she had seen the wolves menacing her men. How
could he be so calloused toward her? The old man's mouth puckered over-
his teeth. He worried about Torka. The wounds of grief were not healing.
He had never been a hard man before. Never. But he was hard now.

Hmmph, thought Umak, feeling protective and tender toward the girl. //
Torka is too stubborn to see Lonit's merit, Umak is not. A growing sense
of sole responsibility for the girl made him feel almost young again.
"Hmmph!" he said aloud, and again the dog looked at him, cocking its
black masked head. Umak directed his conversation toward the dog. "Next
time wolves come against this old man, they will see that he is not so
old as they would like! Lonit will see this, too."

Umak nodded, satisfied with his boast. He had no doubt that he had
spoken truly. He felt strong again, virile again; his bad leg barely
ached. He paused beside an ice-flowered freshet that ran through a small
grove of finger-high budding willows. Half-buried within a thick
embankment of marsh plants, the little stream invited the dog to drink.
Umak watched the animal lap at the cold water, then bent and began to
break off several twigs from the green-stalked willows. Half of these he
stuffed into the all-purpose medicine bag that he carried at his belt;
Lonit had made it for him out of the skin of the condor, with the downy
breast feathers still attached.

He rose, placing the remainder of the twigs between his teeth as he
wiped his hands on his traveling robe. His fingers ached with cold, but
he barely noticed as he trotted purposefully after Lonit. He was not the
least bit breathless when he caught up with her. He held the twigs in
his right hand as, with his left, he cupped her elbow and brought her to
a stop, turning her toward him.

"Here. You take. Magic spirits live in the green stalk of the willow.
Good spirits, too small for a girl or even a spirit master to see."

She was grateful for the chance to rest but hoped that he did not see
this in her stance or expression. She stood still, not understanding
what he wanted her to do with his strange gift of twigs.

Seeing her hesitancy, he explained with robust enthusiasm. "You chew
stalks! You release willow spirits into your mouth. They will run away
into your body. They will do the willow-spirit dance. They will eat your
fever. They will steal your pain. Then they will go away, grateful to
Lonit for nourishing them." She bowed her head. He had seen her
weariness. He had probably seen her stumble. Umak must think that she
was the most unworthy female ever born. But to her surprise and
confusion, before she could vilify herself further, the old man's
strong, big-knuckled fingers poked at her chin, gently prodding her to
look at him. And when she did, she was shocked to see that he was
smiling.

"Lonit has walked far with wounds. Lonit is brave. Lonit is strong. To
Lonit, Umak gives the willow spirits. They are not for those who are
unworthy."

Her face flushed with shame. Did he actually believe what he said? No.
He was just being kind. He was trying to make her feel better. Slowly,
as she walked beside him, she obliged him by chewing on the willow
stalks. They were bitter, but soon she began to marvel at the old man's
magic. Not only had he mastered the spirit of a wild dog, but now he
commanded the spirits of a tree! As he had promised, her fever lessened.
The ache in her arm decreased. She thanked him. He grunted, obviously
pleased with himself as he told her to thank the willow spirits instead.
This she did and tried to envision them; tiny green feasters dancing
within her body. She wondered if they had names, as men and women had
names. She wondered if they looked like trees, with branching arms and
limbs and leafy hair. She wondered if they ate pain raw or cooked it in
the heat of fever.

She walked on, feeling immeasurably better; but as her fever ebbed, her
fear grew. The mountain towered ahead, shadowing the world. And from its
savage heights, something was watching them.

Torka paused. Umak and the girl came to stand beside him. They could all
feel it now. The dog stopped near the old man's side, head down.

Wind spirits, thought the girl, and knew that against their fierce and
vicious nature, the gentle, healing spirits of the willow would be
powerless.

Lions, thought Umak. Or bears. Or wolves. Memories pierced through him.
His chin went up. He did not want to think of his earlier failure with
the wolves, but he did. He wondered how he would perform when they came
upon larger and more dangerous prey.

Torka stood tall, his eyes slitted against the wind and glare. It could
be anything, he thought. A great, stalking mountain cat. A short-faced
bear just emerging from its winter sleep. Or only a bird, a falcon or an
eagle. Or a lemming, or mouse, or a fat marmot sunning itself on a
ridge, its shiny little eyes taking in the progress of human travelers
with only the dullest form of interest. Whatever it was, it could not be
more threatening than anything that they had already faced on the open
tundra. Even if it proved to be a large flesh eater its threat was
lessened by their knowing that it was there to menace them.

As his eyes scanned the heights, they focused upon a high cornice that
jutted out from the up-thrusting, west-facing wall of the mountain.
Above that huge, protruding pout of granite, a series of caves pocked
the wall. Their size and placement intrigued him. If they could be
reached, the largest and deepest would offer excellent shelter from the
wind and weather and give them protection from predators as well. // the
cave were not already occupied by predators. He was certain that Umak
would give him an argument. He was not disappointed.

"Hunters of the band do not live like beasts in caves!" the old man
protested. "Hunters of the band must live as our fathers have always
lived--beneath the open sky!"

The light of day was fading. Rain clouds were gathering. A cold wind was
sliding down off the summit ice pack. Far below them on the tundral
plain, dire wolves began to howl. Torka saw Lonit cringe against the
sound and measured her weariness against his own fatigue and the many
miles they had come this day. "We must make camp," he said. "Soon it
will be dark. Wolves or even larger prey hunters may be on our scent.
Father of my father, we are all that is left of our band. We are at risk
as long as we camp in the open. To camp against the mountain wall would
be a good thing. To camp within it would be even better. Umak has spoken
the words of wisdom himself: In a new life, men must seek new ways."

The old man harrumphed. He looked up at the caves with a hostile squint.
He did not like the look of them, but he was a spirit master and could
not bring himself openly to oppose his own words of wisdom. "We will
see," he pronounced.

And they went on.

They found the way to the caves with little difficulty, although they
continued to feel eyes watching them. They had been walking across the
tough, spongy skin of the tundra, but now they stepped out across the
bare bones of the mountain, traversing the high, sandy shoulder and
picking their way across a tumbled outwash of glacial till and scree.
They walked around the mountain, and as they looked up from the base of
the mountain's eastern wall, the peak seemed to be a part of the
gathering night. Although miles around, the mountain was not as high as
it had seemed from a distance.

They stood in the lee of a narrow canyon, where an ice-choked stream
flowed sluggishly over a stony bed. Here and there were patches of hardy
soil, just enough to support a few clumpy mounds of sedge grass and
low-growing alpine shrubs. Where the canyon wall absorbed the most
sunlight, there was a bedraggled stand of spruce trees. They clustered
close together, droop-armed and bent-headed, like costumed hunters
frozen in a dream dance. In the rapidly thickening twilight, the trees
looked black. The strong, unmistakable stink of a musteline cut the
frigid air.

Weasel or wolverine. Not much danger there. While the dog sniffed out
the unfamiliar terrain, the travelers searched for signs and scents that
would reveal the presence of other, larger animals, but nothing
indicated that they were trespassing into the territory of any creature
that might prove a threat to them.

They turned their attention to their destination. The caves were some
three hundred feet above them, hidden from view by the overhanging lip
of the cornice. Torka pointed out a series of horizontal breaks in the
narrow fissure that angled steeply upward from the base of the rock wall
to the cornice. It looked as though a giant hand had gouged a stairway
into the stone. It was the only access route to the caves and would
prove a dizzying, difficult climb for any creature that did not possess
wings, but its degree of difficulty was proof that no larger cat or bear
would have made the climb before them.

Except for the dog, they made the ascension without incident. The
precipitous alignment of the route caused the dog to hesitate. It stood
at the base of the wall, watching with perplexed apprehension as its
pack climbed without it. It barked twice. Umak, the last in line, paused
and called down, urging the dog to follow; the way was steep, but with
effort, Aar could make it. The dog, not convinced, stood its ground. "It
is nearly dark, and a storm threatens," Torka reminded Umak. "Come,
Father of my father. Leave the dog to make its own way."

The old man bristled. "Umak will not leave his brother!"

Torka was distracted by the quick, shallow breathing of the girl. Lonit,
right behind him, was obviously exhausted. He reached down and extended
a hand, offering to assist her. He would reason with Umak later. The old
man had a blind spot when it came to the dog.

"Here," he said, gesturing to the girl to take his hand. "Torka will
help you."

She was leaning into the cold, rough face of the rock. The weight of her
pack was a frightening burden; not only did its straps cut into her
shoulders, but she was desperately afraid that it would throw her
off-balance and pull her backward into a fall to her death. Her heart
was leaping in her chest, and her mouth was dry. Her wounded arm was hot
and aching once again, for using it in the climb had caused it to bleed
anew. She was certain that several sutures had pulled free. But she
would not let Torka see this further display of weakness. Although she
longed to reach up and grip his hand, she demurred.

"Lonit is strong! Lonit needs no help from Torka!"

He hissed his annoyance through his teeth as, disgusted with her, he
turned to complete the climb. What a willful, ungrateful creature she
is! Females! Old men! Dogs! Let them all make their own way!

He reached the lip of the cornice and hauled himself up onto a broad
ledge that ran, cavelike, deep into the mountain wall. The girl was
close behind him. He could hear her smooth-soled boots slipping on the
slag that lay within the footholds. The rasp of her breath came in
scrapes of pain. Torka slung off his pack, leaned down, took hold of her
pack frame's straps, and pulled her up onto the ledge beside him. She
slumped to her knees, head bowed, and visibly trembled as she told him
that she had been capable of completing the climb without his
assistance. He fought back the impulse to kick her. It never occurred to
him that she might not be speaking out of arrogance.

It took Umak a while to convince himself that no amount of persuasion
was going to get the dog up onto the ledge without his help.
Unfortunately, Aar had not forgotten the unhappy incident with the
tether, and although it was Torka who had sought to confine the dog, it
did not trust Umak enough to allow the man to touch it. Umak harrumphed.
He understood the dog, knew its thoughts as clearly as if the animal had
spoken them. Carefully, slowly, he climbed down and tried to assure the
dog that if it could not climb as a man climbs, then Umak would carry
it. But each time he tried to get close to the dog, Aar backed away from
him.

The wolf pack that they had heard earlier was closer now. Its howls sent
shivers up and down the old man's back. Torka called down to him, but
Umak did not reply. He felt small and vulnerable and very tired beneath
the soaring walls of the mountain. It was beginning to rain, and he
could not delay his ascent much longer, lest the rocks become too
slippery to climb safely. He also felt angry with the dog for not
trusting him despite all that they had been through together and
frustrated with his powers as spirit master for having failed to coerce
the animal into doing his will.

"You! Aar! You will come to Umak!" The command was as bold as the
gestures that accompanied it.

The dog cocked its head and looked at Umak as though he were cray. "Aar
will come to Spirit Master!"

Aar lowered his head. He did not like being shouted at.

"Come! Your brother calls to you'! The dog must obey the man!"

The dog began to back away.

Umak leaped at the animal, hoping to grab it and show it that he meant
no harm by his touch. But Umak grabbed at air where, scant seconds
before, hair and hide and bone had stood. The dog had also leaped.
Backward.

Flat on his face, Umak levered up with his gloved hands and glared at
the dog. "Stay alone, then! Be meat for wolves! But do not say that Umak
did not try to help you!" He rose and wiped clay and pebbles from his
trousers and rubbed his bruised knees. "In new times, men must make new
ways! So, too, must it be for dogs!"

He turned his back upon the dog. He readjusted the weight of his pack
and began to climb. By the time he reached the halfway point, he was
feeling guilty. He paused and looked down, then smiled.

Brother Dog was following.

Although the ledge was an alien environment to those born and raised on
the open face of the tundra, it had the advantages of being dry, out of
the weather, and devoid of threat. A brief exploration revealed that no
animal had yet claimed it as a den.

In the darkness, they dropped their packs, spread their sleeping skins,
and yielded to exhaustion. They lay at the very back of the enormous,
low-ceilinged, room like ledge, curled in their furs, close to one
another. The dog lay near, but not too close, to Umak. Aar licked his
paws, for the way up to the cave had bloodied them, but after a while
even the dog slept. The night was filled with the sound of the
travelers' deep, even breathing and with the all-pervasive whispering
and drumming of the wind and rain. Now and again the rank, musty stink
of musteline caused Lonit to stir restlessly in her sleep, as did Torka,
but only the dog was roused by it.

Aar raised his head and snuffled. It was pitch black in the cave. Every
hair on the dog's back stood upright. Its snuffle became a low, menacing
growl. Something was moving in the darkness at the entrance to the cave.
It heard the dog and froze.

Suddenly the wind changed. The scent and shadow vanished. The dog, not
certain of its own senses, was at the lip of the ledge, where the scent
was strongest, sniffing, still growling. Something had been there, but
the dog could form no picture of it. Its scent was like nothing that the
animal had ever smelled before. He lay down. If it came back, he would
be ready for it. All night the dog kept vigil for his man pack. Only
toward dawn, when the rain turned to snow and the mountain wall became
slick with ice, did Aar allow himself to sleep. Nothing could climb the
mountain now. Nothing except a wind spirit.

The snow fell in eerie silence--thick, wet snow that smothered the night
and filled Lonit's dreams with hauntings. She awoke and saw the dog
keeping watch. She let her dreams ebb away. She was glad to release
them. Wind spirits had taken form within them, dancing and whirling like
snarling, snapping weasels, weasels that stood upright like human
hunters as they hacked one another to pieces with bloody, sharpened
clubs made of the thighbones of men.

She awoke in a sweat, wishing that she had more of Umak's magic willow
stalks to chew on. She knew that she was feverish, but she had no wish
to disturb Umak to get more of the stalks from within his medicine bag.
She could see it, lying close at his side as he slept, but she would not
think of taking anything from it without his permission.

The snowy, clouded light of morning was thin and gray. It gave the stone
walls and ceiling of the cave a cold, sinister appearance that seemed to
be a remnant from her dreams. But it was real enough, and she did not
like it. She longed first for the tundra and the open sky, then for the
snug, familiar confines of a pit hut as she rose and began the rituals
of morning. Her arm was hot and hurting. She bit her lip. She would tend
to it later. Her discomfort was not important. What mattered was to have
a fire made and a meal ready by the time her men awoke. She must serve
them before she even thought about her own needs.

The snow turned to rain again as she built a small fire of bones and
dried sod that she had carried with her in her pack. By the time Torka
and Umak were awakened by the scent of its smoke, she had taken strips
of dried caribou steaks, wet them with melted snow until they softened a
little, then threaded them on thin skewers of bone and set them to cook
over the flames.

They sat close together in silence around the little fire. Torka and
Umak on one side, Lonit on the other, the dog at a wary distance,
watching and salivating until the old man tossed it a portion of his
share despite Torka's sullen disapproval. Umak smacked his lips and
nodded to show the girl that she had done well. Torka made no effort to
display his appreciation. But for Lonit, who had often been severely
beaten by her father if he did not like her cooking, his willingness to
eat what she had prepared was compliment enough.

The meat was soon gone. The little fire smoked. The sods had been
transformed into heat. The burning bones cracked and settled into ashes.
Inhibited by their surroundings, the travelers did not speak. Outside,
it was still raining hard. Beyond the bleak, barren protection from the
elements that their high, rocky aerie afforded, the wind moaned and the
rain beat upon the face of the mountain as waterfalls of meltwater
cascaded downward from the summit ice pack.

After a while, uncomfortable with their silence, discomfited by the
strange sounds of the mountain itself---deep, internal groanings and
shiftings that seemed to emanate out of the rock--Umak was inspired to
speak. He told the story of how the People came to be created. "It began
on a day like this, long ago. Before the Great Flood, when all living
things were male, the first rain fell. It did not turn to snow but
stayed as rain for many days and nights, until all living things were
drowned except two spirit masters."

Torka and Lonit were enthralled. The old man spoke with the flat, formal
cadence of one who has spent over half a lifetime learning to tell a
story correctly. He cast an enchantment with his words. Even the dog
listened, its head cocked, appearing to understand.

"The two spirit masters took refuge from the rain on a day like this in
a cave like this, high on the Mountain of Power. And when at last the
waters receded from the world, they were alone. It was not a good thing.

"On a day like this, they sat together. In a cave like this. They grew
bored with one another's company. "Let us put life back into the drowned
world," they said. And this they did. From the Mountain of Power, they
made great magic. The sun came back, and day was born again. And the
moon came back, spitting out the stars that it had hidden in its mouth,
and night was born again. The green plants grew anew, and the animals
rose up to live again.

"But when they tried to make new people, they could not do this. They
tried and tried again. But the great flood had diluted their powers.
They were very tired. They looked out from their cave and were sad. It
was not a good thing to be alone in a world with no people."

He paused. His listeners were rapt. It was the most ancient of tales.
They had all heard it countless times, but it was comforting to hear it
now, on a day like this, in a cave like this, with the rain falling and
the mountain holding them high within the clouds as the spirit master's
words poured out of the cave and rode upon the back of the wind to tell
the spirits of the air and sky of how the People who were no more had
been born.

"The two spirit masters slept. The Mountain of Power gave them dreams.
On a day like this, in a cave like this, they awoke and knew what they
must do if they would make new people. By the magic of the mountain it
was done--they copulated, male to male. By the magic of the mountain,
one man became pregnant by another. And when the moon had fled from the
night nine times, and returned nine times, the first child of the People
was delivered out of a man. In blood. In pain. This was not good. So, by
the magic of the mountain, First Child became a female. And from that
day to this day, woman is created so that males may know the company of
other males without ever again being forced to endure the terrible
ordeal of childbirth. That is for women. Always and forever."

The story nourished them like a good meal. Umak looked thoughtfully at
Torka and Lonit. The cold, high world of the mountain was desolate and
strange, but Torka had been right to lead them here. Male and female sat
safely together within its sheltering walls of stone. They had survived
the destruction of the People, and therefore the People had not been
destroyed.

As Lonit sucked the last remnants of flavor from her roasting skewer,
the old man found himself appraising her speculatively. Man-need stirred
fleetingly in his loins, then disappeared as he chastised himself. The
girl is only a girl. In time she will be a woman. But not now. He
stifled a yawn. The fire was warm. The meat in his belly was as soothing
as the juice of the willow. His eyelids felt heavy. He closed them,
locked his folded arms around his knees, and allowed himself to nod off
to sleep.

For Torka, Umak's Creation tale roused no speculative interest in
Lonit's fertility. It roused memories of his lost woman and children. He
rose and went to stand at the edge of the cornice, just out of the rain.
Looking out across the clouded sky and down to the misted, rainy tundra
far below, his thoughts roamed the past.

The sound of falling stone suddenly distracted him, and the rank,
glandular stink of musteline intruded into his nostrils. Aar was barking
excitedly, standing closer to Torka than he had ever done. Torka walked
as close to the edge as he dared and looked over. There was nothing,
only the rain, only the clouds, only the precipitous wall of the
mountain dropping away into the mists. He cast a glance upward into the
rain. When it stopped, he would explore the smaller caves that lay
above. Perhaps the musteline lived there and had been drawn down to the
larger cave by the smell of roasting meat. Strange that he had not seen
it.

Umak was now wide awake and kneeling by Torka's side as he touched the
rain-sodden ground, then brought its scent to his nose via his
fingertips. Weasel? No. Not quite. The scent was not quite like any
animal scent that the old man had ever smelled. It was as though the
smells of several species had melded. He sniffed. He did not like it.
There was even the vague essence of Man mixed into it. But that was
impossible; there were only the three of them alive in all the world. A
dark cloud of foreboding rose in him. "If it comes to our cave again, we
will kill it," he said, thinking, before it kills us.

Torka shrugged. Despite the previous night's rest, he was tired and
annoyed with himself for not having seen the intruder before it slipped
away. He would have to guard against such carelessness in the future.
With Umak at his side and the dog following, he went back to hunker
close by the fire where Lonit sat carefully unwrapping her bandages.

She felt so miserably ill that she had barely paid heed to Torka's and
Umak's concern over the animal whose essence had permeated the wind.
Whatever it had been, it was gone now. She wished that she could say the
same for her pain. What she saw beneath the bandages came as no
surprise. Her woman's blood had ceased to flow the night before, but her
arm was bleeding again and oozing a clear, hot fluid in the few places
where Umak's sutures still held fast.

"Aiyee-eh!" exclaimed the old man as he looked at her arm. He dropped to
his knees beside the girl and began to examine her wounds with gentle
fingers.

Torka was furious with them both. Why had the girl not complained about
her arm? Why had she allowed her wounds to fester at the risk of
infection? He had seen hunters lose fingers, limbs, and lives because of
such carelessness. In her arrogance, did Lonit imagine that she was
above the corruption of the flesh? How could Umak coddle her and
encourage her irresponsible behavior? What an outrageous, insufferable
creature she was! Why, out of all of the women in the band, had she
alone survived? Why was his beloved Egatsop not here beside him? The
question brought all of the agony back, and the longings. In a sudden
fit of rage, he grabbed Lonit by her good arm, swept her to her feet,
and dragged her to the edge of the cornice. She screamed, certain that
he was going to throw her off. Instead, he half ripped off her sleeve
and held her injured arm out into the rain.

"This female is the only female in the world!" he shouted at Umak. "If
the People are to live, they must be born again through her someday! She
may think herself above the rest of us, but she is not! If she dies, the
People die forever. Umak has said this. Umak should remember it. This is
not the Creation story told again--Torka will not couple with Umak to
produce a first child. Of this Umak may be sure! If this female will not
care for herself, then Torka will care for her . and the care that Torka
will give will not be as gentle as that which Umak has given!"

With hard, com passionless fingers he scrubbed her wounds and opened the
soft, infected scabs to the cold, clean, healing rain. The girl sobbed
and squirmed, but he held her fast until an equally enraged Umak charged
him with all the force of a rut-maddened bull caribou.

Taken by surprise by the force of the old man's blow, Torka released his
hold on the girl. Lonit collapsed in a heap, and only Umak's strong,
broad fist curled tightly into the fabric of Torka's tunic kept him from
falling backward off the ledge.

The girl stared in shock, and the dog growled in confusion.

Torka gaped at his grandfather in amazement as rain fell upon them,
cooling their tempers.

"Hmmph!" snarled Umak, releasing Torka with disdain. "Torka is brave!
Torka is strong! But Torka is blind when it comes to women!" The days
passed. Rain continued to fall in intermittent squalls that kept the
face of the mountain slippery by day and icy by night. It was not safe
to venture out. The travelers were content to remain within the
sheltering confines of their aerie. Across the entrance to the ledge
they hung the oiled hide that would ordinarily have served as flooring
for their pit hut. It proved an effective weather baffle, screening out
wind and rain and keeping the floor of their shelter dry. They collected
drinking water in bags of oiled skin that Lonit had contrived to hold
the rain. They gathered loose stones and placed them in a circle at the
back of the cave, making it as good a fire pit as any that they had ever
built of sods upon the open tundra. Hungry for warmth after days of
wandering in the wind and cold, they piled their skins close to the
fire. The stones absorbed the heat of the flames and, unlike sods that
burned away to nothing, radiated heat long after the meager fire had
died and the meticulously banked coals had cooled.

They slept. They rested. They recouped their strength. Umak filled the
hours with tales of the People. Aar lay close to the fire pit, but not
so close that any member of the dog's man pack might take it unaware. It
watched the entrance to the cave, listening and sniffing for any hint of
the foul smelling intruder, but the mysterious creature did not return.
Just in case it did, Torka set a snare across the entrance, hoping to
entrap it.

Umak stood by, watching stoically. "Wind spirits will not be caught in
the best of Torka's snares. A man cannot hold the mist."

"Perhaps." Torka went to sit by the fire again. He took up the piece of
whalebone that he had taken from the plain and began to wrap a length of
sinew binding around its blunt end. "When the rain stops, Torka will
hunt it."

"A wise man does not hunt spirits. A wise man makes praise songs to
those whose flesh is of air and wind."

"Torka can think of no praise words to sing to a thing that smells like
a foul wind blowing out of the hind end of a badger. When the rain
stops, this hunter will find out what its flesh is made of. If it is
spirit, Torka will praise it. If it is meat, Torka will kill it."

The rain continued. The hunters grew restless. They readied their
weapons for future use. Torka began to think of more appetizing prey
than mustelines. Like Umak and Lonit, he salivated when he recalled the
camels and musk oxen that they had seen on their way to the mountain.
When the weather cleared, he would hunt big game before he turned his
talents to confrontations with odoriferous mountain dwellers, be they
flesh or spirit.

Lonit snared the impatience of her men. She was feeling much better. Her
fever was gone, her arm was healing nicely, and her appetite returned
just as the supplies of dried caribou meat began to run low. Despite
their best conservation efforts, they used most of the sods and bones
that she had brought along for fire making. They ate their meals raw and
made fires only when it was necessary to cut the chill of the most
bitter mornings.

While the men worked to make projectile points out of the odd assortment
of stones that they had collected enroute to the mountain, Lonit spread
out the roughly cured caribou skins that she had packed from their last
encampment. It would take hours of meticulous scraping before they were
supple enough to be sewn into garments. Undaunted, she applied herself
eagerly to the task with her good arm, not only because there was
nothing else for her to do, but because she knew that her men would
savor the luxury of possessing two sets of clothing again so that they
would be able to don clean, dry garments after a day's hunting the muddy
tundra. She smiled as she worked. She would make Torka's clothes first:
a new pair of trousers to go with the tunic of fox skins that she had
stitched for him. Torka. She cast him a longing glance, then quickly
looked away. She had successfully managed to stay out of his way lest
she inadvertently provoke his are once again. But new clothes would
please him, even if they came from a homely, unworthy girl.

The nights were still long and cold. The mountain filled the darkness
with strange, otherworldly sounds that made sleeping difficult. The dog
would growl now and again. The travelers would awake, hut the darkness
lay undisturbed, and the snare that Torka had rigged at the entrance to
the cave went un tripped

"Whatever walks the dark wind of the mountain night is not of flesh. It
is spirit." Umak rose from his sleeping skins, knelt, and raised his
arms, rocking back and forth as he chanted a praise song to the
invisible spirits of the mountain.

Torka watched him, unconvinced. "We shall see." He burrowed beneath his
furs. He went back to sleep and dreamed of mountains made of roaring
water and of crooked spirits that walked the earth in the flesh of a
mammoth that fed upon the deaths of men. He opened his eyes, suddenly
wide awake, listening to the sounds of the summit ice pack shifting in
the night. He thought of the Destroyer and knew that if a man dared face
it with the right weapon, it could be made to bleed.

Lonit curled herself into a little ball within her sleeping skins. She
listened to Umak's song of praise to the mountain spirits and was
afraid. She did not like the mountain at all.

Two days later, the rain stopped. They drew the weather baffle aside.
The clear, bra en light of a cloudless sunrise filled the cave. Far
below, scattered across the tundra, game could be seen grazing: a small
herd of musk oxen, the family of camels that they had seen before, and a
few head of steppe antelope. Without a moment's hesitation, Umak and
Torka eagerly took up their weapons and went out to hunt. At Torka's
insistence, Lonit stayed behind. He wanted no female at his side to
contaminate his luck. Umak reminded him of how helpful the girl had been
in the past, but Torka was adamant. Lonit made no complaint. She was
certain that he was right. Still, even though Umak assured her that they
would stay well within hailing distance, she was apprehensive about
remaining alone on the mountain.

With her splaying dagger in her hand to protect herself against any wind
spirits who might come to menace her while her men were away, she
watched the hunters descend the trail. It was wet and slick, but without
the weight of their traveling packs to hinder them and throw them
off-balance, they moved easily. The dog followed at its usual wary
distance, its tail high and its tongue lolling. Lonit was sorry to see
it leave. She would have appreciated its company.

The wind blew softly out of the east. Warmed by the yellow light of the
rising sun, it was sweet with the scents of earth and grass, of fragrant
spruce and artemisia, of a thousand scents that Limit knew but could not
put name to. Her hand relaxed around the bone haft of her dagger. It was
not a morning to sustain thoughts of ghosts.

She forgot all about her fear of wind spirits as she went back into the
cave and withdrew the stone shells from the bag in which she had carried
them along with her fire making tools. From her pack, she took the four
braided lengths of sinew that would form the arms of her bola. With
these in hand, she went back to the lip of the sun-washed cornice and
seated herself. It was her intent to begin the assembly of her bola, but
the beauty of the morning distracted her.

Never before had she rested in such a high place. Never before had she
imagined that such vistas as this could exist. She drew in a satisfying
breath of the morning, held it in for a long time--digesting it,
savoring it--before she released it and drew in another and another
until she felt lightheaded and as radiant as the sun. Perhaps the
mountain was not so bad after all.

Far away across the rolling tundra, enormous banks of clouds spanned the
horizon. It was a moment before she realized that they were not clouds.
They were mountains. Birds flew against them, tiny motes against soaring
walls of ice and stone. The birds flew closer. She saw them sweep across
the sky, then bank and swoop down to land upon the many ponds, lakes,
and swollen rivers that glistened in the morning sun. She smiled as she
turned her attention to the making of her bola. In the days to come, she
too would hunt. Not with her men, but in the way of a woman. She would
take many birds. She would snare them with her stone hurler, pluck them,
and hang them to smoke over smoldering beds of spruce and moss. When the
time of the long dark returned, Torka and Umak would have much meat to
augment their own stores of game. Smoked waterfowl would serve as a
tasty diversion when they were all sated upon the heavier flavors and
textures of game meat. They would be pleased with Lonit.

A cascade of small stones fell somewhere high above the ledge. Startled,
Lonit ducked and scooted back under the protection of the ceiling of the
cave. The rockfall was over in a moment, but it was time enough to turn
Lonit cold with fear. The brightness went out of the morning. She was
certain that she had heard something slipping and grabbing at the
treacherous rock face above the cave. With a gasp, she dropped the
unfinished bola and made a dash for her dagger. Clutching it in her
hand, she stood ready to defend herself as wild, nightmarish images
filled her mind.

But the moment passed. The last of the little avalanche tumbled away
onto the scree far below. After a while, there was only the sound of
meltwater cascading from the heights as the wind licked gently against
the mountain, a wind so warm and sweet with spring that the girl relaxed
and told herself that she was a foolish female whose imagination was
running away with her common sense. The days' extended rainfall had
loosened the stones and caused them to fall. Nothing alive moved on the
vertical crags above her. She was alone on the mountain.

She went back to the ledge, where she sat and resumed work on her bola.
She basked in the sunlight like a lemming on a rock, but she was not
fully at ease. She thought of wind spirits and kept her dagger close,
just in case it was needed.

Aar clambered onto the ledge ahead of Umak and Torka. To Lonit's
delight, each man had taken an antelope. Their eyes were bright with
satisfaction as they slung their kills from their shoulders and dropped
the tawny, delicately boned animals at Lonit's feet.

They were impatient to gut and skin their kills. Lonit made her praise
dance short and stood aside to watch them as they worked; but there must
have been something in her demeanor that alerted them to the fact that
she was troubled. She told them that it was nothing. She said that she
was a foolish female who had imagined that she heard the sound of
footfall on the mountain wall above the ledge when, in fact, all she had
heard was the sound of falling stones. She was surprised when they
exchanged meaningful looks.

"Perhaps it was not only a trick of the light," said Umak as he put down
his knives and rose from the crouch he had taken over the body of his
antelope.

Torka was on his feet, wiping his bloody hands on the hairy side of his
freshly lifted antelope skin. "Come. Whatever it was, we will find it.
Now!"

"It?" Lonit's query came before she could call it back.

"The thing that we thought we saw moving on the mountain wall above the
ledge," informed Torka with a surly snap. "Why did Almost A Woman say
nothing about it before she was asked? Why did she sit on the ledge like
a rock instead of going after it?"

Her face flamed. She bowed her head, choking out an admission that
shamed her. "Lonit was afraid of wind spirits."

Umak turned on his grandson angrily. "Almost A Woman cannot climb safely
with only one good arm! And if she had tried, Torka would have said that
she was wrong to risk herself. Bah! Umak says that Torka is worse than a
woman! He cannot make up his mind. One moment he says this, another he
says that! Hrmmph! Lonit must listen to Umak, who is spirit master! And
spirit master says that Only Woman In The World was right not to put
herself in danger by trying to chase ghosts!"

"That was no ghost we saw above the cave!" Torka chafed against his
grandfather's open censure. Umak had never spoken harshly to him before
they had been forced to travel in the company of the girl. He glared at
her. "Listen to Umak, then! Torka will climb the mountain wall. Torka
will bring back the ghost spirit. Torka will make a sauce of its innards
to flavor the flesh of the antelope that he has killed!"

With his dagger gripped between his teeth, he ignored the old man's
protests as he set out to fulfill his boast. He had no fear of the
shadow thing that he and Umak had seen scooting along the bare face of
the mountains. From their distant vantage point, it had seemed to be no
more than a shadow, created by light and wind playing on the
crenellated, up swept walls of the mountain. Reflecting on it now, he
knew that it had been more than that; it had been a dark, lithe, hairy
thing, larger than a wolverine but a little smaller than a young bear.
The girl had heard it. They had all smelled it on their first night on
the ledge. He was certain that it was no wind spirit. For a reason that
he could not fathom, he wanted the girl to know that. He wanted to make
her see that Umak was not always right. He would bring her the carcass
of the old man's ghost spirit, and she would see that it was only an
animal. With the razor-edged bludgeon that he had fashioned from the
whale rib and now wore scabbarded at his belt, he would smash its skull
and open it from throat to crotch. He would drop it at Lonit's feet and
say: "Here is the wind spirit! Here is the ghost whom Umak fears. Dance
now the dance of praise for Torka, who has killed it. Dance now for the
hunter who has driven fear of the mists from our cave!"

The thought gave him immeasurable pleasure. He could not say why. It
should not matter to him what the girl thought. It should not, but it
did.

As he climbed, his only worry was that he might come upon his quarry
when he least expected it. He visualized himself groping upward for a
handhold, only to have the shadow creature's claws and fangs rip into
his flesh before he could make a grab for his bludgeon. He saw himself
thrown off-balance, hurtling to his death while the shadowy thing
cowered on a ledge. Umak and Lonit would watch him fall, and the old man
would say: It is as Spirit Master has foretold-men do not hunt spirits.
To those whose flesh is of air and wind wise men make praise songs.

Hmmph, thought Torka as he climbed. We will see who is made of air and
wind and to whom Lonit will sing her next praise song.

He carried his dagger in his teeth, using it to slash defensively across
each hold before he committed his bare hand to it. The rock was cold,
and it crumbled beneath his grasping fingers. Rotten in some places, and
hard and slick in others, it made for treacherous climbing.
Nevertheless, long, vertical fissures in the stone allowed him good
leverage. Soon he found himself upon a broad, shouldering slope. He
paused and caught his breath, flexed his hands to relax them, then
walked through filmy mists, telling himself that they were only that and
not wind spirits.

Above him, clouds were forming over the summit ice pack. He heard
occasional groans and cracking sounds emanating from the glacial mass; a
less pragmatic man would have imagined that he heard ghost voices, but
Torka heard the living power of earth and ice and knew that, as long as
he walked wisely and warily, it bore him no threat. Still, he was a
hunter of the tundra, of the broad, rolling steppe. He was out of his
element and knew it. The mountain made him feel small and vulnerable to
forces that he did not understand. Instinctively, he walked quietly, his
dagger at the ready.

Now and again he felt the eyes of something observing his progress as he
continued up across the slope. Watch well. Torka is coming. Torka says
you die, he warned in silence.

The surface of the slope granted little traction. He walked as though
across hard-packed sand. Composed of a blanket of scree and till that
lay hundreds of feet thick over the solid rock underpinnings of the
mountain's east wall, the slope stopped abruptly at the base of a
soaring precipice that ended where a downward extension of the summit
ice pack began. It was a huge lobe of glacial mass. Studded with stones
and boulders bigger than mammoths, it overhung the precipice and
extruded downward over its sides, showing underlayers that were black
and brown with the refuse of the mountain. Meltwater bled from beneath
it, sheening the sheer surface of the rock with uncountable raucous,
milky waterfalls.

The feeling that he was being watched persisted. Torka picked up the
stink of musteline and followed his nose to the series of caves that he
had viewed days before from the tundra. They pocked the lower wall of
the precipice. Unlike the broad, sheltering expanse of cavelike ledge
upon which he and the others had made their encampment, most of these
caves were little more than mere depressions in the rock; only one was
large and deep enough for a good-sized musteline to live in with room to
spare.

Torka did not venture too close. His fingers tightened around the bone
haft of his dagger. The entire area reeked of the creature's habitation.
Looking for tracks, he drew his bludgeon from its scabbard of caribou
hide and advanced, holding the deadly weapon poised in case the animal
charged him. But whatever resided within that foul den was not there,
nor had it left any telltale paw prints that would have revealed its
identity to the experienced tracker. With utmost caution, Torka peered
into the cave.

The creature had made a small, filthy nest for itself of grasses and
twigs, which it must have carried up from the tundra far below. Lined
with an assortment of bird feathers and down, it was littered with bits
of chewed bone and fragments of gnawed tendons. There were no feces
fouling the nest, but the musk like stench of glandular secretions
forced Torka to fight the need to retch. He backed away and drew in
lungfuls of the rapidly cooling mountain air. What sort of creature
could dwell in such a foul nest? It was a cold, hostile place for any
kind of animal to chose as a home, although, Torka noted, it did catch
the light of the rising sun and afforded a spectacular overview of the
tundra while still being out of the direct path of the wind.

He turned, scanning the heights and the slope below. He was still being
watched, but from exactly where, he could not say. He wanted to
investigate, but the wall was too steep, the glacial lobe too
treacherous, to invite further exploration. And, to his surprise, his
shadow was growing long. Soon the day would be over. The prospect of
descending the mountain in darkness was sobering.

Annoyed, he squelched a rising surge of frustration. Umak's "ghost"
would live out this day. But not another if Torka had his way. It did
not take him long to position a loop snare around the entrance to the
cave. As he worked, he was glad that he had begun his climb with such
rash impetuosity--he still had his snare nets and sinews with him. After
he and Umak had each brought down an antelope, neither man had seen much
sense in taking the time to set snares for smaller, less desirable prey.
Torka set them now, placing them at likely places along the slope and at
the very lip of the east wall as he began the difficult descent to the
cave where Umak and Lonit awaited his return.

His mouth was set as he climbed down. He had set his snares with
infinite care. One of them was bound to work. Tomorrow, Umak would look
upon his "ghost," and Lonit would see who was more of a spirit
master--the man who sang praise songs to the unknown, or the man who
dared to seek out his fears and slay them. Torka was in a black mood
when he entered the cave. Aar, dozing on the ledge, awoke when it saw
him, took one look, growled, and moved well out of his way. If the
animal had not moved, Torka would have kicked it. He was tired and
hungry and not at all glad to see that, in his absence, Lonit had
butchered both of the antelope. His mouth turned down. Kgatsop never
would have been able to prepare a kill so quickly, nor would she have
readied it for eating or laid out the portions to be dried with such
neatness. The gathering shadows of the approaching night reflected his
mood as he observed the perfection of the small, nearly smokeless
cooking fire that the girl had made. Egatsop had never been able to make
so fine a fire. Never, thought Torka, and once again found cause to
despise Lonit for having caused him to think unfavorably of his
beautiful beloved.

He paused. The girl had already prepared a meal for Umak. She never
failed to show deference to the old man. Again Egatsop compared badly.
Again Torka found reason to loathe Lonit. He knew that she worked
diligently to discredit Egatsop in his eyes. What a despicable girl she
was! How could Umak abide her scheming? Torka's eyes rested upon his
grandfather. He sat beside the fire, sound asleep, snoring blissfully
with his head on his knees and a half-consumed haunch of antelope still
in his hand at his side.

Now the girl was approaching the returning hunter. He glared at her as,
with downcast eyes, she offered a roasted haunch from his own kill.
Torka snatched it from her hands without a word and walked past her to
hunker down by the fire. He ate in sullen silence, not wanting to look
at her as she knelt across the fire pit from him, patiently awaiting his
command for water or more meat.

He cast her a surreptitious glance. He knew that she must be thinking
that he had failed. He had not done what he had set out to do.
Defensively, he boasted through a mouthful: "Torka has found a place of
the 'spirit's' dwelling. Tomorrow Almost A Woman will see that it is
flesh, not mist. Torka has set snares. Tomorrow Almost A Woman will
singe its stinking hide in this fire pit. Tomorrow Umak will drink its
blood and know that Torka was right!"

She made no reply. None was expected. She could sense the anger in him
and wondered what she had done to cause it. She was puzzled as to why he
was speaking to her at all. She picked up a water skin and held it out
to him. Perhaps he was thirsty? A man should not have to ask for water.
His woman should anticipate his need.

Their eyes met. Held. For a moment, Torka was so startled that he
stopped chewing. Lighted by the ruddy glow of the little fire, Lonit's
face was as smooth and tawny and delicately beautiful as that of the
young doe whose flesh he was consuming.

His hunger vanished. A new and long-dormant appetite flared, then was
cooled by incredulity. Lonit beautiful? Umak was right! There were
spirits on this mountain! They must have seeped into Torka's head when
he had walked upward through the mists. Even now they were feeding off
his sanity. To look with desire at a homely, wretched girl like Lonit
was to shame the memory of his beloved Egatsop. Suddenly furious, he
reached out and backhanded the water skin out of her hands.

"Get away! Tend to your skins and your woman's work! Stay away from me!"
He snarled his rage and hatred at her, sorry that he had not hit her.
"Torka cannot stand the sight of you!"

She did as she was told. Numbed by his display of wrath and revulsion,
she cowered well away from him, huddling in the darkness at the very
back of the cave where he could barely see her. Tears stung beneath her
lids. She blinked them back, but they fell anyway, and she was grateful
for the shadows.

He did not look her way. He did not want to think of her. He turned his
full attention to the haunch, eating with a vengeance until he had
stripped it of all but the thickest portions of the thigh meat. Slowly,
he became aware of the stink of musteline and knew that he had brought
the stench of the creature back with him. It permeated his clothes. He
gave the back of his hand a tentative sniff, then cursed. It was on his
skin, too, and in the long, unbound lengths of his hair. Disgusted, he
threw the haunch into the fire pit and got to his feet, peeling off his
clothes and tossing them back into the shadows. Lonit would know what to
do with them once she caught a whiff of their essence. Meanwhile, he
bent and scooped ashes from the edges of the fire pit and scoured his
skin with them. He rubbed himself until he was gray from head to foot
and the warm, absorbent coating of ashes drew in the stink of the
musteline and masked it with its own acrid, smoky scent.

Lonit did not smell or see the reeking garments that lay scattered
before her. She saw only the man who stood naked in the firelight. The
flames smoked. The haunch that he had thrown into them had disturbed
them; they fed on its fat and tissue, giving off a hot, dusky light that
cast strange dancing images onto the walls of the cave.

And in this light she saw the maleness of him, and the scars of many
hunts. She saw the breadth of his back and shoulders, the leanness of
his hips and waist, the power of his thighs and upper arms. Unable to
look away, she could barely breathe as she watched him go to the far
wall where she had placed the water skins near the entrance of the cave.
He took two of the skins and went to the outer edge of the cornice.
There, in the cold wind of evening, he emptied them over himself. She
heard him gasp, and something deep within her loins caught fire. Dim,
dark recollections suddenly flared within her mind. She saw her father,
felt him riding her, pounding her, cursing her because she could not
"catch fire." She had not understood what he had wanted of her. Now,
having looked at Torka in the tremulous light of the flames, she
understood, and knew for the first time that a woman could burn as hotly
as a man--but not for just any man.

Silhouetted against the dying embers of the day, Torka cleansed his body
and shook out his hair. He reentered the cave, took up one of his
sleeping skins, and returned to the fire. He seated himself. Within the
encircling folds of the dark, hairy bison skin, he began to shiver
himself warm. He was tired, unaware of the girl watching him, unaware
that she was shivering, too, but not with cold. The moments passed.
Torka dozed, then slept. Lonit could hear the deep, even pull of his
breathing. She heard the snores of the old man. In the shadows near the
entrance to the cave, Aar gnawed on a bone. She listened to the rasp of
the dog's teeth and to the sound of the last of the haunch fat dripping
and spitting in the fire pit. The flames were cooler now. The time for
"catching fire" had passed.

Now, for the first time, she became aware of the smell of Torka's
tainted garments. She understood that he wanted her to cleanse and air
them. As quietly as she could, she dragged them--at arm's length--to the
fire. She took up ashes and rubbed them into every inch and seam of the
clothing. When this was done, she took them out into the rapidly
gathering night. She spread them out upon the ledge, and weighted them
with stones. The wind and sun would cleanse them. In time the stink of
musteline would lessen, but it would never fully disappear. In the near
darkness, she ran a palm over the silky fox tails that trimmed the tunic
that she had made for Torka. How many hours had gone into its
construction? How long would it take her to accumulate so many prime fox
skins again ? She sighed. Torka would need a new set of clothes.
Although she was tired, the thought inspired her. He had told her to
tend to her skins. She would do just that! Perhaps he would stop being
so angry with her if she could quickly replace his garments with even
better ones. Her injured arm was healing rapidly. She no longer used the
sling, and she could use her hand again without pain, although the
sutured skin often itched.

She sighed again. Torka would never smile at her looks, but he might yet
show pleasure at her workmanship. Ignoring her fatigue, she set herself
to the task at hand. The real work would begin tomorrow. Now the skins
must have their final curing. Tonight she would sleep naked with them
wrapped tightly around her. They would absorb oils from her skin and
take on a soft resiliency that they had not possessed since the animals
that had lived within them had been slain.

As quietly as she could, she went to where the skins were spread and
stood above them, undressing. Layer by layer, her garments fell away
until she stood naked and shivering in the meager warmth and fading
light of the dying fire.

Within the fire pit, the blackened haunch bone settled and cracked.
Marrow swelled out and oozed onto the coals. Steam hissed. The sound
roused Torka. He looked up. At one whom he had never seen before.

She stood at the edge of the darkness. The soft, fading fireglow defined
her every curve. Torka stared, entranced, enflamed, and confused. The
figure standing naked before him could not be Lonit. Yet the eyes that
stared at him could belong to no other. They stared back at him like the
eyes of a startled antelope--round, dark pools in which the firelight
swam.

But it was not her eyes that held his glance. It was her body.

Almost A Woman was a woman. And for the first time since Torka had left
the camp of death behind, Egatsop's memory was eclipsed. She was dead.
Lonit was alive. And it was life that rose in him now. It banished
memory. It banished comparisons. It banished all longings but one. He
was hard with need as his eyes moved over the contours of a body that
did not belong to any half-grown adolescent. Lonit's skin was as sleek
as a young doe's, her form lush and rounded. This was the flower of
which Umak had spoken. Long dormant, it was now ripe with life and
promise.

Torka stared into the darkness after Lonit had knelt, wrapped herself in
the closest skin, lain down, and closed her eyes. Anger stirred within
him now. Why had she displayed herself if she had not intended to come
to him for gratification? How dare she turn her back upon him now,
curling up in her skins like a child after brazenly flaunting the fact
that she was anything but that? Among the People, it was a man's right
to sate his sexual need with any available female as long as her own man
offered no objection. Lonit was the last female in the world whom Torka
would have singled out to be a vessel for his pleasure, but since the
murderous rampage of the Destroyer, she was the only woman in the world.
She was his. And Umak's.

Torka looked at his grandfather. As far as he knew, the old man had made
no overtures to the girl, but he had made no secret of the fact that he
had been considering such possibilities. Now, asleep beside the fire
pit, Umak slept heavily. Torka knew that, unless deliberately awakened,
he would not stir until dawn.

His eyes strayed back to the girl. She lay on her side, unmoving in the
shadows. He suspected that she was only pretending to be asleep. Now
that she had aroused him, she rejected him. A growl formed at the back
of his throat. He did not notice that the dog heard him and looked up.
It had been too long since he had known a man's release. The flame that
Lonit had ignited within him would not be extinguished. She had no right
to turn away from him. It was her obligation to yield to his desire.

He went to her and pulled the skins away. He lay down beside her,
drawing his own sleeping robe over them both to cut the chill of the
deepening night. Her back was to him, as hot and rigid as his need.
Roughly, he turned her toward him. Roughly, his hands explored the woman
whom he had not known existed until this night.

Lonit yielded to Torka all that he desired, all that she could offer of
herself, for his pleasure as much as for her own. Now, at last, she was
his woman. Now, at last, he found her useful. Now, at last, he was
guiding her in ways that truly pleased him. She followed eagerly,
touching him, loving him, opening herself to his questing mouth and
hands, arching to accept him when he entered her. Her body was no longer
her own. It was one with his. Her movements were his movements, as
savage, as intense.

For Torka, her response was shattering. Never, in all of their years
together, had Egatsop responded to him as Lonit was responding now.
Never. Even in this, she shamed the memory of his beautiful beloved. But
in the darkness, joined to him, moving with him, Lonit was beautiful in
ways that he had never imagined. He had intended to use her, to come to
a quick and purposefully hurting release, but her unexpected passion had
aroused him to heights that he had never thought possible. He forgot
everything but the moment, prolonging their union, savoring it,
withdrawing and entering in an ecstasy of control that was broken at
last when the girl cried out and his release came in a final, probing
thrust that brought a sob from her.

In the darkness, Aar turned his back upon them and moved a little closer
to the fading warmth of the fire pit. Umak slept on undisturbed. Dazed,
Torka and Lonit lay trembling in exhaustion, their bodies joined, still
moving, seeking the last ripples of pleasure until, at last, sleep took
them. They knew no more until the first of the creature's screams of
pain cracked the night in two. The first rays of the sun were just
pouring across the eastern plain by the time Torka dressed, took up his
weapons, and began the ascent of the wall. Having slept fully clothed,
Umak had a head start. The old man had said nothing to either Torka or
Lonit when he had noted their unusual sleeping arrangements. The screams
of the creature had been too imperative to ignore. He had chosen the
lightest of his spears, tightened his belt, and gone out to see for
himself just what was howling on the cliff above the cave. He climbed
above Torka now, both balancing their spears across their shoulders,
using the chin to steady and grip it when necessary. Although it was
awkward going, Umak was at his best in the morning. Despite his bad leg,
he moved with a natural grace and agility.

The full light of morning bathed the mountain. Above them, screaming
like a scalded child, the creature hung upside down over the side of the
mountain face; one of its short, hairy legs was caught in the noosed end
of the last snare that Torka had set the day before. They could see the
animal fairly well now, and smell it. Its head was hidden within the
stiff downfalls of hair that were as long and dark as a musk ox's. They
could not see its face. As it flailed madly with its thin, furry arms,
its small, stinking body spun round and round, propelled by the force of
its own frantic movements.

Umak paused, looking down at his grandson as he felt obliged to concede:
"No wind spirit that."

But what was it? Neither man had ever seen anything like it. It was much
too large for a weasel or wolverine and too small for a mountain cat or
bear. As they stared up at it, its screams stopped and became panting
moans as it grabbed with hand like paws at its trapped limb, desperately
trying to pull itself up and work itself free. If it did the latter, it
would fall to its death, but it would die anyway.

Umak took his spear in his right hand. He aimed with the precision of
one who seldom missed, leaning back as far as he dared, then hurling the
projectile upward with as much weight behind it as his tenuous position
on the mountain would allow. It allowed little. The spear fell low. It
missed the target's body and lodged itself in one of its thighs.

The scream that came from the animal struck both hunters as sharply as
though they, and not the creature, had been pierced.

On the ledge below, Aar cocked his head. Still in a half-dreaming state
of bliss induced by the events of the night before, Lonit stopped midway
through her dressing. She listened, certain that her ears must be
tricking her.

The hunters stood frozen. The little body above them continued to spin.
It was no longer screaming. It was sobbing in short, pathetic bursts of
sound that only one creature in all the world could make: words. This
was not an animal. This was not a wind spirit. This was a child.

In one moment, their entire perspective of the world had been changed by
a small, sobbing, indescribably filthy child.

They ascended the remainder of the wall and hauled themselves onto the
overhang from which the child had fallen. They pulled it up. It fought
them all the way, thrashing like a fish on a line. When Torka reached
down to grab it, it shrieked and slapped at him. Trying not to breathe
in its stink, he grabbed it by the scruff of its neck, hefted it onto
the overhang, and attempted to put it on its feet. Its response was to
kick out at him with its good leg. The wounded leg offered no support,
and the child collapsed, its weight snapping the protruding end of the
spear and driving the shaft deeper into the muscles of its thigh. The
resulting pain was so excruciating that the child did not cry out;
instead it dropped as though it had been brained by a boulder.
Unconscious, it lay sprawled at the feet of the hunters, a ragged heap
of foul, tattered furs and long, unkempt hair.

Torka and Umak stared at one another in perplexity, wondering if they
were both experiencing the same delusion. What lay before them could not
be a child. In all the world, they were alone. The People were dead. All
of the children were dead. The mammoth had slain them. And yet, only a
cursory examination revealed the "creature" to be an emaciated, fully
human little boy of about nine. When they parted the filthy strands of
his hair, both men drew back as though stung. The tear-streaked,
dirt-blackened little face was so like that of Torka's beloved son,
Kipu, that they gasped, momentarily disoriented.

With tremulous fingers, Torka traced the familiar features. "Father of
my father, how can this be?"

For the first time in his life, Umak could not summon a harrumph, much
less an answer.

Torka closed his eyes and withdrew his hands. The sight of the child had
brought the old agony back--memories of that small, precious boy who was
lost to him forever.

Umak was crouching over the boy beside Torka. He examined the wound.
Even though still unconscious, the child was murmuring against his pain.
The old man was confused. He had thrown the spear and had made the
wounding. But how could he have known that this small, foul-smelling
thing was not an animal?

As Umak extracted his ruined spear, blood bubbled warm and red and wet
out of the boy's wound. Umak dipped his fingers in it and touched what
he could not deny.

"Spirits do not bleed," he said, rising, hefting the boy across his
shoulders as though he were an antelope taken in a hunt. "Come. Torka
and Umak must return to the ledge now. This child's wound must be
tended."

Dazed by the implications of their discovery, a befuddled Torka
followed. Midway in his descent, he paused. His head was clearer now.
Things were suddenly coming into a new and distinctly different focus.
The boy had changed everything. He was real. Somewhere out there was
another band. They were not alone! There were people, hunters, men who
might be convinced to go in search of the Destroyer. And if they could
not be convinced, he would go alone. It would not matter to Umak and
Lonit. They would be a part of a band again.

Torka would be free to follow the beast, and find it he would, even if
he had to follow it beyond the edge of forever. In memory of all who had
died, for Nap and Alinak, for Egatsop and Kipu, for all of those who now
lay looking at the sky, this Torka would do! The boy sat naked at the
back of the cave. His leg hurt. He felt hot with fever; but he would not
chew upon the sticks that the old man tried to force upon him, nor would
he put on the new tunic that the strange-eyed girl had placed before
him. The tall, good-looking young hunter knelt before him, asking
questions again. The boy pretended not to understand, although the man's
words were so similar to those of his band that he knew most of them.

"Why are you here, alone upon the mountain? Where is your band?"

The boy kept his features set, scowling with feigned stoicism, trying
hard not to make a face of disgust that might betray his understanding
of the hunter's questions. Surely this man had seen children abandoned
before? Surely it could not come as a surprise to him that sometimes
those who were left to die survived? The old one was staring at him. He
glared up at him, then looked away. The old one's eyes had a way of
making him feel invisible.

"This little one has been left alone to set his spirit free to walk upon
the wind," the old one said.

Hearing the truth, the boy cast a careful look up at the old man. He
stood beside the younger hunter, his arms folded across his chest, his
time-runneled face scowling with introspection. The boy knew him for
what he was and was afraid of him. He wore the paws of a dire wolf
around his neck, as did the younger man, but he carried a medicine bag
at his belt, and where he walked, the wild dog was usually close at the
heels of his shadow. The boy looked around. The dog lay at the far end
of the cave, looking back at him out of a blue eyed, black-masked face
that was as impassive as the old man's. The boy gulped. The dog was in
the old one's power. Clearly, the old one was a magic man.

"The boy is strong," the young hunter was saying, "He is beyond the age
of name giving. The People would not waste such a boy as this!"

"The People are no more. If there are others in the world, who may say
what they would do?"

"Where is your band?" pressed the young hunter.

The boy held his tongue. My people will come back, he thought. They will
come back for me. Supnah has promised. He has sworn that if they survive
the winter, they will come back for their children. My father would not
lie! If he lives, Supnah will come for Karana. And he will kill these
people and their dog. He will make them pay with their lives for the way
they have treated his only son! So Karana will be silent. When Supnah
comes, these people will howl with surprise. Then Karana will speak.
Then Karana will laugh. Then these people will die!

He glared at the young hunter. His thoughts had made him feel brave. He
glared at the old man. Had the strange eyed girl not been bent over the
cooking fire, he would have glared at her too. They had all conspired to
take him captive. While he had been in the place of dreams, they had
burned his leg and sewn up the wound that they had made. They had
scrubbed him with water and ashes. They had stripped him of his garments
and of his dignity.

The garments were the last clothes that his mother would ever make for
him. Fringed, and sewn from the furs of all the kinds of animals that a
man might hope to kill, they had been for his first hunt. She had
stitched the many seams and strips so finely that the stitches were
nearly invisible. He had gone forth with his father boldly, proud of the
new clothes, proud of his new dagger and of the spear that had been made
just for him. It had been a good hunt. But it had been the last of the
good times. The dark times had come and stayed until his mother was
dead, and all of the babies had been exposed, and all of the old men and
old women had walked away into the endless storms so that the younger
men and women would have enough food to share with each other and their
children.

The band had moved on in search of game. There was no game. The women
grew weak. The surviving children grew gaunt and ill. The hunters sang
the songs that would bring Isack the sun. The sun had not returned.

They had moved on again and again. In each camp there was starvation. In
each camp there was death. Then, in the looming presence of the
mountain, Navahk, magic man of the band, had taken Supnah, the headman,
aside. And when at last their words were done, Supnah had looked old
even though he was young, and Navahk had walked past Karana, stopping to
look at him as though he were of no more worth than the larva of a black
fly squirming in the beak of a rapacious bird. He had turned and walked
on, but not before the boy had seen him smile.

Supnah had come to him. "Magic Man has seen much game ahead. It is far
across a hard land. We will go there. We will hunt. Karana will wait
here with the children who are sick. Karana will guard the little ones
until Supnah returns."

Supnah had not returned. Although Karana had done his best to guard the
children, they were weak. One by one, they gave their breath to Spirit
Sucker until Karana was left alone with his spear, and his dagger, and
his fine warm clothes, listening to the remorseless moaning of the wind,
remembering the smile of Navahk, knowing that the magic man had wanted
this for him and wondering what he had done to make the shaman hate him
so.

In the blue shivering light of the aurora borealis, he had seen the
eagle flying back and forth from its aerie high upon the mountain wall.
Weakened by hunger, he had yet enough reason left in him to know that it
was still too early to see the eagle flying above the tundra. But there
it was, and Karana had thought that if he could bring down the eagle, he
would keep Spirit Sucker at bay, and somehow, across the many miles,
Navahk would know that he had survived and would stop smiling.

It was this thought that got him to his feet, but it was the presence of
dire wolves arriving to feed upon the dead children of Supnah's band
that had put fire to his intent. He had run and run until at last he was
on the mountain, hefting his spear, hurling it with his last ounce of
energy. Impossibly, it had taken the eagle through its breast. The bird
had fallen, and the boy had pounced upon it, devouring it even as it
screamed its last; and all the while that he had eaten, he had thought
of the smile of Navahk and wished that it was the flesh of the magic man
that he was consuming.

For long, uncounted days he slept in the eagle's cave, warm in its nest,
safe upon its broad aerie until a huge tera torn sighted him and swept
down to pluck him off the cliff. His spear saved him, but in his panic,
he stabbed upward once, then drew back, took the weapon in both hands,
and whacked at the bird as though the spear were a stave. In a squawking
rain of flying feathers and spurting blood, the condor was driven away.
He stood shaking, the spear splintered and broken in his hands, and knew
that he must seek a smaller, less-conspicuous refuge.

He followed a marmot up to the little caves, then killed the marmot and
ate off it for several days. Hunger drove him down off the mountain to
hunt; but where there was prey, so too were there predators. A great,
fang-toothed cat almost caught him once, and he was nearly mauled by a
young, solitary short-faced bear. Soon, inspired by his strong desire to
survive, he snared as many weasels as he could, regretfully rubbing
their stinking, oily glands into his clothes and hair. It had hurt him
to ruin his mother's beautifully made garments, but he smelled so foul
that nothing wanted to eat him. Now he was safe. He did not think that
his mother would be angry.

Alone on the mountain, he lived by his wits, hunting the lowlands when
hunger made it necessary, then retreating to the safe, sheltering
heights. Patiently, he awaited his father's return, confident that
Supnah would come for him. He longed for that day and dreamed of the
moment when he would stand with proud contempt before Navahk. He watched
the wide, empty miles for endless hours, but Supnah and his band had not
returned. These people and their dog had come instead.

He was disgusted with himself for having been caught. His glare
intensified. He had ferreted out each snare except the last one. He knew
that he had been right to fear the strangers. They, or at least their
magic man, must possess a great and fearful magic to have bent the will
of a beast so that it lived with them as though it were a member of
their band. Had it not been for the growls of the beast, he would have
blundered into their company sooner, drawn irresistibly down from his
cave to theirs by the smell of roasting meat.

Now the girl was kneeling before him, offering a sliver of bone upon
which she had roasted choice blood meats. The two men had hunted
earlier; the smell of the fresh, fire browned meat was almost too much
to refuse.

Nearly. He made a face at the girl. She lowered her unusual eyes,
sighed, and went away, leaving the meat beside him. He let it lie, not
certain if it was poisoned.

"It is safe! Eat! You are a boy, not game to be taken with bad meat!"
snapped the old one.

The boy's eyes widened. The old one was a magic man. He had seen into
his thoughts. Fear tightened in his gut, obliterating his hunger. Why
were these strangers so kind to him? He was not of their band. Perhaps
they were going to feed him to the wild dog? But no. If they were going
to cut his throat and slice him into fillets for the dog, they would not
have stanched and stitched his wound. A new thought dawned. It made him
feel weak and sick with dread. Perhaps they were what all men feared?
Members of the Ghost Band. In times of light they came from nowhere and
disappeared into nowhere, stealing young women and boys, then vanishing
as though they had never been there at all, leaving burning encampments
and dead and dying to mark the reality of their raids.

Suddenly shivering and trying hard not to show it lest the strangers
know that it was from fear and not cold, he realized that this cave must
be the place to which the Ghost Band vanished to dance its ghost dances.
Here they must gather after their raids, with their tattooed skin and
their huge, flapping labrets of carved bone that so deformed their lower
lips, they terrified everyone who had ever seen them and lived to tell
the tale.

"Where is your band?" pressed the young hunter again, speaking slowly,
with an intensity that made his voice sound as though it was ready to
snap. "If your people abandoned you, in which direction did they go? Can
you tell this man nothing? Can you understand not even a word of what
this man says?"

The boy slapped his arms across his chest and locked his hands beneath
his elbows in an effort to keep himself from shivering. The young man
bore no tattoos, nor was his lower lip pierced to hold a labret of any
kind. And why did he care so much about one small boy who had been left
behind by others? Maybe he was of the Ghost Band, waiting here for his
fellow raiders to join him in their mountain stronghold. Those others
would be tattooed and wear labrets so huge that they tripped upon them
when they walked! They would try to make the boy point out the way that
Supnah's band had gone; then they would follow and kill them all.

The thought was so anguishing, it drove back the boy's fear and replaced
it with anger. "Karana will tell the Ghost Man nothing! Karana is not
afraid! This boy's father is the mountain, and his mother is the mist!
Karana is alone! He has no band!"

Beside the fire, the girl looked up, as startled by the sharp outcry of
the child as the dog, whose ears went up.

Torka measured the boy shrewdly through half-closed eyes. He reached out
and pressed gently upon the child's bandaged thigh. When the boy gasped
with pain, Torka nodded. "Karana is not made of mist or stone. In time,
he will tell Torka where his band has gone."

Karana hissed and bared his teeth like a cornered lynx, hating himself
for having blurted out any words at all. Now they knew that he could
understand them. Now they knew that he could speak. Now they would never
stop asking their questions. But he would tell them nothing. One day his
leg would be healed, and he would run away, find his father and his
band, and lead them here to kill these strangers. If only they were
ugly, they would be easier to hate. If only they were not so kind, it
would not be quite so hard to keep up his guard against them. If only
the girl were not such a good cook, the smells of roasting meat
emanating from her fire would not make his stomach lurch and gurgle in
betrayal of his resolve not to be hungry. Where was Supnah? Why had he
not returned as he had promised? Karana would not allow himself even to
think that his father might not have survived the winter. Supnah would
return, and soon. Karana was finding it very hard to be brave.

The eyes of the old one swept over him. It was as though the wings of an
invisible bird had brushed against his skin.

"Hmmph," exhaled the old man in a voice that revealed nothing of
himself. "Do not try to be so bold, Little Hunter. We are not ghosts. We
are all that is left of the People. You are of our band now."

While Torka and Umak hunted with Aar upon the tundra far below the cave,
the boy slept in the sun on one side of the ledge, and an unhappy Lonit
cracked marrowbones with a stone on the other.

The full, yellow light of the cloudless morning washed over her. Lost in
thought, she took no notice. She was remembering another light: the
invisible light that had burned within the cave when she and Torka had
"caught fire." It had been brighter than a thousand Arctic mornings,
warmer than the sun at noon upon an endless summer day. In that light,
she had been Torka's woman. Fully his at last, she had trembled with
gladness, knowing that in all the world there was not a female left
alive to take him from her side, nor was there a man who would say that
she was not worthy of him.

Her happiness had been such that she was actually thankful to the great
mammoth who had destroyed the lives of many so that joy might come into
her life. Lying warm and exhausted from lovemaking within Torka's arms,
she had drifted into sleep, too blissfully content to feel guilty about
her gladness. Those who had been harsh and cruel to her were dead. The
only two who had ever shown kindness to her were here beside her.
Together they would make a new life, a new People. A sweet, euphoric
contentment had absorbed her consciousness as she had willingly slipped
into the sweetest dreams that she had ever known.

The sense of bliss and gladness had remained with her until the animal
had cried out and she had known that it was not an animal. When Umak had
returned with the boy in his arms, she had taken one look at the child's
face and had nearly swooned with dread. It was Torka's little son,
returned from the dead to remind her of what a selfish creature she was.
Had she actually been glad for his death? No. Her heart bled for the
children who had died beneath the rushing, ripping onslaught of the
killer mammoth. She had been foolish to think that Torka had made love
to her; he had used her to sate his need because she was the only woman
available. How he must long for Egatsop!

She sighed with pained resignation. Torka would have another woman soon,
she was certain of it. She paused in her work. Her eyes moved to rest
upon the boy. His existence was proof of the existence of others. No
longer could Lonit cling to the belief that she was the only woman in
the world. When Torka had thrown the boy's foul, tattered rags off the
cliff, Lonit's practiced eyes had noted that they must have been
beautiful once, for they had been sewn of many strips of furs that had
been joined with infinite precision. The hands of his human mother had
sewn his garments with pride and love. Karana had screamed in rage as he
had made a pathetic, lurching grab for those garments. Lonit knew that
the intensity of his attachment to his clothes had little to do with the
clothes themselves; it was a manifestation of his love for the woman who
had made them. Lonit wondered what she was like. No doubt she was
beautiful, like her child. It must have torn her heart when she had been
forced to abandon such a fine son. But why had Karana's parents left
him? He was well beyond the years during which it had been acceptable
among Lonit's band to expose a child. The fact that he had been able to
survive on his own proved that he had been strong and able to hunt.
Perhaps he had not been abandoned? Perhaps he had been lost in a storm
and even now his people were backtracking along the game trails in their
search for him. Lonit did not want to think of that. She preferred to
think that they had died of starvation during the long, bitter time of
the winter dark.

The sun was so warm upon the ledge that the marrow in the bone that
Lonit had been cracking softened and grew oily and rich with scent. A
fly buzzed in, fighting the wind with transparent wings as it began a
greedy exploration. Another joined it. Still lost in thought, Lonit
absently waved them away as she was confronted by a sobering truth: She
wanted the boy's people to be dead. She wanted to be alone in the world
with Torka as her man and Umak as the patient, caring father whom she
had never known. But it was not likely that an entire band would starve
to death, and the boy's behavior drove that point home to her. Fighting
against pain and fever, he dragged himself to the lip of the cornice and
sat staring across the tundra. Lonit watched him and knew that he was
certain that it was only a matter of time before his people returned.

But they had not returned. It had been many days since Umak had carried
Karana down from the heights. The hours of light were growing longer.
Soon night would become a thing of the past, and still there was no sign
of Karana's people. Lonit's eyes focused upon the boy. His leg was
healing very slowly. It was still hot and so full of pain that he could
barely move it. Had Torka not insisted that he spend his nights out of
the wind, he would have remained on his mat of piled skins, there on the
other edge of the cornice, and never stirred at all, except to relieve
himself. Still, Umak said that his wound was healing. Fragments of bone
from the splintered end of the spear were beginning to work their way
out of the inflamed thigh. Umak said that this was good, for it was the
splinters that caused the festering. The wound still bled a little and
sweated clear fluid, but it no longer oozed the thick, greenish
secretions that had caused the old man so much concern in the first few
days after he had speared the boy.

Karana's appetite had returned, although he still refused to eat in
front of any of them. He snarled at Lonit each time she came close to
place an offering of meat before him. When Aar ventured near to steal
the neglected portions, the boy clouted him across the nose. Insulted
and intractable, the dog stayed near the child, waiting patiently. When
no one was looking--except the dog, and Lonit from her place at the far
side of the fire pit--Karana wolfed down every morsel of food that she
had brought to him. Covertly, she had observed the boy's growing
interest in the dog. His initial fear of the beast gradually became
curiosity. Intrigued by having a wild animal in such close proximity, he
had begun to toss it the joints that he had not quite scraped free of
marrow. Each day his toss grew shorter, drawing the animal closer and
closer, until one day he held out a generous scrap of meat and Aar was
eating out of his hand.

From that day, when not hunting with Umak, the dog stayed beside the
boy. In the cave or on the ledge, Aar could be found at Karana's side,
sleeping next to him in the night, absorbing sunlight with him by day as
the boy sat with his back against the mountain wall and kept his vigil
over the empty tundra far below, patiently awaiting the return of his
people.

Lonit sighed again. Soon now, they would come.

Torka was also convinced of it. He seemed reborn, no longer sullen and
reflective but eager to greet each day. He had no time for Lonit. When
he was not hunting, he was busy with his weapons, working and reworking
his spears, knapping and re knapping his projectile points. Lonit was
convinced that he occupied himself to keep his man-need quelled, and
when Karana's band came, he would choose someone worthy from its women
to warm him in the night. Meanwhile, when darkness fell, he built a
signal fire on the ledge, sheltering it from the wind within an
open-ended baffle of skins laid around a brace work of bones.

"If Karana's band is out there, they will see Torka's fire. Soon they
will come."

The boy had listened with wide-eyed apprehension, as though he feared
that the flames would attract ghosts instead of men; but as time passed,
he began to relax a little. Both Umak and Torka ignored his hostility.
They spoke to him and shared their thoughts, and Torka showed him the
People's way of making weapons out of stone and bone, and Umak told him
tales of magic and myth, and although he would not speak in
acknowledgment of their open concern for him, the fear and hatred that
had gleamed from wide, dark eyes when they had first brought him to the
cave was less apparent now.

Still, he kept his unrelenting daylight vigils and snarled at Lonit
whenever she brought food to him. She had given up trying to communicate
with him. In time, he would speak again. In time, he would lose his
fear. In time, his people would come, and who knew what would happen to
her among strangers, when her own band had barely tolerated her.

She had said as much to Umak. He had listened pensively and understood
her fears, for he himself suffered similar apprehensions. Here, alone
with Torka and Lonit, he was a hunter again, needed again, strong again.
Within a band, he would be only one more old man living out his days
until his time came to walk away upon the wind.

They had sat together the night before, close to the fire, while Torka
and the boy slept. The sounds of meltwater cascading down from the ice
pack had filled the darkness. Now and again, from somewhere deep within
the mountain itself, there was the low groan and grinding sound that had
become familiar to them.

Umak had seemed suddenly to come to grips with an unspoken argument that
he had been waging with himself.

"The People were not the only people," he said. "There are other bands.
We are not alone. Umak says that it may be the people of the tundra are
like the great herds of caribou. Once they were one bull, one cow, then
one herd with many calves. Calves grow. They become many bulls, many
cows. The bulls lock horns in combat. Blood is shed. The younger bulls
break away from the main body of the herd. Cows follow to form a new
herd. Like this it happens, many times. Soon there are many herds, each
moving its own way, each following its own route of migration in endless
search for food, forgetting that there are other herds until not one cow
or one bull remembers the beginning."

"This woman is happy here upon the mountain. She is content with >Umak
and Torka as the only members of her 'herd." "

"It is so with Umak. But no man or woman may hold the wind. It will blow
what it will to us. And whatever comes, we must be strong." Now flies
were landing on the back of her hand and crawled between her fingers,
buzzing and circling as they feasted on the oils that had risen from the
marrowbone. She flicked them away with disgust and rose to her feet,
wiping her hands on the hide apron that she had made of unwanted scraps
left over from the garments she was sewing for her men.

She could see them now: two solitary figures striding toward her, with
Aar trotting along to one side, tail up and bouncing. They had taken a
fair-sized ground sloth; its bulky shape was unmistakable as they took
turns dragging it. Its thick pelage would make a wonderfully thick
sleeping mat, and its extraordinary claws would make excellent tools
with which to dig the late-summer harvest of edible tubers. The
happiness of anticipated pleasure filled her, then disappeared. The
warm, sweet springtime wind moved around her. It brought no warmth or
sweetness. Remembering Umak's words about the wind, Lonit considered it
a hostile thing.

Her eyes scanned the tundra. Were people of another band there, just
beyond the mountainous, snow-mantled horizon, walking toward her even as
she gazed? No! It was not possible! She could not bear to think of it.
Yet she could not help herself. Torka would welcome them. He had said
so. He had spoken enthusiastically of safety to be found in numbers and
of workloads eased. Umak had accused him of planning to go off to hunt
the Destroyer. He had not denied it, but Lonit was certain that the last
thing on his mind was hunting mammoths. He was thinking of a new life,
of a new woman, perhaps many women, and Lonit knew that he would have it
all. What woman would not eagerly open herself to pleasure him? What
hunting band would not welcome a man of Torka's skill and daring among
its ranks?

And what of Lonit?

She drew in a breath. It was bitter.

Her mother's words rose from the past. ".. . there is no place in the
band for an ugly girl .. . you must be useful .. . you must be brave ..
. you must be strong...."

The bitterness within her grew. Lonit has been all of these things. And
still Torka will choose another. But Lonit is strong. Let the wind blow
to her what it will. Lonit will not be afraid.

She would still have Umak. She would stay with him, to serve him as a
daughter--or as a woman if he wished it. She would be all things to him,
and when the time came for him to walk away upon the wind, she would
walk with him to gentle the journey for him. Together, they would set
their spirits free upon the wind. It would not be a bad thing. Without
Torka as her man, Lonit had no wish to go on living. The long,
lengthening days, which yielded to star-filled nights, continued to
pass. Below the mountain, grasses greened and grew tall. Across the
tundra, flowers of every shape and shade imaginable burst into bloom. In
the high, precipitous alpine canyons, groves of miniature dogwood became
spangled with white, four-petaled stars, while willow catkins turned
gold with tiny blossoms, and dwarf bunchberry and cranberry flowered and
began to set fruit.

Flies, gnats, and great hordes of whining mosquitoes formed black, veil
like transparencies over 'pristine lakes and ponds. Birds were
everywhere. Fishing hawks and eagles rode the thermals, soaring and
banking above rivers in which salmon had begun to run. Geese of myriad
sizes and varieties vied with ducks, swans, turn stones and sandpipers
for prime nesting sites within the wetlands. Cranes and herons stood
serpent-necked and stilt-legged in the sedge marshes, while loons called
and lobe-toed phalaropes splashed and spun within the shallows of
uncountable streams as they ducked their heads beneath the water to
scoop up larvae and freshwater crustaceans with their beaks.

Foxes and hares, ptarmigan and owls lost the last of their winter-white
coloring. They were brown now, or red or gray, or mottled combinations
of all three. Along the wide, stony outwash plain that lay at the base
of the mountain, a herd of blocky, short-maned horses paused to drink,
caught the scent of man, nickered nervously, and moved on. Not far away,
in the now-luxuriant scrub growth of a meadow on the fringes of the
tundra, a winter-weakened yak fell to the predations of a ravenous
short-faced bear and its cubs. A rusty-gold pride of shaggy-coated lions
dozed in the long grass downwind of a small herd of musk ox that grazed
the mountain's southern flank.

And in the deep, spruce-shaded canyon below the aerie of Torka, Umak,
Lonit, and Karana, Umak followed cloven footprints along the hard-packed
spine of a still-existing snowbank. Within a grove of stunted birch
trees, he sighted his prey and brought down the bud-antlered bull moose
with one throw of his spear. Struck through its heart, the animal
dropped to its knees, woofed once, then keeled over, dead.

The old man's cry of triumph echoed up the mountain walls to set
vibrations running deep into the silt underpinnings of the summit ice
pack. Somewhere deep within the glacier, an enormous lateral fracture
cracked lengthwise and stressed the masses of ice on either side of it.
Imperceptibly, the lower mass slipped just a little; but the entire
glacier groaned, cracked open into fissures along its surface, and
stretched subtly downward to accommodate the changes within itself.

The movements and sounds had been no more and no less than the usual
erratic shiftings that the old man had grown used to over the past
weeks, so he paid no heed to them now. High above him, where the sun
struck the south face of the ice mass, a lobe of white a quarter of a
mile thick oozed forward to overlay its stony, vertical foundations. A
family of large white sheep, which had been feeding on the green tufts
of a sky-high meadow, leaped into thin air and skittered down the
mountain wall. A tera tom circling in the blue, clear vault of the sky,
cast its shadow on the gaping, mile-long mouth of a thousand-foot-deep
crevasse that had not been there a moment before.

At the back of the canyon, a thin avalanche of small stones and bits and
pieces of glacial ice clattered and rolled for thousands of feet before
landing not far from where Umak stood. But the old man had seen many
such rockfalls since he and the others had come to the mountain.

Torka was coming toward him, his own spears in hand. Umak uttered a
little whoop of pride. He had beaten Torka to the kill! Aar was already
sniffing at the carcass and lapping blood from the wound. Umak raised
his arms and shook them to show his victory, knowing that the bull moose
he had slain was in its prime. Coupled with the many antelope that they
had taken, plus the sloth and the woman meat that Lonit had snared with
her traps and bola, the ton and a half of meat that the moose would
yield would be more than enough to feed them all for the rest of the
summer, through the fall, and on into the time of the long dark and
beyond. If they wished, they need not hunt again but could spend their
time at leisure while Lonit worked at the endless tasks that times of
plenty presented to those of her gender.

When Torka came near to appraise the kill, Umak spoke his thoughts to
him, adding: "Lonit is one woman. There is much meat. In this new place,
it may be that the spirits who give power to the hunter will not mind if
these two help Only Woman In The World."

"Lonit is not the only woman in the world."

"When Umak sees others, then he will believe that there are others. In
the meantime, there is much meat to butcher, many hides to work--too
much for Only Woman In The World."

Torka sighed, doing his best to restrain annoyance with his grandfather.
Umak had not referred to Lonit as Almost A Woman since he had awakened
to see Torka and the girl sharing the same sleeping skins on the morning
that they had discovered Karana. Torka did not like to be reminded of
that morning or of the night that had preceded it. He avoided Lonit when
he could. She stirred memories of their coupling and the feelings toward
her that he had never felt for anyone but Kipu and his grandfather. It
disturbed him to have to admit that, in retrospect, he remembered
feeling no such tenderness for Egatsop. Passion? Yes. Possessiveness?
Yes. Pride in knowing that the most beautiful woman in the band had
accepted him? Yes. But lately, when he looked at Lonit's tall, slender
figure bent over her drying frames, or sewing, or cooking, he found
loveliness in her every move and gesture.

By the standards of the People, he knew that she should not seem
beautiful to him, but she did. When watching her patience with the
wounded child or her devotion to Umak, Torka always found himself
thinking that Egatsop would never have been so patient with another
woman's child or as devoted to an old man who had need of his pride.
Although Umak did his best to pretend otherwise, there was no mistaking
the fact that he was strong in the morning and tired and stiff-jointed
each afternoon. Egatsop would not have understood why Torka would stand
back and allow Umak to stalk and make a kill that he could easily have
made in half the time, but somehow he knew that Lonit would understand.
He had seen her listen to the old man's tales, pretending that he had
not dozed off midway through a story only to awake with a start and
repeat it all over again from the beginning, unaware that he had been
asleep at all. He had seen her surreptitiously pound Umak's meat before
roasting it, and he had known that she did this to spare the old man's
teeth, which must be growing brittle. So many little things, all done
when she thought herself unobserved. It was impossible to despise such a
girl.

He knew now that he had completely misjudged her. He had come to care
for her deeply, but he did not want to care. The caring could cripple
his resolve to find and slay the beast that had destroyed his band. Each
time he looked at Karana, he saw his lost, beloved little boy and knew
that before he could allow himself to care for anyone or anything again,
he must drive his spear into the eye and brain of World Shaker and see
the monster fall and breathe its last.

"Umak says that he will help Lonit. Only Woman In The World will be glad
to have another pair of hands to work the hides and cure the sinew and
prepare the meat."

The old man's statement drew Torka from his reverie. He looked at his
grandfather and knew that he had been right to mislead him into thinking
that he had beaten him to the kill. He looked vibrant, arrogant, almost
young again. The placement of his spear in the moose told Torka that,
despite the encroaching infirmities of old age, he was still a hunter to
be reckoned with. Coupled with his powers as a spirit master, Umak would
be an asset to any band. The thought was steadying.

Torka repeated the compliment aloud, then went on: "When Karana's people
come, it will be a good thing to share our meat with them. They will
welcome us. And Lonit will have the hands of many women to help her with
her work."

"// Karana's people come!"

"They will come. They would not abandon such a son as Karana. Torka says
that the boy was lost in the storms of the time of the long dark. Even
now, hunters are coming in search of him."

"The time of the long dark was longer and darker than any that this old
man can ever remember. Never has Umak seen such storms or felt such
cold. If the boy was lost, his people will think him dead. They will
send no one to search for him." "If Karana were Torka's son, Torka would
not stop searching until he found the bones of his little one and placed
them with his own hands to look at the sky. Only then would Torka
believe that his son had given his spirit to walk upon the wind."

"Hrmmph! Torka would not have lost his son in the first place, no matter
how fierce the storm, no matter how white the wind. It took a crooked
spirit to tear the life from Kipu's heart. But Umak says that Karana has
been abandoned. His people will not come!"

Torka rose, impatient with the conversation. He knew that Umak must have
his doubts about joining with a new band; he must be worrying about his
age. "You will do well with a new people, Father of my father. You are
Umak! You are spirit master! You will be strong. You will follow the
game again. Life will be good. You will have women again. You will be
proud again. You must not be afraid."

The old man's face frowned in righteous indignation. "Umak does not fear
for Umak!" His arms went wide, then up and out as though to encompass
the entire hunting range that lay at the base of the great mountain.
"Torka has brought Umak and Lonit to a good place. We have made a safe
encampment. We have much meat. We do not need others to help us survive.
In this place, we could stay forever!"

The impassioned outpouring of the old man was contagious. Torka
responded with equal intensity. "Forever is how long Torka will take, if
that is what he must take to find and kill the Destroyer!"

"Hah! So it is as Umak has said! Torka waits for Karana's band so that
he can walk away from this old man and from Ixnrit and from Karana and
say to the great mammoth: "Torka comes to you now, across a far land,
seeking one who has destroyed the People, seeking to kill one who cannot
be killed! And if Torka dies now, it does not matter, because Umak and
Lonit and Karana are safe in the care of another band!" "

Torka stared at his grandfather. It never failed to amaze him that, just
when he began to accept the fact that Umak was a man of failing
faculties, the old man's mind snapped and sparked and cut through to the
very quick of his own thoughts. The image of a brittle-toothed, sinewy
elder sitting stiff backed by the fire vanished. Before him was Umak,
fiery temper sd wily tracker of beasts, slayer of bears, teacher of
infinite wisdom.

"Come with me, then!" he urged. "When Karana's people come and Lonit and
the boy are safe, we can go together. Together we will kill the
Destroyer and return to tell the tale!"

"Hmmph! Even if Karana's band come, Thunder Speaker is far away, and
this old man says that this is good. The memories of the Destroyer are
bitter! Let them go, Torka. Forget what has been. Look at what is. Life
is good now. And if this spirit master's eyes have seen clearly, then
Umak says this: When the time of the long dark has come and gone, when
the first blue light rises with the setting of the starving moon, Lonit
will bring forth new lite, and the People will be reborn. Will Torka say
then that his life does not matter? Will he then say to Umak: "Come, let
us leave our woman and child to the care of those who lose or abandon
their own?" Hmmph! Torka will do as he must. But Umak will stay with
Lonit. To this old man, her life is worth more than the death of a
mammoth."

The sun stood still in the sky. The world turned upside down. The
northern lights shone by day, and the wind rose to transform their
colors into rainbows that ran like rivers over the land.

Only Torka saw these wonders. He was not certain why he saw them. He did
not want to be happy over Umak's revelation, but the more he thought
about it, the more the sense of wonder grew within him. Perhaps it was
because they had all been so close to death--the old man, the girl, the
hunter, the boy, even the dog. In a sense, they had all walked upon the
wind only to be rejected by the spirits, to be cast out of the world
they had known, not to die but to be reborn in a new world; and now
their rebirth was being confirmed in the promise of the new life that
was growing within Lonit as surely as summer was ripening upon the land.

Perhaps Umak was right. The Destroyer was far away, in a part of the
world that they had left behind. Life was good on the mountain. For the
first time, Torka realized that as long as his remnant little band held
together, the People could not be destroyed. The People lived on in Umak
and Torka. Through Lonit, they would be reborn to survive in generations
yet to come. Perhaps it was time for Torka to release himself from the
past and to send his memories of the great mammoth walking away upon the
wind ... at least until Karana's people came. Now he would think of
other things. He would care for Lonit and their coming child. He would
think about the future. And savor the renewed joy that he now found in
the wonder of living. They acted so strangely toward her. Lonit could
not understand why. She had made a clean, orderly encampment for them
upon the ledge and had set much meat to dry and many hides to cure on
the long, broad lip of the cornice. She was content with her woman's
work, but they insisted that they help her with it. She felt demeaned by
the sight of her men scraping away at hides, cleaning and twisting
sinew. Were they dissatisfied with the quality of her labor? Humiliated,
she had applied herself with extra care and vigor, only to be scolded,
told to rest, and ordered to stop working so hard.

It was very confusing. What else was a woman to do? Men hunted; women
worked. And how much rest could one female need? Ever since Umak had
brought down the moose, and he and Torka had piled its meat into its own
skin and devised a pulley to haul it up onto the ledge, they had treated
her as though she, and not Karana, were injured and in need of special
care. She would catch them watching her in the most curious ways, as
though they waited for her to say something special, or as if they
expected her to be sick.

It was perplexing. Her appetite had never been better. She felt well and
strong, although her breasts were tender, and she waited apprehensively
to experience her time of blood. What would her men say when it came?
Would they be content to banish her to the far reaches of the cave? Or
would they send her away to sit out her time at the base of the mountain
wall? The thought made her shiver with dread. She was glad when her time
of blood did not come, although she wondered why it stayed away.

Lonit knew only what she had been able to observe, that the time of
blood came with some sort of mystic regularity that had something to do
with the phases of the moon. But twice more the moon went through its
cycle and her time of blood did not come. She was relieved. In the
meantime, half of her wished that her men would stop treating her so
strangely, while the other half rejoiced in incredulous disbelief. Torka
was being kind to her. For reasons she did not understand and would not
even think to question, he did not seem to hate her anymore.

The sun stayed longer and longer in the sky. Then, one day, it did not
set at all. Sunset came, but the sun did not disappear. Instead it
hovered low upon the western horizon, like a lambent coal glowing softly
in the blue fire pit of the sky, then slowly slid northward in the
lingering twilight. At midnight, the sun began its slow descent toward
the east. Hours later, a new day was born. Not once had the sun left the
sky.

And still Karana's people did not come.

Lonit saw that the boy was brooding. He barely touched his food. "Lonit
will gather eggs for Karana," she told him.

The boy glowered. Lonit smiled. Karana still kept his silence and
maintained a mask of hostility, but Lonit had seen subtle changes in his
behavior over the past weeks. She had observed that fresh eggs, raw or
cooked in the ashes of the fire pit, were his favorite food. His leg was
healing nicely, although it would probably be many moons before the torn
muscles would be as good as new. His fear of the spirit master had
gradually become awe as Umak spent hours with the boy, telling him tales
of the People, teaching him to play bone toss, and sharing with him much
of the same knowledge that he had shared with Torka when Torka had been
a boy. Not to be outdone, Torka also doted on the boy and took time out
from the working of his own weapons to fashion a spear for Karana out of
a long bone taken from the moose.

"Soon Karana will hunt with Umak and Torka. This will be a good thing."

The boy had not replied, but he had taken the spear and hefted it,
shaking it at an imaginary quarry. And then, for the first time, he had
smiled.

Lonit had watched the relationship of her men and the boy grow. Karana
was gradually filling the void that Kipu had left in their lives. She
was glad for this, but sorry for the child. No matter how kind and
caring Umak and Torka were to him, it was obvious that he still longed
for his own people. For all of his fierce bravado, he was still a lonely
little boy. Sometimes, when the men slept or were off hunting, Lonit
heard him whispering softly to the dog. In Aar, Karana had found a
companion in whom he could confide his secret hopes and fears. Aar found
an affinity and empathy with the child perhaps because the dog was, for
all of its strength and voracity, little more than a lost pup itself.
Boy and dog were always together now. They slept back to back, actually
touching, and when Karana sometimes whimpered in his sleep, the dog
licked his face and whimpered soft encouragement back to him. Karana
would throw a skinny little arm around Aar's neck and cuddle close. The
dog made no attempt to move away.

The day was hot and windy. Torka volunteered to accompany her on her
search for eggs. They went down the mountain together, with Lonit
marveling at his open concern for her safety. He carried her gathering
nets over his shoulder and went down first, reaching back to steady her
descent as she followed.

She had already gathered most of the eggs that were available near the
mountain's flank. One of the few lessons that her mother had taught her
was to never take all of anything. This was the way of the band, Torka
confirmed. A few eggs here, a few plants there, a few head of game or
geese, and always there would be more to greet the hunters and gatherers
in the following time of light.

They went out onto the tundra, deep into the sedge marsh where the geese
were now molting the last of their flight feathers. They would be bound
to the earth while they raised their young. New feathers grew meanwhile
to replace the old so the geese would be strong when they flew away into
the face of the rising sun in the last lingering days of summer before
the time of the long dark.

Torka paused. It was very windy. The grasses hissed all around. The
waters rippled and splashed as waterfowl, suddenly alerted to their
presence, took to their wings in a cackling, honking, squawking
hysteria. Since many were devoid of the long, strong feathers that
allowed them to fly, many gained no altitude at all, instead crashing
through green walls of grass to disappear without grace or dignity into
another portion of the marsh.

Torka laughed.

It was such a rare sound, Lonit looked at him, startled and pleased. He
was no longer the same man who had walked the wind and led her and Umak
to the mountain. He had lost the gauntness of winter. The sun had
bronzed his face. Her love for him was so intense that it nearly choked
her. Despite the wind, the day was hot; she could barely breathe.

"Look," said Torka, raising his arms. "The wind has blown the flies and
biting ones away across the plain. Let us take advantage of this. Such a
day may not come again until the time of the long dark has come and gone
and a new summer is born!"

He gave her no opportunity to reply as he put down his spears, dropped
the egg-gathering nets, stripped off his clothes, and plunged into the
cold shallows, hooting with delight as he splashed and wallowed like a
child.

"Come!" he called.

It was a command. She could not refuse. It was good to peel off her
summer tunic; it had grown much too tight across her breasts, no doubt
the result of all of the food that her men so generously shared with
her. Yet she had found it strange that only her breasts should grow fat
while the rest of her remained lean and her belly tighter than it had
ever been.

Removing her boots, she walked into the shallows, gasping against the
unexpected chill of the water, hoping that Torka would not find the
sight of her too repulsive.

As she came toward him, he grew suddenly quiet. The expansive, boyish
expression of absolute carelessness vanished from his features. She
paused, knowing that the sight of her had ruined his happiness--but when
he got to his feet and came to her, she knew that the sight of her had
only banished the boy and roused the man.

His eyes moved over her slowly. His hands followed. When he touched her
breasts, she gasped and shivered as though the wind had suddenly turned
cold. But she was not cold. She was aflame. His palm pressed gently
against her lower belly to lie flat against its tautness, and slowly a
smile moved upon his mouth as he nodded.

"Lonit is beautiful," he said, and drew her to him in an embrace of
exquisite tenderness, holding her, enfolding her in his arms. "Lonit is
Torka's woman. This baby ... it will be a good thing."

"Baby?"

He did not speak. He breathed the breath of his life into her nostrils,
then lifted her and carried her out of the water. Gently, he lowered her
onto the tundra, and more gently than that he made love to her. Beneath
the golden eye of the midnight sun, Lonit knew that it was love, and
when at last they lay joined, exhausted and fulfilled, she understood
why she had not shed a woman's blood and needed no one of her own gender
to explain to her how she had come to be carrying Torka's child.

Now they were lovers. They shared the same sleeping skins. The days ran
on, one into the other, like golden fish leaping through the mesh of a
skeining net that would not hold them.

And still Karana's people did not come.

The boy was walking again, with the aid of a crutch that Umak had made
for him out of a caribou antler. His wound was still painful and he
limped badly, but he continued to keep his vigils on the ledge,
patiently waiting for his people as he watched Umak and Torka hunting on
the tundra far below the mountain.

Berries began to ripen in the canyons. The hunters accompanied Lonit on
gathering forays and stood guard over her as she dug for edible tubers.
To humor her insistence that they store as much as possible against the
threat of starving times, they went with her into the wetlands and stood
by admiringly as she refined her skill with her bola by hunting geese
and other waterfowl. Even with the first roundness of pregnancy
beginning to show, she was still as swift and lean and agile as a young
doe.

"Hmmph. The longer Umak looks at Only Woman In The World, the less ugly
she becomes."

"Lonit is not ugly, said Torka defensively, and did not correct his
grandfather for referring to her as the only woman in the world. For
Torka, she was the only woman. He rarely thought of Egatsop these days,
and when he did, it was a sad and tender remembrance. The possessiveness
and the rage against the way she had died were gone. She was dead; he
had placed her to look at the sky with his own hands. Lonit was his
woman now. He knew that he would never desire or love anyone the way he
loved Lonit.

Hatchlings were flying. Young foxes, wolves, and lions were learning to
hunt. Burrowers and rodents were watching the unwary among their young
learn how to die. Bison and musk ox, horse and camel, antelope and yak,
the great browsing herds grazed their way ever eastward across the
steppe beneath the great mountain. Soon the first of the season's
migratory birds would rise from the tundral wetlands to wend their way
into the face of the rising sun. Karana looked out across a world that
had been tinted rust by the first frost of autumn.

Where were his people? Why did they not come?

Lonit sat in the sun on the far side of the cornice. The boy heard the
soft sound of her voice as she hummed to herself while she sewed. She
was stitching new boots for them all. Her voice was soothing. The boy
did not want to be soothed.

His brow furrowed as he stared out across the world. Aar had followed
Umak and Torka down from the heights. The old man had discovered bear
sign in the canyon. He and Torka had decided that they would dig a pit
trap for it at the head of the canyon. Such a large and potentially
dangerous animal was not welcome in their hunting range, and bear meat
was among the best if eaten fresh. Rich and sweet, it would be a feast
for them all. The fat of the animal would burn long and steadily in
Lonit's oil lamp. Its thick hide would provide warm winter leggings and
over vests for them all.

But Karana was not thinking about the bear that would soon die at Umak's
and Torka's hands. He was thinking of his people. A deep, aching hurt
formed at the back of his throat. Was his father dead? Could it be that
Karana was the only member of his band to survive that last terrible
winter? Or was the old spirit master right? Could it be that his people
had abandoned him?

The supposition was one he had not allowed himself to consider. Supnah
would never have abandoned him. Never. Yet now he remembered the
anguished look that had contorted his father's face when the magic man,
Navahk, had spoken to him. And he remembered the way that the magic man
had smiled at him. It had been a smile full of secrets, dark secrets,
like insect larvae hidden deep within the belly of a wounded longspur
that he had once found upon the spring tundra. The little bird had
looked all right; he had thought that it was only stunned and shivering
against the cold. But when he had lifted it from the snow, the worms
that were eating of its damaged breast squirmed and wriggled against his
palms as, with one last shudder, the tiny bird had died.

The memory was so unpleasant that Karana closed his eyes and shook his
head, trying to blot it from his mind. He hoped that Navahk was dead,
his own belly eaten out by worms. He could not understand how his father
could have taken the advice of such a magic man. Perhaps it was because
they were brothers? Perhaps it was because, long ago, Karana's mother
had adored Supnah but avoided Navahk, and Supnah felt obliged to
compensate him for that?

Perhaps Karana would never know the answers to these questions. Supnah,
Navahk, and his band were far away. Karana was alone with strangers, and
as time continued to pass, he was finding it harder and harder to remain
hostile toward them. It was clear to him now that the old spirit master
had not meant to hurt him. Still, he resented the old man for his
refusal to believe that Karana's people would return.

He opened his eyes. He looked around the well-stocked, meticulously
maintained encampment and had to admit to himself that life here with
Umak, Torka, Lonit, and the wild dog was good--so good that sometimes he
actually hoped that his people would not come for him.

But they would. He knew that they would. To wish otherwise was to be a
disloyal son. He clenched his teeth and set his mouth into a scowl.
Karana would wait for his people. Soon now they would come.

The dog alerted them to danger. They had been busy digging the pit trap,
cutting down spruce trees and hacking them into stakes onto which the
bear would, they hoped, fall and impale itself. To be certain of their
quarry's death, they had baited the canyon with freshly killed marmots
into which they had inserted deadly slivers of bone that had been
ingeniously softened and bent double. Pointed on both ends, when
swallowed by the bear, the bone splinters would be straightened by its
digestive juices, expanding into lethal rods that would pierce the
animal's intestines. Weakened by pain and internal bleeding, such a bear
could be tracked and killed by two men. It would be dangerous, but if
the bear avoided the pit trap, they would have no other way of
successfully bringing it down with minimal risk to themselves. It was
not a way of hunting that either Torka or Umak liked, but both men knew
that even with a full complement of hunters there was no prey more
dangerous or unpredictable than a bear unless it was an enraged mammoth.

Their main problem had been keeping Aar from making off with their
marmots. They kept throwing stones at the dog to keep it from snatching
the deadly bait, and the dog, insulted and confused by their behavior
toward it, had turned and started back toward the ledge. So it was that
Aar came upon the bear and alerted the hunters to the fact that they
were about to become the hunted.

For one moment, the great bear froze in the brush at the neck of the
canyon. Standing on all fours, it was over six feet tall at the
shoulder. When it stood erect to sight its prey, it was more than twice
that. It had a push-faced snout and a wide, over slung lower jaw. Its
huge, shaggy body rippled with an under layering of fat, and its small
yellow eyes fixed the hunters as it shook its enormous head and
slobbered out of a gaping maw of a pink-lipped mouth that showed teeth
more suited to ripping flesh than grinding berries.

The great head dropped. The eyes did not blink. The bear made no sound.
It charged without warning, but Aar's sudden, lightning-swift
counterattack distracted it. Confused by the dog's frenzied barking and
bold, circling, snapping lunges, the bear paused. It turned first one
way, then the other as it attempted to swat the audacious dog. Its
movement allowed Torka time to level and hurl a spear. It went deep into
the bear's shoulder, quivering harmlessly but not painlessly in a layer
of fat. The bear growled now, rearing up and shaking itself. With the
spear still projecting from its shoulder, it came down onto all fours
again and ran straight toward Umak.

The old man never flinched. With his spear in one hand and his dagger in
the other, he crouched, waiting. The bear was a blur of brown as it
filled his vision. Behind Umak, Torka raged at his grandfather to run,
but he did not. A lifetime's worth of hunting wisdom and experience
galvanized his senses. Sight, sound, smell, taste, and the sensory
nerves at the tips of his fingers all functioned at their maximum levels
as Umak, spirit master, bent them to one purpose. He was master of his
own spirit now, in complete control of his body and emotions. The light
that burned at the back of a man's eyes when death was near was
white-hot within his own eyes now. He stood his ground until he could
smell the breath of the bear and one huge, clawed paw flew outward
toward him in an attempt to swipe off his head.

In that instant, his mind and body were consumed in the bright inner
fire of pure intent and absolute fearlessness. The eyes of man and beast
met as Umak lunged forward to drive his dagger deep and his spear
through the bear's left eye socket straight into its brain. The animal
swept over the man like a breaking wave of brown fur. When it fell, it
fell with Umak in an embrace of death.

Torka's heart was in his throat and his knife-edged whalebone bludgeon
was in his hand. Time seemed to throb in cadence with his pulse--and it
was fast, much too fast. He was breathless, unable to react to what he
had just witnessed. And then, in an explosion of energy, he cried his
grandfather's name. As Aar leaped upon the fallen bear with slashing,
ripping teeth, Torka joined him, hacking and slicing with his weapon. He
knew that he was sobbing. He did not care. The great bear was dead, with
Umak's spear in its skull and Umak's dagger deep in its thorax, and all
that Torka could see of his grandfather were his legs sticking out from
beneath the monstrous mound of ruined fur and bleeding carcass.

Then one leg moved, and the other. From out of the bottom of the mound
came a weak and angry voice. "Torka can skin this great bear later! Umak
may be a spirit master, but what he has killed is not going to get up
and walk away! Get this old man out of here!"

Night had returned to the tundra. And in its star-filled darkness, the
little band feasted on the meat of the great short-faced bear. Umak had
not come away from the encounter unscathed. The bear had half-scalped
him, but as wounds went, it was not so bad. He sat proudly while Lonit
sutured it. He remembered his failure with the wolves and smiled as he
thought: This wound is a good thing. It has given back to this old man
his pride.

They shared their food with Aar. Karana sat close to Umak as Lonit built
their fire high. For the second time since he had come to live with them
upon the ledge, the boy spoke.

"Karana is glad old man alive." "Hmmph! This old man is not so easy to
kill!" replied Umak. "And Umak is glad boy has decided to use his mouth
for more than eating and scowling!" He gave the child a cuff to the side
of the head. It was gently done. The boy smiled as he watched Umak don
the bear-claw necklace that Lonit had made for him. The old man had
salved his wound with a paste of willow pulp and urine. The curative
oils of the willow soothed the rawness of his sutured scalp. Ammonia in
the urine would discourage infection. Although he was tired and hurting,
Umak had never felt stronger or younger or more deeply at peace with
himself. In his old age, he had faced down and killed a bear that was
even larger than the great white bear that he had slain in his youth.

"This is not the first bear that Umak has taken," he informed the boy.
"No. Long ago, when this old man was a boy no bigger than Karana, the
bear spirits said to their little ones: "Grow strong. Grow wise. Grow
wary. Umak is growing to manhood, and he is all of these things!" "

He told his story then. In the high, ruddy glow of the dancing fire,
they sat close together in the darkness of the cave, enchanted by the
spell that he worked with his words. Umak of old was born out of the
dark to live again in the light of Lonit's fire, to hunt, to walk the
savage tundra, to live as a youth again in the magic of the night until,
in the dying glow of the flickering shadows, the old man, weakened by
blood loss and exhausted by the events of the day, fell asleep.

Karana looked at him adoringly, sighed, put his head on the old man's
knee, and contentedly lost himself in his own dreams of adventures that
had been nurtured by Umak's tales. Aar slept beside the boy, and Lonit
lay asleep on her side upon her new mattress of ground-sloth fur.

A weary Torka looked at her with love. His eyes drifted to the old man
and the boy. He was reminded of the many nights during his own childhood
when he had slept close to his grandfather, with his head on Umak's
knee, nourished by his wisdom and his strength. It seemed so long ago,
yet with no effort at all, he could call it all back--all of it.. . too
much of it.

Sadness touched him. It erased the soft, warm mellowness of his mood. In
the darkness, pale from loss of blood, Umak looked frail and worn. The
youth who had leaped to life through the magic imagery of the spirit
master's tales was irretrievably lost to the past. Suddenly uneasy,
Torka rose and went to stand at the edge of their aerie. He could not
put from his mind the realization that, had it not been for the warning
given by the dog, he and Umak would probably not have survived their
encounter with the bear.

The wind touched him. It had the chill, dry bite of autumn to it. Beyond
the mountain, the world was a vast, texture less sprawl of darkness.
Stars, like cold white embers throbbing on the sleek black skin of the
night, defined where earth ended and sky began.

Where were Karana's people? Were they out there now, far across the
tundra, staring toward the mountain and wondering at the fire's glow
high on its eastern wall?

Or was it as Torka had feared from the beginning? Were they alone in the
world? He was happy now, with Umak and Lonit and the boy in this strange
high camp that they had made above the game-rich land. But without
another band to give strength to their numbers, they would be doomed to
live out their days alone, always at risk of imminent death. Umak was an
extraordinary hunter, but he was an old man who would not be able to
hunt forever. If Torka were injured or killed, how long could Lonit and
their coming child hope to survive with only a wild dog and an injured
boy to protect them against the dangers that would face them every day
of their lives?

Not long, he thought.

And while Umak, Karana, and the dog dreamed the deep, restful dreams of
those who wee content, Torka sat bundled in his sleeping skins against
the mountain wall at the edge of the cornice. He watched for distant
fires, for signs of other bands, then slept the fitful sleep of one
deeply troubled. His dreams were of wolves and roaring walls of water,
of frozen wastes of endless tundra, and of a mammoth with eyes as red as
blood and shoulders as high as the mountain. He saw himself as a condor,
his feathered arms spread wide upon the wind. And then, as in a dream
dreamt long before, he became a lightning bolt, a spear of silver,
streaking down toward the mammoth, down toward death as thunder rent the
sky and he entered the flesh of the Destroyer, piercing it to its very
heart.

He awoke with a start.

The thunder had been real. He could hear it now and see the evanescent
flash of lightning upon the far horizon. He stared, wondering for a
moment if he had heard another sound within the thunder, a higher,
sharper sound--the screaming trumpet of a mammoth.

He listened. There was only the sound of the distant storm. Somewhere,
high above the cave, something shifted within the summit ice pack. Torka
paid no attention to it. He closed his eyes. It was nearly dawn. He
slept again, and this time he did not dream at all.

When the sun rose above the eastern mountains, its light spraying across
the tangled, icy sprawl of distant summits and spreading across the
miles to pierce his lids, Torka came up out of darkness, shielding his
eyes with the back of his hand, certain that he had to be dreaming.
There was no wind. The silence was so absolute that it hurt his ears,
and the color of the dawn was so intense that it seared his vision. It
filled the great sweep of plain with shimmering golden light. And in
that light, something was moving, schooling in a long stream like fish
swimming beneath the surface of a light-dappled lake. And in the
silence, slowly, sound was growing.

Within the cave, Umak, Karana, and Lonit slept heavily in the last,
lingering shadows of the night. The dog rose and came to stand beside
Torka. Tail tucked, ears back, head out, Aar stood at the lip of the
cornice and surveyed the tundra. Now Torka was certain that he was
dreaming. The dog never came close to him intentionally. They hunted
together for Umak's sake and they shared the same cave, also for Umak's
sake, and now for Karana's as well; but Torka and Aar shared a mutual
distrust. Aar had not forgotten that Torka had once tethered him, and
Torka would not allow himself to forget that Aar was still a wild beast.

Now the beast was growling, so intent upon the vision that was rising in
the lake of morning light that it paid no heed to Torka as he rose and
stood.

Man and dog surveyed the world together. Slowly the light began to fade.
Slowly the sound allowed definition. Torka stared in disbelief. He
closed his eyes and stared again. The vision was still there, real. He
was not dreaming. Slowly, from out of the northern sweep of the vast,
undulating tundral steppe, people were coming toward the mountain.

PART IV.

WORLD SHAKER

They were not Karana's people. The boy leaned on his crutch and stared
down at them with a sinking heart that was buoyed only by the fact that
they did not look like the Ghost Band either. They were a small,
bedraggled band of fewer than thirty weary travelers. Their clothing was
roughly made. They wore no labrets, nor were their faces painted,
although they were so encrusted with soot and grime that at first they
appeared black.

They paused at the base of the great peak, murmuring among themselves at
the unprecedented sight of a wild dog keeping company with men.

Torka and Umak stood together on the ledge. Aar stood in front of them,
barking and snarling as though he had appointed himself spokesman for
his man-pack. Lonit and Karana stood to one side. When she leaned close
to ask the boy if they were his people, he growled at her and shook his
head in a vehement display of disgust.

"Karana's band not look like that}"

His negative reaction affirmed Lonit's growing feeling of foreboding.
She did not like the look of the newcomers, but until Karana spoke, she
was certain that her apprehension was caused by her resentment of them.
After her lifetime of dreaming, Torka was her man at last. Alone in the
world with him, she would be his woman forever. Together they would
create a new band, and the People would be reborn. Now her dream was
shattered. Among the people who stood looking up toward their aerie,
there were bound to be women more worthy of Torka than she. He would not
want Lonit anymore. She would be an embarrassment to him. When their
child was born, he would not consent to hunt for it. He would turn his
back upon them both.

Staring down at the newcomers, Lonit hated them and herself. If only she
were not such an ugly, unworthy girl, she could rejoice at their coming.
Yet, slowly, hope began to lessen her fear of them. Even from the
distance, she could see that their clothes were ragged, not from wear
but due to shoddy construction; it was as though the women who had sewn
them had not bothered to take the time to fit them properly or stitch
them with any care. The women stood apart from their men, bent nearly
double under the weight of enormous, lumpy-looking packs. Lonit could
see that their skirts were worn and uneven, neither fringed nor trimmed
with any sort of contrasting fur. The men were also clad in ragged-edged
garments. Other than their weaponry, they carried no loads at all. A few
short, squat young boys were walking out of the main body of the group
on either side of a bison-skin clad hunter who wore his stiff black hair
pulled into a single tuft at the top of his head. Lonit stared. The tuft
seemed to be spraying out of the man's skull, but even though he walked
into the wind, his hair was so stiff that it barely moved. He carried
spears in both hands. With arms raised, he was shaking them as he cried
out in a high voice that bespoke friendship.

"What dhag men. Galeena come! as frend!"

In his necklaces of wolf paws and freshly taken bear claws, Umak ignored
the weakness that his scalp wound had brought on him. He stood as tall
as he could. He held a spear arrogantly in one hand. He was determined
to show only strength and disdain to the newcomers. He shared Lonit's
apprehension. He did not like the look of this band, and could not
understand a word of the language that its headman had spoken. Karana
was looking at him, waiting for him to respond with the infinite wisdom
of a spirit master. Lacking such wisdom, Umak chose to remain silent for
long moments during which he scowled with a great display of authority.
His chin went up. His mouth turned down. His eyes half closed as though
he were looking beyond this world into another plain of existence that
only a spirit masters eyes could see.

"Dhag Men, Galeena come as frend! Dhag Men bahd been man of spaweh?"

The words of the tuft-headed man hung in the air. Torka frowned,
straining to understand while Karana came close to Umak, impressed by
his scowl and the wonderfully insolent way that he stood glowering down
at the strangers. Wanting to win praise from the old man, Karana spoke.
"Karana knows man talk. Man asks who on mountain. Man says his name
Galeena. Galeena says he would come to us. He asks us not kill him. He
says he friend. He calls this band Dog Men. He asks if Dog Men be men or
spirit."

Umak was impressed, as were Torka and Lonit. Torka nodded to show his
approval.

"It is good that Karana knows the words of other bands," he said.

"Hmmph," Umak snorted, noting that Torka and Lonit knew what Karana had
not yet discovered--that their spirit master's knowledge was not
limitless.

The boy was delighted by Torka's compliment. He stood a little
straighter and imitated Umak's haughty demeanor. "Karana be like spirit
master someday! Know all things. But Galeena speaks same words as Torka.
Many bands, all speak same words. Just say different."

Umak cocked his head. His scowl became a smile. He had been right when
he had told Lonit that the People were like the great herds of caribou!
They had been one at the beginning. Now they were many, and the words
that they spoke were slowly changing as they ranged farther and farther
from the center of Creation.

The light of comprehension was born within Umak. "Dhag MeJi .. . Dog
Men. Galeena khum ah frend .. . Galeena comes as friend. Hmmph! It is
good that this spirit master can speak to Galeena and his people."

And this he did. He raised his spear arm and shook it. "Galeena khum ah
frend! Umak is spirit master! He says to Galeena: Come! Be welcome! Dog
Men have much meat to share!"

It was a mistake. The old man knew it a moment after Galeena came up
onto the ledge with a half dozen of his hunters following right behind
him. The stink of the strangers preceded them up the wall; and it was a
more offensive stench than that in which Karana had wrapped himself for
protection against predators. This was the stench of filth--of unwashed
bodies and clothes and of something else, something threatening. Tension
walked with these men. Karana had to kneel and put his arms about Aar to
keep the dog from attacking. The animal lowered its head, and every hair
upon its back stood on end as a low, steady growl came out of its
snarling muzzle.

Umak did not have to look at Brother Dog to share its instinctive sense
of danger. He was sorry that he had invited the newcomers without first
conferring with Torka. If anything went wrong, Umak knew that he would
be to blame. But what could go wrong? he asked himself. They were men.
Hunters. Once they had washed themselves and aired their clothes, they
would be no different from the men of the People who now lay looking at
the sky. But why did they hold their weapons so defensively? Why had
they brought none of their women and children up onto the mountain with
them? Umak snorted quietly, assuring himself that the newcomers were
afraid of those whose spirit master had bent the will of a wild dog so
that even the smallest among them could touch the beast as though it
were his brother. He stood a little taller. He scowled a little more
disdainfully. It was good to know that men feared his powers once again.

Torka eyed the newcomers warily. His hand tightened around the
sinew-wrapped haft of his whalebone bludgeon. He could not have said why
he had taken it up, but the moment the strangers had begun the ascent of
the wall, he had felt the need to show them a sign of strength. Why? Men
hefted weapons against game and predators, not against their fellow
hunters. Men did not hunt men. Yet, the moment he had looked into
Galeena's small black eyes he had seen a bold rapaciousness in them that
had made him glad that he held his weapon.

Galeena spoke. Politely.

Torka replied. Politely.

Galeena grinned, and all six of his spear-carrying fellow hunters
grinned with him.

Torka felt fury race through his veins. Galeena was eyeing Lonit in a
way that made Torka want to brain him. His fingers flexed around his
weapon. "This woman is Torka's woman, he told him in a tone that left no
room for debate.

Lonit flushed. She bowed her head, dropping her lids, and moved to stand
behind Torka, wanting to be shielded from the strangers sight. She did
not like them. There was something in their eyes and smiles and the way
that they carried their weapons that frightened her. She wished that
they had never come. Yet, their coming had caused Torka to speak words
that she had never thought to hear him speak to others. A new band had
walked into their world, and Torka had not denied her. The realization
was heady.

Galeena took a step forward. Aar nearly leaped out of Karana's arms.
Threatened by the dog, the man froze. His hunters aimed their spears at
Aar. Karana felt suddenly lightheaded with fear, but he kept his place
and tightened his grip around Aar's neck. He knew that his little arms
could not hold the dog if it chose to spring to the attack, but his
softly spoken words kept the dog at his side. "Hold, Brother. Until
Spirit Master speaks, these smelly ones are welcome among us."

Galeena eyed the boy and the dog, measuring the moment and finding a
powerful magic in it. He looked at Torka, saw his strength and
unmistakable resolve to stand against any threat to his band. But it was
such a small band: one hunter, an old man, a young woman, a boy, and a
wild dog. A strange company, one to be wary of until Galeena was
absolutely certain that it was not more than it appeared to be. "Yuh
Dahg Men, spaweh pay eh he asked directly.

Torka strained to understand the words. Umak grasped their meaning and
replied with pride. "Umak is spirit master!" When Galeena's features
clumped into a mass of humps and seams that showed his lack of
comprehension, the old man repeated in the newcomer's dialect. "Umak
spaweh master Umak's people .. . pay eh .. . you call Dog Men. We are
strong with spaweh, spirit!" It would do no harm to embellish their
status. The spirits of the mountain had been with them, allowing them a
safe encampment, protecting them during the hunt. Umak was gratified to
see the look of uncertainty and restrained awe upon the faces of the
newcomers when they looked at Brother Dog. It made him feel almost
omnipotent as he spoke to the strangers with his chin jabbing up and his
eyes looking down his nose at them as though they were ignorant children
coming to him for their first lesson in the wisdom of the People.

Galeena's eyes narrowed shrewdly. He had not failed to note Umak's tone
of condescending superiority. He appraised the fresh scalp wound on the
old man's head and thought: He may command the spirits of this place and
of that wild dog, but some animal did that to him. His magic is not so
great. He is mortal, this spirit master. And those who stand with him,
they are mortal, too. He nodded. He grinned, displaying brown, furred,
wide-gapped teeth as though he considered them to be objects of beauty
that all should admire and envy. He gestured outward, indicating the
spacious ledge and the fine encampment that Lonit had made.

"Ghu camp this," he said, openly coveting the many skins and racks of
drying meat, fish, and fowl, as well as the sacks of dried berries and
roots. Like Umak, Galeena had quickly grasped the subtle differences in
the dialects of the two bands. He altered his own with pleasure, wanted
Umak to know that, although he claimed to be a spirit master, he had
misjudged Galeena's potential for understanding. "Galeena's band, we see
fiah this camp from long far way. We come. Now we camp this camp. Be
safe from Big Spirit in this high place we share with Dog Men."

The world shook beneath Torka's feet; yet the movement was within him as
his heart leaped within his chest and nearly staggered him. Big Spirit?"

"You not know Big Spirit? Big Spirit shake world! Big Spirit kill many
Galeena's people. In far place, many die. Galeena's band meets many
bands at place where tundra and to rest meet. Much spruce there. Many
mammoth browse where Corridor of Storms begins. Bad place. Mountains all
ice there. High to sky. Walk like men. Make sound like women wailing.
Wind never stop. Blow all time."

"And Big Spirit?"

Galeena grunted, not wishing to be hurried by Torka's impatient query.
It required concentration to form the words in a way as to be understood
by the Dog Men. "We make camp there. Where Corridor of Storm begins. We
hunt mammoth. We kill. Many bands together. We take much meat. We feast.
Then Big Spirit khums, hiding in skin of animal it khums .. . looking
like mammoth it khums .. . but too big for mammoth. It kills. Many run.
Its red eyes see all. Big Spirit follows. Its tusks kill men, like this!
Its feet kill women and children, like this! It cries out. Then it goes.
And men come out of hiding. Men try to track Big Spirit, to kill Big
Spirit. Rain khums. Much storm leaves no tracks to follow. But Galeena
and his people, we say this good. We come far place. We seek high camp.
Away from Big Spirit. Galeena says Big Spirit walks far tundra, looking
for men to kill. And men cannot kill Big Spirit. It is like mountain. It
lives forever!" He paused, observing the affect his words had on his
listeners. "You, Torka, you know Big Spirit?" "Torka knows Big Spirit."

"Torka meet in far place? Maybe Big Spirit kill many Torka's band, too?"

"It is so."

That why Torka's band small! Very small. Torka bring to high place be
safe! This good! This camp very good camp! Room for many. Galeena's
people, we come! We stay! We make one band with Dog People! Old man
Spirit Master, he talk spirit talk for all! Galeena's band, no spirit
man us. Mammoth kill. Now good times for all together. Many make hunt
safe! Many live easy! It be good thing!" 2

It was not a good thing. Galeena did not ask, he took. He put his
weapons aside, but still he took. Peacefully, his people came up onto
the ledge. They did not ask anything of its occupants. Their greater
number allowed them the privilege of simply dropping their belongings
wherever they wished. When Lonit attempted to direct the women to the
part of the cave best suited to their needs, they swept her aside and
ignored her protests. Suddenly, her orderly encampment was one of
confusion and disarray as the women rifled through her stores and
stuffed their mouths with berries and wedges of fat. Lonit stood back,
waiting for Torka or Umak to come to her aid with them, but they had
similar troubles of their own.

Galeena had clearly taken over. He barked commands to his surly hunters
and kicked at the few young boys who were the only children in the band.
One of them threw a short, poorly balanced spear in Aar's direction. It
missed the dog, but Karana did not miss the boy as he leaped at him and
knocked him to the ground. Umak pulled them apart. Karana was so angry
that he was oblivious to the pain in his leg; he knew only that Aar had
disappeared.

"Brother Dog will come back," assured Umak.

"To this? This no longer Torka's cave! This Galeena's wallow!" protested
the child.

The boy was right. Galeena's men were hunkering in the shadows,
devouring Lonit's carefully preserved meats. They tossed the scraps
randomly about and relieved themselves at will, wherever and whenever
the need presented itself.

"Over there ... on the sedges with that! And over the side with the rest
of it! You keep that up and the whole ledge is going to smell like a
bison wallow!" Torka raised his voice, then thought better of it.
Galeena and his band already looked and smelled as though they had come
up out of days of rolling in a muddy dung heap. And their numbers
totally overwhelmed any authority that Torka attempted to maintain.

Torka watched them with thoughtful contemplation. They were a filthy,
disgraceful people. He had no doubt that, had he tried to stand against
their occupancy of the ledge, they would have forced their way past him,
even if they had to throw him off the mountain to do so. Still, given
time, rest, and food, their manner was bound to improve. They too had
suffered beneath the deadly shadow of the Destroyer. As much as Torka
disliked them and was angered by their forced intrusion, he could frame
no logical argument against Galeena's intent to join forces and share
the occupation of the ledge for the betterment of all. Adjustments would
have to be made on both sides. And with other women to assist her,
Lonit's workload would be eased, and she would have those of her own
gender to assist her at the birth of their child. Karana would have
friends his own age. Umak would be able to be a spirit master again,
with a real band to pay him homage. And he, Torka, would have men to
hunt with; the dangers of the kill would be lessened considerably.

And Galeena was probably right about Big Spirit. His sentiments echoed
Umaks certainties. The mammoth was a spirit. No man could hope to kill
it--not without risking becoming a spirit himself. His eyes strayed to
Lonit. She was coming toward him, clutching her personal belongings.
Compared to the women of Galeena's band, she was the most beautiful
woman in the world. He was proud to know that he had put life into her
belly. He recalled their many love makings and thought of the child that
would be born to them toward the end of the time of the long dark. He
imagined its cries and the smile that would dimple Lonit's face and
bring warmth to her antelope eyes when the infant at last took suck upon
the firm, round breasts that he so cherished.

He smiled as she came to him. All thoughts of the great mammoth left his
mind as he drew her close. Life was good. The future promised much to
him. With Lonit as his woman, Torka was no longer ready to throw his
life away. Galeena's people ate as though they feared that they would
never eat again. They stuffed themselves until it seemed that they could
eat no more, but they did eat more. And more. Until Lonit protested to
Torka that soon all of their winter provisions would be gone.

Galeena overheard her. "Woman no worry! Tomorrow men hunt. Both bands
together, we take much meat. Have plenty eat for all come dark time
winter."

The sun stood high in the sky. Exhausted by what Galeena said was a very
long trek to the mountain, his people lounged upon their own filthy
sleeping skins and upon the hides and furs that they had freely seized
from Lonit's stores. Scratching at their vermin-infested bodies, some of
them slept; others gnawed bones, wolfed meat, gulped fat, cut wind,
belched, and coupled freely. Now and again, some of them rose to
defecate or vomit; then, thus purged, they ambled back to their sleeping
skins to doze or eat or copulate within full view of the unruly boys who
scoured the cave for leftovers.

Never in their lives had Torka's people seen others behave in such a
despicable manner, nor had they ever seen such rowdy, offensive youths.
Torka would have asked Galeena why the boys had no one to feed them; it
did not seem logical to him that they could all have been orphaned. And
there were simply too many women in Galeena's band. No young girls. No
toddlers. No infants. And no elderly, either, for that matter just men
and women in their prime and a pack of nearly a dozen animalistic boys
who ran wild amid the adults, foraging for food and harassing everyone,
especially two greasy matrons who sat by themselves beside a sloppily
made fire where no man joined them. They were evidently widows; Torka
had seen them fight for their share of food as savagely as the boys.
Now, as he watched, one of them whacked at the boys with the thighbone
of an antelope as the other one stared wistfully across the cave at
Umak. The old man ignored her, and Galeena showed no concern over the
screechings of her embattled hearth mate or for the brawling boys. The
headman was too busy beneath his sleeping skins with his appropriated
food and the two giggling, guffawing women who were his wives. Torka
knew that he would get no answers from Galeena until the man was rested
and sated.

Torka was sickened by the stench and crowding, and at his insistence,
his little band had relocated their fire stones, sleeping skins, and
what Galeena had left them of their personal belongings. They moved well
out of the center of the cave, almost onto the exposed lip of the
cornice. The new site was not without drawbacks. When the weather
changed. or when the wind grew strong, they would have to build a
weather baffle to keep themselves and their little fire sheltered and
dry. It did not matter. The air was breathable here, and the stench of
Galeena's people was not totally overpowering. No one objected to their
moving; no one even took notice. Galeena's people were too occupied with
their own sleepy, gluttonous pastimes.

As Lonit rearranged her fire stones and Torka and Umak settled
themselves, Karana glowered unhappily. "Karana does not like these
smelly ones Torka should take his spear and make them go away."

"Torka is one. They are many. Karana must remember that they have come
far. They have suffered much. They are tired and hungry. In time, when
they have rested, they will change their ways. They cannot live like
this all the time! Karana will see that this is so. And in the meantime,
Torka says that it was not so long ago when Karana was a smelly one
himself."

The boy flushed angrily. "Only to keep the big-toothed animals from
eating me!"

"Perhaps it is the same with Galeena's band?" suggested Torka.

Ignoring the stares of Umak and Lonit, Karana knew that he was speaking
out of turn, but he did not care. If he did not speak his fears about
Galeena's band, he would have no hope of convincing Torka to change his
mind about them. He lowered his voice, speaking in the tone of a
conspirator. "Galeena's people bad people. Maybe they are Ghost Band!
Maybe they eat us when all meat is gone! If Torka cannot drive them
away, then Spirit Master must make them disappear! It would be a good
thing. Then Brother Dog will come back. Then this will be a good camp
again!"

Torka's brows came together thoughtfully. "Galeena's people are not
ghosts, Karana. If Umak made them disappear, we would be alone ... at
great risk again .. . and Karana would have no other boys to talk
boy-things to. He would have only a dog who cannot understand or speak
to answer."

Umak harrumphed at this, but before he could speak in defense of the
dog, Karana bristled and replied hotly.

"Karana does not talk to those who have tried to kill his brother! Aar
does understand! And Karana says that one of Brother Dog's droppings is
worth more than all the boys of Galeena's band!" With this he limped off
to stand at the very edge of the cornice, leaning on his crutch of
antler, missing his brother dog more than words could ever say.

Slowly the sun slipped behind the mountain to leave the eastern world in
shadow. Darkness began to fill the cave. Galeena's people slept. A chill
wind drove Karana back to Lonit's fire. Neither Umak, Torka, nor Lonit
said a word about his earlier display of temper. He sat in sullen
silence, trying to think of a way to apologize without altering his
position. Galeena's people were all that he had said, and more. He knew
it and would not change his mind. He must make Torka change his.

In the light of the rising moon, a wild dog howled, and from across the
unknown country to the east, another dog answered, then another and
another.

Karana tensed.

Umak listened. He nodded reflectively, trying not to be distracted by
the eyes of the matron. Alone among her people, she was still awake. How
long had she been staring at him? And how many winters had come and gone
since a woman had looked at him like that? Hmmph. She was not young, but
she was not old, either. Beneath her slovenly garments and layers of
filth, she might even prove to be human. The possibility was
intriguing--so much so that, when he spoke in reference to the dog, he
knew that he was not speaking of Aar at all. "Perhaps Brother Dog will
not long be alone, without a mate to share the meat that he brings to
his camp?" Lonit looked at Torka and sighed as she heard the lonely
sounds of the wild, distant animals. Moonlight was silvering the night.
"Perhaps Aar will find one of his own kind. It would be a good thing."
In the glow of the moon, Torka had never looked more handsome as she
thought: Lonit has found her place beside Torka at last. Even in this
camp, with these smelly people all around, it is a good thing.

Karana glared at them. The old spirit master had the oddest look on his
face. And Torka and Lonit seemed to see nothing but the reflection of
the moon shining in their eyes as they looked at one another. He
suddenly felt alone, as though, despite the crowding of the cave and the
presence of those who had taken him into their band, there was no one in
the world for him, not even a wild dog. For the first time in longer
than he wanted to acknowledge, he thought of his people. So much time
had passed since they had walked away into the snow-driven mists,
promising to return for him and the children. Now, when he tried to
recall his father's face, he did not see Supnah at all; he saw a
composite of Torka and Umak. Supnah was far away, lost in the misted
past, but someday he would return ... if he could. But Karana was sure
that if something had happened to his father, Karana would have known
it. And yet, despite his certainty, he saw not his father but the
leering, contemptuous smile of Navahk, Magic Man.

Karana shivered. His certainty shriveled. He willed his memory of Navahk
away, but it would not go. The magic man's smile lingered at the back of
his mind. His white serrated teeth, with canines as fanged and sharp as
any wolf's, bit at Karana's conscience.

Karana is an ungrateful son who has forgotten his own people.

Was the accusation his own, or was it Navahk's? He could not tell. He
only knew that it was true.

Clouds drifted intermittently across the face of the moon. Within the
cave, darkness thinned and thickened. Karana pulled his sleeping skins
around his narrow little shoulders. Beside him, Umak drew the skin of
the great short-faced bear around himself. It was not fully cured, but
the boy knew that if the old man did not keep it close, Galeena or some
member of his band would probably try to steal it. As the boy watched,
Umak drifted into sleep, as he often did, sitting upright, nodding
trancelike, as though he were not asleep at all but in communion with
the mystical powers of the mountain. Karana envied him. He wished that
he had the power of a spirit master so that he could will the sneering
image of Navahk from his mind and make Galeena's people disappear.

The wind was rising, and Karana could hear it hissing against the
mountain. From somewhere high above the cave, small stones tumbled,
their sound muffled as they plummeted through the veils of one of the
innumerable waterfalls that would continue to bleed out of the summit
ice pack until the first frost of autumn turned them solid. Karana
listened. The dogs still howled. It was a lonely, desolate sound. He
wondered if Aar was out there. He wondered if the dog would ever come
back.

"Sleep now," Torka said. "Tomorrow we will hunt. Torka will bring back
prime meat, and Karana will wet his skinning dagger in blood."

Karana lay down and tried to sleep. Torka and Lonit bundled together. It
was very quiet in the cave. Only the howls of the distant dogs disturbed
the familiar sounds of wind and mountain. Galeena's people snored, but
the sound was muffled beneath their piled sleeping skins. Karana felt
the night growing all around him.. He longed for the warmth and strength
of the dog beside him. If the smelly ones should go away, Aar would come
back to his man-pack. Then Karana would not be alone.

He sighed. He flung a small, slender forearm across his eyes. He tried
to sleep. The moon hung low in the western sky by the time he succeeded.
The dogs were silent. Far away across the tundra, a blue-eyed,
black-masked animal sat alone at the crest of a hillock. It stared up at
the mountain. Toward dawn, it slept, whimpering in its dreams.

In the darkness at the back of the cave, a woman of Galeena's band
stirred and wept softly in the arms of a scar-faced young hunter;
neither had participated in the debauched feasting of their people. They
had no appetite for anything; the grief upon which they feasted had
deprived them of all but a deep and unremitting sadness. "Have you been
awake all night, lana?" "To sleep is to dream, Manaak, of Big
Spirit...." "Big Spirit is far. It cannot come to such a high camp.
Galeena has led us well, as he promised. We will have a new life." His
words were a bitter combination of consolation and sarcasm.

"Big Spirit is here," she said, sighing, and placed a hand over her
heart. "With little Ripa, our daughter .. . with all of those who died.
Why does he kill even the little ones, Manaak? Why is he so angry?"

"He is a spirit. A big spirit. He may do as he wishes."

She shuddered. Her hand moved from her heart to touch his face, to
linger upon the still-fresh scars. "But what will stop him? No man can
kill him, Manaak! No man! Galeena has sworn it."

"I will kill Big Spirit," Manaak vowed.

"You must not speak so! If you challenge Galeena again, he will do more
this time than have the others cut your face!"

Manaak did not reply. He held her close, wrapped his arms around her,
and felt their unborn child move against his forearm. Beyond the
darkness of the cave, he could see the fading stars prickling the night.
He could hear the shh sound of the waterfalls that bathed the face of
the mountain. It was a soothing sound, but he was not soothed. "Did you
see the little one? The boy with the limp? The one they call Karana?"

"I saw...."

He heard the catch in her throat. Deep within him, his sadness became
anger. "We could have carried him. I could have carried him. Antu was
small, and like Karana, not hurt beyond healing. I could have carried
him. I wanted to carry him. I--" His voice broke. He could not go on.

Her fingers caressed his lips. "Galeena is headman. The decision was
his. You fought. He cut your face. It was the second time you stood
against him, Manaak. And you have said the words yourself. Galeena has
led us well, to a new life, to a place where Big Spirit cannot come.

"To a place without children."

"What was done had to be done for the good of the band. Galeena has said
so."

"These Dog People have not thrown away their little one. Their old man
hunts. And he is so old, Galeena would have put him out of our band many
winters before he could live to look as he does. Yet he is strong. He
hunts and is of use to his people. The one called Torka says that the
old man killed the great bear whose skin he wears."

"The ways of the Dog People are not our ways," lana soothed. "They too
have faced Big Spirit, but look how few of them are left! The one who
leads them, this Torka, looks bold and brave, but he has yielded his
camp to Galeena, so he must be weak. You see, Galeena's ways are best.
He has led us well. He was right to--" She stopped, unable to continue.
The sadness within her was so great that her soul swam out into it and
nearly drowned.

Manaak felt her go limp within his arms. He rocked her as though she
were a child. He thought of Ripa, the little daughter whom he had seen
die beneath the feet of the killer mammoth, and of Antu, the son he had
been forced to abandon when Galeena had led his band into the storm so
that his hunters would not be forced to join the other bands whose
headmen had elected to pursue the great mammoth and try to kill it.
Later two of the survivors had caught up to them and recounted the way
their fellow hunters had died. Even though their spears had tasted the
blood of Big Spirit, the beast had gone its way, immortal. That was what
Galeena had said, gloating while his hunters nodded in affirmation of
his decision to abandon the hunt for a creature that could not be
killed. Only Manaak had not agreed, thinking that, even though men had
died in the attempt to kill it, at least they had tried. At least they
had not turned their backs and run like frightened dogs.

"Sleep," he whispered to the woman in his arms, and he felt her relax
and yield to sleep at last.

But Manaak did not sleep. He sat with his back against the mountain
wall, and wrapped in the shadows of the ebbing night, he watched the sun
rise above the soaring, glacier ridden peaks that rimmed the horizon of
the unknown world to the east. Deep within the mountain, something
moved, sighed, and moaned. It was a terrible sound, like some huge,
living thing trapped within the stone and trying to get out. Yet it was
a whispering rather than a roaring. Then it was gone, and Manaak
wondered if he had imagined it.

At the entrance to the cave, the man who called himself Torka rose and
faced the dawn. He peeled off his tunic and trousers, then went out. A
few moments passed before he returned. His body shone of moisture, and
his hair was dripping wet. Manaak frowned, knowing that Torka must have
allowed the icy water of one of the cascades to wash over him. It was a
strange thing for a man to do, he thought, then decided that it must be
some sort of religious ritual unique to the Dog People.

Torka stood in the fight of the rising sun, allowing it and the morning
wind to dry him. Manaak saw the power of his body and the new scars that
marred him. Had the mammoth done that to him? Had he, like Manaak, come
close enough to Big Spirit to look into its red eyes and smell its foul
breath and see the blood of his people upon its tusks?

Manaak thought of his dead children and of his sad-eyed woman. Then he
thought of Galeena, who had led his band into the storms that had
decimated them.

Manaak's mouth flexed downward. Slowly, gently, he eased lana from his
arms. Carefully, wishing to rouse none of Galeena's people, he made his
way across the cave and approached Torka. He was impressed by the man's
alertness, for Torka turned to face him before he came close, eyed him
watchfully, and scowled with pinched nostrils when Manaak stopped beside
him.

They stood shoulder to shoulder. Torka was taller, and stronger, if
Manaak's judgment of such things was sound-and it usually was. His eyes
narrowed, measured, searched, and found what they were seeking. lana had
been wrong; there was no weakness in Torka. "Galeena seeks safety for
his people in Torka's cave." He hissed the words provocatively. "Galeena
hides from his fears like an old wuhman hiding from those who would put
her out of her band to die. What does Torka seek?"

"Torka has found what he has sought. Safety for my people within a new
band."

"And what does Torka fear?"

The question took the warmth from the sun. Torka saw the answer shining
darkly in the other man's eyes.

Manaak nodded. He smiled, but there was no happiness in the smile, only
a twisted, burning affirmation of his own hatred. "Torka has seen Big
Spirit ... he has seen his children die .. . and he has looked into the
red eye of the beast that Galeena says cannot die."

"It bleeds. It can die."

Manaak's smile deepened. He turned slightly, gesturing out across the
tundra. "It is out there somewhere. Be it flesh or spirit, it is out
there. It looks for men to kill, for children to crush, for bands that
have not found safety in high camps like this." Torka's brow furrowed.
"Galeena is wise, then. He seeks safety for his people, as Torka has
done. Together our two bands will live and hunt as one ... in safety."

Manaak's face contorted with disgust. "There is safety for no man,
wuhman, or child as long as Big Spirit shares the world with us!" Now
Torka gestured broadly and angrily. He resented the pointed censure that
he saw in Manaak's eyes. "Big Spirit is far away. It walks another
world."

Manaak shook his head. "Big Spirit will khum someday for your children
and mine. Unless we kill him."

"We?"

"Torka! Manaak! Together!"

The old, terrible longing to kill the Destroyer came rushing back to
roar inside Torka's head. He took in a breath and tried to quiet the
roaring with common sense as he spoke earnestly to the man who called
himself Manaak. "Two men cannot kill the Destroyer. Even if they had the
power of lightning to speed their spears and set fire to their hearts,
we would still not be enough."

Manaak nodded, relaxing a little. He smiled again, and this time it was
a smile, not a grimace of frustration. "Two men could set fiah to the
hearts of in any men. And with many hunting together, it could be done."

"Galeena has said that he has no wish to hunt the great mammoth."

Manaak shrugged. Sunlight was bathing the interior of the cave. The
people of his band were stirring, and their headman was rising, rumpled
and retching, from his bed skins. Manaak's smile disappeared. "Galeena
may not be headman foreveh," he suggested, then turned and left Torka to
consider the meaning of his words. Crack!

The sound was an explosion of power as the two bull musk oxen came
together with the skull-splitting intensity of the autumn rut.

Torka leaped to his feet. He had his spears in hand before Karana
shouted the news that he had sighted the herd grazing in the willow
scrub on the outwash plain. Torka was beside him in an instant. They
stood together on the lip of the cornice.

"Look!" exclaimed Karana, pointing off. "Many musk ox!"

Torka looked, then beckoned to Galeena's people and gestured them
forward. "Come! Now we will hunt! Together!"

Not one of them moved. They stared at their headman, waiting for a
signal from him. No signal was given.

Galeena yawned. He lay on his side, his tufted head propped on an elbow,
with his two women sitting cross legged and stark naked on either side
of him. "Not hungry. Hunt tomorrow," he announced, and reached up to
tweak the nearer nipple of his younger woman as though it were a fruit
that he thought of picking.

The woman giggled and shook herself.

Torka was annoyed. Galeena had promised to hunt. A day and a night and a
morning had passed, and still he lounged in lazy squalor. "Come!" Torka
attempted to persuade him. "See for yourself! A man can spend only so
many hours on his back with his women. Come away now, before you find
yourself as soft-bellied as a female. Look! There are musk oxen below
the mountain, so close that this man can feel their life spirits riding
the wind, asking to be hunted!"

Slowly, Galeena sat up. Slowly, his fingers twisted the nipple of his
woman until she cried out. He roughly shoved her back, released her
breast, and smiled when he saw frustration in Torka's eyes. It gave him
pleasure to irritate this man. He did not like the way Torka tended to
assume authority. Galeena yawned again, widely, with profound
deliberation. Then, when the yawn was done, he said, "Not hunt today.
This day be nearly finished."

Impatience hardened Torka's words. "So is the meat that was to have been
food for Torka's people during the time of the long dark."

A low murmuring went through the members of Galeena's band. They looked
from Torka to their headman, awaiting his response to Torka's audacity.

It came with an insolent smile. "When the meat gone, we hunt then."

Never in his life had Torka heard such foolish reasoning. Wait until
food was gone before seeking more? Lounge on one's buttocks while an
entire herd of musk oxen grazed within one's hunting range, and never
lift so much as a spear to take meat? It was unthinkable! It was an
offense to the spirits of the game. He said as much.

Beside her fire, Lonit shrank within her garments and stopped stitching
the new winter gloves that she was sewing for Karana. Across the ring of
stones, Umak rose. She knew that he would have gone to stand with Torka,
but the weight of the great bearskin slowed his steps. He wore it as a
robe, and with the head of the huge beast balanced atop his own, he
looked twelve feet tall, yet she barely saw him. She looked aghast at
Torka, remembering the laws of her band: One did not set oneself apart.
One strove to be like all others, to exist within the whole for the
survival of the whole. Torka had chafed against such strictures before,
and clearly he was chafing now--so much so that it frightened her as the
stunned incredulity of Galeena's people had quickly settled into well
focused anger. Torka had openly impugned the judgment of their headman.
By so doing, he had indirectly impugned them all, for they had chosen
Galeena to lead them.

Several hunters rose, took up their spears, and shook them warningly at
Torka as the boys skulked out of the shadows to stand behind Galeena.
The headman's women scowled, while at the back of the cave, sad-eyed
lana looked on listlessly and Manaak stood up and stared expectantly at
Torka. More than the threat of the raised spears of Galeena's hunters,
it was Manaak's expression that cooled Torka's temper and reminded him
of his place. Whatever grudge the scar-faced Manaak held against
Galeena, it was Manaak's grudge, not Torka's. Galeena might not be
headman forever, but he was headman now. He might appear to be little
more than a lazy, flatulent fool, but his people had thought enough of
him to follow him, and he had brought them to a safe encampment. Whether
he liked him or not, Torka had to concede that Galeena had accepted him
and his people into his band without question.

He rebuked himself for his impulsiveness. He had been wrong to challenge
Galeena. The man had come far. If he was not ready to hunt, Torka must
accept his unreadiness with understanding. It was not as though the herd
of musk oxen was going to disappear; the habits of the animals were such
that, unless threatened, they would remain where the browsing was good.
The bulls would be charging and rutting or muzzle-deep in the
autumn-yellowed willow scrub. Last spring's calves, fat now and
sprouting the stubbly beards that were characteristic of their species,
would be looking on while the cows bawled and slobbered and were
impregnated by the bulls.

Torka's hand tightened about the hafts of his spears. It was not the way
of the People to refrain from hunting when stores were low and game was
near, but it was evidently the way of Galeena's people. He recalled
Umak's words: In new times, men must learn new ways. So must it also be
within a new band.

He sighed regretfully. His blood was up for killing, but he could be
cooled. "Torka will hunt tomorrow," he deferred amiably to Galeena.

The headman's greasy brow expanded outward toward his even-greasier
hairline. His topknot skewed to one side as his loose-skinned scalp
twitched and slid over his broad, foreshortened cranium. He leered
smugly at Torka as though he had just gulped down a piece of contested
meat without sharing so much as a bite. "Torka hunt when Galeena say
hunt! Torka not hunt when Galeena say not hunt! Or Torka go! Take people
and leave Galeena's khamp!"

"Galeena's camp?" Torka nearly choked at the man's brazen insolence. The
malicious glint in the headman's eyes was unmistakable. His people saw
it. Once again they murmured among themselves. Pleased, they nodded and
smiled.

Torka's eyes narrowed. His willingness to compromise was shattered by
the realization that Galeena's refusal to hunt had nothing to do with
weariness; it had to do with his desire to put Torka in his place and
demean him before his own people, as well as before the members of
Galeena's band. So far, he had succeeded. Torka was aware of little
Karana looking up at him expectantly, and of Lonit looking away,
pretending not to see his shame. Torka knew that within the skin of the
great bear, old Umak was watching him. If he backed down to Galeena now,
he would never again be able to command respect from anyone, especially
from himself. But for the sake of his little band, and for his unborn
child, he must walk cautiously in pursuit of his pride.

So it was that he assumed an Umak-like stance, head high, chin up, mouth
down, his face as hard and blank as stone. "Hmmph. Galeena has said that
his people and Torka's people will be one band. Many will hunt safely
and live easily. Torka would not speak against the wisdom of Galeena.
Rather would Torka say that in the time of the long dark that will soon
send the sun to hide beyond the western edge of the world, the wisdom of
Galeena'will speak for itself."

Galeena's people looked in confusion to their headman. They waited for
him to tell them whether Torka had spoken in deference or sarcasm.

Galeena glowered. He was not sure himself. Beside him, Ai, his younger
woman, sat very straight. She was staring at Torka with an interest that
no female belonging to one man should ever show to another without the
expressed permission of her mate. He backhanded her across her face so
hard that he cracked her nose. It spurted blood. Her small, pudgy hands
flew to her face. When she cried out, he hit her again.

Disgusted, Torka turned away. He went to sit at his own fire. Karana
followed. And at the back of the cave, Manaak observed the harried,
resentful expression upon Galeena's face and smiled.

The day ended. A night passed. A new day began.

Umak rose with the dawn and leaned close to Torka, indicating Galeena
with a nod of his head. "That one is bad. That one has a heart that is
small and rotten with too much pride. But that one is also stupid. This
old man can make his heart smaller. But Torka must not challenge Galeena
again. Torka must watch. He must stand back and observe how Spirit
Master masters the spirit of Galeena."

With these words, he donned his bearskin and his necklaces and balanced
the head of the great short-faced bear upon his own. If the weight of
the huge skull stressed his scalp wound, he showed no sign of pain. He
streaked his cheeks with ashes--bold strokes that gave his features a
look of imperious disdain, as though he were at odds with the universe
and confident that he was somehow more powerful than the forces of the
earth and sky.

He rose and flung his arms wide. Chanting loudly, he strode to the very
edge of the cornice. He made invocations to the dawn, not in words but
in syllables, at first short and staccato, then long and drawn out, as
though the wind were sucking the words from his head.

When he turned at last to face those whom he had awakened, the sun stood
at his back. He shone like an eagle soaring in the very heart of a
midsummer noon. He looked magnificent, larger than life. When he threw
back his head and howled, from across the miles far below the mountain
Brother Dog howled back.

His audience stared, transfixed and awed.

When his howling stopped, the wild dog was also silent. With a harsh,
whooping cry, Umak flung his arms straight up, nodding his head so that
the skull of the great bear appeared to be moving of its own power. One
of the matrons swooned with fright, and the ferret-eyed boys were
sobered. Even Torka was impressed. Umak swayed, and Umak danced. But it
was not Umak--it was the great, short-faced bear that moved and
breathed. When the shadow man within it spoke, he spoke with the voice
of the great bear, and Galeena's eyes went so wide that they appeared
ready to pop from their sockets.

"Today the spirits of the game await the spirits of the hunters!" roared
the great bear that was Umak. "Today will be a good day to hunt!"

And it was so.

Even if the sky had poured rain, or clouds had gathered to whiten the
tundra with snow, no one who had witnessed Umak's transformation into
the bear spirit would have thought to question him. They took up their
weapons and went out, men and boys together--all save Umak and Karana,
who stood watching with the women on the ledge.

"Soon we will join them," soothed the old man, one hand upon Karana's
shoulder, sensing the boy's need to follow the hunters. "When we are
healed and strong, we will run ahead of them and show them how it is
done, and all will envy this old man and this small boy."

Karana looked up along the wall of fur that was shaded by the
out-thrusting head of the great bear. Umak was in there somewhere. The
boy could see the jab of his chin, the black hollows of his nostrils,
and a few wisps of his hair threading through the claws and paws of his
necklaces. "Will Brother Dog run with us, Spirit Master?"

Umak heard the longing in the boy's voice. It touched him. He too missed
the company of Brother Dog; but last night and the night before, the
baying of wild dogs had joined Aar's howling to puncture the darkness.
Umak reflected on this and spoke his thoughts. "We have found a new
band. So too has Aar found others of his own kind. Our brother will have
no need to hunt with his man-pack now."

"But we are his brothers!" protested the boy. "How can we know that he
is happy with his own kind? Karana is not happy with these smelly ones!
Karana is--" He stopped. His words had grown loud, and the women of
Galeena's band were staring at him, as was Lonit. He saw the reproach in
their eyes and glowered resentfully, "waiting for Umak to speak.

But Umak made no reply. He had forgotten all about Karana, and the
farthest thing from his mind was concern for the whereabouts or welfare
of a wild dog.

The two matrons were coming toward him. They were carrying offerings of
meat scraps piled onto platters made of the pelvic bones of large
grazing animals. They were both looking at Umak in that way again. And
they were completely naked.

Blood beat behind Torka's eyes. It was all that he could do to keep
himself from shouting with the joy of exhilaration. It was, as Umak had
promised, a good day to hunt. The sky was clear. The sun was warm. The
wind blew to cool them and to keep the biting insects away.

Although Torka hated to admit it, it was obvious from the first that
Galeena knew what he was doing. He led his men well, in the same age-old
way of hunting musk oxen that Torka had learned as a boy from Umak and
the hunters of his own band.

They did not approach the herd head on. They went around it in stealth,
in small groups that did not come together until they were well beyond
the grazing grounds of their prey.

Now they formed into a single line. The wind was their ally, blowing
their scent away from the herd. They stood squinting, facing into the
wind, with the good, rich stink of the animals exciting their need to
hunt.

Galeena's arm went up, signaling the men at either end of the line to
begin to move forward. Slowly, the line became a loop. Gradually, it
enclosed the herd, leaving it only one route of escape, into the
dead-end glacial canyon in which Umak had slain the moose.

It was a while before the animals realized that they were being herded.
The tundra! scrub was high enough to conceal the crouching, stalking
hunters. Then the first bull caught sight of them. It froze; then its
head went up, its nostrils working as though trying to disavow what its
small eyes had already confirmed to its brain.

But there was no denying the presence of the hunters now. They stood
erect, their spears at the ready. Galeena screeched a signal that echoed
out of the mouth of every man and boy who burst forward in a howling
tide of enthusiasm for the chase to come. "Ow-yah! Hail"

They raced forward like men pursued by hornets. The oxen panicked and
ran before the hunters until, sensing entrapment within the canyon, they
whirled and paused to form a protective circle on the high flank of the
mountain. It was a defensive formation that served them well against
wolves and lions. With their calves safe inside a bastioning circle of
outward-facing cows and bulls, the musk oxen lowered their heads and
displayed their massive up curling horns to the two-legged flesh-eaters
who came howling and yipping at them like wild dogs.

But they were not dogs--they were men, and much more dangerous. They
were not intimidated by the oxen and kept well away from the ripping
horns, not once coming close enough to place themselves in danger. Their
spears gave them the advantage of distance, and their knowledge of their
prey gave them absolute supremacy. They knew that the musk oxen would
not charge them. The animals would not break their defensive circle.
They would die where they stood rather than abandon their calves or
wounded to the predations of the hunters.

And so the men and boys of Galeena's band killed them, and Torka joined
in until at last he stood back, wondering why the hunt continued. They
had dropped over three-quarters of the herd. Only two old bulls remained
standing, and a few cows and calves. The dead and dying animals would
provide so much meat that their women would be hard-pressed to prepare
it all. Still the hunt continued, with Galeena's men and boys making
dashes in to retrieve their spears so that they might be used again and
again.

Torka was appalled. To take all of the musk oxen would be to destroy the
life spirits of this herd forever. He could not believe that Galeena
would allow his hunters to do such a thing; it was against the strictest
taboos of the People to kill in such a profligate manner. Always a few
animals must be left, for it was said that if the last calf died, so too
would the last child die in the time of the long dark when the herd
animals refused to come to be hunted by those who cared not for their
continuance.

Scar-faced, hard-eyed Manaak came to his side. "Why Torka not hunt? Do
you fear a few old oxen as much as you fear Big Spirit?"

He was gone before Torka could reply, but the words had gored him.
Still, he would not have killed again had Manaak not provoked the last
of the old bulls into a charge.

It was the largest animal in the herd. Over five feet tall at the
shoulder, it was massive, with grizzled, shaggy hair cascading to its
fetlocks. Every square inch of its fifteen hundred pound body was
layered with muscle except for that portion of its skull above its eyes.
That was horn.

Galeena had already placed a spear into the old bull's shoulder, so that
blood loss and pain caused the animal's head to drop. Its broad horns
seemed to flow together above its brow, like a flattened band that
spread downward into deadly, upturned points at either side of its eyes.

Manaak hurled the last of his spears, which buried itself beside
Galeena's weapon. The bull's knees buckled, then locked. It did not fall
but fixed its antagonists with small, pain-filled eyes. Behind it, one
of the few surviving calves bawled, and at the bull's cloven feet,
another bull lay on its side, eyes glazing, tongue lolling as its rib
cage heaved in the last paroxysms of death.

"I will make the final kill!" proclaimed Manaak.

"Only if you can get to your spear before I get to mine!" Galeena
answered Manaak's challenge.

As Torka stared and as the others goaded them on, Manaak and Galeena
approached the bull. They feinted this way and that while the boys came
up from behind the animal. Clambering over the bodies of dead and dying
oxen, they poked at the bull's already bloodied hindquarters with their
spears until an enraged cow forced them to retreat.

Blood was showing in the thick, dark pelage of the bull's shoulder. It
was salivating heavily--thick, pink foam that betrayed internal
injuries. It wheeled just as the boy who had driven Aar from the ledge
tripped and went sprawling flat on his belly.

Incredibly, the bull charged. It was nearly dead on its feet, but rage
fueled its effort. Several men loosed spears at it, all falling short.
It was Torka's spear, longer and lighter than the projectiles used by
the hunters of Galeena's band, that buried itself in the soft flesh at
the base of the bull's cranium. It sliced deep. Torka's position had
allowed him the perfect angle for the killing throw, and his strength,
skill, and the quality of his weapon made it possible. His projectile
point severed the balance center at the back of the bull's brain, and
cerebral hemorrhage did the rest. The animal dropped dead inches short
of crushing the fallen boy.

On the ledge where he had been observing the hunt with Karana and the
women, Umak roared with pride, and the women, including Lonit, shouted
with amazement and delight. The hunters and boys came to Torka to speak
their approval and tell him that never had they seen so fine a throw.

Only Galeena said nothing. The exhalation that hissed through his
gap-toothed mouth was deep, reeking of resentment. And although the boy
who had fallen was Ninip, his only son, he felt no gratitude to Torka
for having saved the boy's life. The boy had been careless. He had
tripped and shamed his father. By saving his life, Torka had shamed
Galeena further. And every man, boy, and woman in his band had witnessed
the humiliation. He would never forgive Torka. Someday he would make him
pay. The women came down from the ledge, and the butchering began. Umak
joined them in his bearskin robe. He walked through the slaughter scene
with the same imperious disdain as a great heron striding through a
marsh.

"Hmmph. Just as Spirit Master said, a good day to hunt." He would not
let them forget that he had foretold their good fortune. As the hunters
skinned their many kills, he stood stoically by. His face betrayed none
of his inner turmoil over the wanton slaughter of the entire herd. What
was done was done. If the life spirits of the game were offended,
nothing could change that. Tonight he would make spirit smokes and send
songs of veneration to the life spirits of the musk oxen. Perhaps that
would satisfy them. If not, they would know soon enough. In the
meantime, his songs and smokes and ritual dances would impress the
people of Galeena's band, especially the matrons. That, at least for
Umak, would be a good thing.

To Lonit's surprise, the hunters of Galeena's band took part in more
than just the skinning of their kills. She was amazed to see them force
their women to stand back while they slit the throats of each animal,
cut out its tongue, and hunkered down to eat on the spot.

As she watched, Torka cut the tongue from the bull that he had killed
and brought it to Umak.

"For Spirit Master, whose magic brought much meat."

The old man grunted, obviously pleased by Torka's deference. As
Galeena's people stared, apparently unaccustomed to youth serving to age
anything other than orders to walk away upon the wind, Umak accepted
Torka's offering as though he had not the slightest doubt that it was
his due. He held the tongue high in a gesture of thanksgiving to the
spirits. He made a loud and lengthy chant of praise to the animal whose
flesh he was about to consume. Then, after cutting off and setting aside
a small portion that Lonit was certain he would bring back to the ledge
for Karana, he slit the tongue in half with his fleshing dagger and
offered a share to Torka.

She saw them both pause and look for her among the women before settling
down to eat together in silence. She was relieved that they had not seen
her or called her forward to join them. She had deliberately chosen to
stand at the back of the group of watching women, stooping, trying to
make herself small so that she would not stand out from the crowd. From
the way that the women hung back, she knew that they expected to receive
none of this part of the kill. As among her own band, the choice
portions were reserved for the hunters.

If Torka or Umak had invited Lonit to share in their feast, they would
win only enmity from Galeena and his men. And Torka had already won more
than his share of that from Galeena.

Lonit could see it in the headman's small, rapacious eyes as he looked
at Torka as though he were an animal whom he would like to hunt. Lonit
was disturbed by the sight of him. He sat on the haunch of the dead bull
that Torka had slain, as though the animal had been his kill and not
Torka's. She liked him less now than when she had first seen him. He had
frightened her then; he frightened her more now.

The wind had dropped. It was warm and sluggish and did nothing to cut
the smell of blood that rose from the dead and dying musk oxen. Satiated
with tongue meat, the hunters began to fling their leavings to the boys.
The youths leaped forward to fight viciously among themselves over every
scrap while the hunters turned their attention to other delicacies. As
Lonit watched, they gouged the eyeballs from the musk oxen with their
thumbs and greedily began to suck the rich, black juices.

Lonit salivated, recalling the days when she had wandered the tundra
with Torka and Umak and they had generously insisted that she share
these delicacies with them. Those days were gone forever. She sighed
with longing for them and was glad when she was called to work with the
other women as the butchering began in earnest. Activity would drive
back the bittersweet memories. Now there were skulls to smash and bodies
to dismember. Brains must be scooped and cherished for the tanning of
hides. Sinew must be separated from meat and saved. Fires must be made.
Flesh must be smoked and roasted. Bones must be cracked, and marrow must
be melted. The hunters were already urinating on the freshly taken
skins. Once saturated, the skins would be wadded into tight bundles and
kept warm by the fires. In a day or two, the skins would be soft enough
to work, and the long hair of the musk oxen could be easily combed free.
Then the women would spread them, scrape off the last of the flesh, and
bind them to the drying frames to begin the long, tedious process of
transforming rough skins into supple garments.

As Ijonit took up her stone fleshing knife and began to work with three
other women to cut the fat-rich hump of a large bull into long, bloody
steaks, she ate freely of the meat. It was warm and sweet. Yet,
strangely, it was also bitter, for as she ate, her mind wandered to the
hunt in which the great bull had been slain. She was unsettled by her
recollections of the wanton, wasteful slaughter of the musk oxen. She
could not forget the pitiable sight of the little calves bleating for
their mothers and the way the brave bulls had deliberately taken spears
into their sides rather than abandon their old and weak and their
stumbling babies.

The taste of the meat was suddenly repulsive. Lonit swallowed and tried
to think of other things. To one side of her, the sad-eyed woman whom
the others called lana worked in silence. Across from her, the other two
women, who had introduced themselves as Oklahnoo and Naknaktup, ate and
worked, laughed and chattered. They mocked the musk oxen for their
stupidity. Lonit found herself resenting their words, reflecting on the
ways of her own species. She wondered why humans--so much wiser and more
adaptable than any animal-were rarely as self-sacrificing and caring of
their own as the brave, dumb oxen that had died this day. She spoke her
thoughts and was immediately sorry.

"Bah!" Naknaktup, the younger of the two matrons, snapped a rebuke.
"Musk oxen not brave! Musk oxen stupid! If they run, they not all be
dead now!"

Oklahnoo snorted in agreement. She was twice as plump as Naknaktup and
several years older. From the set of their features and the sound of
their voices, it was obvious that the two were sisters. She appraised
Lonit as though she had doubts about her sanity. "Is good thing musk
oxen not think like people! If oxen run away, if leave behind young and
sick, we take only some meat. But because oxen stupid, because they stay
with old and weak, we kill alll Does Torka's wuhman say this not good?"

The woman had asked a question. Lonit was bound to answer. "It is not
good! There are no cows or bulls left to make new calves. The herd is
gone forever. Never again will hunters feast upon its meat and offer
thanksgiving to its life spirits."

Oklahnoo shrugged. "What matt eh that? We feast now\ This is not only
herd musk oxen in all world! We find more. We kill many. Foreveh!"

"Eh yah!" added Naknaktup.

The sad-eyed woman looked up from her work and suggested that they get
on with theirs. "Much meat to butcher. Sun will not slow its walk across
sky while wuhmen talk."

Oklahnoo flashed a smile in which her well-worn teeth were like mottled,
mossy pebbles that have lain too long at the bottom of a stagnant pond.
Her fleshing dagger was a large, rounded, crudely knapped stone that fit
within her palm like a nut within its shell; where it protruded along
the heel of her hand, it was razor sharp. It was with this edge that she
sliced into the meat of the oxen's shoulder, speaking with relish of how
she had managed to suck hot blood from the neck of a still-living calf.
The hunters had slit its throat and cut out its tongue, but they had not
severed its jugular vein. It had still been alive when Oklahnoo had
fallen upon it. She chortled as she imitated the sounds it had made when
she had buried her face in its torn throat. She used her arms to show
the way it had kicked.

Lonit suddenly felt nauseated. The sisters were the same twosome who had
come naked to Umak to offer meat and whatever else he would have of
them. He had taken the meat and nothing else; but he had appraised them
with interest. Lonit could not understand why. She found them revolting.
Like all of the women of Galeena's band, they were filthy. Their hair
looked as though it had never known the soothing pull of a comb. A
lifetime's worth of grease thickened the snarled strands. As they
hunched over their work, they chided her again for her concern over the
fate of the musk oxen.

Lonit made no reply. She knew that they would not understand her
feelings any more than she understood theirs. Could they not know that
someday their own lives might be in jeopardy, forfeit but for the
intervention of someone willing to put himself at risk for their sake?
Did they consider themselves somehow beyond injury or illness or the
onset of old age? Would they be so filled with laughter when the members
of their band sent them away to walk the wind because they could no
longer forage and fight for the leavings of those who were stronger and
younger?

Lonit's eyes strayed across the killing scene. Three or four women
worked to butcher each musk oxen. The men and boys lounged about,
restoring the energy that they had spent in the taking of so much meat.
Not for the first time, Lonit noted that this was a band without
children or babies or old people. She did not have to ask why. The
young, the old, and the infirm were always expendable during times of
trouble. And these were times of trouble--or had been until Galeena had
brought his people through the storms of adversity to a safe encampment
upon Torka's mountain.

Her eyes rested upon her man. How proud of him she was! And of Umak, who
hunkered beside Torka, scraping marrow from a broken leg bone with the
marrow scoop that she had made for him. He did not look like a man at
all but like a great bear; it was almost amusing to watch him, to see
the delicate marrow scoop disappear into the human face that was hidden
beneath the head of the animal. It was difficult to remember that the
strong, clever spirit master was an old man who, not many moons ago, had
volunteered to walk away upon the wind so that the People would not
suffer for his sake.

The realization was distracting. Umak had survived. The People had died.
And Lonit and Torka were alive only because of the wisdom and concern
and inestimable strength of one old man who had not been considered fit
to live. Through storm and cold and against the predations of wild
beasts, they had stayed together and fought for one another until, at
last, they had found safety within a new band. Soon Lonit would bear
Torka's child. And all because of one old man, the People would be
reborn.

One life did matter. To risk one's life to save another was not the act
of a fool.

Within her womb, Lonit's baby moved to affirm her thoughts. Her free
hand went to her belly. The child within it was still very small, but it
was strong with life and rippled within her like a tiny fish shivering
within the confines of a protected pool. Usually the movement of the
unborn child filled her with joy, but now it filled her with shadows.
This baby would be born in the time of the long dark. Umak had told her
this would be so. But could he assure her that a child born under the
starving moon would be allowed by the people of Galeena's band to live?
Would the matrons, Oklahnoo and Naknaktup, laugh at her as they now
laughed at the musk oxen if she were forced to expose her baby to the
spirits of the storms? And would Torka allow it?

Lonit suddenly felt ill. Distraught, she rose and, without bothering to
explain her hurried departure, went to stand alone, away from the
killing site. She faced into the wind. It was too warm to soothe her.
She was pale with nausea, and there were tears in her eyes when the
sad-eyed woman followed and came to stand beside her.

The woman looked at her out of a gaunt face that would have been pretty
were it not layered with soot and grime. She wore a stained, ragged
dress that was stretched like a drum skin across the huge distension of
a well-advanced pregnancy. When she spoke, her voice was soft and deep
and sweet with empathy. "Torka's wuhman have baby in belly?"

Lonit nodded.

The sad-eyed woman smiled and nodded. "lana think this so. First time
baby, this?"

"First time baby."

Again she nodded. "Is good thing. First time baby best. Hard to bring,
but best. lana will help. Lonit not be afraid, lana have babies before.
Two babies. And help bring many more."

Lonit frowned. Many babies? And not one of them alive to ride firmly
bound to its mother's back? Had the deaths of her children saddened
lana's eyes? Many had died when the Destroyer had rampaged through
Galeena's encampment, but perhaps lana's infants had been victims of the
long, cold nights of the starving moon, which all too often had driven
the women of her own band to expose or abandon their newly born. She
shuddered. She did not want to think about it.

"Lonit not be sad," said lana, indicating with a bloodied hand the
slaughtered herd of musk oxen. "Not for them. Better all die. Better die
than be sad for lost calves ... for lost mothers ... for lost fathers.
lana say, better all die than some remember." Lonit frowned and shook
her head, understanding that lana was not speaking of musk oxen at all.
"No. It is not better to die. It is never better to die. And this woman
will,

never abandon her children!"

Even though her face was darkened by soot and grime, lana's face paled
visibly. Her eyes went very wide, and for a moment she stared at Lonit
as though she was not quite certain that she had heard her correctly.
Then, lowering her head, she sighed and whispered: "Not speak so.
Galeena say, Lonit do. Is way of band." "Lonit is Torha's woman. Galeena
camps in Torka's cave. Galeena eats of Torka's meat. Torka speaks, Lonit
answers. To Torka. Not to Galeena."

lana shook her head slowly, almost wistfully. "Much man Torka. But
Galeena headman this band. Lonit listen what lana say now. Lonit
remember: Torka must do as Galeena say or hunters of Galeena, they kill
Torka. Then Lonit be sad. Then Lonit say: Better die than remember!"

They worked until the sun went down, and still the butchering was not
finished. So much meat. So many hides. So much blood. Wolves came. And
dogs and foxes--concealed by the shadows of encroaching night, but they
were there, waiting.

Umak waited for Aar to come into the light of the fires that had been
made. If the dog was there, he kept to the shadows, and the old man knew
that Brother Dog would not come to him that night or any other--until he
broke company with the people of Galeena's band. And this he could not
do . nor did he wish to.

At sunset he made a dance to the dying and stripped naked to bathe in
the nearest of several deep, icy pools that lay at the base of the silt
shoulders rising from the outwash plain. He made a ritual of the
bathing. Torka guessed correctly that it was a ruse. Umak saw his
grandson trying hard not to smile as, at Umak's request, Galeena and his
people solemnly stripped themselves of their garments and waded out into
the water to be "purified" by the old man's magic.

And it was magic to coerce such filthy folk into doing that which they
had never done, supposedly to gain the power of the day that had brought
them luck during the hunt and to keep the spirits of the game strong and
sanctified within themselves. These were what he had assured them they
would gain through their sacrifice of bathing. And he made certain that
they were thoroughly doused, especially the matrons.

From the ledge, Karana watched the night gather and the fires of the
hunters burn like suns upon the outwash plain. He sat alone and from his
aerie saw the predators gather around the butchering site. He looked for
Aar among the shadowy forms. If the dog was there, Karana could not see
him. The lonely boy signed, wishing that he could have participated in
the hunt. Tomorrow, when the butchering was done, Umak and Torka would
bring him tongue meat--he was certain of that--and Lonit would have
saved hump steaks for him and would roast them to his liking.

But now he was alone with his memories and his dissatisfaction. He sat
in the darkness, holding the spear that Torka had made for him across
his knees, with his small fists curled around the smooth, white length
of its haft, and thought of all the chants that he had heard old Umak
make. He tried them out himself, hoping to find the right sequence of
syllables and chanting rhythms. Now and again he lifted the spear high
into the night, an offering to the spirits. If he held it high enough
and shouted loudly enough, perhaps they would hear and heed his wish to
make the magic that would cause Galeena and his wretched band to
disappear. But nothing happened.

The hours passed. He knew that upon the plain the armed hunters took
turns forming a circle to guard the meat from the many predators that
lay in wait to steal a portion. Karana knew that they would have a long
wait. Galeena was too gluttonous to share a meal with anyone without a
fight.

The night thickened around him. The stars disappeared. Clouds had
covered them.

Karana sighed, wondering if his chants had brought the clouds. Perhaps
he had worked weather magic instead of make-people-vanish magic?
Something would be better than nothing. He rubbed his injured leg. It
ached. The weather was in for a change. He hoped it poured rain onto
Galeena's butchering site; that would show his people what a luckless
headman they had chosen to lead them.

But the clouds held no rain. They were only the cold congealed breath of
the mountain. They smelled more like winter than early autumn. Karana
bundled his sleeping skins around him and lay down to sleep.

When he awoke, Aar was beside him, curled close. He was certain that he
was dreaming, but the dog was real enough. The dried blood on its
shoulder and the fresh scabs on its nose told him that, as did the warm,
rough licking of the animal's tongue. "Brother Dog!" Karana joyously
wrapped his skinny arms around Aar's shoulders and held the animal as
though it were indeed the brother of his heart.

The dog whimpered and licked his face with increased enthusiasm.

The boy touched the dog's wounds and frowned. "So you have not been
accepted by your own kind. Nor have I been by mine. Have you found a
Galeena ruling the dog pack? Well, Karana has found a dog ruling the
man-pack. You were right to run from Galeena. He is bad, as bad as the
dog that did this to you, my brother."

They lay close, not sleeping, merely resting and finding comfort in
their closeness. Deep within the mountain, the familiar restless surge
of sound sighed and groaned and then was silent. Karana listened It was
quiet .. . unnaturally quiet. With a start, he realized that the
waterfalls that cascaded downward from the summit ice pack had frozen

"It will be winter soon," he whispered to the dog.

Aar's head was up. He listened to the silence and was as discomfited as
the boy by it.

"Karana does not think that he can spend an entire winter in this place
with Galeena and his people. Karana is working hard to make the magic
that will make them disappear."

The dog whined and licked his face; it was almost as though it had
understood the child's words and wished to tell him that, even though he
was doomed to failure, Brother Dog would not judge him for it.

Karana sighed, his enthusiasm for his ability as a magic maker quashed
by common sense. "If Torka will not drive Galeena away, Karana will
leave this place. Together we could be a band. Karana and Aar. It would
not be a bad thing."

The dog sighed softly, and Karana lay still, thinking about what he had
just said. It would not be a bad thing. It would be an impossible thing.

Unless his leg healed.

He closed his eyes. He would try to make the magic that would do that;
it could not be as difficult as summoning the clouds. And he had done
that, hadn't he?

He slept and dreamed of dark, savage miles of storm swept winter tundra,
of children dying beneath the cold fire of the aurora borealis, and of a
small boy following the flight of an eagle to a Mountain of Power where
he had lived alone, as an animal, for far too long.

He awoke with a start. The sun was rising above the snow-streaked
mountain to the east. Brother Dog was gone. And for the first time since
he had been trapped in Torka's snare, his leg did not hurt at all. He
watched the sun rise. He watched the sky spirits build a huge rainbow
ring for the sun. It was extraordinary, filling the sky. Karana smiled.
Clouds were gathering again. Slowly the circular rainbow faded, and the
air began to grow warm. Karana knew that it was going to rain. He wished
that Brother Dog had stayed to share the morning with him, for when the
first raindrops began to fall, they made the morning more wonderful than
any morning that had ever dawned before. These raindrops were special,
for Karana knew that he had made them.

His leg was aching again, but not so badly that he doubted his magic. It
felt so much better, in fact, that he rose, took up his crutch of
caribou antler, and tossed it off the ledge.

He watched it fall. From now on, the only staff that he would carry
would be the spear that Torka had made for him. Soon he would hunt
again. Soon his people would return. Soon, if Umak refused to make the
magic that would drive Galeena's people away, Karana would do it
instead. He would watch Umak's every dance and gesture, memorize every
nuance of every chant, and absorb the old man's knowledge until he too
was a spirit master. He would tvirn Galeena's people into lemmings and
order them to follow their filthy headman over the ledge to their
deaths. Aar would come back then he was certain of that. And when his
people returned, he would greet them with Brother Dog at his side. Umak
would step forward in his bearskin, with his necklace of wolf paws and
bear claws, the head of the great bear balanced atop his own. He would
put a hand upon Karana's shoulder. Together they would stand before
Navahk, magic man, and Umak would say: "Behold Karana, Boy Who Brings
Rain. Behold Karana, whose magic is strong in the shadow of this spirit
master." And Navahk would not smile, for in the presence of Umak and
Karana, his own power would be small indeed.

The premise was exhilarating, but only for a moment. Great black squall
lines were massing along the horizon to the northeast, and lightning
flashed nearby. Thunder shook the world, as well as the boy's
confidence. Far below the ledge, the hunters, boys, and women were
scurrying about. Karana squinted against the distance and saw Umak
waving his arms at the sky. Galeena was directing the hurried packing of
meat into hides. The butchering camp was being abandoned. The people
were preparing to return to the shelter of the cave. If the full fury of
the storm broke upon them, the way would be difficult and dangerous.

A knot formed in Karana's belly as he watched Torka walking beside
Lonit, carrying most of her share of their load along with his own. What
if she were to stumble and hurt herself and her baby as she ascended the
wall to the ledge? With each raindrop, the chances of such a mishap
increased, for the way would be slippery and treacherous.

Karana was suddenly cold with dread. He had caused this rain. It was not
falling hard yet, but it would be. He had willed it to be so. He had
wanted the people of Galeena's band to blame their headman's wasteful
way of hunting for having angered the sky spirits. But now that he
thought about it, they had shown no reticence when it came to slaying
the entire herd of musk oxen. They would probably not blame Galeena at
all. They would blame their new spirit master. They would say that, by
failing to deter the storm, Umak had proved that his magic was that of a
weak old man.

Karana felt sick. He would have to make the storm go away. But how? He
had not the slightest idea of what he had said to call down the spirits
of the rain. He had merely copied what little he remembered of Umak's
atonal chants. There were no words. There were only snatches of sound
that made no sense to anyone who was not a spirit master.

It was raining harder now--big, cold drops. He extended his arms and
allowed them to form a clear, cool lake within his cupped palms. For the
first time, Karana realized just how foolish he had been to assume the
responsibility for the use of such powers. If Umak were blamed for the
storm, he would have to step forward and admit his blame before
everyone, regardless of the consequences The prospect was terrifying.
With a purely reflexive action, he flung his arms upward and released
the rain that he had held captive within his hands.

"Go back to the sky! Tell the spirit-, of the air that Karana has called
you by mistake! Tell them 'hat Karana is sorry!"

In that instant, a bolt of lightning, struck downward along the mountain
wall. It came so close to the ledge that Karana could smell it and feel
its power tirgling in the air all around him. When thunder followed
almost instantaneously, he jumped straight up. His head was so filled
with the sound, he did not hear the sharp, grinding, almost human cry
that came out of the summit ice pack. He was absolutely positive that
the sky spirits had come to punish the audacious boy who had dared to
steal the magic chants of Umak so that he might become a master of
spirits.

He was master of nothing. He was only Karana, a little boy, who would
never take the powers of the spirits for granted again. Yet, as he stood
on the ledge, the wind veered sharply. The great squall lines reversed
direction. The rain stopped.

And Karana knew that he had made it so.

They came up onto the ledge, rejoicing that Umak had turned the storm
away. They spoke of the grandiose invocations that he had made to the
sky and of the wonderful dance that he had done on behalf of the
hunters. Karana stood by and said nothing as they dumped their meat,
hides, and horns without ceremony. No one except the storm had witnessed
his encounter with the sky spirits. That was best. He had never seen
Umak look happier. The old man behaved like one half his age as he
preened under the doting attentions of the matrons. The two sisters
aggressively vied for his favor. Karana had to concede that, since their
dousing, they were not so bad to look upon. He was glad for Umak, and
had no intention of telling anyone that he was responsible for the
comings and goings of clouds and rain.

He was very tired. He felt as though the lightning bolt had drained away
a portion of his spirit. He dozed beside Lonit's fire while the men and
boys made several additional trips back to the butchering site. He heard
the youth whom the others called Ninip make a caustic remark about his
uselessness. Torka countered it while Karana pretended not to hear. Soon
his leg would be strong and flexible again. He would show Ninip who was
useless: Boy Who Brings Rain, or Boy Who Falls On Face Before Bull!

Through deepening sleepiness, Karana heard the women speak of how clever
Galeena had been to discover this high, dry encampment. He heard them
say that had it not been for their headman's resourcefulness, they would
have been forced to camp as they had always done, on the open tundra, at
the mercy of every storm. Here, thanks to Galeena, they could sit out
the weather and work their hides and prepare their meat with little
concern for the elements. Karana muttered to himself but was too weary
to remind them that he had found this cave, and had it not been for
Torka's fire, Galeena would never have thought to bring his people to
the mountain. Galeena was a man of minimal imagination, brave only when
he had armed hunters at his back.

Karana rolled over and closed his eyes. He was almost dreaming now: Aar
was at his side. He hunted with Torka, in the shadow of a great bear
that was Umak, while Lonit followed close behind with an infant upon her
back and her bola in her hand. It was a fine dream. Karana savored it
and knew that the best thing about it was that Galeena and his people
had no part in it at all.

It was nearly dark by the time Galeena announced that all that was going
to be brought up from the butchering camp had been brought. Although
everyone knew that there were still carcasses that had not been fully
stripped; no one protested. They had taken the best portions. The rest
would have to remain behind. Everyone was exhausted, and the storm that
had been sent into retreat that morning was advancing now.

They slept through the worst of the deluge. By morning the rain had
turned to sleet. Torka rose to secure the weather baffle that he had
raised the night before to keep his little family warm and dry. As he
looked at the sleeping forms of Karana and Lonit, he was troubled by a
concern that had nagged him since yesterday.

Darkness had forced them to abandon further trips to the butchering
site, and the weather would make any descent of the wall dangerous. But
they had left so much meat behind! They had killed so many musk oxen
that, even if the weather allowed, they could not possibly have
butchered them all. Unguarded carcasses at the killing site, which was
close to the mountain, would invite predators. If the predators
lingered, they would pose a threat to anyone who left the ledge to hunt,
fish, or gather tubers and berries.

He had said this to Galeena, but the headman had shrugged and said they
would be cautious and kill the predators if they proved a problem.
Nevertheless, Torka remained troubled. He wanted to speak his mind to
Umak, but the old man had passed the night with the matrons at their
fire. Torka saw that he now sat cross-legged before the ring of stones,
frowning as he stitched at the sleeves of the tunic Lonit had made for
him. He had a lap full of what looked like the flight feathers salvaged
from the tera torn that they had killed so long ago. Torka had no idea
what Umak was doing with them. The matrons buzzed around him like flies.
He swatted them away, so intent upon his work that he did not hear his
grandson when Torka called out his name.

It was Galeena who came to him. "Is good thing we khum this dry khamp,
uh?" He indicated the foulness of the morning with a snap of his head.
"Torka still worry about leaving meat? Galeena say stop. If beasts khum
to eat of Galeena's kill, it will be good thing for them. And for us.
Fat beasts slow. Not danger to men. Torka worry too much.

Torka eyed Galeena and spoke his thoughts. "Galeena has eaten well of
Torka's kills. Galeena grows fat. But on the hunt, Galeena is not slow.
He is a danger to the beasts who would feed off the meat that he has
wasted.

The headman considered Torka's words. There was good in them, and bad.
Gompliment and insult mixed together like summer-ripe berries mashed
into rancid fat to mask its stink. No man had ever spoken to him as
Torka spoke .. . except Manaak--and Manaak had paid. He thought of the
way Torka had shamed him by saving the life of Ninip, his son. Again he
vowed: Torka will pay. Grinning, Galeena slapped him familiarly upon his
back. "Torka always think his way better?" he said, pressing with an
oily amiability that reeked of insincerity. Beneath the oils were sharp
barbs, set to snag.

Torka raised a brow. "It is sometimes difficult to accept new ways. Does
not Galeena also find this true?"

Galeena was aware that several of his hunters, his women, and his son
were watching him. He was also aware that Torka had subtly turned the
barbs of his question back in his own direction. He was not about to be
caught. With a definitive snort, he said that he found no trouble
adapting to new ways, provided they were worthy of his consideration.

This said, he sauntered to the rim of the cornice. He stood just far
enough back to keep out of the rain. He hefted his tunic, loosened the
sinew tie that bound his baggy trousers around his waist, and freed an
enormous, blue-veined penis. He proceeded to relieve himself. "All see!
Galeena piss new way! Torka's way! Not in cave. Over rim of ledge!" As
he had expected, the wind blew his urine back at him amid clouds of
steam. He laughed and turned to face into the cave. "All see what happen
when Galeena piss Torka's way! Torka make killing throw on hunt! Torka
save life of worthless boy! But Torka best learn not to piss on himself
before he tells Galeena to accept new ways!"

The hunters howled. The women guffawed. Umak stared, taken aback. And
young Ninip flushed deeply with shame.

Torka knew that he would be wise to let the insult pass, but it was too
much for him. "Indeed. But Galeena should know that among Torka's people
there is a saying: A man who pisses into the wind holds his brains in
his hand."

Galeena was speechless for only a moment. "Torka's people are dead," he
reminded venomously, putting the cutting edge of a thinly veiled warning
to his tone.

"Not all of us," replied Torka, measuring his adversary, wondering if he
would ever be anything else.

That night they danced. After a day of laying out hides, setting meat on
racks of bone to dry, and preparing yards of precious sinew, they felt
the need to celebrate such a rich bounty. They danced, and their fires
danced with them-high, wasteful fires built of the last of Lonit's
carefully dried sod and bones and lichens. When she protested, saying
that if the weather did not improve they would be hard pressed to find
fire makings to last them through the time of the long dark, Naknaktup
silenced her. Oklahnoo reminded her that it was still autumn. lana said
that winter was far away. And Ai, the younger woman of Galeena, assured
her that they would have plenty of time to gather and store the kindling
and makings of future fires. Tomorrow. Or the next day. Or perhaps the
day after that.

In the meantime, they kept their fires high. Smoke filled the cave and
blackened its rocky ceiling. Eyes smarted and nostrils burned, but
Galeena's people seemed not to notice. They clapped their hands. They
stamped their feet. They praised the spirits for having brought them to
this safe, high encampment. They praised the musk oxen for having been
stupid enough to allow Galeena's hunters to kill them all. They praised
each other for everything, anything, and absolutely nothing. They formed
a line, then a circle. The circle opened and closed. The dancers sang.
They formed a line again and moved like an ox bowed river, snaking back
and forth around their fires.

"Khum! Torka's people! Galeena say you dance tuh!" It was Ai. Small and
plump, her wide, round face shone in the firelight. It was greasy and
blotched with soot from the fire. Her nose was swollen from Galeena's
earlier clouting, but amidst the fall of her shoulder-length black hair,
her face was still pretty. Very pretty.

Torka could not keep himself from smiling back at her as she took his
hand.

"Khum! she urged, and led him off to take his place beside her among the
circling dancers.

He hesitated only a moment, making certain that Lonit was following. She
reached for his free hand, but the circle closed. The line broke.
Wondering why she looked so distraught, he was surrounded by a press of
dancers, each moving to his or her own rhythm, each chanting his or her
own song.

Someone took her hand, pulled her half off her feet. Lonit gasped,
startled to find herself in Galeena's embrace. He was dancing as he held
her so close that she could barely breathe. She had not realized how
strong he was. His right hand curled about her waist, held it high
against her back, hurting her, forcing her to move with him as his free
hand touched her in ways that no man except her father had ever touched
her--invading the lacings of her tunic, grasping, deliberately hurting
her. She tried to pull away, but he jerked her wrist upward. Again she
gasped. He leered at her, wolf-eyed in the firelight darkness. All
around, dancers moved, lost totally in the moment. The tip of Galeena's
tongue penetrated the gap between his front teeth. It was a lewd and
obvious symbol. She was glad for the firelight, for he could not see the
blush that flamed upon her cheeks. He leaned close, whispered an obscene
suggestion, told her that when Torka's baby fought its way free of her
body, she had best remember who was headman of this band if she expected
the child to be allowed to live.

He released her then, so forcefully that she spun away from him and
nearly fell. When she caught her balance, he was nowhere to be seen. She
looked for Torka, but dancers were all around her, sweeping her along.

It was so warm within the cave that she could barely breathe. The
firelight made everything seem unreal. She thought she saw Umak dancing
with the matrons ... or was it the great, short-faced bear? She saw the
boys leaping and swaying in grotesque parodies of the adults.
Disoriented, she wondered if she had imagined the last few moments. Had
Galeena actually threatened her? Why would he wish to do so?

The movement of the dancers shoved her along. To her infinite relief,
she saw her own fire circle. Karana sat solemnly before it. She forced
herself out of the dance, half stumbling as she seated herself
gratefully upon her sloth skin. Breathless, dizzy, she shook her head to
clear it. When Karana asked if she was all right, she told him that she
was fine.

But when she saw the way that Ai was looking at Torka, she was not sure.

The night passed slowly, like a bad dream. For Lonit, the only good
thing about it was that Torka did not linger with Ai. After a few
moments he left the headman's woman and the dance to join Lonit at their
fire. Ai glared after him, as did Galeena. When Lonit asked Torka what
he had done to offend them, he exhaled a sigh of annoyance, wrapped his
sleeping skins around them both, and held her close. "Nothing and
everything," he replied obliquely, then would say no more on the
subject.

They slept together until the night was nearly over. Lonit awoke and lay
still within Torka's arms, remembering the previous night and wondering
if her fear of Galeena had caused her to misunderstand his words. She
could see no reason why the man should wish to threaten her and even
less reason for him to desire her. She could hear him now, sating
himself upon one of his women. Probably the pretty one, she thought, and
recalled the way the woman had looked at Torka. Not wanting to remember
or to hear more of the breathy, savage coupling, she buried her head in
Torka's arm. She snuggled closer to him beneath their sleeping skins and
wished that Galeena and his band had never come.

Far beyond the mountain, the howling of a wild dog rose with the dawn.
Lonit wondered if it was Aar and hoped that the animal had found a
better band than that which had driven it away. She took her memories of
Brother Dog with her into her dreams and was sound asleep when Karana
rose, took up his spear, and walked out of the cave to stand in the
light of the rising sun. He stood alone. He listened to Aar, and to the
summit ice pack shifting and settling on the heights far above the cave.
He had heard that sound a thousand times before, yet now, on this cold,
clear morning, it was as though he were hearing it for the first time.
It spoke to him so clearly that he cocked his head and closed his eyes,
allowing its voice to whisper to him not out of the deep, uncharted
canyons of the mountain but of his own soul.

Go. Co now. Boy Who Brings Rain is no longer welcome on the Mountain of
Power.

The inner voice startled him almost as much as the pressure of Umak's
hand.

"Karana rises early to greet the sun," commented the old man.

The boy stared at him, sensing that his words, although gently spoken,
had nevertheless been a rebuke. It was for the spirit master to greet
the sun.

Yet, as they stood together facing into the rising sun, it was the boy
who was touched by its power. Karana's eyes and heart and very being
were seared.

Umak was unsettled by the strange, wide-eyed expression that appeared
upon the child's face as Karana's voice tumbled out of his mouth, a
breath ahead of the fear that colored his revelation.

"The mountain says that we must go from this place. We must go eastward
into the face of the rising sun. Listen! Brother Dog calls on the wind
and echoes the voice of the mountain. He warns us. We must go from this
place, or we will stay here forever!"

"Karana must stop such talk! Because Umak has refused to use his magic
to make Galeena's people disappear now Karana would have us pack up and
leave and abandon to them the best encampment we have ever known!"

"It is a bad encampment."

"Hrmmph! It has saved the life of one small boy! It has allowed Umak,
Lonit, and Torka to live in safety! Karana will anger the spirits of
this place with his ungrateful talk!"

"It is the spirits of this place that speak through Karana's mouth!"

Umak was taken aback. "Umak is spirit master! Karana is a little boy!"

Karana gulped. Umak was very angry. The boy nodded,
not wanting to upset him. He decided that he would say no more. Umak
must be right. He was being presumptuous to assume that the spirits
would wish to tell him anything. If they had warnings, they would give
them to Umak.

Days and nights flew before the sun and moon like clouds driven by the
gales of time. Karana listened in vain for the spirits of the mountain
to repeat their warnings. After a while, he was glad they remained
silent. His leg was not quite strong enough for a trek into far and
unknown lands, and even if it were, he would not want to go without
Torka, Lonit, and Umak. And they would not believe that the spirits of
the great mountain would choose to speak through such a little mouth as
his.

In many ways, life was improving upon the ledge. The autumn nights were
growing longer. The days were sweet and burnished by the light of the
Arctic sun, but there was an ever-increasing quality of fragility to
that light. Man and beast became restless in anticipation of the time of
the long dark, so even Galeena's people were moved to rise with the sun,
to hunt, to gather, to prepare for the lean, dark days to come.

The skies turned white with tens of thousands of migrating snow geese
heading south and east. They competed with Lonit and the women of
Galeena's band for the last of the season's berries and roots. While the
geese fattened on the autumn bounty of the tundra, Galeena's women came
down from the mountain to set snares for them, and Lonit took great
pleasure in stalking them with her bola, a weapon totally unknown to the
people of Galeena's band. Torka was proud to see how the hunters openly
admired Lonit's skill with the strange device. They and the boys
murmured with amazement at the whirring sound it made as it flew low
over the ponds and marshes, and even surly Ninip cried out with
astonishment as its perfect weighted thongs hissed around the legs and
necks of its prey. Wishing to make a gesture of friendship, Lonit
offered to teach the women of the band how to use it, but they were not
of a mind to try new things; Ai turned up her flat, now-crooked little
nose and said it was easier to set snares than to waste her time
attempting to master such a complicated thing as a bola.

The enmity that had strained Torka's relationship with Galeena was
gradually softening into a begrudging toleration. Neither man liked the
other, but Torka had proved that he was a good man to have along on a
hunt, and for the sake of his people, he had not challenged the headman
since their last exchange of hostile words. Now that Galeena was finally
showing concern for the future welfare of the band, Torka saw no reason
to provoke him; his younger woman was already going out of her way to do
just that. It was obvious to everyone that, since Galeena had cracked
her nose, she was nursing a grudge against him, deliberately focusing
her attentions upon Torka in order to antagonize her own man. Torka
avoided her when he could. Now she was angry with him, too, which
pleased Galeena and made Lonit very happy.

The inner recesses of the cave were once again packed high with
provisions for the coming winter. Drying frames were everywhere, and
each was weighted with meat and fish and fowl. The women worked skins
and fashioned horns and bones into tools of many uses. Umak, happily
situated with Naknaktup and Oklahnoo at their decidedly cleaner fire
circle, portended good things for those who spent the last days of the
time of light in preparation for the inevitable rising of the starving
moon. With the two doting matrons to see to his every need and whim, he
had no time for Karana. When the boy came to him, Umak waved him away,
telling him to seek those of his own age for companionship. Karana
shrank back from him, hurt and bewildered by his rejection, but the old
man did not notice. He had his women and his port endings and those were
enough to keep any man busy. Arrogant, confident, and fully virile
again, he had assumed great status as spirit master of Galeena's band.
He might be beyond his years of running down steppe antelope and killing
them with his bare hands, but everyone knew that he had recently stood
against the great short-faced bear, and he would not let anyone forget
that he drew the essence of its power from its skin each time he wore
it. He greeted each dawn with a chant in which he referred to himself as
Man Who Kills Great Bear Alone. He invoked each sunset with a plea for
the return of the sun, in the name of Man Who Walks In Skin Of Great
Bear Spirit.

And behold! The sun rose! The sun set! Everyone was impressed.
Especially Umak. Because of their confidence in his magic, Galeena's
hunters were bolder and better at their kills. Because they feared his
power, Galeena's women bathed and maintained a cleaner encampment when,
from out of a feigned trance, he insisted that they do so or be eaten by
the wind spirits. Torka was openly proud of him, and a beaming Lonit
brought him prime portions of meat from her own fire. All the women of
the band did so, for as the man who called the spirits of the game to
die upon the hunters' spears, Umak was not required to hunt for himself
or for his women.

For the first time since his youth had left him, Umak was content with
his life .. . except when he was distracted by Karana's watchful eyes.
The boy's face was impossible to read, even for a spirit master, so Umak
did not try. It was enough for him to see that the boy was walking
without the aid of his crutch. Soon Torka would take him down from the
ledge to hunt small geese. And all because Umak had used his skills as a
healer to drive the bad spirits from the boy's injured leg. The old man
was proud of his accomplishment.

And Torka, seeing the change in him, was glad.

"Umak is happy in this new way of life?"

"Hrminph! To live in one place is not the way of the People! But Man Who
Kills Great Bear Alone says that this mountain is the Mountain of Power.
To this spirit master it gives great strength and wisdom! To those who
camp within its walls, it is good!

Torka could find no cause to disagree with him. Galeena and his people
left much to be desired when he compared them to the members of his own
band, but life was easier since they had come; and, although Torka often
found himself longing to be alone again with only Lonit, Umak, Karana,
and the wild dog for company, he had to admit that the future seemed far
less threatening. Umak was right. Life was good upon the mountain. For
the first time in longer than Torka could remember, days and nights were
passing with very few shadows.

Until, one night, he dreamed again of the roaring wall of water. It rose
up from beyond the horizon to sweep eastward toward the mountain. Black
and raging, it drowned all that moved before it, except one indomitable
creature that walked through and above it.

It was huge. It was silent. It was terrible in its unwelcome
familiarity. Neither flesh nor spirit, its shoulders held up the sky.
Its massive, stanchion limbs parted the waters. Its bloodied tusks
ripped the fabric of the clouds. Bodies rained out of them. Headless,
faceless, crushed, and mangled, they grasped at its shaggy hair and rode
its monstrous back, leering at the dreamer across the tormented miles of
his memories.

Alinak. Nap. Egatsop. Kipu. The bodies of the People-they were all
there, beckoning and speaking to him on the rising wall of the wind,
telling him that he could not walk away from them, that they had
followed, that they would always follow .. . until he was one of them, a
member of their band again, forever. He twitched in his sleep. He tried
to shake the dream away, but it intensified. The beast of his nightmares
reached the mountain wall. It was larger than life, but only half the
size of his terror as the beast raised its trunk, so the bodies of the
dead could clamber upward and leap onto the ledge.

They were mists, smokes, swirling over the sleeping forms of Umak,
Lonit, and Karana. He knew them all, and yet did not know them. Those
flattened, mangled, hideously smashed, and bloodied corpses could not be
his beloved woman, his more-beloved son. Neither had faces, yet somehow
they smiled and stared at him before putting their mutilated cloud
mouths over the faces of Umak, Lonit, and Karana to suck their life
spirits from them.

The beast rammed its tusks into the mountain wall. The world shook as
Thunder Speaker trumpeted its triumph over the man who had dared to
stand alone against it and live to tell the tale.

Torka!

It spoke his name as its impossibly long trunk encircled his chest,
crushed his ribs, and lifted him, carried him out of the cave, and
hurled him upward into the night. He flew into the clouds and. was
blinded by their mist. Lightning flashed nearby. Thunder deafened him as
he grasped the bolt and turned it to his purpose.

It was a part of him. He was the lightning bolt. It was an extension of
his spear arm. It burned and set his spirit afire. It sapped him of his
humanity as it transformed him into a living weapon. His arm was not an
arm, it was a five-jointed sling of power; its muscles and tendons and
flesh were all fused by the lightning into a wondrous device that coiled
back and then sprang forward like the limb of a leaping lion. The power
of that beast, and more, was his as the lightning bolt was propelled
from his hand downward with the speed of a plummeting eagle.

He struck the Destroyer through its red, hate-filled eye. He went down
into that hatred, into a lake of blood that choked him and cooled the
power of the lightning bolt until it and he lay cold and lifeless within
the heart of the great, dead spirit that would never again roam the
world to feed off the lives of men.

"Torka!"

Manaak's imperative whisper brought him out of the dream. He stared up
at the scar-faced hunter, dazed, dry mouthed, his heart pounding. Dawn
was thinning the darkness. Lonit lay warm against his back beneath their
sleeping skins, but he was cold, badly shaken, glad that Manaak had
awakened him.

"Khum! Listen! Torka must hear!"

Rising carefully so as not to awaken Lonit, Torka drew on his tunic and
followed Manaak to the edge of the cornice. The world was blue with
cold, and the waterfalls were frozen solid. The wind spoke softly,
promising that soon the sun would rise.

From across the endless miles, from out of distant canyons and
glacier-choked mountain ranges far to the east, there came a sound that
gave substance to Torka's dream.

"Mammoth ..." Manaak exhaled the word as though it were the answer to a
long-chanted prayer.

Torka listened, his heart and spirit as cold and frozen as the
waterfalls, until the sound redefined itself and he smiled with relief.
"Many mammoth. A herd. Very far. Days from this place. A herd means
females and young." The dream was fading now. He felt better. He saw the
look of disappointment cross Manaak's face and did not care. "Big Spirit
. World Shaker .. . the Destroyer .. . the one that Manaak would kill,
that one is solitary. That one walks alone."

Manaak's eyes narrowed. "Big Spirit was not alone when it came upon the
encampment of mammoth hunters at the entrance to the Corridor of Storms.
The mammoths screamed as they died in the bog pits into which the
hunters drove them. Then Big Spirit came. Like the shadow of an early
winter he came and fell upon us like a storm. When he left, he went
alone; but it is said that Big Spirit follows the herds. He watches the
old, the weak, the little lost ones who wander off to die. He kills
those who would eat of their flesh. He grinds into the tundra those who
would disturb their bones. It is for this he lives: to crush the life
spirits of those who hunt mammoth."

"Then he will not seek us here, for we are men who prey upon other kinds
of meat."

Manaak shook his head. "It is said that Big Spirit knows and remembers
all. And like Manaak, he does not forgive. Big Spirit is out there
somewhere; even as we speak, others may be dying in their encampments.
Someday it will come to us, and we will have to face it. Galeena may be
content to hide in the belly of this mountain, but until Big Spirit is
dead, Manaak will listen for the sound of mammoths moving in the night,
and Torka will twitch in his dreams."

Torka was troubled by Manaak's words, but as game continued to pass
below the mountain in a slowly dwindling parade, no mammoths were seen,
and the animals that he and Manaak had heard trumpeting in the distant
mountains were not heard again.

Fowl continued to fill the skies by day and to chortle, honk, and quack
within the frosty marshes during the ever lengthening nights. The
animals of the tundra were exchanging their summer coats for winter
white. Pikas and other rodents feverishly stockpiled the last of the
season's available greenery--sticks and stalks and tender shoots that
dared to sprout in defiance of the increasing cold. Cached in lichen
lined burrows, these would dry and serve as fodder when snow and ice lay
deep and impenetrable upon the surface of the tundral world.

The men of the band hunted with less urgency now. The boys were
encouraged to go out on occasional forays as long as they remained
within hailing distance of an elder. Karana's leg was much improved, but
when he took up his spear and prepared to follow the others, Ninip
mocked him for his lingering limp, and Torka was adamant in his refusal
to allow him to descend the wall.

"When your leg is stronger, you may go. Not yet."

Karana accepted Torka's words in sullen silence, but he glowered when
the others left without him, and would not be cheered, even by Lonit's
offering of his favorite pudding, a mixture of finely beaten fat
sweetened with congealed blood and pebbled with dried bunch berries and
cranberries picked fresh in the canyon at the base of the mountain wall.

The days passed, and the nights, and Torka nodded with encouragement
when he saw how Karana exercised his leg until its muscles burned; but
the boy continued to limp badly, and Torka refused him permission to
leave the cave.

"You will be slow. You will be unsteady. You will be a danger to
yourself and to any man or boy who hunts beside you."

"Then let me hunt alone! Let me prove what I can do!"

The boy looked so much like his lost son that Torka had to look away.
"Soon," he said, and tried to put his memories behind him. He failed.
When he looked again at Karana's earnest little face, he spoke his heart
to one who had become like a son to him. "Time passes quickly, Little
Hunter. It seems that only a moon ago I was a boy walking in the shadow
of my father, eager to prove myself to him and to my people. Sometime
between then and now, I became a man, shadowing my own son. And now, my
father and my son and most of my people walk the spirit world, and Torka
walks with Karana, and both of us are shadowed by the wisdom of Umak,
our spirit master. I will ask him to make the chants that will cause the
spirits to hurry the healing of Karana's leg. But Karana must remember
how much Umak has already asked of the spirits in behalf of one small
boy."

"Spirit Master has his women and a new band. He does not care about one
small boy."

Torka shook his head. "Karana lives because of Umak's magic. Karana
grows stronger because one old man would not let him die. Life is good
for us, Little Hunter, so be patient. Be content with the days as they
are given. Be glad that between now and the rising of the starving moon,
Torka will hunt for you and Lonit will cook for you while Umak shares a
common fire with those who have made him feel young again in this high,
safe place."

"Spirit Master has forgotten us," pouted the boy.

Torka smiled. "No, Little Hunter. He has remembered himself and has
found it good to be a man among men again."

It was still autumn, but small, hard flakes of snow driven by a
whistling wind stripped the leaves from the willows and whipped the
world into a stinging froth of white.

The people of Galeena's band stayed within the cave. They ate and slept
and ate again, and when Lonit once again found herself concerned over
their squandering of food, the women mocked her for her worrying. Theirs
was a well established pecking order, and they made it quite clear that
she was at the bottom of it. But in the main they offered friendship and
companionable gossip as readily as they offered criticism and advice. To
her surprise, although they made occasional remarks about her
appearance, they did not find her repugnant. When Ai made a slur against
Lonit's unusually lidded eyes, matronly Naknaktup came to her defense.

"If Galeena lets Ai live long enough, maybe she will watch her own
wandering eyes and not worry about Lonit's! This woman live long time,
see many people have eyes like Torka's woman. In some bands far from
this place people prefer eyes like that. So this woman say: If man as
fine as Torka take Lonit to be his woman, maybe her looks better than
ours. And much better than Ai's since Galeena smash her nose for looking
at Lonit's man!"

All of the women laughed at that, except Ai and sad-eyed lana, who never
laughed at anything. Lonit was too astonished to respond. Others with
eyes like hers? Whole bands of them? Was it possible? Or was Naknaktup
only saying it to be kind? No. Among these women, with the possible
exception of lana, kindness was a word that had no meaning. She knelt
with them in a circle around a large oxhide that was in the last phase
of scraping. They had all paused in their work--Ai to glare at Lonit
with open hostility, the others, except Lana, to snort and guffaw at Ai.

Lonit wished they would stop. Ai's mouth puckered into a knot of
resentment that only intensified the mirth of the other women. Lonit
could not help but stare at their broad, uniformly round, flat faces.
Since Umak had coerced them into washing themselves occasionally, their
features were visible--small, even, so similar that they might all have
been sisters. Even the plainest of them had the taut, up swept fold of
skin that covered their lids and made their eyes appear to slant upward
toward their temples. How she envied them their eyes and their round,
pretty faces. But nothing else! She was Torka's woman, and she knew that
they all envied her for that.

Ai was on her feet, wiping her small, pudgy hands on her apron less
skirt. "Laugh! Go ahead! But soon Ai will laugh loudest. Lonit and her
man, they think they better than us! Keep apart, turn noses up at our
food, our ways! Now Lonit's belly grows as big and round as a summer
moon. Soon Ai will lie with Lonit's man! And when Lonit's baby comes,
Galeena will never let it live. Never! This woman will make certain that
this is so!"

"Sleep now. Do not worry, little Antelope Eyes. Believe me, Galeena's
woman cannot say what he, or any other man, might do."

Lonit had waited until very late to speak her fears to him. She had
awakened him with a gentle touch, and now he returned it and kissed her
brow. "Sleep," he urged. "Torka holds no fear of the threats of a
jealous female."

"Jealous? Why would Ai be jealous? She is Galeena's woman .. . and she
is beautiful."

"Lonit is beautiful."

She smiled wanly, wanting to believe him but failing. "Lonit will soon
be as Ai says ... as big and round as a summer moon."

He drew her into an embrace, his broad, strong hand pressing gently upon
her belly. "The summer moon is the most beautiful moon of all."

She wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed herself and the child
against him, loving him so much that, for a moment, she could not speak.
But she had to speak. "Lonit has overheard Karana say to Umak that this
is a bad camp, that we must leave this place, that the Mountain of Power
has spoken through his mouth to warn us away."

"Karana is a little boy. Would the spirits of the mountain speak through
him instead of Umak?"

"Umak is old. Perhaps--"

"Umak is spirit master. If the spirits were to speak to anyone, they
would speak to him. And he is happy in this camp. Here he has found the
power of his manhood again. So do not listen to the babblings of a
foolish woman and a more foolish child. Soon Torka's woman will be
delivered of our summer moon. Soon the time of the long dark will be
upon us. We will stay here, in this high, safe place. It was ours before
it was Galeena's. Thanks to Umak's magic, his people are changing ... a
little. In time things will be better between our people." He stifled a
yawn and shifted his weight against her. "Lonit will see. Soon this will
be a good camp again."

She wanted to disagree, to speak to him of her troubled memories of the
night when the fires had burned high and the people of Galeena's band
had danced and she had imagined that the headman had threatened her; but
Torka had drifted into sleep, and she was yawning and growing heavy
eyed. Perhaps it was just as well. Galeena had made no further advances
to her, nor had he threatened her in any way. The night of the dancing
fires seemed long ago, part of a half-forgotten bad dream. She sighed,
glad to allow her recollections of it to fade. In Torka's arms, with
their unborn child sleeping high beneath her breasts, life itself seemed
a dream. She closed her eyes and slept, smiling because she knew that no
dream could be sweeter, or more unbelievable to her, than what she was
now sharing with Torka.

It was a time of the telling of tales. Umak spoke first. When his voice
began to crack and it became apparent that the weather was going to keep
everyone confined to the ledge for the remainder of the day and night,
Galeena took over. Whereas Umak's tales were intricate, allegorical
stories that spoke of man and beast and their eternal conflict and union
with the forces of Creation, Galeena's stories were straightforward,
rather unimaginative tales of bold adventures in far places. In Umak's
stories, man and beast were always subservient to the powers of the
earth and sky. In Galeena's tales, he and his band were the central
figures around which all else moved. Sun, moon, stars--all revolved
around Galeena. He spoke of strange-sounding hunting grounds in which he
and his hunters killed until all of the game was gone. He spoke of
feasts that lasted for days on end, until all the food was gone and he
and his band were forced to move into the hunting territory of other
bands. He spoke once more of the Corridor of Storms, a game-rich but
terrifyingly narrow, wind scoured passage of open grazing land between
mile-high mountains of solid ice ... mountains that shifted and moaned
like women in labor and sometimes came crashing down in huge avalanches
to bury men or beasts traveling beneath them.

Now for the first time, the tone and emphasis of his tales changed.
Here, in the cold, wind-wrapped shadow of his memories of the Corridor
of Storms, Galeena the storyteller reluctantly conceded that even the
mighty Galeena, hero of his tales, was only a mortal man after all.

"How many die neeah Corridor of Storms, whey eh mountains walk like
people?" His question was part of his story chant.

"Many die neeah the Corridor of Storms, whey ah mountains walk like
people!" his hunters responded in unison. His women keened as though
they were one. The boys of his band listened with wide-eyed wonder even
though they had heard the tale so many times that some of them were able
to mouth the words in silence as Galeena spoke them aloud.

"Do they die of the mountain falling?" Again Galeena's question was a
part of the story.

"They do not die of mountain falling!"

"Tell us then what kills the people!"

"The wrath of Big Spirit kills the people!"

"Ai-yah! And who is wisest headman of all bands? Who keeps people safe
from falling mountain? Who leads people from Big Spirit when he khums to
us like storm?"

"Galeena!"

"And who tells his people to hunt Big Spirit never more? What man saves
life of this band while othehs follow Big Spirit and die?"

"Galeena! Ai-yah-hay! Ga-lee-na!"

He beamed at their open adulation, then scowled when he saw that, alone
among his hunters, the scar-faced Manaak remained silent and visibly
unimpressed. Even Torka seemed taken with his storytelling. He sat
cross-legged at his own fire circle with Lonit and Karana. All three of
them faced into the cave, watching Galeena as he postured and puffed out
his chest.

"Where lies this Corridor of Storms?" asked Torka.

"Eastward. In the face of the rising sun," replied Manaak.

Galeena snorted with incredulity. "What kind hunt eh not know Corridor
of Storms?"

"This kind," admitted Torka evenly, not in a mood to be riled. "Torka is
a man of the west. Torka cannot know what he has not seen."

Again Galeena snorted. "What kind know-nothing people live in west not
know more mammoth browse in east?"

"People who follow the caribou have little concern for the ways of
mammoth," Torka said. "To us, the meat of a mammoth is fit to be eaten
only during the worst times of the starving moon. It is too tough. It
tastes too much like the bitter sap of the trees that it eats. Even the
smell of its flesh offends us."

"Ha!" blurted Galeena with explosive enthusiasm. "Bands khum from all
places to join at great encampment. Kill many mammoth. Tough meat makes
tough people!"

And smelly meat makes smelly people, thought Karana with disgust.
Suddenly an idea burst into his consciousness, and he wondered why he
had not thought of it before. "At this great camp where many bands come
.. . has Galeena seen the band of Supnah? He leads many men, many women.
He is not much for mammoth meat, but in starving times ..."

Galeena did not appreciate the child's interruption. "What care yuh this
Supnah?"

Karana told him, and Galeena grunted, telling the boy that he had seen
and shared a fire with a man named Supnah.

"Big band. No little ones. No babies. Some wuhmen. And magic man.
Navahk, is that name?"

Karana's eyes grew round. "Navahk. It is so."

Galeena grunted again. He told Karana that he and his band had met with
Supnah and his people while they were still enroute to the great
encampment. They had both taken a few caribou. They had shared a cooking
fire, and Galeena had invited Supnah to continue on with him to the
great gathering of mammoth hunters close to the entrance of the Corridor
of Storms. Supnah was unfamiliar with the area and had expressed his
dislike of mammoth meat. "Last time Galeena see that man, he was still
at fiah. Long time back now. Supnah say he stay that place, hunt more
caribou, then go on, following herds whereveh they lead."

"But he promised to come back for me, for all the children. He--"

"Said nothing of son. Said nothing of childs. So Galeena says now to
Karana, that after Big Spirit killed many in camp of mammoth huntehs,
Galeena led his band back west, away from Big Spirit, looking for this
Supnah, thinking maybe two bands be betteh than one. But Supnah gone.
Supnah follows caribou. And Big Spirit follows Supnah. Galeena sees
tracks. So Karana forget Supnah, forget all huntehs who walk the tundra
with no high, safe mountain to keep them safe from Big Spirit!"

Karana's head was swimming. He knew that everyone was staring at him. He
did not care as he blurted: "You saw the tracks of Big Spirit and did
not follow Supnah to warn him?"

Galeena's people murmured. The boy's question had sounded like an
accusation.

"Follow Big Spirit?" Galeena shook his head. "What for this man do that?
Galeena is not ready to send his spirit walking on the wind! Huntehs
hunt, game, not crooked spirits! And why does Karana care what happens
to one who walked away and left him to die?"

"Because I have not died! Because he is my father! Because his band is
my band! Because I know that if he could have returned for me, he would\
And because, unlike Galeena, Karana is not afraid of Big Spirit!"

He knew at once that he had grievously overstepped his place. Lonit
gasped, and he heard Umak exhale a muted harrumph even before he saw the
black, sobering look on Torka's face.

Torka reprimanded him strongly and angrily. "Not until Karana has faced
Big Spirit, as this man and Galeena and his hunters have done, will he
know the meaning of fear. Be it spirit or flesh, many brave men have
died trying to kill the great mammoth that has many names. This is a
little boy with a mouth twice his size! Until he is a man, with the
weight of a man's responsibilities upon his back, let Torka not hear him
challenge or criticize the ways of his elders, for while their wisdom is
great, Karana possesses no wisdom at all!"

Karana was shamed by the rebuke, but not so cowed by it that he failed
to see how it soothed Galeena and mollified his hunters. They all
murmured favorably at Torka's speech. The women nodded, and the boys
followed Ninip in a chorus of jeers. Karana hung his head. He heard Umak
say that Karana was a boy who learned quickly and would not repeat his
mistake. He felt sick, betrayed.

To ease the tension of the moment, Umak began to tell a tale. His two
women rose and urged the others to pass the meat. Once again, the people
of Galeena resumed their endless feasting.

Lonit offered an aged ptarmigan egg to Karana. It was one of his
favorite foods, but he waved it away. He had no appetite. Far off across
the tundra, muffled by the falling snow, a wild dog howled. Or was it a
wolf? Karana could not tell.

Suddenly restless, he went to stand at the edge of the cornice. Umak's
chant filled the cave. The words drifted like smoke into the boy's head.
There was magic in the Mountain of Power, he thought. A dark and
subversive magic that turned even such brave and honorable hunters as
Torka and Umak into compromisers who could find wisdom in the excesses
and cowardice of a man like Galeena.

This boy will not stay in this place. It is a had camp. As Brother Dog
has left it, so too will Karana go. He will follow his own people
eastward, into the face of the rising sun. And no matter what Torka
says, Karana will not be afraid!

But as he looked down along the icy, precipitous route that he would
have to take in order to leave the cave, he was afraid. He had climbed
this face of the mountain many times before his injury. In sun, in rain,
in sleet, in snow, he know every foot- and handhold. At best it was a
time-consuming climb and not without danger. At worst it was deadly, and
only a fool would try it.

Karana was not a fool. He had survived alone upon this mountain too long
for any man to accuse him of that. Yet Torka had done just that in front
of the entire band.

There was a hot, hard lump at the back of Karana's throat. When he tried
to swallow it, it would not move. He had not realized just how much he
had wanted Torka's approval or how much the denial of that approval
could hurt.

The snow had stopped. The air was very cold. The wind seemed to be
holding its breath. Soon the snow would begin to fall again, but now
Karana could see the sun. It was a small, dull yellow eye that stared at
him through miles of shifting clouds. Something about it made him think
of Navahk, the magic man, watching him, smiling his hate-filled smile,
daring one small boy to follow where brave hunters dared not go

The change in the weather was causing Karana's leg to stiffen and ache.
He knew that Torka would be proved right about him if he tried to make
the climb down from the cave alone. And when he fell to his death from
the icy wall, somehow Navahk would know and the eye of the sun would
grow wide with pleasure as, miles away across the tundra, the magic man
smiled. Unless .. .

Speculation pricked him. He remembered the pulley and sling that Torka
and Umak had devised to heft the heavier portions of dismembered moose
up the mountain wall. The device had seen much use since that day. It
was flimsy, and if not carefully balanced, as much meat fell from it as
was successfully brought up the wall.

Karana will be careful, vowed the boy. In the deep, dark shank of this
night, while everyone sleeps, Karana will go. No one will miss him. This
is no longer his cave or his mountain. Torka's people are no longer
Karana's people. They are of Galeena's band now.

The day seemed to go on forever. As snow continued to fall, the people
of Galeena's band grew tired of eating and listening to story chants.
They drank a foul liquid that their women had prepared and stored in
bladder flasks. Soon half the flasks were drained, and while Torka
knapped projectile points and Lonit busied herself with her sewing,
Galeena's people showed little inclination to engage in productive work.
They dozed, and when they woke, their speech was slurred, and for a
little while they were much given to laughter. Then their mood changed.
The hunters coupled with their women as though they were angry, so
quickly that afterward the partners were irritable and argumentative.
The boys were forbidden even to sip from the flasks and soon grew bored
and fell to squabbling so viciously that Ninip hit another boy with a
rock and Umak had to be summoned to suture the scalp of the screeching
boy.

Karana sat by himself, bundled in his sleeping furs close to the edge of
the cornice. It was better to watch the snow fall, cool and clean and
silent, than to observe the activities within the cave. In his mind, he
had already left it. When Lonit came to him and tried to persuade him to
come in from the cold, he ignored her. Had Torka come with even the
slightest word of apology, he might have weakened and lost his resolve
to leave. But Torka had not come, and although Karana was disappointed,
he told himself that he was glad. Torka had become a stranger. Anyway,
he told himself, he would have to grow used to the cold, which would be
his one constant companion until he found Brother Dog and the two of
them set off across the tundra in search of Supnah's band.

Beside the headman's fire circle, Ai whispered incendiary words to
Galeena. Well-pleased by her behavior of the last few days, he accepted
her advances. Smashing a woman in the face was a good way to deal with
troublesome females, although Ai had taken longer than most to stop
sulking. Now, as she handled him, he sighed with pleasure and nodded at
every word of flattery that she was whispering into his ear. As she
opened herself wide to his impatient rutting, he did not doubt her for a
moment when she told him that he was the best of all men at all things.

But then Weelup, his second woman, whispered the words that Ai had told
her to say under threat of being tripped the next time she descended the
mountain wall: "Some say Torka is betteh." Weclup cringed as she spoke
and rolled away in anticipation of a blow.

It came.

Galeena hit her hard across the back as he shriveled, his mating with Ai
ruined. "What wuhman say that?" he demanded with murder in his eyes.

"No wuhman," soothed Ai. "Torka thinks he is best man at all things.
Always Torka challenges Galeena. Torka does not eat from our fiahs.
Torka does not drink from our flasks. Torka insults our men by lying
only with his own wuhman."

Briefly, at the back of his anger, Galeena knew that no man had offered
to share a woman with Torka. It was up to the headman of a band to make
such a gesture first. And Galeena had deliberately chosen not to do so.
If any man was guilty of insulting another, it was he for not extending
such a common courtesy to another. Torka did not seem to mind. The young
man was obviously more than content with his own strange-eyed female,
and Galeena was glad, because he had no desire to share either of his
women with a man of whom he was clearly jealous.

Ai ran her small, warm palms over his chest and lifted her head to lick
and nip at his skin. "Galeena not worry what Torka say or what other
wuhmen and men of his band may think. Ai hears the old ones say that
long ago, Galeena was best man of all at great gathering where many
bands come to hunt and dance the plaku at the entrance to the Corridor
of Storms."

"Old ones? Long ago? .. . Galeena is best man now! If wuhman dance plaku
in this khamp, Torka could not come close to matching this man's
prowess!"

Ai smiled and buried her face in his chest lest her smile become
laughter at his expense. "Galeena not have to say this to Ai! Ai is
Galeena's wuhman, she wants no man but headman! Ai knows that Galeena is
best of all!"

"Ai will seel" He shoved her away and was on his feet, declaring that
his people must prepare for a plaku immediately.

Silence fell. Galeena's people stared at him with stunned and gaping
incredulity.

"Plaku! Plaku! Make ready! Make ready!" he ordered, watching as the
men's blank faces wrinkled into lecherous grins and the women's hands
flew to their mouths in a vain attempt to suppress their titters.

Ninip hooted and led the boys into a snickering little clot of
whisperings as lana came to take Lonit by the hand and draw her away
from Torka to sit with her at her fire circle.

"Plaku not for woman with baby in belly," she explained, and had time to
say no more before Naknaktup joined them. The older woman gloated as she
informed them that Umak was indeed a great and powerful spirit master,
for he had put a baby into the belly of one who had thought herself long
past bearing. Lonit was so delighted, not for Naknaktup but for Umak,
that she forgot to ask why she had been drawn away from Torka's fire.
Now the old man would be young again, for the child that Naknaktup would
bear him in his last years, the child that would strengthen him and
renew his purpose in living--not just to posture and preen and make his
wonderful magic but to pass on the gift of his life to one whose spirit
had been formed with his own loins. "Yuh see! All wuhman will want Umak!
They will dance the plaku for my man! This wuhman will be proud!"
Naknaktup beamed.

"Plaku? What is the plaku?" pressed Lonit.

"It is a dance that is done at the great encampment of mammoth huntehs
near the entrance to the Corridor of Storms. Plaku . the dance of
wuhman's choosing. It is a sharing of pleasure, from one band to
aiiotheh, from one man's wuhman to anotheh wuhman's man," explained
lana.

Lonit blinked, not liking the sound of this at all. "Who shares? Who
chooses?"

"All share, but it is the one time when the wuhman may choose. One man.
Many men. Any man they would desire to lie with. Any man except their
own man. For this one time."

"Not my man!" protested Lonit.

Naknaktup laughed at Lonit's exclamation. "Any man, my little one. Torka
.. . Umak .. . Galeena .. . any and all! More wuhmen want one man, more
proud his wuhman be!" She clapped her large, work-roughened hands
together with delight as she savored her memories. "This wuhman live
long, see many things, dance at many plakus. Long time back, before
Galeena become headman this band, Naknaktup see him take on all wuhman
at great gathering!"

"That is not possible!"

"Galeena young eh then," conceded the matron, adding a conspiratorial
wink. "Very small gathering that time. Not so many wuhmen, and plaku
last long time. But Naknaktup tell Lonit that Galeena has one big,
hungry, rising bone! That one reason huntehs make him headman this band.
Any man with bone that big--"

"My own Manaak once took three wuhmen same time," lana interrupted,
obviously not wanting to hear Galeena

Craised. "When Manaak finish, all three wuhmen filled and appy. Not dry
and bruised like Galeena leaves wuhmen aft eh his pounding! But that no
matt eh All wuhmen want Galeena. He headman. No wuhman but lana want
Manaak now that he has scars on his face."

Lonit was in despair, yet she saw the sadness on lana's face and wished
to soothe it. "Among this woman's people, a man with scars is a man who
is envied by others. Manaak is strong and has a fine face. His scars say
that lana is lucky not to have to share her man with others! Lonit does
not want to share Torka!" She looked so distraught that Naknaktup
reached out and swept her into a motherly embrace. "Listen to this
wuhman, little one. Manaak has scars because Galeena cut him. Manaak's
scars mark him as man apart ... as man who will die if he challenges
Galeena again."

lana put a gentle, empathetic hand upon Lonit's arm. "You will share
your man, Lonit." Her voice was as soft and sad as her eyes. "The plaku
is a dance of our people. You and Torka are of this band now. If Torka
is chosen and refuses one of our wuhmen, he will not be a man to envy.
Our huntehs will be angry. They will hold Torka while Galeena cuts his
face or maybe even drives him from this place. Then Lonit will become
Galeena's wuhman. Then Galeena will kick Lonit until Torka's baby dies.
Then Lonit will live by his fiah and share his sleeping skins with Ai
and Weelup until Galeena grows tired of her. Then Galeena will send
Lonit to follow Torka, to walk alone into the wind, to be food for
beasts."

The men of the band built a single fire in the center of the cave. It
was a smoky, careless pyre heaped high with the bones and refuse of
recent meals. They dragged their sleeping skins close and seated
themselves around it, leaving a broad circle of open ground between
themselves and the flames. Here the women would dance. The hunters made
lewd jokes about the dancers, and wagers as to whose prowess would be
tested and by whom. When Torka made no move to join them, they called
out to him, patted the ground where they wanted him to sit, and reminded
him that he was a man of their band now. No man of the band could stand
aside during a plaku, nor would any male who had a breath of spirit left
in him wish to do so.

They all laughed at that. One of them suggested that perhaps Torka was a
different kind of man. Another replied that since he had yet to join
with one of their women, there was no way to tell if he even was a man;
although he was a fine hunter and his own female seemed to be evidence
enough of the workings of his rising bone.

Torka felt his face flush with resentful embarrassment. He was aware of
a pitifully distraught Lonit sitting far off across the cave with lana
and Naknaktup. He could not bring himself to look at her. He wanted to
speak out, tell Galeena's hunters that, among Torka's people, it was not
expected of a man to copulate with other men's women in order to prove
his virility; but he knew that they had spoken the truth when they had
said that he was of their band now. The People were dead and gone. And
Umak's sage words of advice were proving their validity more and more
every day: In new times, men must learn new ways.

Even if they neither like nor approve of them, he added to himself,
reluctantly joining the circle. He sat down beside Manaak and, for a
moment, was distracted by Karana staring judgmentally from the shadows
just beyond the circle of hunters; then the boy was gone, off to mope at
their own fire circle no doubt, and Galeena was summoning Umak to join
the others.

"Hrmmph!" was all the old man said as he came forward in his bearskin
robe and his softly clicking necklaces of claws and paws. Over the last
few days, he had completed stitching the flight feathers of the condor
to the seams of the sleeves of his tunic. When he raised his arms, he
appeared to have wings, as though he were not a man at all but some
strange, otherworldly combination of bear and bird. He held his arms
high for a moment, waiting for the exhalations of awe from those who
observed his display; they came, mainly from the women. Satisfied, he
folded his legs beneath him, laced his arms across his chest, and stared
stoically into the flames.

But only a rock could have sat stoically through the plaku. As a prelude
to the dance, the women circulated among the men with flasks of the
oily, thick, foul-smelling drink that Torka had managed to avoid over
the last few weeks. It was a revolting mixture of blood and fermented
berries and juices, of mosses and fungi, and of willow bark pounded into
pulp and then chewed by the women until it became totally liquified and
mixed with their saliva.

Now he had no choice but to drink, and to drink deeply. To do otherwise
would be to offend the people of Galeena's band, who set much store by
the potion. He gagged twice, but managed to swallow down a mouthful. The
men nodded. The watching women tittered and moved on.

He soon understood why they drank it. It had nothing to do with flavor,
for the taste was even worse than he had thought it would be. And he
knew in less than a minute why Galeena and his people were so often
indolent and lethargic. One swallow of their women's potion, and he was
warm and blinking. His shoulders tingled. The soles of his feet seemed
irritably sensitive. He worked his toes. The sensation was exquisite.
His eyes were suddenly taking in light and substance differently than
they had ever done before. The cave, the fire, the men seated around it,
the women moving slowly with their flasks of fluid, all seemed as
beautiful as the first dawn at the ending of the time of the long dark.
He felt somehow larger, stronger, yet as light as a small boy riding
snugly bound to his mother's back as she walked out across the tundra in
the long-gone days of his earliest childhood.

But he was not a child. He was a man seated among other men, watching as
the women slowly stripped themselves of their garments; watching as they
slowly oiled their bodies with fat and rubbed their breasts, bellies,
and the soft, dusky inner curves of their thighs with leaves of aromatic
wormwood; watching as they slowly joined hands and, facing away from the
men, began to circle the fire, stepping to the side, not lifting their
feet from the ground, but sliding them slowly along the earth; watching
as they raised their arms and slowly began to chant; watching as their
steps grew wider, allowing firelight to show between their thighs before
they scissored closed again.

Slowly.

Everything moved, swam, and pulsed a beat slower than that of his heart;
and then his heartbeat was hammering, and the movements of the dancers
quickened as they turned. The fire was behind them now, and within the
men who watched them. Their bodies glistened. They displayed their
breasts and bellies and the soft, oiled triangles of fur that hid
softer, moister areas that were not so easily displayed. They tilted
their hips, rolled them slowly, allowing glimpses of vistas rarely seen.

Dry-mouthed, Torka watched, hard with need, entranced, unaware that he,
along with the other men, had begun to clap an increasingly strident,
quickening rhythm. He had forgotten Lonit. He had forgotten Karana. He
had forgotten everyone and everything but the dancers.

Their movements determined the cadence of the clapping rhythm. They
smiled as they danced--not wide, tooth-showing smiles, but tight, grim
little contractions of pleasure. The brief autumn day that had seemed so
long was finally ending. The long shadows of night were filling the
cave. The women of Galeena's band danced the plaku, and for one brief
night they were in control of their men, and they knew it.

The dance continued, each woman moving more slowly as she passed a man
she favored, her knees bent, limbs splayed, hips moving, arms extended
upward, shoulders jerking so that her breasts quivered and her round,
soft nipples went hard and dark.

It was growing dark. The fire had consumed most of the bones and refuse
and was settling now. The circling stopped. Ai danced before Torka and
fed another fire. Her back was to him. Her arms were raised, small pudgy
hands entwined. With her strong little limbs splayed wide and her knees
bent, she rocked her hips back and forth, shifting her weight from heel
to toe, flexing her surprisingly slender ankles and supple waist as she
stretched upward, arching her rib cage like a well-fed lioness clawing
at a tree, and began to answer the fire's sounds with low, hungry mewings

All around the circle, the hunters had gotten to their feet. They were
casting off their clothes and freeing themselves. Torka was no
exception.

The dance went on. There was an excruciating moment as one of the
younger hunters dropped to his knees, moaning in shame and frustration.
Already spent, he would be of no good to any of the women who might have
thought to choose him. Torka felt a momentary pang of pity for him. It
would be a long time before his woman or hunting partners allowed him to
forget this moment.

The women turned as one. Torka looked into Ai's face and saw features as
savage and impassioned as an Arctic storm-and, despite the heat of the
moment, every bit as cold and uncaring of all but its own release. In
that instant, Torka knew that Ai had provoked Galeena into calling for
the plahit so that, while the headman was distracted by other women, she
could demand from Torka what he and Galeena had both denied her. She was
a bold, selfish, manipulative creature who was responsible for the
shaming of the young hunter and for the hours of worry that her threats
had brought to Lonit. He was filled with loathing for her; but the
loathing did nothing to cool his lust. If anything, it inflamed it.

All around the circle, the women of Galeena's band were choosing
partners. Torka saw or heard none of their ferocious joinings.

Ai was smirking at him, displaying herself, handling herself as only a
man should handle a woman. Her eyes fastened on the erected height and
width of that portion of his body that she had so long desired and now
so thoroughly aroused. Little pearls of saliva appeared at the corners
of her mouth. She licked them away as she came forward to fulfill the
threat that she had made to Lonit.

He hated her, yet wanted her and would have taken her even if he had not
known that to refuse her would be to insult Galeena and risk being cast
out of the band. It was not his welfare that concerned him. It was
Lonit's, and Umak's, and that of his unborn child. With the time of the
long dark soon approaching, they needed the protection of the band ...
as much as he needed to have Ai now--but on his terms, not hers.

He fought back an urge to snap her in half and sate himself upon her
lifeless body so that she could find no satisfaction in his release or
in Lonit's humiliation.

Lonit.

Her name was in his heart as he lifted Ai from her feet, gripping her
firmly beneath each armpit, deliberately hurting her. He felt her tense
and try to twist free of his grip as she realized that she had lost
control of the moment.

He lowered her slowly, browsing, biting, thinking of the wild stallions
of the steppe as he took her down and impaled her so violently that he
knew he had hurt her. He was larger and harder than he had ever been.
Too big for her, but not for Lonit. The realization gave him immense
pleasure. He thrust deep, heard her cry out in pain, and knew that
Galeena's legendary organ was overrated. Release came, and it was as
violent as the penetration. Like a rutting wolf, he remained within her
and held her close even though she tried to twist away.

"Ai, Galeena's woman, is this what you have wanted?" He whispered the
words into her throat, just below her ear, and took her again with
deliberate carelessness.

He lay, still joined, with the bulk of his weight atop her, deliberately
ignoring the pressure of her small hands as she pushed upward at his
shoulders. She gasped his name and begged him to move.

He did, not to release her, but only to press her harder. He pretended
to sleep then, holding her down with the weight of his body as he
listened to the other hunters ambling back to their own fire circles or
breathing in deep satisfaction where they lay. He feigned snores and
breathed them into her ear as he felt her squirm and pant as she fought
to free herself from his grip. He held her where she was until
sleepiness took the edge from his intent. She was crying softly when at
last she managed to slip from his near stranglehold and tiptoe back to
Galeena's fire circle.

Torka folded his arm beneath his head and allowed himself to yield to
sleep, smiling because he was certain that Ai would never want to lie
with him again.

He slept fitfully. His dreams were fragmented images of the past: of
Egatsop, beautiful and alive; of little Kipu shrieking with childish
delight as he tossed him high into the air, caught him, and tossed him
up again; of Big Spirit, shadowing the world, shaking it, destroying it;
of Ai dancing naked in the ruins of his life, boldly offering herself to
him while Galeena glared at him with killing on his mind and Lonit held
an infant to her breast and wept softly.

Lonit.

He reached for her in his sleep. She was not there. His dreams shifted,
becoming troubled recollections of his coupling with Galeena's woman and
of the way that he had been forced to put Karana in his place. He had
found pleasure in his demeaning of the woman but not in his humiliation
of the child. That brave, loyal, stubborn little scrap of a boy had come
to mean more to him than he would ever have thought possible.

The dream dissolved. He opened his eyes. He stared into darkness. Karana
had been wrong to speak so rudely to the headman. Galeena would have
been well within his rights to banish the child from the cave as
punishment for such behavior. If it had come to that, Torka knew that
there would have been a confrontation between himself and the headman.
He would no more allow Karana to be put at risk than he would stand
aside and allow Lonit or Umak to come to harm. It was for their sake
that he bore Galeena's filthy ways. It was for their sake that he had
not turned his back upon the conniving Ai. And it was for Karana's own
good that he had given him such a severe tongue-lashing. He would have
done no less if the boy had been his own son.

The thought brought a revelation. In Kipu he had lost a son. In Karana
he had gained another. If Lonit bore a male child, it could mean no more
to him than Karana. They would be as brothers, and Torka would name them
both as his sons. Surely the boy must know this!

But how could he know if Torka had not told him? He had only to recall
the hurt, angry expression upon Karana's little face and to remember the
look of despair in Lonit's eyes before the plaku had begun to know that
neither of them understood what drove him or the depth of his feelings
for them. It was not the way of the People to speak such thoughts to
others.

In new times men must learn new ways.

Umak was right. Torka would go to them now. He would hold Lonit close
and assure her that Ai was nothing to him. Nothing. He would look Karana
in the face, his eyes focusing directly into those of the boy so that
Karana would have no doubt that he spoke with a true spirit, and he
would name him son.

In the thinning darkness, Torka rose and stepped quietly over the
sleeping bodies of yesterday's plaku dancers. Predictably, Galeena had
the most women around him. Any of the females of the band would gain
status by coupling with its headman. He had not gone back to his own
fire circle. Ai slept there alone while her man lay on his back with
sleeping women entangled around him, their arms and legs entwined like a
clutch of worms.

He was disgusted by the sight of them. When the time of the long dark
has passed, when Lonit is strong again after the birth of our child, if
Galeena has not changed, then Torka will leave this place. There are
other bands out there. They are bound to be better than this one.

He walked around a hairy mound that he knew was Umak. Two naked women
lay snuggled close beneath his "wings." The head of the great bear
seemed to smile up at him as he passed. Torka smiled back, thinking that
the old man truly was a spirit master; he had mastered his own spirit
and willed it to function as a young man's again in his old age.

His smile vanished when he reached his own fire circle. The weather
baffle sheltered Lonit's sleeping form, but Karana was not there. Nor
were his sleeping furs, his clothes, or the spear that Torka had made
for him.

Karana had been gone for hours, and all that time snow had been falling
steadily, covering his trail. The wind was bitter, and the mountain
sheathed in ice.

Galeena declared that a search was impossible, and his hunters agreed.
Although Umak was visibly distraught, one look at the mountain wall
forced him to agree with the headman. Yet Torka decided to follow
Karana.

He dressed, then lowered himself on the sling controlled by ropes of
twisted rawhide, as Karana had done. Even though it was more difficult
and more dangerous for a grown man, Torka was so concerned about Karana,
he did not think about his own safety. He searched for hours, plodding
eastward, certain that Karana would be seeking his people where Galeena
claimed to have seen them. He would be heading toward the distant
mountains, making his way across the savage, unknown land toward the
place that was called the Corridor of Storms . where Big Spirit walked
the world, destroying the lives of men and crushing small, vulnerable
boys who dared to walk alone because they believed themselves to have
been abandoned by their friends. Across the endless miles, he shouted
Karana's name. The wind blew his voice back into his face along with
stinging particles of hard, pellet like snow, which reduced visibility
so much that, for a short while, he lost his sense of direction.

As darkness gathered beyond the swirling, howling, wind driven white, he
suddenly thought of Lonit and his unborn child. If he were to die, they
would be at Galeena's mercy with only a frail old man to protect them.
Torka's sense of frustration was absolute. For their sake, he must
return to the mountain, but to turn his back on Karana now meant
abandoning the boy to certain death.

His grief was unassuageable when, at last, he committed himself to the
homeward trek. When he reached the base of the mountain, Manaak was
waiting for him.

"Tomorrow," said the scar-faced hunter. "This man will go out with you
tomorrow. Perhaps two will find what one could not."

Faint but real hope stirred. "Tomorrow," agreed Torka, and knew that in
Manaak he had found a friend.

They climbed the wall together in darkness, each man clutching the
sling's rawhide ropes and supporting the other. Manaak had poured ashes
over the wall to lessen the slipperiness of the ascent. It did some
good, although both climbers nearly fell several times. Only the ropes
of the sling, steadied from above by Umak, kept them from losing their
balance completely and allowed them to keep a reasonably firm grip on
the wall. When they finally clambered onto the ledge, the hunters of
Galeena's band commented on the impressiveness of their climb--and on
the foolishness of it.

"It is not a good thing for a hunter to risk death for the sake of a
child," scoffed Galeena. "That Little Lame One has gone to feed his
spirit to the storm. He is scrawny, but he will make meat for wolves and
lions. He was not good for much else than that from the beginning, this
man thinks. Torka must forget him now."

Torka pulled his ruff back and shook snow from his shoulders, then
looked at Galeena out of tired eyes. The headman was obviously feeling
cockier than ever since he had awakened after the plaku with several
women in his arms and a passive Ai at his fire circle. He was a hard,
arrogant man who had no understanding of compassion; but with the
exception of Manaak, his hunters were loyal to him, not in spite of
these qualities but because of them. With Galeena as their headman, they
could live as soft and as indolent a life as their habitat allowed; and
upon the mountain to which he had led them, life was soft indeed.

Torka eyed them with contempt, knowing all too well that there was not a
man among them who would hesitate to drive a spear through his heart if
Galeena asked it. So, although he would have liked to strike the headman
down for the words he had spoken so callously against Karana, he said
quietly: "Among Torka's people, it is not considered a good thing to
abandon the dead before they are dead. The Little Lame One survived
alone for many moons upon the tundra. His courage led him to this
mountain and to this cave. He is still alive. In the warm new garments
that Lonit has made for him, he will curl up like a fox against the
wind, with his back to the storm. He will survive. Torka will find him.
Torka will ask none of Galeena's men to risk themselves."

Tomorrow came. The storm intensified into a driving blizzard that shook
the very foundations of the world. Although Manaak said that he was
ready to accompany Torka on another search for Karana despite the
weather, Torka had only to look at the bereft expressions upon Lonit's
and lana's faces to know that he dared not venture out this day. In
frustration, feeling that he had to do something, he kindled a signal
fire and hunkered down beside it.

Ninip sauntered near. "Little Lame One is dead! Not even the beasts that
gnaw his bones could see Torka's fire through this storm!"

Torka slapped out at him, missing but driving him off. The boy laughed
belligerently. Torka ignored him and continued to nurture his fire,
sheltering it from the wind, hoping against hope that somehow Karana was
alive, that he could see the beacon and know that there were those upon
the mountain who longed for his return.

Hours passed. The storm raged on. Umak phrased an endless litany of
chants, imploring the spirits of the wind and weather to turn away from
this part of the world so that one small boy might be able to find his
way home again; but the spirits that had obeyed his command on the night
of the musk-ox hunt did not heed him now.

The storm grew worse. Torka continued to feed his little fire as day
became dark and Umak's chants droned on. Exhausted, drained by the
energy that it took to keep his hope alive, he stared out across the
storm-riven world and thought of the tales that Galeena had told of
other bands, of strange lands, of the Corridor of Storms, and of vast,
rive ring herds of game moving back and forth across the world,
vanishing at summer's end, then returning out of the eternal night at
the ending of the time of the long dark.

Where did they go in that time when the darkness swallowed them? Why did
they go? What force impelled them to begin to leave the tundra even
before the first gauzing of frost turned the grasses brittle and caused
the willow to turn gold? Did the spirits gift them with some secret that
was withheld from Man? Did they journey to some far and shimmering plain
beyond that place of horrors that Galeena called the Corridor of Storms?
Did the sun hide there, warming that far and unknown land and bathing
the herds in its precious, life-sustaining light while Torka's world lay
cold and dark beneath the storms of the time of the long dark?

And where was Karana now? Was he following the herds, trekking ever
eastward in search of his people? Would he find the father whose love
meant so much to him that he would not admit that the man had abandoned
him? Was he, even now, looking back toward the mountain, hating Torka
for having shamed him before Galeena's band? Or was he dead, in the
belly of a beast, as Galeena claimed? Was he lying frozen and alone,
perhaps, a tiny, forsaken figure looking at the sky forever?

The thought was unbearable. Torka's face was drawn with fatigue when he
looked up, startled by Galeena. The headman had come to stand beside
him. He was looking down, shaking his head.

"Torka must forget the scrawny one. This fiah, it is waste of fuel.
Little Lame One has chosen his path. The way was clear to him. Galeena
says that he made the brave choice, asking no man's pity, wanting no
wuhman's tears. Now that he is dead, Torka must admit that it is good
thing."

Torka's eyes were as cold as the storm. "When Torka with his own two
hands has placed the bones of Karana to look at the sky, then and only
then will Torka admit that Karana is dead. And even then, Torka will not
forget one who was as a son to him. And never will Torka say that the
death of a child is a good thing!"

All that night the storm raged, and while her man slept, Lonit kept the
beacon fire burning. When he awoke, she spoke no words that might cause
him pain. She brought food to him and dragged her sleeping skins close
to his side so that she might keep the vigil with him. Sometime before
dawn, she fell into a deep, troubled sleep. She dreamed of wild dogs
running out across a world of white. Land, mountain, and sky, all were
as white as bones. She awoke with a start.

Torka was gone. Like Karana who had vanished before him, he had gone in
stealth. His heaviest, multilayered winter clothing was gone, and he had
taken enough food from their provisions to sustain him on a long
journey.

"He has been gone for much time," lana told her, coming close to offer
comfort.

"Why didn't you wake me? Why hasn't someone gone after him!"

"Too much snow. Too much wind," explained Manaak, obviously upset. "If
he had told this man that he was going, Manaak would have gone with him.
Togetheh we might have--"

"Joined the lame one in the world of spirits!" interrupted Galeena. He
came close to Lonit as she stood before her fire circle. He put a heavy
hand upon her shoulder and smiled down at her; the smile was a leer.
"Forget Torka. No man of this band will follow that one into this storm.
Torka not come back. Lonit not worry. Galeena always care for wuhmen."
His hand curled around her shoulder.

She twisted away and shrank back from him. "Torka will come back!"

"Snow has buried his tracks," informed Ninip, slurring his words
vindictively as he grinned at Lonit's misery. "No man could find him in
this storm! No man would risk himself for a hunt eh so weak in his head
that he throws away his life for a cripple!"

"Karana is not a cripple!" Lonit would have slapped him had he been
within striking distance. "And Torka is not weak! Would your father not
search for you if you were lost in a storm?"

The question caused the boy's wide, dirty face to flame and twitch. The
members of his band laughed as Galeena replied: "Not for Boy Who Falls
On Face Before Oxen would this man put himself at risk in any weatheh!"

For another day and night the storm blew and howled and spat snow at the
world. As in Lonit's dream, the land, mountain, and sky all turned
white, part of a freezing, tattered cloud scape into which no man who
wished to live to see another day would have set himself.

And then, seemingly in a moment, the storm was over, and the sky
cleared. The tundra lay white and still, buried beneath the frozen
rubble of the storm. A cold sun shone, all warmth bled out of it, as all
youth seemed to have been bled out of Umak. The once-proud spirit master
stood on the ledge, in his bearskin robe, with the head of the beast
balanced atop his own .. . but the skin was only a skin, and the head
was only a skull, and within his own body, he felt like an old man
again. For nearly a week the storm had raged, and for all that time,
Umak had raged back at it.

Why had the sky spirits ignored him? He had made such a show of his
magic. The people of Galeena's band would not have been surprised if he
had flown off into the storm like some sort of a miraculous bear-bird
that was fully capable of ripping the power from the heart of the storm,
of plucking up both Karana and Torka with taloned feet and returning
them both safely to the mountain.

He had been enchanted by his own spells. For a moment, when the boy had
first disappeared, when Umak had first taken his place upon the ledge
and spread his feathered arms up and out, he had almost believed that he
could fly!

Not until Torka had descended the wall had he been confronted by the
truth. He had wanted to go, to lead his grandson boldly down from the
heights in search of Karana. He had frozen where he stood, an old man in
a bearskin robe, with a stiff leg and an absolute terror of the
ice-sheathed wall that he had known he could not hope to conquer.

So he had folded his legs, not like a bear but like a camel, and wrapped
his body in the skin of the great short-faced bear. He had hidden within
it for days, pretending to be what he knew he was not. He was glad for
the bearskin; it made him seem large while, in truth, he felt very
small.

Gradually, the members of the band began to doubt him. Oklahnoo watched
him with a jaundiced eye. Her sister, a kinder soul--or perhaps simply
protective of her man and the child that she carried--continued to bring
him food.

"Umak is spirit mast eh she assured him. "Umak's magic is strong. It is
slow this time, that is all. This wuhman say, chant hard."

He was grateful for her encouragement. It helped to cut the sting of the
slurs that he overheard the other women make. They were careful not to
speak too loudly, just in case they were mistaken; but it was there, all
the same. Deep within that part of himself where self-confidence was
born, there was an expanding emptiness, where guilt had begun to take
root.

Why had Karana left the cave? Because an old man had been so taken with
himself that he had ceased to care about one small boy?

Umak shuddered in almost overwhelming remorse. Where was Torka? He had
risked his life to go in search of Karana because a spirit master's
powers had failed to bring him home. Now the storm into which he had
gone was over. Why had he not returned? "Please, Spirit Master, you must
not stop your chanting!"

He looked down, his attention drawn by Lonit.

"The spirits of the mountain, of the wind and storm, they will listen to
your words! They have always listened to Umak!"

The girl's expression of faith touched him but did little to restore his
own faith in himself. He felt old and stiff-bodied.

"This spirit master, he is tired," he admitted to Lonit.

Lonit sat beside him. "Torka must be tired. Karana, too." She sighed and
laid her head against his arm as though she were a child. They sat
together in silence, looking across the miles, their faces illuminated
but not warmed by the cold, late-autumn sun. Softly, Lonit spoke of the
past: about the long, bitter way that they had traveled together since
the Destroyer had come and gone from their lives; how an old man who had
walked the wind had brought Torka and a frightened girl to a new life;
how he had willed the desire to live into her; how he had stood against
foxes and wolves and storms; and how always the spirits had listened
when he spoke.

"They will listen now," she whispered, her eyes brimming as she looked
up at him. "For Torka, for Karana, and for Lonit, they must listen. If
Torka does not return, Galeena will take this woman to his fire circle.
He will kick her until Torka's baby dies. Then Torka will be truly dead.
Forever. And Galeena will be glad."

He was so appalled by her statement that, for a moment, he could not
speak. Then he stammered: "Why would Galeena kill Torka's baby? These
are not starving times."

"Ai has said that it is his way."

"Hrmmph! Not as long as Umak is spirit master!" He rose and readjusted
the weight of the bearskin upon his bony frame and began to chant again.
His voice was a rasping vibrato that did not quite rise above the
occasional deep, barely audible reverberations that emanated from the
heart of the mountain, but it was stronger than it had been for hours.

Lonit brought food to him. He did not eat. She brought him water. This
he sipped, to moisten his throat so that it would not fail him.

At dusk, a rockfall clattered down from the heights. From his place upon
the ledge, Umak observed it out of fatigue reddened eyes as it fell
along the precipice to the left of the cornice. There was ice in it, and
large discolored wedges of snow pebbled with detritus that must have
broken loose from beneath the under layering of the summit ice pack. It
was one of countless such slides that he had witnessed since first
coming to dwell upon the mountain; yet there seemed to be something
different about it. So much snow. So much detritus. Perhaps it was only
the failing light. He could not be sure, nor did he care. He had more
important things to occupy his thoughts at the moment.

It seemed that the spirits were not deaf to his invocations after all.
His heart soared, for Torka was coming toward the mountain, and Karana
walked beside him.

Exhausted by their ordeal, Torka and Karana slept for a day and a night.
The boy curled within the fold of Torka's arm, close to Lonit's fire
circle. In the predawn darkness of the second day, Karana awoke and
looked at Lonit as she began the preparations for the first meal of the
day.

"He came for me.. .." he whispered wonderingly. "He told me that he
followed the tracks of wild dogs deep into the heart of the storm. He
risked his life ... for one small boy."

She shook her head, and when she spoke, her words held a gentle and
loving admonition. "Of course! What did you expect? He is Torka! Torka
would never abandon one of his own!"

The last of the migratory waterfowl that had survived the storm were
gone from the tundra. The great herds had vanished into the setting sun.
In the last days of light, game was growing scarce, but Galeena's people
were not concerned. The men of the band hunted with abandon. Although
they had already seriously depleted the provisions that they had piled
at the back of the cave, they gorged themselves on their fresh kills and
left little to be put aside for the long, lean days of darkness that
were soon to come.

The women had lost their earlier minimal enthusiasm for work. Most of
them were pregnant now, and Lonit found herself observing them with
increasing concern. They were growing as fat as bears preparing for
hibernation. Lazy, sloppy bears. She wrinkled her nose in disgust at the
foul smells that had begun to emanate from their carelessly prepared
winter stores. In the relatively warm, wind-protected confines of the
cave, improperly dried berries were mildewing, and green moss was
furring their supplies of meat. When she spoke of her concern, even lana
was surprised. The sad-eyed woman informed her that mildew added a
special tang to berries, and nothing was tastier or more tender than
meat rimed with green mold.

"Yes," she agreed. "This is so. But it is too early in the season for
the mold to be so advanced. It will eat the meat before we do! And the
mildew is so thick on the berries that soon they will not be berries at
all but gray little clumps of fuzz not fit for eating." "Everything is
fit for eating," said Oklahnoo, overhearing.

The others agreed.

Lonit shook her head. "It will be so in this camp! If Galeena's women
are not more careful, we will all be reduced to chewing hides long
before the sun returns at the end of the time of the long dark!"

They did not take kindly to her criticism. Naknaktup told her that her
pregnancy was making her as fussy as an old woman, and Weelup added that
fussy women, old or otherwise, were not welcome in Galeena's band.

"Torka's wuhman is just like her man," Ai sneered imperiously. "Always
she thinks her ways are best! But where are the people who taught her?
They walk the wind while Galeena's band grows strong and fat in this
khamp."

Again the others agreed and added that although Torka was a man who was
good to look at, he was always too busy--hunting, working his weapons,
teaching the little lame one new ways to hunt, even though this was
clearly a waste of time. Weelup said that Galeena had told her that the
other men had complained that sometimes just watching Torka made them
tired, and the headman still resented the way he had ignored his wishes
and gone off in pursuit of a child who was better off dead.

"Karana is no longer lame," Lonit corrected her emphatically. "He walks
with a slight limp, but he can climb the wall as well as any man, and
better than most of the boys. Sometimes this woman thinks that he looks
like a little sheep, scampering up and down, as surefooted as a
half-grown ram."

"Maybe we will eat him in the dark time winter," suggested Ai.

The others laughed. All except lana. She was looking pale and wan these
days; the other women were certain that her baby could come at any time.
It was rare for Lonit to speak out in anger, but she did so now,
directly to Ai. "In starving times, this woman will see you on a spit
before she will stand by and allow harm to come to Karana!"

The other women murmured in startled amazement.

Ai smirked loftily. "There will be no starving times. Galeena says that
never again will his band wander the winter dark in search of food. Food
will come to us in the dark times. Galeena has watched. Galeena has seen
how the mountain breaks the back of the tundra wind. On one side after a
storm, much snow. On other side, little snow. While the great herds
follow the setting sun over the edge of the world, other animals stay.
They browse and keep themselves fat for the spears of Galeena's hunters.
All through dark times, they will eat. All through dark times, Galeena's
people will eat them. So this wuhman says: Only stupid Lonit worries
about meat spoiling. Galeena says, when it is gone, there will be more.
Galeena says, in this c amp, his people will never go hungry! And Ai
says to Torka's wuhman, threaten me again, and all of your Dog People
will be sorry!"

Lonit stared, aghast, not at the threat, but at Ai's careless and
utterly disrespectful attitude toward the unpredictable and all powerful
forces of Creation. Ai's words had flown in the face of the spirits of
the game and defied the powers of the starving moon.

"Beware, woman of Galeena. The spirits grow angry with those who assume
too much," warned Lonit, and from that moment on her world was filled
with shadows that had nothing to do with the ever-shortening days. No
matter what Galeena might say, or how Ai might unquestioningly echo him,
the starving moon would rise. And once it stood high in the great, black
sky, it might not set again until all of the people who dwelled upon the
mountain were dead, as punishment for the arrogance of their headman and
his woman Ai.

On the far southwestern horizon, a plume of volcanic smoke rose from one
of the tangled, snow-mantled peaks that, in daylight, appeared to be
holding up the sky. But since it rose during the night, the plume went
unseen.

Beneath Torka's sleeping skins, the mountain dropped and rose so subtly
that its movement merely caused him to sigh and draw Lonit a little
closer. When the roaring of the distant eruption reached his ears, it
was so muted by distance, it seemed to be no more than a slight rising
of the wind. But high above, on the glacier that smothered the summit of
their mountain, the mile-long crevasse that had opened on the day that
Umak had killed the moose now gaped wide.

Upon the tundra, small animals felt tremors deep within the permafrost
and scampered out of burrows and hiding places. Birds took flight,
winging across the full face of the moon. Wolves and dogs made low,
confused howls and yaps. Game animals huffed and circled restlessly as,
miles away, a herd of mammoths trumpeted its uncertainty to the night.
And from a distant, sprawling passageway that cut a swath of open
grazing land between two continental ice sheets, an answering trumpet
came, high and shrill--unmistakable to any man or beast that had heard
it before.

It was that sound that woke the people on the mountain and had them on
their feet, listening in terror.

Chunks of ice fell from above; then all was quiet. The people looked out
across the blue, moonlit world, and Naknaktup pressed close to Umak,
asking the spirit master what had disturbed the night.

Wind spirits, thought Lonit, for the quiet was absolute except for the
soft whispering of the wind against the mountain.

Umak felt the wind against his face. It was cold, a winter wind that
made his bones ache. His breath congealed into clouds before his eyes,
veiling the banking flight of the birds that were returning to the earth
like falling leaves.

The silence thickened and expanded, then entered the cave and pulsed
within it. There was not a man or woman or boy who was not steeped in
the terror of his or her own private fears--including the spirit master.

Umak remembered Karana's words of warning: We must go from this place.
It is a bad encampment. We must go, or we will stay here forever.

Yet he knew that to go from the high, sheltering safety of the mountain
into the savage, unknown distances of tundra that were now under the
first shadows of the time of the long dark would mean certain death .. .
not for the entire band, but certainly for an old man with aching bones
and an aging matron swollen with child. Umak had walked the wind once.
He was not ready to do so again. He wanted to live long enough to see
himself reborn through Naknaktup and also through Lonit; for the life
that would come into the world through her also would be Torka's. A
third generation of spirit masters, an unbroken line into the future
born from the loins of one old man. The thought was so heady that it
actually warmed him until the dark cloud of Manaak's words drew the old
man back to the moment.

"It is Big Spirit that walks the night. It is that great ghost that
makes the mountain tremble and the beasts cry out in fear. It has
followed us, as Manaak has always said it would. Now we must hunt it!
Now we must kill it before it kills us all!" The women broke into an
anguished keening. The hunters grumbled and looked anxiously at one
another. Galeena was clearly angry.

"This man heahs no beasts!" the headman said, gesturing outward into the
night. "This man heahs no ghosts! What disturbed the night is gone now.
Galeena is sick of Manaak always talking about Big Spirit. Galeena says
that if Manaak ever sees that great ghost, he is free to hunt it alone.
As for Galeena, he has found a safe khamp for his people. What shook the
world is silent now. It will not come to this place."

"No man may say what the spirits will do," said Umak.

Galeena faced him furiously. "That spirit walks in the skin of a
mammoth. Mammoths do not climb mountains. And Galeena does not hunt
mammoths unless they are safely mired in bogs!"

"That could be arranged," suggested Torka. "With enough men working
together, we could track it down, discover where it is browsing, and
lure it into a trap we devise."

The excitement in his voice did nothing to ignite anything but alarm in
the other hunters. Only Manaak was inflamed by it.

"It would be a good thing. Those who walk the tundra would foreveh sing
praises to those who killed Big Spirit!"

"Men cannot kill spirits," said Umak, waving a warning hand at Manaak to
silence him. "Men make praise songs to appease their anger. Men walk
lightly in the spirits' shadows and make the songs that will cause the
shadows to fall upon other parts of the world."

"So that other men may be killed?" Torka's question was sharply edged;
he had heard the uncharacteristic chord of expedience in Umak's voice.
It both angered and startled him. Karana was right: Umak had changed
since he had become spirit master of Galeena's band.

"Galeena does not care about othehs!" said the headman, and when his
hunters all sighed with relief and murmured in agreement, he flashed his
wide, gap-toothed grin and slapped Umak upon the back with approving
familiarity. "Wise men will listen to their spirit mast eh Wise men will
make the songs that will keep Big Spirit fah away, walking its own part
of the world!"

"Make all the songs you will," said Torka grimly. "This man has dipped
his spear into the blood and flesh of Big Spirit. If that one walks into
our world, it will take more than songs to drive it away." Galeena eyed
him with dislike. "Torka always knows everything.

He is not the only man to have faced the great ghost! Torka and Manaak
want to fight Big Spirit, you make spears. Many spears. Strong spears.
Sharp spears. If Big Spirit comes, Galeena will let you kill him. // you
can. But now, Galeena says listen to the night: It is silent. Big Spirit
walk anotheh part of the world. If you wish to follow, Galeena says go!
He will not stop you. But as for this man and his huntehs, we hunt meat,
not spirits. We will stay here. Foreveh!"

On the far horizon, the volcano returned to sleep, as did the people of
Galeena's band. The night passed in silence, except for the whispering
of the wind and the deep, somnolent murmurings of the summit ice pack.
Toward dawn, Manaak came to Torka's fire circle.

"This man goes now to hunt Big Spirit," he whispered, prodding Torka
with a gloved hand. "Does he go alone, or does Torka come with him?"

Torka backhanded sleep from his eyes. He looked up to see that Manaak
was dressed for traveling and hunting: His spears were thrust through
his pack, his snare lines were looped around one shoulder, and over the
other hung his game bag with its extra supplies of projectile points and
tools for knapping, butchering, and other assorted uses. Torka frowned
as he propped himself onto an elbow. He replied softly so that he would
not disturb Lonit or Karana, who slept on either side of him. "Unlike
Manaak, Torka does not feel alone in the world. Unlike Manaak, Torka
could not leave this camp without looking back. Unlike Manaak, although
Torka would risk himself if he thought that he had a chance of killing
Big Spirit, Torka will not abandon his woman because Galeena has goaded
him into pursuing his own death."

Manaak hissed in anger. Torka's sarcasm had cut clean through to the
bone of truth. The scar-faced hunter thought of his woman as he exhaled
his frustration. "Big Spirit is out theh. Someday it will come. Someday,
for the sake of our wuhmen, we are going to have to face it."

"Someday. Not now. Who will hunt for our women in the dark time of the
starving moon if we do not return? They are both big with child. It is
for them that we must stay. Torka has been thinking much about it. We
will do as Galeena suggests: We will prepare our weapons and make many
strong, sharp spears--enough for every man in the band. If Big Spirit
comes to browse below our camp, we will have the advantage. This man
does not think much of Galeena's ways, but he is right when he says that
mammoths cannot climb mountains. Do not be so eager to die, my friend.
We cannot be certain that it was the voice of Big Spirit that we heard.
Be glad that the great ghost walks far away, in another part of the
world, and know that if it does come to us, we will be ready for it."

Manaak was not a man easily swerved from his course once he had
committed himself to it; nevertheless, Torka's words made sense.
Disgruntled and not fully mollified, he went back to his own fire
circle.

Torka lay awake, envisioning how it would be if the great mammoth did
come. The men of Galeena's band would stand together in a line along the
Up of the cornice. They would hurl spear after spear down at the beast.
They would create a rain of death, and the beast whom Galeena's people
called Big Spirit would flee or die.

It seemed so easy .. . too easy. He was aware of the wind and of the
sound of something moving, shifting deep within the core of the
mountain. It was a familiar sound, but had it always been so constant?
So like a heart beating a rhythmically

"Listen. The mountain is alive. Once it was a friend. Now it warns us
away."

Karana's voice had been no louder than a sigh, yet Torka was startled by
it. The moon had set hours ago, but starlight illuminated the boy's
face. Torka saw the worry in his eyes. "Away?" he asked the boy. "Into
the time of the long dark? One hunter, a boy, a woman with child, and an
old man? How long would we survive?"

"Umak is spirit master! His magic would make us strong!"

"Umak is happy in this camp. He would not leave it."

"Then we must go without him."

"Never. Torka would not abandon you, Little Hunter. Would you ask him to
abandon the father of his father, to walk away from one who saved his
life, and Lonit's, and Karana's?"

The boy chewed his lower lip for a moment before he replied. "Spirit
master no longer cares for anyone but himself. But Manaak and his woman
would come with us. We would be a band. Karana may be little, but he is
a hunter! And Torka is the best hunter of all! Torka found Karana in the
great storm. Only the cleverest of trackers could have done that!"

"Cleverer trackers were after you--a pack of dogs--and from the way they
were running, it was obvious that they were on the scent of prey. This
man made a guess that you were that prey. It was fortunate for Karana
that something drew them off so that Torka found you before they did."

"If Brother Dog was with them, Karana would have come to no harm."

"Do you still think of that one? Forget him. Aar has found a pack of his
own by now, and if that was the pack that trailed you, do not doubt for
a moment that Brother Dog would have joined the others in their kill.
Men and beasts cannot be brothers, Karana."

"Hmmph!" exhaled the child in an excellent imitation of Umak. "Torka's
people live with Galeena's band!"

Torka laughed at the comparison and shook his head sagely. "For now,
yes, because it must be so. But with the exception of Manaak, there is
not one among them whom Torka would call brother."

The mountain was silent. Dawn yielded to a cold, bright day of absolute
perfection. The animals of the tundra grazed and hunted. No mammoths
were heard, and the strange restlessness of the previous night seemed
like a half-remembered dream. The people were reluctant to leave the
cave but could not quite understand why. Umak made special chants of
propitiation to the spirits of the sky and mountain. As though summoned
by his song, a huge tera torn with vult urine wings swept the sky, and a
small family of delicately boned steppe antelope ventured from the
willow scrub to graze close to the base of the mountain. The fears of
the previous night forgotten, Galeena and his hunters went down from the
mountain, and as Torka stood back in revulsion, they killed the entire
little herd.

It was nearly dark by the time they returned to the cave. As was their
way, they settled in to spend the night feasting as though there were no
tomorrow. Sated by their gluttony, they slept for all of the next day
and night and lounged in contented indolence for two days more.

Motivated by boredom and the desire to indulge themselves in the savory
flesh of fresh-killed lamb, they left the ledge to track an elusive
flock of Dall sheep into the shadowy heights of the narrow canyon where
Umak had killed the moose and the great short-faced bear. The sheep were
fleet and agile. They leaped and bounded upward along the walls of the
chasm as easily as cloud shadows. Excited by the chase, the hunters
pursued them even though the confines of the canyon were intimidating to
those who were used to hunting upon the broad, open miles of the tundra.
Galeena led them into the heights, and the boys scattered through the
frostbrittled scrub and dark groves of stunted spruce, sending ptarmigan
and hares racing for better cover.

Torka watched them and wondered if they were very brave or very stupid.
Perhaps in people as unimaginative as Galeena's band, the latter induced
the former. He told Karana to stay close and to keep his spears at the
ready. The same thick, high ground cover that had hidden the great short
faced bear could be hiding equal dangers.

Despite a slight limp, the boy kept up with him. His leg was strong
again, and although the other boys taunted him for his stiff gait, Torka
noted that Karana refused to rise to their baiting. He demonstrated his
mettle by going anywhere that they dared to go, by never complaining or
asking that any exception be made for him. The leg had to pain him at
times, but if it did, he never spoke of it; only an occasional tension
at the corners of his lips betrayed the extent of his effort.

They continued on until a projecting, down-thrusting lobe of the summit
glacier blocked their passage. Further penetration into the canyon was
impossible unless they ascended the ice. The sheep skittered up ahead,
their small, sharp hooves cutting into the snow, sending fragments of it
exploding outward as they raced for their lives. Galeena's well-thrown
spear took an adolescent ewe through the neck. Manaak's weapon flew to
embed itself in the haunch of a ram. Several animals stumbled and rose
to run on, half of them with spears protruding from various portions of
their bodies. Others fell, their white coats red with spattered blood,
their bleats drowned by the howling of Galeena's hunters.

Torka told Karana to go forward and make a kill if he wished. The boy
was off in an instant. Torka did not move. He stood transfixed,
momentarily disoriented. The glacier ... it had not been there
before--he was certain of it. He eyed the soaring, dirty-faced mass of
ice that blocked the way before him. Several spruce trees lay broken and
half-buried in a rubble heap of rock-hard boulders of snow, which the
boys and hunters of Galeena's band were scrambling over as they climbed
to retrieve their kills. Those trees had been erect when Torka had last
seen them; they had composed the little grove in which Umak killed the
moose. Now, as he studied the now and ice in which the trees lay all but
totally buried, he realized that he was not looking at a glacier but at
the accumulated debris that had been falling away from the underlayer of
the summit ice pack ever since he had led the others to the mountain.

Manaak came toward him, carrying his ram slung over his shoulders. He
was curious as to why Torka was not participating in the hunt. When
Torka shared his thoughts, Manaak shrugged and told him that it was the
same everywhere. "Old men in far khamps they say that ice spirits grow
strong. Ice spirits fall from sky. They coveh the earth. Stay on
mountains. Not melt. This mass of ice, it will grow in the dark time
winteh. In shady canyon like this, even in summeh, not all of it will
melt. Next dark time, it will grow again. It will fill the canyon, grow
so high it will join with the main summit glacier. In the next time of
light, it will begin to walk out of the canyon, grinding all before it.
This man has walked fah and hunted many game trails. In the fah
mountains, whole passes are disappearing under ice that walks. In many
places, game must find new ways to come through the mountains to the
land of good grass."

Torka understood at last why his people had waited in vain for the
caribou to return along their usual route of migration. "From where do
the herds come, Manaak? Have you traveled there, into the face of the
rising sun?"

"No man may do that. The herds come from out of the rising sun, through
the Corridor of Storms, from oveh the edge of the world where no man may
follow."

"I wonder...." Torka's musing was curtailed before it was fully begun. A
terrible high, raking screech reverberated through the canyon. It was
followed by the pain-filled screams of a boy and by the shouts and
curses of men.

The lion-size jumping cat had been feeding off the carcass of the camel
that it had killed several nights before. The cat was old, with a
partially joined spinal column, and an arthritic hip. Its limbs were
short, giving it hyena like proportions, as though the bodies of two
distinctly different types of animals had been joined by mistake. This
cat was no swift-footed predator of the open tundra; this cat was
designed to spring. Its brain was small. Its disposition was surly. In
its waning years it had become a particularly nasty and unpredictable
aggressor. When Ninip and the other boys accidentally flushed it from
its cover, it sprang for a quick retreat up the face of the icefall; but
its hip hurt enough to make an upward vault too painful to consider.
With its short, lynx like tail twitching, it wheeled and spat, swiping
out at the boys and hissing as it displayed the two fangs that would
someday win others of its species the name saber-toothed.

This cat, a prowler, a lurker, and leaper, was always ready to hurl
itself upon dull-witted prey that happened to browse too close to where
it lay waiting to pounce. And pounce it did, leaping at the boys who
shouted and stamped and menaced it with the few spears that they had not
thrown after the fleeing sheep. With all of its power projected into its
spring, the lion-size cat was a blur of long, tawny fur. Its lower jaw
appeared to have unhinged itself as it flapped back against its throat.
Its mouth gaped impossibly wide, allowing its fangs, which were half as
long as the forearm of a man, to project forward.

Ninip was its target, but the boy sidestepped just in time, pulling his
nearest companion into the way of the cat. When the animal hit the boy,
its canines plunged straight through his thorax. He went down hard, with
the cat on top of him. One of the animal's fang tips cracked against a
rock that lay beneath the boy's punctured back. The cat yowled against
the pain of a shattered nerve, drew out its teeth, and stabbed its
victim again and again, all the while scratching and tearing at the
boy's midsection until its paws and body were red and fouled with the
color and stench of its victim's disembowelment.

The boy was not dead. He could make no sound, but his hands spasmed at
his sides and his limbs jerked convulsively. The cat was eating him
alive. Karana threw his spear. All the other boys had fled, and the men
of Galeena's band were watching. Why they were making no move to come to
the fallen boy's aid, there was no time to guess. In his excitement,
Karana had thrown one spear short of his target; but he still had
another, his best one, the spear that Torka had made for him. His small
hand curled around the haft, balancing it lightly. From the corner of
his eye, he saw Ninip glowering at him.

Karana advanced slowly, spear arm bent, the weapon levering for just the
perfect balance as he made ready to throw. He was aware of Torka and
Manaak running toward him, their spears at the ready. Torka held his
whalebone bludgeon in his left hand. Karana drew in a breath of resolve
and aimed. He wanted to make the killing throw. Then all men would call
him Lion Killer instead of Little Lame One. Torka would be proud. And
Ninip would never have cause to mock him again.

Watching Karana, Ninip knew his intent. He was suddenly furious. How
dare the little lame one stand up to the marauding cat as though he were
the bravest boy in the world? He would never be able to live down the
ridicule of his companions or the disgust of his father if he stood by
in fear of the great cat while puny Karana made an attempt to kill it.
Galeena still held him in contempt for having stumbled before the
charging ox. Ninip would never win his respect if Karana made this kill.

With a burst of energy that eclipsed his fear, Ninip raced to Karana's
side and snatched the spear from his hand just as the smaller boy was
about to release it. Caught off-balance by a violent elbow jab to his
side, Karana fell as Ninip gave out a loud, triumphant whoop. The spear
was light and long, much different in balance from the heavier,
thick-shafted weapons made by the hunters of his own band. He sought the
right position from which to make his killing throw, but his movement
had caught the attention of the cat.

It moved so quickly and unexpectedly that Ninip had no opportunity to
react. In one great leap it was on him, knocking him down. He fell on
his side with the spear still in his hand, uselessly pinned to the
ground by the downward pressure of his head against his forearm.
Instinct had caused him to curl into a fetal tuck, protecting his vital
organs from the ripping claws and stabbing fangs of the cat. With his
thick winter clothing his only protection against the predations of the
beast, he screamed out to his father to kill the cat before it tore him
to pieces.

High above the canyon, the giant condor that was often seen circling in
the sky flew across the face of the sun, drawn by the sounds of death
and killing. Its shadow distracted the cat, which looked up for an
instant, long enough for Ninip to see his father and the other hunters
standing immobile. Not one of them was even making an effort to lift a
spear. They were going to stand there and watch him die.

He could not have said when Torka's spear struck the cat. Manaak's
followed. The cat seemed to lift straight up off the ground, whirling
and backing away, making the deep, ugly rasping gargle that felines make
when they are cornered and in a rage. Ninip did not move, uncertain if
his limbs and arms were still connected to his body or if he was even
alive. Slowly Torka moved into his line of sight to stand between him
and the cat. Ninip's vision was blurred by blood--his or the cat's, he
could not be sure. Torka was making low, hostile me wings to the animal,
baiting it, calling it to him. He held his strange, knife-edged
whalebone club. Ninip felt faint, confused. Why was Torka putting
himself at risk for one who had never done anything to deserve his
concern?

As Ninip watched, Torka crouched. He gripped the narrow, sinew-wrapped
end of his weapon in both hands. He continued baiting the cat until,
with a shriek of rage, it hurled itself at him. He leaped aside with
supreme agility and grace, spinning around as he did so. The long, sharp
edge of his weapon severed the outreaching taloned paws of the cat. It
landed before it realized that its feet were missing. The stumps would
not support its weight. Screaming and stunned, it fell rump over head as
Torka closed on it to smash its skull with three brutal downward strokes
of his bludgeon.

Like the boy whom it had disemboweled, the saber toothed cat died
slowly.

If Galeena had had his way, Ninip would have been left behind to die
beside the mutilated body of the disemboweled boy. The headman was
openly angered by Torka's killing of the cat.

"Again Torka risks his life to save a useless one! Did Torka expect
othehs to join him in his risk? No. A band needs men, huntehs, not
clumsy boys!"

The other hunters all spoke in agreement. They resented Torka's display
of bravery, which had shown them a standard by which they had no wish to
be measured.

Torka looked incredulously at Galeena. "Ninip is your son."

"Bah! What is son? This man has had many sons before. Will have sons
again."

It was difficult for Torka to comprehend the extent of his callousness.
"The spirits have been generous to Galeena. The cat broke a tooth while
attacking the other boy. It must have been in pain, so it did not stab
Ninip. He is badly scratched and bruised, but with care, he will be
healed soon enough."

"You saved him, you heal him! Galeena will not claim that clumsy one as
his own!"

The ice that formed on the ponds was bottom deep now and would not melt
until spring. Daylight was little more than a brief blue haze. While the
cold, dry wind blew hard out of the northwest, lana went into labor
twice, but both episodes stopped short of producing a child. Manaak was
restless. Umak made child-come-forth chants to no avail, and Ai smirked
behind his back and whispered to Galeena that the spirit master's magic
was certainly less than effective. The old man harrumphed and said that
lana's child would not be born until its spirit was ready; Oklahnoo eyed
him skeptically while Naknaktup pointed to Ninip and boasted that the
boy was alive only because of her man's healing magic.

For Umak's sake, Torka did not argue with her. Ninip was recovering,
albeit slowly. The incident with the cat had changed him. His
combativeness and arrogance had bled out of him. Black and blue, sore
and sutured, he sat in passive dejection beside Torka's fire circle.
Although Torka had once detested the boy for the way he had treated
Karana, now Torka worried about him. Ninip would not eat unless food was
forced upon him. He would not speak unless spoken to, and then his
replies were limited to grunts and mumbles. His onetime companions
wanted no part of him except to taunt and mock him as cruelly as he had
once taunted Karana. His bright, ferretlike eyes had gone blank. He
seemed to have lost the will to live.

Karana gloated. He was openly resentful of Ninip's newfound place beside
Torka's fire circle. He was glad that the other boys had turned on their
former leader. He found it infinitely satisfying to know that he was no
longer the sole object of their animalistic pranks and derision. As for
Torka, a strangely disturbing malaise had settled upon him since his
killing of the cat. Sometimes, as he would work upon his weapons, he
would find himself looking at Ninip, wondering if he had done the right
thing. The headman had not put his own life in jeopardy, even for his
own son, because he had others to consider--his women, his band, and the
other boys. And Ninip was clumsy; he probably never would make much of a
hunter. Among Torka's people it had been considered a grievous affront
to the spirits of the game to squander meat upon anyone who might prove
a liability to the band. Why should it be different among Galcena's
band? In the depth of the time of the long dark, the lives of his
people, as well as those of Torka's little family, might depend upon the
food that he was now forcing upon Ninip. He sighed, dissatisfied with
the course of action to which he had so thoughtlessly committed himself.

With his back propped against the mountain wall and his buttocks
cushioned by the grass-stuffed pockets of furs that Lonit had stitched
to form a knapping pillow, he paused in his work. He had been reshaping
damaged projectile points with his fire-hardened antler hammer. Despite
the hide pad that kept the palm of his left hand from being accidentally
cut or bruised, his hand ached with fatigue. How many spearheads had he
braced against it while shaping them with his right hand? All that he
had set aside for redefinition. He was surprised. It did not seem that
much time had passed since he had first begun to work, but there they
were, arranged in a line beside his hammer stones and flakers.

He found himself wondering once again where the great herds of grazing
animals went in the last days of autumn before the world went cold and
the long, storm-driven time of the long dark began. From this aerie, he
often watched the sun rise and set in a pale, ever-diminishing arc that
was barely in the sky long enough to grant any warmth. Soon it would be
only the faintest glow on the southern horizon, and then it would be
gone completely. Where? he wondered. Where does it go? Could not men
follow it, tracking the great herds perpetually eastward to .. . what?

His thoughts paused in mid flow He had led his people to the mountain.
He had lighted the signal fire that had drawn Galeena's band across the
miles, and although the man was filthy and flatulent and full of his own
overinflated sense of self-worth, there was safety in numbers. With the
time of the long dark beginning to settle upon them, it eased Torka's
mind to know that Lonit and Karana and Umak were safe, sheltered within
the mountain like infants secure within their mother's womb. Danger lay
out there, on the open tundra, in the growing cold and dark where the
Destroyer walked, looking for men to kill.

The days that followed were intensely cold. The wind slid down off the
summit ice pack to mingle with the fierce, dry tides of air that blew
out of the vast distances of Asia and the far north.

Lonit spent most of her time with lana. When the sad eyed woman had
experienced the first of her unfruitful contractions, the other women
had drawn her away to the very back of the cave lest the spirits of her
suffering contaminate them all. There had been talk of sending her from
the ledge to wait out her travail in a pit hut at the base of the
mountain; but those women who were with child thought twice about this.
Although it was customary for women in labor to be kept apart, it was
one thing to have one's man erect a little birthing hut at the fringes
of an encampment, and another to be alone on the tundra while the rest
of the band was high above and far away. Umak said that in new times,
men and women must learn new ways. Everyone was relieved, and a grateful
lana was allowed to stay while Manaak went down from the mountain to
gather dry sedges and grasses and to cut sods from the tundra that would
be used to soften the floor of the cave upon which she would give birth.
He returned by way of the pulley, reporting that the permafrost was
growing thick; soon the land would be frozen rock hard.

Lonit was unable to understand the unwillingness of the other women to
sit with lana. With the exception of Naknaktup, who came occasionally to
lay a questing hand upon lana's belly and brow, they all appeared to be
totally unconcerned. When lana's pains began again, they and their men
kept far away from her.

Lonit took lana's dry, cold hands within her own warm palms and held
them tightly. "Lonit will stay. Lonit will help. Lonit will sing woman
songs for lana, but lana must tell Lonit how they go, because the women
of Lonit's band walked the spirit world before they could teach her."

"Songs? Among lana's people, theh are no songs for this." She gasped,
held her breath, and gritted her teeth until the wave of pain that
washed over her had ebbed away.

Lonit released her hands and stroked her brow. "Among Torka's people
there were many songs. Happy songs. Sad songs. Songs for every
happening. Especially for thisl Listen. Umak makes the child-come-forth
chant for you! It has great magic!"

"This woman's baby does not seem to heah it."

"Because the women do not sing their own songs. Always Lonit would hear
them when she was a little girl. This woman would listen and try to
imagine how it must be for the women within the birth hut. The hut was
always so far away that Lonit could not hear the words of the women, but
she could hear the rhythm of their song. It went like this."

She sang softly, searching for the right tone, for the perfect cadence.
She found both. Her voice was as sweet as clear water running over
smooth stones on a summer day. It seemed to cut the chill of the cave,
to bring the sun back into the sky.

Within the cave, everyone stopped what they were doing and turned to
look and listen. Torka's heart swelled with love and pride. The song was
no more beautiful than the woman who sang it.

lana sighed. She was soothed until the next contraction. Then she cried
out, gripping Lonit's hand so tightly that the younger woman winced but
made no move to pull away. lana was weak, exhausted, and beyond comfort.
"Go from this woman, Lonit. There is no help for this slow-to be-born
child. Birth is like death. It must be endured alone."

Lonit would not leave her. For what seemed endless hours, she stayed
with her friend and sang her sweet songs of life until she had no more
voice. Was it day or night, morning or afternoon? In the nearly
perpetual twilight of the beginning of the time of the long dark, it was
impossible to tell. The wind drove thick, storm-heavy clouds between the
earth and the sky. Darkness consumed the world. lana's moans and cries
went on and on. Umak did his best to continue chanting, but like
Lonit's, his voice was gone.

"Your magic is no good, old man," Ai openly derided him.

Hours passed. lana's ordeal continued. The people of the band began to
murmur about bad spirits. Weelup and Ai complained that they could not
sleep. A disconsolate Manaak defied the others of his gender by going to
his woman and cradling her in his arms. An equally disconsolate Lonit
wept when she saw the grief on his face and crept from lana's side to
seek solace in Torka's embrace.

It was Ai's incessant wheedling that finally drove Galeena to his feet.
Even when he picked up one of his spears his intent was not clear to
Torka, Umak, or Lonit; but Karana knew, and the members of Galeena's
band made sounds of approval.

He advanced purposefully, telling Manaak to step aside. "That woman's
noise making has gone on too long. It is not a good thing."

Manaak saw the spear poised in the headman's hand. He did not move. For
love of lana, he had forgone his need to track and kill the great
mammoth that had crushed the life from their tiny daughter. For love of
lana, so that she would be assured the protection of a band when the
birth of their third child became imminent, he had stayed with Galeena's
band. For love of lana, he had not slain the headman when he had forced
him to abandon his injured little son. And now, for love of lana, he
would fight Galeena to the death before he would stand aside and allow a
spear to be thrust into her.

Galeena did not misread the challenge or the hatred that he saw in
Manaak's eyes. Manaak had always been trouble. It would be good now to
put an end to him. He readied to thrust his spear.

But it was Manaak who thrust himself at Galeena. Younger, leaner, and
faster, Manaak sprang at the headman, who went down with a who of of
surprise and a curse of outrage. But he was strong, and anger made him
doubly powerful. He managed to free himself of Manaak's hold, and in a
moment both men were on their feet, glaring at one another.

Galeena called back over his shoulder, demanding that one of his hunters
silence Manaak's woman forever while he did the same to her man.

Torka did not remember getting to his feet; but he was standing with his
whalebone bludgeon in his hand as Lonit broke like a startled doe and
raced to lana's side. He called her back, but it was too late. Instinct
born of affection and loyalty to the only female friend she had ever had
in her life drove her to throw herself protectively across lana.

"Galeena is a hunter of game, not of women with babies in their belly!"
she cried, looking up at the headman with fire in her huge, round eyes.

The women cried out in dismay, amazed at her audacity. The men picked up
their spears and glared at her menacingly as they closed ranks around
their leader.

Galeena, comfortable with his armed hunters behind him, smiled his wide,
ugly, gap-toothed smile at Lonit. But it was not truly a smile; it was a
malicious leer of intimidation. "Long time back, this man warned Torka's
wuhman to remembeh who is headman of this band. Galeena thinks maybe she
will learn now. This man thinks, more than one baby in belly will not
live to take its first breath. if Lonit does not get out of Galeena's
way."

"And Galeena will not live to take another breath if he threatens
Torka's woman again!" said Torka, and suddenly Umak was beside him, a
spear in both hands, looking enormous in his bearskin; and beside him,
looking very small and very bold, was Karana, brandishing the spear that
he had retrieved from the body of the slain saber-toothed cat. Manaak
joined them, his face congested with fury.

"This was Torka's encampment before it was Galeena's!" snapped Karana.
"By right, Torka is headman here!"

The tuft of hair on the top of Galeena's head shook as his brows
expanded toward his temples. He laughed. "This man sees two huntehs, a
boy, and one spirit mast eh who has lost his powers! Galeena says that
by might this encampment belongs to whoever can hold it!"

His men, over a dozen strong, looked at one another, then grinned
malevolently at Torka as they shook their spears in his direction. Their
women set up a brief ululation in support of them.

"Strike them down," hissed Ai hungrily. "They have challenged Galeena
fah too often. It is a bad thing that they live. It will be good to see
them die. They will make meat for us in the dark time winteh."

Galeena appreciated her words. She reminded him of the leaping cat that
had disemboweled the boy and nearly eaten Ninip. If that boy's mother
had been more like Ai, he would never have turned her out into the
winter dark after she had completed suckling the boy. He would have kept
her for inspiration. Ai made him feel young and bold, but not quite bold
enough to ignore the expressions of resolve on the faces of his
adversaries. He and his hunters easily outnumbered them, but their
spears were sharp, and he had seen what Torka could do with his
bludgeon.

The wind was rising beyond the cave. Its sound distracted Galeena. Wild
dogs were howling in the distance, and their voices gave Galeena as much
inspiration as the cruel, vindictive advice of his younger woman. He
cocked his head. He would like to kill. He would like to see Torka and
Manaak and their allies dead and on his women's roasting spits; but
Galeena preferred confrontations to be weighted in his favor. If he
speared Torka's woman, he would be likely to be speared himself, and
there would be no pleasure in that.

So he said with cloying sweetness as he gestured broadly; "Why men fight
over wuhmen, uh? Torka, Manaak, and old man whose magic is as weak as
his old bones, you take your wuhmen, and your little lame boy. You go.
Now;." It will be good thing!"

The implication of his words was obvious. Nevertheless, it took his
hunters and their women a few moments to realize that Galeena was
condemning Torka and his people to certain death. He stood with his
spear poised to strike Lonit. His men adjusted their weapons so that, if
it came to a contest, there was no way that Torka and the others could
hope to come out of it alive. He laughed again. They laughed with him.

"Torka not happy? Manaak not happy?" he slashed them with the questions.
"Galeena is reasonable headman! He not keep people in band when they are
not content! So go! Take your wuhmen with babies in belly! Take your old
man who makes no magic! Take your lame little one! Go into the storms of
the time of the long dark. Galeena, he does not care what you do, or
where you go! Galeena will stay in this safe, high khamp foreveh!"

They could stand up to Galeena and die in the cave or take their chances
on the open tundra. The latter was their only option. Reluctantly, they
took it.

Manaak descended the wall first, to steady the guide ropes as first lana
and then Lonit were lowered in the sling. Umak followed after making the
appropriate curses upon Galeena. The headman and the people of the band
laughed at him. Ai squawked at him like a riled goose and told him to
save his magic and his curses; he would no doubt have need of both
before his spirit left his body to walk upon the wind of time of the
long dark.

He growled back at her and pulled his bearskin close. He would descend
the wall like a man, not like a pregnant female; but before he did, a
wailing Naknaktup begged to accompany him and would not be dissuaded,
although she keened as she was lowered from the ledge.

Torka stood alone, facing Galeena, asking to be allowed to take what was
his by right: the barest makings of a new life. "I ask you only for
those things that were mine before you came to this camp--a few skins,
the rib bones to make a sledge, the--"

"The dead have no rights in this khamp or any otheh. You go with what
you have on. This man gives you your life. Everything else, Galeena
takes as his own."

With the spears of every man of Galeena's band leveled at him, Torka
began his descent of the wall. Eager to join the others, he took hold of
the pulley ropes, inserted one foot into the sling, and began to lower
himself.

On the ledge, Galeena leered, and a laughing Ai took up a butchering
blade and begafTto saw away at the rope.

"Stop!" Ninip rose from where he had been sitting immobile beside
Torka's fire circle. He had been watching in silence as the man who had
saved his life had been degraded by his father. As he looked at his
father now, Ninip wondered dully why the affection and respect of such a
man had ever seemed so important. Beside Torka, Galeena cast a filthy,
twisted shadow. Although Ninip was stiff and sore, he stood tall and
straight as he shouted at Ai to leave the rope alone.

Everyone else yelled at her to keep on cutting. She looked toward
Galeena, awaiting his command. He told her to keep on with her work. She
made a little exhalation of pleasure and did as she was told.

This time, to the shock of everyone who watched, Ninip hurled himself at
her and knocked the blade from her hand. She fell in a heap as Galeena
cried out in outrage.

"Torka will die if she does not stop!" shouted the boy.

"That is the idea!" Galeena shouted back.

Halfway down the wall, Torka heard their words, jerked inward on the
rope to force it to swing back toward the wall. It was rimed with ice,
but he grabbed for a hold, found one, and kicked loose of the sling. He
clung off-balance for a moment before the hold ceased to be a hold.
Facing into the wall, he slid a good twenty feet before he managed to
stop his fall and cling tightly, breathing hard

Above him on the ledge, Ninip looked down and sighed with relief. "Torka
has saved this boy's life at the risk of his own. Ninip will follow
Torka now! Never again will this boy claim Galeena as his own!

The statement of intent and defiance was Ninip's last. Caleena threw his
spear with all of his power behind it. It drove straight through the
boy's back, into his heart, and stopped only when its bone head pierced
his chest. At Galeena's signal, his hunters followed suit. The force of
the many direct hits drove Ninip straight off the ledge.

Night had fallen. It wrapped the outcasts in a protective blanket of
darkness as they drew the spears from Nimihs broken body. In silence,
Manaak took the weapons, as Umak said that they would mean the
difference between life and death in the new life that they must now
face together Above them, Caleena and his people were howling as they
threw stones and refuse down from the ledge. One of the hunters took up
Torka's bludgeon, menaced them with it, and began to descend the wall by
way of the pulley. It was a mistake. Ai's dagger had done its work. The
rope broke the moment he trusted his weight to it. He fell like a rock
and landed like one.

Torka retrieved his bludgeon, then left the man moaning and twitching
where he lay. Torka lifted Ninip and held him in his arms as he led his
band of outcasts away from the mountain. As long as it was dark, Galeena
and his hunters would not follow. They would not put themselves at risk.
They would stay in their high, safe encampment, not even venturing from
the cave to bring the fallen hunter back up the wall so that he could
die in the arms of his woman, safe from night-stalking predators.

They came soon enough. Dire wolves. The man named them as he screamed
for Galeena to help him. He screamed for a long time. Neither Galeena
nor the wolves heeded him. Torka and his people heard him, and although
they walked on into the hostile night without looking back, they knew
that as long as the wolves fed upon him, their small band would be safe
from predators. They buried Ninip on the outwash plain, in a little
burrow that they dug and lined with evergreen branches of spruce. It was
a pungent, fragrant grave. They laid him down in it, and because it was
small, they curled him up like a fetus. Umak made songs of thanks to the
boy whose brave spirit had overcome its inherent nastiness and had,
through his gift of weapons, through the sacrifice of his death, given
them all a chance to live.

It was a solemn moment. Naknaktup wept in memory of the boy's mother who
had not been allowed to live past the days of his weaning, and Lonit was
filled with a terrible empathy for one who had known the pain of a
childhood devoid of love. Karana was troubled, sorry that he and Ninip
had not exchanged so much as a friendly look in all of the time that
they had lived together. They might have been friends ... in time. But
now there was no time. Ninip's life was over.

They piled many stones over the little grave so predators would not eat
his flesh or scatter his bones. Not one of them had ever buried another
human being. Always the bones were put out to look upon the sky forever;
but somehow, that did not seem right. On the tundra, the skin of the
land was too thin to allow for the digging of a grave, and the
permafrost was rock hard. In the black, shadowing presence of the
mountain, the ground seemed to welcome Ninip's body. For reasons that
none of them could name, it seemed right that he should be placed here,
safe from predators, within the flank of the mountain upon which he had
given up his spirit for them.

Torka took one of the spears. With the stabbing dagger that he carried
at his belt, he notched out its maker's identification mark and
inscribed his own. Across it, he incised the double lateral lines that
had been Ninip's mark of ownership. Then he broke the spear across his
thigh and placed the pieces upright upon the grave.

"So that the spirits of the mountain will know that Torka claimed this
boy as his own. So that Galeena will know. It is as Ninip claimed. Not
even in the spirit world would Ninig claim Galeena as his own. Ninip is
of Torka's band. Forever!"

They went on. Manaak carried lana. The shock of the past few hours had
stilled her pains, but in the blue haze that was all that would be of
the next day's light, her labor began again. One great contraction broke
the water in which the unborn child was cushioned from the jolts of
life; and the infant came forth in a gush, so quickly that Umak had no
time to frame a single child-come-forth chant. He made a praise song
instead while Manaak nearly fainted with relief, and Karana said that
the newborn boy would grow to be a very wise man because he had the good
sense to refuse to be born into Galeena's band.

They rested only long enough for lana to be tended by the women.

"We must go far from this place," said Manaak. "It is not Galeena's way
to be forgiving. He will come for us if he can. Like a pack of wolves,
his huntehs will fall upon us while we sleep. We must go on."

For a day and all of a nearly endless night, they walked and rested,
rested and walked. Manaak carried lana until she insisted that she was
strong enough to walk on her own; and this she did, although it cost her
dear. Nevertheless, when Umak offered to make a litter of his bearskin
robe, she refused.

"Your magic lives in that, Spirit Masteh, she told him, holding her
infant close. "It may not work quickly, but it is a strong and wonderful
magic that has given this son to me."

Two days later, they came upon the carcass of a large bison. It had been
old and sick, and whether it had died of natural causes or been killed
by wolves was impossible to say. Only a small portion of it had been
eaten; belly, throat, exes. tongue, and the upper flank. The rest was
intact, and it was an easy task to drive away the smaller carrion eaters
that had evidently just arrived to feast upon it. From its ribs they
erected a framework for a small pit hut and draped its hide and Umak's
bearskin over it.

lana made no objection; in fact she smiled as she gratefully lay down
within it, out of the wind.

"We will all dwell within the life-sustaining warmth of Umak's magic,
she said.

And so they did.

It began to snow. And the snow kept falling, a soft, windless snow that
covered the land and filled the world with silence .. . until a terrible
roaring shattered that silence. The earth shook, and their little
shelter shivered as though against a wind, but there was no wind.

In terror, they clambered from their shelter and squinted against miles
of white stretching away forever all around them. In all those miles,
nothing moved. In all those miles, there was no color at all except the
black, soaring bulk of the Mountain of Power, Galeena's mountain. They
stared, perplexed and then awed. The entire upper quadrant of the
mountain was moving. The vast, mile-thick skin of the summit ice pack
was fracturing, slipping, sliding downward as the supersaturated
underlayers of scree and till, overstressed by the weight of the new
accumulation of snow, suddenly refused to support their burden. In
great, dark sheets of debris, the underpinnings of the glacier were
giving out, causing the glacier itself to override them.

As Torka and his little band of outcasts watched in stunned silence, the
entire east-facing flank of the mountain, including the cavelike ledge
and all of its occupants, was buried forever beneath the geological
debris of centuries.

Karana tugged gently at Umak's hand, and then at Torka's. "The mountain
was warning us."

The old man harrumphed as Torka nodded, drew Lonit close, and said
quietly: "Galeena was right. He will stay in his high, 'safe' encampment
forever."

PART V.

THE CORRIDOR OF STORMS

Alone on the winter tundra, Torka set his little band to the
tasks necessary for its survival. The weather cleared briefly. They
worked together in stunned silence, still only half believing the
enormity of the catastrophe that had destroyed Galeena's band and had
nearly befallen them. They used every scrap of the bison carcass, eating
as they worked to scrape precious, life-sustaining marrow from its
joints, then setting aside the long bones of its legs, which would later
be fashioned into spears. They extracted sinew from its meat and plucked
the long, tough strands of hair from its tail and mane so that these
wiry filaments could be braided into snare nets for birding and rodent
catching and into lines for ice fishing.

By the time the weather closed in again, they had used the bison's horns
to break up the frozen tundra and hack out a larger, deeper circle over
which they reerected their pit hut. With sods banked high all around, it
was a warm refuge from the cold wind and hard-driving snow as, far off
across the tundra, a wild dog howled as though in protest to the storm.

Karana cocked his head in the darkness. "Listen. Brother Dog has seen
the mountain fall. He mourns for us."

Umak listened to the distant, mournful cries of the dog. He held
Naknaktup close as she silently grieved over the deaths of her people;
however, he was not thinking of her or of the members of Galeena's band.
He was remembering another night, another storm, and an old man who
walked away upon the wind while a wild dog followed and kept him from
dying. He closed his eyes. Where was Brother Dog now? And by what
selfish enchantment had Umak gone so long without wondering about the
fate of the brother who had saved his life?

The wind rose. It took the sound of the dog and whipped it away across
the world so that, within the pit hut, the voice of the wind was the
only voice that could be heard. Manaak and lana slept in each other's
arms as their infant suckled contentedly.

Lonit drifted off to sleep. She lay nestled close to Torka. His right
hand rested lightly across her belly. The baby moved. The future moved.

Torka listened to the wailing of the wind and reflected on the events
that had made him headman of this tiny, vulnerable band. He had never
wanted to be headman. Yet now that he thought about all that had brought
him to this desolate, storm-ridden place, it seemed that, ever since
Thunder Speaker had rampaged into his life, some invisible force had
been directing his steps. Testing him. Leading him. But why? Where?

The questions followed him into sleep. He dreamed of distant lands
stretching eastward beyond the Corridor of Storms, of lands warmed by
the rising sun, where flocks of birds filled the skies and herds of game
roamed the valleys. The dream was so intense and of such a fine and
glorious land, that he awoke half-hoping to find that he had been
transported there. But around him, the world was cold and black. Beyond
the pit hut, the storm raged, and winter ruled.

There was no time. No days, no nights, no dawn, no dusk.

There was only darkness, and in that darkness the wind lived and
breathed its dry, cold, savage breath in a ceaseless exhalation that
flayed the world and raked the skies clean of clouds.

And in that endless dark, beneath those cold skies, Torka and his little
band survived. Food was scarce, but such a small group of people needed
little to sustain them. As game dwindled in the vicinity of one camp,
they moved to another. They warmed themselves with meager fires fueled
with small bones and dried dung, and as they left one encampment to seek
out another, Lonit encouraged them to gather stones and pebbles. They
were rare on the open tundra, but life upon the mountain had taught her
how valuable they were for taking in heat and radiating its precious
gift of life-giving warmth for many hours after even the most carefully
tended sods, bones, and fragments of dung had burned away to nothing.

They walked across the rolling land, their direction determined by the
game that they followed and by the bite of the subzero wind. Without the
heavy winter garments that they had been forced to leave behind, they
were at a profound and deadly disadvantage until they were able to
contrive suitable cold-weather clothing out of the most unlikely skins
and furs imaginable. Whatever they hunted and killed, they ate and wore.
In the skins of fish and birds and squirrels they went forth. Badger and
fox, lynx and hare and lemming--their skins were cursorily treated and
stitched into patchwork gloves and boots, hoods and surplices. The
intestines of their prey were opened, their contents shared among all
members of the little band; then the opaque casings were dried over
their fire, oiled with melted fat, and transformed into parchmentlike
sheets that were fashioned into outer tunics that effectively broke the
wind.

From hunting camp to hunting camp, they moved and prospered. Although
heavy with child, Lonit had never felt better. Naknaktup had recovered
from the initial queasiness of her pregnancy, but she still brooded over
the loss of her people, especially Oklahnoo, her sister. Along with a
fully recuperated lana, Naknaktup worked with Lonit to set snares and
sew, to butcher and scrape skins, and to pound fat into oil as she
shared lana's joy in her tiny son and outspokenly anticipated the birth
of her own child.

"This woman so old, she think she never again have baby," she said,
beaming as brightly as though she had swallowed a piece of the summer
sun. "Umak is great spirit master This wuhman proud to be his woman!"
Then the sunlight slowly faded from her eyes, and her smile sagged as
memories clouded her happiness. "So many little ones this wuhman have.
All dead now. Killed. Sent into storms. Or eaten in dark time winteh."
Lonit's eyes went wide. "Eaten?"

"Caleena not like little ones. Keep only some few strong childs. If
times bad, in dark times winter, when game is scarce and men not like to
hunt in cold, Galeena kills little ones. Babies make good meat."

Now Lonit at last understood why there were no children in Galeena's
band and why lana had shown so little enthusiasm over the impending
birth of her baby. The Destroyer had not killed all of the little ones
of her band; Galeena had.

Naknaktup was perplexed by Lonit's surprise and obvious revulsion.
"Torka and his people not eat babies?"

"We do not!" she cried, then recalled the rumors that had circulated in
the winter camp of her own band before the great ghost mammoth had come,
rumors that Teenak, the headman's woman, had killed and portioned her
newborn infant to be used as food. Her hands crossed protectively over
her own unborn child. "Never in this new land, in this new band, will
the people of Torka eat their children. Never!"

Naknaktup and lana looked at one another, then both of them smiled
hopefully at Lonit. "May this be so," they said in unison.

"It will be so!" she replied emphatically.

The two women nodded.

The sun was back in Naknaktup's eyes as she said: "Then life with
Torka's band will be a good thing."

And it was so. Each camp seemed to be a little better than the last. The
men hunted successfully, taking Karana along with them so that he might
learn from their skills and experience. The women shared the work of
life, preparing not only food and clothing but all of those little
things that raised the quality of their existence from mere subsistence
to a level that allowed them a modicum of pleasure.

They laughed. They sang the songs of life. Umak filled the hours with
wondrous tales. Manaak and lana's infant wailed and whooped with
lustful, aggressive exuberance for life. He had survived those first few
tentative weeks of life in which it was not certain if a child truly
possessed a life spirit; now there was no doubt of that. Manaak's new
son was old enough and strong enough to be named and thus acknowledged
as a member of the band. They called him Ninipik--Little Ninip. And
there was no doubt in anyone's mind that the brazen spirit of the brave,
dead boy had come to live again within the body of Manaak and lana's
little son.

Torka would always remember the exact moment in which the idea came to
him. He was on the way back to camp with Manaak and Karana after several
hours of successful hunting. The three of them had taken two steppe
antelopes, a winter white hare, and four fat ptarmigan; nevertheless,
the sight of a large herd of horses stopped them dead in their tracks.

"Look at that...." drawled Manaak, salivating. "All of that red, sweet
meat on the hoof, standing just out of range of our weapons, as if they
knew the exact distance that our spears can fly."

"We should make longer spears," suggested Karana.

"Longer spears would be too light to take such heavy bodied quarry from
this far away, replied Manaak.

"Then we should make longer, heavier spears!" retorted Karana.

Manaak laughed. "Our speahs are fine for taking horse, Little Hunter.
What we need are long eh arms}"

It was the last sentence that snagged in Torka's brain and hooked itself
into his thoughts so that he could not be free of it. He mulled it over
and over, all the way back to camp, all the way through the meal that
Lonit had ready for him, and when he slept, he dreamed about it.

The dream was in part a memory. He saw a young girl holding up one of
the long wing bones of a condor. She marveled at its lightweight
structure and asked how such a fragile bone could support the weight of
such a great wing. He saw himself, kneeling, working the wing,
fascinated by its anatomical structure, intrigued by the strength and
elasticity of the powerful tendons that gave a spring like movement to
the muscles and bones.

And then, in a recollection of a dream within the dream, Torka saw
himself as a man with the wings of a condor; wings that carried him high
above the world, that made him weightless and allowed him to experience
the awesome thrust and power of flight. He was a spear hurtling across
the sky, a spear that controlled its own passage.

He awoke with a start, his right arm bent, fist against shoulder.
Slowly, the idea uncurled within his mind as his arm curled outward. He
lay flat on his back. Again and again, he bent his arm inward, then
straightened it, feeling the workings of muscle, bone, and tendon. The
idea grabbed him, forced him to his feet, and hurled him out of the pit
hut. He stood erect beneath the savage Arctic sky, a man in darkness
with the light of inspiration igniting his soul. He took one of his
spears from where it rested with the others against the conical exterior
walls of the pit hut. He tested its weight and balance. The idea was
growing in him; shapeless but not without direction. He hefted himself
squarely on both feet. He pivoted to the right, leaning back, back,
until all of his weight was on his right limb and he was twisted, helix
like until he could twist no more. His power was now concentrated within
the right side of his body. He could feel it deep within his calf and
thigh as, through the controlled tension and angle of his foot, he
willed himself to whirl around. He felt his power uncoiling, releasing
itself upward along his body as he hurled himself forward, caught his
balance on his left foot, steadied it with his right, and threw the
spear.

It flew up and out in an arc against the stars. It sliced through the
frigid air as cleanly as Torka's creative imagery sliced through his
brain. He caught his breath, stunned as the idea flared to life and took
shape until, in the darkness, he saw it clearly and cried out to the
stars.

"This is how it flies!"

Umak peered out from the pit hut, frowning as he saw Torka throwing one
spear after another toward the stars. He asked his grandson if he
thought that the lights in the sky were prey that men might hunt and
eat, then informed him that bad spirits had gotten into his head if he
did.

Torka ignored Umak. The idea had taken direction now. It led him, and he
followed eagerly, throwing his spears toward the stars. With each
release, he felt the source and the redistribution and the flow of his
power radiate through him into the shaft. He understood that, as in his
dreams, the spear was an extension of the man. Again and again, he
retrieved his spears and threw them, feeling the throw, understanding
the mechanics of it, remembering the great, long bones of the condor's
wing and realizing that the beginnings of the idea lay in that moment
when Lonit had wondered how such lightweight bones could support the
flight of such a great bird.

It was not the size of the bones; it was their length, the elasticity of
their tendons, and the multiplicity of their jointing. The power of a
man's spear lay not in the weight of the shaft but in the tension that
the man released through every bone in his body. The snap-and-fling
action of his wrist was as crucial to the throw as the long, sustained
push of the powerful muscles of shoulder and back.

"Torka?" Manaak came out into the night to stand beside him, obviously
worried about the strange and apparently irrational behavior. "What are
you doing?"

"You were right!" Torka said, slapping him on the shoulder. "We need
longer arms! Another joint! Perhaps two! And more tendons to bind them
tight and allow for greater thrust!"

Manaak stared, his mouth agape. "Come back into the pit hut, friend.
Umak is already making chants to drive the bad spirit from your head."

Torka smiled. "The spirit that has come into this man's head is a good
spirit--so good that it may change the way we hunt forever!"

Torka was right. It took him several weeks of experimentation and
frustration, of failure and mediocre success and failure again; but soon
he had devised a harmless-looking device with a handgrip at one end and
a barbed tip at the other. Carved out of the pelvis of the bison, it was
the length of his forearm. With the grip held in his right hand and the
butt of his spear braced against the barb--the narrowing, pointed end of
the shaft facing back over his shoulder and gripped midway along its
length between his thumb and index finger--Torka had designed a crude
missile launcher.

With practice it became a second forearm and wrist, allowing him to
increase the power and snap of his throwing arm, more than doubling the
speed and distance of his spear's thrust.

Manaak, Umak, and Karana each insisted upon making his own spear
thrower, and soon they were hunting with Torka in amazed delight as
their women stood by and were glad.

"With the new tool, the hunters can stand well back from the game and
make their kills in safety," observed Lonit proudly.

"It is a good thing," agreed Naknaktup.

And lana, no longer sad-eyed, smiled and nodded; but her smile would
have fallen had she heard the words of her man as he knelt beside Torka
over the body of the horse that they had taken.

"Look how deep the spearhead has gone into the flesh . straight into the
lung .. . and from such a distance!" Manaak fingered the wound that his
weapon had made. "With the right projectile points, a man could dare to
hunt mammoth with this spear throw eh Torka looked at the other man and
shook his head. "Torka has no taste for mammoth."

"The one that Manaak would hunt, he would hunt to kill, not to eat."

"Then Manaak will hunt alone," said Torka.

"If Big Spirit comes, we will stand togetheh."

Without warning, Torka struck out at him. Manaak fell sideways, more
surprised than angry; his thick winter garments had cut the sting of the
blow, but nothing could have lessened the anger that he heard in Torka's
voice.

"You speak with a tongue that will bring ruin to us all!" accused Torka.
Manaak had named the unnameable. Here, in this wide, rolling land where
their women had no recourse to a high, safe ledge upon which they could
seek shelter in time of danger, Manaak had spoken the name of the beast
that Torka feared more than death. He reached out and jabbed Manaak's
shoulder warningly. "Life is good! Your woman smiles in a camp where
there is meat. Your infant suckles, and mine readies itself to be born
out of my woman's womb. We have responsibilities in this life! Are you
so eager to die, Manaak? Are you hungry to have me die with you? Without
us, who will hunt for our women in the time of the long dark? How long
will they live with only an old man and a little boy to protect them?"

They ate the horses flesh for many days. Slowly winter began to wane. It
had been cold and dry, with little snow; but now, as the time of the
long dark approached its end, the weather changed. The wind turned,
drawing moisture-laden clouds inland from distant polar seas. Snow fell
and fell. Above a thick and storm-swept cloud cover, the starving moon
rose over the tundra.

As Torka and his little band moved from camp to camp, game became harder
to find. Low on the eastern horizon, when cloud cover allowed, they
could see the first promising glow of sunlight above the tangled summits
and glaciers of distant ranges, but hibernating animals still slept
beneath the ground, safely hidden from the prods of the women by deep,
hard-packed drifts of snow, and when browsing animals died from lack of
accessible forage, they, too, were buried as soon as they fell. Wolves
and wild dogs sang the song of hunger as they prowled the lonely,
wind-driven landscape. And the people of Torka's band grew lean and
began to starve.

They made an encampment in the smothering, howling whiteness. They lived
on wedges of fat that had been meant for use as tallow for their oil
lamps. Lonit was approaching the end of her pregnancy. She wondered if
she would have milk for her baby. Although lana had not spoken of it,
Lonit knew from the fretful sounds her infant made while nursing that
her milk was not flowing as it should. Naknaktup knew it, too.
Occasionally Lonit would catch them both looking covertly at their men,
and at Torka in particular. Since they had been forced from Galeena's
mountain, they had all looked to him as headman. Umak made the magic;
Torka made the decisions; and Manaak was second in command. They had
assumed their roles as easily as they donned their garments. Only now
the decisions were growing more and more difficult, and it was natural
for them to be questioned.

"Why do the women watch me like that?" Torka asked Lonit.

"They wait for you to command lana and Manaak to give up their baby to
be food for us all."

"This man will never ask such a thing!"

"It is what Galeena would have done."

"Torka is not Galeena! Torka does not eat the children of his band! The
children are the iuture of the People! II is for them that we fight to
survive the winter dark!"

He had spoken loudly, and in anger. The pit hut was small. His words
were heard by all. Lonit looked at lana and Naknaktup with an
I-told-you-so expression written across her face. Manaak made a grunt of
approval. Karana looked at Torka wonderingly, recalling the way Torka
had risked his life to find him in the storm; now, more than ever, he
knew that Torka was unlike any man he had ever known. Umak harrumphed
with pride that Egatsop had been wrong about his grandson. Torka's
innate compassion was not born out of softness; it was the foundation
upon which his wisdom was building.

"We will survive. To make new life! To hear the laughter of our
children! For this, we hunt! For this, we live! For this, we will now
make the songs of life in the winter dark, loud songs so that the sun
may hear us in its faraway part of the world and hasten to return to its
children!

They sang, and from out of the winter dark, wild dogs sang back to them.

"They are close," said Torka.

The people fell silent, listening.

"Do you think Brother Dog is out there?" asked Karana.

"Somewhere. Yes. If he lives," replied Torka.

Umak closed his eyes, turned his face upward, and breathed deeply,
drawing in the sound of the dogs, sieving it for an answer to his
unspoken question. His mind remained blank. Dogs sounded alike. He
harrumphed, disgusted with himself. Umak is spirit master. If Aar is
near, this old man should know it in his bones! But his bones knew only
the cold and a deep, aching stiffness. Umak is old, he thought, then
opened his eyes and glared into the darkness defiantly. "This man is not
so hungry that he would hunt and eat his brother!"

"Nor is Karana!"

Torka eyed the old man and the boy sternly. Manaak had already slipped
on his hunting coat. lana was readying her snares. Torka nodded at their
intent. He told Umak and Karana that wild dogs were fair game for
starving men who must think of the welfare of their pregnant women and
children. "If Umak and Karana have made a spirit bond with the dog they
call Aar, so be it. They will stay here and guard the women. Manaak and
Torka will hunt and set snares. And if Brother Dog has found a place
among the pack that howls, he had best be wise and run far, for Torka
will have no second thoughts about killing him."

They traveled eastward under lowering clouds, following the song of the
wild dogs. They picked up spoor and were heartened. They trotted on, the
wind rising at their backs.

The tundra rolled on ahead of them. Surface snow blew in the wind like
transparent veils of mist. They stopped to rest and eat one wedge of fat
apiece, scanning the world, making certain that they kept their bearings
so they would have no difficulty returning to camp.

Manaak thumped his chest to indicate his satisfaction with their
prospects. He rose, shook his spear thrower, and said boldly: "With this
we will bring home meat!

Torka would have cursed him for his outspoken arrogance, but he had
already trotted away. Torka followed.

Hours passed. The dogs seemed to be leading them. No sooner did they
reach a place from which the dogs' song had come, than their spoor led
them on again.

"It is as though they stop and wait, calling us on, leaving sign by
which we may follow," commented Manaak thoughtfully. '

"They are dogs, not men!"

"Yet Umak calls one of them broth eh

Torka did not appreciate Manaak's reminder. He ignored it and went on
until bison sign brought him up short. He realized with a start that he
and Manaak were not the only hunters afoot. The dogs were on the trail
of their own game, and it did seem as though they were going out of
their way to cause the men to follow.

"The spirits are with us!" exclaimed Manaak. "It may be so," said Torka,
wishing that Manaak would not speak so freely of things that had not yet
come to pass.

Manaak caught the undertone of censure in Torka's tone. His impatient
nature was irked by Torka's innate caution. "Look, at your feet, bison
sign everywhere! See how they have gouged through the snow with horns
and hooves, have rooted with their noses to get at the grass stubble
that lies beneath! A big herd! Not more than two days ahead of us! Khum!
We will go back now and tell the othehs. The promise of much meat will
give us the energy we need to move our encampment near to the grazing
grounds of the bison. Soon we will hunt! The bison will be amazed at the
poweh of our spear throwehs! We will drink their warm blood and feast
upon their flesh while we laugh at our hung eh beneath the cold face of
the starving moon!"

Torka was so appalled by Manaak's brazen, thoughtless boasting that he
could not speak. Deep within his gut, fear churned like schooling fish.
He felt nauseated as he realized that Manaak had just broken the same
taboo that Nap had broken on the day that Thunder Speaker had walked
into their lives to destroy their world. He had dared to name his prey
before actually sighting it. And worse than that, he had vocalized his
intent to laugh at the spirit of the starving moon.

Torka was suddenly painfully aware of the wailing wind. It slapped at
his back. He shivered, not against the subfreezing wind but against a
greater cold as a terrible wave of premonitory dread swept through him.

"Come," he said. "I smell storm in this wind. We have been out from the
encampment long enough."

For a thousand miles, the wind swept across open, treeless land, blowing
ground snow before it until earth and sky were indistinguishable. Umak
stood facing into the wind, relief flooding him.

"They come! At last the hunters return to us!"

Manaak emerged from the whiteness, so elated by his news that he
embraced the old man. "Bison, Spirit Masteh! The dogs led us to them! A
great herd! We will pass this storm and dream sweet dreams of meat in
the winteh dark! We will move our khamp, and then we will hunt! Oh, how
we will hunt!"

He swept the old man ahead of him into the pit hut. Shaking off snow, he
shared his joy with them all and tossed to lana the single hare that his
snares had taken.

"It is not much meat for now!" he declared. "But we will all eat of its
flesh and cook its bones in a boiling bag over what little fat we have
left for our cooking stones. Soon we will eat hump steaks, and our hands
will glisten with blood and oil! Tell them, Torka! Tell them of the
bison sign, and of the size of the herd that ..." His words trailed off.
He squinted into the dark interior, looking from face to face. "Where is
Torka? He was ahead of me when I stopped to pick up this hare. He should
have been back by now."

Outside, the wind struck so hard at the pit hut that the entire
structure shook. Lonit let out a cry of dismay and, with Umak and Karana
following, went out into the storm. Frantically, she called out to
Torka, but the wind took her voice and fragmented it, blowing it away
across the tundra in the opposite direction. Torka would never hear it.
And if he did not, he would never be able to find his way back to the
encampment in the shrieking, driving whiteness of the blizzard. Never.

"In such a storm .. . how long can a man live alone without food or
shelter?"

Manaak's question cut Lonit to the bone as Umak drew her back into the
protection of the little hut and out of the lung-searing bite of the
subzero wind.

Voices.

From out of the roaring emptiness, from out of the boiling whiteness of
the storm, Torka heard men speak. Their sharp, guttural commands drew
him back into consciousness. He looked up from the bottom of the ravine
into which he had fallen and saw figures trotting along the rim.

One. Two. He counted a dozen men, furred and cowled in the dark, shaggy
skins of bison, with spears in their hands and backs bent as they moved
against the wind. Then they were gone, enveloped in the blowing snow.
And in all the world, there was only the sound of the wind, and in the
boiling whiteness nothing moved.

Nothing.

Except the man at the bottom of the ravine.

Alone and disoriented, Torka shook his head to clear it, telling himself
that the figures had not been real, could not have been real. They had
been ghosts walking the blurred edges of his consciousness. Dreams.
Nothing more than dreams.

His head ached with questions. How had he come to be lying inert at the
bottom of this deep, irregular crack in the surface of the earth? Where
was Manaak?

The questions brought immediate answers. He remembered that Manaak had
paused to kill and string a hare that had tangled itself in one of his
snare lines. It had been snowing very hard. They had been walking along
the slope of a steep incline, one of many conical little hills that
pocked the otherwise flat terrain like blisters. They had used them as
marking points to guide them back to their encampment, but in the
wind-driven snow, although the hills ranged from thirty to over a
hundred feet in elevation, they had been difficult to spot. Manaak had
said something about hoping that they would be able to find their way
home, and Torka had replied that they would do so, provided they did not
linger until the storm grew worse. So, when he had gone ahead, Manaak
must have assumed that he had continued on without him. With the wind
shrieking all around, neither man heard the sound of the inner core of
the little hill collapsing; Torka had only known that one moment there
was solid, snow-covered ground beneath his feet, and the next he was
falling as that ground opened without warning. He could not have known
that the hill was not a hill, or that the broad, flat, circular expanse
of land over which they had been traveling was an ancient silt-filled
lake. Over millennia, water that had once glistened beneath the Arctic
sky had been thickened into a stew of soaked sediment that was the
outfall of erosion in the distant mountains. Surrounded by permafrost,
excess water froze to form hard cores of ice that slowly bulged above
the surface of the ground. Except for their presence in otherwise flat
terrain, they looked like any other hills, but warm summers transformed
the texture of their frozen centers, and cold winters redefined them
until pressure and expansion rent them with fissures and filled them
with air pockets. Torka's weight had been enough to cause one of these
rifts to open; the resultant crack in the side of the hill had opened
beneath him and caused his fall into the now open air pocket beneath.

It had happened so quickly, so unexpectedly, that he had had no time to
react before his head hit the side of the ravine. He had no idea how
long he had lain unconscious, but the storm had blown itself into
monstrous proportions. The ravine provided a natural refuge. He knew
that he dared not try to get back to the encampment until the wind
dropped and the snowfall lessened. As he stripped off his outer coat and
stretched it across the top of the narrow fissure to serve as a roof
that would keep the weather out and his body heat in, he could only hope
that Manaak had found his way back to the encampment or had found
shelter against the elements. Meanwhile, in his many-layered garments,
he locked his gloved hands beneath his armpits and wished that his
snares had entrapped a hare, as Manaak's had done. Salivating, he tried
not to think of food. He thought instead of oil lamps and glowing fires
of sods, and tried to will himself warm.

His head began to ache dully again. He closed his eyes and slept until,
out of the howling whiteness of the storm, the Destroyer walked within
his dreams. He saw it clearly, a moving mountain half-invisible within
the blowing snow as it moved inexorably toward the encampment of his
people.

He awoke with a start. As on that terrible dawn of long ago, all of his
senses screamed: Danger! He listened. Had he heard the trumpeting of the
great mammoth? No. There was only the sound of the wind wailing,
screaming, and moaning--a sound to put demons into the mind of any man.
But that demon was far away. Best to forget it, to sleep, to preserve
all energy for the maintenance of precious body heat. Above the narrow
cleft of the ravine, the air became colder as the wind continued to
rise. The storm would rage for hours. Nothing would be moving within it.

Nothing.

Fleetingly, he thought about the conjured images of ghostly men that had
first awakened him. Briefly, he half remembered something that Karana
had said, had feared so long ago.

The Ghost Band.

What had the boy said of it? They come in the time of light, to steal
women and boys, then to vanish as though they had never come at all,
leaving burning encampments and the bodies of the dead and dying as the
only proof that they existed at all.

He told himself that he was being as fearful and overly imaginative as
Karana. This was not the time of light. It was the worst winter storm he
had seen in many moons. Nothing would be afoot in such a storm. Nothing.

Except ghosts. Except spirits.

"No!" he spoke the admonition aloud, and although the wind drowned his
voice, the mere exhalation of a human sound was comforting.

He forced his thoughts to drift. At length he slept lightly, one hand
curled around the haft of his bludgeon, the other on the one spear that
had not broken in his fall.

Within the encampment, Naknaktup awoke. The storm had lessened. Her
people slept--deep, troubled sleep--but Naknaktup was not troubled. The
storm would end. Torka would return. If Umak believed this, Naknaktup
was certain that it would be so. Her confidence in her spirit master was
complete. He who was old had put the spirit of new life into one who was
old enough to have begun to suspect herself barren. Truly, Umak was a
maker of miracles. And the weight of the miracle that he had implanted
within her womb was now pressing against her innards. She sighed against
her need to relieve herself as she rose, drew one of her sleeping skins
around her shoulders, and went out.

The wind had dropped considerably, but it was still snowing and bitterly
cold. Naknaktup was glad that her baby would not be born until the full
return of the time of light. She smiled as she waded through the snow,
daydreaming about wanner days and the sweet smell of her infant, how it
would be to cuddle it and suckle it, and She stopped. Shadows were
moving in the snow. Dark, hairy shadows, as though bison stood erect on
their hind limbs and stalked prey in the guise of men. She counted the
shadows. One .. . two .. . many. And all carried their weapons in such a
way that Naknaktup immediately sensed danger.

They came out of the wind, leering at the startled woman who stood with
her graying hair whipping in the wind. Visions of light and warmth and
of suckling babes vanished as Naknaktup managed to cry out an undefined
warning just as a spear struck her breast and pierced her heart.

Inside the pit hut, the others were instantly alerted by her dying
scream. Assuming that a predator had attacked her, Umak and Manaak
grabbed their spears, glad that the weather had caused them to store
them inside instead of outside, as they usually did. They shouted at
Karana and told him to stay out of the way. lana clutched her baby
close, and Lonit wished that she still had her bola so that she might be
of help.

Younger and faster, Manaak pushed Umak aside so that he would be the
first one to leave the pit hut.

"Umak is spirit mast eh Manaak is hunt eh Let him walk before you!"

"Hmmph! Naknaktup is Umak's woman!"

Manaak would not yield. He wanted to be the first man out, the first to
face wolf or bear, lion or mammoth. Mammoth! How he hoped it was the
great ghost. His lust to kill outweighed his common sense, eclipsed the
small voice that shouted at the back of his brain: // it is Big Spirit,
we will all die.

He came out of the pit hut breathing hard, prepared to face Big Spirit
but totally unprepared to face hostile, predatory strangers of his own
species. For one fatal moment he stared at them, his spear poised in his
hand. It was his last moment. Two spears found him. One drove straight
through his neck. The other entered through his belly and drove its
barbed nephrite head through his lower back, severing his spine.
Disbelieving, he suffocated on his own blood as his knees buckled and he
dropped to the snow. The last thing he heard was Umak shouting his name
as the old man came bursting out of the pit hut from behind him.

Umak never saw the blow that felled him. He came up out of the shelter,
leaping at his attacker. He had seen Manaak fall, and he had seen what
had dropped him. Old he was, and no longer as strong as he had been in
his youth, but in this moment, he knew that his woman was dead, and his
unborn child. His rage made him young. His rage made him powerful.

But youth and power were nothing to the shadowed form who stood behind
him, to one side of the entrance to the pit hut. The man swung downward
with the heft of his spear, to send Umak sprawling.

It was silence, not sound, that woke Torka. The wind had stopped. Eager
to return to the encampment, he shook snow from his outer coat, donned
it, took up his one good spear, and with his bludgeon at his belt,
climbed out of the ravine. In the thin, transient light of day, the
world was white the land, the sky. were snow white, cloud white He
squinted against the glare. Soon it would fade. If he was going to find
his way back to the encampment before dark, he would have to hurry.

When the depth of the snow allowed, he moved at a lope, his muscles
gradually relaxing as movement warmed them. Experience enabled him to
find his bearings with little trouble. Now and then he paused, noting
landmarks that would have been unrecognizable to all but the most
seasoned tracker; softened by the over layering of snow, everything
looked different. But he was Torka. The blood of many generations of
spirit masters flowed within him, and Umak had taught him well

He went on and did not look back. Soon a dark, uneven stain of smoke
became visible on the horizon, pinpointing the exact location of the
encampment. So they had built a signal fire to guide him home. He was
glad. It would make the way easier, although he wondered what they had
found to burn that would yield so much smoke. He quickened his step,
thinking of the warmth of the pit hut, hoping that Manaak would be there
to greet him, and longing for the soft arms of his woman.

Lonit! He almost cried her name aloud as he imagined her dimpled smile.
As he crested the top of a low, rolling slope, his thoughts veered
sharply, and the brightness went out of the day. He did not slow his
pace as he looked back over his shoulder.

From the way their tongues lolled from their mouths, the pack of dogs
must have been following him for some time. Instinct told him to keep on
running. Wisdom forced him to stop and face them. On the top of the
slope, high ground granted him an advantage. He could never outrun them.
But he could kill a few and, after he had put the rest to flight, take
his kills back to the encampment. The dogs would not make good meat;
they were far too lean. His little band, however, was in a state of near
starvation and would rejoice no matter what he brought them. And if he
skinned it first and ate its blue eyes before returning to the pit hut,
they would never know that they fed upon the flesh of Brother Dog.

Aar's black-masked head was unmistakable amid his tawny eyed,
gray-haired cousins. He was very thin, with ribs showing and scars
across his nose and high at his shoulders; but he was clearly an animal
in his prime now, the second largest clog in the pack, with broad,
slavering jaws and a wild, halt-mad look in his eyes.

"Brother' Dog .. . we meet again. This man sees that you have reverted
to kind, as he always knew you would.

Aar's head went down, neck outstretched, ears hack. Beside and slightly
ahead of him, the largest male growled, and, as though by command, every
animal in the pack followed suit.

Slowly, Torka loosed his bludgeon and raised it with his left hand while
holding his spear at the read) in his right. The dogs understood his
threat. Several took a few halting steps back, but their leader, the
largest male, snarled. He took two steps forward and froe, his hair
bristling along his shoulders and spine.

Torka stood immobile, allowing the dog to perceive no lear in his
stance. "Come, he invited. "You are the biggest. You will make the most
meat."

The dogs head twisted a little, as though it tried to understand the
words of the man. Aar moved up beside it, shoulder to shoulder, tension
rippling in his muscles as he strained to hold himself back.

"Ah, Brother Dog, Umak would not be happy to see you now or to know the
fate that you have chosen. Come, try to feed upon Torka, and Torka will
make certain that you are never hungry again!

Starvation had made the dogs bold. They closed ranks behind their
leader. The big male led them to attack, and yipping and yowling they
came at Torka without hesitation. They poured up the slope toward him,
and he swiped down and across with his bludgeon. But even as his weapon
came in contact with the side of the big clog's jaw, he saw to his
amazement that the leader had another enemy.

Aar was at his throat. If the weapon had not killed him, the slashing
teeth of Brother Dog would. The big gray dog fell sideways. Others
swarmed over him to meet the swiping death dealt to them by Torka's
club. Not once did he have to use his spear. With Aar fighting by his
side, turning on his own kind in defense of Brother Man, Torka was able
to brain the most aggressive members of the pack. The rest ran in
whimpering retreat. All but one--a shaggy, heavy-bellied female, who had
stood back from the melee, stared up the slope at Torka and the dog, as
bewildered by Aar's behavior as Torka was overwhelmed by it. For the
first time since Umak had insisted that Aar was his spirit brother,
Torka knew that the old man had been right all along. Stunned, he
dropped to one knee. The dog stood close, but not too near, staring at
him out of a bloodied face. Tentatively, Torka extended a conciliatory
hand.

"Brother Dog ..." he acknowledged, and although he did not understand
how it could be, he knew that somehow the dog was more than an animal.
In a strange and bewildering symbiosis, the dog had chosen to place its
loyalty with Man. "We have not been friends, you and I," said Torka,
"but from this day on, truly we will be brothers,"

Torka would have prepared the slain dogs for transport to camp, but as
he began to do so, he saw the tracks. Frozen in the bottom layer of hard
snow, the wind had blown away their covering of soft powder. Torka
stared, touching them, noting their differences.

Many men.

Aar sniffed at the footprints with interest, and the female dog did the
same. Torka was struck cold with dread: The furred, armed men that had
walked along the rim of the ravine at the height of the storm had not
been figments of his imagination. They had been real. Karana's words
came raging back into his head as his eyes fastened on the distant
signal fire that he knew was not a signal fire at all.

The Ghost Band , .. it comes in the time of light to steal women and
boys, then to vanish .. . leaving burning encampments and the bodies of
the dead and dying as the only proof that they existed at all.

With Aar at his side and the female dog trailing at a wary distance,
Torka raced for home. The pit hut was a pile of charred, stinking rubble
by the time he reached it. He stood in shock, cold and immobile, as
memories of another encampment raked his soul. Death .. . death .. .
everywhere. A voice screamed within him. No! Not again! No!

He moved forward quickly, hoping that the bodies that he saw would rise
to mock him, parties to some obscene jest. They did not rise. Manaak was
dead of massive spear wounds, but the weapons had been drawn from his
corpse, and he lay in a frozen pool of his own blood. Naknaktup sprawled
where she had fallen, on her back, hideously mutilated, with her unborn
child ripped from her belly and placed in a position to suckle wounds
where breasts had once been.

Had there been food in his belly, Torka would have vomited. He used his
spear to steady himself, searching for Umak and Lonit and Karana, half
hoping that he would not find them, then going mad with blind,
directionless rage when he could not. He cried out their names, and
lana's. The wind blew them back at him out of miles of empty, desolate
darkness.

Aar's soft whimpering drew him to Umak's body. The old man lay
half-buried in the rubble of the pit hut, so blackened by burns that he
was unrecognizable until, from out of the ashes and charred skins and
bones, softly slurred but unmistakable sound reached Torka's ears.

"Hrrum .. . mphh ..."

Frantically Torka cleared the rubble of the hut away, and when he looked
down at his dying grandfather, he bowed his head and wept like a child
until a. blackened, bony finger poked at his tears.

"Tears are the blood of a man's spirit. Do not let it bleed. Strength is
born in the spirit. Torka will need his strength to track Lonit and
Karana and Manaak's woman...."

"They live?"

"No thanks ... to this old man. They took them east .. . in the last
waning hours of the storm...." A deep, low garble rose to choke him. His
hand fell to grip Torka's lore arm as he willed himself to endure his
pain. "Torka .. . must go ... now...."

Gently, as though he held an injured child, Torka gathered his
grandfather into his arms and held him close, as if, through the power
of his love, he could keep death away. "We will go together, as Umak
once brought Torka out of the way of the wind, to a new life, so Torka
will carry Umak until he is well and strong again. "Hrrmmph! That would
not ... be ... a good thing." His lungs had been seared in the fire;
blistered tissue made every word an agony. But he was Umak. He mastered
the spirits of his pain, and although he fought for even- phrase, he
smiled as he spoke, knowing that even now, at the very end of his life,
he icas a spirit master. In a rasping whisper, he spoke to Torka of the
past, and of the future that now rested with him. "The People .. . they
live in you .. . forever." "Forever ..."

Aar lay down and nuzzled his snout beneath the old man's hand while the
female dog, still untrusting of Man, lay down at the edges of the ruined
encampment.

"My brother, once more it is time for this old man to walk away upon the
wind. But this time, Brother Dog will not stop me...."

The wind rose. The darkness thickened. Far off within the distant
eastern ranges, there was a roaring within the wind, a trumpeting. Torka
listened to the easily recognizable voice of a mammoth. Thunder Speaker?
World Shaker? The Destroyer? Or Death itself, he thought, filled with
hatred for the beast whose predations had ultimately brought him here,
to this terrible moment of absolute despair.

"Listen. It walks before us ... into the face of the rising sun!"
Euphoria lightened Umak's voice. Within Torka's arms, his body rose,
then fell back.

"Father of my father?" Torka dared not ask the question.

Aar answered it. With his head pointed skyward, Brother Dog cried a high
song of mourning for the spirit of an old man who walked the wind at
last. Within the freezing dark, a light glowed like a cold white eye
that stared unblinking across the miles. The furred, cowled men pointed
and grunted with obvious appreciation as they prodded their captives
with their spears.

"Klamah! Klamah!"

"Hurry! Hurry! echoed Karana in his own tongue, belligerently leaning
into the wind and walking as slowly as he could.

Ahead of him, lana tripped, and when Lonit bent and tried to assist her
to her feet, her reward was a brutal spear poke to the back that sent
her sprawling. Infuriated, Karana sprang to her defense, but his hobbles
brought him up short, and now all three captives were on the ground.

Those who had taken them were not amused. Long, barbed spears gave clear
commands that words did not have to speak. The two women helped each
other to their feet. Karana rose, made a grab for one of the offending
spears, and was kicked so hard that he ended on the ground again.

Was it the blow? Or was it something else? The boy sat clutching his
gut, gasping for breath as something moved deep within his chest and
belly. Like clouds scudding across a full moon, he saw shadows, felt
them within himself, and knew with a bleak, expanding emptiness within
his heart that Umak was dead. The spirit of the old man who had touched
him now moved within him and around him. He reached out to grasp it, to
hold the invisible substance of what had once been the soul of Umak, but
such things could not be held. And yet, as he was booted to his feet and
pushed along by his captors, somehow it was still with him. He cocked
his head and realized that it would be with him always, a part of him
forever.

"Hmmph!" he exclaimed, and did not wince when the blunt end of a spear
was rammed hard into the small of his back to silence him.

They walked for hours. The cold white light was a beacon toward which
the fur-clad men directed their steps until, toward dawn, the light
disappeared and they paused to rest, hunkering down in the snow to eat
their traveling rations before curling up to sleep. When they awoke, one
of the heavily garbed men took the infant from a passive lana and handed
the baby to Lonit. He said something to the others, low and grating
words that made them laugh with dark intent. Several of them came to his
side to join him in taking turns sating themselves upon lana. Manaak's
woman neither yielded nor resisted. She lay with them like a limp,
vacant eyed doll. Lonit closed her eyes and held the baby close. She
knew that it lived only as long as lana complied with her captors'
wishes. Memories of death--terrible, bloody, purposeless death--ran red
behind her lids. She opened her eyes and sat shivering, close to Karana.

"Why have they not killed us? And why did they not gut me along with
poor Naknaktup?"

The boy, cross-legged beside her, stared out across the darkening miles.
"Karana knows only what he has heard others say of the Ghost Band. They
steal women and boys. Naknaktup was older than you, and no beauty. When
we reach their encampment, the Ghost Men will take us down into the
earth and we will die to this world forever."

Lonit's mouth worked with bitterness as she listened to the animalistic
grunts and moans of pleasure that her captors made as they found release
within lana. "They are men, not ghosts," she said. "So we must continue
to walk slowly, to drag our feet so that our tracks are clear. Our
captors think that they have killed or captured us all. They do not know
of Torka. They must never know what gives strength and hope to Lonit and
Karana."

The boy nodded. Unconsciously, he mimicked his beloved spirit master as
he crossed his arms over his chest, jabbed his chin skyward, and turned
his mouth down. "Hmmph, it is so," he said in a whisper of what he
wished was absolute certainty. "Torka will find us!" But the weather
changed and the wind turned. Once again it blew with a demonic intensity
that whipped fallen snow into smothering rivers of air. Travel was
impossible. Footprints were erased from the world, and after two
interminably long days and nights of storm, a bereft Torka emerged from
the lee of a tundral hillock, where he and the dogs had curled against
the cold, to look upon a tundra that was wiped clean of any trace of
those who walked ahead of him.

For a long while he stood staring, listening, his heart as empty as the
land that stretched before him. Then resolutely he went forward into the
face of the rising sun. The dogs snuffled as they trotted beside him, as
though querying his reasons for traveling into unknown land.

"Lonit is there, and Karana," he informed them, unaware that he was
doing the very thing for which he had so often criticized Umak; he was
talking to the dogs as though they were capable of understanding his
words.

The days that followed were brief intervals of pale, wind tattered light
through which Torka loped with Aar at his side and the female dog
following at a wary distance. The nights were long spans of wind-chilled
darkness through which he tried to sleep so that he could travel with
little or no need of rest in the hours of light. But on the third night,
he awoke in the deep darkness that precedes the dawn and, for the first
time, fully focused on the bright star that burned cold and white on the
mountainous horizon. The star did not move! It was not a star. It was a
beacon! He cursed himself. The marauders were traveling by night,
gaining the extra hours, following a signal fire that could not be seen
by daylight.

He was immediately on his feet, scooping up his weapons, then moving
toward the light. The dogs whined, but he ignored them. The mountains
were near--long, hulking ranges smothered by glaciers. There was the
strong smell of ice in the wind, but he caught neither sight nor scent
of travelers or encampments. If those who had taken Lonit, Karana, lana,
and little Ninipik were members of the Ghost Band, they were well named.
Trailing them was like trying to follow a cloud after it has vanished
from the sky. But now, at least, he had a light to guide him.

He traveled all that day, keeping his course straight for that part of
the mountains where he had seen the light. He stopped only long enough
to appease his exhaustion, sleeping little, eating less. Although the
land was rising, the mountains seemed no nearer. He went on, into the
night and the next day until fatigue dropped him and he lay upon the
tundra, watching the dogs hunting for themselves. They worked as a team,
sharing their food and their sleeping place. He thought of Lonit, and
his pain over her loss was unbearable. He buried his head in his forearm
and slept without bothering to eat. When he awoke, it was to Aar's
nuzzling of his hand. The dog stood over him. The animal had placed the
midsection of a hare, with head and extremities chewed off, before his
face. Aar stared at him, apparently waiting for him to eat the offering.
Torka was hungry enough to comply. As he gnawed the unexpected gift, he
recalled the many times that, at Umak's insistence, the food of the band
had been shared with the dog.

The light was close now. The marauders strode forward with confidence.
Exhausted, Lonit again felt the deep pull of pain creep from her lower
back around her pelvis. She had listened to enough woman talk within
Galeena's encampment to know that such pains were the onset of labor.
Her infant,

Torka's infant, was ready to be born. Torka! She bit her lip to keep
from crying out his name.

The mountains were dead ahead of them, and the land beneath their feet
was slowly rising to meet them. Karana had been walking apart from the
women. Now he came to walk beside Lonit.

"From the crest of the hills, I saw him!" His voice was a whisper that
somehow managed to roar with triumph. "A man with two dogs running at
his side! It was dark, but in the starlight, I saw him! It has to be
Torka!" For the first time since the raiders had come to the encampment,
he saw Lonit's face dimple into a tremulous smile. For the last two
days, she had looked so pale and wan, he had begun to fear for her; so
he did not tell her that what he had seen had been so far away that the
image had appeared to be no more than three tiny shadows moving upon the
snow-whitened land. Not one of the Ghost Men had noted the movement. But
Karana had seen it. He had known that it was Torka because, as on the
ledge when the spirit of the mountain had warned him of danger,
something within him had spoken the truth of Torka's presence to his
soul; but he did not think that Lonit would believe him. "We have only
to slow our captors down for another night--perhaps two--and leave
whatever signs of our passing we can, to help him follow us."

Her smile faded. Her eyes strayed to the hulking, shaggy forms who
stalked out ahead of her, using their spears as prods to assure the
firmness and depth of the snow that lay beneath their feet. Behind and
to each side of her, other men walked--ugly, tattooed men with hideous
bone labrets piercing their lower lips and protruding downward over
their chins like carved, saliva-slickened fangs. Killers, she thought.
Men who carry spears and daggers not only to hunt and protect themselves
from predators, but to enable them to be predators of their own kind.
"If Torka comes for us .. ." She stopped herself before she spoke her
fear aloud and thus assured that it would come to pass, but the words
were in her eyes as she looked at the boy. If Torka comes for us, they
will kill him.

Ahead of her, the man in the lead suddenly stopped, raised an arm, and
called out what sounded like a greeting. Lonit and Karana looked ahead,
puzzled, but glad for the opportunity to rest .. . until they saw
figures coming toward them out of the foothills. They carried torches of
what appeared to be tallow-soaked grasses and skins bound onto the rib
bones of large game animals. Soon they were there, breathless, smiling,
ugly men who embraced the marauders as though they were long-awaited
brothers returning from a hunt.

And so they were. Only their quarry had not been game; it had been
slaves. Dizzied by a concept too alien to comprehend fully, Lonit found
herself the object of their scrutiny as they pulled back her hood and
passed her from man to man. Each of them handled her, touched her belly,
and seemed pleased as they exchanged animated words of congratulations
to her captors. They put their hands on lana then and examined her
strong, bawling little son, nodding, grunting all the while. Then they
turned their attention to Karana, poking at him, leering as though he
were a nubile young girl, handling him as provocatively as they had
handled the women, until the boy screamed in outrage and made one of
them regret that he had removed his gloves before beginning his trespass
into Karana's garments.

Lonit cringed, certain that they were going to strike Karana dead for
his action. They laughed instead and pushed the boy as though he had
pleased them. The man he had bitten sucked blood from his wound, loosed
a snare line from his belt with his free hand, and while two others held
Karana, he looped the sinew cord and slipped it around the boy's neck.

"Shliank!" he exclaimed, and jerked the tether hard, pulling Karana
close.

Lonit did not have to speak his language to know that he had just
announced to all that Karana was now his. For the first time, she noted
that this man's labrets were more elaborately carved and twice as long
as those of his kinsmen. In his dark, shaggy bison skins, he was a
grotesque but undeniably powerful man. Fanged like a beast, his face was
so darkened by the swirling black patterns of his tattoos that, even in
the light of the torches, she could see nothing but the pure, dangerous
savagery of his features. When he commanded the others to move on, not a
man among them hesitated, and when Karana strained against his lead, the
man only jerked it harder. Strangling, the boy was forced to follow.

Toward the light.

It was an eye glaring at them from the side of a narrow, elongated mound
that rose at the base of the foothills. And then, slowly, the eye
opened. Men emerged from it.

Fear crawled within Lonit's belly as she balked and was prodded onward
across broad stretches of snow free talus that would never hold the
tracks of men. Karana walked ahead of her, choking as he fought against
the pull of the tether. On and on they walked, up the side of the
embankment, into the eye.

Lonit cried out in terror. Behind her, for the first time since lana had
been forced to endure rape for the sake of her child, Manaak's woman
made a sound. It was a soft, squirming, mewling exhalation that begged
for mercy. For herself. For her baby. For Lonit and Karana.

But there was to be no mercy for any of them. This was the destination
toward which they had been driven. There would be no turning away from
it now. Hard, unyielding hands gripped Lonit from behind, shoved her
forward onto the mound, then upward toward the eye. She saw at last that
it was only a gaping hole within the shoulder of the embankment. From
deep within the earth, light shone, and a hideous, animalistic, fanged
face grinned up at her as, against her will, she was lifted up by the
back of her armpits and handed down, down, into the eye, to waiting
hands.

She nearly fainted as heat and stench and light enveloped her. Placed
onto her feet upon moist and slippery ground, she was surrounded by
leering, naked men with oiled bodies that were tat toed from their
foreheads to their toes, including their genitals.

Again she was handled, her garments invaded, her belly touched. She
tried to break away but was mocked for her efforts, turned around and
around, pressed against, then pushed forward, deeper into the eye, down
along a stinking, slippery-floored corridor that ran deep and then
laterally beneath the surface of the mound. It opened into another
passage, with a short, nearly vertical stairway with a framework of
bones, which led into a small, skin-lined room in which many spears were
stacked, and out of which several torchlit tunnels branched.

Disoriented, Lonit, for the first time, succumbed to despair. Behind
her, lana was weeping. Karana was nowhere to be seen. As Manaak's woman
was forced into one tunnel and Ijonit was pushed ahead into another, her
thoughts were like frightened birds flying into a storm. Karana was
right. These men are of flesh, but also are ghosts. Not even a tracker
as skilled as Torka will ever find us here.

It was Aar who first picked up the scent of Man and ran in circles,
snuffling, nose to ground, tail wagging madly while the female dog
cocked her head with curiosity and watched him. When Torka found the
first of the tracks nearby and recognized the bootprints of Lonit and
Karana, he whooped with joy. The female dog cocked her head in the other
direction and whimpered softly, thoroughly confused by the behavior of
the males of her pack.

"Torka will find his woman," he vowed grimly. "And in stealth, with
bludgeon and blade and spear hurler, this one man will make many men pay
for what they have done."

They went ever eastward, toward the mountains until they reached the
talus slopes and lost the trail where the snowpack ended. Aar picked up
the scent and ran in several directions, returning at last, as darkness
claimed the world, to where Torka sat alone, hoping to sight the night
fire by which he might be guided. But there was no light except that of
the cold, distant stars. From the east, he heard the not-too distant
sounds of mammoth. A calf calling, a cow's reply, and then the voice of
another calf, older than the first, but high with adolescence and
quivering with distress. The dogs heard the mammoths' cries, and their
heads went up as they whimpered softly, as though in sympathy.

Torka was suddenly struck by the realization that, like the dogs, he
understood the communications of the mammoths as clearly as though they
had spoken to one another in his own language:

"Mother! Where are you? I am afraid!"

"Child. Be still. I will come for you."

"Mother. My sibling is in trouble. Come quickly!"

"Children. Be calm. Do not be afraid. By light or dark, I will stand
with you."

Torka listened. The mammoths' sounds continued, then stopped. The cow
had comforted her little ones. His thoughts astounded him. How could
this be? Mammoths were prey. They possessed the spirits of beasts, not
men. Mammoths could not love or grieve or worry. Or seek vengeance
against those who had brought their loved ones to grief or destruction.
Or could they?

Suddenly bitterly cold, Torka looked at the dogs lying curled one
against the other. The female had abandoned her pack to be with Aar.
Why, if she did not love him? His own love for Lonit was like a stone
within his throat, choking him with his need to find her and Karana and
to avenge the deaths of Manaak and Naknaktup and his beloved
grandfather.

Memories of a huge, hate-maddened red eye crowded in on him. The
Destroyer's attack had come as he and Nap and Aiinak were trying to
butcher the fallen cow. Had the Destroyer been her mate? Could the great
mammoth have loved her? Could an animal think like a man? Love like a
man? Hate like a man?

No! Torka was certain that it could not be so. In time, he would kill
the Destroyer and drink its blood in the name of his lost band, Egatsop,
Kipu, and his infant daughter, who had not lived long enough to know any
of life's joys.

His mouth was set. His eyes stared out across the dark and savage land.
Now he had other prey to hunt--murderous, woman-stealing, slave-taking
men. And for one man alone, they would be every bit as dangerous and as
difficult to kill as any mammoth. Lonit screamed, hut her voice was
absorbed by the suffocating, airless confines of the tiny room in which
she lay. It was one of several cubicles that were located at the end of
the Ghost House's innumerable warren like underground passageways. Like
the tunnels, its walls and conical roof were braced with rib bones and
mammoth tusks, then chinked with the same thick mud of human feces mixed
with grass and refuse that covered the floors. The entire room oozed and
stank and emanated heat like a festering wound.

Lonit screamed again and gasped for air.

Several tattooed women sat around her as she labored to give birth. They
had placed her upon a bed composed of several thicknesses of mildewed
furs lain across a mattress of moldy grass and lichen. Beneath the bed,
a frame of mammoth ribs kept the mattress from spilling over onto the
warm, fetid slime of the floor. In the dull, flickering glow given off
by two oil lamps that burned on stands of caribou skulls propped onto
bone posts, the women's faces were a blur of oily, darkened sameness
until one of them folded into a smile of empathy and understanding. She
rose to see to Lonit's plea.

Naked except for a loincloth of feathers, the woman was nearly as tall
as Lonit. She reached the apex of the room's ceiling with no difficulty
and removed a large sod from its center. The warm, stinking air rushed
up and out, forming vapors as cold air entered.

Lonit drank it in. It was sweet, it was clean; it was from the world
above, where Torka lived and looked for her and, by now, must have given
up all hope of ever finding her. It took all of her effort to keep
herself from calling his name. One of the women snapped a rebuke at the
woman who had opened the air vent. The tall woman closed it, and the
other women mumbled in appreciation. Lonit nearly retched as the stench
of the room closed in on her again. The tall woman, seeing her
discomfort, reopened the vent. The other women spoke to her sharply, in
what sounded like several different dialects, but the tall woman merely
glared at them, her tattooed hands resting on wide, tattooed hips. The
others rose, one of them yelling a sentence that ended sharply with the
word gu/ap. The tall woman responded with an even sharper sentence that
ended with the same word. The others rose as one in a communal huff and
left the cubicle by way of a low, hide-covered exit that was little more
than a hole in the wall. The tall woman sighed, shook her head, and came
to sit with Lonit.

"Gulap will come anyway," she said.

Lonit was startled to hear her own language spoken.

The tall woman smiled at her obvious recognition of their shared tongue.
"You and Aliga, we talk same talk. Must come from same part of the
world. Far away. To the west, yes?"

"Yes!"

Aliga's smile thinned into wistfulness. "Times were good there. A long
time back. It is best we forget. This place stinks like a corpse in
summer, but it is good to know that in spite of all this stink, we are
alive."

At that moment another contraction took control of Lonit's senses--a
pain so intense, so absolute, that for a moment nothing existed except
the pain. A tide of excruciating pressure bore her down, down until .. .
slowly ... it began to ease.

Aliga lay a questing palm across her abdomen. "Your baby will come soon
now."

"Where is lana? I would have her with me now."

"Your friend, she is with the men. She is new, so they will use her for
a long time. Be glad you are here. After the baby comes, I will give you
a drink if you want, to make bleeding last long time. No man will touch
you while you bleed."

"What have they done with Tana's baby?"

"Strong boy, that baby! Many women here will be proud to suckle him.
When he is bigger, Ghost Men will take him to the great gathering of
mammoth hunters not far from here. Ghost Men will trade him for many
good things, and for more women."

Lonit stared, afraid to ask the next question. "And Karana . will they
trade him, too?"

"Little one with limp? No, he is pretty like a girl. Ghost Men will use
him like a woman. In some bands, such boys are valuable to hunters on
long treks without their women." She saw the expression of
incomprehension upon Lonit's face. "On long treks, boys do not bleed,
boys do not get babies in belly. More valuable than women to some." She
sighed, with infinite sadness. "Your friend is lucky to have a boy baby.
This woman hopes you have the same. Then Ghost Men will let your baby
live ... if Gulap says the omens are good."

"Gulap?"

"She is oldest sister of headman, the mother of his favorite sons. She
is very old now, and very smart. Very clever to live so long in a band
such as this." Aliga grew suddenly quiet. Women's voices could be heard
approaching the blood room. Aliga put a warning hand on Lonit's wrist.
"Be brave, be strong, Woman Of The West, and say nothing to anger Gulap.
The headman has said that you will belong to him when your bearing blood
has ceased to flow. He has said that he will tattoo you himself. This is
a great honor but has made Gulap very angry at you. Never again will her
brother look at her as he has looked at you."

"But this woman is ugly! Why should he want me?"

Aliga looked at Lonit as though she could not believe what she was
hearing. "You have the eyes of the running doe. It is considered a mark
of great beauty among many bands. It is as rare as the white lion, or
the call of the loon whose back bears no stripes. The rare thing, the
unusual thing, it is valued above all else. You are beautiful, Lonit,
Woman Of The West. Can it be that no one has ever told you that?"

"Only one. But it has been enough.... It has been everything...."

All night long the mammoths cried sad sounds of mourning. Torka slept
fitfully until dawn softly colored the tundra and an incredibly foul
stench came to him on the back of the east wind. The dogs had smelled
it, too. They had risen as one, turning toward the stink, and then away
from it. They exhaled through their nostrils as though trying to cleanse
them; then, suddenly restless, Aar began to circle and sniff again,
whimpering to himself.

Torka rose, recognizing the smell of Man in the wind. It was twice as
foul with rotting refuse and offal as that of the ledge after Galeena
had taken it over. It was undeniably the stench of an encampment. But
although he scanned the horizon until his eyes teared and burned, he
could see no signs of life at all ... until Aar turned, faced due north,
and froze.

Torka followed the eyes of the dog, and for a moment he too was unable
to respond.

A long column of people was advancing toward him--too many people to
constitute the marauding band for which he had been searching. He could
see females bent beneath heavy loads, and men carrying spears and snow
prods. If there were small children, he could not see them. A small
group of hunters was trotting toward him, calling out, their spear arms
raised. He stood his ground, with his own spear at the ready and Aar
growling at his side.

The men were dressed in finely worked skins, and as they approached,
they bore the scent of those who did not live in squalor. The leader of
the group paused just out of spear range, his arm raised. Another,
younger, man came forward to stand beside him. He wore garments stitched
entirely of the white belly skin of winter-killed caribou. He also
raised an arm, and as he did, the hawk talons that were strung from the
bottom seam of his medicine bag jangled in the wind.

Torka did not move until the first man threw down his spear as a sign of
peaceful intent. The man in white did the same, although Torka sensed a
certain reluctance in his gesture.

"We seek the great gathering of mammoth hunters at the entrance to the
Corridor of Storms." The voice of the first man was as clear and devoid
of threat as a cloudless sky.

"We have heard the call of mammoths in the night. We would hunt!" The
second man's voice was as lean and sharp as a well-knapped projectile.
"Where is your band, Man Who Walks With Dogs?"

It was not the tone of the men's words that struck Torka. It was their
dialect. He knew it as well as he knew his own--it was Karana's tongue.
As he took note of the number of the strangers and the lack of children
among them, he knew instinctively that these were Karana's people.

With no further concern for his own safety, he threw down his spear. "I
am Torka! I seek the Ghost Band that has stolen my woman and Karana, son
of Supnah! If you are that man, then join with me. This day we will hunt
men, not mammoth!"

Within the Ghost House, Karana feigned sleep. Stripped of his clothes,
he lay very still, afraid that movement would draw his tormentors back
to resume their unnatural mauling of him. He could hear them now,
sloshing urine over themselves in the adjoining sweat room. He had
pretended not to understand them, even though his natural gift for
unraveling the various threads that composed the markedly different
tongue had served him well. Now that they had sated themselves upon
him--and upon one another--they spoke of pursuing other prey.

The sound of the mammoths had excited them almost as much as their
manhandling of Karana. It was evident from the way the beasts were
calling that one or more of them was mired. The others were staying
close, trying to help or to offer comfort.

The marauders spoke of how the headman had already led a large party of
scouts from the Ghost House to determine the whereabouts of the mammoths
and of the pleasure they would all soon take when the killing of the
beasts began.

Karana listened, hating them, hating the way they had bruised him deep
inside his body where no man had the right to bruise another, let alone
a half-grown boy. Their voices rose and fell. Karana's hatred rose and
congealed into an unswervable resolve.

Go. And while you hunt, I will take up my clothes and escape, upward
like smoke through the vent of this room before anyone can catch me. I
will find Torka and lead him here. Together we will see if Ghost Men
bleed as easily as the men and women whom they kill for pleasure.

The premise was invigorating, but it suddenly occurred to him that he
had no idea what they had done with his clothes.

His eyes strayed along the contours of the bone ladder that ed upward to
the vent of the room. A cold and hostile world ay there, through the sod
hatch. If he moved quickly, he
could make his break for freedom now. Not one of the robust,
well-fed Ghost Men could follow through the vent, but Karana was small
and agile enough to wriggle through it if he tried.

He trembled at the challenge, then at the realization that he had no
hope of survival without his clothes--unless he found Torka immediately.
And what were the chances of that? What if he had been mistaken about
his sighting? What if the shadows that he had seen moving upon the
tundra had only been tricks of the wind and the starlight?

From off along one of the stinking, labyrinthine tunnels of the Ghost
House, Karana heard Lonit cry out. He felt her pain and knew her fear.
He closed his eyes tightly, commanding the spirit of courage to grow
within him. Lonit was Torka's woman. To Torka, he owed his life. Within
the Ghost House, Karana, Lonit, lana, and little Ninipik were already
dead to the world above.

Perhaps a naked boy might survive, he thought as, slowly, he rose from
the foul mattress of furs and lichens.

Torka is alive. Torka is near. As on that cold, clear morning when the
mountain had spoken to him from out of his own spirit, the voice that
told him that Torka was alive was a spirit voice. Karana could no more
have disregarded it than he could have ignored the cries of Lonit. He
had heard women in labor before. Lonit's time was very near. And
Karana's time to escape was now.

Naked or clothed, he might never get the chance again. In absolute
stealth, he peeled back the bed furs from the mattress, and with the
speed of an-eagle launched from its perch, Karana flew up the ladder,
shoved the sod to one side, and forced his body through the vent, back
into the world of the living.

With Aar on the scent and leading them as though he were master of the
pack, Torka and the men of Supnah's band advanced across the tundra in
search of the Ghost House, following the stench of Man that had briefly
risen from the earth to foul the wind. For a moment it returned, strong
and sweet with the stink of hot urine and decomposing refuse and fecal
matter. Then it was gone, as completely as though they had imagined it.

They paused, scenting like animals. Supnah's even, weather-lined
features were taut with concentration as, beside him, the man in the
skins of winter-killed caribou knelt, balancing his weight upon the
balls of his feet. "Is my brother, Supnah, certain that he wishes to
follow these Ghost Men when we have spent half a lifetime successfully
avoiding contact with them?" "If Karana is with them, Supnah will
follow," replied the older man.

"Karana is with them," said Torka emphatically. "And this man says that
ghosts do not leave tracks by which they may be followed."

Navahk, magic man, eyed Torka out of cold, heavily lidded eyes that
seemed to see right through him. Torka could not remember ever having
seen a handsomer man, or one whom he instinctively distrusted more. Not
even Galeena had elicited such a negative reaction from him at their
first meeting. Perhaps his experience with that headman had adversely
colored his attitude toward all strangers? He could not be certain. He
felt no repugnance toward Supnah, even though he found it difficult to
overlook the fact that he had abandoned Karana. Nevertheless, Torka saw
the resemblance to the boy in the father's weatherworn face, and
responded to the clear-eyed intelligence that honed his features and
defined his open, albeit cautious nature. Supnah was totally unlike his
younger brother.

The magic man's every word and gesture were guarded. His long, full
mouth was set into a perpetual smirk, as though he held a great and
wonderful secret that no man save him would ever know until it was too
late--and even then it would not matter, because no one but Navahk was
capable of understanding it. Torka had not been with Supnah's band for
more time than it took to tell them of how Karana had followed an eagle
to a safe refuge upon the Mountain of Power before he had felt the eyes
of the magic man boring right through him. He had turned to look at the
man, and Navahk had smiled in the most friendly manner, showing wide,
perfect teeth that were oddly pointed, as though he possessed an entire
mouthful of canines; but it was not the man's unusual teeth that caught
Torka's attention and put him on guard. It was his eyes. There were
depths within them that warned of treacherous undercurrents. For reasons
of his own, although he smiled and pretended otherwise, Navahk was not
glad to hear that Karana, his brother's son, was alive, nor was he eager
to take the opportunity to rescue him from the Ghost Band.

But Supnah was elated. He seemed half a lifetime younger. "Karana was
abandoned by this man once. It will not be so again!" He put a strong,
beautifully gloved hand upon Torka's forearm. "It is good that the
spirits have guided us to this meeting."

"It is good," agreed Torka.

Navahk, magic man, said nothing.

The hunters shook their spears, and all agreed that if Supnah willed it,
then it was time to hunt the Ghost Band; too long had that band preyed
upon others as though their fellow men were beasts who might be hunted
like animals.

Navahk's smile deepened. "Can men hunt spirits? It is said that, because
the Ghost Men possess no true flesh, they must steal the women of human
bands. Otherwise they would have no sons. Can we feel anger toward them
for that?"

"Were it your woman they had stolen, you would have no need to justify
your anger," said Torka coldly. "And this man says to you that they took
more than women from Torka's camp. They took furs and what little food
we had. Ghosts do not need to eat or to clothe themselves. They sound
less like ghosts than like men who would rather prey upon the women of
other bands than take the time to raise girl-children of their own."

A murmuring went through the hunters. The corners of Navahk's lips
pulled inward, creating hollows beneath his high, rounded cheekbones.
"It is said that they are great, shaggy spirits, with the bodies of
bison and the stabbing fangs of leaping cats. It is said that their
faces are black, and that the only time that men may look upon them
without being killed is when they come to the great gathering to gain
women for trade goods. They come in the mist and disappear into the
mist. No men have ever dared to hunt them as we do now."

Again the hunters murmured. This time they looked to Supnah, waited for
him to refute his brother. He was momentarily at a loss for words.

Torka knew that Navahk was playing upon the fears of the others. Was the
magic man afraid? Torka measured his smile, his eyes, and the straight,
lean lines of his body within the white casing of his clothes. No. Torka
was certain that fear was an emotion that did not come easily to Navahk.
There were subtler motivations beneath his reluctance to pursue the
Ghost Band. His tongue was as cold and quick and dangerous as a river in
spring flood. From the way the others behaved toward him, it was
apparent to Torka that Supnah was not the only decision maker in this
band. Navahk's judgment was sought in all things. Together Supnah and
Navahk shaped and steadied the lives of their people; but although
Navahk openly shared in the leadership of the band, Supnah bore the
ultimate responsibility for its successes or failures. No wonder the
magic man smiled, thought Torka, remembering that Karana had told him
that it was because of omens seen by Navahk that Supnah had left his son
to care for the other children of the band while the adults went off in
search of food. The memory disturbed him. Why would Navahk have advised
such a thing? And how could Supnah have listened to him?

Ahead, in the distant turnings of one of the mountain canyons, the
mammoths began to call to one another again. Distracted and suddenly
impatient, Torka gestured toward the sound. "Go, then. Hunt mammoth.
This man will search for the Ghost Band. For his woman, for the woman
and child of one who was a friend to him, and for a boy who has been as
a son to him, Torka will go on alone. He is not afraid."

He had meant to goad them, to sting their pride, and by so doing force
them to commit themselves to the course that he so desperately needed
them to take. Alone, he had virtually no chance at success. With nearly
twenty armed men beside him, success might just be assured.

But they stood and stared. Their magic man's statements had robbed them
of their zeal. Even Supnah seemed uncertain now.

"How can we know that Karana is still alive and not a spirit?" the
headman asked.

Torka felt disgust for Supnah. He was weak, and Navahk manipulated him
like a strip of soggy sinew. He was not fit to be headman. "We cannot
know. We can only try to find out." With that, he turned and walked away
before he lost control of his tongue and made a statement that so
impugned the manhood of Supnah that his own life would be forfeit. If
Karana, Lonit, lana, and little Ninipik were to be found, he would have
to find them alone.

He lengthened his stride, so frustrated and angry that he was half-blind
with suppressed rage. Aar and his female ran ahead of him, noses to the
earth, tails up, cutting wide circles until, suddenly, Aar stopped dead
in his tracks.

From out of the east, a small, naked boy was stumbling toward them. The
old woman's face was black. There was not an inch of her skin, including
her eyelids and ears, that was not tattooed with swirling dots that
whirled over her features in patterns resembling the rib boning spirals
of the aurora borealis.

Lonit stared at her through a haze of exhaustion and ebbing pain. Never
had she seen such a hideous apparition. Green mold colored the woman's
brows and lashes. Repeated rinsings in urine had britt led her hair and
bleached it yellow. It fuzzed around her face like an aura of matted
spider webs upon which some animal had relieved itself. Her features
were hidden in folds of oiled, weathered skin that was full of peaks and
valleys. And out of those peaks and valleys, a chasm opened--it was the
woman's mouth. From out of the mouth poured words that Lonit could not
understand, but they were spoken in the voice of youth, not age. It was
like hearing a newborn infant cry out with a voice of an adult. Lonit
was so startled that, for an instant, she forgot the fear that had come
to her when Gulap had entered the Blood Room.

Now Gulap smiled, displaying small, tattooed teeth that had been filed
down to points--a mark of beauty among the women of the Ghost Band. She
shook a rattle over Lonit. It was a hollowed sloth's claw into which the
bones of rodents had been placed. They made small, dry clickings,
punctuating Gulap's words. As she spoke, the other women began to keen.
Gulap's smile widened.

Lonit closed her eyes. The pain was returning; it was a terrible,
strapping pain that encircled her back and belly like an invisible belt
that was being tightened and tightened until she was certain that it was
going to cut her in half. The sound of the women's low mourning seemed
to intensify the pain. They held her upright in the birth position. She
was glad for that. She was too weak to kneel alone. But she wished they
would stop their ululations. She wishedPain suddenly ripped upward into
her body as, with a brutal thrust, Gulap turned her rattle into a dagger
that entered Lonit, pierced the water-filled caul that surrounded her
baby, and pulled out. Lonit's eyes were wide as she screamed against the
violation. Only the tension of her muscles, locked in the vise grip of a
contraction, had kept the now-bloodied claw from penetrating the flesh
and bone of her baby.

Gulap spoke. Gulap shook her head. She watched Lonit protectively
recoil, violently tearing herself from the arms of the women who held
her. Aliga was closest. She looked sorrowful and repentant as she
translated Gulap's words to Lonit.

"Gulap says she will end your woman pains. Gulap says it is better that
your baby die, Gulap has seen bad omens for you: Your milk will be
poison, and your infant will be unfit to suckle from any woman's
breast."

"And so she will guarantee that by putting a hole in my baby's skull
before it can take its first breath!" Lonit glared at Gulap, wanting the
woman to know that she was not duped by her pretense to magic.

"Do not look so at the wise woman, cautioned Aliga.

"She is not wise, she is wicked! Tell her that this woman wants no part
of her help with the bearing of this baby! Tell her that Lonit has no
desire to be her brother's woman! Tell her that if she will stand aside,
Lonit will have her baby and then leave this place. With Jana and the
boy Karana, Lonit will go far and never look back!"

Aliga's head swung from side to side. "We would all go far and never
look back if we could. If Gulap were to let you go, the men of this band
would kill her."

"Tell her my words!"

Aliga shrugged and did as Lonit asked, showing no surprise when Gulap
grinned with malevolence as she spoke directly to Lonit.

Aliga translated. "Gulap says that the boy Karana has run naked into the
cold. He has been gone for a long time now and must be dead. When those
who have left the Ghost House to hunt mammoth return, they will be very
angry and will punish the hunters who were careless enough to allow such
a pretty boy to escape. Even now Liquah and Tlah look for his body. When
they find it, they will skin it. Gulap will make a dress of it for you
to wear when your bearing blood has ceased to flow. It will make the
headman smile to take you and what is left of the boy at the same time.
And in the meantime, Gulap says that Woman Of The West should not worry
about her baby. It is cursed. Male or female, it matters not. The minute
it is born, Gulap herself will take it out and feed its spirit to the
wind."

Brother Dog welcomed Karana with such enthusiasm that the boy was
knocked flat. The hunters of Supnah's band would have speared the beast
that seemed to be devouring their leader's long-lost son; but Torka
shouted "hold," and in a few moments Karana was running toward them
again, with Aar trotting happily at his side, licking at his hand while
the female dog followed, whimpering in confusion.

Never had the hunters of Supnah's band seen a boy walk with a beast as
though it were his brother. They whispered among themselves, wondering
by what magic the small, naked boy stumbled past them, with an animal
loping at his side as though its spirit were enchanted into believing
that it was a human being instead of a wild dog.

Navahk watched and listened resentfully as Karana paused before his
father and accepted the obligatory welcome from the headman of his band.
For a long time, Supnah looked at the boy with eyes that spoke of a love
that was deeper than his words could express. He put his hands upon the
child's shoulders. He called him Boy Who Follows Eagle. He wrapped him
in clothing brought quickly by other members of the band.

Karana was proud to accept the name. He was glad to be reunited with his
father. Yet there was a strange, bittersweet emptiness within his heart
where filial love should have been. Supnah had turned his back upon him
and abandoned him to the storms of the time of the long dark. On the
other hand, Torka had risked his life to face into those storms in order
to save him. It was Torka to whom he owed his loyalty now. It was Torka
to whom he turned, embracing him shamelessly, as a son embraces a
beloved father. When Torka returned his embrace and called him Little
Hunter, that childhood endearment was more welcome than the bolder name
that Supnah had given him. Boy Who Follows Eagle. He was that. But he
was also Little Hunter, and he knew that he would always be Torka's son.
And Lonit's brother.

"She lives," he said. "She cries out in childbirth, and her life is in
great danger in the most terrible place that this boy has ever seen.
This boy will take you there. Together we will bring Lonit out of the
spirit world and back into the world of the living!"

"So they are ghosts.. .." Navahk's words were half statement, half
question, spoken in a tone as soft as the finest sinew.

Somehow, as Karana paled, Torka felt a sinew noose fall around his neck
and tighten. "Look!" Karana pointt'd eastward, glad to look away from
his uncle.

Barely visible upon the distant talus slopes, two figures were trotting
toward them. They moved in the stop-and-start way of trackers, and only
the angle of the sun kept them from sighting Supnah's hunters in the
shadows of the rolling tundra.

"Ghost Men, whispered Karana.

"You cannot be sure of that," said Navahk.

The boy nodded. "Their house is there, under that long mound that looks
like a hill. They will be trailing me, I think. They would not want any
of their captives to escape to bring others back to their hiding place
or to tell others how easy it would be to kill them there. It would be
like smoking badgers. The Ghost House is a great burrow with many
tunnels and breathing vents; but the vents are very small, and there is
only one entrance. Block that, close the vents, and they would all die.

"Or stand with spears at ready at the entrance, send fire into the
vents, and then close them. They would come pouring out like the vermin
they are rather than suffocate." Torka smiled at the concept; with a few
refinements, it might work.

"Spirits are immortal. Those who would hunt them are risking their
anger," said Navahk obliquely.

"The Ghost Men have risked my anger!" Torka shot back. "And now I will
prove to you that they are men!

He asked no man to follow but commanded Karana to remain behind. With
his bludgeon and spear thrower at ready, he stalked those who sought
Karana. It did not take him long. The first man never saw the spear that
killed him. The second whirled, looking for adversaries who were not
there. When Torka showed himself, he was so far out of normal spear
range that the man threw all three of his spears, plus those of his
fallen comrade, and not one of them came close. Torka smiled when he saw
panic take the man. Now the Ghost Man was seeing a ghost.

He took his time picking up the man's spears. Slowly he gathered them,
tested their balance, and found them crude but serviceable. The Ghost
Man watched him, backing up, almost tripping over himself as he finally
turned and began to run.

Propelled by his spear hurler, Torka's spears flew like missiles, one
after the other. The first two landed ahead of the man, stopping him in
midstep as the third pierced his back, to emerge through his belly, and
two more embedded themselves in the backs of his thighs. Torka's mouth
twisted with satisfaction as, from behind him, Supnah and his men
approached, amazed by his prowess and the "magic of his spear thrower.

"No magic, he told them, and offered to fashion a spear hurler for any
man who wished to have one .. . but after they helped him to rescue his
woman. They mumbled among themselves. He barely heard them as he leaned
over the dying Ghost Man and rolled him onto his side, ignoring his
cries as pain ripped through legs, in which spears were still imbedded.
"You are no ghost," he snarled, remembering Manaak and Naknaktup and
Umak as his hand curled in the leather at the man's throat. "Tell them
what you are."

The Ghost Man's eyes bulged in his black face. Beneath the tattoos, the
skin was paling as the luster of life began to fade from his eyes.

"Tell them!" Torka insisted, shaking him, savoring the knowledge that he
roused pain.

"Man ... I am ... a man ... I am.. .."

"Soon a dead man," Karana said, jerking the spear from the man's gut,
knowing that in doing so, he disemboweled him. He would die slowly. As
Karana had suffered slowly, under this man's maulings, under his weight,
and under the terrible knowledge that this was the man who had hit Umak
from behind and thrown him into the blazing pit hut to be burned alive.
They went forward under a lowering sky. Karana led the way, glad that
Navahk had chosen to remain behind with several other men, who would
guard their women against any large flesh-eaters that might come against
them.

They were halfway to their destination in a world the color of slate
when they dropped to the ground and lay flat. Their eyes slitted against
the rising wind, they watched from the lee of a tundra! slope as armed
men emerged from the Ghost House and disappeared into one of the canyons
that cleft the base of the eastern ranges. The wind blew toward them out
of those high, glacier-choked vastnesses. The smell of ice was very
strong. Now and then, the cry of a shrieking mammoth pierced the
silence.

"They have gone to hunt the great tusked ones," said Karana. "The Ghost
House will be nearly deserted, except for a few guards and the captives.
We will steal back our women and be gone before those who hunt mammoth
can return.

Supnah eyed the horizon speculatively. "The guards .. . we will have to
kill them. This man has never killed another man.

Karana looked at his father, wondering if abandoning children to the
winter dark was not the same as killing them.

"The Ghost Men are predators of their own kind," said Torka. "By their
actions, they have made themselves prey to be hunted by other men. When
they are dead, the people of the tundra will live without fear of their
predations. To kill them ... it will be a good thing. He trembled
against a terrible resolve as he watched the last of the Ghost Men enter
the distant canyon. When they return, they will find their encampment as
I found mine, he thought. When they return, they will die .. . but not
until they see the corpses of their brothers and loved ones left for
carrion, as I have seen them leave mine.

Through low, narrow, stinking tunnels, the old woman walked and
chortled, gloating over the obscene victory that she was about to claim.

The baby in her arms was beautiful, as beautiful as its mother and as
strong. Gulap sucked at the remnants of her teeth. Her grin became a
grimace. Woman Of The West had fought for this infant like a cornered
lynx. She had scratched and bitten, and when the others had obeyed Gulap
and tried to hold her down, she had resorted to a hard, outward kick
that had caught the old woman squarely across the chin. Gulap's tongue
explored the swollen, tender area beneath her lower lip. She could taste
blood in the spongy depression where two teeth had been. Her grimace
twisted downward into an expression of hatred that made her appear even
uglier than usual.

Seated along the steamy, bone-lined tunnel that led toward the entrance
to the Ghost House, one of the guards shuddered as he watched her pass.
Would all females become as hideous as the headman's elder sister if
allowed to live past the years of their prime? He closed his eyes and
went back to dozing, sorry that he had looked up at her in the first
place.

She stalked on, her booted feet slipping a little in the ooze of the
floor. A little farther along, another man stood dozing on his feet. She
gave him an elbow jab to his ample paunch as she walked by him and
turned back, chuckling at his expense as he grabbed at his gut.

"Come! Put on your clothes! Gulap needs a man to walk ahead of her to
keep her safe from flesh eaters as she goes to offer them this useless
meat."

"A girl-child?"

"Not for long!" she exclaimed, squawking like a malevolent old bird
until the guard opened the way before her into the world above. It had
taken him only moments to slip on his surplice and loose-fitting boots.
For what she had in mind for him, he would not need to be out in the
cold for very long. He was up the ladder with all of the graceless ease
of a bear bellying up a spruce tree.

Now the cold wind struck down at her, shriveling her happiness as it
reminded her of her lost youth--for despite the heavy garments that she
had donned for her venture, she was chilled to the bone. Her filed teeth
ached deep within her gums. She clamped her small tattooed lips in a
grimace.

How many years had passed since she had been a resilient young girl
impervious to the weather? Too many! How long ago had she been a bold
and seasoned traveler mocking the slave women of the Ghost Band when
they balked at crossing an icy autumn river? Too long! When the captives
had wailed, she had flailed at them with small, hard fists, and when
they cowered naked against the cold and the ice-thickened water, begging
for their clothes, she had kicked them. Her bones would crack from such
treatment today.

Now, as the freezing, heavy wind embraced her old bones, it invaded the
loosely fitting upper portion of her tunic. Her free hand reached to
pull up her hood, then stopped. It would do no good. The cold would find
her flesh no matter how many layers of skins and furs she wore. Even
within her sleeping nest of grass and lichens in the Ghost House, with
all of her sleeping furs piled over her, she would shiver and her bones
would ache--and she would lie awake, remembering her youth and the
warmth of men who had once slept beside her. The men slept with young
captive women now. Beautiful women. And she would grind what was left of
her teeth and know that she would sleep alone until the end of her days.

"Mother .. . hand up the meat so that you may more easily climb the
ladder!"

The guard's voice cut her as deeply as the chill of the wind. Mother?
She was not that man's mother! Her reaction to his unintentional insult
warmed her, for warmth always came from anger .. . and from the pleasure
she found when inflicting pain on those who possessed the youth and
beauty she could never have again. She was suddenly no longer interested
in performing the ritual murder of the baby in her arms. It was too
young to fear her, to cower, and to show terror of her. It could but
die, bleating like a goat. But its mother? That one could warm her old
bones and take the ache from her teeth. Not through death, for Gulap
would need the permission of the headman for that. It would probably
come in time; but Gulap needed to be warm now. Impatiently, she handed
the infant up to the guard, telling him to take it far enough from the
entrance of the Ghost House so that it would not draw predators.

"Pack its mouth with snow, and its nostrils. Let it suffocate. It is a
bad death. But slap it first, so that it cries. I want its mother to
hear it scream."

He shrugged and took the child. Its life or death was of no concern to
him, but infant killing was woman's work. He silently cursed the old hag
for sending him out into the bitter wind to attend to such a demeaning
task while she returned to the warmth of the Ghost House.

As he climbed out of the mound, he could hear her chortling happily,
shaking her bloodied sloth's-claw rattle. He hoped that she would trip
and fall and impale herself on it.

Then he looked at the infant within his arms.JThe "meat" looked like its
mother. He smiled, visualizing the bloodstained tip of the sloth's-claw
rattle. He had seen Gulap use it. The mother of this child would live to
lie beneath many men, but never again would she bear meat that would be
offered to the storms.

They lay in wait. Hidden behind the mound, they let the man climb out of
the earth. He stood with his back to them, breathing in the cold, clean
air of the tundra as the wind combed through the stinking, matted
strands of his bison-skin coat. He did not turn around.

It was the last mistake in judgment that the man would ever make. Supnah
grabbed him from behind as Torka, his blood so stirred that he made no
use of the ladder, leaped down into the interior, with his spear in one
hand and his bludgeon in the other.

All along the labyrinthine corridors, the torches were flickering and
dying. The strong smell of smoke and the stink of burning hides began to
permeate the interior of the Ghost House, but try as she might, Aliga
could not open the vent to the Blood Room; it seemed to have frozen
shut.

Lonit did not care. They had taken her baby. They had exposed Torka's
child. She was a captive in an underground world where she had no hope
of ever seeing her man again. Her labor had been long and hard, but the
birth itself had been quick and without complications. Nevertheless, as
she lay upon her back, thinking of lana's horrible fate, which she would
soon share, she watched the wicks sputtering in the oil lamps and
thought: The room grows dim, but it does not matter. This woman can feel
the light of her own life going out. She closed her eyes. It will be a
good thing.

Aliga shook her. "Lonit! Listen! Do you hear voices? Far off toward the
entrance to the Ghost House. Male voices cursing in our own tongue."

The weariness of childbirth had made Lonit groggy. Compounded by the
lack of air, she was sleepy, drifting in her own thoughts, only half
hearing Aliga. "lana. Where is lana? I have not heard her baby cry. It
must be a good baby."

Aliga bit her lip. This was no time to tell Lonit that lana's baby had
not been good, that it had grown colicky and irritable when held to a
strange woman's breast. Annoyed by its fretfulness, Gulap had brained
it.

And now, suddenly, Gulap was in the room, one hand holding the hide flap
in the doorway aside, the other gripping her rattle. Slowly, she
advanced. Slowly, she jabbed upward with the bloodstained tip of the
claw, shaking it until it hissed as she spoke. No doubt assuming that
some of the hunters had returned, she ignored the sounds that poured
into the Blood Room from the various interconnected tunnels. Her eyes
were ferret bright.

"Stand aside, Aliga. Woman Of The West and Gulap will spend some time
together. With this."

Aliga stared--not at the old woman who stood, stripped naked again, as
stringy and desiccated as a wind-dried haunch of old meat, but at the
upraised tip of the hideous claw. Deep within her loins, mutilated
muscles contracted involuntarily as she recalled her own impalement and
the grunting sexual satisfaction of the tattooed hag who now stood
eyeing Lonit. Aliga's heart went out to the young woman. She was so
weak. She would be unable to fight against Gulap, and if Aliga tried to
intervene, the men would punish or even kill her. No one challenged
Gulap. Ever. She was the elder sister of the headman. She had born him
many sons. None of them would stand against her.

The old woman grinned, shaking the rattle to punctuate each step she
took toward Lonit.

"Spread her legs!" she commanded, and Aliga, sickened, moved forward and
did her bidding.

Lonit's eyes fluttered open, and she attempted to raise her head as the
hag bent before her, motioning Aliga aside. But now the old woman looked
up, startled by the sudden intrusion of one of the other female
captives.

"We will suffocate!" she gasped. "We will be smoked like fish over a
smoldering fire capped by a skin basket!"

Gulap was confused. "What are you saying?"

"Strangers have come! They have sealed the vents! Even now they run
through the tunnels, killing the guards who try to escape in search of
air. Next they will come here! They will kill us all!"

Aliga's face showed a mixture of dread and delight. "In this place we
are already dead!" she snapped, then recoiled as the hide door flap was
flung wide.

The man who forced his way through the low entryway was tall and
mad-eyed from killing. He pushed the wailing woman aside, and as she
fled, he stood staring past Gulap and Aliga to the bed of furs upon
which Lonit lay. His hair, his clothes, his strongly handsome face--all
were red with the blood of the Ghost Men. The killing end of his spear
and the long, strangely curved blade of bone that he held in one hand
were slimed with gore.

The old woman blinked, appalled and aroused by the sight of him. He was
Power. He was Death. He was the most perfect and beautiful man she had
ever seen. And she knew that he was going to kill her.

The sound that came from her throat was a half growl, half purr. As the
perfect man looked at her, she could tell by his expression that never
in his life had he seen a more hideous woman.

His revulsion struck deep into her pride. Her heart was beating hard,
fast. Old. Gulap is old. Old. Old. Her heart hammered the word again and
again until it shrieked out of her mouth, and in a leap of loathing, she
flew at the man, slashing out at him with the rattle, wanting to ruin
the beauty of his face, to destroy his youth and his life with the
deadly claw.

He feinted to one side and sent her stumbling past him. She wheeled and
came at him again, still shrieking. The pointed tip of her sloth's-claw
rattle raked his shoulder, drawing blood as it pierced the layers of his
sleeve and the flesh beneath. He tripped her, and she fell in a
twitching heap, her heart bleeding as it beat its last faltering rhythm
around the claw that had become imbedded within it. Aliga was so
lightheaded with terror that she was certain she was going to faint.
Gulap was dying. In a moment, her own life would end. The stranger was
moving toward her. To her amazement, she did not want to die. Noting
that his dark, wide eyes were upon Lonit now, she swallowed hard and
launched herself to stand between him and the weakened girl.

"No!" she cried, surprised at her own courage, which caused her to
remain, feet planted firmly, between the exhausted young woman and the
death-dealing stranger. "You will not touch Aliga's sister!" she told
him, wishing that she were not trembling so, hoping that her almost
complete nudity would not provoke him to rape as well as murder.

His eyes took measure of her. He saw her fear, but he also saw her
bravery. Slowly the killing madness bled out of his expression. His
hands relaxed upon his weapons. "Do not shiver so, Aliga. Your 'sister'
is my woman. No harm will come to her, or to you, from Torka. He moved
past her to kneel beside Lonit's bed of jumbled skins and furs. He put
aside his weapons and tentatively touched her face, whispering her name
as though he feared to speak it lest she vanish.

Her hands moved to fold over his as life welled up within her and
flickered within her eyes. "Torka?"

He drew her carefully into an embrace and held her as though the
substance of his own life was dependent upon her.

"It is so, he said, kissing her, breathing the warmth of his life
through his nostrils into hers, and joined with her, mouth to mouth,
life to life. "We are one," he whispered when the kiss was done. "Torka
and Lonit .. . one life. Forever .. ."

The men of Supnah's band emerged from the Ghost House in silence,
sobered by what they had done--neither rejoicing nor lamenting the fact
that they had slain others of their own kind. They left the bodies of
the marauders where they lay and led the once-captive women to freedom.

Torka carried Lonit in his arms as Kararta came to them. "Look! cried
the boy, ecstatic, holding up a tiny bundle. "Karana has taken good care
of her for Torka and Lonit! But now she is hungry, and this boy cannot
feed her!"

Lonit sobbed with relief as Karana eagerly placed her tiny daughter into
her arms. Torka looked at the infant and saw that she had her mother's
antelope eyes. He wanted to smile and be glad, but for the moment he
could feel nothing. There was a dark, cold emptiness expanding within
him. It stank of the blood of the men whom he had killed.

The baby fussed at Lonit's breast. Fatigue and stress had combined to
keep her milk from flowing. Aliga came near, bundled in furs now to
protect her from the bite of the wind. She reached up, offering to take
the infant to lana to be nursed.

"In time, Lonit's milk will flow. For now, let lana suckle it. Perhaps,
by feeding your child, lana will also be fed."

Neither Lonit nor Torka understood Aliga's words until their infant was
placed into lana's embrace. Her sad, now vacant eyes brightened. Her
haggard face eased into a radiant smile. She cooed. She crooned. She put
the child to her breast, kissing its tender brow, calling it Ninipik and
"little son."

"Where is Manaak's child?" asked Torka.

While Lonit closed her eyes and buried her head in Torka's shoulder,
Aliga came to answer his question. "So many spirits walk the wind...."

"Too many," replied Torka, his voice as bleak and hostile as the land
around him. "And more will follow before this day is done."

They took the women back to where Navahk and the others awaited their
return, and when the captives told them of what they had endured, there
was not a man in Supnah's band who did not agree with Torka that their
hunt was not over. As long as any Ghost Men remained alive, all their
own lives were in jeopardy.

Only Navahk stood back from the others, observing Torka as he sat with
Karana and the dogs, refitting the end of his spear with a new point.
"For whom do you hunt, Man Who Walks With Dogs? For the good of all, or
for yourself?"

Torka did not hesitate. "I hunt the Ghost Men for Manaak, and for a dead
child with whom he walks the wind. I hunt the Ghost Men for Naknaktup, a
brave old woman who dared to turn her back upon her people for love of
an even braver old man. I hunt the Ghost Men for Umak, who was father of
my father and master of my spirit. I hunt the Ghost Men for lana, for
Aliga, for Lonit, and for my daughter who has yet to be given a name, so
that never again need they fear that 'ghosts' will come in the night to
murder their people and steal them away into slavery. I hunt the Ghost
Men for Karana, so that no boy may ever again suffer at their hands. And
I hunt for Torka. Yes. Because I need to hunt them. For myself."

They devised a plan for their man hunt. They would go out in several
groups, each scouting the exact whereabouts of the Ghost Men. Once
found, they would gather into a single force, surround their prey, and
kill them all. The Ghost Men would be absorbed in their mammoth hunt,
killing or butchering, totally unaware that others of their own kind
pursued them.

Supnah named the men who would stay behind to protect the encampment of
women. Karana was told to remain with them and to make certain that the
dogs made no trouble; the animals made most of the women nervous. The
boy pouted and openly showed his disappointment, insisting that both he
and the dogs would be of help to the hunters. Neither Torka nor Supnah
would hear another word from him. They told him that they planned to
walk into danger and would not put his life at risk.

"We leave some of our bravest hunters here," said Supnah, attempting to
soothe the boy's feelings. "Our women must have strong men to guard
them. Karana will be one of these. And Navahk, too. It will be a good
thing for Karana to be with his father's brother again. Learn from
Navahk. He has much to teach us all."

Karana seethed with frustration while Aar nuzzled his hand to offer
comfort. Navahk was a tall, smiling figure in white, staring after the
departing hunters with unblinking eyes as they walked away and gradually
disappeared into the distance.

"Navahk will make the magic to make us strong upon the hunt," said
Supnah to Torka as they strode out together.

"Our numbers and the many fine spears that Supnah's men carry will make
us strong," replied Torka. He could not have said why he wanted no part
of Navahk's magic.

At the edges of the encampment of women, Karana looked up at Navahk and
experienced the old, instinctive fear and distrust of the man and his
ever-present, insidious smile. If Navahk saw the boy, he gave no sign of
it. He did not move. He kept on staring. He kept on smiling. The wind
was hard out of the east now, cold and acrid with the smell of ice, of
rotting stone, and of distant groves of spruce. Navahk did not flinch as
it blew against him. It whipped the long, white fringe of his sleeves.
It lifted the single winter-white flight feather of an Arctic owl that
he always wore braided into the forelock of his waist-length black hair.
It rippled in the thick, silken white caribou skins of his surplice and
leg gins

Karana shivered against the deep, threatening ugliness that he had
always sensed lurking beneath the exterior beauty of the magic man.
"Navahk .. . why do you smile?" he pressed, half-afraid to speak the
question, yet knowing that he must.

Navahk's smile deepened as he looked down at Karana. "Why does Karana
think that I smile?"

Karana's eyes were caught in those of the magic man. In deep, black,
bottomless sinks, Karana's mind waded as though through pitch. He sank,
choking, fighting for breath as, suddenly, within the strangling
darkness, light exploded. Vision swam, like sunlight reflecting off
huge, towering walls of ice. It was a miles-high world of ice, and in
that world, a sound reverberated, such as the boy had never heard: a
screaming, a roaring, a trumpeting. And suddenly the ice was falling,
breaking apart as the vision itself shattered. "Karana knows. Karana
sees. The son of my brother's woman, of the woman who would have been
mine had I been headman .. . knows that he is of my flesh ... he sees
the world through my eyes .. . and what he sees betrays the truth of his
birth to all but Supnah, who is a fool who sees nothing!"

Karana stared, still trapped in Navahk's eyes. In his father's eyes. He
felt sick, confused, betrayed. "You left me to walk the wind!"

"Thereby breaking my brother's spirit! I command the band through his
mouth. Only for your sake has Supnah ever been strong enough to stand
against my will--your sake and your mother's. It was good that she died!
It will be good when your spirit joins hers. I have seen your death,
Karana. That is why I smile."

The boy stepped back, aghast, unable to speak.

The smile was back upon Navahk's face. His eyes strayed once more to the
eastern ranges. "The canyons entered by the hunters will lead them to
the Corridor of Storms. It is a place of death from which no man has
ever returned. Supnah and his hunters will turn back, but Torka will
die. I have heard his death in the roar of the thunder." Turning, Navahk
reached out to close his fingers upon Karana's shoulder, the fingers
curling inward, deliberately rousing pain as his eyes focused upon the
boy with purely raptorial intent. "You will die with him--you who should
never have been born. Navahk will share his magic with no one!"

Karana wrenched himself free. The magic man reached out to grab him
again, but Aar's warning growl stayed his hand.

"I have seen your death, Navahk continued. "And Torka's. In the face of
the rising sun .. . beyond an endless corridor of ice and storm, you
will all die."

Karana was suddenly angry. "We will all die. Someday. But not today if
this boy can help it!" He wheeled then and tried not to think of
Navahk's smile as he raced eastward across the tundra with Aar at his
side and Sister Dog loping close behind.

Distance was deceptive upon the tundra, but the carelessly laid trail of
the Ghost Men was not. It led them into the neck of the canyon, deep
into a cold, wind-scoured cleft of land between two southeasterly
aligned mountain ranges. Through groves of spruce and alder, they moved
in silence, as far ahead the distressed cries of mammoths called them
on.

It was a dark, high-walled territory--intimidating to men born and bred
on the open tundra. Above the bare, black bones of the mountain, massive
glacial lobes extended downward from the heights. Torka cringed,
recalling the terrifying collapse of the glacier that had capped the
Mountain of Power, but he could hear the voices of the Ghost Men now, as
well as the cries of mammoths. He went on. For Umak, for Manaak--for all
of those who had died at the end of the Ghost Men's spears and for all
of those who had been degraded by them--he would not allow himself to be
afraid.

The canyon widened ahead, then forked suddenly in several directions.
They took the most promising one, advancing more quickly now as they
were drawn forward by the catcalls and hoots of the Ghost Men. They were
very near. The adult mammoth screamed, and the sound echoed in and out
of the intricate convolutions of the canyon. They took a few more steps,
then stopped dead, knowing that they had taken the wrong turn. The
mammoth's cries were behind them now. Nevertheless, they did not move.
They were too stunned by what lay ahead.

The world spread wide before them. Never in their lives could they have
imagined the staggering dimensions of the landscape that lay ahead.
Below them, the mountains fell away to merge with a wide swath of
undulating tundra) plain, It ran eastward into infinity, between the
leading edges of two glacial masses that appalled their senses--two
continent spanning ice sheets. The majority of the moisture of all the
seas, rivers, and oceans on earth lay frozen two miles thick within
their monstrous vastness.

"The Mountains That Walk ..." whispered Supnah in awe.

His men murmured softly, reverently. The wind blew toward them out of
the east, across distances too huge for men to conjure; but somehow
Torka conjured them as his eyes roamed out over that miles-wide ribbon
of tundra) plain that cut due east between the ice sheets. Thick with
the first new grass of spring, it rippled in the wind like the fur of a
green animal, and upon its skin other animals were grazing. Distance
made it impossible for him to identify their species, but clearly that
broad, glacier-walled avenue of tundra was rich with game.

Supnah followed Torka's gaze and shook his head with warning. "The
Corridor of Storms is a bad place. No man may- hunt there."

"Not even Torka! panted a breathless Parana. Torka was startled to see
him, and annoyed. He admonished him for following when he had been told
to stay behind. The boy gulped an apology, then blurted, "This boy had
to warn you! Navahk has said that bad things will happen if Torka
follows the mammoths into the Corridor of Storms."

Kuranas words shadowed even- man within the hunting party. They eyed him
and the dogs dubiously, until they were distracted by the renewed cries
of the mammoths and the taunting of the Ghost Men.

"Navahk has not seen with a clear eye," Torka said. "The mammoths call
us away from the Corridor of Storms, not into it."

Supnah's men were glad to turn back to their purpose. Karana was told to
stay close as they reentered the canyon and followed the x-oices of the
Ghost Men into the correct fork. It led them to a small valley ringed by
sharply defined cliffs. A tiny spruce-lined lake lax- at the base of
these encircling walls, and in the lake, a spear-riddled mammoth calf
lay dead, mired up to its shoulders in the icy sludge of the
treacherous, flax-like loam that layered the lake bottom. The Ghost Men
stood arrayed along one of the ridges that partially jutted into the
lake. They were just out of reach of the exhausted mammoth cow that
raged at them as she smashed her body against the rock in a hopeless
effort to get at them. They mimicked and mocked her and hacked at her
mutilated trunk with daggers as she tried to sweep them off the ridge.
Several spears protruded from her bloodied flanks. Nearby, at the
opposite side of the lake, a frightened adolescent mammoth swayed and
cried pathetically from a grove of spruce trees while its mother
continued her attempt to drive off the men who had killed her baby.

There was something indescribably touching about this besieged little
family of mammoths. The cow and adolescent could easily have escaped
their tormentors, but the cow refused to abandon her calf even though it
lay dead; and the adolescent cried and called with fright as though it
were a human child. Mother! Sfo/;." Come away! Before it is too late!

The exhausted cow cried back in a vain attempt at consolation, then
called as though petitioning for help from others of her own kind who
might be within hearing distance. Stumbling, she nearly fell into the
lake herself as she sobbed and gasped in impotent fun-, ignoring her own
wounds as she continued her attempts to drive the calf killers from the
ledge.

Then, suddenly, as Aar growled and Sister Dog whimpered, the cow stopped
and turned. The world shook. Thunder rent the sky. But it was not
thunder. It was a great and terrible roaring as, from yet another branch
of the canyon, a bull mammoth pounded into the valley.

Its shoulders touched the sky, and the top of its head was in the clouds
as it stopped, observing the scene that met its small, red eyes. It was
breathing hard. How far it had come, how long it had run, no man could
have said, for, as was the way of its kind and gender, it had been
ranging alone since it had last cast its shadow upon the lives of men.

It was the Destroyer. It was Thunder Speaker. It was World Shaker. It
was the beast of Torka's nightmares. In disbelief, the Ghost Men stared
as Death charged them full speed. The cow had been unable to reach them,
but as they scrambled for their lives, the giant bull plucked them off
the ridge and hurled them high against the cliffs. They broke, screaming
and spurting blood from ears, mouths, and noses as they crashed to the
ground. Some were dead when they landed. Others lay stunned or screaming
as Death ground them into the earth, screaming back at them in a
trumpeting rage that obliterated the panicked cries of Supnah and his
men as they raced for safety through an offshoot canyon too narrow to
allow the great bull to follow.

Only Torka stood immobile, transfixed, watching as the Destroyer
comforted the cow. Its mate? Yes. Torka was certain of it. After the
killing was done, the bull huffed softly, consoling, caressing, snapping
off the offending spears with its great trunk; then it soothed the
wounds, scooping clay from the lake and packing the wounds with its long
snout until the blood ceased to flow. Together, with infinite tenderness
and soft buffings of affection the pair touched the adolescent and drew
it from its hiding place within the spruce grove. They went to the lake,
then stood swaying as they called to the lifeless calf. With its vast
tusks extended, the bull reached out and beneath the limp, bloodied
infant, levered up, lifted it from the muck, and laid it upon the
embankment.

"Torka!" A terrified and almost infinitely brave Karana had come back
into the little valley. He tugged hard at Torka's sleeve as he rasped an
imploring whisper. "What is the matter with you? Come! Supnah and his
hunters have taken the high ground all along the canyon wall to the
west. If the beast tries to follow, it will lodge itself in the narrows.
Before it can back out, we can kill it! Its meat will last us forever!"

Torka's hands were closed tightly around the hafts of his spear and
bludgeon. He tested their weight against the merit of the boy's words.
Karana was right. It could be done. Yet now, as at last the moment
arrived when he knew that he could avenge himself upon the Destroyer, he
wanted no part of its death. The giant mammoth was not a mindless
marauder but a creature capable of the same deep emotions as he. Indeed,
the beast was no more of a beast than Torka-and less so than Galeena or
any of the Ghost Band.

But it was too late for reflection upon the virtues of the great
mammoth. It had picked up his scent and those of the boy and the dog who
had followed. The Destroyer's head went up. Its ears oared forward.

"Run!" Torka commanded Karana.

Together, with Aar beside them, they fled, racing for survival, knowing
that if they could reach the narrow canyon where Supnah and the others
waited on the heights, they would be safe.

Halfway there, Karana's weak leg gave out. He fell, stunned, his mind
filled with Navahk's smiling visions of death until Torka wheeled back,
scooped him up, and ran on. The moment of compassion had cost him. The
mammoth was nearly on them. In desperation, he made for the nearest rock
face and lifted Karana high.

"Climb, Little Hunter! Climb for your life!"

He turned, knowing that he was all that stood between Karana and death.
The light that burns behind a man's eyes when death is near was white
hot behind his own. There was a strange thrumming within his ears.
Beyond it, he heard Aar's savage barking as the dog ran circles around
the mammoth, attempting to distract it as he ran between its limbs,
leaping up and snarling. The mammoth demonstrated an amazing grace as it
flicked the dog away with a backward movement of its enormous foot. The
dog cried out and fell in a heap.

"Brother Dog, we will run together upon the wind," called Torka, knowing
that in the next moment he would follow the valiant dog into the world
of spirits. Truly they would be brothers forever.

He stood his ground and hefted his weapons. He called back over his
shoulder for Karana to climb. Climb! One bludgeon and one spear were all
that stood between him and the realm that Torka and Aar would soon walk
together.

"Come!" he called to the mammoth. "Thunder Speaker! World Shaker! He Who
Parts the Clouds and destroys the lives of men, Torka is not afraid to
die!"

What happened next seemed to occur within a dream, within a heartbeat.
And yet the telling of it would last for generations. The man held his
weapons steady, staring into the eyes of the beast. The mammoth paused.
Perhaps in that moment the Destroyer remembered the bold hunter whom it
had once left to die in the snow. Perhaps it scented no stench of the
Ghost Men who had slain its calf. Or perhaps in the great and legendary
wisdom of its species, the mammoth saw in the man one who shared its own
great heart, one who would risk himself to save the life of even the
smallest member of his own kind.

Whatever the great beast saw, whatever it sensed, it stood for a long
time before, at last, it turned away. Something walked within the ebbing
night. Something huge. Something silent. Something no longer terrible.
It moved within a shadowed valley, and while the people of Supnah's band
rejoiced that the Ghost Band was no more, Torka climbed to the heights
of the canyon and looked down, sharing the grief of the great mammoth as
it mourned its dead calf.

He stayed in that place until the day was done and another day was being
born. Karana joined him, with Lonit, to bring him the good news that Aar
had not left the world of the living to become a spirit.

"Hrmmph! Brother Dog is too smart to be killed by a mammoth! He was
bruised and his pride was hurt, but while we were hunting the Ghost Men,
Sister Dog was having a litter of pups. Aar has his own band now! And
Karana has many dog brothers and sisters. It is a good thing! Umak would
be glad!"

Torka nodded. Yes. The old man would be glad .. . especially to see how
the boy was emulating him. Not only in gestures and patterns of speech
but in subtler, deeper ways. Navahk also saw it--there was a power
within the child. He would be a spirit master someday, and a greater
magic man than Navahk could ever hope to be. Navahk .. . Torka did not
like the man ... or trust him. He had empty eyes, as though his spirit
had already flown from them to walk upon the wind.

Lonit cuddled close to her man. She held their tiny daughter to her
breast, suckling her within the garments of fur that Supnah's women had
shared with her. She pointed off, down into the valley where, with
heartbreaking tenderness, the mammoths were laying spruce boughs across
the body of the dead calf. "It is as though they were people," she
whispered sadly.

Torka nodded. She was right. The mammoths were like people. Better than
most people he had ever known.

The dawn was clear and cold. Supnah was approaching them. "Come," he
beckoned. "The band readies to move on. We will hunt bison to the west."

The words washed through Torka's mind as he rose. The mammoths were
leaving the little valley. Slowly they walked into the light of the
rising sun, heading eastward out of the can von and into the Corridor of
Storms. Torka could see it clearly from the heights. The sun shed its
light straight down the tundral avenue. He could see game grazing in the
distance. Overhead, wheeling above the glacial vastnesses, flocks of
wild fowl were flying toward the sun.

He was suddenly trembling. "There is a new world out there, in the face
of the rising sun. We will follow the game there, to the east. We will
not go back."

Supnah looked as though Torka had struck him. "But no man has ever dared
venture into the Corridor of Storms! Death awaits those who journey into
the unknown."

A sweet sense of calm filled Torka, as though an old friend had suddenly
returned from the spirit world to stand beside him and speak through his
mouth. "Umak says that a hunter must face into the light. Only by facing
death may his spirit overcome it.

The baby made soft sounds of contentment as it drew life from Lonit's
breast. She stood close to her man and looked back, westward to a world
that had brought only darkness to her spirit and then forward, into the
dawn, into a new world that was filled with light. "This woman is not
afraid," she said boldly.

"Nor is this boy," vowed Karana as he smiled, suddenly understanding the
vision that he had shared with Navahk. It had not been a vision of
death. It had been a promise of rebirth, a vision of a new life in a new
land ... in the face of the rising sun .. . beyond the Corridor of
Storms.

Far below them, the great mammoth led his family onto the greening
tundra that lay between the glaciers. It seemed to Torka that, for the
moment, the largest of the threesome lifted and moved its trunk as
though beckoning the man to follow. Torka raised his arm. The mammoth
trumpeted. It was a sound that shook the world. Torka smiled, saluting
the great beast who had allowed him his life and defined his future.

"This man will go forward into the dawn, he said to Supnah, knowing at
last that his dreams had been more than dreams. Behind him, to the west,
the world was a hostile, hungry place, with half the year in light and
half the year in darkness. But ahead, to the east, the sun was rising
over herds of game and greening tundra. He would lead his people there,
into the dawn, following not the Destroyer but Life Giver, into that
warm, bright hunting ground out of which the sun was born.

Into the new world.

Author's Note

This work of fiction has been carefully and painstakingly researched and
is based on evidence found by archaeologists, paleontologists, and
paleoanthropologists.

The author would like to thank particularly the staff at the George C.
Page Museum for their assistance and to praise once again the editorial
skills and insight of Laurie Rosin, whose patience and suggestions
helped guide and shape the project from the beginning. Grateful thanks
also go to Kathy Halverson, Book Creations's research librarian, for her
sleuthing on my behalf and for the many gems of documentation that she
sent my way. To all the team at Book Creations, whose talents were set
to smoothing Torka's way into the New World, thank you. Thanks to Reva
Robins, librarian, for her assistance and interest in the project and
for the loan of Asen Balikei's extraordinary work, The Netsilik Eskimo,
published for the American Museum of Natural History, The Natural
History Press, 1970.

Grateful thanks also go to Knud Rasmussen for recording his observations
of his Thule Expeditions and to the Smithsonian Institution for honoring
the pioneering ethnographic fieldwork of Edward William Nelson by
reissuing his magnificent monograph, first published in the Eighteenth
Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, 1896-97, "The Eskimo
About Bering Strait."

The debate over exactly when Man first entered the Americas continues to
rage, but most archaeologists do agree that Homo sapiens came out of
Siberia, hunted and gathered their way across a land bridge that now
lies beneath the Bering Strait, and eventually migrated southward to
people both the North and South American continents. Recent finds in
Brazil have been dated to 32,000 years of age. Farther north, the vast
ice sheets of the Pleistocene all but obliterated any telltale signs of
humanity that can be proven to be older than 15,000 to 20,000 years; but
we must not forget that the Epoch of Ice lasted for over two million
years, and at least four times within that period the great continental
ice sheets grew to smother the world, then melted again, as they arc now
in our time.

And who can say that the interval of warmth that we now enjoy is not
only a breath of time between the coming and going of the Ages of Ice?
Perhaps our cities and civilizations may one day be buried and scoured
into oblivion. Perhaps, millennia from now, Homo futuri ens will pick
through the debris of glacial scree in search of our bones and pottery
fragments even as we now search the ruins of yesterday's epochs in
search of even the smallest proof that once, at the dawn of time, a man
whose name might well have been Torka led people out of Asia into a new
world to become the first Americans.

BEYOND THE SEA OF ICE would never have been written if Lyle Kenyon Engel
had not given this author the inspiration and the confidence to write
it.

As the producer of the KENT FAMILY CHRONICLES, WA CONS WEST, STAGECOACH,
WHITE INDIAN, and SAGA OF THE SOUTHWEST Series, to name but a few,
Lyle's love of Americana was absolute. He had long envisioned a series
of novels that would chronicle the lives of the first Americans, those
unknown men and women of antiquity who followed the great herds of the
Pleistocene out of Asia, across the Bering land bridge, to people the
New World.

Torka's story is my invention, as are the characters and all the meat
that goes onto the bones of a plot before it can qualify as a tale
worthy of telling, but Lyle's enthusiasm for the subject matter was the
driving force behind the construction.

BEYOND THE SEA OF ICE is as much his novel as it is mine. The initial
concept was his. As early as 1979, he had the name of his hero. And
because his love of animals equaled his love of Americana, he had the
name of the first dog to be domesticated by man: Aar.

In an increasingly complex and callous world, Lyle Ken yon Engel was
more than an agent and more than a producer of fiction novels. He was,
as one of his authors so aptly called him, the Maestro, orchestrating
the creation of books that have brought, and continue to bring, joy to
millions of readers around the world.

Lyle, I hope that BEYOND THE SEA OF ICE is one of them. I hope that it
is one of the best! And if it is, I thank you for giving me the chance
to write it.

William Sarabande Fawnskin, California