“It was. We are married now.”
“Where is Hero?”
They had forgotten him! “We went to the top,” Keeper said. “There was a big white bear. Hero distracted it so we could get back safely. Then—”
“And he’s not back?” Haven tied the boat behind the other, and drew it to the bank.
“He was giving us time,” Crenelle said. “He should return soon.” But she was looking nervous again. “This passage—it’s the bear’s trail.”
“Then we had better go elsewhere,” Rebel said from the third boat. “After we make sure Hero is all right.”
Craft and Harbinger were already stepping from the boats and checking their spears.
“I don’t know how well spears will work,” Keeper said. “The passage winds around, and there’s not much room at the sides.”
“Better than arrows, I think,” Craft said.
There did not seem to be a better course of action. Keeper fetched his own spear. “Whitepaw is with him. He hoped to lead the bear astray, then follow us back. I know the way; I’ll lead.”
They let him. He felt guilty for leaving Hero there, though it was what seemed best. He forged along the winding passage, his hands against the walls for guidance in the gloom, wishing it could have been done some other way. Had he been having sex with Crenelle while his brother died?
Then Whitepaw came bounding up. He knew her by her sound. That meant that Hero was close behind. “Hero!” Keeper called. “Are you all right?”
“I’m not sure,” his brother’s voice came back.
“The bear—is it after you?”
“No, I don’t think so. I don’t hear it.”
It was fairly dark now, which would make it hard to see, apart from the twists of the passage. “You aren’t injured?”
“I think I can’t see.”
Keeper didn’t like the sound of that. “You are hurt in the eyes?”
“No. Maybe it’s just too dark.”
“I have a torch,” Craft said, coming up behind. He had lit one, and its light flared brightly.
Soon Hero stood in the illumination. “Can you see this?” Craft asked.
“By the smell, you have a torch. I don’t see it.”
Hero was looking in the wrong direction. He was indeed blind. What had happened?
“Was it bright out there?” Harbinger asked from farther back.
“Brilliant,” Keeper said. “Crenelle and I had to shade our eyes from it.”
“I heard of a man who spent too much time in the sun in winter,” Harbinger said. “The brightness got in his eyes, and he couldn’t see for several days.”
“That must be it,” Hero said. “I looked all over, leading that bear, to be sure I didn’t step in a crevasse or off a cliff. I tried to squint, but the brightness hurt. I ignored it and led the bear away from the tunnel. Then I circled around and returned to the tunnel, but I couldn’t see it. Whitepaw led me to it. Then I was all right, because I could feel the sides.”
“We must get you home,” Craft said.
“I’m not injured. I just can’t see.”
“You won’t be much good in combat or on a hunt if we don’t get you home where you can get better,” Craft pointed out.
They reversed course and led Hero the rest of the way back. The women had the boats packed and ready. They got in and shoved off. There was no point in waiting for the bear to arrive.
The trip by torchlight was relatively swift, because they were going downstream. Keeper wasn’t easy about the prospect of entering the sea at night, but it did seem best to get Hero home as soon as possible, so he could rest and recover in safety.
But as they reached the open water of the river, they were buffeted by strong winds, and the water got rough. “There’s a storm!” Harbinger said.
They wanted no part of that! They turned the boats and paddled back upstream, getting away from the storm. They would have to spend another night under the ice after all.
“We don’t need to go home because of me,” Hero said. “I can paddle well enough, and do other things, as long as someone tells me where. It’s easy, here in the boat.” Indeed, he was doing most of the moving of the boat, while Keeper guided it by paddling on one side or the other.
“You’re right,” Crenelle said reassuringly.
Maybe it was better this way. Hero back home would have to be largely idle, and he wouldn’t like that. Here in the boat or in the gloom of a tunnel, he was at less of a disadvantage. If Harbinger was right, the blindness would last only a few days.
“We can make camp at another ice cave,” Keeper said. “Now we know how the ice protects us from a storm. It’s better than a lean-to. We can fish, extending our supply of meat. It should not be difficult.”
“It should not be difficult,” Crenelle agreed. She smiled at him, and he realized that she was thinking of more than camping. They were, after all, married now.
Mankind did not make it to North America 20,000 years ago. The ice was impassable, considering the technology of the time. The melt described would have been a fringe effect limited to summer. As it was, human penetration to North America proper may have been a fairly close call, as mentioned in the forenote, because as the ice age ended and the continental ice shelves retreated, the melt from them returned to the sea, raising it to its present level and covering Beringia with water. Perhaps only the easternmost fringe of mankind’s population remained in Alaska as the sea rose year by year to inundate the plain. That fringe probably followed an extending ice-free corridor between the Laurentide ice sheet that covered most of Canada and the Cordilleran ice sheet that covered the western fringe of Canada and the southern fringe of Alaska. This corridor was just east of the Rocky Mountain range, and may have been ten to fifty miles wide and a thousand miles long.
The evidence of human passage is scant; in fact, were it not for the incontrovertible indication that human beings did make it to North America, the balance of evidence would have indicated that no such passage was made. As it was, it must have been swift, with perhaps a small band moving through in as little as a year, leaving no traces. It was no easy passage; they might have followed the Yukon River east, then had to cross the Mackenzie Mountains to reach the lee side, then bear south between the endless glaciers. It could have been a migration of desperation, through a channel providing little sustenance. Perhaps enemy tribes cut off their return to the more fertile lowlands of central Alaska, so they had to go forward into the unknown, or starve. So they gambled that the corridor did not lead to oblivion. Until that tribe emerged below, and discovered a world more wonderful than any imagined. It was surely one of the more remarkable breakthroughs of human existence. The rest is prehistory.
But there are mysteries beyond this. There is growing evidence of human occupation of South America dating from before the ice sheets retreated, and some evidence of scattered North American sites. Where did these people come from, if not from Beringia? The obstacles to passage before the ice-free corridor opened are so formidable that it is difficult to believe that any human colonization could have occurred. A boat culture might have done it, staying to the shoreline and not penetrating to the continental interior. Maybe a bad storm blew those boats far enough south to find the end of the ice, and they were unable to return to tell their fellows. Or perhaps the ice-free corridor opened at prior times, briefly, allowing a trace leakage of human beings. Neither of these prospects seems likely. Yet if the evidence of earlier settlement holds up, some such explanation will be necessary. At present it is a mystery that archaeologists would dearly like to resolve. The best present lead is from cores drilled in the continental shelf off the Queen Charlotte Islands along the west coast of Canada. These cores show that this area, which is now more than 450 feet below sea level, was above water 14,600 years ago. There was a wide flat corridor leading south, with herbs and pine trees. So this made human passage much easier. This could account for the presence of people along the coasts of Amer
ica more than a thousand years before conventional dates. But the evidence is that there was ice across Alaska throughout this period, as shown in the story. How was that passed? Perhaps there were a few islands off the lowered coast that the ice could not reach, so that at certain times boats could hop from one to another, until they reached the Pacific corridor. The southward progress of such boat people might have been a mere intermittent trickle, compared to the later land corridor trek, but it might have happened. The key is surely associated with Beringia in some manner, for the immensity of the Pacific Ocean makes a more southern crossing even less probable. Like the fabled Atlantis, Beringia existed long ago, and sank beneath the sea, a victim of climate change. Unlike Atlantis, it was real.
6
HUNT
Fifteen thousand years ago, Africa was similar to the way it is now, though in the intervening millennia it was warmer and wetter. Mankind had spread throughout the continent, just as it had through the rest of the world, except perhaps for the Americas. The ice age had not ended, but was slowly weakening.
Between the shrunken rain forest and the expanded desert was the broad savanna. Nomadic tribes crossed this, looking for sustenance. The setting is central Africa south of the Sahara. At this time the size of stone implements was decreasing toward what is called the microliths, or much smaller blades. This was not because anyone ran out of stone, or made smaller weapons or tools, or hunted smaller animals, but because they were learning how to make better use of smaller stone chips that would otherwise have been wasted. They dulled the reverse edges so they wouldn’t slice the wrong things, and mounted them in wood. In this manner they could put one, two, three or more microliths in a single tool, and have a better instrument. They could make a sickle, or an adze, or spear with special projecting barbs, more efficient for its specialized task. This was another aspect of the technology that spread across Europe, Asia and Africa.
Chapter 1 ended with a decision to be made: would Hero marry Crenelle, accepting the implication that he had raped her? The following chapters pursued the consequences of his refusal. This chapter follows his life the other way: he did marry her, and his siblings joined them and remained in Africa instead of traveling into Eurasia. Five years have passed in their lives since Chapter 1.
“Daddy play.”
Hero woke to the voice of his daughter. Tour was four years old, and the cutest girl in the tribe. He could never say no to her.
He sat up. Crenelle was outside the hut; he heard her working there. He had overslept, though he had no excuse; it had been several days since the last hunt.
Tour was holding a top. It was a rounded chip of wood, a knot, pointed on one end. She liked to watch it spin, but her little hands were not as strong as his; he could make it spin much faster and longer.
He got down beside her, took the top, and turned it rapidly between his spread hands. It dropped to the hard earth floor and stood there, whirling firmly. Tour watched it, her eyes large and bright, her black hair straggling across her dark face as she concentrated. She just loved the motion. He in turn loved seeing her while she was fascinated. His fascination was with her fascination.
The top slowed and wobbled. Tour was just as interested in this aspect. Her tongue touched her lips as she focused. Hero wasn’t sure what it was about the motion that so intrigued her, but it was enough to know that it did.
The top finally fell on its side, rolled a bit, and stopped. “Dead,” Tour said solemnly.
That was what she thought? No wonder she preferred to make it live. He picked it up again and gave it another spin. She could watch it as long as he could animate it.
Playing with his daughter always reminded him of her mother. Crenelle liked to play with an object of similar size, but it wasn’t wood. Indeed, from it had come the child, in a manner of thinking. Crenelle had insisted on being raped, and though that was counter to his family’s way, he had finally compromised by letting her tell her tribe he had raped her, the first time. She in turn compromised by not telling that to his tribe. It had been a small sacrifice that brought him great reward. He loved Crenelle, for all that she was the one who had chosen him, on the basis of his hunting prowess, rather than his choosing her. She entertained him endlessly on the bed, and was competent to handle the foraging and household chores, and of course she had brought him Tour.
Crenelle entered the room. “Craft is coming,” she said.
“Uncle Craft!” Tour said happily. He had made the top for her. Maybe he was bringing another.
Crenelle went back out, to tell Craft to go on in. For reasons Hero did not follow, she normally remained well clear of his brother.
Hero gave the top one more spin, and stood, awaiting his brother. Craft had been checking on a potentially awkward situation, and was surely coming to report.
Craft entered. He glanced at the child. “I’ll go out!” Tour said, quick to catch the hint. She knew when adult business was happening. She picked up the precious top and dashed out.
“The chief died this morning,” Craft said. “He designated Bub to be the next chief.”
“That must not be,” Hero said. “Bub resents our family, and will do us mischief the moment he has power.”
“True. But if no one contests it, he will take the office once the burial ritual is done.”
“What are we to do?”
“I talked with Rebel. She said you have to contest for it. If you are chief, we will have no problem.”
“But Bub won’t fight me. He knows he’ll lose.”
“I talked to Keeper. He said there’s another way.”
“How can I fight a man who won’t fight me?”
“By going on a challenge hunt. If you go out alone, with just one man as your second, and succeed really well, the elders will have to designate you as chief instead. Because it is supposed to be the bravest and strongest man of the tribe, not just the one the old chief favored.”
“But who would be my second?” Hero asked. “Most of the men are afraid of Bub, and for good reason—he carries grudges.”
Craft nodded. “He does. But he already has a grudge against our family, so one more won’t hurt. I will be your second.”
“I don’t want to be chief.”
“You can designate someone else to be chief, if you step down. If you win the contest.”
Hero wasn’t happy with this, but knew that his brother spoke truly. He would have to do it. “When?”
“Now. The burial will be in three days, after the chief’s spirit has safely left his body. You must win your challenge by then.”
“What must I hunt?”
“The ultimate: a male lion.”
Hero sighed. Ritual challenges were limited to spears and knives. This was a severe restriction for single combat with a beast as formidable as a lion. “I must tell Crenelle. She won’t like this.”
“I will fetch weapons.” Craft departed.
Thus quickly it was decided. They simply couldn’t afford to have their family be subject to the ill favor of the next chief.
Crenelle returned. “I heard,” she said, sparing him the necessity of telling her. She stepped into him and kissed him. “Don’t get yourself killed, my love. I don’t want to have to marry your brother.”
“He is coming with me.”
“There’s another brother.”
He wasn’t sure how serious she was, so just held her without speaking. It was true that when a man died, one of his brothers was expected to marry his widow, so as to be sure she was provided for. But would she want to marry Keeper? He was a year younger than she was. Still, he did on occasion bring over a puppy for Tour to play with.
Now that he thought about it, it occurred to him that it was odd that neither of his brothers had married. It was not because willing women were absent. What were they waiting for?
Crenelle quickly packed his pack with food and a firepot. Then she bore him to the bed and made love to him, efficiently and well. She had always been good a
t that. “Return to me, Hero,” she whispered in his ear.
“I will try.” But they both knew that it was no simple mission he was going on. A group of men could take a lion, but it was chancy at best for a single man, especially if the lion pride was near.
Craft returned, his own pack on his back and a number of weapons in a harness hanging at his side. “I have told an elder,” he said. “We will be watched.”
That meant that scouts would be out, observing what they did, without helping or interfering. Hero would be disqualified if Craft did anything other than support him or tend his wounds. But if he were successful, the news would be around well before he returned to make his claim.
And if he died, Keeper had better get over to his house with the dogs to protect Crenelle and Tour, for Bub would send his minions there to burn their house—punishment for Hero’s temerity in challenging him. Keeper well might have to marry the widow quickly, to make an end to the threat. For by the code of the tribe, Bub would have no grievance against Keeper or his family. Enmities existed, but even a chief had to be wary of going counter to the code.
They knew where there was a pride of lions, and walked swiftly that way. Prides came and went; this one had moved into the area in the last month, so not much was known about it. It wasn’t safe to spy too closely on a pride. But it surely had an adult male, and that was the animal Hero had to kill. Craft would be allowed to scare off the grown females, if he could, so long as he took no part in Hero’s battle with the male.
Hero had never tackled a grown lion before, alone; no one had. That was why it was a worthy challenge. He had driven off a lioness on occasion, when she came too near his kill, but that wasn’t the same. Oh, a female lion was formidable enough; but he had not had to pursue and kill her, which would have been a different matter. He wasn’t sure he could do it. But he would find out.
“Do you ever feel fear?” Craft inquired as they walked.