That evening was the end of the time of contentment. The next day, a strong, gritty wind blew from the direction of the delta directly into the entrance of the burrow; when Niall ventured out, it made his eyes run, and the sand grated between his teeth. Mara cried most of the day until even Niall felt like suffocating her. That evening, there was no contact with Ulf or Veig, although Siris sat for over an hour. Jomar told them not to worry; hunters often had other things to do at nightfall. But it was the same again the following day. By this time, Ingeld had become so anxious that she also sat cross legged on the floor at dusk and tried to empty her mind; but Niall could tell by her breathing that she had no success.
The next day they were all tense and worried. At nightfall, Siris and Ingeld again sat a few feet apart, their heads bowed, while Jomar and Niall lay on their mattresses and tried not to move in case the rustling sound distracted the women. They heard the change in Siris’s breathing as she made contact, and Niall sighed with relief. Then, almost immediately, Siris gave a piercing cry and they heard her fall. When Niall reached her, she was lying on her back and her face felt cold. Ingeld was already moaning something about death, and Jomar told her sharply to be silent. Niall propped up his mother, while Jomar forced water between her lips; she gasped and began to cough. When she spoke, her first words were: They are dead. Thorg and Hrolf are dead.” Ingeld began to scream and wail; the children woke up and began to cry. And Siris also sobbed quietly. She could only tell them that the two men had been killed by the ortis plant, and that Ulf and Veig had managed to escape with their lives.
Then Ingeld began to scream with rage. “Why did it have to be mine? Why not yours?”
They let her scream on until she grew tired and began to sob. She cried most of the night. Niall felt ashamed to be so happy that his father and brother were alive.
When Ulf and Veig returned ten days later, both were exhausted. Ulf’s right breast and shoulder were covered with circular marks that looked like burns; Veig had become very thin, and there was an expression in his eyes that Niall found deeply disturbing: the look of a man who is haunted by something he cannot forget. Both collapsed on their beds and slept deeply for most of a day and a night.
The juice that had cost Thorg and Hrolf their lives was contained in a small gourd that held little more than a pint; it was sealed tightly with leaves and leather thongs. When, a few hours after Ulf’s return, Mara set up her incessant wail, Siris carefully unbound the thongs, levered off the top of the gourd and gave the child a tiny quantity of the clear, syrupy liquid in a wooden spoon. Within less than a minute, Mara was asleep; she was still sleeping sixteen hours later, when Ulf woke up.
At the first opportunity, Niall sniffed the ortis juice. It had a pleasant, sweetish smell not unlike honey, with a touch of a certain mauve flower he had seen in the country of the ants; but after Jomar’s story about the plant, he found it disappointing.
For days after their return, Ulf and Veig seemed listless and depressed. Veig later admitted to Niall that during the last thirty-six hours of the return journey, both had been staggering like drunken men, and that neither had expected to reach home alive. In the rocky wilderness, Veig had collapsed three times, and for a while after the last occasion, Ulf had carried him on his shoulders. Fortunately, they had encountered no predators; if any creature had attacked, they would have been helpless. They were too exhausted even to scan the skies for spider balloons.
Ingeld had now recovered from the first shock and had become bitter and surly. They put up with her angry jibes because they felt sorry for her. But one day when she had been drinking the fermented fruit juice, she went too far, and accused Ulf and Veig of being cowards who had allowed her men to die. Ulf gripped her arm so hard that she screamed with pain.
“Never say that again or I will strike you to the ground, even if you are my brother’s wife.”
She collapsed on the floor and began to sob. “I am too young to be a widow. Am I to live for the rest of my days without a man’s embrace?”
Ulf saw the justice in her claim. She was still under forty, and many men would find her beautiful. He said thoughtfully: “There are no men here for you. But you could return to your own people.”
She looked up with a gleam of hope. She loved any kind of change. “How could I reach them?”
“We could take you there.”
She placed her hands on her stomach. “I shall soon be too big to travel.”
Ulf considered this. “All right. We leave on the next night of the full moon.”
Siris protested that this was too soon — they were still exhausted after their return from the delta. But Niall caught the hard, stubborn look on Ingeld’s face and knew she was determined to have her own way. For her, the thought of any delay was intolerable, although she knew that Siris was right; it would be safer to leave it for another month. It made no difference to her if Ulf and Veig died on the way back; by that time she would be safe with her own family.
As the time of the full moon approached, it became obvious that Veig would not be fit enough to travel; he was still too weak to go outside, and he suffered from a recurrent fever. Jomar’s limp made it impossible for him to walk more than a few miles. Siris tried to persuade Ingeld to wait another month; Ingeld, averting her eyes to conceal her true feelings, replied that if he left it that long, she would be unable to walk such a distance. Finally, Siris shrugged her shoulders and gave up the argument; they would all be glad to see the last of Ingeld.
Niall caught his father looking at him speculatively and knew what he was thinking.
“Couldn’t I go instead of Veig?”
“Do you think you could walk that far?”
“I can walk as far as Veig.”
“But this is a five-day journey, perhaps more.” Ulf drew him a map in the sand. Ingeld’s people lived near the shores of a salt lake called Thellam, about two days’ journey south of the great plateau. The most difficult part of the journey was across the desert that lay at the foot of the plateau, for there were few landmarks. On the far side of the desert there was a country of bare rock and wadis, descending to the salt lake. There was vegetation there, and some water; but there were also poisonous centipedes.
Niall pointed to the plateau. “Could we not avoid the desert by climbing up onto the plateau ?”
“There is nothing there but bare rock, and the air is thin.”
“But bare rock is better than sand dunes that change every day.”
Ulf only said: “Perhaps.”
By the time of the full moon, Ulf had recovered his strength. Veig still had hollow cheeks, and his eyes looked tired. Siris was unhappy at the idea of Niall travelling so far, but she knew there was no alternative. It would be dangerous for Ulf to attempt the return journey alone; there were many predators who would attack a lone traveller but think twice about attacking two men.
At least they were well provisioned. On the day before they set out, Veig went hunting with the pepsis wasp, and caught a large desert rodent. Siris stuffed this with herbs and seeds, and roasted it whole. She also baked them thin wafers of bread from a flour made of wild maize. For many days before the journey, the women collected clear water from the waru plant; they had also learned to place gourds under the long, twisted leaves of the welwitschia, to catch the dew the plant intended for its own roots. The brackish water that the ants collected from the depths of the burrow was not suitable for long journeys, for it was full of minerals that left a bitter taste in the mouth and made the throat dry.
They set out an hour before dusk, each carrying two baskets suspended from shoulder-yokes. The day was still hot, although the wind had dropped. When darkness fell, they rested for an hour in the sand, and Niall fell asleep — having been kept awake most of the previous night by excitement. As soon as the moon rose, they went on. The night was cold but the exercise kept them warm. Ingeld — who, having got her own way, now felt slightly ashamed of herself — plodded on silently, making no complaint about the pace. The desert was beautiful in the moonlight, and they could see the plateau clearly ahead of them; but it was a great deal farther than it looked. When the moon set, they were still able to travel by the light of the stars, their eyes having become accustomed to the dark. They reached the foot of the plateau an hour before dawn. As the sun rose, they entered the cave in which Niall had spent the first seven years of his life. They ate a light meal of maize bread and cooked locust, then slept through the heat of the day.