This was no longer true. With the mountains now wrapped in endless winter, the herds of deer depleted, the snow in the forests lying late into the spring, their timeless sources of food were no more. They were eating now, there were fish enough in the river at this season. They had been joined at their river camp by sammad Kellimans; this happened every year. It was a time to meet and talk, for the young men to find women. There was little of this now for although there was enough fish to eat there was not enough to preserve for the winter. And without this supply of food very few of them would see the spring.
There was no way out of the trap. To the west and east other sammads waited, as hungry as his and Kellimans’. Murgu to the south, ice to the north—and they were trapped between them. No way out. Ulfadan’s head was bursting with this problem that had no solution. In agony he wailed aloud like a trapped animal, then turned and made his way back to the sammad.
From the top of the grassy slope that led down to the river, nothing looked amiss. The dark cones of the leather tents stretched along the river bank in a ragged row. Figures moved about between the tents and smoke rose from the fires. Close by him one of the tethered mastodons raised its trunk and bellowed. Further along the shore some women could be seen scratching at the earth with their fire-hardened sticks, digging up edible roots. The roots were good food now. But what would happen when the ground froze again? He knew what would happen and he thrust the thought from him.
Naked children ran screaming, splashed in the water. Old women sat in the sun before their tents plaiting baskets from willow and reeds. As he walked by the tents Ulfadan’s face was set and stern, unreadable. One of his smaller sons hurried up to him, bursting with an important message.
“Three hunters are here, from another sammad. One of them is very funny.”
“Take this rabbit to your mother. Run.”
The hunters were sitting around a fire, taking puffs in turn from a stone-bowled pipe. Kellimans was there, and Fraken the alladjex, old and withered, but respected greatly for his knowledge and healing powers. The newcomers rose in greeting when he appeared. One of them he knew well.
“I greet you, Herilak.”
“I greet you, Ulfadan. This is Ortnar of my sammad. This is Kerrick, son of Amahast, son of my sister.”
“You have food and drink?”
“We have eaten and drunk. Ulfadan’s generosity is well-known.”
Ulfadan joined the circle about the fire, took the pipe when it was passed to him and inhaled deeply of the pungent smoke. He wondered about the strange hunter without hair, who should have been dead with the rest of his sammad but was not. He would be told at the proper time.
Other hunters were also curious about the newcomers and came and sat in a circle about them, for this was the way of the sammad.
Herilak was no longer as formal as he once had been. He waited until the pipe had passed only once before he spoke.
“The winters are long, and we know that. The food is scarce and we know that. Now all in my sammad are dead except two.”
There was a silence among the hunters after he had spoken these terrible words, wails of agony from the women who listened outside the circle. Many had relations who had married into Herilak’s sammad. More than one looked up at the eastern sky where the first stars were beginning to appear. When Herilak spoke again no sound disturbed him.
“It is known that I went with my hunters so far south that there was no snow and it was hot in the winter, to the place where there are only murgu. It was my thought that murgu had killed Amahast and all in his sammad. My thought was correct for we found murgu that walk like men and kill with death-sticks. It was one of their death-sticks that I found among the bones of sammad Amahast. We killed the murgu we found there, then returned north. Now we knew that death lay to the south and we knew what kind of death it was. But we were hungry this last winter and many died. In the summer the hunting was bad, as you know. So I took the sammad south along the coast because of the hunger. I led the hunters farther south for the easy hunting there. We knew of the danger. We knew that the murgu might attack us too, but without food we would be dead anyway. We were on our guard and there was no attack. It was only after we turned back that they fell upon us. I am here. Ortnar is here. The rest are dead. With us is Kerrick who is the son of Amahast, captured by the murgu, now free at last. He knows much about the murgu ways.”