West of Eden. Book two. Chapter 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25
CHAPTER NINETEEN
A child could have read the signs of the sammads’ passage, so clearly were they marked in the soft turf. The deep ruts cut by the poles of the travois, the large footprints of the mastodons, their high-heaped dung. Herilak made no attempt to obliterate these tracks—but hunters waited in hiding, some of them a two-day march behind the sammads, to make sure they were not being followed. Days passed and there was no evidence that the dark Tanu or their longtooth companions were behind them. Despite this Herilak still made certain that there were guards ready and watching, day and night.
Since all of the valleys and ridges led down from the high mountains, flattening out and vanishing on the arid plain, they went down from the hills to the plain itself. Instead of working their way across the ridges, the march continued along the edge of the desert. Hunters went ahead, scouting the valleys for water. When they camped each evening the mastodons would be led up the valley to drink and browse.
The march continued. The hunting was sparse in the foothills and on the plain. The grasslands at the foot of the hills began to extend further and further into what had been only arid desert, cut now and again by dry watercourses. But there was no water upon the grassy plain, little or no animal life. They could only go on.
It was only after the moon had waxed and waned twice that they reached the river. The water must have drained from the high mountains for the current here was strong and the channel that it had cut was very deep. They stopped at the brink, seeing the water tumbling over the rocks below, sending up white spray.
“There is no way to cross the river here,” Kerrick said. Herilak nodded and looked away downstream.
“It might be wisest not to cross it—but to follow it instead. With all this water there must be an end to the desert. Where the desert ends we will find game. This we must do for even the murgu meat is coming to an end. We have to find a place where there is food to gather and animals to hunt.”
Then he spoke aloud the thought that was with them always. “We must find this before winter comes.”
They followed the river as it snaked across the plain and into a range of hills. There were many places where the bank had broken down, where they could water the mastodons. At some of these sites there were also the track of deer. And something else. It was Munan who spoke of it first. He joined Herilak and Kerrick at their fire and sat down, his back to the hills.
“I have hunted for many years,” he said. “Only once was I hunted myself. Let me tell you about that. It was in the high hills that you call mountains where I was tracking greatdeer. The trail was fresh and it was early morning. I walked silently, yet I felt something was wrong. Then I knew what it was. I was being followed as well, watched. I could feel eyes on me. When I knew this to be true I jumped about suddenly—and there it was on the ledge above me. A longtooth. Not close enough to spring, not yet. It must have been tracking me—just as I tracked the greatdeer. It looked into my eyes, then it was gone.”
Herilak nodded in agreement. “Animals know when they are being watched. Once I watched some longtooth and they turned because they felt my eyes. A hunter can sometimes know when there are eyes upon him.”
“We are being watched now,” Munan said quietly, poking at the fire. “Do not turn your heads, but get wood and when you so do look at the hill behind my back. There is something there, watching us, I am sure of that.”
“Get wood, Kerrick,” Herilak said. “Your eyes are good.”
Kerrick rose slowly and walked a few paces, returning with some sticks that he pushed into the fire.