Death on the Trek (2 page)

Once many small horses ran free on the plains. These horses were like the large ones that roam in herds now, like the mammoth also do, but were smaller than horses now, and very fleet.

They were eaten by large predators, and some were eaten by Hamapa, although we have always preferred to hunt slower, larger game. Our Ancient Ones began to notice there were fewer and fewer of these small horses over time. Large herds dwindled down to small ones. Then an Ancient One, who was a good tracker, saw a herd going toward the place where Sister Sun goes to sleep and followed them. Maybe this was a time when they needed food, and he wanted to hunt them. I do not know why he followed them, just that he did. They ran for many suns, then kept going for many moons.

The herd he tracked was joined by other small herds and grew large. It became a huge herd, but kept running in the same direction.

The good tracker finally had to turn around and return to his village. But he felt the horses would keep running. The Storyteller of his tribe believed that the horses were going to the place where the Hamapa came from in ancient times. They would go, he said, far to the north and across a narrow land. Then they would be in a vast land, like the one we are in. They could live there. Maybe they would not be eaten by so many large hunting animals.

The Hamapa tribe would now attempt to follow the mammoth as the ancient tracker had followed the little horses. Mootak concluded the Saga, adding a new thought of his own at the end.

Others have said the small horses traveled in the direction away from the Guiding Bear who turns with the Seasons in Mother Sky, to a land where it is always warm.

Wherever they went, they are no longer here. Sometimes creatures need to move in order to survive. This may be what the small horses have done. It is what our Ancient Ones did when they came here. And it is what we must do now.

No sound disturbed the crackling of the fire, which was dancing in the slight breeze. No thoughts were sent out. The tribe, people of muscular limbs and of small stature compared to some others, sat in a circle around the fire.

Each Hamapa was wrapped in private thoughts, cloaked in dark colors so that others could not perceive them. Enga knew, though, that these private thoughts were full of fear. She fingered the carved wooden figure she held under her mammoth skin wrap, next to the seed of her mate, Tog Flint Shaper, the seed which was growing inside her. What would the future hold for her child? She was not able to visualize it. She only knew that the life of the new baby would be vastly different than hers had been, in a different land. A land she did not know yet. She longed to touch the skin of Tog, but he was not tuned into her thoughts at this moment.

Hama rose again, rattled her gourd, and nodded to Lakala Rippling Water, the Singer. Lakala was surprised to be asked to sing again. Hama sent forth a picture of dancing and Enga gladdened. She was happy that the tribe would dance tonight, although they all must be careful not to get too tired out before the start of the trek.

As Lakala stood up, she caught the eyes of Sannum Straight Hair and Panan One Eye. Sannum set a beat on his log drum in time with the nodding of the head of Lakala. When her high, soft tones lifted into the air above them, it was another Song of Blessing to Dakadaga. After a bit, Panan raised his wooden flute and followed the notes of Lakala with trills of his own.

Having another song after the Saga was not the usual order, but, Enga mused, nothing was usual any more.

Panan had been holding Sooka, the baby of Vala Golden Hair, but handed her back to Vala when he started playing. Sooka kicked and squirmed and Vala was barely able to hold her. The green eyes of Vala showed annoyance. Enga could understand her attitude, somewhat.

This baby was not like any other Hamapa infant. She came from a seed that was not that of a Hamapa, a person very different from them. Her limbs were long and thin, and she had not walked yet, even though she had already been alive six moons. Hamapa babies, sturdier and stronger, were walking at that age. Whim, the baby of Fee Long Thrower and Bahg Swiftfeet, ran back and forth on his short, fat legs as the adults had their meeting.

A tall, pale stranger who had sojourned with them had given Vala the seed for this baby, Sooka. The Tall One had also had a narrow body and a different kind of face, the lower part of his jaw sticking out where that of the Hamapa did not. He was eventually called Stitcher because of his skill at binding together skins with a sharp bird bone and leather thongs, but he was no longer with the tribe.

When he joined them, he had brought with him buttons made of antler, a marvel that none of the Hamapa had ever seen. Stitcher was also the carver of the wooden figure Enga held tightly in this time of no sun, their last one in this place. The figure captured the curves of the female who had been Hama at the time. Enga saw her face when she gazed on the carving, her hair loose, as she had always worn it. Enga fingered the woven bracelets, set in wood. She missed Aja Hama very much. The name Aja Hama meant Former Most High Female, but it implied much more, as it was not given to all former leaders. It was given to that one in honor, after her death. This was the female who had raised her and her birth-sister when the tribe had taken them in. That leader had been cruelly slain. Enga was probably not the only one who wished she were still here to lead them on this frightening journey into unknown places.

The squirming baby nearly slipped from the arms of Vala. Tog Flint Shaper, the mate of Enga, left her side and went to help Vala. Enga clamped down tightly on her feeling of jealousy. It would not do to annoy Tog about this. Enga had always known he was attracted to the female with the beautiful golden hair and the bright green eyes. But, she reminded herself yet another time, he was
her
mate, not that of Vala. He would never stay with Vala, would not mate with her.

Lakala changed into a Song of Asking, pleading for safe passage in the moons to come. Now Hama nodded to Enga, the best dancer in the tribe.

Clad in her everyday mammoth skin, as was the rest of the tribe, Enga rose to help with the appeal to the Spirits. To make the best impression, she should have been wearing her more formal bear skin cape, but everything was packed away, ready for departure at first sun. They would leave hungry. There had been a hunt two suns ago, but not much had been caught, only a few small ground squirrels.

She tucked the carving into her waist pouch and moved gracefully around the fire, in front of the Hamapa who sat in the Paved Place. She swayed in time to the rhythm, closing her eyes to block the sight of Tog beside Vala, their heads almost touching and smiles on their faces, to block the fear in the eyes of her tribal brothers and sisters, to try to block her own fear.

It had worried her that, a few suns before the early Passage Ceremonies, Hama had also given names to Sooka and Whim. Before this, Hamapa babies had always had the Naming Ceremony after they had passed twenty moons.

* * *

Jeek had worked so hard and the blazing fire was so warm that he was dozing off during the assembly. Earlier, his mother, Zhoo of Still Waters, had ordered him and Teek Bearclaw to do one task after another. In addition to clothing, tools, and adornments, which everyone had, she also must pack her healing supplies, for she was the Healer for the tribe. Jeek cut up a good portion from the supply of the long grasses stacked in the corner of their wipiti and tucked them into the bottom of the large pouch they would carry with them. As he worked, using the large stump in the middle of their dwelling to whack at the grasses with the flint knife, he wondered if the new place they found would have all the conveniences that this one had.

He carefully wrapped her knife in a thick scrap of mammoth hide and placed it into their large pouch. Zhoo then gave him instructions to wrap well the skin bag full of bear fat and the hollow gourd full of honey and place them on the top of the other healing supplies.

Zhoo and some others had all helped with the hardest task, getting the skins from their wipitis taken down and ready so they could depart at first sun. Pieces were cut from them to make travel pouches. Other small pieces were saved to be fashioned into foot wrappings, and sacs and pouches to carry whatever else would be needed. They all wanted to start as early as they could. The seven wipitis they dismantled were all of equal size, but the two left intact were much larger. In one had dwelt Hama and her mate, and in the other, the single males. At this dark time, they would all attempt to sleep in the two large ones, then they would dismantle them just before they left. The mammoth tusks that supported the structures would have to be abandoned, being much too heavy to carry.

Many had joked that no one would sleep during the time of no sun, but Jeek was sure he would. He was so tired.

The mammoth tusks that were being left behind marked where they had lived for so long. In the darkness, they rose from the ground like bare, white rib bones.

Now, he watched Akkal coming down the Sacred Hill, carrying the precious fire, but soon nodded off, in spite of the alarming waves of fear and anticipation flowing from almost everyone.

He jerked his head up, now wide awake, when the startling news of the Passage Ceremony for Akkal was announced. He clamped down his jealousy with the hue of Mother Sky at dark time as quickly as he could, hoping that pretty Gunda had not received it. Why was this happening? Akkal had not passed the number of summers required, that of all fingers and one foot of toes. He was only two summers older than Jeek.

The mind of Jeek wandered off to his own future Passage Ceremony. He imagined himself standing tall and straight before Hama, taller than he was now, waiting to receive his second name. What would Dakadaga choose for him? What would it be? Jeek the Clever? No, probably not, since Enga Dancing Flower was the only one who called him that. At one time he had desired to be Jeek Beaver Slayer. Most of all, though, he wanted to be Jeek Spear Thrower. He wanted that very badly. He had practiced in secret as often as he could. He did not know how he would practice on the trek, but he would try. He knew well that only females in the Hamapa tribe threw spears. Males, his mother told him often enough, did not have the patience or the skill. Their job was to carve up the meat and drag it back to the village on hides after the females speared the animals.

A gentle thought from Gunda washed over him, bathed in the pink of a private communication. She admonished him for thinking of himself before the tribe. He glanced at her, sending a bashful, drowsy apology, and she smiled at him in a shy way.

Then the second Passage Ceremony, that of Mootak, also was announced. Jeek shook himself even more fully alert, even alarmed. This was serious. Dakadaga must have doubts that either of these two youths would reach fifteen summers. If they did not make it, would any of the tribe survive the coming trek?

He wished both he and pretty Gunda were old enough to dance. After the ceremonies, he watched with admiration as Enga twirled and dipped. Her birth-sister, Ung Strong Arm, danced beside her. Tog and Vala joined in. Bahg Swiftfeet danced with his mate, Fee Long Thrower, while their baby crawled over the stones of their beloved Paved Place. Even old Cabat the Thick moved his feet as quickly as he could.

Jeek felt all the asking pleas being flung to the Spirits. He sent his own upward, concentrating on lifting them all the way to Mother Sky and Dakadaga.

Then Hama did something she rarely did. She flashed a bright red message for all the children to dance as she and her mate, the one she had chosen to be Hapa, the Most High Male, joined in.

Surely, Jeek thought, catching the small, soft hand of Gunda as they stomped around the fire, all the Spirits would hear the Hamapa and their journey would be safe.

Chapter 3

“Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons would have been quite closely related, and genetically there may have been no barrier to Neanderthal/Cro-Magnon interbreeding… Hybrids…may have been discriminated against by the parent populations…”

—
In Search of the Neanderthals,
Christopher Stringer and Clive Gamble

“Our ancestors likely had sex with Neandertals...”

—from http://news.sciencemag.org/archaeology/2015/01/humans-and-neandertals-likely-interbred-middle-east by Michael Balter

Sister Sun was starting to make her climb into Mother Sky when the tribe set out. They had been up and astir for a long time already, assembling their traveling pouches and cutting a few more pieces of mammoth hide. They stripped the hide from the large wipiti of the single males and used it to bundle extra spears and rock tools, along with the dried meat for the journey. At the last moment, Hapa suggested they take the other very large hide also, the one from the wipiti he shared with Hama, and tuck it inside the whole packet to use in case the first one wore out from dragging it for many moons. Panan One Eye argued with Hapa, as he often did, but everyone else could see that it was a good idea and Panan gave up after a short time. Enga Dancing Flower did not know how many moons they would have to travel before they came upon the large herds of mammoth that used to roam in this place. None of them knew that.

Even though the warm season was upon them, the time of new growth, seed season, this early in the day the breath of Mother Sky made its way through their wraps to raise bumps on the skin of their limbs.

Enga took one long last look at the village, the Paved Place that had been built in times past, the Sacred Hill nearby, the places where the wipiti had stood in a semicircle. She paused to listen to the babble of the nearby stream where they had washed their bodies and had gotten their drinking water.

Hama thought-spoke to the whole tribe,
Is everyone ready to depart?

Many nodded heads and sent back positive vibrations. All except Vala Golden Hair. She approached Enga and Tog Flint Shaper where they stood with their belongings, ready to leave. She carried her baby, Sooka, in a sling on her back. The baby kicked and squirmed, as she often did. Sooka was not content in the sling like most Hamapa babies.