Chapter 22 - The Cave of the Gray Stone People part 2

My father took Nyala and the children into the Siede to help watch over them while we were absent. We gathered supplies, armed ourselves and set out long before sundown.

Gray clouds gravid with precipitation boiled up from the south as we moved swiftly through the familiar terrain of our southern hunting grounds. Those pregnant clouds swept across the sky as we jogged after the Fat Hands, dimming the sun and sending the temperature plummeting. By midafternoon, the sun was just a hazy disc shining through the low ceiling of the heavens, giving light but little warmth. The wind gusted, rattling the last russet leaves clinging to their branches. It did not rain but the air was dense with it. My nose began to run and my fingers went numb from the chill. We were all sniffing and complaining of the cold but we did not falter. Our mission was too important.

As we traveled, I couldn't help but think about our search for the lost Neanderthals. Not just the fearful creature that had stalked our camp in the night, but also the gruesome condition of Fodar's remains. Probably not the wisest thing to do, seeing as how there was no way our party could overtake the fleeing Fat Hands before dark, but I couldn't help myself.

We would have to camp in the open tonight.

We would be isolated, vulnerable.

All at once, the fear of that night came over me, a rush of anxiety that made my heart spasm in my chest.

Be brave, I said to myself. Just concentrate on putting one foot down in front of the other.

We were far from helpless. Strom and Hyde were accomplished hunters. Like Brulde and I, they were tent mates, their bodies lean and muscular. They were young, energetic, brash. Brulde and I were several years older but we were not ready for the Siede yet. Though time had begun to soften our physiques, transforming what had once been slabs of striated muscle into plush papa padding, we were more seasoned, craftier. Eyya was having difficulty keeping up with our pace, but she was a Fat Hand female and just as strong as any Fast Feet male. We were certainly capable of defending ourselves.

Yet even as I tried to encourage myself, I recalled how fast the creature had moved, the strange way that it had contorted its body, as if there were no bones beneath its flesh, and how it had swiped my spear from the air.

Would the five of us be able to fend off the creature if it should come for us during the night?

The question nagged at me as we loped through the darkening wilderness.

By evening we stood atop a low mountain at the edge of our hunting grounds. Though our village was cut off from sight by a series of intervening hills, we could see across the low, flat grasslands of the Mammoth Hunters' territory. We could see the Fat Hand group, tiny with distance, halfway between our position and the southern horizon. They had already made camp for the night. In the gloom, their campfires were winking orange sparks.

"It's getting dark. We need to make camp soon," Brulde said. He was standing beside me, the blustery wind whipping his curly blond hair around his head. Fine spicules of water billowed in the wind. Though it had not rained yet, our clothes were soaked through and we were chilled to the bone.

"We should build a lean-to," Strom said, his breath misting. "It's going to come a downpour any minute now."

"The fire is more important," I said, frowning at the gathering gloom. "We need a big fire tonight. It's only going to get colder, and… we may not be safe."

Brulde glanced at me sharply. Though the Lizard Man had been the subject of much speculation in our village over the past moon, interest in the creature had begun to flag and we had given little thought to the strange Others before setting off in pursuit of the Fat Hands. That seemed a foolish oversight now, with the last light of day guttering in the west.

Brulde turned in a slow circle, eyeing the surrounding wilderness. His face was gaunt, the scar on his cheek a crenelated groove. Strom and Hyde shifted closer together, clutching their spears. "I'll gather wood," Eyya volunteered, starting blithely down the slope.

"Don't wander off by yourself!" I barked, and she froze, looking back at me with fear-struck eyes. I was the oldest of our group and so, by custom, was leader of this expedition. I didn't want to frighten anyone unnecessarily, but I wanted my band to be wary. I glared at each of the four, lips taut, hoping to impress upon them my seriousness. "That goes for all of you," I said. "Don't go anywhere unaccompanied tonight. Not even to shit. The Fat Hands may be fleeing from those Others. If they are, we might have enemies nearby. Enemies who are fast and brutal."

Hyde was the only other man in our group who had participated in the search for Fodar and Evv. Face grave, he arched his eyebrows at Strom. "It was very fast," he said.

Strom put his hands on his hips and cursed, looking west.

I charged Brulde and Eyya to gather wood, lots of it, and Strom and Hyde to build our shelter. I tasked myself with making the fire. I was probably one of the more proficient fire-makers in our village. I had always had a knack for it, even as a boy. I took out my fire-making kit and hunkered down, crouching over the bag to keep the flint and batting as dry as possible. By the time we had built a fire and constructed a lean-to large enough to accommodate the five of us, dark had descended upon the mountaintop and the lowering heavens were black and starless.

We squeezed in together under the shelter to eat and rest. A few sparse raindrops angled in under the edge of the roof, blown in by the increasingly stout wind, to hiss in the coals. It was close quarters but comfortable enough and we slowly began to thaw. Strom, Hyde and Brulde conversed idly as they ate the venison we had brought along. Eyya hummed quietly as she picked burrs from the fur trim of my coat. She was restless. Her eyes returned again and again to the darkness outside our shelter. When she had finished cleaning my coat of burrs, she started grooming my hair.

"Take off your vest and I'll repair the seam," she said. "It's coming apart at the shoulder."

"It'll be fine," I answered, patting her on the hand. "Just leave it be tonight."

I ate sparingly, senses alert to the darkness beyond the firelight. I could hear the wind howling through the treetops. It was a sound much like the hum inside a conch shell, only louder. There were no animal sounds. The beasts of the forest had retreated to their own shelters ahead of the storm. The only noise, apart from the drone of our conversation, was the whoop and shriek of the wind in the treetops and the thunderous percussion of lightning.

"Did you see how they arranged their campfires?" Strom said.

Yes, I had noticed. They had arranged their campfires in a defensive ring. Our people did that, too, when we felt threatened. You bedded down inside the ring and kept a watch on the darkness outside of it. It was a good way to keep the group safe from large predators. I said as much and Eyya peeked back out at the dark, her brow furrowed. I did, too. Suddenly, our single campfire seemed woefully inadequate.

Nothing we could do about it now.

Hyde took first watch when we had finished eating. Brulde shimmied over to Eyya and me and lay down.

"Help me spread out our bedding," Eyya said. Nyala had sent our best reindeer blanket. We unrolled it and draped it over our bodies. Brulde and I squeezed in close to Eyya, enfolding her protectively in our arms.

"No escape for you tonight, my dear," I teased her. "Either way you turn, you're going to get prodded."

"At least I'll be warm," Eyya said with a smile, and then she pressed her face to my chest and closed her eyes.

Brulde's calloused hand lay warmly on my hip. We watched one another in grim silence over her head, listening to the storm. Finally, Brulde sighed and relaxed his body to sleep.

I didn't sleep well that night. I would start to drift off and then the wind would hoot and I would jerk awake, thinking it the cry of the Lizard Man. Twice I dozed and saw the creature in my dreams, its eyes glowing eerily, its pale body inhumanly contorted. Both times I snapped awake, heart thudding in my chest, feeling breathless and jittery.

Just a dream!

Finally, I rose to take watch, relieving Hyde at the fire.

"Can't sleep?" he asked, and I shook my head.

"Bad dreams."

Lightning flickered outside the mouth of the tent, freezing the rain in midair for an instant.

"It is a good night for bad dreams," Hyde said with a grin, and I chuckled and nodded in agreement.

Hyde yawned and stretched his arms. "Well, if you are awake," he said. I nodded my assent and he crawled to bed. His tent mate was a motionless hump beneath their blankets. Hyde vanished beneath the heavy furs. His companion stirred and said something to him groggily, too low for me to hear. Hyde whispered back and then they got comfortable, spooning together to share their body heat.

I kept my spear close at hand and stared out into the rainy forest. I imagined evil, hungry eyes out there, watching us from the darkness. In my mind's eye, we were surrounded by Lizard Men. They encircled our tent, crawling silently toward us, teeth like sharpened stakes, rain splatting down on their fish-belly white skin. Every noise made me jerk to attention, heart leaping into my throat. I watched the dark for their eyes, those strangely reflective eyes. Once or twice I thought I saw a pair of them, winking dimly in the dark. Each time, I lurched to readiness, but it was just the firelight glinting on some wet leaf or gout of water.

It was still dark, and still raining heavily, when Strom awoke. He rose and shuffled to the edge of the lean-to to piss, his urine steaming in the chill. "This cold will make a woman of you," he said. He flopped down beside me and held his palms out to the fire. "Have you heard anything?" he asked, meaning outside in the darkness.

"Just the rain," I said.

"I'll take watch now if you'd like to get some sleep," he said, and I nodded.

We conversed quietly for a little while. "Go lay down," Strom finally said the second time he caught me yawning. "I will guard us until daybreak." I didn't argue. I crawled across Brulde and Eyya and scooted up to her from behind. The furs were warm, if not quite completely dry. I lay my spear on the ground beside me, within easy reach if anything hungry should decide to come in from the rain. I squeezed in close to my favorite wife, arm across her waist, and burrowed my face into the bush of dark hair at the back of her head. Eyya smacked her lips and mumbled something incoherent. Brulde was snoring loudly, but that had always been more of a comfort to me than an annoyance. The steady respirations of my mates calmed my twitchy nerves and I was finally able to doze off and get some much needed rest.

Tomorrow, we shall catch up to the fleeing Fat Hands, I thought.

I was afraid I would dream of the Lizard Man, with his glinting eyes and stake-sharp teeth, but I did not dream of anything.