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   Gam Me
   The elder finished his chant, and the men forced me back at spearpont.
Holding them up, they pushed me back onto the platform of logs, then pushed
it with the butts.  I got down, and held onto the logs as they twisted, and
moved in the water.  A wave went under, lifting one side, then the other,
and the sand moved farther away.
   The tribesmen turned their backs, I was already dead to them.  That was
why the eldest chanted, they were giving me to the sea like those we lost.
I was alive, but not to them.  I could see the mountain in the water, but
it was still far off, and not getting any closer, so I moved to the side,
and dipped a hand in the water.
   It was cold, and wet, but no good to drink, so I played with it.  It
flowed around my hand, and I felt I could pull it if I cupped my hand, as
if to drink.  The raft moved a little in the water.  I tried again, and
moved a little more.  Laying on an end, I could use both hands to pull me,
like wings.  I paddled out until I could see the mountain, slowly getting
closer.
   Another interpretation of my banishment came to mind, they where letting
the Gods judge me, decide my fate.  They're said to live there, on the
mountain in the water.  We send them our dead between the tides, and they
guide them in to join them.  Or, the water carries them out, to the inland
seas, or the deep open ocean.  The Elders argue about what's out there,
monsters to eat you, or just water forever that you can never drink.
   Later, it stood over me, high, and solid.  I couldn't see a place I
could get up on it, so I pulled around to see if there was a beach.  I
didn't see any Gods either, nor plant, nor animal, just a wall of seamless
stone.  I got to the end of it, and kept going, carried by the water faster
than I could pull back.  My arms got tired, and the mountain farther away.
   I lay back, remembered the Elders, talking over the fire about a winter,
many lives ago, when the water hardened like stone, and they could walk
across it.  Someone had been there, they said, and even come back.  They
told stories of wildmen, like the grey backed giant apes, but with brown
hair, and stength like no man's.
   The sun was high, and hot, and I grew thirsty.  I pulled my skin over my
head, but my mouth was so dry.  The water splashed around me, and I looked
out, at it.  I watched my hand go out to cup it.  It tasted of salt, and
only made me thirstier, like the Elders said, but I fell asleep.
   I woke in the night, and pulled off my skin.  Off to the side, I could
just see land, a brown and green line at the edge of the sky.  I pulled
toward it until my arms ached, but it didn't seem to get any closer.  The
wind changed, and the water moved under me.  It carried me out, faster than
I could pull the raft, and after a while, I couldn't see anything but
water, all around.  Tired, the sun beat down, so I pulled up my skin, and
stuck my head under it.  It was hot, and I wished for water I could drink,
but I was able to fall asleep.
   The world shook, and I rolled over the logs.  It was dark, and water
washed around me loud.  Looking through the starlight, I could see land,
feel sand under the raft.  So close, I bet I could pull the raft to it.  I
unwrapped my feet, and stepped into the water, but I couldn't pull it over
the sand.  I pushed it, tried to float it over, and around, but I lost
hold, and it floated away.
   The water was shallow, so I tried wading in to land.  It was so cold,
and got deeper, until my skin was dipping in it.  The sand shifted under my
foot, and I fell.  Struggling up, the wet fur was heavy, but warm.  I took
it off, tried floating on it, and pulling through the water, but it sank,
then floated away.
   I was stranded in the water, too deep to touch the sand, and only my
head sticking out.  I pulled the water, but just moved back, and forth. 
Kicking helplessly, that seemed to move me up, so I turned over, and kicked
some more.  I moved some more, and pulled myself on my back.
   It worked better if I kicked one leg, then the other, so I did the same
with my arms.  I turned sideways, so I did the other side, and turned back.
Working together, arms, then legs, I was able to move better, and at last,
I kicked, and my heels sank into sand.
   I stood up, turned around to see the shore.  With my raft, and skin
gone, I had my undercloth, and and a little braided belt to tye it on.  Not
even the footskins, or their straps.  I looked around, but it got too dark
to find anything.  I was cold, hungry, and thirsty with no skin, or fire to
make me warm.  Exhausted, I found a tree I could curl under, hugged myself,
and shivered until the sky started getting light.
   The fire rose in the sky, over the land.  It warmed, and dried me, so I
could get up, and see what I could find.  My stomach ached, like it was
eating me out from the inside, but I found a trickle down the beach that
wasn't salty further inland.  I drank long, but it was too small for any
fish.  My stomach full of water, I felt I had enough energy to maybe get
some food.
   I laughed, at least I already had my funeral so I could rest.  It would
be too bad if I starved after coming so far.  The land was strange, and I
didn't recognise the plants.  Some of the trees were tall, and straight
with spiky leaves like the creosote bush.  I followed the stream up, and
kept my eyes down for fish.  I didn't see any, but I found a rock, worn
smooth, but it looked like the milkstone that shatters clean instead of
crumbling.
   I went to work, the sound of stone on stone bouncing between the dirt
banks.  I spotted a twinkle, like a star in the light, and walked up to
look close at it.  Another rock, this had red shiny layers in it.  The
flint split in my hand, and made a good enough point to dig it out.
   I struck stars, the firestone turned shiny under the red, which flashed,
and hit the water.  I climbed up, barefoot, the rocks in my foot skins,
hanging around my neck to keep them from banging together.  There was a
small level there, with a rock to sit on, so I took out my flints, and
worked them.
   The loud sound also drives off predators, so you are almost never
attacked.  I kept my head down, hair in front of my eyes so I didn't loose
one.  This one turned out to be a chopper, easier to make, and more usefull
than a point until I had a good shaft.  I left it deep, so it could sharpen
it down later.
   Over the clacks, I heard a voice, muffled in the trees.  Standing up, I
folded the sharp flake in my hand with the edge out, and wrapped my fist
around the striker.  A man came out, brown like the bark of the trunks, and
pointed a spear at me.  Covered in a skin, around his shoulders, his hair
was loose, and hung around his face.
   I caught a look at his thick spear, and threw my striker right at his
forehead.  I turned to run, almost right into another spear.  There where
more, surrounding me.  "Unth," the first one pointed at my hand, then shook
the spearpoint away.  It was just sharpened wood, but I tossed my chopper,
and held my hands out, open, and empty.
   "Wait," I said, "Relax."
   His head turned, and his brows came together, but he didn't say
anything. Letting go of his spear with one hand, he waved it, toward him,
and the others moved around me.  Someone pushed me with the shaft a spear,
and they led me off.  Just sharpened sticks, they held the thick end, which
they also used as a sort of club.
   They were shorter than me, with loose hair which was bark brown, but
sometimes had red in it.  You couldn't see the red, unless the sun was
shining on it.  The cheif's didn't have any red in it, but was lighter,
almost straw colored, and not as tightly curled as even theirs.  It hung
down long, past his shoulders like waves.
   They all seemed to be related, and their faces looked like something you
would beat someone with.  Bone showed through under their skin, which was
dirty, and they smelled.  They moved very quietly, spears out, but still
surrounding me with the club ends.  They didn't look like spears you could
throw.
   They led me upstream, on a well worn trail.  Coming to a bend, around a
hill, the ones in front climbed it, planting their spears in both hands in
front of them.  I scrabbled at the rocks, and soil, which rolled down
behind me.  There was a flat place they climbed up to, and I came up after
them.
   There were women there, pregnant, with spears.  Holding them up next to
them, or resting against them, they lifted them, or tilted them at me when
they saw me.  "Unth?" it appeared to be the only word, to get attention,
then point, or gesture.
   "Unth!" the cheif pointed at me, then swung his spear to point at a
hole. Dug into the ridge, under a flat grainy rock, I saw it went further
back, and dissapeared in the trees.  There were logs around, dry, and part
rotted.  They brought their spears down, and backed me into the hole.
   The floor sloped down, and it wasn't high enough for me to stand up in.
I turned around, and saw a shape in the shadow.  "Unth!" a tiny voice
grunted, and they ran out, screaming, and poking me with sticks.  I tried
batting them away, but there were too many, and I had to step back.
   More jabbed me in the back.  Looking over, they were just young,
crouched and holding the sticks to the floor.  The others weren't poking me
very hard, and the sticks weren't sharp, they were play killing me.  I
played it up, moaning like a wounded buffallo, and clutching their sticks
like they were stuck in me.
   The floor flattened out on the back, and I sat down, laughing on it.  I
sneezed, and the giggling young jumped back, at the ready.  The cave
smelled like rotting piss, and the children put down their "spears."
Standing over me, they were naked, and filthy with wild hair.
   Three boys, and two girls, the eldest looked like she might start
becomming a woman soon.  She Unthed, importantly, and pointed around. 
There were two boys, a little smaller than her that went to break the
littlest up, who were tickling each other.
   I looked around, the walls, and floor were dirt, and there seemed to be
a rock on top, flat, and sloping slightly back.  A shadow was stretched
over this, and I turned to see a pregnant woman, looking down with her
spear.  She smiled, and her beard moved.  She looked just like the men,
except for the bulge in front, and two more on top.  She held her skin
crossed over them, but I saw her fur coming out the top.
   Walking to the slope at the entrance, I still couldn't stand all the way
up, but there were the others, around the top.  Just the other pregnant
women, they looked around, alert for something.  The rest were gone, and I
guessed some were women too.  Not pregnant, I just couldn't tell.
   One of them was beating a rotting log to split it.  She held the rock
wrong, in both hands to beat it with the blunt end instead of the corner,
and bashed it into the side.  "Unth," I said, and pointed at the rock.  She
held it up, then walked over with it in her hand.  I held mine up for it,
so she waved to one of the other women, "Unth," and she pointed her spear
at me.
   Still ready to smash me in the head with it, she bent down, and put it
on my hand.  I showed her in the dirt, laying up the slope how the blunt
end crushes, and the sharp end cuts.  They had sharpened spears.  I set it
down, got up, and picked up the crude axe.
   They picked up their spears, and pointed them, so I pointed two fingers
at my eyes, and said "Unth." I took the rock to the log.  A flat wedge,
it's sharpest edge was worn round, and rough, but I could jam the it into
the rottenest spot on one end.  I grabbed a good thick dry stick, and
pounded the back.
   I drove it deeper, and heard a creak from it.  Working it back, and
forth with the short heavy branch, and it cracked open.  Rotten on the
underside, the rest split, and I pulled it apart.  Grubs, and bugs came
out, and the women put down their spears to grab them.
   They ground them on a rock, worn into a long bowl with another rock, and
fed it to the children.  I sat down on another log, and picked up a good
round striker.  Chipping at the edge, my striker crumbled, so I picked up
another.  This one held together, and struck a chip off of the back of the
wedge stone.  Everyone watched me, sipping the bug, and grub mash in thier
hands.
   I hadn't eaten in days, so I cupped my hands together like that, and
they pointed their cupped hands to the hollowed rock.  It was a thick
gritty paste, I dipped some out on my finger, and touched it to my tongue.
Several flavors fought over it, none of them familiar, nor pleasent.  There
was a tang, sometimes bitter, sometimes sour, but I ate it for something in
my stomach.
   I sat back down, on the wedge stone.  It was smooth where it chipped. 
The flake was fairly sharp on my thumb, so I pulled at my beard, and tested
it.  Grey, and ungrained, like slate, it wasn't in layers, and broke sharp
enough for wood, at least.
   I got back up, and wiped my hands on my undercloth.  There was a good
striker, so I picked it up, and sat down with my legs around the wedge
stone.  Striking the back at the corner, I blinked right before each strike
because it was below my hair.  Working down the back, I knocked off a nice
flake, about the size of my flattened hand with one decent edge.
   Sitting back on the rock, I flipped the point, and worked the back,
knocking off a bevel to the long face.  A double edge, I cracked moon
slivers out the back to sharpen it.  The women had tucked the youngest
under their pelts to feed them, watching me.  I wrapped my thumb around the
short, fairly blunt edge, and said, "Unth."
   Waving the edge at my hand, but not touching it for Sharp, I pointed to
one of the skins one of them was sitting on.  She got up, set down the
little, who was old enough to stand up, and beg for milk, she picked it up.
I took it gently from her, fully aware she could beat me to death without
her spear, I held it out, and stabbed my blade straight through it.
   Pulling it, I pushed down to cut the gash wider.  Then, I unthed, and
handed her the sharpstone.  Flipping the skin over my head, I stuck it
through the hole, and straitened it on my shoulders.  They set it aside,
and gathered up the young to take them down the hill for some water.
   I went with them, and my reflection looked filthy, so I washed my face
in it.  Some of the kids did the same, and looked up.  I saw their skin was
light grey, not as dark as mine.  In the water was some of that pyrite rock
like I'd found further down.
   I picked up a big peice, with a good layer going through it, and carried
it back.  Searching around, I found some more of that white rock, and split
it with my striker.  I had a good enough edge to shave some of the drier
wood, and pulled flat sided sticks from the least rotted part of the log.
   Some pine needles, leaves, and straw from the hillside stuffed under
this, I struck stars.  The sun was already low in the sky, and a fire would
warm the cave nicely.  Everyone "Unthed, and pointed, but I got one of the
stars to stick to a dry leaf.  I blew it to a bigger ember, and spread it
to some fibers inside a chunk of bark.
   Carefull not to blow it away, it heated some needle leaves, which
smoked, then popped to flame like creosote needles.  I quickly lit a
shaving, and spread it under the kindling.  Breaking up sticks, I put those
on to keep it going while I gathered rocks to put around it.
   Everyone was inside, spears pointed out.  I broke wood off the partly
rotted log, and threw them on, then sat on what was left to hold my hands
up to it.  I didn't even "unth," just waited.  The sun went down, over the
hill we were on, but I didn't let the fire.  The women came out, stood
around it, and felt the warmth.
   "Fire," I said, and picked up the forked sapling.  Using the stone I
made, I stripped the bark, and cut off the top ends.  Tapered, and weighted
like their's, I thinned the notch on top, and flattened the insides of the
branch stubs.  I hadn't seen any kind of chord, so I cut from my beard, and
the back of my head, and rolled the hair thin between my palms.  Pulling,
and twisting, I spun it between my hands until it was tight.
   With one end in my teeth, I bent it in the middle, then let it turn into
a double twist.  I slipped the loop end over one of the sides of the fork,
picked up the head, and lashed them together.  I knotted it on the bottom,
and didn't get up.  I just "unthed, and handed it to one of the women.
   Holding it by the head, pointed at me, I handed the other end to her. 
She took it, and held it up to the light.  She didn't say anything, but all
the others got up to look at it.  Tired, I crawled into the cave to sleep.
The youngs were curled up together, under a skin, so I found a cold place
to lay down, and curled up in mine.
   The rotten piss smell made me sneeze, and the eldest got up.  "Unth,"
she pulled at my skin, and crawled under it with me.  She was warm, and
snored lightly, so I fell asleep.  I woke up in the night, looked up at the
fire.  A woman was poking it, and threw something on.  Another walked
behind her, her new spear walking next to her.
   I was stiff, in my undercloth, and had to reach around the oldest's
bottom to move it.  Closing my eyes, I hugged my little bit of warmth, and
went back to sleep.  In the morning, the sun shone straight down into the
den.  She was up, and the fire was dead.  I blew ashes off of the coals,
and saw a couple embers glow.
   "Unth," I waved for the women to bring me stuff, and they brought
everything, even stones, and old skins.  The children did too, but I threw
some needles on the coals, and caught the fire on scraps of wood.  Getting
up, I added sticks, and peices lying around, and went up the hill for more.
   One of the women, not even nursing yet came with me with a spear.  I
said "I'm not going to run," and acted it out, but she unthed, and turned
around, spear planted to protect me.  I gathered what looked to be driest,
and least rotted, and carried it back in my skin.
   The older children went out with the other women, and came back with
forage.  Eggs, berries, and nuts, they ate everything but the eggs they
hadn't sucked out first, and I took the rest.  Different kinds, and sizes,
I cooked them in the grinding rock on the fire.
   Large, and stuck in the ground, I got the least pregnant one to help me
pull out, then knocked most for the dirt, and stone off.  It was grainy,
like the roof stone of the cave, and I put it on the coals.  I had to build
it up to get it hot enough to boil spit.  I mixed them all together with a
shaved stick, and split it to scrape it up.  Blowing on it, I served it
into their hands.
   Mostly reptile, I tasted what was left of the log meal from last night.
It wasn't bad, mixed in.  I took another flake off the other side of the
wedge stone, and mounted it before the sun was all the way overhead.  I
handed it over, and the least pregnant woman gave me a wooden one.
   The children played all morning, the older ones running against the
younger ones, and not quite hitting each other, and once, they did.  He
went back to the back, and cried, and the others ignored him.  The eldest
ordered the rest around.  By far the tallest, she was showing some growth
in the hips.
   The boy stopped crying, quietly, sniffed, and got back up to play.  They
dug a lot, breaking up the floor by poking it with blunt sticks, and
pushing the dirt up to the sloped side.  It was slow, and they did it very
little, but over time, they could make it deeper.
   The women "Unth"ed and I heard spear butts on the slope.  Looking over,
the men were back, and as their skins came open, I saw one was a woman. 
There were three men, and two carried a carcass by the legs, while the
woman, and cheif carried the spears.  Split open at the belly, it had long
brown wooly hair, wet from the creek, and dirty.
   They set it down, and the cheif "Unth"ed, pointed at the ring of
blackened stones.  I got down, blew away ashes, but there was no ember.  I
had a pile of tinder, now, and the women were learning how to keep fire
alive by feeding it.  Picking up my star striking stones, they were wrapped
in their own leather scrap of skin.
   The hunters jumped, as I struck stars, kneeling on the little skins. 
"Unth," the women pointed at their eyes, then me at the fire pit.  The
hearth was warm, with a good bed of ash, so I got it started quickly, and
built it up to a good cooking fire.
   I cooked the meat, but some of them tore into the carcass with half a
jawbone, tearing through the flesh.  I picked up a spear point, and carried
it over.  "Unth," I tucked my thumb over the short, bunt edge at the
bottom. They grabbed spears, and the ones watching lowered theirs, but I
held the sharpstone back, and my other hand open in front of me.
   I took a leg by the hoof, and cut to the inside of it.  I'm no butcher,
but I've had to process a carcass before.  Working in the point, I sawwed
it, back, and forth down to the bone.  I pulled back to look down the
wound, and dug in an edge to pop it, then cut through the bottom without
much trouble.
   I cut the inside down to the knee, and skinned it back.  Going over to
the fire, I held the leg out, stiff, and melted some of the fat off.  It
dripped into the fire, smoking, and burning, and stank of cooking pork. 
The woman with the grinding rock stopped, picked up a pre-chewed peice of
raw meat, and put it in her mouth.  Some of the others were tearing out
chunks, with their teeth, or thick blunt nails, so I got up, took a bite of
the cooked meat, and handed it to the cheif.
   He tried it, smiled, his beard greasy, and I showed him how to cook it.
I picked up one of the spears, and some of them reached for theirs. 
"Unth," I stuck a chunk of meat on it, and held it over the fire.  It was
good meat, fat and with a healthy red even when the blood is out of it.
   The cheif Unthed, and reached out to tear a peice of his haunch off for
me.  Digging in his nails, he twisted, back, and forth, and pulled out
almost a handfull of meat.  He handed it to me, and picked up a spear.  He
handed that to me, and I was part of the tribe.  "Unth," he pointed for me
to go watch, the hill above, and the creek below.
   One of the hunters, a woman told me what to watch for.  She unthed, and
acted out other people comming.  She also said there were predators, cats
in the trees.  From the sound she made, I imagined some sort of leopard, or
panther.  She had a deep voice.
   I ate the meat, shared some with her.  She was just like the men, except
the breasts.  I figured she had the other woman parts, under all that fur.
Thinner, shorter, and farther apart than her mane, and beard, only the
breasts, and top of her face weren't covered.  Her hands were bare, and the
soles of her feet.
   She was wearing her skin over her now, with a hole cut for her neck. 
I'd shown the pregnant women how, and they showed the others.  I looked
around, and only the women wore them that way, and me.  One more way to
tell them apart, they all still looked alike, except for the lenth of their
hair, and beards.  Some where lighter, or darker, but you couldn't see that
from the firelight.
   I could pick out the cheif, when he was facing me.  His forehead was
flat, but didn't slope back as much.  He told the story of the hunt,
"Unth"ing, and pointing people out, and making spears with his fingers. 
They had to camp for the night after dropping me off.
   He held his hand up, waved his fingers like rays for the sun, and hid it
behind his other hand.  He bruoght it back up, and showed who found the
wooly boar.  They chased it into a dead end gully, and stabbed it, trying
to climb back out.  There were a lot of holes in the skin, and deep wounds
in the meat.  Two women where holding it up by a spear through it, over the
fire.
   I'd set up the skin, to smoke by it, after scraping out the fat, and
other filth stuck to it.  It was going down, so I went back, and tended it.
I showed the cheif how to feed it, keep it alive, but not let it grow too
big.  All the pregnant women were asleep, curled up with the young under
skins.
   Some of the men took women back, and slept with them when their watch
was done.  I stayed up, with the cheif, and told him about my trip across
the water, the mountain in the sea, and falling asleep to wake up in his
people's land.  He told about leaving his villiage, old enough, but not
strong enough to challenge his father.
   His people spoke, had names, and his was Balger, a hunter's name.  We
continued talking with our hands, which he liked, because it was quiet. 
His new tribe, he pointed around, didn't learn his words, could only Unth,
and throw rocks down the hill to kill game.  They were good foragers, and
learned to use spears, like his people.  A spear beats a rock, he stabbed
into his fist with his thumb, and he became cheif.
   I asked him about their marriage traditions, and he said "Unth," his
name for them, the only thing they can say.  They all sleep together, and
more, and didn't even know what made the women heavy with child when he
came to them.  In his people, and his new tribe, each man has a woman,
until they mix blood, and she runs dry.  Then, they can choose other women.
The cheif has the rest, the best women, and first pick.
   I told him the culture I grew up with, marriage until one dies, and
trading children, to marry and have their own children.  A woman is more
valuable than a man, and usually comes with a dowry.  He said I did not
have a woman, and said I could choose any of them, even one already
married, but just one.
   I looked around, still unable to tell them apart, except by how pregnant
they were, and told him I could wait.  He asked who would do the women's
work, and I said I would.  In my culture, we had women's work, and men's. I
won't go into it, but I realised that that was why I was doing so bad out
here.  I was used to having women, and they made things I could use, like
cloth, and bread.
   My people were specialised, I made spears, and arrows, and never had to
use them.  I could, throw, and fight, but I wasn't a warrior.  From his
story, Balger did better on his own than I did.  He still spoke of women's
work, and they practiced it here, but anyone could bash a log with a rock,
and grind what fell out, and wiggled to a paste.
   I was weaker than them, but I know things they don't, just as Balger did
before comming to them.  I didn't say anything to him about all this, but
fell asleep next to the fire.  I woke up, cold, and threw some more wood
on. The oldest woke up first, and the pregnant women nursed the littlest.
   The older ones climbed out to warm in the sun, and fire.  The eldest got
into the cheif's skin, and he said she was his child.  I wished I had a
woman, or children to warm me up as I built up the fire.  It was coals, and
warmed me until I got flame, and blew it up to cover some split logs.
   We had meat for breakfast, and went down seperately for water.  Noone
went alone, without at least one spear, and others watched from the hill. I
washed my face, and hands again, black with soot, and some of the youngs
did it too.  The eldest dipped her hair in it, and it hung, wet down her
back.
   Hers was very red, under the filth, and out in the light of day.  Almost
as light as the Cheif, her father's it hung down in red waves, like ripples
of fire.  I realised he was not just of a different tribe, but different
people, different blood, and it showed in his daughter.  She was taller
than the others her age, and not as brutish, stone headded.  Even pretty,
in her own way, she smiled, and looked up the bank at me.
   On the way back, she started bleeding, so the woman with her checked
that she wasn't hurt, and took her back to wash her between her legs.  I
stayed upstream, got out of the water, which was now unclean.  It was
flowing, and would carry it away, but I shook the water off my hands
anyway. The den was too small for everyone to get in together, so I decided
to make it bigger.
   I took a sharpened spear, and broke up the ramp.  Other men, and women
helped, pushing the soil up, and out.  The cheif stood in the top, Unthing,
and pointing like it was his idea.  We got the whole floor fairly flat,
with a ramp out to the yard out front, and I dug in this to make a fire
pit.
   I lined it with stones, and rocks dug up, and gave it a hearth to keep
it from rolling out.  It sloped out, but I'd fix the walls eventually.  Now
little higher than the floor of the cave, we had a sort of high wall around
it.  That night, we could all get in it, and it didn't stink.  I kept a
fire going, sending the men out for wood, and curing the skins as best as
possible.
   The cheif gave his daughter a skin, split like mine, and a spear,
sharpened wood.  She cried, and ran off because she wasn't the oldest any
more, she was the youngest.  They let her go, ignored her, but I went
after. I took my spear, headed, and ballanced unlike theirs.
   I found her, curled up, and sniffing behind a tree.  She turned away
from me, but I came around, and wiped off her tears with my thumbs. 
"Unth," I said, Look, pointed to her eyes.  I did the one thing I could, to
cheer her up, something she'd never seen.  I threw my spear, straight into
a standing tree.  The handle shook in the trunk, then the head snapped,
dropping it to the ground.  She got up, wiped her face, and looked at the
stone, sticking out of the bark.
   I showed her how to throw hers, all wood, and it was badly ballanced,
but she was clumsy at it.  It turned in the air, but she could hit a tree.
She grunted when she threw, "Hruh!" and it bounced but end first.  I picked
it up, the thick end was heavy, and threw it backwards.  It bounced off,
straight, and clattered on the ground.
   I showed her that, and she got it to fly straight when I showed her
where to hold it.  Taking out my sharpstone, I cut a notch around it.  I
went back, but she kept "Hruh"ing behind me, and I heard her stick bounce
off something.  Climbing back up the hill, I sat down across the fire, and
signed to the cheif that I'd take a wife.  He agreed, and hugged me to seal
the deal.  He was stronger than me, taller than the others, but still not
as tall as me.
   His daughter came back, with her stick, and he married us.  He just put
our hands together, and shook them in his, "Unth," and that was it.  I held
her, softly crying.  She was young, but would grow oleder, and could live
long enough to have many young.
   She curled up with me, that night, and I named her, "Hruh," for the
first sound I'd heard from her other than "Unth," snoring, or quietly
crying.  I pulled the smallest nail off with my teeth, and felt under her
skin.  She was skinny, with almost no flesh on her chest.  There were
little round patches, with her nipples, like pebbles in the center.
   I ran my hand down the cave of her belly, between her legs, and a little
stubble caught at my fingertips.  On her little hill, I felt farther,
between her lips, and the soft warm folds to her cave.  I pressed in, just
enough to feel it was blocked, and let go.
   I hugged her, no man had had her, and though wooded, I didn't make her
my wife.  She was unclean, and you couldn't give her your blood to mix. 
She would just bleed it out again, so I held her, warm against me, and fell
asleep.  Someone woke me, the fire was dying, and I got up to fix it again.
   The cave was starting to smell like piss again, so we spent the night by
the fire.  I counted the tribe, four men, four women including me, and my
wife.  A handfull of young, two boys, almost old enough to wear skins, and
already good enough with sticks to handle a spear.  Three littles, two
still suckilng, and three more on the way.
   The fire smoked covered the smell, and warmed the cave now that it was
lower.  The heat rose, to us sitting on the wall around it.  We kept our
spears close.  Most of the meat was gone, they would have finished it, raw
before it rotted.
   Hruh sat with me, on my legs, and I talked to her, told her about my
trip across the water, and up the stream.  I told her I would build her a
house, that doesn't stink of piss, down by the water, and she fell asleep
under my lap.  She snored quietly while I talked to the cheif, and the
others who were up.
   He said we needed to hunt again, and told how they did it.  The best way
was to send the women, who went around the animal, and chased it onto the
men's spears.  He held his hand out flat, fingers out, then made the other
animal shape, with his thumb pointed down, with all but the middle finger.
This stood out, for the head, or tail.  He rammed it into the spears, then
turned it over, flat, and dead.
   I learned some of his spoken words, "Uhuh" for yes, "Uh uh" for no, and
"Huh?" for what.  I said them with him, and Hruh moved against my chest. 
She started snoring again.  I fell asleep with her like that, out there,
and someone must have fed the fire because it was still alive when we woke
up.
   I went down to the river to piss, and warmed the water in my hands to
gently wash Hruh, down stream.  I told her to do it, every day until it was
over, and made her an underskin out of an old patch of leather.  I told her
only she could take it off, and me.
   It was women's work, but she was my woman, and she had to be taugt.  I
washed my hands, making sure to scrape under my nails, and wishing I had a
washing cake.  I didn't know how to make one either, it was "Woman's work."
Hruh turned back at my voice, aready carrying her spear back up the bank.
   I made spearheads for all of us, but didn't ballance any of them before
we left for the hunt.  The same ones who captured me, we followed the
stream up, through the hills.  There was a trail along it, both sides, and
game used it too, from the droppings.
   I'm not a hunter either, but I could learn.  I recognised predator
droppings from the meaty look of it, without seeds, or fibers in it, except
fur stuck to the sharp end.  They kept the spears up, pointed out, while I
carried mine at the rear.  The cheif was in front, with the others out to
the sides, the women on the ends.
   A deer was drinking from the bank, head low, but one eye pointing at us.
Like a gazelle, but with short thick legs, it's horns were brown, and
spread like branches over it's head.  The cheif didn't Unth, just pointed
off to the sides.  The women left, into the trees, and one snuck across the
stream.
   We'd passed others, feeding it, and this one was narrow enough to step
over.  The men got down, behind boulders, logs, stumps, or trees, and I
stood up behind one.  We waited, heard yelling, and running hooves. 
"UNTH!" the men got out, behind the cheif, and planted their spears.
   I raised mine, behind them, and overhand.  Holding far back, for the
most reach, the animal crashed into us, and I stabbed down between the
twisting antlers.  It rolled, thrashed, and our spears swung around.  The
women came, stabbing it over, and over until it died.
   The cheif was under it, alive, but unable to get up.  He cried out,
wordlessly.  A spear handle was across him, broken, and I picked it up. 
Lifting his skin, he had a new bruise, straight, and across one side.  I
felt carefully, broken ribs, and he cried out again.
   I'm not a healer either, but I could tell it hurt to breathe.  I showed
them how to carry him, on spears with skins between them.  He was
unconcious, coughing blood.  I took turns carrying him, the animal, and the
few spears we had left.  Mine was broken in it's shoulder, but the handle
was still solid, and maybe still green enough to fit another.
   We got him back, and it took four of us to get him up the hill.  The
carcass was left to the side, while everyone crowded around, and unthed. 
He coughed blood, so I turned him on his good side so he could breathe. 
That's all he could do, cough blood.  He didn't wake up, and was cold in
the morning.
   I made him a raft, and though the stream was to small to carry him, we
dragged him down, the hunting party who was with him when it happened.  It
was the one time I saw them cry together.  It wasn't taboo, if all did
together.  The other men didn't cry, they went down to the water, and
wrestled.
   Putting their hands up, together, they tested their strength.  I watched
from up the hill, forcing each other down to kneel in the water.  Some held
spears, watched, pointed.  When they all tested each other's strength, they
paired off, and fought over spears.
   Sharpened sticks, they kept the point away, beat each other with the
heavy end, snarled, and unthed at each other.  One went down, and the other
pushed him by the staff, into the water.  He let him up, and "Unthed". 
Another unthed, and took off her skin.  The first had already dropped his,
and held the spear up, level in front of him.  She grabbed it, tried to
take it, and he pulled back.
   Pulled low between them, they spashed around, and he tried to swing the
club end into her.  She twisted, one arm pushing, the other pulling, and
threw him into the water.  Another stepped up, a man, and tried to take it
from her.  He twisted it upward, and he lost his footing.  Pushing
foreward, he fell back into the water.  She knocked the other's leg up with
the thick end, and shoved her back, to let go, and spalsh onto her back.
   The last man, one of the first, who lost came up, and she hit him, even
before he touched the spear.  Jabbing him hard with the blunt end, he fell
back, and doubled over.  She climbed back up the hill, on broad bare feet,
and the spear handle.  "Unth!" she held it over her head, and looked
around, right at me to challenge her.
   I picked up my spear, threw it up the hill, and watched where it stuck.
I'd sharpened the wooden end, like theirs to ballance it, and leave a point
that wouldn't break.  I skinned, and we cooked the carcass.  Some of the
women where crying, his daughter, still, but together.
   The new cheif came up with my spear, stuck it in the ground by the
wooden tip, as I'd thrown it so it wouldn't break.  "Unth," she held out
her hand.  She helped me up, and led me down to the den.  She bent over for
me, raising her skin.  I hesitated, but she got up, pounded her hand flat
on her chest, "Unth," then raising her fist as if with a spear.  She was
the cheif.
   She lay me down, pulled off her skin, and sat on me.  Far too strong to
fight, I undid my cloth, and looked up at her.  She looked like a man, her
eyes so deep I couldn't see them in the shadow of that massive stony brow.
She had breasts, bare except the patch of fur between.  I reached up to
feel them until I was wooden.
   She sat up over me, her chest hairy between the soft swell of her
breasts.  I closed my eyes, tried to think of something else, or someone
more attractive.  She lay over me, breasts around my neck, and fur sticking
through my beard.  Reaching between us, she gripped me in her thick, rough
strong hand, and put me in.
   She brushed my cheeks, and my beard caught in the fur of her chest as
she humped me.  I closed my eyes, and thrust up into her to make the blood
come faster.  I held in, pressed into the bottom of her, she wasn't very
deep.  The blood came, in pulses like the spray from a cut throat.
   I gave her my blood, hoping it would mix with hers, and I never had to
do that again.  She wouldn't let me go, just held me to her, too strong to
struggle free.  At last, she fell asleep, and relaxed.  I gently lifted her
arm, thicker than mine, and wood hard with muscle.  Careful not to wake
her, I crawled out from the overwhelming piss smell.
   Hruh was still crying, I hoped for her father, but everyone saw the
whole thing.
   I called the cheif "Huhuh," for the sounds she made with men.  She took
another man the next night, and another the next.  I built a camp, across
the stream where we could still see each other, and our fires.  We went
back, and forth, sharing food, skins, and sharpstones.  All of them came
from me, the only one who could work them well.
   I made a lean-to, lashing a branch up between two trunks, and laying
skins, sewn together across the back.  I staked these down, and piled on
rocks to hold it.  Just for that night, I had to cut Hruh's hair to lash
it. I'd used all mine, except the chords in front making spears.
   It was done by the time the sun got low, and I got a fire started in the
twilight.  I took Hruh under the tent, and took off her skins.  She hadn't
blooded them in days, and I had my nails torn off, worn smooth on stones
like my father taught me.  I'd had another wife, back where I came from,
but she didn't come with me.  She was a virgin when I got her.
   Laying her down, I turned next to her, and spread her legs.  Some of her
fur had grown long enough to see, and I felt more growing in on her little
hill.  I licked my fingers, and wet her, slipping a finger between her
lips. She was clean, I made sure with water warmed in my hands from the
stream.
   I licked my fingers again, then again, pushing the fluid into her.  I
pressed my littlest finger into her, felt the barrier, and gently pushed
through it.  I added more spit, and pressed in until the seccond nuckle.  A
tear rolled down her cheek, but she smiled, and kept her eyes on mine.  I
moved my finger, gently inside her until it sank, all the way in her.
   I wet my next smallest finger, and worked it inside her.  Then, I
skipped one to the next to the thumb.  I went back, to the longest finger,
and felt the bottom of her, soft against the tip.  Good, and wet inside, I
undid my undercloth.  She looked down at it, wooded as hard as I could
remember it.
   I turned her over, on her side, and wrapped my arms around her.  Feeling
between her legs, I spread her open, and guided myself to her with the
other hand.  I felt around, pressed just the soft tip into her.  Slowly, I
pushed in, rolling back the skin from the head of my staff.  I had to work
it a little, but slowly, gently, I pushed in to the wood.
   I held it there, pressed into her, and pulled the skin around my shaft.
I held her with the other arm, not too tight, and milked the blood out into
her.  I was surprised how quickly it came, and let myself fall away to
catch my breath.  She fell asleep next to me, so I got up, fixed my cloth,
and put on my skin.
   The fire had died, and getting up, to fix it, I heard a splash.  A low
growl, followed by another splash.  The wood I'd put on, broken to
splinters on the end caught flame, and I picked up my spear.  A "tree cat,"
black spots on a yellow pelt crouched at the water's edge, across from us.
I looked, further up the hill, but it was dark, not even the moon to see
the bottom of the den.
   I shifted the spear foreward, more weight to the front, and threw.  It
saw it comming, and moved, but away, down the path.  My spear stood, in the
hillside where it hit.  I picked up an end of the burning branch, and
carried it across.  The head was broken, too deep to dig out, so I turned
it over to use the sharp side if I needed it.
   The fire kept them away, just like the spotted panthers from were I
came. They stayed out of the feilds, except to hunt, and away from our
fires.  The woman cheif, Huhuh came down, and watched while I slept.  She
crawled in with my wife, and I tended the fire until dawn.  Hruh got up,
she'd slept through the leopard, and kept me company.
   The sun came up, behind us, and lit the cave on the hill.  People got
up, including Huhuh.  I took her spear, shaved the end, and ballanced it
for her.  Just a sharpened wood one, I threw it across the water, to stick
in the side.  I picked up another, and she went to get that one.  I started
ballancing it, and she came back.  Hruh picked up her spear, and went down
to teach her.
   I told them to throw up stream, and made more wooden javilins.  I cut
them to shape, and polished the roughest parts, then stepped down to take
over.  Hruh could usually get hers to hit pointed the right way, but I
stopped her, and showed her how to ballance it.
   Holding it up, flat, I brought my fingers together under it, right under
the mark I made.  Holding it in one hand, I took Huhuh's hand, and put it
on it.  Then, I raised it, holding her wrist, and put my hand on her
shoulder.  I slowly took her through the throwing motion, and she followed
through, dropping the spear.
   Catching it, quick before it floated away, she carefully raised it, and
threw, with Hruh.  She said "Hruh!" throwing it.  It stuck in a sandy bank
quite a way up.  Hruh's splashed flat on the water, and floated back down.
I went back, to build up the fire, and made throwing spears for the hunters
when they came down.  After a while, they where grunting, "Hruh," even when
they weren't throwing.
   After they all had spears, I made a thick chopper, and split a log into
planks.  I took the skins down, and cut the boards to lenth to reinforce
the roof.  Laying the skins back on, I had the thinnest left, so I broke
them up, and threw them on the fire.
   It's easier to keep one going than having to start one.  Huhuh came up,
and "Unthed" at me.  Climbing up to my bank, she stood next to me, and
threw her spear.  It stuck, almost to the top, where the others were.  They
shouted, shook their spears, but she'd made a point.
   I Unthed, and brought them together to tell them never to throw them
towards anyone you aren't intending to kill.  Always away from us, and
toward the enemy.  Also, we were within a stone's throw of each other. 
That was part of my design, I built more camps, up, and down the river.
   I had couples come with me, help me, learn by doing.  I cut their hair,
and spun it for them.  Long, and strong, I used it to lash up the ridge
poles, and sew the skins together.  By the time we were done, we needed
more skins.  I had everyone take two spears, a thrower, and one to keep for
defense.
   By then, they were able to get the javalins to hit head first, but
accuracy wasn't even a concideration.  We had lots of them, three men, and
three women that could throw like men.  "Hruh" was now the cheif's name,
and the word for throw.  My little wife was dissapointed, but I told her
I'd give her a better name, or let her choose one.
   She didn't come, but stayed behind with the mothers, and the young. 
Going up-stream, we followed a different path, and ran into a different
tribe.  Stooped over, they carried rocks, from the river, bigger than their
heads.  They grunted, lifting them above them, and yelling incoheirently.
   I lifted my spear, shifted my feet, and threw.  My spear landed, and
stuck between them, but it was followed by the others.  Several were
knocked aside by rocks, but many of them fell, wounded.  The rest threw
their rocks, two handed, but didn't even reach our spears.  These were up,
and they ran rather than charging, carrying their fallen.
   We picked up our spears, and passed them around, and carried them for
throwing.  My thrower was wood, like their's, but I had a long broad stone
on my fighting spear.  This was sharp on the bottom, and ballanced for
throwing, but heavier.  We didn't find any game before dark, so I made a
fire, and broke branches for torches.
   I sent the women up with the torches, damped the fire, and told them to
come back when they couldn't see it.  All kinds of game came out, small,
and fast, and we threw, and stabbed, and beat at it with our spears until
we had a good little pile of meat.
   We cooked some of it, to eat, the torches thrown in with some more wood.
Some of the throwing spears were broken, so I threw those on too.  We
curled up around the fire, and slept full in shifts, then hunted more on
the way back.  The other tribe was gone, or avoided us, and we got back
with more meat and skins.
   They where small, and we didn't have much hair, so I sheared the
boarskin, and spun it's wool.  I didn't know how to make cloth, women did
it, with sticks, and a strange seated dance.  We had enough solid pelts for
the watch huts, but not more.
   I couldn't sew the small hides we got together into something decent,
but I used them to patch the ones we had.  Many were worn through, and
others had holes from when they were killed.  I also made foot skins,
cutting off strips to tye them on.  Nobody wore underskins, yet, but my
wife, and I.  They liked the convenience of just peeing on the spot,
usually in the den.
   The three watch huts were watched, and there was still a fire on top
when we got back.  I sent the couples down to the camps with torches.  At
the bottom of the hill, to either side, I could see them from my hut,
across the water between them.  People walked back, and forth, and up, and
back down all night
   I walked over to the other fires, as they died down, showed them again
how feed it, and back to mine.  The other tribe didn't come back, find us
shining in the night, or went around.  Hruh stayed with me, and traded
watch.  
  
Bloodlines