Ivory and Bone(9)
“They may be frequent visitors. They may not. In any event, we will treat them like members of this clan. They will sleep in their own hut.”
And so you will.
Not long ago, our clan was far more mobile than it is now. When I was a boy, maybe six or seven years ago, we followed the bison from place to place, ranging between the northwestern hills in the summer to the mountains in the southeast in the winter. The bison were plentiful then, and our huts were more like tents, easy to put up and take down and light to carry.
But one winter, the bison crossed through the mountains to the east and headed south in the direction of your current home. This was the first winter after you had visited us, and our two clans were not on good terms. The elders decided that we could winter without the bison herd, since the mammoths didn’t migrate nearly as far and stayed within our hunting range all winter. We all trusted the elders—a council of ten men and women chosen by my father, the High Elder, for their wisdom and selfless contributions to the clan. So our tents became heavier huts, beams of mammoth bone anchored to the ground near the shore to give us easy access to the sea, at least until we were iced in for the hardest part of the season. We had always used kayaks to fish, but my mother’s sister and her family became adept at hunting seals.
When most of the bison failed to return from the south two springs later, few people worried. We had become settled in this camp, remaining here nearly year-round. Mammoths were still plentiful, and following the bison herds no longer seemed practical. Instead, we made seasonal trips to hunt and gather, always returning home to this place. Our huts were sturdy and covered with thick hides. They were warm and comfortable, lit by seal oil we burned in lamps of concave stone.
Despite our new comforts, putting up a hut for you and your siblings now makes me yearn for the days of light and portable tents. Our father has instructed us to build you a hut of generous proportions. This one will be wide enough to separate into two rooms by draping hides from the ceiling, like the one my own family lives in.
Pek holds a post made of the chiseled thighbone of a mammoth as I dig a furrow to place it in. The post is thick and the cold ground is stubborn. I hack at the earth with the sharpened edge of a heavy flint stone lashed to a handle I cut from a poplar branch. The handle is rough and the skin of my palms splits from the effort.
“Let me take a turn,” Pek says.
I wave him off. “You brought down the kill; I’ll put up the hut.” Still, bloody hands are slippery hands, and my progress slows. Pek leaves me struggling and returns with a second ax, borrowed from the butchers. Eventually, we force the ground to yield and dig out a trough wide enough for the support beam. We dig a second, then a third. The process becomes routine and my mind drifts to you.
“Pek, do you know what happened between our clan and the Olen clan five years ago?”
“I know someone from their clan killed someone from ours—”
“Killed someone? Who—”
“Tram’s father.”
Tram’s father. I remember his death, of course. “He died during a hunt.” As a child, I’d been fascinated by the burial—the spear laid in the grave, the bison horn in the dead man’s hand. A hunter’s burial.
We’ve just wedged the upright beams into place when the next question forms in my mind—why would a hunting accident almost lead to war? Before I can ask, Kesh and Roon join us, carrying hides for the covering.
“If this is for the girls, we want to help,” says Roon. He is the adventurer among us, always talking about traveling out onto the sea in a boat and what he might find if he did. When the rest of us would complain or worry about the lack of girls in our clan, Roon would develop elaborate plans for trips down the coast or west across the hills. Often he would sneak out of camp early in the morning or late at night, hoping to spot smoke rising from another clan’s fire.
He never did, but he never gave up.
“This is for the girls as well as their brother,” Pek says. “And neither of these girls is young enough for you.”
“Maybe not, but there are other girls in their clan.”
“How would you know?” I shake out a coarse bearskin and drape it over the frame of the hut. A musky scent fills my nostrils. The fissures in my palms have stopped bleeding, so I’m able to grip the edge of the hide tight while Kesh binds it to the support beam using a cord made of mammoth sinew. We stretch it taut from beam to beam, creating the bottom layer of the new hut’s roof.
“I asked them.”
Leave it to Roon to be direct. Why wonder if you can just ask?
“I hope our parents didn’t hear you,” I say. Our mother would think a question like that was too forward. Still, I’m pleased to know that my baby brother took the initiative. I doubt he would have had a moment of sleep tonight if he’d been forced to go to bed wondering. Something about knowing that there are other girls in your clan drains a bit of tension from me, as well. Between Seeri’s clear interest in Pek and your even more obvious disdain for me, I had already given up hope of finding someone from within your clan.
Of course, if all the girls in your clan are as arrogant and rude as you are, I would rather be alone forever.
When the hut is finished, our mother comes to fill it from wall to wall with fur pelts—bison, bear, elk, and mammoth for the floor; saber-toothed cat, caribou, and sealskin for blankets. You will sleep warmly tonight.