Chapter 7: Strangers

The two women realized that they were at a stalemate. There were no sounds or sights to clarify the situation, and they were going to have to decide between investigating the commotion in front of them, or retreating and putting an unknown at their back. Neither of them wanted to move any closer, and neither of them wanted to turn away.

Eventually, they decided to move out of the brush towards the river, keeping their distance in an attempt to find a better view. They moved slowly, leapfrogging between whatever cover they could find and ready to run at a moment’s notice. It was Neta who first caught a glimpse and waved Khea over. 50 meters away, in a gap between the trees and the taller brush, she could just make out a large, black mound on top of a small rise against the face of the escarpment

“Right there,” she pointed, “I think that’s a bear on the ground. It’s not moving.”

“I see it. It might be a bear. Do you see what it attacked?”

“No. But if it’s dead, we should leave while we can. It sounded like a person and getting caught by a tribesman would be just as bad as getting caught by a bear.”

“Maybe. But what if It’s just a dark bush, and we run into the real animal on our way back? We need a better view.” Khea looked around, “if I helped you up, do you think you could climb that tree over there?” She pointed a few meters away at one of the taller trees in the area that had no low branches.

“I think so.” So the two made their way over to the tree and with a lift from Khea, Neta climbed a few meters up until she could see past the foliage.

“It definitely looks like a bear; I can see its head and claws. It’s not moving.”

“Are you sure? Take the time to be sure.”

“It’s not moving. Let me get a little higher.” Neta climbed a few more branches until the tree started to bend under her weight. “Khea! I see the tribesman! He’s not moving either, but he has a pack!”

“A pack? Anything else?”

“Yes, there is a bag next to him. The bear is on top of him, and they’re not moving.”

“Are you comfortable? Can you watch for a few minutes to be sure?”

Neta wasn’t comfortable but was also acutely aware that she was responsible for their limited supplies. It would be easier to bear the limb digging into her stomach for a few minutes than to argue with Khea if the pack was worth the risk.

“Yes, I’ll watch.”

Neta watched, but she mostly waited for Khea to satisfy herself. No matter how long she waited, if Neta asked if it were long enough, Khea would want to wait longer. Khea was a good friend—the best friend—but she forgot about courtesy when in protector mode; it was easier to let her take the lead in those situations.

“Still nothing?” Khea eventually asked.

Neta smiled, having waited her friend out. “Nothing. Both of them haven’t moved, and I haven’t seen anything else.”

Khea helped Neta out of the tree, and the two of them made their way up to the break in the trees. Again, slowly and cautiously, as Khea reminded them. Khea focused on confirming the bear was dead, first with a stick, then checking to see if it was breathing. Neta saw the massive pool of blood and took advantage of Khea’s distraction to walk around to check the pack on the ground. At almost the same time, the two friends realized what they were looking at, stopped, and turned to one another.

“That’s not a—”

“This doesn’t belong to—”

After interrupting each other, they were both interrupted by a low groan from the body underneath the bear.

“Fuck! He’s alive!” Khea exclaimed and moved to hit him with her branch.

“Wait!” Neta stopped her. “He’s not a tribesman.”

“So?”

“He’s not a danger to us.”

“How do you know? He killed a bear!”

“Khea, we’re not killing anyone. We’re not killing anyone.”

Khea realized what she was poised to do. “Right, sorry. I’m a little hyped up right now.”

“Okay, good. We’re safe now. Put down the stick and help me roll this bear off him.”

“What?”

“Khea, he’s hurt; we’re not leaving him here.”

“Neta, we can hardly feed ourselves, and we’re on the run, stopping to care for someone else is a terrible idea.”

“Take a deep breath and listen. We’re not running; we’re hiding, and we just found a very well-hidden cave that the big, nasty predator just vacated. Second,” Neta held the pack open so Khea could see inside, “this bag is full of food, and that bear is made of meat. Even if we weren’t helping, we’re staying to harvest the bear.”

“Okay...” Neta agreed tentatively.

“Finally. WE’RE NOT LEAVING SOMEONE TO DIE.”

With a lot of effort, the two were able to roll the bear enough to drag the man out from underneath. He had several lacerations across his chest, but it was unclear how bad they were as the entire area was covered with blood. With the danger past and someone needing help, Neta took the lead. After finding the cave suitable, the two dragged the man inside and laid him down near the fire. Neta got his shirt off and began tending to the man’s wounds. She sent Khea on several tasks: find these herbs, feed the fire, fetch more water, etc. Eventually, left with nothing else to do, Khea explored the cave in more detail while Neta continued to nurse her patient.

She found a number of strange items, but many were at least familiar. She was very impressed with the knife and the lightweight pot. Eventually, she made her way into the cold room and found a frozen rabbit, which was strange on its own, but that reminded her that she was hungry, and that reminded her of the fresh bear carcass outside. She quickly cut up the rabbit and some vegetables from the pack and put them in the pot over the fire to start boiling. Then, she began cleaning and butchering the bear. Her new sharp knife made the process much easier. Without a smokehouse or drying rack, she put most of the meat in the room where she found the rabbit, hoping it would freeze the same way. A few choice bits were cut up and added to the stew while one roast hung over the fire. Finished for the moment, she checked on Neta.

“How is he?” she asked.

“I don’t know. He’s not bleeding, and I’ve bandaged the cuts as well as I can. We’ll just have to wait and see if or when he wakes up.”

“And what do we do then?”

“I don’t know. But honestly, if it wasn’t for him, wouldn’t this cave be exactly the kind of place we were looking for?”

“Yeah. You haven’t even seen the best parts yet. Let’s eat, and then we can figure out what we’re doing next.”

They shared their best meal in days, and Neta fed the man what broth she could. He was swallowing well, which was a good sign. They worked out a watch schedule through the night, although Neta made Khea agree to wake her every few hours to check on the strange man, even when it wasn’t her watch.

Over the next several days, both women were surprised at how quickly and easily they had fallen into a routine. Neta stayed close to the cave, not letting her patient out of sight. She handled most of the cooking and kept a pot of broth to feed the man. Khea collected supplies and napped during the day so she could keep watch at night while Neta slept. They slowly worried less and less about being tracked and began to think of the area, specifically the cave, as home. They dragged some logs in to build seating near the fire and constructed a set of sleeping platforms covered with their few animal skins. As Khea ranged farther and farther with each foray, a collection of vegetables and herbs grew in the pantry. The snares were found, improved, and reset, with most of the kills going into the broth pot and contributing to the small but growing pile of animal hides. Over that time, the strange man regained his color, and his breathing became considerably easier.

Some of the supplies they found with the man were used daily. Both carried a knife as part of their daily dress; the pot lived over the fire; the canteens were a marvel, but one they quickly got used to; the pack carted goods in and out of the cave several times a day, and the clothesline was a novel convenience. However, there was a small pile of strange items that simply collected dust in a corner.

The two discussed what to do when and if the strange man woke up. Khea wanted to tie him up now so that he was restrained if he did wake up, but Neta assured her that he would be too weak to pose a real threat, and besides, they had his knives now. Eventually, they agreed to let him regain his strength and then send him on his way with a pack of food.

Neither of them realized that the entire discussion was built on the assumption that the cave was their home and that they weren’t intruders.

I woke up slower than usual, and even more strangely, I was aware I was waking up slower than usual. I knew I wasn’t conscious yet, and things weren’t making sense, but I couldn’t do anything about it. I remembered parts of the bear attack—the surprise, getting knocked down, shooting the big bastard, and the bear landing on my chest. As things became clearer, I could swear I could still feel the weight on my chest. No, I could definitely feel the weight on my chest.

Fuck! I needed to get out from under this bastard.

The adrenaline woke me up completely and instantly, and I instinctively took a deep breath and tensed up to roll out from underneath the oppressive weight.

It’s a really bad idea to take a deep breath and twist your torso with broken ribs. In my defense, I didn’t know I had broken ribs yet.

With a groan, I fell back and focused on taking slow, easy, painless breaths. I wasn’t successful, but it was an improvement. My fucking epitaph.

My eyelids were too heavy to open, so I worked my way through the rest of my body to see what was still attached and operational. My mouth was dry, and my throat was scratchy. I could definitely feel my chest; there was a general throbbing along my left side. The back of my skull felt like a giant, overripe pimple, but somewhere below the pain were two hands and two feet, so I was probably physically intact. I could feel fur under my hands, so I was probably under an animal skin of some kind. I could smell a fire, or at least smoke, and the faint odor of—chicken broth, maybe? Finally, I could hear voices, two of them at least, and some movement, but there was something wrong with the voices that I couldn’t quite place.

Also, I wasn’t wearing pants.

With great effort, I opened my eyes and let them adjust. It looked like I was in my cave. A fire was burning before me, but most interestingly, two extremely attractive women were staring at me. One was standing a few paces away with her arms crossed, and it looked like she couldn’t decide if killing me was worth getting blood on her knife. My knife, I realized. The other was kneeling at my side and speaking to me. In contrast to her friend, her face showed sympathy.

The close one was clearly asking me something, but I couldn’t understand what she was saying. A headache I didn’t realize I had got stronger and stronger the more she talked. I grimaced, and my hand instinctively went to my head. Her eyes got wide, and she stopped talking, which didn’t relieve the headache, but at least it didn’t get worse. She turned to mess with something near the fire, returned with a leather cup, and held it to my lips to drink. It was some sort of hot tea that tasted like tree bark. Although, to be fair, all tea tastes like tree bark.

She kept at it, though, and I eventually got a few swallows down. The warm liquid felt good in my throat, and my overall discomfort level dropped. She started talking at me again, this time with hand motions. I think she was trying to introduce herself. She turned and pointed to her friend, who now looked even less friendly. They began a rapid back-and-forth conversation, and my headache started growing again. I tried some more of my tea, but it didn’t help this time. I groaned again and felt like my skull was going to split from the inside out.

They both stopped and looked at me. Then the angry-looking one said something, and my world exploded. The headache reached an agonizing peak, and then ... stopped.

I sighed in relief.

The helpful one said, “Are you okay?”

This time, I could understand her. No more headaches, either.