Chapter 8: Of The Journey & Four Breasts

It was just minutes before sunrise and the sky was draped in a skin of purple when I stepped outside through the entrance of our hut. The morning air felt cold against my skin and a penetrating chill shot through my veins. I relieved myself then went back inside to eat. After breakfast we packed the travois placing the sleeping furs, tarp and poles on the bottom as a platform for the other items.

After everything was organized, I noted a problem. The problem was with the spears. The new spears were much longer than normal spears and even if they had not been, we couldn't carry them under our new tight fitting clothing as was customary with standard furs. I decided the most practical solution was to stitch two small straps onto the back of our shirts, one on the left side near the center and the other just below the right shoulder. That way after sliding the lightweight spears through the straps we could carrying them easily without restricting movement.

After explaining my idea to my two mates, I came up with a little mischievous secondary idea of my own. We cut the straps and stitching then after removing our shirts so we could stitch on the straps I slipped my arms out from the top of my jumpsuit and bundled it around my waist.

The girls looked at me strangely obviously wondering why I had removed the jumpsuit then finally Sheel asked, "Dac, why did you pull down your jumpsuit?"

I acted nonchalant when I answered, "Oh, because in order to position the straps in the correct location the jumpsuit would get in the way and then the strap would end up in the wrong location." Then I took a spear, laid it over my shirt and started the strap assembly layout.

"Oh." Sheel replied.

The look on both women's faces told me they didn't have a clue how the jumpsuit could possibly effect the position of the straps, but rather than argue with me, they quickly followed my example and pulled down their jumpsuits.

I grinned to myself as I sneakily looked up and saw four magnificent breasts pop free from their confinement and four berry-sized nipples instantly turn hard in the cool air.

We worked diligently on the shirts, me spending more time than I should gazing at their breasts when suddenly, Roya yelled out, "Our breasts!" then laughingly she said to Sheel, "Sheel, the jumpsuits have nothing to do with the straps. Dac just wanted to look at our tits."

Sheel looked up from her work and I could see enlightenment fill her eyes, then while giggling she said, "Dac, you are so sneaky. It is too bad we do not need any straps on our pants. Then at least Roya and I would have something to look at as well."

We all laughed together.

I inwardly applauded the girls because they didn't pull up their jumpsuits until after all the spear straps were completed.

The spear holders worked even better than I had expected with one exception. They fit comfortably and hardly restricted movement at all, and the spears came free quickly and easily, but the single exception was it took some practice and coordination to get the spear back into the lower strap without help. Well nothing is perfect.

With everything packed and the three of us outfitted, we headed off to find Treeya.

The walk east across the plain was long and difficult at times. We walked 6 to 7 hours a day, resting once at mid-day. We covered between 8 to 15 miles a day. On the third day I brought down a small saiga antelope for fresh meat. The antelope was young and had probably lost its mother and sibling (saiga antelope usually give birth to two young), and because it was lagging behind the herd of 40 or 50 animals it was easy pray for my long spear.

The tarp worked out well as a traveling hut, but both women fussed over it incessantly during assembly, making sure I didn't puncture our precious bathing pond while putting it up.

Both women insisted on taking their turns with pulling the travois. When I objected, they used my own words against me, "We are one now. None is more important than the other," when I pointed out that those very words had absolutely no affect when I wanted to cook for them, they just kissed me on the cheek and pulled the travois anyway.

We walked on at a good pace and came to a large almost barren basin, which even before my awakening, I had never crossed before. I scanned the great expanse of the basin with eager eyes. It spread remoter and remoter, with only a few clusters of sere thorn bushes here and there, and the dim suggestions of some now waterless ravine, to break its desolation of yellow grass. Its dull distances melted at last into the bluish slopes of the far off hills... hills which looked to be of a greener kind, and above them invisibly supported, and seeming indeed to hang in the sky, were the summits of the ice shelf's that grew larger and bolder to the north as the sides of the basin drew together. In addition, eastward the basin opened onto the plains once again until a distant darkness under the sky told where our destination lay. However, I looked neither north nor south, but only steadfastly across the basin toward the plains.

We walked cautiously down a long slope and entered the basin, and came through a waste of prickly, twisted bushes and dry shapes of horny branches that grew amongst the rocks, into the levels below because the soil was scanty, and the only herbage was this scorched dead straw that lay on the ground. Still, by hard scanning, and by kneeling down I could ascertain that others had passed this way because there were trodden places, bent and broken blades of the coarse grass, and even the sufficient intimation of a footprint.

There was no breeze. What a vast, still place it seemed to me, a monotonous afternoon slumber with the sky open and blank, except for a somber veil of haze that had gathered in the upper valley, then off to my left I saw the purple-black flash of a snake which quickly vanished amidst the brown.