Chapter 30

Glade believed that she'd arrived at the point in her life where events had directed her. The trials she'd endured from the time her tribe was reduced to slavery; her travels across the southern and northern lands; her marriage to Flint; and, of course, the ever-present shadow of Demure: all of this was destined to culminate where she was now. The pinnacle of her life was to be a peripatetic shaman in the company of her black lover in the white glacial foothills of the Great Mountains.

What could be more perfect? And now of the two women, it was Glade who was the dominant partner. She and Demure were fated to stay together forever until they died in one another's arms in the encroaching snow that crept so slowly down the flat bottomed valleys. This was surely how it was meant to be.

But, alas, this was not how it would be.

In her role as shaman, Glade had the duty to care and succour many different and diverse people. Demure accompanied her wherever she went. Her chief duties were to chant, sing and occasionally dance, which she did with rather less natural fluidity than Glade. But like her lover, Demure was constantly and intimately exposed to the ill and diseased. Many illnesses made their presence known by perspiration and delirium. Some had much stranger and often rather disgusting symptoms. These included vomiting, diarrhoea, huge pustules, foul swellings, great blood-filled gashes and even limbs that were chewed away by an invisible force that began its predation at such extremities as the toes, the fingers and the nose. Often, the illnesses were easily treated. A boil was lanced. A poultice on a pus-filled wound. Herbs and spices to anaesthetise the patient. In some cases, despite Glade's best efforts and after all the treatment and care, the only end was death. The cause of death might be the bite of a wild beast or the sharp edge of a flint weapon. There was always a toll from pure accident. But the worst of all were the epidemics which spread like the concentric rings of water in a pond into which a stone was thrown. First one victim. And then another. And within a few days or even a half cycle of the moon, many more people would suffer from the same illness. Most survived or did so in a weakened state. Some died. These were mostly the old, the young and the pregnant. In such epidemics, it was the shaman who most often had to confront disease, death and distress.

Flint had been a wise shaman. One example of his advice which Glade always remembered was that she should wash and clean any part of her body that might come in contact with a patient both before and after providing treatment and care. In those cases where the invalid coughed or spat blood she would cover her mouth and nose with a thin deer-hide mask that she would later wash. Cleanliness was a necessary part of the ritual of healing and was sometimes the most awkward. Clean water wasn't always readily available. But Glade believed that such attention to cleanliness was why neither Flint nor Glade ever contracted any of the illnesses she treated.

Demure was not so lucky.

It had been easy to dismiss the symptoms when she first showed signs of sickness. With the cold, the damp and the piercing wind, who wouldn't feel unwell on occasion? Then Demure collapsed onto the bare earth where the two lovers were walking, on a path beaten by horse and aurochs across grasslands beside a bush and a trickling stream. Glade knew exactly what to do. She dragged her lover across the grass to a copse where she lay Demure down on a bed of moss and ferns beneath as many furs as she could pile on top of her.

When the contagion tightened its grip Demure was pasted in a cold dank sweat; foul scabby pustules covered her skin; and she coughed up dark green mucus. Her last few days were ones of unceasing pain during which Glade sat constantly by her side and tried to persuade her to eat and drink. She would periodically yell or curse, but mostly she had only the energy to mumble, moan or simply wince. Her body was racked by spasms of agony and the phlegm she coughed up was soon stained with blood. Sometimes she lost consciousness, but the pain would return her to consciousness. And then she would stare around her in confusion and evident distress. Bit by bit, all hope of recovery vanished.

Life faded away from Demure. By now, she probably welcomed its departure but Glade was devastated. She had hoped, against the evidence accumulated during her years as a shaman, that just this time, for once, the spirits would look kindly on the afflicted. But this was not to be. One moment the same temporal space was occupied both by Demure's body and by Demure the woman Glade had loved more than anyone else in her life. The next moment the body was nothing more than an empty shell. Death came unannounced. Her halting breath halted altogether. The eyes that flashed before with agitated hopelessness became dull and characterless. The incessant rhythm of her heart ceased to beat.

All that was left for Glade to do was to bury the body. There were tribes she'd encountered who believed this was a necessary ritual to pacify the spirits. Others preferred to burn the body and some even deliberately left the body on an exposed hill to be scavenged by wild beasts or vultures. Glade had no religious preference, but she would rather that the animals that ate her lover would do so underground and not where Glade might suffer the anguish of seeing a jackal or a hyena run away with Demure's limbs or vital organs.

And once the body was buried, all Glade could do now was weep.

And weep she did. For day after day. And she did so under the shadow of the tree where she'd cared for her dying lover for so long. The tears were sometimes soft and salty. They were more often accompanied by chokes and stabbing pains of regret. Glade's eyes were swollen, her mouth was raw and salty, and a dark shadow followed her gaze wherever it roamed.

Much as Ivory loved Ptarmigan, her love was still split between the woman she was with and the woman who might still be alive high up in the distant mountains. But as the seasons went by and Autumn once more gave way to Winter, it seemed increasingly likely that the newly settled Cave Painters were right to be pessimistic. Glade would never return. Were vultures and hyenas at that moment gnawing at her bones in the plains near the Great Tongue Glacier? The horrifying image haunted Ivory. She'd much rather imagine Glade shivering in the icy wind up in the mountains. She preferred to envision her alive and struggling back, perhaps alone, across the snowy wastes to return to the arms of the woman who, despite everything, was still in love with her.

"We have to move from the valley," advised Murex the Cave Painter in the Autumn. "The valley doesn't have enough game and forage to sustain the village for another year."

"We must wait for my husband to return," said Ptarmigan. "It is my duty."

"It is also your duty to protect and guide the village," said Murex. "Your husband will not return. He and the other Mammoth Hunters are dead. They cannot have survived in the lands where they settled. There are other valleys where we can settle. There are other plains, rivers, forests and caves."

"When is the best time for us to seek out such places?" asked Ivory.

"Not now," said Murex glancing up at the sky from which a few isolated snowflakes were falling. "In Winter we should hoard what food we have and stay put. But come Spring, we should venture on."

"The Cave Painter speaks the truth," said Otter, one of the River People. "We have nearly exhausted what little bounty the Mountain Valley offers."

"Shouldn't we return to our traditional Summer hunting grounds in the north?" asked Quail, a woman from Ivory's tribe of Mammoth Hunters.

Ivory and Ptarmigan looked at each other. It was a subject they'd already discussed. Only half the village was now composed of people from their tribe. Most of the men were River People and Cave Painters, and they were good hunters. Those who were not Mammoth Hunters were unlikely to elect to abandon the security of the mountain valleys and rivers of the south for the mammoth steppes in the north. There were quite different hunting skills required to fell a mammoth or indeed the other large animals common in the northern plains such as rhinoceros, bison and musk ox.

"We shall discuss it at the evening feast," said Ptarmigan. "It is a matter for the entire village to decide. But the shaman and I believe that the advice given by Murex and Otter is sound. There is more game and forage in the southern lands. The winters are less cold. We should accept our fate. If my husband and our fellow Mammoth Hunters haven't returned by Spring we should leave the Mountain Valley and settle wherever the village so decides."

Ptarmigan didn't really believe that her husband would return. In fact, she told Ivory privately that she'd be happier if he didn't. The Chief was an old man. His predation on other women, including Ivory, disgusted her. She was the Chief's wife not his sex toy. Nonetheless, Ivory nursed her faith in the beneficence of the spirits. Every day she gazed up the hillside in the hope that Glade would return. She visualised her struggling down the slope by herself to announce that the great survivor had once again come through against all odds and all expectations. She had crossed deserts, seas and forests. Surely she could also survive a passage through the mountains.

However, as the Winter drew in and the hills became covered in snow, there was still no sign of any figure, alone or otherwise, descending the slopes. Instead there was a repeat of the bleak conditions of the previous winter. The snow settled. The wind blew with icy ferocity. The cold penetrated through the thickest furs. But this year, with the better land lore provided by the Cave Painters, the villagers ate better and were better able to fend off the worst that the winter demons could throw at them.

It was a morning in early Spring when news finally arrived of the fate of Chief Cave Lion, Glade and the others.

The snow had mostly melted, but patches of white persevered in the shadows where the sun didn't directly shine. Ivory scanned the hillside as she did every day no longer really expecting to see anything, but then she saw just over half a dozen figures stagger down the hill. Even from this distance she could identify the heavy furs covering these figures as being of the traditional style worn by the Mammoth Hunters.

There were no actual hunters in the company, whether of mammoth or any other animal. There were four women, two adolescent boys and two younger girls. Two of the women were pregnant. One of the boys had a gaping hole where his left eye would once have been and the imprint of tooth marks and claws on his chest. The company was wretched, starving and frail. Their progress was slow even now when they were so close to the village. But their arrival was acclaimed by cheers, tears and ululation.

"Where are the others?" asked Ptarmigan once the company had been welcomed and the wailing and weeping became subdued.

"Dead," said Red Squirrel, the oldest woman.

"Are you sure?" asked Ivory.

"The ones we didn't bury were the ones eaten by lions and vultures," said Lemming, another woman.

"Every one of them? Including the Chief and the shaman?"

"We buried both of them. The only animals that will eat them are worms and moles," said Red Squirrel.

The company were tired, hungry and cold and Ivory took care of them. She needed to tend their wounds and treat their fever, but most of all find out what had happened. The account emerged in fits and starts, but it confirmed all of Ivory's fears.

There had already been several casualties before Chief Cave Lion and the other Mammoth Hunters even arrived at the plain of the Great Tongue Glacier. The journey across the mountains took many days. It was across valleys, over hills, alongside streams and through a mountain pass beside a perilous drop—down which had fallen Grey Wolf—and through snow in which the travellers sunk to their knees and which claimed the lives of two of the younger children. The villagers were already fatigued before they arrived at their destination, including the Chief. He limped badly and had caught a fever which couldn't be treated because there was no time to stop.

It was obvious that despite the Chief's fine words the hunting grounds weren't very special at all. The animals that passed through didn't stay for long and few of these were the large game that the Mammoth Hunters were primed to hunt. There were patches of woodland in which the women could forage but these nestled only on the steep slopes of the hills and were difficult to clamber through. The hunting grounds were bad enough, but worse were the stipulations that the Cave Painter imposed on their use.

No breeding animal was to be killed if it was larger than a deer. Only old and frail animals could be hunted. Horses were sacred and could only be killed on special days by Cave Painters. The Mammoth Hunters should never stray beyond the bounds of the encircling cliffs and the empty expanse of rough rocky ground ahead. No trees were to be cut down unless they were old or diseased. Rivers and streams must not be dammed and the flowing water diverted. If a representative of Ochre's village should come to inspect the Mammoth Hunters' use of the lands loaned to them, there must be no let to the pursuance of their duty. After every rule and regulation was spelt out, Ochre, the Cave Painter's ambassador, punctuated his account with a fierce guttural expression associated with a finger pulled across his neck which Glade chose to translate to the Mammoth Hunters, who otherwise wouldn't have understood a word, as meaning that there would be unfortunate consequences.

Ochre departed after he'd dined with the Mammoth Hunters on the meagre rations they'd gathered on the journey, which was through lands much more bountiful and promising than the plains of the Great Tongue Glacier. He indulged for the last time in sex with Glade which he did openly and in front of the children. Even those villagers who believed the shaman was little better than a slut, despite her shamanic skills, felt pity for a woman who was being so openly humiliated. As, of course, was the entire village. Many of the Mammoth Hunters who watched Ochre recede into the distance wished that they could accompany him if it meant that he could lead them to richer hunting grounds.

The cold, the snow, the fierce winds and the difficulty of constructing shelters in this forbidding place steadily claimed the lives of more children, some of the women and even two of the warriors who like the chief had become feverish on the arduous trek. The death toll rose bit by bit, especially when the inadequacy of the shelters they'd put together was confirmed during a particularly fierce snowstorm where either the wind blew them away or the sheer weight of snow caused them to collapse. Other than the shelters they'd made, the only other places the villagers could rest were in caves that were most often already occupied by cave bears or cave hyenas.