West of Eden

by Harry Harrison

Kerrick was all too aware of his thin beard as well as the hair on his head that did not yet cover his ears, so he felt shame and started to sit down. But Herilak rose to his feet and stood beside him, touching his arm so he would remain standing.

  “This hunter has the name of Kerrick, not little-hair. Although Ilgeth should know much about little-hair, since each year he has more skin than hair reaching up above his own eyes.”

  There was a great amount of laughter and thigh-slapping at this so that Ilgeth could only scowl and be silent. When Herilak had been sammadar he had used humor often to convince others. But he had other things to say as well and he waited for silence before he spoke again.

  “Kerrick’s hair is of importance only to remind us that it was removed by the murgu when they held him prisoner. We must not forget that he can speak with them and understands them. Our stomachs are full because he showed us how the murgu could be killed. We hunted where we knew they could strike. He showed us how we could attack them first and we killed many. When Kerrick talks we will listen.”

  There were grunts of agreement at that, so much so that Kerrick had the courage to go on.

  “Then we are all of the same mind then that we cannot go north. To the east the land is as barren as here until the shore is reached where the murgu can strike. There is no place to winter there. Nor is there to the west where the land may be good but where the way is barred by Tanu who will not let us pass. Now I ask the question; why do we not go south?”

  There were murmurs of astonishment at that, and at least some laughter that died away when Herilak scowled fiercely. He was much respected, for his skill as a battle leader as well as for the strength of his arm, so laughter faded before his displeasure. It was Ulfadan who rose then and spoke of the south.

  “I have gone to the edge of the forest to the south, and when I was young even out into the grass that goes on forever. This I found there,” he touched the long tooth strung about his neck. “I was young and foolish enough to risk my life for it. There are no deer there but only murgu that fight and kill. Murgu as tall as trees. There is only death for us to the south. We dare not go that way.”

  There were cries of agreement and Kerrick waited until there was silence before he spoke again.

  “Let me tell you of murgu, because for many years I lived so far to the south that the snow never came and it was warm always. In that warm land there are murgu that eat grass and graze in the forests and in the swamps. Though they are not like the deer or other animals that we hunt, they can be eaten and their flesh is good. I know, because that is what I ate all those years.”

  There was only silence now. Even the women stopped talking to each other, the children ceased their play, as they all listened to Kerrick’s strange and frightening story.

  “What Ulfadan has told you is true. There are great murgu who eat the smaller ones. I have seen them and have seen even stranger things as well. But that is not important. What is important is this. How do the murgu-who-walk-like-Tanu live there? How do they exist among the killing murgu? They eat the meat of animals just as we do. Why are they not killed by the murgu as high as trees?”

  There were many reasons he could have mentioned, but none of these were relevant now. Only one thing was and he was determined to speak of that and that alone.

  “They are not killed because the murgu-who-walk-like-Tanu kill anything that threatens them or their meat animals. They kill them with this.”

  He bent and picked up the hèsotsan that lay on the ground beside him, held it up high. There was not a sound now and every eye was upon it.

  “No matter how large the beast, this will kill it. A murgu that would need all your spears and all your arrows to kill will fall dead when a single dart from this pricks its hide.”

  “I have seen this,” Herilak broke in, bitterness in his voice. “I have seen the murgu come from the sea with these death-sticks, seen all in my sammad fall before them. Have seen the largest mastodon fall before them when the death-stick cracked. Kerrick speaks the truth.”

  “And now we have many of them,” Kerrick said. “Many of them, darts as well. I know how to care for these death-stick creatures and I can show you the manner in which it is done. I know how to make them send out the darts of death, and will show that to you as well. If you go south there will be good hunting, good forage for the mastodons. And with these—” he held the weapon high above his head so all could see “—only certain death for the murgu.”

  After this there was excited talk and much argument, but no decision. Kerrick had eaten little during the day and when he saw Herilak leave he went after him. They went to the fire where the women were roasting meat on green boughs, brewing bark tea as well. Merrith, the woman of Ulfadan, saw them sit down and brought them food to eat. She had few teeth left, but she was wide and very strong and the younger women did as she ordered.

  “I hope the death-sticks will obey us as they do you, or we will all leave our bones in the south.” Her voice was husky, almost like a hunter’s. She spoke her mind freely.

  “Do you think, then, that we will go south?” Herilak asked, talking with difficulty around the mouthful of meat.

  “They will argue all night, but that is what they will decide in the end. They talk too much. We will go south because there is no other way to go.” She looked at Kerrick with frank curiosity. “What are these murgu like who held you captive? Are their tents big? Do they use mastodons—or giant murgu to pull their travois?”

  Kerrick smiled at the thought, then tried to explain. “They don’t live in tents, but grow special trees like tents that they sleep in.”

  Merrith laughed loudly. “You are telling me wicked stories. How can you load a tree behind a mastodon when you move to another campsite?” The rest of the women around the fire were looking their way, listening as well, and there was much giggling at this thought.

  “It is the truth—because they stay in the same place all of the time so they do not have to move their sleeping trees.”

  “Now I know that you are telling me stories. If they stayed in one place they would hunt and kill all of the animals there. They would pick all the fruit and then they would die of starvation. Such a funny story!”

  “This is true,” Herilak said. “That is the way that they live. I have been there and I have seen them, but I did not understand them. They do not need to hunt because they keep all of their animals in one place so they cannot escape, then kill them whenever they want to. Is that not the way it is?” he asked Kerrick.

  Merrith had shrugged her shoulders at such useless stories and gone back to her fire, but the other women remained, eyes wide as they listened to this wild talk. True or not, the stories were worth hearing.

  “That is only part of it,” Kerrick said. “A lot of things happen, and different murgu do different things. Some clear the land and build the fences so the animals can be kept safe, yet kept apart. Then there are the guards who take care of the males during the breeding season so the young are born safe. Some raise food for the animals, others kill them when the time comes. Others fish. It is all very complex.”

  “The males take care of the babies?” one of the women asked in a quiet and nasal voice. The older woman beside her struck her.

  “Be quiet, Armun,” she said.

  “It is a good question,” Kerrick said, trying to see who had spoken, but she had her face turned away with her hair held over it. “The murgu lay eggs and the males hatch the eggs. Then when the young ones come out of the eggs they go into the ocean to live. They do not take care of babies the way we do.”

  “They are filthy and should all be killed!” Merrith called out, for she had been listening all the time. “It is not right that women should hear these kind of stories.”

  Their audience scattered at her command and the two men finished their food in silence. Herilak licked the last fragments of meat from his fingers, then touched Kerrick lightly on the arm.

  “You must tell me more o
f these things because I want to know all about these creatures. I am not like the woman—I believe every word that you say. Like you I was their prisoner. Only a short time—but that was long enough. If you lead, I will follow you, Kerrick. A strong arm and a quick bow are what a hunter needs. But the Tanu need knowledge as well. We are Tanu because we can work stone and wood and know the ways of all the beasts that we hunt. But now we hunt murgu and you are the only one with the knowledge that we must have. It is you alone who can show us the way.”

  Kerrick had not thought of it this way before, but now he had to nod reluctant agreement. Knowledge could be a strength—and a weapon. He had the knowledge and Herilak respected it. This was high praise from a hunter as wise and strong as Herilak. Kerrick felt the beginning of pride. For the first time he began to believe that he was not the complete outsider here.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Merrith had been correct; after talking far into the night the hunters had decided, with great reluctance, that they must go south to find grazing for the mastodons. With this decision made they had to face the next problem. How were they to go about doing this?

  It was just after dawn when Herilak emerged from their tent. He was building up the fire when Ulfadan and Kellimans approached him. The two sammadars greeted him formally, then sat down beside him at the fire. Herilak poured them wooden mugfuls of bark tea and waited for them to speak their minds. Behind his back Ortnar looked out of the tent, then quickly pulled his head back inside.

  “You would think after last night they would have enough of talking, but they are still at it,” he told Kerrick. “I don’t see any problem. Kill murgu, that is all we have to do.”

  Kerrick sat up in the sleeping bag and shivered as the cold air hit him. He quickly pulled his leather shirt over his head, then ran his fingers through his short hair, yawned and scratched. Through the open flap of the tent he could see that the three hunters were still talking. He felt as Ortnar did; they had had enough of this the night before.

  But this final meeting could not be avoided. Herilak rose from the fire and went to the tent and called to him.

  “There is need of you, Kerrick. You will join us.”

  Kerrick went and sat beside them at the fire and sipped the hot, bitter brew while Herilak told them what had been decided.

  “The sammads will go south because they have no other choice. However they do not know what to do when we reach the murgu. But one thing is certain, the murgu must be killed, therefore there must be a battle leader. They have asked me to be sacripex.”

  Kerrick nodded agreement. “That is as it should be. You led us in victory when we killed the murgu on the beaches.”

  “An attack is a single thing and I know well how to lead in that. But we are now planning more than an attack. We are planning to leave the forest and go south into the grasslands where there are only murgu. Murgu of all kinds. Then we must kill these murgu with the death-sticks. Now I will tell you the truth. I know little of murgu and I know nothing of death-sticks. But you do, Kerrick. Therefore I have said that you must be the sacripex.”

  Kerrick could not think of an answer. This was too unexpected. He turned it over and over in his head, then reluctantly spoke.

  “It is a great trust, but I do not feel I know enough to be sacripex. Yes, I know much about the murgu, but little about hunting and killing. Herilak is the proven leader here.”

  They were silent then, waiting for him to continue. The sammads were looking to him for leadership and he could not refuse. Ortnar had heard what had been said and had emerged from the tent and joined the waiting hunters. They wanted him to lead, but he did not have the skill. What could be done? What would the Yilanè do in this situation? Once he had asked himself this question an answer began to appear.

  “Let me tell you how the murgu order these things,” he said. “In their cities there is a sammadar who is first in everything. Under this sammadar there is a sammadar of the hunters, another for the food animals, and others for the different work of the city. Why do we not arrange things in the same way? Herilak will be the sacripex as you have asked. I will serve under him, advise him on the ways of the murgu. But he will be the one who decides what must be done.”

  “We must think about this,” Ulfadan said. “It is a new thing.”

  “These are new times,” Kellimans said. “We will do as Kerrick has told us.”

  “We will do it,” Herilak said, “but it is I who will serve. Kerrick will tell us about the murgu and what must be done to hunt them and to kill them. He will be the margalus, the murgu-counsellor.”

  Ulfadan nodded agreement and stood. “That is the way it must be.”

  “I agree,” Kellimans said. “The hunters of the sammad will be told and if all are in agreement we will go south when the margalus says.”

  When they had gone, Herilak turned to face Kerrick. “What must we do first, margalus?” he said.

  Kerrick pulled at the strands of his thin beard while the two hunters waited. The answer to this was easy, and he hoped that all the other problems would be as simple to solve.

  “To kill murgu you must learn about the death-sticks. We will do that now.”

  Herilak and Ortnar were armed with spears and bows as always, but Kerrick put his aside and took up a hèsotsan and a supply of darts instead. He led them upstream away from the tents, to a clear space beside the river. The trunk of a dead tree lay trapped here among the boulders, where it had been left behind by the high waters of spring.

  “We will shoot at that,” Kerrick said. “If anyone else comes near we will be able to see them. There is death in these darts and I want no one killed.”

  The hunters put their spears and bows aside and reluctantly came close when Kerrick held out the hèsotsan.

  “There is no danger yet, for I have not put darts into the creature. Let me first show you how to feed it and care for it. Then the darts will be inserted and we will use the tree for a target.”

  The hunters were well used to working with tools and artifacts and soon stopped thinking of the weapon as a living creature. When Kerrick fired the first dart they jumped at the sharp crack of the explosion, then rushed to the tree to see the dart stuck there.

  “Will it shoot as far as a bow?” Herilak asked. Kerrick thought about it, then shook his head no.

  “I do not think so—but it does not matter. There will be no need to kill at a distance if the murgu attack us. When a creature is hit by a dart the poison affects it almost at once. First it falls down, then stiffens, then dies. Now you must learn to use the death-sticks.”

  As he began to hand the weapon to Herilak he saw a movement in the sky behind him. A bird, a large one.

  “Get your bows, quickly,” he said. “The raptor is here, the one that speaks to the murgu. It must not return. It must be killed.”

  The hunters did not question his orders but seized up their bows and nocked the arrows, waiting until the bird swooped low. As it drifted over them on wide-stretched wings their bowstrings twanged at the same instant. The well-aimed arrows flashed upwards, both thudding into the raptor’s body.

  It gave a single screech and tumbled from the air, splashing into the river.

  “Don’t let it get carried away,” Kerrick called out.

  He stopped to place the hèsotsan carefully on the ground, and before he could straighten up the other two had dived into the water. Ortnar was a strong swimmer and he reached the dead bird first, seizing it by the wing and spinning it about in the water. But it was too large for him to handle alone and he had to wait for Herilak to help him drag it ashore. They emerged from the river, their fur garments wet and streaming, pulling the immense bird after them, then letting it drop onto the sand.

  “Look there,” Kerrick said, “on its leg, that black creature.”

  The bird was dead, but this animal was not. Its claws were locked about the raptor’s leg. The thing was featureless except for a bulge on its side. Herilak squatted to look closer
at the beast—then jumped back as the eye opened and looked up at him, then slowly closed again. He reached fur his spear, but Kerrick stopped him.

  “There will be plenty of time for that. First we must show this to the hunters, show them the eye that watches us and the bird that carries it. These are the beasts that tell the murgu where we are. Once the hunters have seen it they will recognize it again. Whenever one appears it must be killed. If the murgu do not know where we are they cannot attack us.”

  “You are right, margalus,” Herilak said respectfully. “You are the one who knows about these creatures.”

  Herilak had used the title easily and with sincerity. He had spoken it so naturally that Kerrick felt a sudden burst of pride. Perhaps he could not hunt as well as they, while his arrows usually missed their mark, but he knew about murgu and they did not. If he could not be respected for his hunting prowess, it was enough that he led in something. They seized up the bird and carried it back to the camp.

  The raptor itself was a wonder, for no one had ever seen a bird that big before. They stretched its wings wide, then paced out their length. The hunters admired the placing of the arrows; both had hit home in the creature’s chest. The children crowded close and tried to touch it, but were pushed away. One of the women bent over and prodded the black creature on the bird’s leg—then screamed when the eye blinked at her. Then everyone had to see this happen and pressed around. Herilak bent and cut the arrows free, then returned Ortnar’s to him as they walked away.

  “Now let us learn to shoot the death-stick as well as we can the bow,” he said.

  By evening both hunters felt as secure with the weapon as did Kerrick. Ortnar fed the creature a scrap of dried meat from his pouch, then rubbed its mouth shut.

  “This will never kill a deer on the hunt,” he said. “It is hard to aim and the darts fall short.”

  “We can kill deer easily enough with spear or bow,” Herilak said. “We need these for the murgu when we go south.”

  “Before we start the journey I want all of the hunters to know how to use these,” Kerrick said. “Only then do we leave.”