Bonesetter (9 page)

The others took up the chant.
Pell was not surprised to see Denit and Pont shouting the curse louder than any of the others.
He thought of appealing to Gontra for support against this death sentence.
Gontra surely owed Pell something, but as Pell searched out Gontra’s eyes, he saw them downcast.
Gontra was chanting, same as the others, not as loud perhaps, but still the same death sentence, “We cast you out.”
Exen too, eyes on the horizon, not meeting Pell’s.
Boro was vehemently chanting beside his new hero Denit, his old pledge to follow Pell from the tribe if Pell was cast out appeared to be forgotten.

Pell looked pleadingly at Roley but Roley’s face hardened and he raised his spear.
Pell scrabbled back a few paces on his buttocks then rose to his feet and began to run.
Out of habit he curved around back toward the cave, running homeward as he always had before when things went wrong.
He had probably covered a mile or two before he slowed, thinking about the fact that cave was no longer his home.
He stumbled to a walk, tears streaming down his face and considered his options.

People just didn’t survive outside
of their tribes.
If t
hey were cast out they died
unless they were able to join
another tribe.
Pell had heard
of a few who had lived for a season alone but they had been good hunters, cast out for fighting or some other crime.
Even excellent hunters eventually died if no tribe took them in.
A few weeks bad hunting, a minor injury with no one to help, an encounter with a night cat—there were just too many things to go wrong if you were alone.

However, Pell knew he wasn’t even a good hunter who might survive a season and later be taken back in.
His poor hunting was after all the primary reason he had been cast out of his tribe.
He knew it might have come to this anyway some winter, if it hadn’t been brought to a head by his stupidity today.
But maybe with a few more years of maturity he wouldn’t have been so clumsy. Maybe he could hit something when he threw.

How could he possibly survive?

For a while h
e considered casting himself off the same cliff that Durr had. At least it would be a quick death rather than slow starvation.
The thing that kept him going was the possibility that, if he survived for a few days, Roley
might
reconsider.
Pell would need fire to keep away the night cats though.
If he must sleep outside the cave he would also need more furs to keep warm.
And he
must
find shelter somewhere, not necessarily a cave but at least a defendable windbreak

He suddenly realized that the women back at the cave didn’t know he was outcast as yet.
Perhaps he could get some supplies?
He continued back to the cave.
His mother saw him coming alone.
With an exclamation she ran out to ask whether he was hurt.

“No Momma, Roley ‘cast me out’.”

Donte staggered and turned white as a sheet.
“No!” was all she could say.

Pell grasped her arm to hold her up but she sank slowly to the ground anyway.
“Yes Momma.
I’m hoping to get
a coal from the
fire and a few sleeping furs before the rest of the men return and tell the women.
Without
some
supplies, there’s no way I’ll survive.
I don’t know, maybe I don’t deserve to live.
Perhaps there’s not a chance that I can make it.
But... I want to try.”

Shaken to her very core, Donte just sat there, staring up at her son.

Pell shook her shoulder a little, “Momma!
Please!
If you won’t get me a few supplies before the hunters come back and tell everyone, I won’t have any chance at all.”

Donte’s face took on a look of resolve.
“I’ll come with you, we’ll form our own tribe of two.”

Pell started back, aghast, then rethought the idea.
It would be good to have some company in exile.
Even in death.
He realized that half the terror of being cast out was the thought of being completely alone.
Later in the spring when the plants began to green and the tubers to fatte
n up Donte would be invaluable. S
he knew the wom
an’s art
of gathering
plant food
.

Pell came back to reality.
Right now it was early spring when they depended on the hunt for all their food and Donte, being a woman, would
only be a heavier burden for an inferior
hunter
such as
himself.
It didn’t occur to Pell that Donte might help with the hunt, the concept of women hunting wasn’t within the pale of his experience.
“Oh Momma, we can’t form a tribe without any hunters.
You’d just die with me.”

“Better to die with you then.
All my other children dead… so many years now...
It’s no use going on if I lose you too.”

Pell thought a moment, “No! You’ve
got
to stay with the tribe, at least for now.
You might be able to sneak me a few supplies if I need them.
You wouldn’t be able to steal anything for me if you were an exile too.
Later this summer, if I’m still alive, you could join me and help me gather for the winter.
We could try to form our own tribe then.
Besides, what I’m really hoping is that Roley will change his mind and let me back in the tribe.
If you stay, you would be able to beg him for mercy on my behalf. You won’t be able to influence him if you’re an outcast too.”

Tears brimming in her eyes, Donte sat staring into the distance awhile, finally nodded, then said simply, “Wait.”

She turned and walked back up the path to the cave.
A few minutes later she came out with a bundle and walked back to where the forlorn Pell stood, somewhat out of sight behind several small trees.

“Here,” she said handing him the bundle, “Two furs, one of Lenta’s old firepots with a couple of good coals, some flint, some sinew and thongs, a big piece of leather and a chunk of meat from yesterday’s kill.
I’ve been thinking about where you should set up your camp.
You need to be a day’s walk from here so you’ll be out of Roley’s regular hunting area.
It would be good if it was towards the Aldans’ usual summer hunting areas so I would be able to find you when the gathering gets better.”

They talked a while and Pell agreed to try to set up his camp in a ravine a day’s walk in the direction of the summer gathering place.
The tribe normally summered at the edge of a large area of grassland about two and a half days walk toward the summer tribal gathering and trading area which was a few days beyond that even.
Thus, he would be about half way between the tribe’s winter and summer areas but at a day’s walk, still outside the hunting areas for either.
The ravine they agreed upon was easy enough to identify because it had a spring fed stream
.
T
he water
of the stream
was known for running ice cold, even in the heat of summer.

Donte clasped Pell to her bosom. Realizing bemusedly that he had grown enough to be as tall as she was, Pell
hugged her back a moment. Then he
turned and trudged away.

Initially Pell started out directly for the ravine with the cold springs.
He hadn’t gone far when he realized he wouldn’t be passing too far from the brush choked gulch where he had wanted to lay in waiting, hoping that an animal would get stuck in his trap.
He had intended to go there later that day anyway.
On the one hand he didn’t want to go, because he needed to set up a shelter as soon as possible against the fear of the big night cats.
On the other hand, he realized that the thicket of brush might be a safe refuge from the cats, which would have difficulty insinuating their bulk within.
It didn’t look like rain that night anyway and the dead brush would provide material for a fire.
And so, instead of passing
by
, he turned into the mouth of the little gulch.

When he arrived at the brushy wall, he immediately smelled blood.
Something had made a fresh kill nearby.
He looked around but whatever it was it wasn’t on his side of the brush wall.
Perhaps it was on the other side?
Excitedly he crouched down and began to go through.
A few paces into the mess of sticks and brush he saw some motion ahead.
He realized that it was coming from the area he had worked on.
There was a boar in there!
And a wolf!
He backed up warily holding his spear out in front of him to ward off the wolf if it came his way.
His heart was throbbing but the wolf didn’t pursue him.
In fact, it appeared that there were only a few abortive motions coming from the wolf.
The boar lay still.
Finally, holding his spear rigidly in front of himself he advanced again.
When he got close again he saw that both animals had become thoroughly trapped in the little area between the sharpened stakes that he had set up the other day.
He suspected that the pig had become trapped first.
The wolf had probably come
to
investigat
e
, hoping to make a meal of the pig.

In any case, they had become wedged into the small area with one another and it appeared that although the wolf had eventually killed the boar, the boar had battered the wolf up against Pell’s stakes and caused some serious injuries of its own.
The wolf lay weakly on its side, lapping at blood still dripping from the boar’s carcass.
It looked up at Pell’s approach and he could see the fear in its eyes.
The wolf was rather small but had a beautiful pelt of silvery brown fur.
He braced himself to plunge his spear into the wolf’s chest, thinking that the pelt would be valuable.
He slid the spear through the stakes that blocked the exit and put the tip on the wolf’s chest so that he couldn’t miss.

The wolf looked into his eyes piteously—in those eyes Pell saw a reflection of himself, begging for his life from Roley.
He cursed and pulled the spear back.
The wolf was no threat in its current condition. Harvesting its pelt while he was traveling would be a waste anyway, he wouldn’t be able to stretch or work it. He had more pig than he could eat before it rotted and in any case, wolf meat was tough and stringy.

He started disengaging the stakes that blocked the passage.
Once he had removed them all so that they no longer formed their one-way block
age
of the passage, he reached in and grabbed the front limb of the dead boar.
He heaved hard and began hauling it slowly back out of the narrow passage that
been
its deathtrap.
The wolf lay unmoving.
Pell pulled the boar back out to the end of the passage where he had left the bundle Donte had made for him.

To his dismay he saw that the bundle had fallen over!
In horror he untied the bundle and felt the little firepot inside.
It was barely warm!
Desperately, he got out his good flint knife and made some shavings from one of the dry pieces of wood.
He broke off some small dry twigs and laid them close to hand.
He opened the fire pot and put the shavings inside on the coal that lay within.
He blew gently.
It didn’t bring a glow!
Frantic, he shook the little vessel, nudged the coals and then blew some more.
Spirits!
The coals were dead!

He couldn’t possibly survive without the tribe, without a cave
and
without fire!
He would have to go back and get another coal—but the hunters were probably already back!
Perhaps he could trade the pelt of the wolf for a coal?

He turned and looked back into the tunnel.
The wolf stood swaying in the entrance, obviously barely able to stand.
He took his knife and walked over to it, it should be easy to kill.
He
planned
to grasp its snout and cut its throat but as Pell reached for its nose the wolf licked his hand.
He jerked his hand back but then recognized it for the friendly gesture it was. Once again Pell found himself unable to look into its sorrowful eyes while killing it.
He backed away and began cutting up the boar’s carcass—after a minute he threw the boar’s head to the wolf.
The animal lay down and began gnawing on it.
While Pell skinned and cut up the boar he worried about what to do.

Done, he wrapped one haunch of the pig, with a chunk of the liver, which was all he estimated he could possibly eat before it rotted, in the large leather
skin
his mother had brought him. He carried this bundle back into the tunnel in the brush.
He collected the downhill set of sharpened stakes that had trapped the two animals and worked his way past the uphill set.
There he laid his bundle and the pig haunch in its leather.
Then he used the sharpened stakes to make another one-way block facing uphill.
Now the tunnel was again doubly blocked, but this time to keep animals away from his stuff rather than trapping them in a zone.
He took his little firepot, made his way back out of the tunnel, wrapped as much of the pig meat in the pig’s own skin as he could carry and set off back to the Aldan’s cave.