From the valley, the windswept pass looks like the sagging back of the near mountains. Bent and bowed from the billowy burden they bear.
The hunters who have approached the pass, in their trips to explore and secure the area around their new valley home, returned with warnings of deep, impassable drifts of snow, unbearably frigid air and howling winds. Even from their valley home, the band has heard the crashing rumbles and witnessed the fiery flashes racing noisily through the clouds above the mountain pass.
It is a fell place. Spooked by the eerie displays of cloud-light and the claps of thunder rumbling down the mountainside, the band fears it.
The leader knows the risk, but he also knows the entire lower valley may disappear in fire. The shore may be swallowed by the ocean. And the valley’s walls may sink into the sea.
Whereas, the mountain pass is high. It is inland. And it is within reach.
The leader urges his fellows on, anxious to put as much distance as possible between them and the valley below. But the climb up the steep slope is slow work. As they make their way through drifts of snow, slick patches of ice and shelves of smooth, slippery stone.
Occasional shifts of quaking ground beneath their feet further slow their upward progress across this arduous terrain.
The band must stop and rest many times until, finally, they are forced to fall out for sleep not halfway up the slope. They are simply too fatigued to go on and, fortunately, they have reached a sheltered outcrop whose rocky ledge is wide enough to accommodate their number.
Under its protective cover, the exhausted climbers curl up together and are asleep at once.
Many restful hours pass before the leader awakens. The earth has remained quiet and still, and the band rises restored and refreshed, ready to resume the climb.
When the last member of the band stands, as if on cue the ground shakes violently and then lies still.
The leader reads urgency in the unstable earth’s warning and immediately strikes out on the upward slope followed by the band.
Owing to their singular metabolism, the furry bipeds can go many days without food and, having eaten the previous day, the hurried departure is no hardship.
The leader does not want to be caught on the exposed mountainside where calamity might stalk and overtake them.
The higher they climb, the easier it becomes. There are no drifts at these elevations, and the colder air and greater humidity make the ice tacky instead of slick.
Even the ground has remained stock-still since they left the rocky ledge.
Progress is so swift and effortless the bipeds are not even winded when they reach the crest of the saddleback. Opening into the high mountain pass.
Pausing at the crest, the leader steals a last look at the home they leave behind.
With one quick downward glance at the valley, he views a scene of utter tranquility. Its smooth rocky walls and broad fields of ice and floe beckon to him. As they shimmer in the clear, crisp antarctic air. While the placid ocean beyond sparkles invitingly.
But the leader knows that their promise is false.
That the valley they flee can become a holocaust of bleeding fire.
That the caves they have called home can slide into the ocean depths.
That, in its anger, the ocean can unleash a racing wall of water to hammer the abandoned shore.
It is with little regret the leader turns his back on the valley. To see it nevermore.
Still, he is taken aback by the scene that greets him ahead.
Where he expected to see an open pass between the high mountains, there is only fog and mist. The opaque curtain reaches from the snow-covered ground ahead into the clouds above. Becoming one with them.
The furry bipeds are entering a land of cloud.
The air is a soupy medium of zero visibility, as the thick mist conceals everything it touches.
The band now must proceed single file, hand-to-shoulder, lest they blunder into some bottomless abyss or irretrievably lose one of their number. It is a slow, halting journey through the dense, haunting fog. A blindman’s bluff without sense of progress or direction.
The leader is determined to reach the pass before the world behind them implodes. So, he presses on with deliberate speed. Trusting the Old One and other spirits who have drawn him here will guide his steps through the clouds.
So long as the ground remains level, he is confident the way will hold true.
Many hours later, he calls a halt, gathers the other members of the band to him, and tells them they will sleep here. Huddled closely together for warmth and cohesion.
The trek through the clouds has been eerie and nerve-wracking for the members of the band. The Old One and the other spirits have not visited them. They are fearful of the ghostly mist and troubled at remaining so long in its blind embrace.
It is one of the hunters whose restless sleep is first disturbed by the sound of approaching danger, and he immediately wakes the leader.
The air is close and still, and the fog remains pale and thick.
The sound begins as a faint, hollow tone, progressively rising in both pitch and volume. At the same time, bright flashes stab across the clouds above them, as terrific claps of thunder shake the ground below.
And, still, the hollow noise builds.
The entire band is standing, hand-in-hand, gawking in awe at the lightning streaking across the clouds above when, suddenly, a body-blow of pounding air blasts them to the ground.
The leader urgently motions them to stay low as hurricane-force winds rush overhead. Scouring snow from the stony surfaces above them.
The members of the band continue hugging the ground, hand-in-hand, while the roaring winds and flashing streaks thunder and rage above them. Closing their eyes against the needle-pricks of flying rime, they wait out the fury of the storm in a huddled mass.
The leader is encouraged by a discernible lessening of the wind’s roar, while the lightning and thunder depart as abruptly as they arrived. Soon, the roar of the wind has softened to the faint, hollow tone that foretold its coming.
That is when the leader opens his eyes and relaxes his grip on the ground beneath him, and . . .
That is when he rises into a different world!
Gone is the storm and, with it, the blinding fog.
The wind has carried away the mist and revealed a stunning landscape of ice and smoothly scoured rock. Gleaming in the clear, crisp air. Between the slopes of towering sierras whose high crags hold the cloudbank in lofty suspension.
The land of cloud is gone.
The land under the clouds has returned.
Every member of the band is relieved that the blinding, misty fog has gone home to its own land in the clouds at the top of the mountains.
But the clouds are not what captures the leader’s attention.
There, just a few feet ahead of them, is a rocky abutment rising many feet above the snow-covered ground and stretching as many feet across. In the blinding fog, the band made it to this spot on the abutment’s lee side when the hurricane-force winds caught them.
But for the intervention of this barrier, all would have been swept away and perished!
This is the work of the Old One, the leader is certain. He and the other ancestral spirits led them to this protected spot so the band could survive and rejoin them as foretold in his dreams.
This place is charmed, he decides, and here is where the band will sleep to regain the strength and energy sucked out of them in the struggle against the wind.
The leader is in deep slumber when the Old One visits him this night.
He comes alone and brings a message the leader does not expect!
Chapter 41. Hidden Eyes
It has been two sleeps since Grak’s discovery of running water, and the inky void of the endless corridor begins to lighten. A cold, leprous pall creeps across the stony surface of the tunnel. Casting every member of the tribe in shadows deep and shallow.
They trudge alo
ng, a file of ghostly figures following the wormhole of their buried crypt.
But while his fellows move mindlessly, in mechanical step with the line, their leader is alert and thoughtful.
Gruk knows treachery when he sees it. Indeed, treachery is what made him leader, and treachery is what keeps him leader. Thus is he ever watchful for its tell-tale signs.
His second-in-command’s recent behavior is a clear tell.
The leader sees treachery lurking behind Grak’s false mask of innocence. And he knows his number 2 is scheming to become number 1.
Grak is sly, but he lacks subtlety. And every transparent attempt to ingratiate himself with the other warriors fairly shouts his disloyalty to Gruk.
The leader knows he alone possesses subtlety, and that is why Grak cannot succeed.
For Gruk, too, has a plan. He needs only the right tool to make his plan work. And he has one readily at hand.
It is another hunter. One who shows no initiative. No spark of intelligence. No comprehension of anything beyond simple, direct orders. He is not resourceful like Grak. He is the slowest and dullest of the brutes.
But he is absolutely dog-like in his devotion to Gruk. And that makes him the right tool for the job Gruk has in mind.
The leader knows Grak is impatient. Knows he will strike at the earliest opportunity. That is why Gruk takes the other hunter aside and gives him the simple instructions that put his plan in motion.
The leader is planning a surprise for Grak. And he wants everything in readiness.
Like an animal licking its wounds, Grak is too consumed by resentment at the sting of Gruk’s rebuff to read the warning in the whispered gestures between the leader and other hunter.
He does not pick up on Gruk’s dissimulation.
He does not pick up on the suspicion clouding the hunter's furtive glances his way.
The leader is right; Grak lacks subtlety. And in Gruk’s world, that is a fatal flaw.
But unexpected events intercede to put off the day of reckoning, and Grak will not challenge the leader until the prize becomes irresistible.
The other hunter does not grasp the larger picture. Only the simple command of his master to stay behind and close to Grak at all times.
He is flattered to be the leader’s “hidden eyes”, as Gruk put it. He will wait as long as it takes to do the job the leader has entrusted to him.
Chapter 42. An Unexpected Message
The Old One grasps the leader’s hand and guides him to a dark shadow at the far end of the abutment. Where the spirit points into the darkness and vanishes.
Rested and reassured, the waking band is greeted by the same serene scene of lucid clarity. The clouds are in their proper place. The air is crisp and cool. The way ahead is clear and open.
Soon, that will all change.
Soon, they will be plunged into darkness.
The leader summons them to the far end of the abutment and guides them into a deep cave carved into the rocky floor of the mountain pass. The windstorm carried away the snow, and its broad entrance is fully revealed.
The smooth, polished stone walls give it an unnatural look. The band is perplexed the leader has taken them here instead of the open pass above.
The cave is dry and wide, its floor level, its ceiling high. The travel is easy, but the darkness is total. The band proceeds hand-to-shoulder, carefully feeling their way along the stone-surfaced corridor.
The utter darkness obscures their progress, as they continue their weary trek. Until fatigue catches up and they stop for sleep.
That is when the Old One’s wisdom is confirmed.
Confident of the spirit’s protection and guidance, the leader slumbers soundly until the rocky floor begins to vibrate and moan. Other members of the band are gently prodding him as light begins to flood into the cave from the far distance ahead.
Disoriented, he cannot discern what is causing the cave to vibrate. But, in the new light, he can read fear and despair on the faces around him.
Then, he beholds a fearful apparition in the distance ahead!
It is a billowing, ghostly form floating toward them and moaning a dirge-like lament. The leader leaps to his feet and cries out to the band to bolt back the way they came.
But it is too late!
The apparition catches them and clutches them in its damp, icy embrace. And that is when the band makes a discovery:
The ghost is made of snow, and its moaning progress is being hurried along by an icy wind. It is the stuff of the storm. Spindrift swept into the cave by hurricane-force winds. Which again are assaulting the exposed mountain pass above this sheltered corridor.
The vibrating rock, rushing icy air and sweeping snow are signs of the violent storm raging across the surface of the mountain pass. The leader is again grateful to the Old One for guiding them to this sheltered place.
He knows from these signs that the corridor will lead them back to the world above and that they are nearing its end.
Calming his badly rattled band, the leader moves them to the lee side of the cave where the rushing air is weakest and bids them to sleep through the storm overhead. They will resume the journey when the wind abates. And the leader wants them well rested for the rigors of the journey ahead.
The cave has fallen still and silent, and the thick darkness has fled when the band awakens.
There is light ahead, and they are eager to reach it. The black gloom of their journey through the cave has been unsettling. They are anxious to emerge once more into the world of light and openness.
Even their most sanguine hopes fall short of the sight that greets them!
Stepping out onto a smooth stone ledge, they enter a surreal world of blue and crystal ice. The air is scrubbed clean by the windstorm, and every shimmering surface stands out in crisp clarity.
At first, they have to shield their wide eyes against the unaccustomed brightness but, as they become inured to its intensity, they are overwhelmed by the beauty of this high alpine world. Where the air is thin and the clouds reach down to the high sierras.
It is a world they soon will leave. The sheltered cave has led them through its underground course directly to the far side of the pass.
The members of the band are mesmerized as they travel the short distance remaining through the pass. The high mountain slopes are naked of snow. Their rocky faces gleam across the pass as if greeting one another.
The surface of the pass at this point is pitted with deep crevasses. Marked by immense sheets of bare, upended ice whose bluish glow paints the ground with its reflected radiance.
The leader calls back to the band, interrupting the reverie of many upturned eyes, urging them to pick up the pace.
The beauty of this place holds menace, he knows, as the windstorms may return at any moment. He wants to be gone from here before that happens.
An even more astonishing scene greets them at the far rim of the mountain pass.
They have reached the northern slope of the high sierras. The declivity from where they stand reaches gently down to a flat, open landscape. Running away into bleak, frozen tundra beyond.
But that is not its most arresting feature!
For that, they must look up, not down.
The thick blanket of clouds covering the southern polar region ends here. While the near tundra remains beneath its mantle, shifting shadows in the far distance attest to lands open to the light of two suns.
Every member of the band knows they soon will enter the sunlit world they crossed in search of a home at this far end of the world.
Chapter 43. Creature of the Grotto
Noah is perched cross-legged on scree at the entrance of the moraine cave when Davina opens her eyes. It has been a serene and quiet night, and both are fully rested and ready for the journey ahead.
Joining her mate, she wonders:
“Is that the world you spoke of? It looks very bleak and desolate despite its greater brightness.”
“It is but t
he threshold of the world we seek,” Noah reassures her. “It is not the world itself.
“That is a temperate place. Beyond the harsh barrens you see in the far distance. We must cross the barrens, and even then it will be a long journey to the land we can call home.”
With that hopeful prospect in mind, the couple leave the cave and strike out across the frozen barrens.
At Noah’s insistence, they turn east to regain the ocean shore they fled to avoid the calving ice-shelf. It is but the work of a morning to reach the shoreline, and they follow its northerly direction once more.
The blue-green sea is both guide and provider as they spear fish for a late breakfast. It is the first time they have eaten their fill since finishing the last of their store from the ice cavern. When the polar mass was torn asunder. They savor the sweet taste and the contentment of full bellies.
But they are eager to make progress this day, and they press on until lengthening shadows begin to reach out to them. Signaling night is on its way.
They have reached a point where the shoreline breaks to the west, following the contours of a small cove. They follow it to a sheltered grotto where the shore doubles back eastward.
Noah did not encounter this cove when he crossed the tundra earlier, so he approaches the grotto with caution. Wary of unknown dangers it may conceal.
The place is empty save for the lifeless forms of many mammoth jellyfish. Apparently stranded on the rocky floor as the tide retreated.
There is no sign of other life.
His only source of concern is the complete absence of odor. The air is fresh and clean. There is no scent of death despite the lifeless forms splayed on the ground near the entrance to the grotto.
Shouldn’t dead jellyfish stink? he wonders.
Perhaps not in this strange world, he rationalizes. Dismissing the unnatural absence of putrefaction as no threat to him and his mate.
He could not be more mistaken!
While Noah is examining the grotto, Davina remains outside, on the shore, spearing fish for their next meal.
Satisfied the grotto is safe, Noah is just emerging from the stony retreat when Davina cries out in alarm.
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