Ember of a New World

by Watson, Tom

  Her butt hurt from sitting on the tree all night, but tonight she would not make the same mistakes. Ember set about fishing in the river for a quick meal. Eventually she would need more than fish to live, but for now she could eat fish for a few days. In time, Ember would look for a more varied food supply, and perhaps even dig for tubers in the forest or look for other edible morsels.

  Drinking river water was generally safe, as the water flowed, though it was possible to become sick and some did. Ember didn't worry much as she bent low, in between spearing a fish, and drank her fill. When she returned to the shore, several fish lay in a pile, one or two still flapping about. Once out of the water, Ember wrapped the new reed skirt around her waist and removed her breechcloth. She quickly washed the soft strip of leather and placed it in the sun to dry. Because she had no others, the cloth would require intermittent use. Worse, washing and sun drying the leather might cause it to become hard or even rot. Normally, the strip might be washed, dried in sand or by a fire, and then scraped with a sharp knife. This eventually destroyed the leather, but this was not a major concern in a village where leather was constantly produced.

  Clothing wasn't the only thing in need of drying. The wet fish on the bank would soon dry in the sun and would become inedible. Fish needed to be preserved. In lieu of salt for air drying, Ember decided she would smoke them. A quick smoking might not work at all and wouldn't last for long if it did, but she hypothesized that smoking might gain a day or two of longevity for the fish. Perhaps she might even remain here for a time and build a new boat if she could. In the meantime, Ember would build her camp and rest for a few days while she considered her choices. With such thoughts on her mind, Ember began work on the camp.

  Ember placed two sticks with Y shaped ends into the ground and placed a pole across the top in between them so the Y ends would hold the pole horizontally. This created a sort of cooking rack to place food over a fire. Slowly, she placed long sticks into the ground around the main rack and pulled them tightly at the very top, binding them with wet reeds, creating a sort of miniature cone shape. Ember trotted down to the river and grabbed another arm full of reeds. She carefully wove them in and out of the sticks she had placed around the rack until the tiny structure had a small reed top, resembling a little hut. Her tiny smoking hut was complete. She would construct a larger hut for herself later.

  After a short while had passed, Ember had two fires burning: one to make charcoal from logs, and another smaller fire beside the tiny smoking hut to smoke the fish. On the rack within the smoking hut, six fish now hung with smoke pouring across their flesh. A piece of bark was cleaved from a tree and used to direct the smoke. Ember was unsure if this smoke method would work for she had only seen the men doing it and had never actually performed the task herself. She worried that she had left some part out. Within a little while, Ember would taste the fish of her labor.

  Until then, she had other concerns. First, the sand must be cleared of debris which might attract unwanted guests. Secondly, grasses were required to make a place to sleep for the night until a hut could be made. Long grass would make the foundation of her temporary bed while short grass would be mixed with the long grass to soften the bedding.

  The cleaning, smoking, and preparations continued until the end of the midday. With her work now mostly done and plenty of the day remaining, Ember sat down for a quick rest and pondered the construction of a boat. She had seen men create such a craft before, but she was never paying much attention when they did.

  Perhaps they dug into the wood of the log with stone tools, yes... that was it. Her mind was slowly recalling the missing parts, but it would take time to recall. First, she would need to find a good log.

  As evening came, Ember sat down by the smoke hut and carefully removed one of the drying fish. As she suspected the fish had not nearly started to dry, a process which took days and some salt, but they had cooked and would most likely last a day or two without going too bad. Ember carefully removed the skin of the fish and squeezed the skin over the rock where the clay had been left the previous day. Much of the water had run from the clay leaving it damp, but not overly saturated. Small drops of fish oil fell upon the rock and still wet clay. Had she thought of this beforehand she might have saved the fish livers, which contained much oil. Ember picked up a few fish bones, saved from the previous camp, placing them on a small flat stone and setting the stone carefully and quickly into the fire. Tomorrow she would use the clay, oil, and fish bones to make herself a body coloring.

  Ember spent the rest of the late day and evening swimming and soaking in the healing waters of the river. The cool water soothed her muscles and numbed the pain in her foot. Thoughts of the wolves returned to Ember and caused a shiver down her spine. How close had she come to death? A hunter with weapons and fire was a formidable opponent to a wolf and wolves rarely ever approached people... unless those people ventured deep into the wide open lands, alone. Ember was sure she had even heard the hunters explain how wolves normally ate small animals like mice and rarely attacked larger animals.

  Ember had escaped and now used her cunning and skills to prevent such events from happening again. Thoughts of her camp and the traps she would soon set brought a sense of control back to her mind. The waters suddenly felt cooler and more wonderful to Ember, and she became acutely aware of their flow across her skin. Afterward, Ember slowly walked ashore, her body fully clean and her hopes restored. The water had made her foot feel much better.

  I would have made a good fish, she thought.

  The last task before bed was the setting of traps. Ember selected many small sticks and carefully cut them with her dagger to have pointed ends. Each of the tiny hand length spears was held over the fire until it had dried and hardened, which took a good time. Ember took the tiny blackened spikes and buried them around the perimeter of the camp. Each spike sat in a small bowl-shaped hole in the sand, pointed up. Over each of the little pit traps, just big enough for foot or paw, leaves and debris were placed. Ember carefully memorized the correct run through the tiny traps and into the water. Around the outside of the traps, she added many long but thin twigs. These twigs would break loudly if someone or something sneaked upon her. Ironically, she had gotten the idea from the loud twig which had nearly cost Ember her life the night before. Lastly, beside her fire she placed a pile of perfectly sized rocks. She would hurt any wolves which came for her tonight.

  The evening drew to a close and night fell with a slight breeze. The weather was generally warm, and the nights were tolerable without the use of furs for warmth. Regardless, Ember couldn’t get past the thought of a warm fire. Soon she had built up the second fire from a simple charcoal manufacturing operation to a raging bonfire. Beside the fire, many large pre-charred logs sat ready to burn. Her fire would last all night with this much wood.

  Ember sat beside her fire wearing only her breechcloth as the skirt was uncomfortable and the shirt couldn't afford to be damaged from being slept in. Ember felt the fire's heat as it drifted across her skin as gently as the wind. She watched as the little hairs on her arm stood up when the cooler wind blew across her, but settled down when the heat of the fire returned. Ember was never one to sleep close to the hearth, but she was starting to change her mind about this issue. The flames were simply intoxicating against her skin. Only the occasional popping bit of hot material caused her concern. The warm wind blowing across her bare body was just too appealing. She couldn't do something like this if people were around. Perhaps being alone wasn't so bad, and the fire felt good as it radiated against her skin. She would use the charcoal to keep the fire burning long through the night. Nothing scared away the fears of the night better than a raging fire. Ember watched the river flow slowly by while she drifted off to sleep.

  Ember awoke the next morning to find that she had rolled around in the sand and was now lying in the gritty substance. Luckily she hadn't rolled near the fire! She would need to place rocks between her and the fire for t
he next night. After a moment of carefully stretching her body, she stood and took in a deep breath of air. With a frown, Ember stood and checked her fish. The large fire had long died, but the effect had kept animals from her fish and she was rewarded with a quick breakfast. Today she would have to create a small hut to provide her shelter and perhaps obtain additional food. She couldn't eat fish forever.

  She turned to the main fire and carefully touched the small stone with the now charred fish bones. The rock was hot but not so much that she couldn't lift it. Ember carefully ground the little bones into black powder with a small stick and mixed this with clay and fish oil. Within a few moments, she had a paste dark as night; a simple black pigment of oil and minerals. Ember stood and walked to the river for a bath. She ran her hair through the water and cleaned her skin with mud. Within a short time, her skin was clean and smooth, as always. Ember bound her hair tightly and flung her head backwards and forwards slinging the water from her hair. This time she let her hair fling more than her head, as her mother had shown her.

  Ember left her shirt at the camp as it was warm enough to go without it and there was no one around anyway, but she donned her skirt out of modesty. Ember took a short jog down the river shore and back letting her body awaken and dry off. The run was slightly painful for her sore foot, but she was careful to remain in the sand and away from the hard ground. She would need to keep an eye on her foot and ensure it healed.

  Once she was mostly dry, Ember pulled her long red hair back and tied it with a thong into a ponytail. She inserted a long black feather she had found into her hair. The feather pointed down and to the right, held by the thong. She had only a few of these precious thongs and would need to kill a larger animal to obtain more. Ember returned to the camp and carefully painted her face and arms in the black pigment. The dark would keep her warm and free of bugs, she hoped. Using her fingers she traced little zigzagging lines down her arms and her face as decoration, more out of habit than the thought of meeting anyone out here. The pigment immediately started working, keeping her quite warm in the sun, but while it warded most insects, it attracted a few others.

  That's what I get for using fish oil, she thought.

  The rest of the day was spent looking for a log large enough and long to make another boat and a few large poles to make a lean-to hut. Ember remembered having seen the men burn the center of a log with coals as they dug with stone axes. Her memory had been working as she slept. Perhaps, in a few days, she might create a simple version of such a boat? Otherwise, she was going to have to walk the entire way north west.

  I guess I could sit on a log and ride it the whole way, she mused. It was a possible method and some people occasionally used such means, but the entire trip with her legs in the water would be uncomfortable and possibly dangerous.

  As the day moved towards the evening, Ember gathered the materials she had found. She removed the extra branches and bits from long solid branches she had gathered. Ember placed them in the ground pointed up in a half circle around a large tree trunk, much as she had constructed the smoking hut. She buried each “pole” a hand's length into the sand and gathered their tops together against the tree. Ember spent a long time that evening lashing the poles with reed and weaving reeds around the poles making a simple framework. As the night started to fall, Ember was only half way done creating the mats which would be affixed to the framework and run vertically. These would stop wind and rain, but not tonight.

  How long would Ember remain in this tiny lean-to barely big enough for her to curl up? She had to get to the west before the season changed, but wouldn't a boat help that goal? The longer she remained, the more likely she might find a log and make a boat, but the longer she remained the cooler the season would become. The cold season was death to the unprepared. Ember would need to kill a deer by some fashion and make cold season clothing, either way. Unfortunately, tanning took a long time and rawhide was a short-lived answer to her problem. Many worries flooded Ember's mind.

  That night was one of the clearest Ember had seen in many seasons. This was all well and good as far as Ember was concerned, given that her hut was still not complete, and totally dark nights could be frightening. The night brought with it a gentle, barely detectible breeze. The spirits of the wind often became tired after their most fierce outbursts and clear skies were often soon to follow a strong rain. The sky was filled with more tiny points of light than Ember could ever hope to count. The biggest of these lights was the moon.

  The moon was a religious symbol of her people's main Gods, the Hunter and the Goddess. The moon was perhaps a place where these two Gods lived? Perhaps a round pool of water in the vast sea above? she wondered, though no one knew for sure. By contrast to the harvest Gods and the Sun God, the moon was more in league with Ember's current state, and she welcomed the massive light it cast upon her new, unfinished, hut. As the night rolled around, Ember slowly slipped into a deep sleep, comforted by the gentle crackling of a warm fire and a soft breeze.

  Ember awoke on her fifth day past the storm with a clear head and a new goal in mind. She had seen a large fallen tree high on a hill, a good distance from where her camp was situated. She could only barely see it, but the odd shape it cast amongst the trees around it had caught her keen eyes. The camp was on the bank of the river in the harder, more packed, sand close to where the grass started to grow. The tree had fallen on the crest of a hill just beside the river not too far from where she was now, but higher in elevation. Ember would journey up the hill and see what could be had of the tree. With some luck, she might even make a boat out of the trunk.

  After an early morning swim and a reapplication of the black body paint, Ember spent the early part of the morning eating some of her fish and foraging. She longed for the blue paint that stained her skin and remained for many days. This black paint was smelly and just not to her liking. Worse, it left her body mostly normal color but with gray shades. Ember was glad she had something, however, as it was considered strange by her people to not be colored. Regardless of the paint problems, Ember needed to diversify her food supply. Foraging would provide new sources of food and people who only ate one thing for too long tended to become ill.

  The forest would often provide food if you knew where to look. Ember was hoping to find some berries for both their medicinal value and their ability to make beautiful body stains. The two main berries were Bitter-Berries, a black round berry which could be mixed with honey and Red Berries, which were made of little clusters of tiny red orbs. Red Berries were sweet and a favorite treat for Ember. Both could be used to make body stains, but right now Ember was more concerned with food than looks.

  Aside from berries, a lucky forager might find Tuber Flowers. These purple flowers sprouted from a tasty tuber root, buried beneath the ground. The root and the leaves were both edible and added a lovely side dish to any meal. When she was a little girl, Ember would find these tuber flowers and pick them to place in her hair. Her mother would scold her for this. Once the flower was picked, finding the tuber root was nearly impossible unless you knew were the original flower had been. Other available foods included Early Nuts, a small nut which fell in the late warm season, before the Spike nuts fell in the harvest season, and a host of eatable green plants.

  Ember walked around the nearest forested area and found some early nuts, a large red berry bush, and even a few tubers near a tree. Returning to the camp, she heated the tubers by the fire, constantly rotating each to keep them moist. A typical technique involved wrapping the tubers in wet reeds to keep them moist, but sometimes placing a stick through the tuber and roasting was more desired. Either way, a tuber needed to be fully cooked before it was eaten as a raw tuber was simply terrible to eat. The nuts were roasted on the large flat rock sitting beside the fire she had used for the bones. Cooking with an open fire was complex and took significant work to ensure the food did not burn and was evenly heated. Ember placed some of the nuts and half of the cooked tuber in her pouch
with the flint and Goddess pendant and clothed herself fully. She might want a snack later.

  Getting to the hill where the tree had fallen took Ember a good part of the morning. Cheerfully, Ember sang a tune as she walked towards her goal. Moving up a hill was always harder than coming down. She had to walk extra carefully as she still had no shoes. Her feet were tough from a life of walking around barefoot, but her people tended to wear boots and shoes except when in their longhouse, at the water, or dancing. She had some small cuts and hurts on her feet, which needed daily tending with water, and a drying by the fire to ensure they didn't become worse. Luckily, the deepest wounds from the bark were coming along well, though they bled a few times that morning.

  Ember could not be too upset about a small wound with a little blood. She had seen men who had been wounded hunting or from an accident and had died in a very terrible way from simple injuries left untreated. Fire truly cleaned everything, and Ember had spent the last two days with her feet propped near the fire as she rested letting the heat melt away all that could make her wounds red and sore. More importantly it prevented the red blotches. A wound, left untreated, would become red, then sore, and finally little red blotches would flow from the wound towards the center of the body. Next, cold sweats would come, and the person would die soon after. Such a death was horrible to witness and likely worse to experience.

  Na Na had explained to Ember that evil spirits could enter the body through cuts and wounds. Merely washing the wound was not enough. The spirits could only be driven from the body by the constitution of the person, medicinal plants, such as the use of White Flowers, or from the purifying power of fire. In fact, one of the last possible cures, when all seemed lost, was to place the person in between two large fires and allow the flame to heal them. The heat would be very intense and the person would need to drink water constantly. Sometimes this worked, but most of the time they died anyway.