Isle of Woman (Geodyssey)

by Piers Anthony

  If they wouldn’t spook, he couldn’t stop them. Blaze ran to cut them off, but already they were passing him. In desperation he fitted his spear thrower to his spear and hurled it at the last of the animals. The best he could hope for was to wound it, so that perhaps they could follow the trail of blood and locate the creature. At worst he would miss entirely. Then he would have to start back to the camp, to intercept the hunting party before it got all the way out here, and explain that he had failed to hold the prey. That he had wasted their time and hope, and risked his son for nothing. That prospect hardly appealed.

  His throw felt good. His excitement and concern lent strength to his arm. The spear sailed across—and struck the belly of the camel. He had scored!

  The animal screamed and staggered, the spear lodged in its gut. Blaze ran to grab that spear, trying to shove it in and inflict more damage. But as his hands closed on it, the camel lurched forward, and the point broke off. Blaze was left with the pointless shaft.

  The camel ran on, stumbling but keeping its feet. Blaze could not tell how bad the injury was. Some animals could run for days after being speared, while others died soon after the strike. How would it be with this odd creature? All he could do was follow it, and hope it fell before too long.

  The camel slowed, and the rest of the herd left it far behind. The camel walked, still moving faster than it seemed to. Blaze’s hope faded. He had made a phenomenally lucky throw, but only a perfect shot to the heart could have brought down an animal of this size.

  Then the beast fell. Just like that, it was on the ground. Blaze had brought it down after all!

  He hurried up. The camel tried to rise, but could not regain its feet. It glared balefully at him. It occurred to him that the creature was in pain. It would be better to kill it, so that it would not suffer further. What was the best way to do that?

  Probably it would be best to slit its throat, so that it would quickly bleed to death. But that head remained disturbingly active. When he tried to approach, the beast squealed and struck at him with its teeth. They were not predator’s fangs, but they looked formidable enough. It did not seem prudent to risk getting bitten. So, with regret, he let it be. Maybe it would die soon on its own.

  He sat down to wait it out. “Camel, if I had a choice, I wouldn’t kill you,” he said. “I wouldn’t hurt any living creature. But I have a wife and three children to feed, and times have been lean. The rest of the People are no better off. So we have to hunt, to survive. The women gather, and that keeps us from starving, but to prosper we need meat.”

  The beast did not seem mollified, so he continued. “I’m really not a hunter. I’m a fire tender. I know all about fires. Indeed, I have fire with me now, in a pot in my pack. I can start a fire anywhere, and use it to cook food or to warm a shelter. So I don’t normally go out to kill creatures. But my son is coming of age, and I have to guide him to manhood, so we went out hunting together. I wasn’t going to throw my spear at all. He was going to do it. But then we saw you and your herd, and you are much bigger game than we expected. My son went back for help, and I stayed here to be sure you didn’t get away. Then when you tried to pass me, I had to act. I really didn’t think I had a chance to bring you down. It was sheer luck, really.”

  Still the camel did not look appreciative. “Well, I suppose the world looks different to you. But if you had to eat meat, and you spied our tribe, I suspect you would try to kill some of us to eat. We’re all just trying to get along, in our separate fashions. So—”

  Blaze paused. Had he seen something? He had been looking around as he spoke, knowing better than to be careless. The day was late, and he did not relish having to spend the night out here in the open. He had expected to find a good tree to climb in, secure from nocturnal ground creatures. They weren’t all predators; there were porcupines and skunks who had quite effective ways of keeping others at bay, and sometimes they acted before fully checking the situation.

  He waited. If there was something, it would show again in due course. It might be merely a squirrel coming down from a tree, or a rodent coming out of a hole. But he had to be sure of its nature before he could relax.

  He realized that if there was something near, it had been warned by his silence; it knew he was alert for it. So he resumed speaking. “So it is just a matter of roles. Right now I have the role of the hunter, and you have the role of the prey. But perhaps your spirit will come back in the body of a wolf or even a man, and when I die, my spirit will return as a camel. Then you will be hunting me, and it won’t bother you any more than it does me.” He paused, reflectively. “Which is to say, it will bother you, but you will do it anyway, to feed your cubs. Maybe in the past you were a hunter, and now it is your turn to be the prey, so that your spirit has complete experience. Who is to say what is right, when we all act according to our natures?”

  He glanced at the camel, and discovered that it was either dead or near death. Its head lay on the ground, and it did not seem to be breathing. So it had not suffered long, despite the lack of a throat cutting. It was now a carcass suitable for butchering.

  But he was not alone with the body. There was a rustle, closer than what he had imagined before. Blaze gripped his spear shaft nervously and looked quickly around.

  Now he saw it, slinking through high grass. His gut tightened. That was no wolf or bear; that was a cat. A big one. Which meant that it would not be enough for him to kill the camel; he would have to guard the carcass too. In fact, he would have to watch out for himself, because the largest of the cats did not necessarily avoid mankind the way wolves did. If they were hungry enough, they would attack a person too.

  He saw the cat again, and this time also the white of a tusk. A sabertooth. The worst. It must have smelled the blood or heard the commotion, and come to investigate. Now it knew that there was plenty of meat here, and it would not leave without getting part or all of it.

  Were there other cats? Blaze saw no signs of them, and indeed, if there had been a pride, they should have come in to force him to retreat. But one cat alone would hesitate to meet one man, because it could not be certain of the victory. A man with a good spear was as formidable an opponent as a cat with tusks. It didn’t know that his good spear had been blunted; that now all he had was the shaft. It didn’t know that his weapon was not enough.

  Blaze considered. He had a series of choices. He examined them in sensible order.

  He could stay and defend the carcass, or he could leave it. If he stayed, the cat would try to come in and take a bite, and he would try to stop it, and it might then turn on him and attack. If he left, he would be safe, but the cat would get the carcass by default, and he would be a failure.

  If he remained and fought the cat, he might beat it back, or it might drive him off. If he had had a good spear, he might have hurled it into the cat and at least wounded it. As it was, he would probably just annoy it, and get killed.

  Then he had another thought, a worse one: suppose he made such a show of ferocity that he drove the cat away, and it did not return? Then where was it most likely to go?

  To find his son Stone. The cat could readily sniff out that trail, and as readily overhaul the boy. Stone lacked even a spear shaft. He would be easy prey.

  No, the issue had to be settled here.

  There was another alternative. He could make a fire. All beasts feared fire. That would keep the cat at bay, without actually driving it all the way away.

  Blaze looked around, and realized that there was very little wood nearby. He saw only a few twigs. Not enough to last. Long before nightfall it would die out.

  Nightfall? That was when the real problem would begin! He could stave off the cat by day, by jumping around and threatening it, so that it thought he was stronger than it was. But at night it would be more alert than he was, and would see better than he did. His vision was acute by day, but poor by night, even compared to that of other men. The cat’s advantage lay with darkness. He would not dare sleep, but eve
n if he remained vigilant, it could sneak up and suddenly pounce, catching him by surprise and bearing him down. If this issue were not settled by night, he would have to flee the carcass, because otherwise he would die.

  So the fire did not matter. It would be a losing ploy. It would merely back off the cat long enough to make the cat’s victory certain. He had to kill the cat first; then he could make a fire for warmth and protection from anything else. With the cat dead, he would be able to forage more widely for fuel, so as to have the fire last the night.

  But how could he kill the cat, with only the shaft of his spear? Even if he could cut the stone point out of the camel’s gut, he would not be able to fasten it firmly to the shaft; that was a special art, requiring cutting of the end of the shaft, and precise fitting, and binding with fine, strong cord. He lacked that art; he was a fire worker, not a spear maker.

  But suppose he could sharpen the end of the shaft to a point? Would that suffice to kill the cat?

  No. The wood simply was not strong enough to penetrate the hide and sinew of a large animal, and reach a vital organ. It might bruise the creature, and embed splinters, but sharp stone was needed to kill it.

  Unless he could ram it into the creature’s mouth, and down its throat. That should stop it! Because the lining of the throat was not tough.

  But the cat would not simply stand there and open its mouth for him. It would sneak up and pounce, and its tusks would plunge through his flesh, crippling him. Then it would kill him at its leisure, perhaps letting him suffer longer than the camel had.

  Unless he tricked it. If he lay down, pretending sleep or death, so that it thought him easy prey, then roused just in time to put the spear in.

  Could he do that? Before darkness?

  He doubted it. He could lie down, but the cat would probably be too canny, and would wait until darkness anyway. Cats were good at waiting, because they could not run down their prey the way wolves could. They had to wait for it to get close; then they jumped out and caught it with a sudden, brief burst of energy. Somewhat the way people did.

  Blaze sighed. There seemed to be no help for it. His only real chance to fight the cat before dusk was to go out after it. If he couldn’t fight it by then, he would have to desert the carcass.

  He hefted his spear shaft and walked boldly out after the cat. There was a rustle as it moved away; it was not sure what to make of this. He turned to pursue it. It moved on around the carcass in a large circle, refusing to be driven away, but also refusing to fight. Yet.

  Blaze followed. “Come and fight me, cat,” he cried. “All I have is an imitation weapon. Turn and fight, because I can not hurt you from behind.”

  Still the cat refused to oblige. It was too hungry to allow itself to be driven off, but not sure enough to stand and fight. So it compromised.

  Blaze was tired, but desperate. He had to make the cat turn on him! Then he might live or die, but the issue would be settled. So he broke into a run.

  The cat moved faster, readily staying ahead. But it seemed nervous. Surely only a man with a good spear would dare to provoke such an encounter! He saw that it was quite lean, with ribs showing; it was hungry, and had been so for a long time. Just as the People were. Lean hunting affected all the predators. That was why they were contesting so determinedly for this one carcass: the one who got it would survive, and the one who lost it might die. They didn’t have to kill each other directly; hunger would do that to the loser. The one who gave up the carcass without a fight, as much as the one who lost the fight.

  Blaze kept running, though his breath was coming fast. Mankind was a long-distance mover, while catkind was a short-distance mover. He could keep this up longer than it could, tiring it. He thought. He hoped.

  He had to slow, being unable to keep up the pace. But the cat slowed as soon as he did. It was less stressed at the moment, because it had merely loped while he was running. But it was tiring too. Its short-range advantage was giving way to his long-range advantage. It did not know that if it simply ran away into the forest and hid until dusk, it would win, because he would not be able to fight what he could not see. It thought it had to remain in contention without a break.

  He slowed to a stride. But no slower. He could maintain that pace indefinitely. The cat could not. The longer this continued, the greater the shift in advantage would be.

  But he knew that before it lost its remaining strength, the cat would turn and fight. He was not at all sure he would beat it. Because if it came at him at the wrong angle, or too swiftly for him to orient his spear, it would be on him, and its tusks and claws would destroy him in a moment. This was a challenge he would never have made, if he had not been desperate. If the hunger of the People did not depend on it.

  At least he was saving his son, because even if he drove the cat away now, it should be too tired to make the longer quest for Stone. He had deprived it of its long-range stalking, by making it use up its strength running around the carcass. That was one victory, even if he lost the rest.

  The cat moved to the side, away from the carcass. Was it giving up? Blaze doubted it—and in any event, he wasn’t sure his son was far enough away to be safe. So he didn’t want the cat leaving, yet.

  So he pursued it, lurching after it. The cat snarled, showing the teeth behind its tusks. What a formidable array! Blaze feinted with his shaft—just as the cat moved forward. The end of the shaft touched a tusk and glanced off. The cat jerked back.

  Blaze realized that it had done the same thing he had: feinted, trying to back him off. Trying to make him make a mistake, such as putting his foot in a hole and falling on his back, leaving his belly open to attack. The cat was as smart as he was, in this situation. The only reason he hadn’t fallen for it was that he had already started to push forward, and couldn’t reverse that quickly. So he had instead backed off the cat, by accident.

  But the next confrontation could as readily go the other way, and that could be the end of him. The cat didn’t want to fight him any more than he wanted to fight it, but it was hungry and had to get at the meat. It would leave him alone, if he simply walked away. Just as he would leave it alone, if it walked away—in any direction other than the one in which his son had gone.

  But it wasn’t going. It didn’t know that his son was out there. It did know that there was plenty of meat right here. So it intended to have that meat.

  That thought gave Blaze a notion. Suppose he hacked off part of the carcass and dragged it some distance away, leaving a share for the cat? Then it could eat, and he could relax, because it would not come for him or the main carcass once it was sated. It might even drag that share away, and he would not see it again. There would still be enough left for the People. That would avoid the risk of a fight he wasn’t sure of winning.

  He walked away from the cat, not turning his back; it was more like a sidle, with the shaft ready. He returned to the carcass. He held the shaft in the crook of one arm and brought out his stone knife. He could carve off a foreleg; that had enough meat to hold the cat, and was light enough for him to drag.

  But as he bent to the task, the cat came in, snarling. It thought he was feeding, and that he would eat the whole thing. So it wouldn’t let him do it.

  “Get away!” he cried, brandishing the shaft.

  The cat backed away, but not far. The moment Blaze sought to address the leg, the cat advanced again.

  He tried working two-handed: holding the shaft aloft with his right, and using the knife with his left. But the skin of the camel was tough and baggy, resisting the stone blade; he needed to hold it firmly in place in order to cut into it. He also needed to look at what he was doing. And if he got through the skin, what about the sinew, flesh and bone? He would never get that leg separated, working with only his left hand while watching the cat.

  Meanwhile, even as he contemplated the situation, the cat advanced again. Perhaps it was realizing that the spear shaft had no point, so was blunt. That his weapon might not hurt it at all,
even if it scored.

  Blaze realized that he would not be able to sever the leg. It would be difficult if he were able to put his full attention to it, and it was pointless to try with less. He was likely to get pounced on. He was unable to explain to the animal what he had in mind. Had it been another man, from a hostile tribe, he could have made a deal. Maybe.

  But if there was more here than the cat could eat in a few hours, why not simply let it feed on the main carcass? After a few hours it would move away, sated, and there would still be plenty left for the People.

  No, that was no good either. Because the cat would naturally go for the best parts first, and leave the rest of it chewed and soiled. That would mean that much of it would be wasted. There might even be cat urine or feces on it, because the cat would try to mark the carcass with its scent.

  So he couldn’t share, either way. He still had to defend his kill.

  Blaze got back to his feet. Oh, he was tired! But so was the cat.

  He resumed the stalking of his opponent. “Come at me, tuskface! Gape your mouth and charge me, so I can ram my pole down your gullet. Do it now.” Because dusk was closing, shifting the advantage. He couldn’t ram what he couldn’t see.

  But the cat was too smart for that. It moved to the side, still not certain he was bluffing. So he lunged at it with the staff, trying to poke it and provoke it into an attack.

  And made his mistake. He misstepped when the cat dodged, and he stumbled, and fell forward. The cat whirled and was on him in an instant, pouncing with its jaws gaping, those two terrible tusks thrusting down. That was the way it killed its prey: by leaping onto the animal’s back and plunging the tusks into the neck. The neck of most animals was weak, being vulnerable to any kind of strike.