Manak-na's Story, 75,000 BC

by Bonnye Matthews

  “Well, jerky has to be good for something,” Mitrak laughed. “It certainly isn’t creative cooking!”

  Domur responded with a chuckle. Both women liked to eat good food. They had not grumbled, for they knew ahead of time there would be days and days of jerky, but they did like well-seasoned, freshly cooked meat. They also liked good, fresh vegetables available when the earth wasn’t covered with white rain. They even would have been delighted to have what they normally just settled for—boiled plants they had cut into pieces and dehydrated to hard pieces in the season of warm nights and then boiled in the season of cold days to bring back tenderness. Rehydrated plants were not the same as fresh, but they were better than no plants at all. They missed their evening meals much more than they thought they would.

  “Can you believe how much weight we’re carrying now? At first I wondered how far I’d be able to travel with the light weight backpack. Now that we’re carrying what is ours to carry, it seems lighter than those we carried at the beginning.”

  Domur laughed as she walked carefully through some scattered rocks. “We are becoming as well muscled as our husbands. Do you think we’d do well as hunters?”

  “You might,” Mitrak replied more seriously, “I can handle meat preparation when it comes to cooking. It still makes me retch when I smell a freshly slaughtered animal. I’d rather do many, many things than bleed and eviscerate a carcass.” She almost retched just thinking about it.

  “With as many People as we have, we’ve been spared a lot. Had we lived in very small groups, we’d have to do things we don’t want to do. I love the size of our group now.” Domur did a palm strike.

  “I agree,” Mitrak said echoing the palm strike. “Is that rain?”

  Domur looked up. “Well, I think you’re right and it looks like we’ll be seeing a lot more. Look that way,” Domur pointed off to the west.

  “Hold up,” Manak-na shouted from the rear. The rain was coming down heavier now.

  Each of the People had a rolled gut sheet made of parallel split sections of animal gut sewed together to form the sheet. When rain fell, they unrolled the gut sheet and pulled it over their backpack and their heads. They had sticks that hooked to the gut skin above their heads and to the backpack, so that they walked with the backpack and their heads protected from rainfall. The sticks held it in place so their hands were free. They pulled the sheets up, hooked them to the sticks, and resumed trekking. Komus also had a rain protector. His was made of tightly woven grass. It was made so that his hands were free unless the wind was high.

  The men and Aryna had been quiet during the trek. Domur and Mitrak chatted constantly. Sometimes the others would tire of the chatter, and at other times they’d find it interesting or humorous. It definitely added color to their trek. No one would have suggested they remain quiet. Komus found it fascinating. Women of the People were more open, more self assured, more outspoken than women of his people. Women of his people might have had the same thoughts as these women, but they would never have expressed them before hunters for fear of disapproval. These women, Komus realized, never questioned whether they were approved—they knew they were. It was insightful for him. He liked it. These women were strong. He wondered about the woman with the hair that once was yellow. There were white hairs among the yellow ones. Many white hairs. She was a quiet one. He wondered why. He’d never have guessed she was one of three survivors of a terrible war.

  The rain came down harder and faster. It made pinging sounds on the gut sheets. They continued on. Rain would not stop the trek. Mixed with the rain were hard little white balls. The balls gathered on the ground. The trekkers wore coverings made for their feet for warm weather. It kept them from walking barefooted on the cold hard balls. The sky was dark and hail became larger. Lightning flashed and thunder roared.

  “Glad I’m not an animal in the open all the time,” Mitrak said loud so Domur could hear.

  “Me, too. Imagine if we didn’t have our gut sheets!”

  “No, thank you, I’d rather not imagine that!” Mitrak laughed.

  Komus stopped. On the hillside near where they were, there was a cave. Komus studied the landscape. Finally, he remembered. They walked towards the cave. He went inside and found the cave was free of animals and other people. Mitrak looked inside the container where she carried the ember for making fires. It had gone out. “We have to use a fire starter,” she said. Komus produced one from his backpack. Aryna had already gathered some dry material that would ignite easily from the inside of the cave. She took it to Komus. Domur and Manak-na had gathered some twigs and were looking for dry wood. They found a few pieces of dry wood towards the back of the cave. They couldn’t see well, so they would have to wait to explore the cave further when they could light a torch. They took what they had to Komus.

  Komus noticed again that the People didn’t need to talk a lot. They just knew what needed to be done and did it. He approved.

  Kai-na stood in the entryway watching the storm. The air always smelled so fresh during a storm. Mitrak went to him and put her arm around his waist.

  “What’s it like when you go hunting, and a storm rises up like this?” Mitrak asked.

  “We act like it’s not happening, unless it is so bad that it frightens the animals, and then we look for shelter.”

  “You must’ve had some tough times.”

  “It’s part of hunting. We have a responsibility to feed the People. That’s foremost in our mind webs, but also foremost in our mind webs is that we have to be alive to do that. We try not to take risks that could be too great. We look out for each other carefully.” Kai-na put his arm around Mitrak’s shoulders and continued, “That is all the substance of being a -na hunter. We’ve had few accidents, because we train to be very careful. When I was injured, we were trying something very new. My injury showed us how to make the dropoff work better for us.”

  Mitrak was surrounded with a deep feeling of closeness to Kai-na but had no way to express it easily. She said, “I love you. I am so glad we live at this time and in this place. We are blessed of Wisdom.”

  He squeezed her shoulder. “I agree. Smell the wonderful fresh air. Have you ever smelled better?”

  “It is so clean,” she agreed.

  A small hearth fire blazed behind them. They turned to see Komus making a torch from a piece of wood they’d overlooked. He seemed to have everything in his backpack. Even some tar for wrapping the end of the torch. He was warming it in his hands. They watched. Once he had it going, he headed to the back of the cave. He came forward with some dry wood to keep the fire going for a good while.

  He looked at Domur and Mitrak. “Do you women think you can make a spit using some of this wood?” he asked.

  The women looked at the wood he’d brought. “I think so,” Domur said optimistically. Mitrak didn’t say anything but wondered what the man had in mind. “We have nothing to put on a spit,” Mitrak finally said, stating the obvious.

  “I will strip off and ask Manak-na to do the same. We’ll find something for the spit without soaking our clothing. After listening to you two this morning, I’m waiting for a great evening meal, well seasoned, and tasting good enough to last for another moon.” He grinned from ear to ear as Manak-na began to strip off the leather clothing he didn’t want to get wet in the rain. “This is a good place to stay overnight. We can start again when the sun shines in the morning,” Komus added.

  Aryna looked at Tongip-na. “Will you accompany me to search for greens?” she asked almost salivating.

  “Of course,” he agreed. Real food sounded wonderful. Both stripped off and were outside ready to find the other part of their evening meal.

  Each of the seven trekkers was busy planning for the evening meal. Getting wet was a small price to pay for a belly full of good food on a trek like theirs.

  It wasn’t long before Komus and Manak-na returned with a medium sized boar. “Just the perfect size for us!” Manak-na announced from the entryway. “This
will taste so good!” He stood by the fire shaking the water from his hair. Domur brought him a skin and helped him dry his soaking wet skin by rubbing vigorously with the soft piece of leather. Mitrak looked at Komus. She took a similar skin and went to Komus. Excuse me, Komus, but I am going to help you. She began to rub his soaking wet skin with the soft leather. The man’s cold skin warmed and began to glow a pinkish red color, just as Manak-na’s skin, though the color of his skin was darker than Manak-na’s. It was still easy to see the rosy glow. Mitrak did not give up until the man was dry and glowing. The same was true for Domur with Manak-na.

  “You’ll have to share this with the women of my people,” Komus said with enthusiasm. “This is wonderful!”

  Tongip-na and Aryna had already dried off before the men arrived with the pig. They took the pig and skinned it outside. The others had already bled and gutted it. They put the skin off to the side at some distance from the cave, since they had no plan to use it for anything, and prepared the pig for roasting. They put the pig on the spit and readied themselves to watch it, turning when needed.

  Manak-na and Komus dressed and the cave was prepared for habitation near the entryway. Sleeping skins were rolled out for seating. It was a wonderful time for a break in the trekking while the rain fell and the storm thundered and lit up the sky. Life was good. Mitrak carried seasonings in little packages. She got a package and brought it to the hearth. Carefully she put the seasoning on the meat as Aryna turned the animal so she would cover all parts. It didn’t take long before the scent filled the cave and turned the thoughts of all to food. It was not near time, however, so they had to do other things.

  Komus checked his warm weather foot coverings and his clothing and backpack. Anything he had was scrutinized to see whether it needed fixing. If so, it got fixed during rest overs while they were not trekking. The others picked up the plan and soon all were checking everything. Aryna repaired a split in Tongip-na’s season-of-warm-nights foot covering and Kai-na repaired a weakening strap on his backpack. The gut skins to protect from the rain were dried off and could be rolled and retied. Time was used well while they stopped for the rain. The torch Komus made warmed the cave and cast a cheery light. He had found a place in the rock wall where the torch fit, and put it there, where it was raised to eye level for the People.

  “I like the raised torch light,” Mitrak said with intensity. “We’ll have to remember that when we return to our home cave. We could make holes to hold torches, if there aren’t any usable wall spaces like this one already available. It’s so much easier to see!”

  “I agree,” Aryna said. “With light like this, I could work longer on my sewing, because I’d be able to see so much better.”

  “You’d probably stay up all night, if you had light like this,” Tongip-na teased her. “There’d never be time for us, and you’d be tired all the time from lack of sleep.”

  Anya looked at him horrified. “What an awful thing to say.”

  “Well, you tend to spend way too much time working. With light like this, you’d be able to extend the already long time.” He grinned.

  “I m sorry.”

  “No need to be sorry. It’s just how you are. I’m just not sure I’d want to have it so you could increase the time you spend working. I like to be with you, and there’s so little time.”

  “You sound newly joined,” Komus observed.

  “Not at all!” Tongip-na laughed. “I love my wife and want every moment with her I can have.”

  Komus wondered whether the seeming initial disapproval was a reason for Aryna’s quiet, but while he watched the interaction, he realized that Tongip-na wasn’t really criticizing. There seemed to be some gentle teasing involved. It was a little confusing why the girl was quiet, but then, maybe it was just how she was.

  The evening continued light hearted until Komus went to the torch and extinguished it in the dirt. They all laid aside what they were doing and rearranged their sleeping skins for sleep. All were more tired than they thought. With full bellies from a wonderful evening meal, quickly all slept.

  When Wisdom returned color to the land, birds were singing and the rain clouds had disappeared, leaving a brilliant blue sky. The beginning promised a wonderful day and the trekkers were ready to leave. They prepared their backpacks and departed after carefully extinguishing the remains of the fire in the hearth.

  They trekked hard, until they reached a hill. Before reaching the top of the hill, Komus said, “From there you can see the big lake.”

  All were terribly excited. It was the end of a quest for them that they had begun when they left the home made from trees. Instead of racing up the hill, they trekked as if nothing had happened. Upon reaching the top, they looked and it appeared that clouds were below them.

  “What is this?” Manak-na asked Komus.

  “Ah, I should have prepared you. Often the air is cloudy here and vision is blocked. But the lake really is there.”

  “If you say so,” Tongip-na teased.

  They continued trekking following Komus.

  By nightfall they had reached the edge of the lake and a good place to camp that Komus knew about. They arrived at a propitious time while there was light left to see to start a fire and build some lean-tos. The foggy mist in the air had risen so they had some view of the lake and it was big! They were awed. Briefly they walked in the cold clear water soothing their aching feet.

  “This trip may be shorter than I thought,” Komus said. “My people may have moved to the place where we camp sometimes near the big lake. In this season we try to take seals.”

  “That would be interesting,” Manak-na said with enthusiasm. Trekking two more moons did not sound like a good time any longer. His feet were very tired.

  “How will you know?” Mitrak asked.

  “If this foggy mist were not here, we’d know already. I hope that in the morning the fog has lifted. Then we’d see smoke from fires. My people camp right over that hill. You can see them from here along the lake’s edge. Oh, I hope they’re there. I have missed them so much.”

  “Komus,” Mitrak asked, “Why did you go to sea?”

  “I went because my father went and his father before him and his father before him on back in time to forever.”

  “Why did you go just because your father did?”

  “It is our way. The first son does what the father does. The second and other sons do what they choose.”

  “I see,” Mitrak said, and she did, but she did not understand at all. What if, she wondered, a son was an exceptional hunter, but because his father was a boatbuilder who sailed, he had to do that. What if he didn’t want to follow what his father did? She thought she already understood that he’d have to do what his father did, regardless of whether he found it good. Maybe, first sons were not even permitted to find out where their special skills lay. Mitrak breathed a sigh of relief that she was People. The concept didn’t seem to bother Komus, but it bothered her a lot.

  When the trekkers awakened, they could see that there was a camp across the lake over the hill that Komus described. The mist was gone and the blue sky over the lake made it an exceptionally beautiful view. Komus opened his eyes and immediately looked to see if his people were camped nearby. He was delighted.

  The trekkers got up and rolled up their sleeping skins. They pulled on their backpacks and began the trek over the hill while they ate jerky.

  When they topped the hill, Komus’s people recognized that there were strangers with Komus and they walked to meet them. Komus’s son ran. He was a young man and had joined while Komus was gone. His wife was with him as he ran. She was a swift runner.

  “Father, so good to see you,” the young man said with a hug.

  Komus held the young man at arm’s length, looking him over. “You have matured, Ergi, my Son.”

  “Yes, Father.”

  A short, round faced, heavy woman waddled over to Komus. He embraced her warmly, turned to the trekkers and said, “This is L
ugmi, my wife. This is Ergi, my son, and his wife, Nolsi. I’ll introduce these people who travel with me when we reach our destination at the camp,” he said smiling broadly.

  Lugmi walked over to Aryna and took her by the arm and began to lead her to the camp. Aryna looked older than the others because her hair was grayer despite the fact that she was younger than Mitrak, but she couldn’t understand why Lugmi singled her out. Komus asked her, “Why are you leading Aryna?’

  Lugmi replied, “Is she not the Chief’s wife?”

  “They have no Chief, my Love,” Komus replied.

  Instead of letting go of Aryna’s arm, Lugmi reached out and took Mitrak’s arm, so she led two of the women. She began asking the women their names.

  “If you’d have had a third arm, you’d have had all three,” Komus boomed out in laughter.

  The trekkers were startled by the change in Komus’s behavior among his own people. Here was a man who was open and booming with joy. They had never seen anything from him but seriousness. This was a whole new world. The trekkers stole glances and raised eyebrows. They would all have admitted to enjoying it tremendously.

  As they approached the camp many more people arrived to meet the newcomers. They gathered near a large hearth and all seated themselves in a circle with concentric circles around it, except where the concentric rings stopped for the place occupied by the chief. The newcomers were set into the circle. It was the way these people had of showing acceptance of them, Komus explained.

  They talked and talked, communication being easy, since all knew the Mol language. Komus’s people had a slightly different way of pronouncing some words, but it was clear what word they meant as they talked.

  The People told that they originally headed towards the big lake, but they found it too cold to continue, so they settled in a place along the way. Komus interrupted to give their name of the place they settled and explain that they had rid the place of evil. His people were hushed, which startled the newcomers. The people of Komus looked suspiciously at the newcomers. They found it incomprehensible that anyone could rid a place of evil.