by R Magnusholm
He turned the boat west, and it picked up speed as it ran before the wind.
“Woo-hoo!” Liz cried. “Now, we’re flying.”
John’s grin threatened to split his cheeks. Far away from land, he had no fear of an ambush. No tigers, no ursines, no aurochs. Water murmured—such a peaceful sound. Rigging creaked, and the leather sail billowed. Sun sparkled on wavelets, impossibly bright and cheerful like thousands of tiny flashbulbs going off at random. Seagulls wheeled high overhead. He briefly considered the possibility that some aquatic life forms might be no less dangerous than tigers on land. But with winters being so harsh, there’d be no crocodiles or hippos here for sure.
The boat cleared a river bend. Up ahead, no more than a mile away, lay the narrow island they were looking for.
“Shall we sail around it?” he asked.
“Sure.”
Chapter 78
The New Salmoner Chief
60 miles north of Camp Bramble
Gnorrk strode into the Salmoner village, surrounded by a posse of his bodyguards. “Hullo. Hullo,” he hollered. His fur was wet up to his chest from wading across to their island stronghold.
Frightened Salmoners peered at him out of the doorways of their slovenly huts.
“Where’s your chief?” Gnorrk asked.
His question was met with polite shrugs and incomprehensible jabbering.
“You haven’t eaten your new chief?” he enquired testily. Perhaps he should have left the twenty-warrior contingent to help Fleetfoot get established as chief of the allied clan. But Fleetfoot had claimed to be in full control and sent the warriors back after ten days.
Gnorrk came to the village square, where a smokeless bonfire blazed before the biggest and best lodge constructed in the Woodlander style—out of branches covered with animal skins rather than reeds. An old bear tending the fire stood to attention and bowed his grizzled head.
The entrance flap of the hut parted, and a rather plump bear emerged. “Hullo, Grandfather,” he said in the clear Woodlander tongue.
“Fleetfoot? I didn’t recognize you.”
“Oh.”
“How did you get so fat in just one moon tide?”
Fleetfoot smiled roguishly. “I told them to bring me a large salmon every evening, or I’ll eat their cubs.”
“Grandson!” Gnorrk’s chest swelled with pride. “I knew you had a streak of greatness in you.”
“Yeah, well.” Fleetfoot glanced over his shoulder into the hut and issued a command in the Salmoner language. Three females emerged, bowed to Gnorrk, and hurried off. Fleetfoot said, “I told them to get some refreshments for you.”
“Well, tell me how things are?”
They sat down by the fire, and Fleetfoot told Gnorrk how he capitalized on the fear of the Woodlanders to force the Salmoners to build him the best hut in the village and to commandeer the youngest and fattest females.
“And they didn’t try to rebel?” Gnorrk asked.
“No, the Salmoners love me.”
Gnorrk lifted an inquiring eyebrow.
“We had some trouble with the Upstream Clan,” Fleetfoot began. “They didn’t like us taking salmon from their brook. Well, it’s our brook now, because all it took to scare them off was to yell the Woodlander battle cry and chant ‘Gnorrk! Gnorrk!’ You should’ve seen them run. We haven’t had any trouble from that quarter again. So, even if I’m a bit rough with my bears, we have peace and plenty of food.” Fleetfoot smoothed his paws over his bulging belly, then added. “And Salmoner females like it rough. You court them by whacking them over the head with a fish until their eyes roll up.”
“Sounds like fun.”
Fleetfoot grinned, his fangs gleaming in the sun.
Gnorrk nodded sagely. His plan had worked. The Salmoners had stopped taking fish from the Crooked Brook, and that in turn increased Gnorrk’s popularity in his own village. With four allied clans, he could muster a bigger army than any rivals, so there had been no enemy raids. And with a fire burning in the village, no tigers attacked at night.
The defeat he’d suffered at the paws of the ugly dwarfs by the Great Salty River still festered somewhere deep inside, but most of the time he could blank out the memory. Everyone else thought it was a victory, anyway. Gnorrk closed his eyes and once again heard the dwarf yell at him angrily, defiantly, viciously. Deep down, Gnorrk knew it hadn’t been a pledge of loyalty.
Salmoner villagers began gathering around, bringing refreshments for Gnorrk and his followers. Tomorrow, he’d set off to visit the clam-eating Sunrisers and their chief Moorgs.
After he’d eaten and rested, Gnorrk asked Fleetfoot to lend him a few of his fighters.
“You’re planning war?” Fleetfoot asked.
“No. I just want your warriors to broaden their horizons.”
He didn’t need to explain to his young protégé that having followers from different clans among his retinue increased Gnorrk’s prestige. He marveled at his own cleverness. It was he who’d tamed fire and gave it to the bear race, and it was he who united four clans to become king. No, he didn’t need to teach Fleetfoot how to be king. Fleetfoot’s job was to keep the northern border safe and to supply troops when needed.
Chapter 79
Blood in the Water
The river island on the Thames
The steep and inhospitable south coast of the isle slid by on the right. A thick tangle of willows and alders descended to the water’s edge. Lashed by wind and repeatedly scoured by tides, the exposed shore had a forbidding aspect, as if it wanted to say: Sail away, stranger. Don’t come here or you’ll never leave.
“No landing spots on this side,” John observed, suppressing a sudden chill. If the boat fell apart now . . . He chewed on his lip, wondering if it was wise to navigate around the far side of the island.
Liz stood amidships, holding on to the mast. She smiled tensely. “What a jungle.”
The tide must have turned, because the turbulence increased, and the river that used to lap pleasantly against the reed hull now began to churn. They hit a swirling eddy, and the boat rocked from side to side. But the Ra was six-foot-wide and stable, and John saw no logical reason for it to fall apart.
He caught Liz’s eye. “Getting a bit rough, eh?” His smile felt plastic and false.
Liz glanced at George, now sleeping in his basket at her feet, and her mouth tightened with worry.
Once they cleared the westernmost tip of the island, he untied the sail rope and pulled the sail down. The boat started to drift east, downstream, turning slowly. Liz removed the rudder oar and passed it to him.
He slotted the oar into its lock, swung the boat around, and rowed it into the fifty-yard-wide channel separating the island from the reed beds and sheltered waterways. They had not dared to cross that channel the last time, but now they boldly approached the isle from the open reaches of the river.
After he’d rowed downstream for five minutes, Liz called from the bow. “There! The landing.” She pulled up the retractable keels.
He peered over his shoulder at the secluded cove they’d seen on their first visit. He steered the boat into it now. The prow bumped against the shore, and he jumped out and made to tie the mooring rope to the projecting tree roots.
“Wait.” Liz pointed up the grassy slope. “Let’s drag her out.”
“When the tide goes out, she’ll be lying on the ground anyway,” he said. “Look, there’s grass underwater. It’s a flood meadow.”
“It’s just . . .” Liz hesitated. “If we lose the boat somehow . . .”
He nodded. Even though there was no way the Ra could drift off, he knew they’d feel better if it was out of the water entirely.
After unloading their supplies, they pulled the boat to high ground, and he tied the mooring rope to the nearest alder trunk. He straightened his back, wiping sweat from his brow. After the addition of the mast and chunky oarlocks, the Ra had become so much heavier. Or perhaps the reeds of its hull soaked up water li
ke a sponge? Surely not. He stooped to examine the bundles of reeds. After tapping them here and there, he was satisfied that although wet outside, the stalks remained dry within.
The gently sloping north side of the island was much more welcoming, and John’s spirits rose. Sheltered from the winds blowing off the river, reeds and waterlilies grew around the tiny cove, and rabbits frolicked in the meadow between the landing and the woods. Once inside the tree line, John felt right at home. Mushrooms pushed up from the ground, and thorny brambles barred their way in most directions.
They had penetrated no more than thirty yards into the woods when the ground descended sharply toward the precipitous edge. Beyond the tangle of trunks and branches, water glinted in the sun. They had crossed the narrow islet and reached the south shore. Even though from the inside it didn’t seem too inhospitable, the vegetation was so dense it would have him taken many hours of hard work to hack a path through it.
John sensed no malign presence here, and rabbits and pheasants appeared to be the largest inhabitants.
“So, what do you think?” Liz asked.
“It feels safe.”
“Not enough firewood to live here permanently. We’d burn all the deadwood in a month or two. Enough to build a wigwam, though.”
They returned to the north shore and looked across the channel to the reed beds only fifty yards away.
“Too close to the mainland,” he said, thinking how fast the tiger had swum today. It practically surged like a torpedo.
Liz must have thought the same thing, because she said, “As long as we keep the fire going, no animal will dare to bother us.” She paused, frowning. “But the ursines would be attracted by smoke.”
“They might not be able to cross deep water.”
“We don’t know that.”
“I’m not proposing we move here,” he said.
She glanced at her canvas bag where she carried the firepot. “Well, let’s make fire and explore some more.”
He collected some dry twigs and bigger sticks and brought them to the meadow. Last year’s reed heads made excellent tinder. After collecting a handful, Liz tipped hot coals onto them. She knelt and blew at them through a hollow plant stem. Flames flickered, and she began feeding them with dry reed stems and twigs. When the fire was well established, she added larger sticks and then lumps of driftwood.
“What shall we eat?” she asked brightly, standing up. “A roasted rabbit or duck?”
“It would have to be a duck.” He pointed at the smoke blowing across the meadow. Before they lit the fire, the meadow had teemed with rabbits. Now, not one remained. Pheasants had vanished too.
“Duck it is, then.”
She picked up her bow and headed to the water’s edge, while John laid George in the grass.
He watched Liz waiting for a mixed flock of waterfowl to paddle past. Ducks of several types mingled with geese, swans, and small black moorhens.
She lifted her bow. “How about a swan?”
“Too majestic.”
“You’re such a spoilsport.”
She pulled the bowstring back and let fly. The arrow stabbed into the mass of the peacefully feeding flock with a vicious twish. Pierced by the shaft, a gray-brown goose of a species John had never seen in any London park, thrashed in a flutter of feathers. The nearest birds scattered every which way, flapping their wings, quacking and honking in indignation. The rest of the flock continued to dabble for waterweeds as if nothing had happened. Liz waded into the shallows and tried to reach the goose with the poling stake but found it too short, and the stricken bird started drifting away, still struggling feebly.
John stood up, slipping out of his kilt and buckskin jacket. “I’ll fetch it.”
“It’s just your excuse to run around naked.”
“Well, it’s summer, and my name’s Summers.”
She chuckled, walking over, and picked up their baby. “You’re just a nudist.”
He waded into the water up to his armpits and turned back to look at Liz holding George in the crook of her arm. Beyond her, light gray smoke rose into the air, distorting the outlines of the trees as it drifted west. An emotion he could not name overcame him. Pride? Love? Anxiety? They were his family, his tribe, and possibly the last of humanity. Or the first, depending on your point of reference.
By the time he reached the goose, it had honked its last and floated limply in the water. A trickle of blood coiled around its open beak. Its glassy eye seemed to stare accusingly, as if to say: Today I float. Tomorrow, you float. One day, we all float.
“I’m sorry, poor thing,” he murmured, grabbing it by the protruding arrow shaft.
He brought the goose ashore. But before he could pull out the arrow, the bird stirred and began thrashing and screeching, causing him to drop it in surprise. The commotion scared George, who turned his face into Liz’s chest and wailed.
The goose emitted an agonizing shriek that set John’s teeth on edge. He grabbed his axe, but the bird sprawled dead on the grass.
“Heck, it gave me a blooming fright,” he said, his heart thumping in his chest. “It wasn’t bloody dead.” He prodded the bird with his foot. “Well, it is now.”
After retrieving and washing the arrow, he laid it to dry in the sun. He plucked the feathers and saved them for future use while Liz calmed their baby down.
“When you grow big,” she said, soothingly, “You’ll be a hunter, but you must never hurt living things for no reason, because death is forever.”
John didn’t think a two-month-old baby had any concept of morality, but he supposed it would do no harm for Liz to mention it now. George enjoyed nursery rhymes, especially the cheerful: The wheels on the bus go round and round despite never seeing a bus or a wheel.
Chapter 80
The Wild Oats
When the sun climbed to midday, the goose started to sizzle on the spit. Droplets of fat dripped onto the coals, flaming up briefly. John and Liz stretched on the grass, yawning. It was their usual naptime.
“What shall we do?” she asked.
John drizzled water over the cooking goose and jabbed it with a sharp twig. “Another half an hour and it’s done. Let’s explore more of the island.”
“What do you expect to find? A monolith or the crown of the Statue of Liberty poking from the ground?”
“Those things would be of no immediate use to us. What I’m interested in are hazels. Food security, you know.” He added a couple of sticks to the fire. “Come on, it’s only a small island. The goose can cook itself.”
Liz climbed to her feet with a groan and picked up George. This time, they headed west along the ridge that was the spine of the island. No game trails cut through the miniature forest, but the tangle was less dense in the shady places under the overarching boughs of aspens and birches. They came to a sunlit gap where rotten trunks lay on the ground, felled by a long-ago gale. Birch and aspen boletes crowded the mossy glade in concentric circles, as if they weren’t fungi at all, but gnomes crouching under wide-brimmed orange and brown hats.
With tangerine shafts of sunlight slanting across the clearing, John felt like he’d stepped inside a fairytale. How many years had passed since he’d perceived the world this way—in all its sun-spangled glory? As a toddler, he’d been very impressed by giant wooden toadstools decorating his local playground.
Years seemed to slough off his shoulders like heavy armor scales, and he sensed himself grinning quite foolishly. They had forced him to read management manuals from the age of five. Trained him to be a leader. Well, to hell with management, and to hell with leadership. He’d rather be a happy savage. He stepped into the clearing, relishing the luxuriant springiness of moss under his bare feet.
Liz gathered some orange-capped boletes. “Look at the size of them . . .” She dropped the mushrooms into her canvas bag.
He nodded, and they carried on, picking their way through the tangle of trunks and stems. This hundred-yard-long island had appeared tiny from th
e distance, but now as they struggled through its dense thickets, the islet seemed to have expanded tenfold. Eventually, they reached its western tip and stood, gazing upstream at the broad curve of the river sweeping past Pimlico peninsula.
After returning to the cove, they turned the goose over on its spit, added more firewood, and then headed to explore the eastern tip of the island. Aspen leaves trembled in the breeze, the soporific sound pleasing to the ear, but they found no hazel trees. So much for food security.
“Satisfied?” Liz said.
“Hmm. Not quite.”
They left the cool, sunlit woods and sat by the campfire. The tide ebbed, and the water in the channel flowed downstream.
Liz hung a greenwood stick with half a dozen mushrooms impaled on it over the fire. “If we get stranded here, we won’t starve.”
“No, we won’t, but the water’s too muddy for drinking.”
“It’s only suspended clay.”
He used a stick with a split end to drop another hot pebble into the cooking skin to bring the water to a boil. Liz added blueberry bracts to make tea.
“The water won’t harm us. We’ve never been sick yet,” she said.
“The keyword here is: yet.”
“A year’s a long time.”
He watched the water boil, mulling it over.
She said, “It’s either the environment is healthier here, or we’re immune to everything.”
“I’m still not happy with muddy water.”
“Once it’s boiled, it becomes tea enriched with minerals and microelements.”
He suppressed a contented grin. Oh, how he loved the way Liz put a positive spin on everything. He poked the goose again. This time, the flesh was soft, and the juices ran clear.
After dividing the bird in two, they ate it with mushrooms, passing around the Arsenal mug of blueberry leaf tea.
Liz dropped the thighbone in the fire. “The problem with waterfowl is that there’s just skin, bones, and fat. Even a woodpigeon has more meat. Proportionally speaking.”