Dave Duncan - West of January

Eventually the great ones persuaded us that the river I sought lay not far off to the south, and it flowed into the ocean, not out of it as the old folk had expected. A raft or a boat was what I needed, everyone agreed. A raft was easier, so a raft it must be. Driftwood tree trunks were not uncommon, and I began gathering them, with Frith’s assistance, and laying them on the beach to dry out.

I learned to hunt, which was a male occupation, although some men did nothing more than trawl a net. With the great ones’ help, one man could easily have fed the whole tribe.

Pebble’s idea of hunting was nothing like that. The harder the chase, the better the taste, in his view. He even claimed to be fond of oysters, which contain nothing but bland slime. Collecting those was a terrifying business involving diving very deep while tied to rocks; therefore oysters were mostly a test of manhood. I hated diving for oysters. I hated being battered black and blue in a mad pursuit of sunfish, or crawling through underwater caves that might contain all sorts of stabbing, munching monsters.

Pebble seemed to be totally without fear. He must have known of my innate cowardice, but he never mentioned it. He would tell me in vivid detail what horror he had planned for me next, demonstrate how an expert like him could survive it, and then just grin, daring me to try. I’m sure my teeth were visibly chattering with terror many times, my knees knocking, but I would always try to bluff my way through somehow, and Pebble would then pretend to look impressed. It was very childish, really.

Worst of all, perhaps, were the snarks. A snark looks something like a marine woollie, padding madly around on the surface. It is indifferent eating, and it comes armed with deadly pincers and stinging tentacles by the hundred. Given the choice, I would not have gone into the same ocean as a snark, but whenever the great ones reported a snark in the neighborhood, Pebble would insist on organizing a snark hunt.

Spears go right though snarks without effect. The only way to catch one is to put a rope around it and tow it to shore. The only way to put a rope around a snark is to leap over it onboard a great one. And the only way to survive getting that close to a snark is to first run the monster to exhaustion. This needed every rider we could enlist. The great ones seemed to enjoy the romp also—why not? The stings did not affect them! Vigorous splashing alarmed the quarry, so the great ones drove it with their roo-like bounding gait, which was terrifying for a beginner who could not swim well. But I must admit, that snark hunt did have a certain exhilaration to it—a dozen or more great ones, all with riders, arching and leaping over the sea, herding the foaming patch of water where the snark thrashed around, plunging in close when it began to tire, seeing who would be the first to dare try the jump and place the rope. That man was the hero of the hunt, of course. Yes, it was insanity and the stings hurt like hell, but I admit I never turned down an invitation to hunt snark.

And all this I owed to Pebble. Endlessly joyful and willing, brave and gentle without limit, he was the first friend I had ever known. The very idea of friendship was alien to a herdman, and Pebble had to start by teaching me that. He never had a mean thought in his life, Pebble. He was my first friend and the best I would ever have. And in the end, I killed him.

Fortunately Violet had warned me that not everyone venerated the Father God of the herdfolk. The seafolk’s deity is the Sea Mother. She is generous and undemanding, asking little of her people. I learned her joyful hymns and tossed small offerings into the water as the seafolk did, and no thunderbolt came to roast my bones. Yet when I was out of earshot of the others, I sang to the Heavenly Father, also—though quietly—just to be sure.

Mathematics was not one of my greater talents, yet I could see that the tribe had fewer children than my father had sired with a mere four women. At first I wondered if the sea was prowled by some marine equivalent of roos, a predator that could carry off youngsters, but then I noticed the absence of pregnancies. The birthrate was at fault, therefore. I assumed that this was due to the fish diet. Certainly I often yearned for red meat.

Company I never had to yearn for. I had only to smile and I would be invited into a bower to rest. Seawomen had very energetic ideas of what resting involved. Even some of the knot-on-the-right wives were not above fluttering eyelashes in my direction. Having unlimited choice available elsewhere, I politely ignored such improper suggestions.

I had innumerable friends, both male and female; I had food and comfort without limit; I had the thrill of hunting and the satisfaction of mastering new skills. What more could a man want?

Well, Sparkle for one thing.

And Heaven for another.

How foolish is youth! In the midst of every comfort and satisfaction a man could possibly desire, my ambition to be an angel still niggled at me like an unreachable itch. I had promised Violet I would meet him in Heaven. I had promised myself! I was still young enough to believe I could make the world a better place, and my conscience scolded me for tarrying when I should be hurrying. Of course, I didn’t know it was my conscience speaking: I thought it was the Father God.

I was a welcome guest at all the feasting places, rewarding my host with the gift of my catch, when I had one, and with my herdfolk songs. The best melodies I knew were hymns that might have offended the Sea Mother, but my knack for inventing doggerel let me put new words to the old tunes. Young and old, the seafolk loved to laugh, and they liked nothing better than hearing some trivial incident of their commonplace lives turned into a satirical ballad, especially if the victim was known to be within earshot. Often the end of my song would be greeted with laughter and applause pouring in through the walls all around. Then I would have to repeat the song, again and again, until the whole tribe had memorized it and was chorusing in complex harmony. The victim usually sang along as heartily as any.

And eventually I would be lured away to a bower to rest.

I have never thought of myself as clever, yet I cannot imagine why I was so stupid as to miss what those young ladies really wanted. My enlightenment came suddenly, at a big feast.

Feasts were commonplace. A big feast was a special event, involving the whole tribe. No normal eating place could hold everyone at the same time, but the copse happened to have a large natural clearing in the middle that served very well, although it was an odd shape. A big feast was held in someone’s honor—and if there was no one who deserved honoring, an excuse could always be found to honor someone anyway. The first I attended had been dedicated to Surge, to celebrate a proposal of marriage from young Sand. All the other unwed maidens were looking very long-faced, for no other boys seemed about to start developing mustaches and related qualifications.

I had congratulated Sand when I heard the news, of course, and asked him jocularly what factors contributed to his decision. He had produced a leer astonishingly like his brother’s and whispered that Surge was going to bear his child—a fact that everyone but me would have already guessed. I just added more congratulations and complimented him on his taste, carefully not mentioning that I had enjoyed surging with Surge a couple of times myself.

Then we had a big feast honoring Wave, and then one for Misty. They were both widows—Misty’s husband Darkly had broken his neck romping with the great ones. That was why she had not wanted to stay and watch the roughhousing, that time she had snatched me away from Raindrops and led me off to rest. I had heard all about it later, while she wept all over my chest, in great need of more comforting.