Dream of a Vast Blue Cavern

Interlude 5: Maia

Khell, four Summers before

 Maia rode her boareal proudly across the ice, soothed by the undulating motion of the beast propelling its giant girth on fat, short limbs. Its tapered body was smooth under her hands, bristling here and there with a few stiff hairs. Its tusks scraped the ice as it cast its head back and forth, sniffing the air. A memory arose, less and less common these days, of Maia’s childhood, riding a furry white, sphere-shaped polloon as it drifted over the water from the summer beach to the sheltered winter cove. Her people had not ridden the boareal, only hunted them. But she was no longer a Nuambe child, she was the healer of the Liathua. When Antahua died, all of her belongings, her egla, her clothes, her dishes, even her boareal became Maia's.

 Today the Liathua people rode for their summer camp, a long stretch of beach covered by smooth, fist-sized stones in varying shades of grey and black. Maia rode near the head of a long line of Khell, behind Lubar and Hakua, who rode side by side and shouted to each other about the route. Each boareal dragged a sled behind it, covered with the belongings of the people; hides, clothes, bones for the frame of traveling egla, and weapons for hunting. The sleek, wide-tailed doal ran in teams alongside the boareal, dragging sleds with smaller loads, young children, and infirm. Most of the tribe walked in a long line behind the boareal and the sleds. The Liathua had swelled in the five summers since Maia had become healer, in part due to some of the mildest winters the Khell had seen. They numbered two hundred and fourteen, the fourteenth born two days prior in the traveling camp. Maia had slapped the healthy baby boy to life, and now he rode on his mother's back while she walked amongst the others.

 Maia smelled the summer camp before she heard it, and she heard it before she saw it. First a waft of dung and brine and rotten fish rolled over her, overwhelming her nostrils. The smell was vile, but also welcome, a smell of life after the cold deadness of winter. Then a furious cacophony of grunts, snorts, groans and huffs assaulted her ears. It drowned out the chief's conversation with his son, and Hakua blew four long, low notes on his boareal tusk horn. Maia shook her head at that; she barely heard the sound beneath the noise from the beach. Lubar and Hakua crested a ridge, then disappeared beyond it. Maia followed, and Pebble Beach came into view, its namesake obscured by thousands of boareal. They writhed in a mass of territorial battles, matings, and desperate scrambles by females to get out of the rampaging males' paths.

 Maia stayed her boareal at the top of the ridge, watching the scene below. She could feel her beast's desire to join the fray. Though the creature was gelded, its instincts remained strong. Maia held tightly to the guiding rope, and stroked the boareal's neck to soothe it.

 Hakua and Lubar did not restrain their beasts. They dug in with their knees and rode directly into the mob. Maia watched as fifty more warriors and hunters followed on their boareal. The men shouted and threw spears, and soon the beach ran red. The tribe would feast well this summer.

 Maia turned and rode along the crest of the ridge. The people followed her to a place where the ice plain rose to meet the ridge, forming a level table overlooking the beach and the crashing waves. The people began cutting blocks of ice for egla and setting up camp. Two pens were made strong with bones and ice for the tame boareal, one for the gelds and one for the cows. A group of women took greased hide bags down to the shore and waded into the surf to gather seaweed. Fire pits were built with pebbles from the beach.

 There was little for Maia to do. The people built her egla, and once she had moved her belongings in, she looked for some way to make herself useful. She checked the boareal in their pen, looking for injuries. She visited several egla, checked the health of the newborn, and spent time with a grandfather who would be making his Journey over the Ice next winter, if the Dhuciri did not take him in the tithing.