The First Jumper (first draft version)

The First Jumper 37: Moving South

It was a melancholy beginning, Little Bear thought the next morning.  They were leaving behind a shelter that had protected them for two and a half years.  Lying in the cave behind them were fifteen members of their tribe, who had been close to all of them.  

When they left the cave, they walled up the entrance with snow and rock, but they didn’t have any illusion about whether that would keep scavengers out.  There was simply no way for them to do what the dead needed, so they left them in the back chamber of the cave, walled up the entrance, and left.

They carried a fire pot, so they would be able to build a fire immediately, wherever they stopped for the night.  They would have to get south quickly, and they made as good time as they could, but most places were still covered in deep snow.  They had to walk on the hillside to get any real progress at all.

The tribe was not the wandering band they had been.  They had become refugees, fleeing wrath of the gods in the form of impossible weather.  They stayed in family groups as they walked, although the whole group stayed as close together as it could.  If a predator came from the side or rear, it would be very difficult for warriors to converge through the deep snow quickly enough to keep it from carrying someone off.

There were many patches of bare ground, but most places were still covered in snow, and some of the drifts were far over their heads.

Little Bear was at the front, to watch for danger from that direction.  Blueberry walked beside him, little She Bear on her hip.  Little Bear’s daughter had been born just before they had been locked into the cave by the terrible cold, and he was amazed at how he could love someone as much as Little She Bear, as he liked to call her.  Blueberry, too, had grown more beautiful.  She insisted on bringing the heavy bearskin, despite the baby.

Aspen walked behind Blueberry, her five-year-old son Sparrow walking beside her.  Most of the time, Aspen carried the bearskin, and Blueberry let her.

Eagle had died two months before, in the endless dark with no food and no fire.  No attempt had been made to try to recognize changes in couples in the dark, but after Little Bear and Blueberry had helped to carry Eagle back to the cave with the others they had lost, Aspen had stayed with them when they returned to the chamber where the tribe huddled for warmth, and Blueberry had not objected.  Much older than Little Bear, she was a comfort in the wisdom she could provide from experience, as the tribe shared stories in the darkness and waited for a spring that seemed would never come.

Rat walked beside Aspen, carrying the tools for making spears and spearheads.  Behind them came Weasel, who had the four remaining extra spears for the entire tribe.  Even though they had carefully searched to recover each spear and spearhead cast, they were down to very little left.  No one knew how to make more spearheads, and there were none left.

Weasel’s face was haunted.  Fern would have been walking beside her brother, but she had not made it.  She was lying in the funeral cave.

Tiger was walking in the next group, so he could be close enough to step up if Little Bear found a problem.  His wife Clover had died giving birth, but Aster and Oak were with him.  Both had lost babies, but they were alive.  

Willow walked beside Tiger in the position of first wife, her little girl Sprout on her hip.  She was gaunt, but she was making it.  Her eyes were a bit haunted, as they looked into Little Bear’s from a few feet away.

Little Bear’s feelings were in turmoil, looking at Tiger.  Their relationship varied from hostile to cooperative.  As he became more and more the de facto Chief, Tiger had learned to trust in Little Bear’s odd abilities to identify prey and predator at a distance.  Little Bear’s ability to sense what an animal would do was uncanny, and much of the tribe owed their lives to that ability.