Chapter 1
The buffalo seemed so innocent, grazing by the riverside. The scene seemed so peaceful, except that there were hunters on either side of the water, in several different bushes. Some were armed with bows, some with spears and clubs, and one with what looked like a rather large knife he wielded clumsily. Of course, like any good hunter, none of these hidden deathtraps made a noise to alarm the buffalo, who just stood there minding its own business. The clearing he was eating his lunch at was almost like any other clearing; it held some moss, more grass, and some random fallen leaves that started the season early. It wasn’t very large, and it wasn’t very deep into the woods. On one side there were trees ended even in sight of the buffalo, where plains started that was the normal habitat for it and its herd.
The hunters slowly crept closer, and were desperate for this particular kill, as they had gone too far from their town to go out on another hunting trip this day, as they hadn’t been able to find anything else anywhere else. Their tribe had been expanding rapidly the last few years, and game wasn’t increasing, so the tribe elders were looking into migrating with increasing urgency as of late. But this wasn’t a direct worry for the armed huntsmen at the moment; they were engaged and had committed to a kill. Suddenly, the buffalo looked up and looked one of the hunters directly in the eyes. This seemed impossible, as said hunter was half hidden behind the tree several paces away. The huntsmen, at that moment, stood still as a pole, stuck with indecision. But arrows soon whizzed through the woods and into the buffalo’s hide which made his decision easier. This happened just as men with spears through the cover of trees came charging into the clearing, throwing their weapons as they went. Finally, some handful of men came within striking range of the still living buffalo’s horns, only to smash their clubs into their target and hope to kill it. Grunting from the impact when they crushed its ribs, the men began to pull out their spears cautiously, hoping to let the buffalo bleed to death if it hadn’t died already.
The buffalo, however, was already dead, and when the men had this figured out, they cheered and yelled to the archers to come join them. The one man who wasn’t cheering was simultaneously the man who hadn’t helped kill the buffalo and the one wielding the oversized knife. Instead of cheering, he looked out of the clearing, near the place where the river came into it, and asked.
“Have they smelled it, are they coming?” The man he seemed to be talking to came to join them in the clearing, and seemed lost deep in thought. After a moment, he shook his head and smiled a smile that would have been a cheer along with the other men if he hadn’t been talking to the chief.
“No, not yet, let’s cover the wounds and drag it home before they do.” The chief nodded,
“Thanks, Glen.” As he turned, he began barking orders and stuck his crude weapon back into his belt. “You heard him, cover the wounds and make preparations for the ride home boys; this one’s going to be the first of many.” Even as he was talking, men put back their weapons. From recovering arrows that hadn’t broken, either in the grass or carefully pulled from the carcass, to clubs back between their baldric and spears stuffed in a huge, elongated quiver, all men deftly disarmed themselves. As they were doing this, the man called Glen; the only one who didn’t seemed to have brought a weapon, pulled a large, worn bear-hide from the pack on his back and rolled it out near the back of the buffalo-carcass.
“Help me with this, would you Kas?” He called out to one of the spearmen, who walked over even as he wiped his spear clean and repositioned it in his quiver.
“Of course Glen, what do you need?” He looked over the now rolled-out hide and looked confused. “Isn’t the buffalo too big for the one hide? I think we need more than one.”
“No, the one is fine; we’ve got enough men to make it work.” Glen countered, who waved his arm at the other men in the clearing. Kas nodded and waved over two more men, and together they rolled the buffalo from the one side, over his back to his other side, onto the bear-hide. The buffalo’s head was on the same side the bear’s was, with the bear’s paws wrapping around the buffalo, closing the gaps with leather straps. The bear’s head was attached to a thick strip of hide fastened to a crude leather harness which made it possible for someone to pull the carcass along, dragging with his back, rather than pulling with his arms.
This hunt was meant to result in several pieces of game, so some of the other men had similar contraptions that hadn’t been used, which they managed to attach to the larger bounty of this fruitful day and the result was half a dozen men comfortably pushing and pulling the buffalo the league-and-a-half back to their growing village. “So is there anything between you and Hinde anyway? You two are spending a lot of time together these days.” Glen inquired, curious.
“Well, for starters, Hinde knows her place as a woman of the tribe, and she’s a good cook.” Kan shot back, laughing at the latter comment. Kas was a man who strongly believed in the separate roles of men and women. Men should be hunter or physical worker, doing work like woodsmen, huntsmen, smith or the like. Women on the other hand, should do work that requires more subtle manipulations of intricate fingers, like sowing, or gathering berries and herbs.
“Ah, but is she…” Glen began to respond, but at that moment, he got a very strange feeling, as if he was on the hunt. Not on the hunt again, but just starting the hunt. Starting the hunt the way wolves would, he suddenly realized. “Oh no,” he uttered.
“What’s wrong with you?” Kas wondered, but when he saw the look on Glen’s face, he went pale and yelled out, “WOLF ALERT!” As if by some magic switch, all the men in the hunting party stopped what they were doing and dropped the buffalo. The men wearing the harness were just done removing them when Glen called out.
“They’re in that direction.” Pointing, Glen shook his head to clear his mind. He felt the howl before he heard it, wolves howling to signal the beginning of the hunt, that they’ve sighted prey and found a way to single it out from the herd. In an instant of pure surprise and complete instinct, he was there. There in the clearing again, only now there were four buffalo, and the men in the bushes were wolves, hiding better and creeping closer. Without thought or yelp, he motioned to close in on the one by the stream, the target. In response, the whole pack somehow knew what he wanted, and on some unconscious command, they began the usual, trusted ritual of separating the prey from the herd.
Only Glen had never done this before, and he didn’t know what he was doing. The moment he realized this, however, he was back where he was walking before. He was on the ground, though, looking into Kas’ eyes. Kas was leaning toward Glen, and upon seeing he was alright stood back up and began talking.
“What’s up with you today? Usually you randomly call out they’re coming, sometimes giving us a direction and rarely the time they arrive, but now you don’t even say a word and I have to guess from your expression. And then you faint, what’s up with that?” Kas was pacing as he said this, frantically making hand gestures. His pacing suddenly came to a halt as he said ‘faint’ and folded his hands, demanding an explanation.
“”I… I was there. I was… I was the alpha wolf.” Glen stammered, getting to his feet, acutely aware of all the huntsmen’s eyes on him. “I was acting on instinct; it seemed as if we could communicate telepathically, me and the wolves. They were hunting in the clearing we were in, and… and…” As he said this, the chief started walking again, and men hurriedly put on the harnesses to take along the buffalo. Kas, still bewildered, shook his head as they started walking again.
“Man, I thought you were strange before, now you’re just weird.” Glen let the implied question go and instead ask a question of his own.
“How long was I out for, Kas?”
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