The Hunter Returns by David Drake, Jim Kjelgaard Page B

respectful silence.
    Wolf performed the hunting rites just as his father and other hunters of the former generation had taught him. He followed tradition perfectly—but the spirits did not bring game to the tribe. Was there some rite that he had forgotten? Had Wolf somehow, during an earlier hunt, offended the spirits so that they would not permit the tribe to have success in hunting so long as Wolf was the Chief Hunter?
    Wolf thought of exile, of being thrust out of the circle of the tribe to starve alone or be devoured with no one to chant his name on the nights of remembrance when the moon was dark. He shuddered and said loudly, “Boartooth! Do all the hunters have spears now?”
    Boartooth got to his feet quickly. He knew as well as Wolf did that the Chief Hunter was trying to focus the tribe’s anger on somebody else. The young man held the shaft to which he had just bound one of his own chert spearblades.
    “Heron, this is yours,” he said loudly, holding out the spear. The shaft had an obvious crook in it. “Now all the hunters in the tribe have spears.”
    Heron reached out from the reflex of a man to take something that is handed to him. When he had time to look at the spear, he jumped back quickly.
    “What is this?” Heron demanded angrily. “You have not tested the spear by bird flight! I will not accept it.”
    “I performed the rites in the forest yesterday when I was alone,” Boartooth said in a haughty voice. “The birds flew straight.”
    “I will not accept this spear!” Heron repeated. “Look at it! The shaft hasn’t been smoothed down like it should be. It isn’t even straight! I want a proper spear, not this.”
    “Hawk’s shafts were smooth, but his spears would not strike hard,” Boartooth said. “I do not make my spears the way Hawk made his.” His tone had changed. He was wheedling with Heron now, instead of trying to shout down the other hunter.
    “I won’t take it!” Heron shouted angrily.
    “Heron is a woman,” sneered Boartooth. “He doesn’t think he needs a spear.”
    Heron grabbed for the spear-maker’s throat with both hands. Boartooth tried to fend him off with the crossed spearshaft. All the hunters jumped to their feet, shouting.
    Wolf saw that he’d let matters go as far as they safely could. He stepped between the angry men, placed one hand on the chest of each, and pushed them apart. “Enough!” he shouted.
    Boartooth gestured as though he were threatening Heron with the chert-bladed spear. The Chief Hunter slapped the weapon from Boartooth’s hands. Wolf was really angry now. “Enough!” he repeated, glaring at the younger man.
    All the men in the tribe had a club or a spear in their hands now. They relaxed when they saw that Wolf was fully in control of the situation.
    “I will not take that spear,” Heron said in a sullen voice.
    Wolf grunted noncommittally. He looked at the spear-maker. “Boartooth,” he said. “Do you still say this—” he pointed to the chert-bladed weapon which lay on the ground beside them “—is a good spear?”
    “It is a good spear, Chief Hunter,” Boartooth muttered. He would not meet Wolf’s eyes. “I performed the rites in the forest yesterday, just as I said.”
    “Very well,” said Wolf. “You will give Heron your own spear, Boartooth—the spear that Hawk made when he was with the tribe. You will keep the spear you just made yourself.”
    Boartooth looked up. “Yes,” he sneered. “I will have the better spear. Heron will beg me to make him a spear soon, and I will not.”
    “Enough,” the Chief Hunter repeated grimly. “It is time we were hunting. Now that we all have spears, we will bring in meat again.”
    He breathed a prayer to the spirits of the hunt that he was correct.

    Wolf crawled to the knoll where Flash, a hunter with a patch of white hair growing from a birthmark in his scalp, waited for him. The Chief Hunter moved so silently that even the little gray birds hopping and chirping from