The Reindeer People by Megan Lindholm Page B

he back to that idea again? 'Tomorrow, maybe. When we have a good supply of wood, so we can bank the fire for the day. Remember, you have to gather lots of wood today if you want to hunt with me tomorrow.' She took up her bow and paused. 'Watch, too, for a piece of wood to make a bow for yourself. You'll need one if you're going to hunt.'
    'Shall I chant to the spirits to bring you good hunting?' Kerlew offered cautiously. She could tell that he expected her usual snort of refusal at his offer. But what could it hurt?
    'While you gather the firewood,' she agreed and ducked out the tent flap. She heard his thin voice rise behind her in the strange monosyllabic song Carp had taught him. Tillu had never been able to decide if the song was in the words of some strange language, or was merely monotonous noises to lure Carp's spirits closer. She thought briefly of the beautiful carved goddess of her river-village childhood. The raiders had dragged the image down and burned it as fuel to roast the fat piglets that Tillu had once tended. She had not trembled before any spirit-being since then.
    Graceful white birches edged the clearing around her tent, while tall dark pines made the hills around it green. A clump of twisting willow grew at one end of the glen; Tillu suspected a summer spring hidden beneath the snow. The glen itself seemed an open, airy place in contrast to the hills around it. Sunlight struck the hide walls of the tent during the day and helped warm it, while the pine forests on the surrounding hillsides sheltered it from storms and provided firewood and game. It was a good place to shelter out the winter.
    Tillu spent her days hunting in the surrounding hills. She was beginning to know them now, and to think of exploring the neighboring valleys. It was still dark as she entered the silent pine forest. The cold of night had put a good crust on the snow. Tillu walked on top of it, heading steadily west, instead of having to plow through it. She picked her way carefully, following old game trails and avoiding the snow-laden swags of the pines. She didn't expect to find game close to the tent. She and Kerlew had been camped there nearly two months now. Their noise and smoke would have spooked away most small game. So she strode along, seeking to put distance between herself and the tent before the brief hours of light dawned.
    The hours of light were few, but the day was long for her. She hunted first under a starry sky disturbed by the pale ribbons of the aurora borealis. She did not turn her gaze up to that spectacle, but peered into the shadows of the forest as she strode silently along. The stew had warmed her stomach but not filled it, and hunger soon chewed at her concentration.
    The gray light of 'morning' found her moving silently, arrow ready, through an open forest of pine. The great trunks soared up around her. Brush was sparse, making it easier for her to walk, and to watch for the small game that was her target. She hated the constant tension of keeping an arrow ready to fly, but knew that any game she spotted would be aware of her. A movement such as drawing out an arrow and setting it to the bow would send them fleeing.
    She watched, not for rabbit or squirrel or ptarmigan, but for movement and shape. The flash of an eye or the flick of an ear in a clump of brush, the white curve that might be the haunch of a rabbit beneath a tree. She loosed once and missed, both bird and arrow vanishing silently into the snowy forest.
    Her first kill came close to noon, and had nothing to do with her shooting skill. She had emerged from the forest into a small clearing. A blackened stump and a few fallen trunks protruded from the snow, showing where lightning had started a fire that had not spread. The open meadow was thick with brush. Tillu stood silently on the edge of the clearing, only her eyes moving. Dawn or gray evening would find this clearing alive with small game, she suspected. But she had discovered it at the