A Daughter Of The Long Pine


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Part One


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They carried her heart with them when they lifted over the skyline of the
port buildings.  First would come that indescribable "thud" reverberating in
her vitals, which would draw her to the window.  Then would come the itch in
her bones as the lift field built up.  Finally, to the accompaniment of a low
shuddering in the air, the bulks of the shuttles serving the starliners would
rise in a majestic swoop into the sky, thumbing their noses to the dictates
of gravity.

Everyone of them, from the sleek black and yellow Norinco Orbit Dashers to
the grey and pitted Port Authority service shuttles, carried away her heart
to the stars and beyond, even perhaps to the ancestral home.  Everyone got
misty eyed about the thought of a pilgrimage to Old Earth; but not one in a
million ever did anything about it.  Most, because in the end, they did not
care enough to make the effort, Bella, because she could not consider Terra
to be her ancestral home.

As a stubby maroon shuttle lifted into the cloudless sky, the scene wavered
slightly from the effects of the "Come Hither" intelligent advertisement
playing on the outside of the window.  Bella pressed a cheek to the glass,
trying to keep the shuttle in sight for as long as possible.  A wistful
expression of longing took possession of her features as her eyes tracked the
shuttle until it was lost in the blue.

She sighed, absently rubbing at the eight digit number tattooed on the inner
surface of her left wrist.  She continued to stare out the window of "Mother
Jadge's Kitchen", seeing not the busy street, but a vista of snow capped
mountains she had never actually seen.  Even if she could somehow get the
necessary cash together, the trip to the Ancestral Home-world would still be
impossible.  That number on her wrist chained her to the planet more surely
than gravity.

"Bella!  Stop day-dreaming child!"

Bella spun from the window.  Across a wilderness of bare table-tops, she met
the stern gaze of an elderly Ogron Matron.  Jadge stood in the doorway to her
kitchens, arms akimbo, wearing a sleeveless dun smock overlain with a pretty
flower printed pinafore.  "We open in half an hour, child," Jadge growled.
"Back to work with you...  Now!" Jadge reinforced the command by flashing her
fangs.

Bella dipped her shoulders , bringing her arms forwards, down and to the
side, palms up.  It was an Ogron gesture acknowledging authority.  She took
hold of a multi-tiered trolley and wheeled it to the nearest table, where she
began setting up with a brisk efficiency.  Bella danced around, her long dark
brown pony tail whisking as the loose light blue coverall belled out about
her slender form.

Jadge watched from the doorway, an expression of motherly affection stealing
over her grizzled features.  Secretly, Jadge held a great affection for the
child, looking upon the human girl almost as the daughter she had never had.
Although Bella was so obviously a Daughter of Terra, she had Ogron mannerisms
ingrained in her soul.  They fitted the human child so naturally, it had to
go much deeper than some superficial overlay to her Terran identity -
acquired out of politeness to her employer.  To all intents and purposes,
Bella was an Ogron female of the High Land Confederacy in a human body.  The
girl both puzzled and disturbed the old Ogron Matron.

Jadge could never look upon the child in motion without being taken back in
her mind to the wild days of her youth among the Tribes of the Highland
Confederacy; and particularly to that shining day when she had been mated to
a Hunter of the Green Valley Tribe at the Mid-Winter Trysting.

Absently, Jadge fingered the bronze ornament, hung on a chain about her neck.
It was made in the likeness of a stylised eagle with spread wings.  Bella,
too, wore a bronze ornament, in the form of a spindly looking pine tree.
Jadge had questioned the child about it when Dora Regis, the girl's Social
Integration Mentor, had brought the waif to her establishment to try out as a
waitress; but the girl had been unwilling to talk of the matter.  Gentle
coaxing over the next few weeks had drawn from Bella only that it had
belonged to her mother, which Jadge knew to be a blatant untruth, since Bella
was so obviously a Daughter of Terra.

Jadge sighed.  It was a mystery, but one for which she had no time just now -
they opened in half an hour.  She turned back to her kitchens.

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Finally, Jadge was able to usher the last patrons out into the pre-dawn grey
and "lock-up" for the day.  She stood a moment surveying the wreckage of the
main room as the "clean-up" crew swung into action, before bending weary
steps towards the stairs to the living areas on the upper story.

On the way, she passed Margie, one of her waitresses.  With her dark
expressive eyes set in a perfectly proportioned face, and framed by a riot of
wavy auburn hair, Jadge was aware that by human standards the girl was a
stunner.  The girl, too, knew the power of her beauty and comported herself
accordingly.  Only now she looked as though someone had fed her to the meat
grinder.

"What happened?" Jadge asked.

The girl turned away.  "Nothing," she said sullenly.

"Nothing?" Jadge echoed scheptically.

"I got in a fight with that little maim-brain weirdo.  She's a danger to
normal folks.  She should be locked away.  I've said it before..."

"What were you fighting about this time?" Jadge interrupted.

"She was drooling over my Jason."

"Jason?"

"Jason...Lord Regis.  He dines here regularly with his sister.  He and I, we
have this understanding and..."

Jadge resumed her trek to her room.  She'd heard it all before.  The social
lives of her waitresses were none of her business.

As she passed Bella's room, her keen ears caught an all too familiar sound.
From inside the room came a furious muttering, punctuated by a series of
thuds and tearing noises.  The sound had such a weight of rage it touched her
heart with an uneasy mixture of fear and motherly concern.  Bella was
fighting the collar again.

Jadge hesitated only a moment, before sliding aside the door and putting her
head into the darkened room.  It was more like an Ogron Den than a terrene
bedroom.  The bed frame had been pushed to one corner, a chair had been stood
on the naked springs, and the small locker had been shoved into another
corner.  The blankets and mattress were piled in the corner furthest from the
door.  The girl sat hunched up in the nest of bedding.  A heavy cloth spread
across the window made the room gloomy.  The only illumination was the angry
red glow of the LED set in the collar about Bella's neck.

With both hands, Bella was repeatedly driving the buckled remains of a
carving knife into the wooden floor, and tearing it loose.  All the while,
she chanted in a low furious tone, the fourth of the nine Curses for the
Damnation of the Enemies of the Tribes.

In two strides, Jadge was at Bella's side.  She snatched the remains of her
best carving knife from the girl's grip.  Bella snarled an oath.  She went
for Jadge's wrist like a striking viper.  The girl's teeth closed on empty
air.  A moment later, she was slammed against the wall as Jadge cuffed her
savagely.

For long seconds, the girl lay glaring up at the huge form standing over her,
eyes burning with an insane fury.  Her hands were clenching and un-clenching
as she fought the restraint of the suppression collar.  Slowly, the madness
seeped away.  Her brown eyes grew shiny as tears welled into them.  She
relaxed into the posture of "submissive child".

Moved by her motherly instincts, Jadge reacted to the girl's very Ogron-like
appeal for physical comfort by sitting down and drawing up her legs to form
the "safe haven".  Bella shuffled backwards between Jadge's legs.  The old
Ogron began to croon.  The sound was a low, rumbling purr, which had a
subsonic harmonic component.  Jadge knew from experience it would calm the
child.  With surprising gentleness, she began to groom the terrene girl.

Bella sighed, cocking her head to give Jadge better access to her hair.
Unlike the Ogron mane, which was rooted down the neck and spine and out
across the shoulders, Bella's hair grew only from her head.  The hair did not
possess the fur quality of a true mane - all of which made it difficult for
Jadge to groom properly.  Practice had given her a technique for handling the
separate strands; and to judge from Bella's reactions, the girl got from the
grooming all the comfort that any Ogron cubling might have.  Jadge wondered
if the humans had a grooming activity.  Certainly, if they had once possessed
such a behaviour, they had long since abandoned it.

As she worked steadily at the girl's long hair, she mused on just how like an
Ogron in her mannerisms this Daughter of Terra was.

"Now, what is it this time, child?" she asked in as gentle a voice as she
could manage.

"I hate them," Bella snarled.  "I hate them all.  Treacherous, cowardly,
nasty, naked apes without honour...I hate them all."

"But, child, they are your people.  You cannot hate them."

"Don't say that!" Bella exclaimed in outrage.  "They are not my people...And
I hate them.  They are cold and furless and live apart." Bella took hold of
the bronze ornament wrought in the form of a thin pine tree hung about her
neck.  "I am the Daughter of Shamba of Long Pine of the High Land
Confederacy," she declared defiantly.

Jadge reached around the girl, and took the totemic ornament in her clawed
hand.  She cradled it reverently in her palm, studying it closely, though she
needed only the feel of it in her hand to know that it was genuine.

"Where did you get this, Bella?"

"It was my mother's."

"Nonsense, child!" Jadge exclaimed, a note of annoyance creeping into her
rumbling voice.  "This is a Long Pine Totem.  It is properly the treasure of
an Ogron of the Long Pine Tribe.  A Gift of Belonging to be handed down the
generations.  This is for Shamba to hand on to her eldest child.  You cannot
be that child.  You are not an Ogron of any Tribe.  You are a daughter of the
people of Terra."

Jadge felt the deep shudder of revulsion which wracked the girl.  Bella
snuggled back against Jadge's body, curling herself down between the knees.
In her mind, she saw again the pathetic creatures, their starved faces, the
staring eyes full of fear and malice, as their thin arms reached to grab her
at the bidding of the Master.  Once again, the acrid stench of her burning
hair filled her nostrils; and the burning pain from her seared and blistered
shoulders made her cringe.  "Don't say that.  Please Mother Jadge.  Don't say
that.  I am the daughter of Shamba of Long Pine...I am...I am."

Jadge plied her hands once more to the shuddering girl's hair.  She worked
for a while, emitting a deep comforting rumble.  When she judged that Bella
had calmed, she said encouragingly: "why not tell me of your mother?  And of
how a daughter of Terra came to be the child of an Ogron?  Now, there's a
tale that must be worthy of its telling?"

Bella calmed instantly, sitting up a little straighter, and lifting her chin.
She took on a grave expression.  She drew about her slight form that ethereal
gravitas which attends all Keepers of the Histories when they are to tell a
tale of great import to the people of the High Land Confederacy.

Bella's response to the formal ritualistic invitation to "tell a tale" seemed
somehow quite natural to Jadge.  The elderly matron settled herself to hear
the story of Bella, Daughter of Shamba of the Long Pine.

"Listen!" Bella began to declaim in a formal chant, "and hear the tale of
Shamba, a Daughter of the Long Pine..."


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There was a great deal of blood staining the trampled snow of the Trysting
Ground.  Even so, there had been only one death at this year's Trysting of
the Highland Tribes.  The young buck had been a Long Pine; but as his
ambition had so evidently exceeded his prowess, his Tribe had disowned him.
The young warrior lay on his back in the snow with a Green Valley spear
standing in his chest, ignored by the gathered Tribes.

A ring of Ceremonial fires had been lit under the eaves of the encroaching
pine forest.  They roared and crackled, filling the gloomy winter afternoon
with the sweet smell of burning pine logs.  The flames held at bay the twin
enemies of the Tribes, Shenki the Demon of Darkness, Lord of the Underworld
and his brother Shemmi, the Demon of the Winter Cold and Lord of the North
Wind.

Inside this Protection, the pavilions of the twelve Highland Tribes had been
pitched equidistantly around the two hundred yard circle of the Trysting
Ground.  Each tent was a rambling structure of shaggy, brown Shog hide, with
its Tribal Totem topping off the central support pole.  The canopied
entrances of the tents faced inwards.  Sheltering under the awning of each
was the Chief and his Tribal Council, resplendent in festival dress.

Before them danced the new brides.  Bronze ornaments woven into manes clinked
and jangled as the naked girls moved through the ritual steps and poses of
the Trysting Dance, displaying themselves for the approval of the Elders.

Their muscles, moving smoothly under lush fur, drove the grey dapples marking
their brown pelts into ever changing patterns.  The youths watched their
brides to be, mesmerised by the flowing patterns, growing excited by the
exhibition of grace and power.

As each bride was given the sign of approval from the Elders, the decision
drew exclamations of admiration from the youths.  The successful hunter
looked smug and self-satisfied.  He accepted, with feigned indifference, the
congratulations of his peers for such a shrewd choice of mate; but as this
was really all about the value each new bride could bring to the Tribe, in
truth, the untried hunters were all really superfluous to this part of the
Ceremony.

In the centre of the Trysting Ground, were three more individuals who were
superfluous to the proceedings.  The naked girls sat back to back on Shog
hide leather blankets, a forlorn centre piece to the ring of churned snow.

Sheeba was tall, powerfully muscled, bright of eye and heavy of fang - a
superb specimen of the High Dale stock; but her pelt was jet black, and her
eyes glowed with an inner golden light; because of these curses, she remained
unclaimed.

Angelica was a runt.  She stood barely five feet six, short for an Ogron.
Her pelt was coarse and patchy; but worst of all was her right leg; the limb
was twisted and under developed.  She was otherwise pretty; her fangs were
heavy and of the palest ivory.  Her brown eyes were bright with a lively
intelligence; and already, there was gathered about her a suggestion of the
ethereal gravitas of one who would be Keeper of Histories; but she remained
unclaimed.

The last woman appeared a magnificent catch for any young Hunter of the
Tribes.  She was tall and stately, with powerful muscles rippling under her
pelt.  The fur was of the most alluring brown; and the pattern of grey
dapples marking her body was most pleasing to the eye.  Her head was formed
in the classic Ogron form and her features possessed every bit of the ideals
of Ogron feminine beauty.  Her ivory fangs were heavy.  She had grey eyes (a
prized colour among the Highland Tribes) which were possessed of
intelligence.  Shamba represented in every line of her body the acme of Ogron
desirability.  Yet Shamba, too, remained unclaimed.

The three girls sat with knees drawn up, staring at nothing.  A thin misting
of snow grains drifting down from the lowering grey clouds settled over them,
making their pelts sparkle, as though strewn with tiny diamonds.  They sat on
in silence, untroubled by the cold, while at the edge of the ground, the
year's Trysting was winding down.

The matrons were leading away the new brides to prepare them for their
nuptials.  Younger women and children were moving to the task of breaking
down the camps with the practised ease of nomadic folk.  Pack animals were
being loaded with bundles of the tribes possessions.  The four Nether Tribes,
who hunted lower down, where the ground was flatter, had rude wagons.  These
were being loaded with that same efficiency.  Fires were being doused, and
tents collapsed.  All this activity was accompanied by a rhythmic chanting
and the clang and jangle of the married women's bronze ornaments.

Well before Mid-Winter Dark had fallen over the Trysting Ground, the Tribes
were packed and ready for their short trip to the Caves of The New Season,
where the wedding feasting would begin.

The untried hunters of the Tribes were checking weapons, and forming up their
parties for the Wedding Hunt.  They were hanging around watching each other
with feigned indifference as they prepared for their part in the day's
ceremonies.  It was a great prize to be the bearer of the First Meet to the
banquet; but the honour would be sorely compromised if the party had been
witnessed to have hurried first from the Trysting Ground.

Forlorn, the three unclaimed girls sat on, their future uncertain.  They had
been forgotten by all save one female.

Shamba's mother kept glancing over at her daughter as she rolled up rugs.
The ways of the Highland Tribes seemed cruel to her.  She had been born far
to the south, "outside the land" to one of the River Tribes who hunted the
delta marshes where the living was easy.  She had never quite come to terms
with the harsh and practical ways of the High Landers.

As she secured a last rug roll, she came to a decision.  She could not just
walk away without doing anything, even if it meant the displeasure of her
husband.  She glanced once at the tall Tribal Councillor standing in the
group of elders by the Chief, and was startled to find him watching her with
a shrewd expression.  None of the shattering disappointment he must be
feeling showed.  Shamba's mother hesitated only a moment, staring back with
defiance at her husband.  Then with deliberate casualness, she rose from her
knees, and took up a bundle.  She had prepared the travelling pack, even
before the Trysting had begun, moved by some deep instinct which warned her
of the shameful outcome to her daughter's Trysting Day.

Shamba's mother moved out onto the Trysting Ground, taking ten steps before
casting the bundle down in the snow.  Shamba looked up.  The gaze of mother
and daughter locked in a long moment of unspoken communication.  Then
Shamba's mother turned, and walked back to the Tribe, head held high,
defiance in her every line.

The stern look of angry disapproval in her husband's eyes did not fool her in
the slightest.  He would punish her for this; he could do no other and still
keep face among the Tribe; but she knew that his hand would be lighter than
the crime ought to warrant.

In an hour, the Tribes were gone.

Angelica was the first to stir.  She struggled to her feet, picked up the
blanket she had been sitting on, and pulled it around her thin shoulders.
She looked around at the dark pines ringing in the deserted clearing.  Her
eyes fell momentarily on the bundle cast by Shamba's mother.  She curled her
lips back - a sign of uncertainty.

"Shamba?"

The other woman started as though from some deep meditative trance.  She
glanced a question up at Angelica.

"Shamba?  What should we do now?"

It was Sheeba who answered.  In a bitter tone, she said: "We die!"

Shamba rose easily to her impressive height.  She stretched luxuriously, and
said: "The Sanctuary Temple will take us in."

Sheeba snorted in contempt.  "I am a High Daler.  We do not expect even our
unwanted leavings to crawl to the Priests."

"What then?" Shamba snarled.

Sheeba threw back her head, and struck a magnificent pose.  "We die.  We go
on until we die.  It is the High Dale way."

Angelica, looking from each of the young women, her expression growing more
troubled, said in a small voice.  "I don't want to die.  I want mother."

Sheeba rounded on her savagely.  "You don't have a mother any more, cripple.
She is dead to you, as you are dead to her."

Angelica recoiled from the bigger woman, and hunched down under her blanket.
She began to cry quietly.  Sheeba watched her coldly, shaking her head in
disgust.  "Netherlanders!" she spat.  "I'm glad we of North Dale do not take
our wives from you soft southern weaklings!  Our Tribe would go to the Land
of Grey Mist in half a season."

"Leave her be, High Daler," Shamba snarled.

Sheeba dropped into a fighting crouch, her clawed hands held ready to strike.
Shamba pointedly ignored the challenge.  "Fighting among ourselves is not
going to help our situation," she said reasonably.  She deliberately turned
her back on the threat, and pulled Angelica into her arms.  The small girl
fell against her, snuggling up to Shamba's hard muscled body.  Shamba
carefully pulled the blanket around them both.

"Hush, hush, cubling," Shamba soothed.  "We'll be alright.  I'll take care of
you...and be your mother.  Hush now cubling."

Angelica continue to snivel, crying out softly for her mother.  Sheeba
watched them a long moment, contempt warring with some other painful emotion
on her features, then she shrugged and relaxed from her fighting stance.

Turning from the little tableau, which touched something inside that she
really did not want to think about, she strode across to the body of the Long
Pine.  Giving the corpse a ritualistic kick, to show her contempt, she yanked
the spear from his chest.

Next, she went to the bundle that Shamba's mother had left.  She knelt by it,
and lay the Green Valley spear on the snow.  She glanced at Shamba, saw the
girl was preoccupied with the cripple, and reached to untie the thongs.

She unrolled the Shog hide blanket, revealing the usual clutch of travelling
necessities.  There were four large bundles of trail rations - dried meat
ground up with herbs and formed into appetising cakes with solidified fat.
Sheeba knew from experience how good it was.  There was a bundle of soft
leather winter clothing which rattled when she disturbed it.  Inside, as well
as a cooking pot, some utensils and a Long Pine Totem wrought in bronze, she
discovered two priceless gifts.

Almost before thinking, her hand moved to claim the prizes for herself.
Sheeba hesitated, shooting a guilty glance at Shamba.  The girl was still
coddling the cripple.  Sheeba shrugged, and took possession of the two highly
polished steel blades engraved with the crest of Inter-Systems Star Lines.
She did not touch the Long Pine Totem.

Sheeba quickly selected a blanket from the bundle.  With a casual efficiency,
she re-wrapped and tied the pack.  Rising, she wrapped the blanket about her
loins as a kilt, and secured it with some rawhide strips knotted on her left
hip.  With reverent care, she slipped the blades into the windings of the
knot.  She hefted the bundle onto her back, slipped arms through the straps
and settled it comfortably between her shoulder blades.

Taking up the Green Valley spear, Sheeba strode back to the others.  "We'd
better get moving," she said.  "We have twelve days grace before we become
No-Tribe.  It's at least five High Dale days to Skar Dale.  At least seven
Long Pine and..." She cast a look of contempt at Angelica.  "The All Mother
alone knows how many cripple days."

"What's that to you High Daler?" Shamba snarled.  "You'll not be going
there...High Dalers don't expect even their leavings to crawl to the
Priests." Shamba had the satisfaction of seeing Sheeba wince at the barb.
The High Daler, Shamba realised, wasn't as hard as she was putting on.

"You'll need a guide and hunter on the journey; and Skar Dale lies towards
High Dale.  I know the land, and the good foraging all ways east of here."
Angelica lifted her head from the folds of blanket, and peered hopefully at
Shamba.  She asked uncertainly: "We're going to the Sanctuary?"

Shamba said: "It is all the honorable future we have now."

"We're not going to die?"

Shamba grinned and squeezed Angelica's shoulders reassuringly.  "NO, cubling.
We're not going to die.  Sheeba is going to lead us to the Sanctuary at Skar
Dale."

"Then what?" Angelica asked.

"Then we shall ask to be taken into the Sanctuary there."

Angelica shook her head.  "No.  I know that, it is Lore.  I mean, what will
Sheeba do then?"

Shamba shrugged.  Sheeba must follow her own path," she said, studying the
High Dale woman closely.  Sheeba had turned her back on them, and was
settling the pack with their few possessions into a more comfortable
position.

Sheeba cast a worried glance at the surrounding pines.  "We must be gone from
here," she said.  "They are coming."

Full of silent menace, ghost grey shapes were drifting towards them in the
darkness under the pines.  Angelica shivered, and leaned in closer to Shamba.
"Will they attack?" she asked.

Shamba absently slid a protective arm about the girl's shoulders.  "I don't
think so," she said, but looked to Sheeba for confirmation, as it was the
High Dale tribe which caught most trouble from marauding packs of Snarls.
They were only seen this far down during winter.

A pale wolf like creature trotted into full view.  It paused a moment, large
ears pricked, and lifted its sharp snout in their direction.  It scented the
air, before turning and trotting over to the corpse of the Long Pine.

"The pack will be busy scavenging the Tribes leavings for a while...but only
for a while," Sheeba explained.  "Come.  This way, quick and quiet- do not
look back...  And if the All Mother wills, perhaps we shall see another
dawn?"

The High Dale woman set off towards the east, not looking to see if the
others followed.

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On an open, snow covered slope, under a sky greying with dawn, Death grinned
at Angelica.  The girl had finally lost her temper with Sheeba.  The High
Dale woman had pressed on through the night at a furious pace, conceding
nothing to Angelica's leg.  The Netherlander girl had gone down several
times.  Each time, Sheeba had stood by watching, contempt written clear on
her dark face, as Angelica had dragged herself up again.  There was no doubt
in Angelica's mind that it was all meant to show her what a hindrance she was
being on their race to reach Sanctuary in the time allowed.  Netherlander she
might be; but Angelica was not without pride.  She struggled on gamely,
refusing help from Shamba, all the while growing more and more angry.

Then, under the paling stars on the steep way, Angelica slipped again.  By
reflex, she grabbed at Sheeba.  The High Dale girl had been walking at her
side, taunting her with derisory looks.  Sheeba had jumped back from
Angelica's out-flung arm.  While the girl struggled to rise, Sheeba stood by
scowling.

Shamba was some way behind, checking their back trail for Snarls, when she
saw Angelica go down.  A certain ominous deliberation in the girl's movements
as she clambered up, warned Shamba that this was trouble.  She began to run,
knowing that she could not be in time to prevent the shedding of Netherlander
blood.

"Because I do not like you, cripple," Sheeba was saying as Shamba reached
them, kicking up a shower of snow as she scrabbled to keep herself from
tumbling down the slope.  The two were oblivious to her arrival.

"That is untrue," Angelica said evenly.

Shamba looked from one to the other, uncertain as to what to do.

Sheeba bridled at Angelica's assertion.  "Do not tell me what is true,
Netherlander."

"I am Keeper of Histories," Angelica stated, head held high.  "What is truth
is my concern.  And...  I say it is a truth that you are afraid."

Shamba tensed, holding herself ready.  Angelica had gone too far; she was
within a whisker of getting Sheeba's spear through her belly.

"Really!" Sheeba ground out.  "What is there about an Netherlander cripple to
fear?"

"My leg."

Alarmed by the sudden panic in Sheeba's golden eyes, Shamba moved forward
preparing to interpose her body.

"I am Sheeba of High Dale...I fear nothing," Sheeba declared.  The assertion
rang hollow.  Her hands, gripping the shaft of the spear, were trembling; but
when the point came down to centre on Angelica, it was rock steady.

Betrayed into folly by her anger, Angelica ploughed on, ignoring her peril.
There was an almost sneering tone in her voice when she issued her challenge.
"Then touch my leg." She pushed her deformed leg forward.  "If you do not
fear it, then touch it."

Afterwards, Sheeba walked away; and when she was out of sight, she grabbed up
a handful of snow and scrubbed at her hand; but no matter how hard she
rubbed, the taint would not wash away.

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It was Angelica's growing irritation at the High Daler's continuing contempt
which caused the disaster.  Sitting cross-legged on a boulder, watching
Sheeba edge towards the sloping brink, and feeling a little perverse,
Angelica said: "Be careful - it's very dangerous," then settled back to enjoy
the fun.

As expected, Sheeba stiffened.  The girl started to turn, some no doubt
boastful remark about High Dalers and danger forming; but she never got the
chance to deliver it.  Her feet went out from under her.  She sat down
gracelessly in the scum of vivid green lichen on the sloping rock, letting go
the baited fishing line.  She made a desperate grab to save herself; but the
next moment she had slid over the edge into the pool at the base of the
warterfall.

In the same instant that Angelica clapped her hands in glee, she recalled
that High Dalers did not swim.  "Shamba!" she cried in alarm.  She slid
awkwardly from her perch.  "Shamba...Help me!"

Alerted by the panic in Angelica's voice, Shamba left the makings of a fire,
and ran over to see what was wrong.  Angelica was kneeling on the sloping
rock, peering over the edge.  Bracing her legs between the slippery boulders,
Shamba took a firm hold of Angelica's ankles.  She gave a squeeze to let the
girl know that she was ready.  Angelica slithered over the brink to dangle,
head down, above the foaming water.

Directly below, Sheeba was clinging to a rocky outcrop, straining every
muscle to cling on against the pull of the water swirling over the lip of the
pool.

Reaching down, Angelica shouted to attract Sheeba's attention.  The meaning
of the words was lost in the roaring of the waterfall; but Sheeba needed
little encouragement to reach out for the proffered hand.  Then, through the
fog of her desperation, recognition of exactly who her saviour must be came
to her.

With the morning's humiliation fresh in her mind, it was all too much for
High Dale pride.  The memory of touching the girl's leg surged up, filling
Sheeba with disgust and self-loathing.  An expression of savage despair
crossed her face.  Deliberately, Sheeba released her hold.

In an instant, the High Dale girl had been washed over the lip of the basin,
and ripped away by the raging torrent spilling down the steep chute.  She
went, unresisting, the weight of her water-logged pelt dragging her under.

Angelica wriggled back onto the rock.  She stood up, her mouth agape in
shock.  She shot an anguished look of bewilderment at Shamba.  Then
Angelica's jaw clenched with resolution.  She would not let the High Dale
girl shame her so.  Shrugging out of the make-shift cloak and kilt, she
stepped to the edge, and dove into the torrent, entering the water cleanly.

For one breathless instant, Shamba stared in horror at the foaming water,
which had claimed her companions, before her mind snapped into action.
Quickly stashing their gear, she picked up the spear and turned to follow the
river down stream.  The footing was made treacherous by a thick carpet of
vivid green and blue lichens.  She ran, slithering and slipping over the icy
rocks with the sound of the rapids in her ears.  A quarter of a mile lower
down, she knew the torrent emptied into another shallow pool, before pouring
over the far edge and falling five hundred feet.

The plunge did not worry Shamba.  She knew in her bones that Angelica would
pull the High Daler from the water.  The look of determination in Angelica's
face had been a frightful thing.

What concerned Shamba was Sheeba's reaction to being rescued by a crippled
Netherlander.  High Dale pride was like a Snarl waiting in ambush,
unpredictable, and lethal.  After Angelica's suicidal provocation of the High
Daler that morning, Shamba knew she had to reach the pool, and try to prevent
the looming tragedy.

Luck was with her.

She burst through a screen of low firs into a cleared area beside the pool.
A shelf of grey rock sloped down to the water.  Sheeba lay stretched on her
back, her feet in the water.  She seemed to be unconscious.  There was a
chance that no blood would be shed.  "All Mother be praised," Shamba cried
aloud in relief.

Angelica was on hands and knees nearby, her thin body heaving as she panted.
Water, running from her pelt, made the grey rock glisten beneath her.  She
looked up when Shamba slithered to a halt on the sloping rock.  There was a
fierce light of triumph in Angelica's eyes.  She pushed herself into a
kneeling position, raised her head proudly, and declared: "The Honour of the
Walkers on Water is unsullied.  I have saved her."

"You little fool!  Do you want to die?  Get out of here now, before Sheeba
awakens."

The look of triumphant self-satisfaction vanished from Angelica's face at
Shamba's angry words.  "But Shamba," the girl started to protest; but Shamba
took two quick steps towards the prideful child, and cuffed her savagely,
sending her sprawling across the rocks.

"Get away from here, you little fool!" she snarled.  "Now!  Before Sheeba
returns from the realm of sleeping spirit."

"But, Shamba..."

Shamba's voice rose in desperation, bearing down the girl's protest.  "A
Netherlander's pride is as soft as the water they walk upon; but a High
Daler's pride is as hard as the rocks of High Dale and sharp as a hunting
spear.  It will never let her forgive this.  She will kill you if she knows
what you have done."

Angelica scrambled to hands and knees.  She was thoroughly frightened by
Shamba's unexpected fury.  Sheeba was stirring.  Angelica looked from the
supine girl to Shamba's angry visage, hesitating a long moment.  That part of
her that was "Keeper of Histories" told her that Shamba was right in what she
predicted; but the prideful and hurt girl was unwilling to accept the
knowledge.  Then Sheeba groaned, her arms groping erratically as she came
back to consciousness.  The sight of the High Daler's eyes fluttering open
broke the impasse in Angelica's mind.  Fear and panic filled her; the sudden
and intense emotions sent her scuttling away towards the low growing firs on
hands and knees.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sheeba squatted at the edge of the tiny pool hidden among the undergrowth.
From the surface, her own face peered back at her, haloed by a blue sky,
dotted with tiny puffs of cloud.

She was examining her reflection, trying desperately to find something to
like about herself.  Her golden eyes peered back at her.  Had those eyes been
in the head of a Snarl, or a Dasher, she knew she would have thought them
beautiful; but in the face of a woman of the High Dale Tribe, they were an
abomination.  Sheeba was too deeply steeped in the Lore and Custom of the
Tribe to feel anything but revulsion at the colour of those eyes, and at
herself for possessing them.  They were the eyes of Shenki, the Earth Demon;
and they went with the black colouring of her pelt.  Both were signs that she
had been "touched" by the Earth Demon" at birth and claimed for his own.
Both were an outward sign of her essentially evil spirit.

She did not know what Evil was?  She knew only that she did not feel evil.
Had she felt there was any justice in the Tribe's shunning, she might have
been able to bow down to her fate.  The self-knowledge that she was not evil
warred incessantly against the revered Lore of the Tribe which said that she
must be, else why had the Earth Demon claimed her?  It was all so confusing.
She raised an arm, balling her hand into a fist to smash the face watching
her from the pool.  The blow never fell.

As she tensed to hammer her fist into that ugly face, fingers touched the
back of her arm.  Sheeba froze, appalled at being so caught up in her own
misery that she had not noticed Angelica's approach.

The girl's hand stroked the short fur of Sheeba's arm gently.  By reflex,
Sheeba snatched her arm away, and glared at the face which appeared beside
her own in the water - golden eyes meeting brown.  Angelica smiled gently and
spoke.

"You are beautiful."

"Do not mock me, cripple!" Sheeba hissed, her lips drawing back to display
her fangs.

"A Keeper of the Histories cannot lie," Angelica declared gravely.  "You are
beautiful."

"How can I be?" Sheeba snarled.  "My eyes are golden, my pelt is touched by
the darkness of the Underworld.  I am a bride of Shenki and must be evil."

Awkwardly, Angelica knelt beside Sheeba.  "Shenki does not exist," she said
simply.

"Of course he does," Sheeba affirmed.  "He is the Brother of Shemi, the
Winter Demon.  Every year they conspire together to bring the dark and the
cold to try and break the spirit of the Tribes.  You claim to be Keeper of
Histories?  And yet, you do not know the Lore of the Tribes."

"I am of the Walkers on Water Tribe.  We do not believe in Shenki.  And as
Keeper of Histories, I know many more histories than are dreamed of in the
Highland.  I tell you there is no Earth Demon nor any Winter Demon.  Winter
is a season which comes every year- whether we honour The All Mother or not.
Among the Walkers on Water, there is no lore to say that a black pelt means
an evil spirit; and so to me you are beautiful."

Sheeba reflected a moment on this revelation.  Then a frightening thought
struck her.  "If there is no Shenki?  Then does that mean there is no All
Mother either?"

Silently, Angelica cursed herself roundly.  As Keeper of Histories, she was
heir to all the Lore and Legend of the Tribes; it was not something she
needed to learn.  Wisdom was another matter.  Wisdom had to be learned; it
took time; and she was barely out of her maidenhood.

She had come to beg forgiveness from the High Dale girl she had humiliated,
to try and repair some of the damage done, not to indulge in pointless
theological debate which could only serve to humiliate the woman further.  By
such indulgence did Angelica risk squandering what little honour still
remained to her in this situation.  She set her jaw and fell forward onto
hands and knees, lowering her head to expose her neck for a killing bite.

"I, Angelica, formerly of the tribe of the Walkers On Water of The Netherland
of the Highland Confederacy, one who would be Keeper of Histories, beg
forgiveness of Sheeba of the High Dale for my dishonourable behaviour at the
fall.  As proof of my sincerity, I put on the mud mask of shame."

So saying, Angelica leaned down to the edge of the pool and ground her face
into the half frozen mud at Sheeba's feet.

Angelica's actions were a formalised ritual.  It was now for Sheeba to make
the next move.  If she considered Angelica's actions beyond forgiveness, the
exposed neck awaited her fangs.  If she needed time to considder, then it was
for Angelica to bear the mud mask of shame upon her face until such time as
Sheeba decided on the girl's fate.  If Angelica was to be forgiven, then it
was for Sheeba, with her own hans, to wash the mud from Angelica's face.

Sheeba was completely nonplussed by Angelica's invoking of the ritual.
Sheeba understood intimately what it was to wear a mask of shame.  In her
case, it was the black pelt and golden eyes; and these could not be washed
away, even were there someone to grant forgiveness for the sins which the
cruelty of fate had thrust upon her.  She sat in a stunned silence, unable to
move, or even think, such a turmoil of emotions were roiling around inside
her head.

However, brittle as it was, Sheeba still had the High Dale pride.

Sheeba leaned down over the crouching girl.  She drew back her lips, exposing
her fangs.  She hesitated; and something caught her attention.

Across the pond, on the hillside amid the boulders and patches of greying
snow, a lone Snarl regarded her from golden eyes.  They were ablaze with the
reflected fire of late afternoon sunlight.  They were beautiful.

Sheeba shivered, suddenly appalled at what she was about to do.  She
scrambled to her feet, and stood glancing between those eyes and the
crouching girl.  She made an inarticulate noise in her throat.  At last, she
was able to say: "It does not matter.  We are outside the Law of the Tribe.
Wash yourself."

Sheeba turned, and walked away.

Angelica lifted her face from the mud.  For one terrible moment there, she
was certain she'd miscalculated Sheeba's state of mind.  Angelica was
trembling with fright; even so, her face under the mud held a triumphant
smile.  She was well pleased with the day's endeavours.

Scooping up the frigid water, she began to wash her face.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

In a holow, on a hillside, thickly grown with pines, where serpents of mist
hunted among the trunks, they camped for the night.

Angelica whined in irritation as she ground her back forcefully against the
rough bark of a tree.  No matter how she moved, it proved impossible to catch
exactly the right spot.  A few yards away, Shamba glanced up from where she
was starting the fire.  A look of sympathy crossed her face.  "I'll be done
here in a moment," she said, and turned back to the task of getting the fire
going.

Across the carefully arranged heap of kindling, Sheeba squatted, expertly
skinning a small animal.  Shamba Watched her working while she worked the
fire-bow.  The fast sawing action of Shamba's hands drew a gentle tinkling
from the Long Pine Totem hung about her neck on a thong.  The sound of the
bronze ornament recalled to Shamba the puzzling incident of the afternoon.

The thong had snapped when they were edging down a narrow way.  The totem had
slithered over the edge and caught in the roots of a scrubby tree rooted in
the rock, twenty feet down the nearly sheer drop.  Sheeba had announced that
she would fetch it.  Shamba tried to dissuade her.  The budding argument was
ended when Angelica, worried at the intensity of Sheeba's determination,
signed covertly to Shamba to let the High Dale girl go.

Shamba paused in preparing the fire.  "Sheeba?" she said.

"Ummm?" Sheeba answered abstractedly, engrossed in the butchery.

"This afternoon...  Why were you so set on rescuing the Totem?"

Sheeba went still.  Slowly, she raised her hed to meet Shamba's gaze.  "A
Tribal Totem is important," sheeba said evasively.

"But not worth the risk of a life, surely?" Shamba persisted, puzzling over
why such a simple question should draw such a tentative response from the
High Daler.  "And it's not even a High Dale Totem," she added.

Sheeba stared at her for a long moment, an inner conflict playing itself out
on her handsome features.  Then she looked down, and attacked the task of
butchery with unnecessary violence, ripping the skin from the carcase - and
quite possibly ruining it for any future use in so doing.  "It doesn't
matter," she mumbled in a voice that said it mattered a lot.

Shamba waited, saying nothing.  Eventually, Sheeba's frantic tearing at the
carcase slowed.  There was a long pause, the silence troubled only by the
wind sighing through the pines, and the low vocalisations of irritation from
Angelica.

Then, hesitantly, Sheeba raised her head.  There was a look of such
vulnerability in her eyes that Shamba's heart clenched.  She was no longer
certain she wanted to know what ailed the High Dale girl.

Hesitantly, Sheeba spoke.  "I just want to be liked," she said, forcing the
words out past her pride and embarrassment.  "Was that too much to ask?  I
only ever wanted to be liked.  But nobody liked me because of my black pelt.
No matter what I did, no matter How bravely I acted, no matter how helpful I
was.  No matter how I crawled to them, it didn't make any difference.  Even
my mother could not bear to touch me.  It did no good....It did no good.  It
was a bitter lesson, but one I learnt at last...But not before it bent my
spirit out of shape.  I can't stop myself trying to be helpful, even when it
is not wanted...  Particularly when it is not wanted.  I cannot help myself.
I have to help.  I cannot control this shameful impulse to demeen myself..."
Sheeba paused, glaring in defiance at Shamba.  "But It doesn't matter any
more, because we are Outside the Tribes."

The low whining from Angelica drew Sheeba's attention across at the girl
writhing against the tree.  Malice glowed in her golden eyes.  If she wasn't
a cripple, she'd not have that problem, Sheeba thought.  Then her gaze
flicked to the darkness under the trees surrounding their camp.

There was nothing untoward to see, nothing threatening to smell, nothing out
of the ordinary to hear and yet...  It took a conscious effort to relax her
grip on the beautiful steel knife.

A tiny flame sprang up under Shamba's working hands.  She leaned down and
blew on it gently.  Soon the fire was well started.  She sat back and grinned
over the fire at Sheeba.  Shamba was proud of her ability to conjure fire.
Sheeba just shrugged and went back to her task.

A particularly loud moan from Angelica reminded Shamba of the girl's
distress.  Scooting back from the fire, she called out: "Angelica!  Come
here!" She patted the ground between her knees.

Angelica needed no further invitation.  Abandoning the tree, she came
scuttling across.  Turning her back, she sat down between Shamba's knees, and
shivered with pleasure as Shamba began to groom her.

Across the fire, Sheeba froze, the knife gripped in one paw, the
half-butchered animal dangling forgotten from the other.  The dancing flames
threw shadows across her face, masking the intense expression of jealousy
there.

At a particularly contented sigh from Angelica, Sheeba dropped the knife and
carcass.  She lurched to her feet, and stalked away into the darkness.  A
dozen yards off, she stopped and turned to watch the intimate scene in the
dancing firelight.

She felt sick to her stomach.  Her heart beat painfully in her chest.  She
was trembling from head to foot.  She could not ever remember being groomed,
not even by her mother.  Anger, jealousy and resentment warred with a
desperate loneliness in her heart.  Although her attention was focused upon
her inner turmoil, still there was some small part of her hunter's mind which
was aware of the danger closing in from the darkness.

Four she was certain of; and there was bound to be more hanging back.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sheeba pointed with the spear to the line of dark pines far below.  Squinting
against the orange haze of sunset, Shamba could just make out the movement
among the trunks.  They were showing themselves deliberately.  Such as they
could pass unnoticed on a bald hilltop if they so chose.  It was a final
warning to the trio of girls trespassing on Skar Dale ground that they should
hurry.

"We should leave her to her fate," Sheeba snarled.  She stood with Shamba on
the ridge looking westward.  Far down the slope, Angelica hobbled gamely on.
The shadowing Skar Dalers emerged carelessly into full view.  They squatted
at the edge of the pines, content to watch the struggling girl.  For now,
they would do nothing; but after midnight, they would come on in deadly
ernest.

On the ridge, Sheeba turned a hard look upon Shamba.  "Our grace lasts only
until midnight tomorrow.  If we go now...  And go fast as a striking Snarl,
we can perhaps make the holy grounds."

"Then go, High Daler," Shamba said without rancor.  "You have already done
more than honour demands.  It cannot be held against the honour of High Dale
that you save yourself now."

Sheeba seethed in furious frustration.  She was desperate to fly to safety;
but found that she could not abandon her companions; and she could not
explain to herself why.  She ground the but of the spear into the crust of
old snow to relieve her feelings.  She wanted to talk to Shamba about it; but
Shamba was already skimming down-slope towards the struggling girl.  Deep in
her bones, Sheeba felt certain they were all going to die...  And all because
of a lame Netherlander.  It was intollerable.

Again, Sheeba ground the but of the Green Valley spear against the unyielding
earth.  For a passionate moment, she almost wished she'd used it on the
cripple when the Netherlander had provoked her over the twisted leg.  She set
the wish aside; such thoughts were no use now, for she had moved on beyond
the time when she would have committed such an act.

A ululating cry from a Skar Daler snapped Sheeba back to the present.  With a
conscious effort, she unclenched the hand which had been soiled by touching
the cripple.  Squinting against the blaze of orange sunlight, she peered down
the slope.  Shamba had reached the cripple, and was assisting her.

The Skar Dalers were moving off at speed towards the south, alerted to the
possibility of game.  A loose heard of dear-like Bok had wandered from the
pines into a small valley to the south.

Sheeba seethed.  Now was their chance, while their pursuers were distracted
by the prospect of the hunt.  If it was not for the cripple, they could be
away into the next valley and making up the time lost to the cripple's
exasperating slowness.

It proved too frustrating to watch the creeping progress of the pair up the
slope.  Sheeba turned her gaze up to the endless blue depth of the sky to
offer up a prayer to the All Mother.  Her heart leapt with sudden hope.  The
sky to the north was darkened by writhing snakes of cloud.

"All Mother be praised!" she shouted in glee.  She began an impromptu jig of
delight.  Shemi, normally an enemy of the Tribes, was taking a hand in their
fate; he was coming to blind their pursuers and cover their back trail...

All Mother be praised indeed!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

The freezing squall hit them at dusk.  Unless they got under cover
immediately, it was going to be a miserable night.  Sheeba, studying the open
slope, covered with a crust of old snow studded with boulders, pointed with
the Green Valley spear.

"Over there, in the lee of the big boulder," Sheeba directed.  Her words were
torn away by the rising gale, sweeping down the slope.

"A Dive Hole?" Shamba asked.

Sheeba did not waste time answering; instead, she put her head down and
forged ahead up the slope against the wind.  Moments later, the snow front
hit them; and the world turned white.

Shamba took a firm hold of Angelica's hand, dragging the girl down close to
the ground.  She began to press forward against the gale, keeping her gaze on
the shadowy form of Sheeba, a few yards ahead.  She held onto Angelica with
an iron grip.  To be separated in this squall would be a disaster.  Rough as
it was, Shamba knew it to be only the first tentative blusterings of the Ice
Giant's displeasure.

Unerringly, Sheeba led them to the lee of the boulders sheltering the Dive
Hole in its down-slope side.  When Shamba came up with Angelica, Sheeba
already had the bundle unrolled.  She took up a blanket and spread it into
the back of the shallow, snow lined hole.  Shamba and Angelica began laying
out the other leather sheets necessary for a successful Dive.

"I'll take the block," Shamba said.  "Sheeba, you take the back, and we can
nestle Angelica between us."

Sheeba winced, her features twisting with disgust.  "I'm not touching the
cripple!" she spat, jabbing the spear at Angelica.  "It goes in first, and
you go in the middle.  I'll take block." She lifted her head high.  "It is
the only position a woman of the High Dale can take." Shamba curbed her
rising annoyance; this was not the time for an argument.  If Sheeba wanted to
take the uncomfortable position of Block, that was her grief.

Shamba took Angelica by the shoulders, guiding her gently backwards towards
the shallow depression under the boulder.  "In with you, cubling.  Quick
now," she urged, sitting Angelica down into the hole.  Angelica wriggled
around, pressing herself into the blanket covered snow to form a body shaped
indentation.  When she was comfortable, she nodded.

Shamba glanced across at Sheeba.  The High Daler was standing out side the
shadow of the boulder, in the teeth of the Katabatic gale.  She might be
showing off, but Shamba could not help a reluctant twinge of pride at the
woman's nonchalant defiance of the killing wind.

"Sheeba," she shouted against the howling.  "Get in here out of the wind.
We're ready." Sheeba signed with the spear that she understood.

Shamba sat down on the freezing ground.  She held a blanket over her head and
shoulders, scooted forwards, knees bent, to fit herself around Angelica, who
was crouched into the back of the shallow cave with her legs drawn up to her
chest.  When they had fitted together comfortably, She tucked the end of the
blanket behind Angelica's head.  Sheeba squatted in behind Shamba on the edge
of the ground blanket.  The other end of which she drew up over her head and
passed to Shamba.  Then she made sure the sides were tucked in tight.  She
held up the shaft of the spear through a gap in the blankets, wiggling it
around to make sure there was enough movement possible to keep an air hole
open when the snow built up.  Then she paused a long moment, crippled with
indecision, before she embraced Shamba with her other arm.  When there was no
cringing away, encouraged and greatly daring, Sheeba laid her head sideways
on the Long Pine woman's shoulders.  In the close darkness, the expression of
child-like delight went unnoticed.

It soon grew uncomfortably hot in the closed nest; but it was going to be a
long night; and that would change soon enough.

Shamba initiated the telling of tales, to shut out the screaming of the wind,
and to while away the long, chilly hours of the night.  "I tell of my
Mother," Shamba began in a measured tone.  "A woman from outside the land and
the Confederacy of the High Land Tribes, indeed, a woman of the far south, in
the land of the River Delta Tribes, where the living is easy; and the great,
fat Mud Crawlers throw themselves upon the boats, just begging to be
eaten..."

"What's a Boat?" Sheeba asked.

"A wagon without wheels that goes on water," Angelica answered; and the
night's entertainment had begun.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

"We could form our own Tribe?" Angelica suddenly proposed.

The three girls were trudging along under a roof of sighing pines.  The girl
was darting along with surprising nimbleness on her deformed leg, easily
keeping abreast of Shamba and Sheeba, despite the thick carpet of new snow
from last night's fall.  The snow crunched under their paws.

Shamba glanced down at the smaller girl.  "Really?"

"Oh yes," Angelica went on happily.  "There's nothing in the Lore of the
Highland to specifically bar only men or women from forming a legal Tribe.
And we have everything we need.  Sheeba can be Hunter, you can be Chief and I
can be Keeper of Histories." The girl drew in a lung full of the crisp air,
composed her features into a dignified expression, and spoke in a formal
chant.

"And it came to pass at Mid-winter Trysting that Shamba of Long Pine and
Sheeba of High Dale and Angelica of the Walkers On Water remained unclaimed
within the Sacred Circle.  And on the eleventh day thereafter, this noble
trio so foolishly abandoned by their peoples, resolved upon the founding of a
new People of the High land.  Shamba, noble and wise would be High Chief.
Sheeba, cunning and swift and lucky on the hunt would be Hunter.  And
Angelica would be Keeper of the Histories.  So it was decreed and decided
under the Pines of Skar Dale.  Many propitious omens attended..." Angelica
faltered to a halt, peering around through the wide spaced trunks of the
pines seeking inspiration for a suitable omen.

A hundred yards off, a Snook, a thing of leathery wings, matted fur, fangs
and fury, dropped suddenly from the roof of pines.  It fell with shocking
savagery upon a Snarl which had been stalking a lone Bok.  The deer sprang
into the air, before skipping away through the trunks to safety, its white
bob-tail flashing alarm.  In seconds the brown form was lost to sight.

Angelica resumed her dignitas, and declaimed: "And a propitious omen attended
upon this Council.  Thus were the People of the Bok founded according to
proper Lore and Custom of the High land Tribal Confederacy."

Shamba chuckled, amused by the child's silliness.  Even Sheeba could not
quite keep a grin from widening her lips.  The trio trudged on under the
pines, their mood lightened.

Before them, a shimmering curtain of light brightened the air.  Golden
sunlight, striking through the widely spaced trunks, magically transformed
the drift of knee high mist into a shimmering gold, making it seem as though
they walked on clouds.

In a few minutes, they came out from under the pines onto the lip of a great
Dale.  Across the stupendous rift, a just risen sun shone with dazzling
brilliance in a wide blue sky.  To the south, the vale sank lower, opening
into a panoramic view of the Netherland.  To the north, the Dale drove into
the mountains like the cleft left by some mighty axe wielded by the Gods.

"Skar Dale," Sheeba exclaimed as though she had just conjured the awesome
cleft for their delight.

With the pursuing Skar Dalers thrown off their trail by Shemmi's
intervention, they felt they had enough time to stop for a rest and to eat
the last of the trail rations.  As the trio squatted on the lip of Skar Dale,
chewing on the greasy lumps of meat, high in the sky overhead a black saucer
shaped Dalek Heavy Cruiser sank southwards towards a landing on the southern
continent.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Run!" screamed Sheeba, and took off like a Bok surprised by a Snarl.

Shamba responded by instinct to the command.  Skimming over the snow drifts,
she had covered a dozen yards before her mind caught up.

"Angelica!"

Shamba glanced back to see the crippled girl floundering hopelessly through
the wind sculpted heaps of snow.  The Skar Dale hunter was upon Angelica in
an instant, clubbing the girl to the ground.  He raised his heavy headed
stabbing spear on high, and aimed it at her throat.

Sheeba was a thousand paces short of Sanctuary, and going like the wind, when
the scream of anguish rang out.  She'd expected it to have been the cripple;
but it sounded like Shamba who had screamed.  Without breaking stride, Sheeba
glanced over her shoulder.

Shamba had stopped, and was turning to go back to where the cripple lay in
the snow.  A Skar Dale hunter stood over the prone Netherland girl, his spear
poised over her chest.  Sheeba slowed.  "fool!  Fool!  Leave the useless
cripple to her fate!  Save yourself!" she yelled; but was unsure whether she
was screaming at Shamba, or herself.  As she came to a halt, two more Skar
Dalers rose from concealment by the boundary stones, cutting off any escape.
They began to close in.  With a heart full of self hatred at her folly,
Sheeba turned and began to walks lowly back towards the tense tableau fifty
yards back.

As Sheeba arrived back, flanked by two Skar Dale hunters, who were keeping a
safe distance from the Shemmi cursed woman, Shamba was on her knees in the
snow pleading for Angelica's life.  "Don't kill her.  Please, don't kill
her."

The Skar Daler glanced at Shamba.  "You are Outside the Tribe.  You are
trespassing on Skar Dale hunting grounds.  The penalty is death.  He looked
back to the terrified girl lying on her back in the snow.  There was no pity
in his gaze.  His shoulder muscles tensed.

"NOOOO," Shamba wailed.  "Please spare her."

Again, the Skar Dale hunter hesitated.  He flashed his fangs to show his
anger.  "Why?" he demanded.

"She is a child."

"She is deformed," he pointed out reasonably.  "The cripple is worthless."

Shamba wracked her brains for some counter to that damning fact.  Noticing
the way the hunter's eyes were roving over her powerful form, Shamba was
suddenly seized by an idea.  She flexed her muscles, causing the dapplings on
her pelt to ripple.  She pointed out quietly: "I'm not deformed.  You can
have me.  I will give myself freely...  Only spare the child."

"We will have you anyway," said the hunter, "before you are punished for your
trespass."

"I will fight you..." Shamba said fiercely.  She flashed her fangs, and
extended her hands to show wickedly sharp claws.  "...But let the child
live...  And I will give myself willingly."

The Skar Dale hunter considered this a long moment.  He glanced to his three
companions.  An unspoken assent flashed among them.  He glanced back at
Shamba, allowing his eyes to travel once more over her superb body, noting
the powerful haunches, and the exciting swell of her buttocks.  He adjusted
his aim, and drove the spear into the snow beside Angelica's head.  "Agreed!"
he rumbled.

Shamba rose.  She went to Angelica, and helped her up.  She shooed the
shaking girl off towards where Sheeba stood, flanked by two Skar Dalers.
Then Shamba loosed the ties of her clothing.  Stepping out of her wraps, she
got down on all fours before the hunter and waited.

Sheeba looked on with a neutral expression.  Angelica would not watch, and
turned her gaze away to the majestic rearing of Skar Peak; but it was
Angelica, when the Skar Dale hunters were finished with their sport, who took
up handfuls of snow and helped to clean the blood and mess from the silent
and trembling Shamba.


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Onwards to part two