A day later and many long strides away, Durc sat at a crackling fire beside a broad swale rich with fresh green growth. By his side lay a likely chunk of flint and two other stones of a kind known to break with a good edge. They were not of the best quality, but would surely yield useful flakes and perhaps a serviceable hand-axe. He had little more than the most basic flint-knapping skill anyway. The riverbank had also yielded a hammerstone that fit his hand comfortably.
His first task was to prepare the hides. He used a bone scraper made from a horse's rib to clean the fat and other extraneous matter from the flesh side. As for the hair, removing it would take longer. He decided not to deal with that for now. Some of it was falling out anyway. These would not be high quality hides. All he required of them was that they be flexible and not rot. They smelled bad already, but that was not unusual. He had seen smelly hides turned into usable leather. The brains usually smelled pretty bad by the time the women used them, at least in the summer. Smoke would help. It amazed him now that women knew all this and men did not. But he did--sort of.
It took most of the day to get the skins cleaned. He washed them off in a stagnant pool some distance from the place where good drinking water seeped from a slow spring. There wasn't enough open water to bathe both himself and the hides, so he got smelly too. That didn't bother him, since there was no one else around. A short run away lay a small, marshy lake where waterfowl nested. He reserved that for hunting, both the birds and their eggs. He would be here until he finished the hides.
At last he had the skins arranged in a sort of tent over a smoldering fire. The smoke worried him a little. Those Others had not been happy to see him. He wondered about them. Sitting at his cooking fire and chewing on a rather dry, tough goose, Durc mused on the strange events of yesterday.
The Others may have saved his life. He couldn't have fought four hyenas by himself if they had really gone for him. With the hyenas there, he couldn't get the hides that he needed so desperately. True, he could have escaped by swimming the river again, but that would have left him naked and without tools or weapons. He owed them.
Another thing tickled his mind--how they had killed the two hyenas, with spears that flew like sling-stones. Clan spears were heavy, held with both hands to stab an animal that was very close. Rocks were thrown, but a spear is a... Their spears were smaller, different in other ways too, though he hadn't been able to see al the details clearly. Spears they were, though, and they killed quite effectively.
There was nothing more he could do now but tend his fires and rest until the sun came back from its journey.
The hides needed a lot of working-over off and on. Several times he had to soften them by soaking in water. He remembered Aga telling him why she did that when he was a curious little pest. Most of the women had been very indulgent with him. The men... well, aside from Broud none had treated him very badly. Vorn had been stern and aloof. That was his duty, though, to instill discipline in the son of his hearth. The man had never been cruel, only scrupulously strict.
The younger men had sometimes treated him badly. But they all had to impress Broud with their loyalty or suffer his ill favor. Even Grev, his milk-brother and best friend, had to behave coldly to him in Broud's presence. Borg always let him know that he was and always would be of low status. Brac simply avoided him. The oldest son of Broud's mate was a brooding, uncommunicative man whose every action seemed thought out twice. His relationship with Broud was ambiguous, lacking something essential. Brac gave the man of his hearth and leader of his clan outward respect, but without spirit.
During the cold nights, Durc stayed close to his fire. He didn't know how to weave mats or baskets out of plant material. All of his experiments turned out so flimsy that they made him ha-ha. But he did make a crude windbreak out of withes and cattail leaves to keep the heat of his small fire close. Dry grass made his bed, or at least a cushion to sit upon. He slept sitting up because he didn't dare sleep long at a time with no large pieces of hardwood to maintain a fire all night. His hunting forays were short too.
Much of his time was spent gathering fuel. He exhausted the supply of small dead wood around the edges of the swale and had to push into the thick shrubs to find more, his feet squelching in wet muck. Green wood made better smoke for the hides, but he preferred cleaner burning dry wood for cooking. His skill in that area improved with practice.
The stones he had brought with him from the river yielded some good flakes. None of them was large enough for the best work, but the flakes he managed to produce were not to be despised. He kept the best, some of which he could work over later, discarding anything not fit to use. This lightened the burden he would bear when he continued his journey.
In his "idle" moments he had a new skill to learn. He approached it uneasily; it was too new. How did one throw a spear? He had neither Memories nor studious observation to guide him, only that brief, shocking glimpse of hyenas struck down by flying spears.
The spears of the Others had looked small, much like the puny ones that he had now. Durc lifted one of his spears in the normal way, with both hands, and made a few stabs at air. He gauged the distance between himself and a clump of basket-grass. With a deep frown of concentration, he flung the spear at it. It hit the clump, but awkwardly, its already low butt striking the ground as it slid halfway through. He tried several more times, then had to go feed his smoking-fire.
Back at his target range, he made a number of very poor throws. He started to feel frustrated. A spear isn't a stone, he said to himself. You throw a stone like this--he let some of his anger go in a one-handed fling. The spear struck the solid tangle of stem and root forming the base of the grass clump and stayed there. Durc smacked his lips loudly and slapped his chest like a delighted little boy.
At last he declared the hides ready to use. Not finished--he couldn't think that without shame, even though he was not a woman. But he spent his last night at that camp in such warm comfort that he slept until his fire went out.
Before he moved on, he cut some thongs from one of the hides to tie his bundle of possessions together. The problem of carrying a roll of hide then became evident. He couldn't afford to have his hands tied up with it. Women used carrying baskets... they had straps rigged somehow. He cut a thicker strip of hide and fooled around with it, finally winding up with a single strap over one shoulder and across his chest and the oblong bundle bumping on his back. It would do.
He tied one of his spears to his rolled hide. It pulled free with little effort, but he wondered if it might slip through the other way. He had smoothed the shafts well. Then he had one of those peculiarly Durc-ish notions that made people shake their heads and give him wondering looks. He wound and tied a short, scrappy thong tightly around it above the fastenings. The spear no longer slipped downward.
His preparations for travel took most of the morning. Durc was hungry, so he detoured to the bird-lake to collect some eggs, which he ate as he walked, spear under one arm, sun on his back.