And that, he realized, was how the men had been in ambush, when the raiders came. Breathing under the murky water, wielding ropes, catching the ankles of the raiders and pulling them down. They did not do it to friends, only to enemies, never showing themselves. So the raiders did not dare enter the water, lest they fall victim to what they could not see.
Lee laughed, seeing his comprehension on his face. Now he knew what would have happened to him, had he not had her protection as he entered the water, the first day.
That night there was a storm. The thunder was very loud, and the rain sounded on the domes, but only a few drips penetrated the tight mass of sticks. It was dark, but Hue felt Ann shivering beside him. He realized that she was afraid of the storm, as many folk were. So he did what seemed proper: he wrapped his arms around her and drew her in close against him.
“Storm hurt no,” he murmured into her mass of hair by her ear. “Light, noise, hurt no.” He felt her relax, comforted. In that embrace they slept.
He realized, coincidentally, that however odd this woman might appear by day, she was quite comfortable to hold by night. The softness of her flesh made up for her lack of fur, and her warm female body was appealing.
On the following day they foraged for sticks for the water shelters. It seemed that these had to be constantly maintained, so that they did not leak. He had appreciated the way they kept most of the storm off, so knew this was useful work. In the afternoon they used their sticks to repair damaged sections of the domes, and to shore up weak ones. There was an art to it that it was difficult for him to follow; somehow Ann and the other women were able to bend the thin sticks and weave them together with their attached leaves to make a blanket-tight layer. But there were also animal skins there, completing the job.
On the third day with Ann, Hue still had no serious expectation of joining the tribe. But he found he was getting more comfortable with it. The ways of the water folk were different from those of his own tribe, sometimes startlingly so, but he was learning that there was a certain underlying similarity. Hunting fish was perhaps like hunting birds, only in water instead of on land or in the air. Swimming was like walking—and indeed, much of it was walking, on the hidden paths under the water. The people seemed less odd as he got to know them individually; they were much like those he had known before. It occurred to him that it might after all be worthwhile to mate with a woman of the water folk, so as to join this special society for the rest of his life. But he still did not want to do it with Lee.
This day they were herding fish to the pond—many small ones. All the women and children and a few men spread out under Itt's direction to circle the school and splash, scaring the fish to the pond. Hue had a notion how that was done, though he still couldn't sense fish with his fingers the way the others could. But he could splash water with the best of them, and that did help herd the fish.
He was positioned between Ann and Lee, with other women and children spread out beyond. He was coming to know some of the others. He saw the child called Ember, so called because she was fascinated by fire and was always eager to help tend it. She was a small, thin girl, about ten years old, but nice of feature and an excellent swimmer; she would one day be a good woman.
Then something strange happened. The water rippled, though there was no wind—and the ripple went right down to the bottom. Hue could feel it throughout his body. The others did too; they looked at each other, and all around, trying to fathom the nature of this effect. It was as if some truly monstrous fish were coming, pushing the water before it—but there was no such creature. He saw that Ann on one side and Lee on the other were as baffled as he was. Little Ember looked fascinated rather than frightened by the oddity, while others seemed poised to flee the water. None of them knew what was happening. But it didn't seem to be dangerous, merely strange.
After a moment there was a dull sound from the distance, across the water and the land, as if something huge had fallen to the ground. That made Hue concentrate, remembering something he had forgotten. “Rock fall,” he said.
Others turned to him. “Hue live mountain,” he explained. His tribe had been near mountains, some of which had very steep slopes. “Rock fall.” He made a gesture as of something dropping down. “Loud.” Indeed, the neighboring avalanche had terrified the tribesmen. But it had stopped, and no one had been hurt. Later they had gone out to the region and found the new pile of stones in the valley, and realized that they had come sliding and rolling down from some high face of the mountain. So it was an ordinary event, just a rare one. Hue remembered the special sound of it, and what he had just heard was similar, though muffled by distance.
The water folk relaxed, understanding the principle. They could see the peaks of distant mountains, but had no experience with rolling rocks. This one must have been really big, because the peaks in that direction were barely visible, being far away. So the land and water had shaken with the impact, but no harm had been done.
The fish herding resumed. Hue realized that this was similar to the herding of rabbits and other small game that his tribe had done, driving them into a canyon where they could be slaughtered. The ways of the water differed from the ways of the land, yet had an underlying similarity when understood. He grasped only a small part of the water life as yet, but was coming to appreciate it better as he learned more. He realized that he would regret leaving it tomorrow.
Someone screamed. It was Ember, fleeing an ominous ripple. “Croc!” her mother cried, alarmed.
There was pandemonium. Women and children alike tried to escape the creature. The other men were on the far side of the skirmish line, too far away to help immediately. Itt started swimming strongly toward the commotion, but would not arrive in time to deal with it.
But Hue was close. He did not know what kind of a fish this was, but he knew the duties of a man when there was a threat. He brought out his axe and lunged for the ripple.
But Lee was between him and it. As he sought to pass her, the ripple veered toward her. A very long green mouth opened, horrendously toothed, and closed on Lee's arm. Lee screamed piercingly with pain and fear as the creature pulled her off her feet.
Hue swung his arm. He struck the green snout. The flesh was tough, but his edge cut into it. The jaws parted and Lee jerked herself away.
Now the croc focused on Hue. It was quick enough to know its enemy. Its mouth opened again, snapping at his head.
But though Hue had never seen a creature like this before, he had once fought a predator of the land. He knew better than to let those teeth score. So he oriented the point of his axe and stabbed it upward, into the descending upper jaw. He struck a tooth, and then the flesh around the tooth, and twisted, grinding the sharp rounded edge against whatever was there. An axe was a deadly weapon as well as a tool, and he did know how to use it.
The creature moved away, swimming far more swiftly than any person could. It circled, and came back for another attack. But in the brief respite, Hue realized that he had been doing it wrong. The thing had its horrendous long mouth, and that mouth was deadly; it was bound to chomp Hue if it kept trying. But the mouth had to open before it could close on anything. So Hue leaped to embrace the creature, wrapping his arms around its snout, squeezing it closed.
He might as well have embraced a lion! The croc whipped its head about, trying to throw him off, and its stout tail lashed at his legs. It hurt; the tail was not only strong, it was ragged, and it could do him damage. Hue had either to let go, or to get close enough to stop that tail. So he folded his body and wrapped his legs around the creature.
But this meant that he was no longer standing. The croc rolled, and Hue's head was under water. He couldn't breathe, but neither could he let go. So he did the only thing remaining: he let go of the snout with his axe arm, and struck where he hoped the throat was, digging the point in hard. The croc struggled mightily, but Hue hung on, carving with his axe.
Until his lack of breath overcame him, and he felt his consci
ousness fading. He felt his arms letting go of the croc, and felt the water coming into his mouth.
Something was jamming down on his back, squeezing him unmercifully. Hue choked, and water poured out of his mouth. He coughed, and choked again. What was happening?
After an uncomfortable time he understood. He was on the beach, and Itt was beating the water out of him. He had nearly drowned, but Itt had hauled him out and done what he knew to do, shaking and squeezing until he started breathing again. Itt had saved him.
But as his body and head cleared, he remembered what else had been happening. “The croc—Lee—”
“Lee,” Lee repeated. Now he saw her, with mud caking her arm where the croc had bitten her. That meant that the women were treating her, covering up the wounds. “Hue owe no.” She looked sad, but perhaps it was because she was in pain.
She gave him credit for saving her life, as perhaps he had, and regarded his debt to her as having been acquitted. He would no longer have to mate with her, if he didn't want to. That was a relief, because though he might not remain with the water folk, he didn't like the notion of having an unpaid debt. He was now even with Lee.
“Croc,” he said, now concerned about what other mischief the savage creature might have done. He didn't know whether he had driven it off.
Bil and Joe were now here. Bil pointed to a thing on the beach nearby. It was the croc, dead. It seemed much smaller, somehow, being no longer than a man. Its throat region had been so severely lacerated that it would not have been recognizable if seen alone. It seemed that Hue had managed to do the job before he faded out.
“Axe,” he said, remembering his most valuable possession.
Ember stepped forward, the axe in her hand. She must have gotten it from the muck after they dragged Hue and the croc out. She gave it to Hue, smiling prettily. He remembered that she had been at one time in the path of the croc, so perhaps she felt he had saved her too. If he had, he was glad of it, because she was a nice child.
“Day,” Bil said then, spreading his arms as if to include the whole land. That meant that the time limit was off; Hue could remain with the tribe as long as he wished, though he could not actually join it unless he mated with one of its women. They were satisfied that he was worth having with them.
Then the group dispersed. Ann came to tend to him, bringing him food. He saw the women returning to the water, reorganizing for the fish drive, which had been broken up. “Fish,” he said, trying to get up.
She pushed him gently down. “Hue no,” she said, and smiled to show that this was a privilege rather than an exclusion. He remained somewhat shaky, so perhaps this was best, because he might not be much good in the line. Evidently Ann was out of it, too, to take care of him.
Hue's head ached and his chest felt bad and his legs were scratched and bruised. But Ann made him lie flat on the ground, and she put her hands on him and kneaded his flesh, and that felt good. She hummed in the mode of healing. She knew the art of women, to make a tense or injured man relax. Her hands were thin, like the rest of her, but competent, and the pleasure they brought him made them beautiful. In fact as he lay there and let her massage him it was as if the pleasure spread from her hands to her arms and to her body, so that it no longer seemed badly shaped. Her legs were still somewhat thick, her hips too broad, and her waist too small, but now these proportions seemed right for her. Her breasts were still swollen, but actually not as much as for a fully nursing woman, and that partial development now seemed normal, as indeed it was for the women of the water folk. Even her jutting chin was not really ugly, and he realized that if she ever got struck on the mouth, her lower jaw would be protected by that buttress of bone so that she would not starve after such injury. He had seen the pitiful state of a man who had taken a jaw injury, able to eat only with pain, and knew that if he himself ever got struck on that vulnerable spot he would suffer similarly. So Ann, somehow, had a more sensible face.
That night, when he still did not feel good, Ann wrapped her arms around him and held him close, much as he had with her when the storm frightened her, and she hummed again, as if to a sick child, and he slept without difficulty.
Next day Joe was waiting outside the shelter. “Come,” he told Hue. So he left Ann and went to join the men. He had been promoted, and no longer had to learn the ways of women.
Now he began to learn the water ways of hunting. They used thin wood spears instead of axes, and sought to drive them into the larger prey of the region. Itt gave him a spear and showed him how, frowning without comment when Hue used what was considered to be the wrong hand. On this day they did not find any such prey, but they freely described how it was done. Hue also learned that they systematically hunted any crocs they found, keeping them out of the tribe's foraging region. The one that had attacked Lee had been an aberration, perhaps disoriented by the distant rockslide and shudder of water. The men felt that Hue had done a bold thing, fighting it alone with his axe. He was of stouter build than they, more muscular, stronger, so had been able to do it, but still they were impressed by the way he hadn't hesitated. It seemed that the women had told every detail, more than he remembered, of his fight with the reptile, with Lee being especially eloquent. He had shown courage on behalf of the tribe, when he had not been obliged to.
He learned how they set their rope and shell snares, so that when a stranger entered the water on hostile business, men concealed amidst the reeds—sometimes under water, breathing through the stems—had only to pull on those ropes to interfere with the legs. There were loops along the ropes, that could catch ankles. There were trench-pits, covered by fine nets and a thin layer of mud, some with sharpened stakes below. The women knew where they were, and avoided them; Hue had been placed between Ann and Lee not merely because he had been associating with them, but because they would steer him clear of mischief underfoot. They had not expected mischief to seek them out.
And they talked passingly about women. Hue, recognizing the opening, mentioned that he realized that he would have to mate with one in order to join the tribe, and that he was getting more interested in the ways of the water folk, but of the two women who had shown interest, one reminded him of his little sister, and the other was thin and odd-looking.
“Chin,” Joe agreed, touching his own receding lower jaw, which was like Hue's. “Chin no, Ann yes.” And the others murmured agreement.
Actually Hue had been more concerned with her thinness and almost complete hairlessness. But he realized that all the water folk were thin and hairless, except for their heads and crotches, so of course they regarded such qualities as esthetic. Their other women tended to be broad of hip and narrow of waist, too. And breasted, with rounded legs. So by their definition, Ann was indeed beautiful.
And he, having figured out the possible usefulness of the chin, had concluded that that need not be an objection. So it made her different from the others; so did his hair and build make him just as different. So in that sense they were reasonably matched.
“Lee young,” another man said. He was Vik. “Vik sister no. Fur.” He shrugged. That was Lee's liability; she was too much like Hue's tribes people.
“Fur bad no,” Bil said, glancing at Hue.
“Fur bad no,” Vik agreed. “Lee yes.”
Hue felt good. Because they were accepting him, and he was furred, Lee's similar liability was diminishing. So she might after all be able to find a mate within the tribe.
The following day they did find prey, a baby hippo they were able to isolate from its mother and stab to death. Then they floated the carcass back to the home beach for butchering. Hue was getting more comfortable with the ways of water hunting, learning them quickly because of their underlying similarity to what he had known. He realized that he would never be as good at them as the natural water folk were, but at least he was making fewer errors.
That night there was another storm. Hue didn't wait for Ann to be frightened; he embraced her immediately. But the storm held off, not coming
close.
Ann, close against him, smiled. It was too dark to see anything, but he felt her mouth stretching. He had embraced her without cause. He smiled back, not minding.
Then she put her hand on his penis and paused. She was silently offering him sex, in appreciation for his protection.
Surprised, he considered. His penis became immediately hard, indicating his body's interest. He no longer found her sexually uninteresting. But he wasn't sure he wanted to mate with her, with the attendant commitment. So he reached down and gently removed her hand. Then he held her close, to show that he was not rejecting her, only declining to go that far.
She relaxed against him, satisfied. Soon she was asleep, breathing softly against him. But he remained awake. Now that he had declined her offer, he wondered whether he should have. His penis remained hard. No, he did not find her unattractive, here in the night. But what of the day?
Then the storm abruptly moved in, and the thunder was loud, and the rain beat down. Ann woke, frightened, and he turned into her and tightened his embrace, to reassure her. She felt his hard member against her belly and paused in her fright long enough to inquire again. But again he declined—and then wondered why he had done so. He did desire her, and would desire her by day. But the major step of mating with her and joining the tribe—that put him into deep doubt.
The thunder eased, but the rain continued. Ann relaxed. But still his penis was hard against her. This time she slid up to put her mouth to his ear. “Ann tell no,” she whispered.
So she would give him sex, and not announce it as a mating, leaving him free. In the steady noise of the rain it would be possible for them to do it, and others would not overhear.