People of the Summit (2)
Long ago, in an age when the People of the Summit still lived much like animals—clustering in packs, without anything resembling civilization—there appeared among them a genius, just as history so often records the sudden rise of a brilliant mind who hurls a people forward.
That genius said:
"How long must we trail after the beasts?"
He hated the hunt itself. The thought of a failed chase leaving his family hungry drove him to seek another way.
In those days the People of the Summit did not yet rule the island's peak. They wandered the upper and lower levels, drifting across the island. They had no concept of throwing as a weapon, and their numbers were few, so hunger was a frequent guest.
The genius decided first to find an easier way to hunt.
He searched every means he could invent, turning the problem over and over, until he noticed the difference between his own kind and every other creature on the island.
They could stand for long stretches on their hind legs alone—and free their forelimbs for whatever they wished.
To people who had used their front limbs only to batter prey, the discovery was a thunderclap.
They studied every use of those hands and invented throwing.
Among ordinary humans, only a gifted few, after systematic theory and training, can hurl a ball at a hundred and sixty kilometers an hour. The People of the Summit, far stronger than humans, needed no such training. Even a stone the size of a man's head they could fling with a single arm as if it were nothing.
The power was devastating. Creatures of the upper levels that had once driven them this way and that were suddenly brought low; the People of the Summit feasted on the giants, and their numbers swelled.
With greater strength they slew the beasts that had ruled the Summit and claimed the place for themselves. They praised the genius who had given them the weapon of throwing, and from the great size of his head they named him the Great Elder.
The First Great Elder did not stop at throwing. He kept searching.
Strong as they were, the People of the Summit remained physically weaker than the upper-level beasts. Even with throwing as a weapon, the hunt still exacted its price.
The First Great Elder, who had always despised the hunt, put his head together with the disciples who learned from him.
Abolish the hunt! Live without hunting at all!
His dream and will passed to his students. Long ages after his death, the fruit of that dream was finally borne by another revolutionary genius who would come to be called the First Elder Head.
Take the tastiest creatures of the lower levels—the pigs—catch them, raise them, and only then eat them.
The idea was born of simple regret: the First Elder Head had noticed the pigs were vanishing, and could not bear the thought of never tasting them again.
Thus began animal husbandry.
By then, of course, the hunt had already sunk roots as culture, ritual, and history; it could never be entirely torn out.
"Squee! Squeeee!"
"Oink! Oink!"
Chester and Monia looked at the pigs the People of the Summit had brought.
So that's where the pork we ate came from.
The pigs the Summit folk raised must have made their way down here somehow.
A pig might escape the Summit and miraculously reach the lower levels once… but twice in a row, right around here? Even coincidence has limits. They're raising them somewhere on the lower levels.
No fence could keep out the upper-level beasts, so the People of the Summit would have built their pens below—and those pens would be near where Chester and Monia lived.
Black Wind showed off the pigs, boasting that they were delicious.
While he crowed, the Summit man introduced as the Little Elder stepped forward and, using the method of expression he had learned by watching, made his meaning plain to Chester.
"A gift of apology."
"A gift of apology?"
"We came in greater numbers than we promised."
Chester nodded. Understood.
He caught a small pig and turned it this way and that.
Well fattened.
"Pig. Pig. Pig."
Monia had been staring at the animals with glazed eyes for some time.
"Roast them. Hurry! Quickly! The little sun!"
Black Wind, who had already tasted roasted meat, began to thrash about as well—until the other Summit folk seized him and pinned him down.
Even Black Wind can't win when five of them jump him at once. Well, of course not.
Even a legendary hero becomes a skewer under a storm of arrows.
"All right. Let's roast them."
"Yay!"
"Monia, let's process them."
"Yes. Shall we do it here?"
"Hmm."
Chester glanced at the Summit people watching them.
"We need to process them, so we're going to the river."
"What kind of processing?"
"All sorts."
Following Chester's lead, the Summit folk trooped down to the river and watched what he did with the pigs.
First he killed one, then lashed it by rope to a branch near the water and cut its throat. Blood poured from the neck straight into the current and was carried away. He worked through the rest of the pigs the same way.
There were eight in all—one for each person, counting Ant's share.
"Ah, look at that!"
"What a waste of blood."
"Less to eat."
"Is that no respect for the prey?"
Of course the People of the Summit mourned the draining. Every drop of blood was food! And he was throwing it away!
While they all fretted, the one called Young Head approached Chester and asked:
"Why do this work?"
"To take the bad smell and the off flavors out of the meat."
Little Elder, Elder Head, Young Head—the clever ones among the Summit people, the ones chosen for those posts—had quickly grown used to the way Chester and Black Wind spoke, and were already using it. They were teaching it to Little Warrior, Elder Warrior, and Young Warrior as well.
Young Head put a few more questions to Chester, then asked whether there was another reason for bleeding the carcass.
"Is there another reason?"
"The smell of a dead creature draws meat-eaters. So we use the river to wash away every last drop of blood and leave no scent behind."
"You knew that a dead creature draws meat-eaters?"
Chester nodded as he lifted the drained pig from the branch.
Young Head asked in surprise. This frail creature seemed to possess far richer knowledge than expected.
Huh. Such a tiny head, and truly clever! Good heavens.
Until this conversation, Young Head had thought of humans as too primitive to have fur, fangs, or claws—just beasts that went uga-uga.
To Chester's ears, of course, the ones going uga-uga were the People of the Summit. No matter how profound their talk, all he heard was oo, oo! ooh-hoo! ho! hoo! ho! hoo! oo!
"Ah, this one's drained too."
While Chester skillfully dressed a pig and stripped its hide, Monia lowered another and began to break it down.
"Strange. Why not just eat it as is?"
"Their teeth must be too weak to chew hide and bone."
"Pity. Life must be hard."
"Poor things. They never even taste the hide or the bones?"
A pig was meant to be seized live and chewed on the spot! Little Warrior, Elder Warrior, and Young Warrior huddled together, muttering that these two did not know how to eat pig.
To Black Wind, standing beside them, the talk was pure nonsense. Roasted snake was delicious!
Irritated, he gave the easiest target—Young Warrior—a shove. Young Warrior, struck on the back of the head, took offense and rounded on Black Wind.
"Kwaaaaah!"
"Ooooo! Guuuuu!"
"Wah! Waaaaah!"
"Kaaaaah!"
In moments the excited Black Wind and Young Warrior were thrashing and brawling.
A head-butt—thump.
Crack!
A fist to the gut—thud.
Whump!
Their movements looked like little more than flailing arms, yet the sounds they made were thoroughly menacing.
"…What are they doing?"
"Why all of a sudden?"
Chester and Monia fed Ant the organs they had pulled free while they watched the two Summit men scuffle.
"Oh, Wind's winning!"
"Well, Black Wind is bigger. Of course he is."
Black Wind subdued Young Warrior in an instant, then, still fired up, charged Elder Warrior.
Elder Warrior lived up to the name. Unlike Young Warrior, who had been beaten almost one-sidedly after a few early blows, he met Black Wind as an equal—until the tide turned and he too began to take a pounding. Then Little Warrior, who had been standing by, rushed in, and the three of them raised a glorious racket of a fight.
"…Haa."
"This is why I can't stand the warriors."
"Same."
The three thinking Summit folk watched Chester and Monia watching the brawl with bright interest, and sighed in mixed embarrassment.
"What do those animal brats think they're doing in front of company?"
By the time Little Warrior stood alone at last, roaring victory and dancing a clumsy little jig, the pigs were fully dressed.