"You won by luck," Frodo said, his fingers tightening around the edge of the splintered spear shaft.
Tor stared down at his son. He wiped a mixture of sweat and mammoth blood from his brow.
"Luck?" Tor grunted, gesturing to the mountain of fur and meat lying dead in the snow. "The Great Tusk is dead, Frodo. The tribe will eat tonight. That is the will of the mountain spirits."
"It tripped," Frodo countered. He pointed the broken piece of wood at the creature’s underbelly. "The only reason your spear pierced its hide is because it lost its footing on the black ice. Look at Jarl’s spear." Frodo tossed the shattered wood at his father’s feet. "Next time, there won’t be a patch of ice, and it will be your chest that gets caved in."
Tor frowned deeply, uttely lost by the strange words spilling from his son’s mouth.
Since the boy’s fever had broken, he spoke like a shaman who had eaten too many bitter roots.
"Enough," Tor commanded, though his voice lacked its usual thunder. He was simply too tired. "Help Garek and the others begin the butchering. The wolves will smell the blood soon."
It took hours of labor to carve the necessary meat, fat, and organs from the mammoth.
By the time the hunting party began the brutal trek back up the mountain toward the cave network, the sun was dipping below the peaks.
They left three men behind... Jarl, and two others whose injuries were too severe to survive the journey.
When they finally breached the threshold of their family’s alcove deep within the communal cave, Kaelen was wearing a shallow trench into the dirt floor.
She was wringing her hands together, her eyes darting to the entrance flap every few seconds.
The moment the hide was pushed aside, Kaelen gasped. She rushed forward, dropping to her knees and pulling both Frodo and Tor into a crushing embrace.
Frodo stiffened. In his past life, hHe hadn’t been touched with such maternal affection in decades.
A strange heat rose to his cheeks, an embarrassing flush that belonged to the twelve-year-old boy he now was, rather than the seasoned engineer he used to be.
Slowly, awkwardly, he patted his mother’s shoulder. He was getting used to this, but it still felt foreign.
"You’re bleeding," Kaelen choked out, her hands checking Tor’s bruised ribs and Frodo’s limbs. "I heard the wailing of Jarl’s mother from the main fire. I thought... I thought..."
"We are alive," Tor said softly, resting a hand on his wife’s head. "We brought back enough fat and meat to last until the thaw."
Seeing her so terrified, Frodo felt a pang in his chest.
A part of him wanted to lie. He wanted to tell her that everything was fine now, that the danger had passed, and that they would live comfortably in the warmth of the cave. But his mind refused.
"Mother, look at me," Frodo said.
Kaelen blinked through her tears.
"I won’t lie to you," Frodo continued. "We lost three able-bodied men for a few weeks of food. I cannot predict if we will survive the next moon if things remain as they are."
Tor scowled, opening his mouth to reprimand the boy, but Frodo raised a hand, cutting his father off.
"But I promise you this," Frodo said, squeezing his mother’s hands. "Once I build what I have in my mind, we will never lose another hunter to the tusks or the claws. You just have to trust me."
Kaelen stared at him, bewildered but strangely comforted by the certainty in his voice.
She let out a shaky breath and wiped her tears. Reaching out, she pressed her thumb against a smear of fresh mammoth blood on Tor’s leather tunic.
With a solemn hand, she dragged her bloody thumb across Frodo’s forehead, leaving a crimson streak right between his eyes.
Without another word, Frodo turned and walked to his corner of the alcove, where his small collection of stones, animal bones, and flint shards lay scattered.
Two days later.
The tribe had been feasting, the morale high, the bellies full. But the scent of a slaughtered mammoth was a beacon that traveled for miles on the wind.
Frodo was sitting near the cave entrance, using a piece of obsidian to carve a notch into a long, sturdy branch of ash wood, measuring the leverage point for his prototype.
Suddenly, he heard a sharp burst of air from a bone flute.
It was the emergency signal.
Garek, the crippled watchman who usually sat by the western ridge, came hobbling down the icy path toward the cave entrance as fast as his crutch would carry him.
"To arms!" Garek screamed. "Hunters to the mouth! Now!"
Tor, who had been resting near the central fire, grabbed his newly carved spear and sprinted toward the entrance, followed closely by the remaining twelve able-bodied men of the tribe.
Frodo dropped his wood and obsidian.
In his past life, the closest he had ever come to a conflict was a heated argument in a boardroom over steel prices. Now, he was overcome by an innate sense of fear.
As Frodo peered over the snowy ledge, his breath hitched.
Marching up the winding mountain pass, following the exact trail Tor’s hunting party had taken two days prior, was a war band.
One... five... twenty... thirty-five.
There were nearly forty of them. All prime-age males. All carrying clubs, stone axes, and spears.
His own tribe had thirteen men left who could hold a weapon.
"The Blood-Walkers," Tor whispered, stepping up beside Frodo, his knuckles turning white around his spear shaft. "They followed the scent of the meat."
The invading war band came to a halt about fifty paces from the steep incline leading to the cave entrance.
From the center of the invading pack, a man stepped forward. He wore the skull of a cave lion as a helmet, its jaws framing his paint-smeared face.
The man slammed the staff into the snow and pointed a finger at Tor, who stood at the cave mouth.
"I am Kael of the Red Clay!" the man’s voice boomed. "You are the weak remnants of a dying people. We smell the fat of the Great Tusk! We smell the blood you spilled."
Kael smiled, revealing yellowed teeth.
"Bring all the meat out to the snow. Give us your women to carry it. Do this, and we will let your men live to freeze another day. Resist, and we will break your bones, eat your children, and claim this cave as our own. You have until the sun touches the highest peak to decide!"