Tsalmothua, near the glacier, circ 18,000 BCE

Tsalmothua, near the glacier, circ 18,000 BCE

Gyorl, panting hard in the thin cold air of the glacier, pondered his son's death. He could no longer feel his feet, he kept squeezing his hands, keeping the aching burning sensation in them.

It was so unfair, he thought. His small band had somehow endured another harsh winter, had begun to welcome the furtive appearances of daylight, the signs of melting, when the invaders had come, slaughtering everyone but his family.

They'd thought themselves relatively safe in the looming shadow of the unspeakable whiteness, the cold place that never went away, never thawed, the source of all his peoples legends and terrors. But the invaders had been hungry, as hungry as Gyorl's people, but more numerous and healthy.

Had their lands been starving as well, Gyorl wondered, with unaccustomed empathy. The last few seasons had grown increasingly harsh, with game disappearing, and all but the most barely palatable plants gone sparse. The elders of his band had counseled moving, as had been done in the old days, but there'd been no place to move. On all sides, other bands pressed them in, jealously defending their own territories, probing into Gyorl's people.

Gyorl's folk had had their successes, stealthy murders, even the obliteration of a small ragged band, and the usurpation of part of their lands. But the meat from the kills vanished quickly, and then it was back to chalky roots. Another time, there'd been the discovery of a winter lodge, but breaking into it had only exposed starved corpses, families who had not made it through the winter.

He looked back over his shoulder. There was just his wife and son and daughter, gamely trudging behind him, of course. The attackers had not been hungry enough to set foot on the glacier. His son fell, and as he watched his wife helped the snuffling boy and pushed him forward, her eyes wary upon her husband.

His son, he thought again. Or his wife, or his daughter. His wife had more meat on her, would last longer, but she was still of breeding age and had many useful skills. His daughter was young, he could breed many more children upon her, but she was not as experienced or useful. Besides which, the clever bitch knew enough to be cautious about his coming near.

His son then. There was little enough meat on the boy, but at least he would not put up much fight.

Gyorl could always have more children. As long as he had food.

The slope of the glacier had been downward for a while. In truth, Gyorl and his family had merely crossed the edge of a tiny lobe. The immense whiteness, loomed up vast and unforgiving, this close, it seemed to dominate the whole world. It was so bright, it hurt their eyes to look upon it, rendered them blind. Everything about it was awful, even the air itself had a thin, crisp quality that seemed to suck blood and heat from their bodies.

His stomach ached. Hunger had been his constant companion through the entirety of his life. His people had a hundred words for the endless shades and permutations of hunger, from deep starvation and wasting, to the cravings of a dozen kinds of malnutrition, to the pangs of a half filled belly, an expectant appetite, a feeding too long delayed.

Gyor was not yet thirty, he looked sixty. His frame was scarred by scurvy and rickets, poorly healed sores, deficiencies of all sorts. Among his people, he'd been counted as hardy and robust.

The glacial mists cleared, revealing bare countryside below. Gyor whooped redoubled his pace.

He clutched his flint knife to him. It was the only tool they had been able to salvage as they fled. It didn't matter, if they survived, Gyorl could make more tools, could find the flints and pieces of wood or thicket, sinew or bones or shell.

Had his wife or daughter a knife? They gave no sign. He thought he was somewhat safe. He was stronger and fiercer than the rest of them put together, and they needed his skills. Still, there was more meat in him than the rest of them.

The slope became steep, Gyor found himself moving faster and faster, struggling to keep his balance. Behind him, he could hear his wife and children's cry as they tumbled.

Within hours, they had reached the edge of the glacier, literally falling down the steep slope into clinging snow banks, and then floundering until they reached bare land.

Greenery was already poking through the newly exposed ground, forcing its way up past dead dried vegetation, tiny shoots and leaves clutching desperately for the minutes of dim sunlight.

Behind them, the glacier loomed. They could not bear to look back at it. Instead, they continued to hobble, gasping, until the air was no longer thin and dry.

Gyorl's eyes swept the countryside, looking for anything edible. So much of it was merely sparse inedible vegetation, or actively poisonous. He spied a small cluster of Kulka roots in a sheltered cleft. Immature of course, this early in the year, and thus taboo. With a cry, Gyorl rushed onto it, tearing the spouts out and jamming them into his mouth, racing to get as many as he could before the others arrived.

As they rushed past him, he flung himself back, watching his families happy cries as they glutted themselves on the barely palatable weed. There would be awful cramps tonight, of course. The roots were not close to ripe, and hard to digest. But they would sustain.

This new land, Gyorl thought, was picked clean as well. It had not always been like this, he thought. Gyorl even from youth, had been cleverer than his peers, he'd gleaned wisdom as well as thin gruel from the brains of his elders.

There had been many kinds of food, he'd thought. But people had eaten the best foods. Leaving only less satisfying less tasty foods to grow in the places they had been. And then they'd eaten that, leaving chalky harsh foods that hurt the stomach. And they'd eaten that.

Whatever, wherever they had eaten, something less appealing grew in the places left behind. The elders had taught that to eat too much let the bad food, the bad plants in. But Gyorl had watched elders glut themselves. At best, starving oneself in denial only slowed the spread of inedible plants.

As they had fled, Gyorl had spied many places where Kulka root could have grown, perhaps should have grown. But instead, there had been only weeds.

He picked up the leaf stalks and examined them. Kulka root, the elders said, grew from leaf stalks. They were very persistent, one reason that they had remained even after more savoury foods had become impossible to find.

He despised weeds, the inedible plants who grew in all the places that Kulka roots did not. He wanted to tear them all out by hand, replace them with Kulka leaves to sprout in their place.

He imagined suddenly, whole meadows of Kulka root, their leaves waving. A field full of them, a larder to take him through the winter.

He looked at his children.

He'd made them, hadn't he. Made them with his wife, had nourished them and made them grow.

Perhaps with Kulka root? Or plants. The wisdom and lore of the elders was full of rules and taboos, things that could not be eaten at all, things that could be eaten at certain times, places where good things could be found, conditions that favoured certain plants ripeness. An awful series of stultifying rules that mocked him whenever they'd convulsed in awful spasms or shit hard nodules of unready plants. But perhaps this lore could be put to use, to help plants grow, to encourage, to spread.

The idea filled him with excitement.

Abruptly, he got up, moving with ready speed he reached his son. His hand gripped the boy's hair and jerked his head back, he plunged the knife into his son's throat, holding him rigid for his death struggles. With eager cries, his daughter and wife scrambled to lap up falling blood.

They would eat well tonight, and for days after, Gyorl thought.

This land was barren, it would be hard to endure here. But that meant no one would hunt them. And Gyorl could follow his inspiration, his vision.

And there would always be more children, if not upon his wife, then his daughter. Neither had the strength to resist him.

The future beckoned.

---

In that case you should've had it be the son who got the idea, killed his father, and married his mother and sister. Cause after all, two counts of incest are better than one. In all honesty, I can see the whole Odipeus thing be a very real concern in this culture.