In the weak light the mammoths were rounded, indistinct forms, shuffling gloomily. The ground was littered with sand dunes and rock from the crumbled walls, so the going was difficult and slow. They were all unhappy: mammoths were creatures of the open steppe, and it was against their instincts to be enclosed by high walls.
But the chasm was short. Soon it opened out — but only into a branching array of more deep gorges, separated by tall, sharp-edged walls. Icebones stamped her feet and rumbled. But the walls of this increasingly complex maze sent back only muddled and confusing echoes.
The nights were the worst. The stars and disconcerting moons crossed the sky, but the mammoths were stranded in a deep shadowed darkness.
Icebones tried to keep them moving. But because of the calf’s weariness that proved to be impossible, and they were forced to endure the dark huddled closely around Breeze, while her calf napped peacefully in the forest of her legs.
In the darkest night, Icebones heard deep, brooding rumbles. All the mammoths heard it, she thought, but none would speak of it, as if fearful of making it real.
In the daytime Icebones, weary and befuddled, strove to keep moving east.
This maze of chasms was a pattern of grooves cut deep into the land, as if by the claws of some great predator, so that the plain high above their heads was cut into sunlit islands, each separate from the others.
Spiral said, "I have become a creature of the ground like a lemming, able only to peer up at the sunlight above." And her grumble was joined by the others.
It was as if it was somehow Icebones’s fault that they were having such difficulties. It was utterly unfair, of course. But then, she thought gloomily, nobody had promised her that being a Matriarch was anything to do with fairness.
"I will tell you stories from the Cycle."
That met with a general groan.
But Icebones said, "The Cycle is our story — your story. This Cracked Land is difficult. But the Cycle is full of stories of mammoths who faced difficulties, for it is the times of hardship that shape us." And she began to tell them the story of Longtusk. "It is said that when Longtusk was a calf the mammoths roamed free, great Clans of them, all across the northern steppes. But Longtusk’s Family was forced to flee, northward, ever north, for the Lost were encroaching from the south, breeding and squabbling and building…"
The mammoths still grumbled, but the noise was subdued, and suffused by the soft pads of their feet, the growls of their bellies, gentle burps and farts. Even the little calf trotting at Icebones’s side listened intently. Woodsmoke was still too young to understand much of what she said. But he was responding to the rhythm of her language, as she hoped they all would.
The Ragged One continued to keep apart.
"At last," Icebones went on, "the mammoths had nowhere else to go. The land gave way to a great frozen ocean where nothing could live but seals and other ugly creatures. It seemed that soon the mammoths would be overwhelmed by the Lost.
"But Longtusk found a way. There was a bridge of land that spanned the ocean, from one great steppe to another. And, on the far side of the bridge, there were no Lost — only open steppe, where the mammoths could grow and breed and live. So Longtusk gathered the mammoths of his Clan, and said to them—"
Something dropped before her, huge and heavy and dark. It opened a cavernous mouth and screamed. She glimpsed rows of sharp teeth.
Without thinking she lunged forward — she felt the rasp of fur on her tusks, the squelch of soft flesh breaking — and the creature screamed louder yet.
And then, in an instant, it was gone, leaving her with the stink of blood in her nostrils, and the echo of that deadly scream rattling from the walls around her.
She stood there, shaking like a frightened calf.
The mammoths had scattered. The calf had been left alone, and he was turning back and forth, little trunk raised, mewling pitifully. "Scared… scared…"
Icebones said, "We must stay together. That — thing — was probably after the calf."
Spiral was stiff with rage and fear. "Enough of your talk," she said. "The Ragged One is right. This is not your world, Icebones. You did not know we would meet such a creature here, did you?"
"If we squabble it will pick us off one by one." Icebones raised her tusks, which still dripped red blood. "Is that what you want?"
At last Autumn rumbled, "She is right. The calf is probably its main target, for he is weakest, and slowest. Breeze, come to him."
Breeze stepped forward and tucked her calf beneath her legs. Woodsmoke tried to suckle, but Breeze pushed him back. The rest of the mammoths clustered around mother and calf.
"We will go on," insisted Icebones. "This warren of chasms will not last forever. If everyone keeps their trunk high, we will survive."
They were reluctant, fretful, afraid. But nobody had a better suggestion. And so they began to move forward once more. The calf’s mewling was muffled by the legs and belly fur of its mother, and the adult mammoths rumbled uneasily, their deep sounds echoing heavily from the sheer ravine walls.
Thunder walked beside Icebones. "What do you think it was?"
"Perhaps it was some kind of cat. There are stories of great cats in the Cycle — Longtusk himself fought such a beast. Perhaps it has grown fat by destroying everything else living here, like the whale in the Ocean of the North. But I have never seen a cat, for none lived on the Island. Many of the animals mentioned in the old Cycle stories are long gone…"
Icebones saw that the stripe of sky visible far above her head was already fading to a deep orange-pink.
"Soon it will be dark," the Ragged One said softly. "And then we will make a story of our own. Won’t we, Matriarch?"
They came to another branch in the chasm system. This time Icebones faced three intersecting ravines, each sheer-walled and littered with loose rock, each leading only to further complexity — and each empty, as far as she could see.
We must continue east, she told herself. If we don’t achieve that much, everything else is lost. She stepped forward and led them into the central chasm.
There was a bellow. The mammoths stumbled back, trunks raised in alarm.
This time the creature had dropped from above, onto Autumn’s back. The mammoth was pawing the ground and trumpeting. She lifted her head in a vain effort to reach her tormentor with her tusks or trunk.
The creature was only dimly visible in the shadows, but Icebones glimpsed hard, front-facing yellow eyes, that black bloody mouth, and claws that gleamed white and dug deep into Autumn’s flesh, causing blood to well and drip down her heavy hair.
Autumn blundered against the chasm wall. The cat creature yowled its protest. But it was ripped away from her back, its claws leaving a final set of gouges.
Icebones lunged forward, trumpeting, tusks held high.
The cat raised itself to its full height, yellow eyes fixed on Icebones. It was spindly, but its body was a sleek slab of muscle. It opened its huge mouth and hissed. And it leapt with astonishing agility up the chasm wall.
Again the mammoths were left in sudden silence.
"It lives on the walls," Shoot said, wondering.
Spiral had her head dipped, her trunk wrapped over her forehead. "I can’t stand it," she whimpered. "I am so afraid."
Icebones herself was shaken to her core. Mammoths were used to facing predators, but as a creature of the open steppe, Icebones had no experience of threats dropping down on her from out of the sky.
She walked up to Autumn. "Your back is hurt." She probed with her trunk fingers at the slash wounds. The covering hair was matted with blood. "We will find mud to bathe your wounds."