There were always more old women than old men. There were fewer ways a woman could die, as long as she survived childbirth. Men risked their lives every time they went out to hunt. Even a bite from a spotted scurrier cub could suppurate and kill the strongest spearman. So many men were lost in the painted men's battles. Women inevitably found themselves the playthings of the victors but they seldom died of it, even if they might wish it, at first. By the time the bruises and torn flesh had healed, most decided life was still better than walking out into the night to meet whatever death lurked in the darkness.
The old man and the grandmothers decided to notice the newly arrived old woman. The old man closest to her
shuffled backwards and two women drew aside a little. Now she was more or less included in their erratic gathering. The old woman blinked away tears and nodded her gratitude.
As she sat quietly, she realised many of the elders were cherishing discreet excitement and not just because there was more than enough food for everyone to eat their fill tonight. The painted man who had worn the mountain-climber's skull was dead. These new painted strangers had shown no interest in offering up the dead of the battle to his blue beast. Indeed, the blue beast hadn't returned since it had flown away in pursuit of the white beast that none of them had seen before. Nor had the white beast come back. These painted strangers hadn't fed it with the dead of the battle against the men from across the river. What did all this mean?
Dark eyes shining bright in the firelight slid towards the old woman. She shook her head regretfully. She couldn't say where the white beast had come from, or where it had gone. She couldn't say, and she would keep her suspicions to herself.
The two wrinkled grandmothers who had made room for her, similar enough in features and mannerisms to be sisters, dismissed the question of the white beast with flapping hands. The blue beast was what they had feared and now it was gone. It hadn't even returned when the painted man's women were fighting with the red stranger.
Which was not to say it wasn't going to return. A wizened old man rubbed a swollen-knuckled hand thoughtfully over his ash-white hair. It could come back the very next morning. Or the black beast from across the river would be back. They knew that black beast of old and it had only been the blue beast and the painted man that had protected them from it. He saw no reason to celebrate.
A grandsire further around the circle was more optimistic, though his mumbled words were difficult to
understand. Perhaps these strangers were going to challenge the painted man who summoned the black beast next. At least two of these newcomers had the powers of painted ones. His son had been in the battle against those from across the river and he had seen fire and wind bend to fulfil the strangers' desires.
The white-haired old man wondered with some asperity just how these strangers could be doing such things without winning a beast's favour by feeding it carrion or captives. The mumbling man had no answer to that and stared into the hearth, sucking on his toothless gums.
Another old man with clouded eyes soon rallied. If they had no answers to their questions, they had the evidence of their own eyes. The red stranger with the mysterious leg had turned his face against the feathered women, there was no doubt about that. He had driven them out to take their chances against the clubs and spears of the village hunters. He had even driven off the black beast after it had appeared to claim the second woman for its own. He had used his powers to turn attackers to dust in the battle. He was plainly set on defending the village.
The white-haired old man wasn't convinced there was any such reason for optimism. How did they know the breaking and burning of the land and the strange white water that had fallen from the sky was the red stranger's doing? And he had taken the painted man's hut, even if he hadn't taken his women. Perhaps he had driven the woman out to be eaten by the beast, knowing it would be waiting for her. Perhaps that was the fate he had intended for the first one, and why he had been so furious when she had been slain. Perhaps that was what these people did, in whatever strange land they came from. He turned to look at the old woman.
She considered her reply carefully before explaining how she had seen them floating along the coast on a strange raft.
They had been coming along the sunrise coast and then turned the headland to continue along the sunset shore. Presumably they had dragged their raft ashore somewhere but she didn't know where that might be. She admitted she had simply seen them walking as she had been coming along the cliff tops herself and followed. The village elders gaped at her. Voluble, the sisters searched their joint memories for any tales of such things that might ever have been brought to the village. The white-haired old man hushed them, openly disbelieving. Piqued, the old woman told of the waterspout that had appeared out of an empty sky to draw away the water beast. That silenced him.
Then the old woman braced herself for someone asking just where she had come from, but no one did. The conversation faltered once again as all the elders wondered what to make of the mystery of the strangers' origins.
One of the sisters heaved a sigh and opined that there was nothing to be done but wait and see, so they might as well enjoy going to sleep on full bellies for a change. All eyes gazed greedily at the gourds now steaming copiously. The circle sat in silence for a while, the old woman wondering if she might expect an equal share.
The old man with the clouded eyes cleared his throat. What precisely was it that the tall stranger had sent the men and boys of the village to gather that afternoon? He explained that he had been occupied with other things. The old woman noted the other elders accepting this readily enough. Of course they would. No one would draw unwelcome attention to their own infirmities by mentioning another's failing sight or trembling hands. No one wanted the hunters or the matrons turning their thoughts to just what the elders offered the village in return for their usual meagre food.
The white-haired old man told him, his wrinkled face animated. First it had been sticks. Not firewood, he
explained, but those rare tree limbs long and straight enough to be turned into spears. But he had stopped any of them sharpening the ends or hardening them in the hearth. The other old men looked at one another, shrugging bony shoulders in incomprehension.
That was not all, one of the sisters added unexpectedly. He had wanted grass. All the elders looked doubtfully at her. The tall stranger had wanted grass, she insisted, and not just for sleeping on. He had piled it inside the painted man's hut beside the sticks. Curious glances turned to the old woman once again. She had no choice but to admit her utter ignorance. Disappointment clouded various faces and she quailed inside.
The toothless old man sat up straight and pointed across the broad stone ring of the hearth as the tallest stranger came out of the painted man's hut, his woman at his side. The hunters of the village hastened to offer him both of the freshly killed lizard hides. The old men all agreed that was wise; any man carrying those knives like splinters of lightning should be placated even at such a cost.
The old woman watched the tall stranger lift up the first heavy lizard skin, turning it this way and that. He was frowning, but more in thought than in displeasure, unless she missed her guess. What was he going to do?
The tall stranger laid the skin carefully down and set the second next to it. He stood up, rubbing a hand across his beard. Snapping his fingers, he attracted the attention of one of the village's most revered hunters, who had been sitting close by the fire and waiting for first choice of the best of the meat, as was his right.