The Hunter's Son

A short story of a Neolithic reindeer hunt

I wonder if my father's grey eyes can pierce the fog as they scan the misty marsh for signs of the prey. Only the freezing wind and the sad cries of the wading birds can be heard as we listen for the distant rumble of their hooves. A sharp pain twists my guts. We haven't eaten anything more than boiled roots and grains since last night. The cramping pain forces a sound from my throat. Father snatches a tuft of grass from the ground where we lie. “Eat this,” he said, "it will quiet your guts.”

“What if they don't come?” I asked.
“They'll come,” he said confidently. “The ancestors will guide them here as they do every year, and this time they won't escape. We'll have meat again soon boy. More than we can eat.”

I tried to remember the taste of the deer but it had been almost a year now of plants and fish and snails and crawling things. Sometimes father would manage to stone a bird, but usually the Chief would take that for himself as soon as he smelled it cooking. I'm sure Father would win if he fought the Chief for it, but he never does.


I pull the ties on my boar's-skin to block out the chill, burning my legs. I ask him why he lets him steal our food. He points to the hills where our ancestors live, and says, “They will let me know when it is the right time to fight.”

An eagle screeches high overhead. We look up. The thick grey cloud is breaking to reveal the bright blue roof of the world.

“But he's weaker, older and slower than you. You should be Chief!”

He nods, smiles at me, and explains, “A chief is not just a man. He is the head and heart of our tribe. He holds us together. No one man, no matter how strong and swift and brave, is a match for mother earth when she's angry.”

His words confuse me and he reads this on my face.

“We are like the wolves, we rely on the pack for survival. As long as the pack is strong its leader deserves respect.”

“Is our tribe strong?” I ask, surprised.

He nods and points at the wall. That useless wall. That great unnatural grey pile of rocks stretching along the contours of the landscape ahead of us, shrouded in the marsh’s damp veil.

That monstrous thing has made this year the hardest ever. Its building sapped the men. The women took their work. We children foraged. No one hunted. I have forgotten the taste of meat.
“I hate the wall,” I say.

“This is our greatest achievement,” he said.“It will make us the greatest of all tribes. We will be known as the wall people.”

Why do those grey eyes see such a different world to mine?

The cold bites into my bones forcing a groan from my chest.

“Shhh!” hisses father, pushing his ear to the ground. “They are coming! I can hear them!”

He gives the lonely call of the curlew to signal to the others lying in ambush.

Now I hear the low rumble of a thousand hooves. Soon the clatter of clashing antlers as the tightly packed mass of trotting beasts comes into view. The sharp wind carries the reek of their sour musk and dung over us. Snorted breath and evaporating sweat rise in curling clouds above the densely packed herd as it fast approaches.

Beneath my hands and knees the ground vibrates with their power and weight. My heart is pounding fast. I grab for father's arm but he snatches away. “Spear!” he hisses. I grab my spear. Now fear is twisting my guts. My fingers are so tightly gripped around my spear my knuckles are shining white.

“Remember the training!” yelled father as he heaved himself up and let out a fierce hunting cry before charging towards the herd.

To my right my crippled uncle banged loudly on a skin drum. People all around me shouted, screamed and made as much noise as possible to scare the beasts against the wall. The plan was working. They were being driven into the bog. That stinking black, sucking mire where father and the other hunters could spear them as they struggled to escape.

But mother earth had another plan in which father tripped and was trampled into the mud by the panicked stampede until there was no sign of him but a reddish muddy slick.

The Chief was triumphant. His wall had worked. Our people were preparing and salting the meat for weeks afterwards. He adopted mother and I. I sometimes hear him with her at night through the skins that separate our beds.

I go outside and look at the moon and chew on a piece of dried meat wondering if it might have been the arm I hung onto or the leg that carried me. I don't like the taste. It feels strange but I must eat it to gain his wisdom and strength. When I do, I won't ask permission from our ancestors to take my place.