Vizsha took a moment to lean back against the cool, blubber coated scale-skin of the jusnk he had been working with. Panting from exertion, he knew he would have to keep moving or risk letting the cold creep in. Patting the junsk on his rump they maneuvered to the edge of the open water of the lake and, after taking a deep breath, they jumped in. Together in practiced unison, they swam to the bottom of the lake to collect junsk bones and hair algae form the lakebed.
While most junsk were slaughtered and harvested for meat, the alphas were left to grow old and sire many pups. Once an alpha reached the end of their life, the hulking beast would swim down to the fireheart searching for warmth one last time before it passed. There the body was left to feed the life that lived in this lake along with and provided for the junsk pack. In doing this, the lake was fed and it, in turn, fed the junsk and his people.
Holding his breath was an unpleasant experience for Vizsha, but today he didn't have a choice. He needed to collect hair algae for the weaning pups but more importantly he needed to collect the larger bones left only by an alpha. With these bones he could begin to form his own junsk sleigh and be able to lead a hunting party come spring.
After several arduous trips down to the murky deps, hooking large bones to the harness on his junsk companion, and returning to the surface with what hair algae he could carry, Vizsha decide that one more trip would be enough algae for the pups daily demands and enough bone to get a good start on the platform of his sleigh. Diving in again, he and his companion quickly found themselves in the much warmer murky depths. Without the low light given off from the boulder sized fireheart some distance away, the job would be nearly impossible. But as it was, Vizsha was able to wrap the leather hoop around a rib bone half as wide as his chest and signal for the junsk to begin pulling with little difficulty. As the bone pulled itself free from the thick mud beneath a bright glow appeared. Thanking the ancestors for his luck, Vizsha swam to the hole left by the bone’s removal, and after a little effort, was able to pull a head sized fireheart with intact cage from the mud. With a great effort, he managed to swim to the surface with his prize.
Pulling himself up onto the ice with one arm, and dragging the fireheart behind him with his other, he managed to exit the lake for what he hoped would be the last time today. The water was pleasantly warm near the bottom, but it was always a shock to come back to the surface. Clutching the fireheart near his chest for warmth he raised his scale-mane and shook all the water he could off himself before it had the chance to freeze. Moving quickly, he redressed in dry skins and tied the bundle of today’s bone haul together for his junsk to pull to the yurt. As they walked together, he admired the gem in his hands. Large and yellow cream colored the heart beat in a steady rhythm giving off a semi-steady light and heat. The gem itself was maybe the size of a child’s skull while the firecage around it made it larger. The firecage looked to be made of polished brass and formed a lattice of bands and ridges over the shape of the heart. Vizsha admired the gem, surprised as always by its heat contrasted to the fact that it looked so similar to a piece of frozen ice.
Usually an alpha’s fireheart like this one would be left in the lake to feed its warmth and ensure the survival of the lake once the gargantuan fireheart inevitably gave out. But there was one exception to that rule, and that was the commissioning of a sleigh. Every sleigh needed a fireheart at its core for heat and light. One couldn’t expect to make a fire on the move in a packed sleigh and carrying enough fuel to keep a hunting party warm was impossible for long expeditions. Unhitching the junsk from its burden near his home he set Haka to heating the water and oils he would need to begin shaping the bones he harvested. Before he set to work forming flat planks and sturdy runners out of the large bones, he went from igloo to igloo and fed the pups the algae they would need to learn how to eat solid foods.
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After the better part of a day of work, Vizsha couldn’t help but see the sleigh taking shape. The bones still needed to be fire hardened and sealed, but the bone nails fit the boards together nicely, and the fat-soaked leather straps were tied just as his father had taught him to. Admiring the clean workmanship that his father had spent many winters instilling in him, he found himself startled as he sent a prayer to his father’s spirit among the thanks he sent to all his ancestors that had come before. He was surprised and yet not hurt like he thought he would be. Feeling the connection he would have with his father throughout all his days through both the ancestors watching over him, and the skills and memories he had been given, he was able to smile and truly feel at ease for the first time in many days.
“Thanks to you Father, it is your spirit guiding my hands that allows me to know I can support our family even if it means I must do it alone. Well not alone.” He thought as his prayer was interrupted by Haka bringing another bone bowl of bubbling oil to him. With a simple kiss on the cheek, Haka returned to her work within the yurt, comfortably not needing to say more. “Living or dead, you still guide me. Thank you, father. I will do best to protect what you have left for me.” Leaving his thoughts at that he rose from his momentary resting place and continued the work he had started.
It wasn’t until long after the light from the heaven trail and the alpha’s fireheart were all that he was working by that he decided to finish his work for the day. Admiring the sleigh coming into shape, he tried to imagine it packed for a hunting trip. The sleigh was a little under 2 sed wide and 4 sed long. With the two junsk needed to pull it, it would be a little over 5 and a half sed. Just the frame, the runners, and about half of the boards were in place but he could already imagine a five-man strong hunting party loaded onto the sled. There was still a need for the rails, the rest of the boards, the drag cart to bring home large prey, and the light mast for the alpha’s heart, but all that work was for another day.
Tired, yet pleased with the day’s work, Vizsha headed the few sed between his workstation and his yurt. Taking a moment, he gazed over the valley. Of the near 25 yurts in the valley, he knew that close to half of them were missing their fathers. 10 men and 5 young men took the tribe’s only two sleighs as well as almost every strong arm from this valley when they traveled into the Lowlands now close to 5 months ago. He understood the risk and didn’t blame his father for making the choice, and yet he couldn’t help the small seed of resentment from growing in him. “Father, if only you could see where we are today, you might not have traded Hebo’s chance at life for your whole village’s future.” He said to the three silver spheres dancing through their paths in the heavens. He knew it wasn’t wholly fair to say that was the only reason his father had gone. The humans new fort was right on the edge of their spring hunting grounds and they had seen patrols come as far as some of the lower valleys last spring. The village needed to make contact and they needed to make it with what little force they had. But it was true to say that it was only due to his father’s desperation for Hebo that he took the party out in the depth of winter and as rushed as he did.
Giving up his resentment and fear, he gave a small bow of respect to the sisters that lit his work into the night as he entered the yurt. Surprised to see there still so much light in the tent, he approached the source, only to see his sleeping sister curled up near a glowing bed of coals on which a pot of bone broth and mushrooms simmered near the edge of the fire ring. Smiling, he made note of the coals and realized she must have fallen asleep no more than an hour ago. Gently picking her up to her low murmurs of protest he promised to get a bowl of broth before he went to sleep to placate her complaints as he tucked her into her sleeping skins next to Loona who had already curled herself into a scaly heap. After drinking two large bowls of savory and salty broth, he took the scale-bone pot off the fire to cool and placed two red-hot coals into a small sealed stone jar lined with skrat fur to keep lit till morning and covered the rest with ash. Moving his quickly stiffening body to his soft skrat fur and fungal mat bed, he quickly fell into a deep and restful sleep, sleeping soundly through the night for the first time in months.