Winter in Eden

and more of them."
    There was nothing that could be said. They skirted the bush—and the others like it—walked up along the high bank until the living dam was below them. A small lake had been formed behind it which had burst the banks further upstream. The river now found a new course out into the desert and away from the valley.
    It was a good thing that they still had the spring of pure water.
    Once they were back behind the relative safety of the barrier they carefully plucked out the poisonous darts before stripping off the stifling layers of cloth. Herilak found Sanone waiting in their usual meeting place, and he reported what they had found.
    "And we had not a single glimpse of a murgu—they have learned to keep their distance."
    "The dam could be torn down…"
    "Why? It would only be grown again. While here the vines are closer to the valley floor every day. It must be said. The murgu have learned how to defeat us at last. Not in battle—but with the slow and ceaseless growth of their poison plants. They will win in the end. We cannot stop it any more than we can stop the tide."
    "Yet each day the tide retreats again."
    "The murgu do not." Herilak dropped to the ground, feeling defeat, feeling as old and tired as the mandukto. "They will win, Sanone, they will win."
    "I have never heard you speak like that before, strong Herilak. There is still a battle to be fought. You have led us before, you have won."
    "Now we have lost."
    Winter in Eden - Harry Harrison
    "We will cross the desert to the west."
    "They will follow."
    Sanone looked at the bowed shoulders of the big hunter and felt the other's despair, shared it despite himself. Was it Kadair's will that the Sasku be wiped from the face of the land? Had they followed the tracks of the mastodon only to find extinction waiting at trail's end? He could not believe it. Yet what else could he believe?
    The excited shouts cut through the darkness of his thoughts and he turned to see what was happening.
    Hunters were running toward them, pointing, shouting. Herilak seized up his death-stick, leapt to his feet.
    There was a splashing roar as a wave of water rushed down the dry riverbed toward them, yellow with mud, quickly filling the banks. The terrified Sasku and Tanu scrambled to safety as the wall of water thundered by.
    "The dam has been broken!" Herilak said. "Are all safe?" Sanone watched the muddy water rush through the valley, saw no bodies—only tumbling shrubs and other debris. "I think they are, the river is staying inside its old banks. And, look, the level has dropped already. It is just as it always has been."
    "Until they rebuild the dam, regrow it. This means nothing."
    Even this welcome sight could not touch Herilak's despair.
    He had gone beyond hope, was ready for his life to end. He did not even lift his head when others called out, only looked up, blinking, when Sanone pounded on his arm.
    "Something is happening," the mandukto cried, hope in his voice for the first time. "The vines, look at the vines! Kadair has not deserted us, we follow still in his tracks."
    High above them a mass of vine tore loose from the cliff, tumbled and fell to the valley floor. Dust rose about it and when it had settled they saw that the thick stems that had supported it were gray and crumbled. Even as they watched the waxy green leaves drooped and lost their shine. In the distance another great tangle of vines broke free and slid down into the valley.
    "Something is happening out there, something that we don't know about," Herilak said, released from the dark prison of despair by the incredible events about him. "I must go see."
    His death-stick ready he ran the length of the valley, clambered up the barricade. Across from him, on the other side of the river, were the cliffs of the opposite bank, a close arrow-shot away. There was sudden movement there and he crouched, weapon pointed. A murgu appeared to stand at the cliff's edge, then another and another. Their repulsive two-thumbed hands were empty. They stood motionless, wide-eyed Winter in Eden - Harry Harrison
    and staring.
    Herilak lowered his weapon. It was inaccurate at this distance—and he needed to understand what was happening. They looked at him, as he looked at them, in silence, capable of communicating only their presence to each other. The width of the river lay between them, the width of their difference wider than any river or sea. Herilak hated them and knew that the stare from their