“They are—but so are we. Our flint knives, our bows, spears, the tents we sleep in, we make all of them. Then think too of the Sasku with their pots and looms, woven cloth, crops . . .”

“And porro—we must never forget that!”

They laughed together while the wrestling on the beach grew even wilder. Two of the Paramutan were so absorbed in the match that they were engulfed by a wave—which everyone thought very hilarious.

“What I have said about making things is important,” Kerrick said. “Even the porro is important. Because this is what we do. We make these things with our hands. The artifacts that we construct cannot die—because they have never lived. A spear is as good in the snow as it is in the jungle.”

“This is true. But is it important?”

“To me—it is the most important discovery. I have been thinking like a murgu too long. The murgu make nothing. Most of them do nothing either—other than live, eat, die. But there are those few of the knowledge of science and they can control living things. I don’t know how they do it—I have the feeling that I will never know. But I have been so stupid in thinking only about the things that they grow. How they do it, why they do it. Everything that I have planned, everything that I have done, has been done in the murgu way. I have tried to think like them always. This was a mistake and I now turn my back on them. I am all Tanu, not half marag. When I say this I see the truth. Let the death-sticks die. They are of no importance. I have made them important and others have believed me. But no more.”

She was frightened. “Don’t say that. Without the death-sticks we die to the south—and there is only winter to the north. You cannot say this.”

“Listen and understand. I am one hunter. I may be dead tomorrow, I could have died yesterday. Because of me we use the death-sticks. When I lived among the murgu I saw how they used them to kill anything that attacked them, no matter what the size. I saw this and realized that if we had death-sticks as well we could also be able to survive in the south. And we have done that—but our lives now depend upon the death-sticks—and that is not right. We must find a way to do without them, a way that is natural to us. If our lives depend upon them, why then we are half-marag—and all are like me. But no more. I and all others must be all Tanu. The answer is right before us.”

“I do not see it,” she said, bewildered.

“Do you not remember the murgu island? How you lit the fire and Kalaleq killed the ship-creatures in the sea?”

“Yes, that is what happened.”