But now they had discovered a whole new world. They had passed through a border area when the trek had begun, where they had seen some deer and other familiar beasts, as well as murgu of different kinds. Quite suddenly this had all changed and the animals they had watched and hunted all their lives were no more. Only some of the birds looked familiar, while the fish in the river were apparently no different. The rest were murgu, murgu in such variety that they could no longer be called by that single name. They were underfoot and in the grass, small lizards and snakes, while grazing the sea of grass itself were beasts of all sizes and colors. The hunters were specially watchful when they passed one of these herds because many times they were followed by packs of voracious carnivores.

Once, squatting and tearing at the rotting corpse of a large and nameless animal, they had seen carrion birds as large as the raptor that had once watched them. They were ungainly things with dark red plumage and very long tails. When the hunters passed close by they hopped about on their long legs and opened their beaks to hiss in anger. They were efficient carrion eaters for instead of bills they had jaws lined with sharp teeth.

The land was rich, the game so plentiful that it would have fallen in great numbers before their arrows had they had the time to hunt, while the weather itself became hard to believe. When they had set out on the trek the leaves were beginning to fall from the trees and they had felt the first cold grip of winter in the frosts at night. But now the seasons had been reversed and they seemed to be going back into the warm time. Even the nights were not cold, while during the day they took off their leather garments and walked with their skins exposed just as they did during the summer.

Then one day they came to the place where the large river that they had been following was joined by an even mightier one. Though it was only just past midday Herilak halted the march and asked Kerrick and the sammadars to join him.

“This will be a good place for a camp. There is that steep trail down to the river below that can be used for watering the beasts. It will also be at our backs at night and will be easy to guard. Good grazing here for the mastodons, fuel in the woods there for our fires.”

“It is still early,” Ulfadan said. “Why do we stop now?”

“That is the reason I called you here. When we began this march we decided only that we should go south. Now we have done that. So the time has come to decide where we will make our winter camp. We must now think about this.”