Kalaleq plunged the spear down with all of his strength, deep into the creature’s hide, then jumped away as the coil of line attached to it began to run quickly over the side. The stench from the punctured bladder was unbelievable and Kerrick lurched to the side and threw up. Through his tears he saw Kalaleq cutting the thong—the bladder dropped into the sea and was swept away.

With this done, Kalaleq kicked overboard the inflated skin just as the last of the line paid out. The skin bubbled away through the water, secured to the line, and the ikkergak turned and followed it.

Kalaleq climbed the mast again and shouted down instructions. If they lost sight of the inflated skin the whole operation would fail.

The steerman glanced at Kerrick and laughed. “Strong poison, good and strong. Make you bring up all your food, just smelling it. Even a ularuaq cannot live long with that poison in it, you’ll see.”

He was right; soon after this they came up to the inflated skin, bobbing on the waves. Below it the immense, still form of the ularuaq could just be made out. The rest of the school were gone, but the other ikkergaks were coming toward them.

“Good stab, wasn’t it?” Kalaleq said, dropping down from the mast and looking fondly at his catch. “Did you ever see a thrust so good?”

“Never,” Kerrick told him. Modesty was not a Paramutan trait.

“It will float up soon, then sink, but you will see what we do then before we lose it.”

By the time the ularuaq’s back was at the surface, the waves surging over it, the rest of the ikkergaks were arriving at the scene. Kerrick was astonished when one Paramutan after another stripped off his furs and dived into the icy water. They had bone hooks, like greatly enlarged fishhooks, tied to the ends of leather lines that they carried between their teeth as they dived down next to the ularuaq. One by one they surfaced and were hauled into the ikkergaks, their fur running with water. They shivered and shouted how brave they were as they dried themselves and redressed.

No one paid any attention to them because they were all busy hauling on the lines. Kerrick could help with this since it required no skill—just strength. The point of this exercise became clear when the ularuaq’s corpse stirred in the water, then rolled slowly over. The hooks had been sunk into the creature’s flippers. Now it floated in the sea with its lighter-colored underside facing upward.