"It must be a Cow. Look at those pretty-pretty tusks. Any self-respecting Bull would be too embarrassed to wear skinny monstrosities like that."

"Hey, little grazer! Can I borrow your tusks? I need a pick to clean out my musth gland, and those spindly things are just the right size…"

He saw that the mastodonts had closed the circle around him.

The big scarred Bull facing him was being whipped, severely, by the Firehead with him. The Firehead was shouting, a simple, repetitive sound: "Agit! Agit!" It was obvious he was trying to drive the big Bull forward. This Firehead was sapling-thin with a cruel, pinched face.

The scarred Bull, seeming unaware of the multiple wounds being inflicted on him, swiveling his huge, filth-crusted rump and let out a fart of thunderous intensity. A foul brown spray knocked the skinny Firehead backward, and the line of mastodonts reacted with stomps and growls of amusement.

The Bull walked forward nonchalantly out of his dispersing brown cloud, muscles moving under his fat brown-black coat of hair. "Sorry about that. These Fireheads are an irritation at times."

Longtusk stood his ground and raised his tusks. "Come any closer and I’ll rip out your other eye."

The mastodont grunted. He reached a stand of low, twisted spruce trees. His trunk flicked out, its pink tip running over one sapling after another. Finally he settled on the biggest, strongest tree of the grove. He wrapped his trunk around its girth and, with a single flick of his huge, low-slung head, ripped the tree out of the ground, roots and all. His mouth gaped, revealing a purple tongue and teeth like miniature mountains, chipped and worn. With a crackling splinter, he bit the tree clean in half, his long jaw bones moving in a powerful up-down motion quite different from the back-and-forth grinding of a mammoth’s jaw. Then he stamped on the tree, breaking it up further.

Within a few heartbeats, a healthy tree had been reduced to a few shards.

"My name is Jaw Like Rock," said the mastodont. He opened his huge mouth and belched; a fine spray of spittle and wood chips peppered Longtusk. "I enjoyed that. But you grazers prefer to munch on a few blades of grass, don’t you? I suppose if that’s all you’re strong enough to manage—"

"I’m strong enough to best you," Longtusk said.

Jaw Like Rock looked puzzled. "Oh, yes. It’s time for me to get my eye ripped out, isn’t it? We’d better get it over with."

Unexpectedly, something barged into Longtusk’s backside. Trumpeting, he tried to turn.

Here was Walks With Thunder, his broad brow dipped. "You let me creep up on you downwind again, little grazer. You’ve a lot to learn."

"I’ve nothing to learn from you wood-nibblers."

Walks With Thunder’s broad head once again rammed his backside, hard. Longtusk stumbled and took two or three steps forward.

Now something wrenched backward on Longtusk’s left hind leg. There was a hoop of hide rope knotted around his ankle, over his foot. The rope’s other end was tied tightly around the roots of a tree.

He heard a yelp of triumph from his feet.

He looked down. It was the little fat Firehead, the one who had detected his presence before anybody else. He had been crawling on the ground close to Longtusk’s feet, and his flabby skin was coated with something dark and pungent.

"Dung," Longtusk said. "Mammoth dung."

"Your dung," said Walks With Thunder easily. "That’s how Lemming crept up on you. You couldn’t smell him. Oldest trick there is, little grazer. And now you’re caught."

Longtusk trumpeted his alarm. "Why are you doing this to me? Let me go! In the name of Probos—"

Walks With Thunder exchanged a glance with Jaw Like Rock, and Longtusk thought he detected a brief sadness there.

Walks With Thunder said, "Grazer, this has nothing to do with Probos."

"Don’t worry, lad," Jaw said. "We’ve all been through it."

"Been through what? Let me go." Frustrated, frightened, angry, humiliated, Longtusk tugged with all his strength at the rope. It wouldn’t give. Rumbling, enraged, he fell back.

The Fireheads stood around him in a loose circle, letting the drama play itself out.

Jaw Like Rock took a heavy step forward, "Come on then, little grazer. Let’s get this over. Give me your best shot."

Longtusk eyed Jaw Like Rock. "There is a stink of Firehead on you," he said. "You have no honor."

Jaw Like Rock stiffened.

Walks With Thunder murmured, "I wouldn’t get him angry."

Longtusk cried, "For Probos!" And he roared and lunged with his tusks.

The mastodont sidestepped — but not fast enough; the tip of one mammoth tusk scraped down his flank. "Well done, little grazer," he said, his trunk investigating the wound. "You were too fast for me."

Longtusk looked down, and saw a smear of bright crimson at the sharp tip of one curling spiral tusk. He felt a surge of pride. If only Rockheart could see him now!…

"Get it over, Jaw," growled Walks With Thunder. "Don’t try to make him feel better about it."

Longtusk, straining at the sinew on his leg, said, "What does he mean?"

"Nothing," said Jaw Like Rock, wiping blood off the tip of his trunk on the sparse grass. "He’s an old fool. Do your worst, mighty mammoth, calf of Primus!" And he trumpeted and raised his stubby tusks.

Again Longtusk lunged.

But the mastodont was standing at his side. He had moved in a blur of speed, too fast for Longtusk to see. "Forgive me, brave grazer." And he brought his tusks crashing down on Longtusk’s head.

It was as if thunder had clapped inside his head. The light was suddenly strange, with everything suffused by a bright golden tinge. To his surprise he found he was kneeling, his trunk dangling on the grass like the discarded skin of a snake.

He tried to lift his tusks, but, oddly, they were scraping on the thin soil of the ground. With every breath he took, the golden light around him intensified.

"…don’t understand it. It’s never taken more than a single blow before. That would have felled Kilukpuk herself."

"You aren’t used to these woolly grazers, Jaw."

"No. Perhaps all that fur—"

"More likely that wretched dome of bone on the top of his skull. Try it again, Jaw. Just make sure you don’t kill him."

A huge face loomed, a gaping jaw, the teeth surrounded by four short, squat tusks. "Try not to move, grazer."

Longtusk felt a wash of fetid breath, a rush of air — and again there was an explosion inside his head.

This time the world fell away, through deepening gold, into darkness.

The sun was high.

He was standing. He was conscious of hunger, an even more powerful thirst. There was a strong scent of mammoth around him… but not quite mammoth.

"…Milkbreath? Matriarch?"

"They aren’t here, lad."

The voice came from directly before him. It was a mammoth — no, a mastodont — short and squat, with a long narrow face and an extra pair of tusks. The mastodont seemed to swim into focus, as if ice water were draining out of his eyes.

The mastodont was a Bull, grizzled with age, and his waist and head and legs and tusks were wrapped around with lengths of rope, knotted tight and tied to the stumps of trees. Only his trunk roamed free, its pink tip questing toward Longtusk.

"Walks With Thunder," Longtusk said slowly.

"I’m glad you know me. That oaf Jaw Like Rock is none too gentle; I feared he might have scrambled your brains for good… Who’s Milkbreath? Your mother?"

Longtusk growled and tried to back away. But he couldn’t move. He could feel ropes wrapped around his legs and torso and head.

"The ropes will tighten if you struggle. They will cut your flesh."

Longtusk pushed hard with one leg. With a creak, the loops tightened just as Walks With Thunder had warned.