She turned to meet her fate.

Beyond the ruins of the hut there was a ring of light: a dozen burning branches held aloft by the paws of the Lost. Several of them had thunder-sticks, which they pointed toward her. She could see their small eyes, sighting along the sticks at her head and belly.

And there was Skin-of-Ice. He was holding his side, but she could see the blood leaking through his fingers.

She tried to calculate. If she charged directly at him, even if the stinging hail from the thunder-sticks caught her, her sheer momentum could not be stopped. And Skin-of-Ice, wounded as he was, would not be able to evade her this time.

She rumbled to her calf. "So it is over," she said. "But the pain will be mine, not yours. You will not see this terrible world of suffering, dominated by these monsters, these Lost. It will be brief, and then we will be together, in the aurora that burns in the sky…"

She lowered her head -

There was a braying, liquid roar.

The Lost scattered and ran, yelling.

A shape loomed out of the shadows: bristling with fur, one tusk held high. It was Snagtooth. Silverhair could see how she trailed the broken length of rope that had restrained her.

Without her trunk Snagtooth was unable to trumpet, but she could roar; and now she roared again. She selected one of the Lost and hurled herself straight toward him. The Lost screamed and raised his thunder-stick. It spat fire, and Silverhair could see blood splash over Snagtooth’s upper thigh. But the wound did not impede her charge.

Snagtooth’s mutilated head rammed directly into the belly of the Lost.

Silverhair heard a single bloody gurgle, the crackle of crushed bone. The Lost was hurled into the air and landed far from the circle of torches.

But this victory was transient. The Lost gathered their courage and turned on Snagtooth. Soon the still air was rent by the noise of thunder-sticks.

Snagtooth reeled. She fell to her knees.

Silverhair screamed: "Snagtooth!"

Through the storm of noise, Silverhair could hear Snagtooth’s rumble. "Remember me…"

And Silverhair understood. In the end, Snagtooth had thrown off her shame. She had chosen to give her life for Silverhair and her calf. Now it was up to Silverhair to get away, to accept that ultimate gift.

She turned away from the noise, the Lost, the fallen, agonized shape of Snagtooth, and slipped away into the silvery Arctic light.

The Lost closed around Snagtooth with their thunder-sticks and ice-claws.

This (said Silverhair) is the story of Ganesha, who is called the Wise.

I am talking of a time many Great-Years ago — ten, twelve, perhaps more. In those days, the world was quite different, for it was warmer, and much of the land was covered in a rich Forest.

Now, in such a world you or I would be too hot, and there would be little for us to eat. But Ganesha’s Family thought themselves blessed.

For Ganesha’s Family, and their Clan and Kin, had lived for a hundred Great-Years in a world awash with heat, and Ganesha had no need to keep herself warm, as you do. And she ate the rich food of the Forest: grass, moss, fruit, even leaves and bark.

If Ganesha was standing before you now you would think her strange indeed.

Though she had a trunk and tusks, she had little fur; her gray skin was exposed to the cooling air all year round. She had little fat on her lean body, and her ears were large, like huge flapping leaves. And Ganesha was tall — she would have towered over you, little Icebones!

Ganesha had two calves, both Cows, called Prima and Meridi.

Everyone agreed that Meridi was the beauty of the Family: tall, strong, lean, her skin like weathered rock, her trunk as supple as a willow branch. By comparison Prima seemed short and fat and clumsy, her ears and trunk stubby. But Ganesha, of course, loved them both equally, as mothers do.

Now, Ganesha was not called Wise for nothing. She knew the world was changing.

She walked north, to the edge of the Forest, where the trees thinned out, and she looked out over the plains: grassy, endless, stretching to the End of the World. When she was a calf, she remembered clearly, such a walk would have taken many more days.

And if Ganesha stepped out of the Forest, enduring the burning sun of that time, she could see where the Forest had once been. For the land was littered with fallen, rotten trunks and the remnants of roots, within which insects burrowed.

And Ganesha could smell the ice on the wind, see the scudding of clouds across the sky.

The Cycle teaches us of the great Changes that sweep over the world — Changes that come, not in a year or two or ten, not even in the span of a mammoth’s lifetime, but with the passing of the Great-Years.

And that is how Ganesha knew about the great Cold that was sweeping down from out of the north, and how she knew that the Forest was shrinking back to the south, just as the tide recedes from the shore.

Ganesha was concerned for her Family.

She consulted the Cycle — which, even in those days, was already ancient and rich — but she found no lesson to help her.

However, Ganesha was Wise. As she looked into the great emptiness that was opening up in the north, Ganesha understood that a great opportunity awaited her calves.

But to take that opportunity she would have to step beyond the Cycle.

Ganesha called her calves to her.

"The Forest is dying," she said.

Prima, squat and solid, said, "But the Forest sustains us. What must we do?"

Meridi, tall and beautiful, scoffed at her mother. "All you have seen is a few dead trees. You are an old fool!"

Ganesha bore this disrespect with tolerance.

"This is what we must do," she said. "As the Forest dies back, a new land is revealed. There are no trees, but there are grasses and bushes and other things to eat. And it stretches beyond the horizon — all the way to the End of the World.

"This land is called a Tundra. And, because it is new, the Tundra is empty. You will learn to live on the Tundra, to endure the coming Cold.

"It will not be easy," she said to them. "You are creatures of the Forest; to become creatures of the Tundra will be arduous and painful. But if you endure this pain your calves, and their calves, will in time cover the Tundra with great Clans, greater than any the world has seen."

Prima lowered her trunk soberly. "Matriarch," she said, "show me what to do."

But Meridi scoffed once more. "You are an old fool, Ganesha. None of this is in the Cycle. Soon I will be Matriarch, and there will be none of this talk of the Tundra!" And she refused to have anything to do with Ganesha’s instruction.

Ganesha was saddened by this, but she said nothing.

Now (said Silverhair), to ready Prima for the Tundra took Ganesha three summers.

In the first summer, she changed Prima’s skin. She bit away at Prima’s great ears, reducing them to small, round flaps of skin. And she nibbled at Prima’s tail, making it shorter and stubbier than her sister’s, and she tugged at the skin above Prima’s backside so that a flap came down over her anus.

Prima endured the pain of all this with strong silence, for she accepted her mother’s wisdom. All these changes would help her skin trap the heat of her body. And so they were good.

But Meridi mocked her sister. "You are already ugly, little Prima. Now you let Ganesha make you more so!" And Meridi tugged at Prima’s distorted ears, making them bleed once more.

In the second year, Ganesha made Prima fat. She gathered the richest and most luscious leaves and grass in the Forest, and crammed them into Prima’s mouth.