The Loafers of Refuge Read Free Page B

strode away. The group of young people hesitated, collectively, and then turned as one and ran towards the encircling shadow of the deep woods, their feet falling softly in the fluffy snow. Atthe edge of the trees they began to separate, each going alone into the wilderness.
    No tools or weapons of any sort were allowed, but Carey knew that anything available in nature was his to use as he saw fit, and he stopped at the first wirtl tree and hastily plucked enough leaves to weave into coverings for his feet. His fingers were numb with cold but he managed fairly well, at least achieving something that would keep the skin of his feet off the snow. The Loafers had no such problems. Their feet had never known shoes, and cold could not hurt them.
    The heavy woods of Refuge, mantled in their blanket of snow, lay before him, and out of these woods he must come back a man.
    The carnivores who made these woods a terror for humans were largely nocturnal creatures, but this was the winter season and food was scarce. He kept a wary eye overhead as he ran, looking for the dreaded flying cat, but saw nothing. And after a time the cold penetrated his blanket so that he felt a creeping numbness in his limbs and knew it was time to find shelter.
    He had been working steadily towards the Whitecap Mountains, a low range fifteen miles to the east, knowing his best chance of finding a warm den lay in the crevices to be found at their base. He was numb and tired when he finally arrived at the first up thrusting rock; it was barren of caves, a solid wall of granite rising for a hundred feet out of the thick woods. He ran along the base, keeping an eye out for holes, knowing that his condition was getting serious and he must find a spot soon or suffer frostbitten hands and feet.
    He finally found a cave, but it was too large for his use, as were the next and the next. The fourth was just a tiny crevice in the rockface, a hole only a few feet deep and so low he could barely squeeze inside. Best of all, there was a large pile of snow caught on a shelf a few feet away.
    Working as swiftly as numb hands permitted he closed the edges of the crevice with snow, packing it in hard and fast, leaving only a small hole in the centre. Then he crawled inside and finished his snowwall from there. When his den wasairtight he arranged his heavy blanket so that it covered him completely and curled into a tight ball, seeking warmth.
    After a time the feeling of coldness began to pass. He lay there and concentrated on being warm; he thought of home and bed and comfort and mother, and finally the numbness disappeared and he knew he was safe.
    When the first feeling of hunger stirred, hours later, he came out of his cocoon sufficiently to reach for his snowbank and eat a mouthful of the dry, powdery snow. He had eaten a good meal that morning, knowing it would be his last for many days, and now there was nothing but snow to quench his thirst, and no food at all. He was not allowed to eat even the berries which still clung, dry and hard, to the
kitzl
trees. He had not told his mother the real purpose of the Loafer initiation rites, but it was perfectly true that its most obvious outward characteristic was a strict fast.
    That evening he slept, still curled into a warm ball, and when he awoke after dark he was so ravenously hungry he thought he would not be able to endure it. To make matters worse he wasn’t sleepy at all.
    He made his first tentative efforts, as he had been coached, knowing it was too soon but having nothing else to do, and was not surprised when he failed. After a long, long time of lying motionless in the darkness he fell into a light sleep, and his dreams were distorted and strange.
    The next two days passed peacefully. His stomach turned numb and stopped hurting, and the first sickness passed. He continued to eat snow regularly, but needed less of it now and knew his metabolic rate had slowed and that he could live for a few weeks before hunger