Bonesetter

“Bonesetter.”

A humble childhood had the boy who would one day be known as such.

He was born
one cold and bitter winter night
to a woman called Donte, who gathered and cooked for the Aldans tribe.
His father Garen
was
a
flintworker.
Garen named his son Pell, a term in their language for a flake of flint.

During Pell’s seventh winter, before Garen had taught his son more than the rudiments of flintworking, Garen developed
pains in
stomach
, then fevers
,
then agony
.
He died a few days later.
When Garen
knew
that
his
death approach
ed
, he called
to
Pell.
Mildly delirious from the fever, Garen gritted his teeth against the pain.
He said, “I have seen the death spirit Pell—and know it comes for me.”
Garen gasped a moment,
but
then continued, “I
hope
that you will become a great hunter.
But…
I have watched you playing with the other boys and ... I fear that you will
not
have the hunting skill
. I didn’t and sons often take after their farthers.
T
hank the spirits, you don’t have the ‘clubbed foot’ like I did
though
.
If you
are
like me, your ‘skill’ will be in the making of tools and in
being able to see
better way
s
to do things.
The o
thers
of the tribe
may not recognize such abilit
ies
as worthy skill
s
.
But Pell, whether the others recognize
your value
or not, where they are strong and quick, you must
make
and use
tools
…” He slipped away for a moment, then whispered
, “
I’m sorry—sorry I didn’t teach you how to work flint.”
The boy sobbed as Garen’s consciousness lapsed.

Pell’s father did not wake coherent again, only a few times—babbling.

His father had been dead for many years before Pell understood what
his
final words had meant. His father was wrong in the long run, about peoples’ recognition of Pell’s abilities.
Pell
himself
did not recognize the truth of the words, “your ‘skill’ will be
in the making of tools and in the
vision of
better way
s
,” until after many others had already recognized the enormous power that Pell’s “great skill” truly held.

The first dislocated joint that Pell reduced, he reduced on himself.

It was a bitterly cold day, nearing the end of winter.
Sharp winds and densely overcast skies made it even more unpleasant.
He and hi
s friend Boro, both scrawny, under
nourished boys of thirteen summers, were returning from yet another unsuccessful hunt.
Hunger pangs gnawed their guts and weariness steeped their bones as they plodded homeward.
As usual by this late
in the cold months, the sparse
winter game near the cave had been hunted out.
Most big game had migrated anyway, and many of the animals that
did stay
nearby
were
hibernating.

The stores of grain and roots put up in the cave during the previous summer were mostly eaten or spoilt.
Meat killed at the beginning of winter and placed under rock cairns to freeze had almost all been eaten or
else had been
dug up by industrious scavengers.
What was left was being rationed severely by Roley.
The Aldans had used up the layers of fat
they had
built up by gorging themselves during the plentiful kills of summer.
They desperately needed to move away from the cave area to a hunting ground that had not been exhausted, at least until the plentiful game of the warmer months returned.
Unfortunately, the weather was still too cold for the tribe to try to live without a cave for shelter
.
They lived in grass huts
in the summers
but even trying to build
the huts
could be life threatening in this weather
.
There was talk of trying to do it anyway, but their summer hunting grounds
were
two days
walk away
.
Traveling to those grounds,
carrying
their possessions, in this
frigid weather, in their current poorly
nourished state, would be fatal to some of the weaker members of the Aldans.
Then they would have to
build
their huts
—
which wouldn’t be warm enough
…

On the fateful day
of his injury
, Pell and Boro had gone out
for a
n
entire day’s hunt up on
the
sere
plateau above the cave to the north—the tribe’s better hunters had taken the more desirable southerly directions into the forests and meadows downstream, nearer to the great river.
Down south
the trees broke the cold winds.
Pell and Boro had walked half
a
day northward on the blustery plateau and then looped back.
Pell had seen but a single gaunt snow hare on this hunt.
His and Boro's stones had both missed; in fact neither even
came close.
But that was to be expected
; the two friends were
clumsy adolescents who were
wide of the mark more often than
naught
.

As daylight faded, they walked carefully back down the steep path above the cave, but Pell’s right foot slipped on a small patch of ice that persisted in a shaded part of the worn path.
Later his toppling would replay in his mind over and over and over—as if in slow motion.
His right hand flailing back to break his fall, his cold, numb fingers catching on one of the boulders at the edge of the path.
His right buttock and elbow striking the rocky path simultaneously, sending shock waves through him. His head cracking down onto stone with a “whock” that resonated through his skull.
A few seconds passed in
the
sure knowledge that
something
would soon be agonizing.

Then the pain arrived.
His elbow wracked in torment.
His head and buttock simply ached.
The full magnitude of the disaster hadn't struck home until the moment that he rea
ched up to rub his head…
his fingers weren't working correctly!
He shook the furs
back
from
his
arm
to look at his hand.
With dismay, he saw his pointer finger
was
deformed!
It was disjointed at the second knuckle from the tip so that the distal part
bent
back and away from his palm.
Because of the angle, the pad at the tip wouldn't touch items he reached for with it, just then his head.
As he stared at the deformed finger, the pain from it finally arrived at his brain, despite the numbing effect of the cold.
However, the pain held a distant second place to the gibbering terror shouting through his system at the thought of being a “cripple” or ginja.

Memories ripped through Pell.

-
Durr with his broken arm—broken in a fall
during
one of the hunts that were Durr's great skill.

-
The hushed clan staring at Durr as he returned with the other hunters, clutching his swollen, deformed arm—grossly twisted and angled midway between the wrist and elbow—the grimace of pain and terror on his face.

-
The wracked agony of Durr’s cries as Pont, the Aldans’ healer, tried over and over to straighten
his
grotesque arm.

-
The elation on Durr's face when the clan voted to let him stay the summer because, that summer at least, the hunting was good.

-
The growing despair as the weeks passed and the arm remained crooked and useless.
Each day Pont had tried anew to straighten the arm but, despite the agony it brought Durr, the
limb remained deformed and useless
.

-
The arrival of Fall with Durr still unable to cast a spear or throw a stone.

His pitiful attempts to do so with his left hand.

-
The
horrific
day
that
Roley declared Durr "ginja" or "useless,” and sent him away.

-
The stoop of his shoulders as he slowly trudged away to certain death.

Durr had
only had the one great skill
—
hunting.
He hadn’t had any “small skills” that he could perform
with one arm
.
He had no “great knowledge” to teach the others
because
there were many other hunters.
And, so Roley said, he must be exiled and go forth to remove his burden from the clan.

Pell had been the one who discovered
Durr’s ragged remains at the bottom of the Cliff two days after Durr had been exiled.
Pell had heard hyenas coughing and grunting at the base of the Cliff.
There were only a few and Pell had been able to frighten them away with a few stones, hoping to garner some of the hyenas’ meal for himself and the clan.
As Pell had come closer he had recognized Durr's spear and some of his furs.
His corpse reeked of rot.
Pell wept
for hours
on that day.
The tears kept coming back as he pictured the once proud Durr jumping from the
C
liff, rather than starving or falling
prey to
one of the great cats.

A great tremor ran across Pell's shoulders as he stared at his finger.
With a cry he grasped the finger in his left hand and pulled as hard he could in an effort to straighten it.
Agony shot through his hand and arm and a grating
, grinding
sensation emanated from the finger itself.

He stared at the finger.
It remained as deformed as before.
He thought
to himself "it's just a finger,"
recalling others in the clan who had prospered despite a bad finger.

But, Pell knew with a certainty that he hadn't been among the good spear casters or stone throwers even when his hand had been
normal
!
What were his chances with a bad finger?
Though he thought of hunting as his “great skill” he knew in his heart that he wasn’t
really
much of a hunter.
Though he’d hoped and prayed for one of the
older
men to take him under their wing, no one had even
tried
to teach him a “lesser” skill since his father
had
died.