Hall of Infinite Doors
The mountain stream is the safest bet, you figure. It's provided food for you in the past, and though it freezes over in winter, the thin, silvery fish there can survive in any season. Gathering your hunting gear in case you find any larger game, as well as a blanketlike sheet of hide to use to cart back your gains, you set out from your cave to search for food.
You pass through the bowl-shaped canyon, studded with herb bushes and plots of rough, primitive agriculture in which your tribe lives, and stride down the steps of the foothills along a path you remember very well. You split from the footpath into the forest just before you reach the first skinny evergreens, and travel along a rough shoulder of rock until you hear the laughing sound of water ahead of you. Picking up your pace, you emerge into a grassy glen bright with midafternoon sunshine and cut down the center with a wide stretch of river. The grass and mud at the side of the river is frozen with the touch of frost, and you find the walk easy as you move down to the edge of the water. The river is deep and lined along the bed with small gray stones, and you can see the hand-sized little fishes leap between them in their migration down the mountain stream. Kneeling here, you realize how your tribe can think of the mountain as holy: here it provides not only water but food, and the sound of the water bubbling and rushing sounds almost like some primal, rocky language that us poor animals don't have the sense to hear.
Usually, fishing is done by dipping a carefully-sewn hide bag into the water and hoping to scoop up the fish as they swim in. The fish are swift, though, and cunning, and often swim beside the bag or out before they can be lifted from the water. WHat's more, you don't have those materials with you, as those bags are difficult to manufacture and you are more of a hunter and carver than a fisherperson. The stream is the most ready source of food available, but you might not have the tools to reach it.
However, often animals come down to the river to feed or snatch up fish for themselves. You know that the stream splits further on, but also gathers into many swirling, rocky pools where birds and small mammals gather. What's more, sometimes you can catch large, slow turtles there, which are valuable as food and materials, as well as a squat, mollusc-like arthropod that escapes your memory as anything known by the civilized world.
You pass through the bowl-shaped canyon, studded with herb bushes and plots of rough, primitive agriculture in which your tribe lives, and stride down the steps of the foothills along a path you remember very well. You split from the footpath into the forest just before you reach the first skinny evergreens, and travel along a rough shoulder of rock until you hear the laughing sound of water ahead of you. Picking up your pace, you emerge into a grassy glen bright with midafternoon sunshine and cut down the center with a wide stretch of river. The grass and mud at the side of the river is frozen with the touch of frost, and you find the walk easy as you move down to the edge of the water. The river is deep and lined along the bed with small gray stones, and you can see the hand-sized little fishes leap between them in their migration down the mountain stream. Kneeling here, you realize how your tribe can think of the mountain as holy: here it provides not only water but food, and the sound of the water bubbling and rushing sounds almost like some primal, rocky language that us poor animals don't have the sense to hear.
Usually, fishing is done by dipping a carefully-sewn hide bag into the water and hoping to scoop up the fish as they swim in. The fish are swift, though, and cunning, and often swim beside the bag or out before they can be lifted from the water. WHat's more, you don't have those materials with you, as those bags are difficult to manufacture and you are more of a hunter and carver than a fisherperson. The stream is the most ready source of food available, but you might not have the tools to reach it.
However, often animals come down to the river to feed or snatch up fish for themselves. You know that the stream splits further on, but also gathers into many swirling, rocky pools where birds and small mammals gather. What's more, sometimes you can catch large, slow turtles there, which are valuable as food and materials, as well as a squat, mollusc-like arthropod that escapes your memory as anything known by the civilized world.