‘We Anak aren’t known for our mountaineering skills,’ Tikaani mused as they walked. ‘I’m starting to see why . . .’
Beyond the narrow gully, the pass was wide. There was no sign of the wolf marks. Beck reckoned the wolf had passed this way a long time ago – long enough for snow to have buried the signs of its passing. The pawprints had survived on the other side of the boulder because it was sheltered there. Here the valley floor was thickly coated with snow, just like the mountainside behind them. It curved very smoothly in a deep U-bend from one side to the other; at the edges it turned sharply towards the sky, shedding the snow and revealing the sharp black rock beneath. Beck reckoned it would be easy to negotiate; it shouldn’t present any major obstacles. On the other hand:
‘That’s why we rarely climb. There’s absolutely nothing to eat.’ Tikaani had put his finger on the problem. ‘And so we stay down on the plains or by the sea.’
The valley was scoured by freezing, dry winds. Tikaani was right – there was little chance of finding anything to eat here.
‘It makes sense,’ Beck pointed out. ‘You have to stay alive.’
‘I know.’ Tikaani sighed. ‘I know. If you’re going to live on the Arctic Circle, then survival comes first. You don’t have time for luxuries like exploring or having fun. But you know’ – he raised an eyebrow at Beck – ‘nowadays, no one makes you live on the Arctic Circle.’
The pass still headed upwards. They hadn’t quite reached the top yet, as Beck had pointed out earlier, but the ascent was much gentler than it had been before. Soon they were much higher than the cleft in the rock that had brought them here. Looking back, all they could see was sky, framed on either side by the valley walls. There may have been a bit of horizon in the very far distance. It was impossible to tell as it merged with the clouds gathering there.
The clouds . . . They were thick and swollen. Beck frowned. ‘We need to press on,’ he said. ‘We really need to. We’ve lost a lot of time, and I don’t want to be around when that lot gets here.’
Tikaani was looking ahead. ‘That doesn’t look like a rock . . .’
Something lay half buried in the snow. Rocks poking through were a common sight, but the lines of this were smoother and rounder. When they reached it, Beck was delighted to see what it was.
‘It’s a reindeer,’ he said. He knelt down beside it and brushed the snow off the dead animal’s abdomen with quick, rapid movements.
‘Retirement was unkind to Rudolph,’ said Tikaani.
The animal was the size of a small cow, covered in stubbly brown hair. Its eyes were clouded and blank. One of its antlers was broken and its neck was twisted round at an unnatural angle. Beck peered up the side of the valley to the rock ledges high above. The deer must have fallen from one of them, and rolled down the side of the valley when it hit the ground.
Beck unsheathed the Bowie knife and Tikaani’s eyes went wide.
‘You’re kidding! We’re going to eat this?’
‘What, a nice venison roast?’ Beck laughed. ‘I wish. But there’s no chance of a fire and cooking up here. No, we’re not going to eat this . . . Not exactly . . .’
He sent up a quick prayer of thanks for the time he had spent with the Sami tribe. The most unappetizing thing they had taught him could be about to save their lives.
Beck pulled off his gloves and felt for the breastbone between the reindeer’s front legs. Then he worked the knife’s sharp point through the reindeer’s skin and cut down towards its rear. Because the reindeer was frozen, cutting was hard work, but gradually the skin parted and the animal’s abdomen opened up to the world. Now that the animal was dead, heart no longer pumping, there was little blood. Beck pulled back the layers of fat and tissue. The reindeer’s guts were like rubbery, bloated balloons packed expertly together. It couldn’t have been dead for too long, Beck figured, because here, deep inside the animal, the innards weren’t quite frozen and the smell of blood was sharp and metallic. It was both sweet and sour, rancid and pleasant. It wasn’t designed to be let out into the air. It was supposed to be contained by the animal’s body.
Tikaani watched with horrified fascination. ‘OK. We’re going to eat . . . what. Kidneys? Heart? I mean . . .’ He started to gabble, maybe to hide his absorbed revulsion. ‘OK, it’s not exactly how you’d buy meat in the shops, but hey, I’m sure there’re no germs up here and it probably doesn’t matter that you didn’t wash your hands first . . . ’
‘You’re getting closer.’
‘Oh God. Am I?’
Beck had reached the stomach. It was streaked with grey and green and splotches of dark red. Beneath his fingers it writhed and bulged like a balloon full of lumpy water. Beck probed it gently, then nodded, satisfied at what he had felt. He slipped his fingers into the cavity on either side and tugged. The stomach slithered out onto the ground like an alien slug that had been gestating in the corpse.
Beck stabbed it with the knife and a gurgling, semi-liquid mass poured out onto the snow. It smelled strongly of sick and Tikaani’s face screwed up in disgust. Beck poked about in the mass with his fingers, then grinned and held up a couple of handfuls of stinking, sludgy lumps.
‘This is what we’re eating,’ he announced.
‘You – are – kidding!’