The feel of solid ice beneath his feet was a joy to Ootah as the he scrambled up a steep hummock. Only when he reached this ridge’s summit did he dare to halt his rushed journey. Then, with his pained lungs heaving for breath, he hunched down and slowly turned to take one last look at the mammoth, black-skinned monster from which he had just escaped.
From his current vantage point, he could see that there were two such beasts extending out of the frozen water. Both were sleek and evil looking, and there was no doubt in his mind that these demons were the legions of Tornarsuk himself. One of these creatures had swallowed him whole, and had been about to carry him off to the land of the dead when the ancestors had once again interceded on his behalf. And by the grace of the Great Spirit, he had been allowed to crawl out of the beast’s belly to reenter the world of the living. This was a journey no mortal had ever returned from, and Ootah once more bowed in humble adoration because a great miracle had brought him back to the frozen land of the people.
With the muted Arctic dawn continuing to develop on the horizon, the Inuit gratefully turned for home.
Though this portion of the pack ice wasn’t familiar to him, that didn’t matter. For he was a hunter, and he would find his way back to his snow house just as the salmon returned each spring to the same spawning grounds.
As he scrambled down the far face of the ridge, his hand went instinctively to his neck. But the bone amulet was long gone, and with it the last vestige of his father. Though he hated to lose this treasure, somehow he knew Nakusiak would understand. Just as their shared dream was an omen of things to come, the amulet had guided him back to the land of the living. And now he had only one mission — to keep his heart pure and clean, so that the fiery evil destined to fall from the heavens would be contained and yet another dawn of peace would ascend over the land of the Inuit.