"Are you Fotchy?" spoke up a man in the background.
"Not Hibron nor Fotchy nor any of your people," answered the stranger, surveying them. "I'm Clark Stevens, wildman and sworn enemy of the city people. Who are you?"
The bearded man lowered his sword. "Come by the fire, enemy of the Fotchy, for their enemies are our friends. Are you alone?"
Stevens beckoned into a brush and a slim, firm-muscled woman dressed briefly in patched remnants of cloth came forth. "Markett, my wife," he explained. Then to her: "These men are our friends, but who they are, I do not know. They are honest people, I think. Let us sit by their fire."
He and the woman crossed their legs before the blaze, and one of the band piled wood on top. As the flames rose, the forest shadows were driven back, and every pebble in the little clearing cast its long shadow on the ground. The black-bearded man seated himself before the two strangers and his people arranged themselves in council behind him.
"Selim, Stevens," began the leader. "I am Isral, one of the judges of the clan of Hebers, expelled and hunted down by the accursed Fotchy these seven generations and more. Are you, too, hounded by the murderous, invading swine?" The firelight gleamed on his nose and played about his curly beard and hair.
"These Fotchy," said Stevens slowly. "I have never heard of them. But I am hounded by another kind, perhaps. I have forsworn the cities of gleaming metal and glass, with their tasteless water and pulpy food. This I have left to live in the wilderness with my wife, and for that reason, they seek to kill me. These Fotchy—who were they?"
Isral spat. "They came from over the ocean and conquered all things. They imprisoned women and tortured men. Their leaders grew fat and luxurious while the common people were ground into the earth. The Hebers (those who we are) were singled out for destruction, though no one seems to know why. All this have I heard from my father, and there is much in the story that is strange.
"The Hebers were driven into the wilderness one winter to die, but even then we were a hardy people and most of us survived the snow and sleet of the first season. There was trouble as the isolated people met and formed clans, and much struggling for power. In the midst of this they neglected to store up sufficient food for the next winter and many died. For years—twenty, thirty, perhaps—they lived as brutes, with little more than fire to aid them. But, as a new generation grew up, they learned to make things with their hands, to build crude machines, and to turn the laws of nature to the common welfare. And from this time, we have risen in numbers and the enjoyment of life."
Isral held up a gleaming sword. "We work with iron and pottery and wood, as well as such metals as we can find in the mountains of the north; we have flocks of goats, sheep and bison. Although we live close to nature, we are not helpless before natural forces, though wholly dependent upon them. We whom you see here are a hunting party sent far south to capture living deer for breeding purposes."